John Boehner claims CHANGE Is In Order For Congress - Democrats and Republicans Ready for Battle

Yesterday, the gavel in the House of Representatives changed hands, moving from Democratic control from Nancy Pelosi, to Republican John Boehner of Ohio. He is now the 61st speaker of the House of Representatives. Still in control of the Senate, the Democrats hold a 53-47 majority lead. The new speaker claims that "Hard work and tough decisions will be required of the 112th Congress. No longer can we fall short," Boehner says. "No longer can we kick the can down the road. The people voted to end business as usual, and today we begin carrying out their instructions."

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The Following is the

Opinion of the Editor of "Obama in the White House Blog"  James

Strange. He may be correct in saying those things, but doesn't every new speaker of the House say the same thing. So where is the change? Just two years ago, President Obama was voted in office, and he was voted in because the country needed a change, and he provided it. It also was a change from the usual, a stale Republican policy to leave well enough alone and do nothing, which is exactly what George W. Bush had done during his entire 8 years in office here on American soil, except for a few policies that did go right under him.  So what have the Republicans done in office to help the cause, say up until now when George W. Bush was President. Not much. All you had was a group of crybabies and complainers between the Democrats and the Republicans of the House and the Senate, and not much got done. So who's the blame here. I would say both parties. But now things are different. Mr John Boehner is talking 'change'. Well maybe he ought to talk about something new, and maybe that's about getting something done. But let the gavel speak. Let's just see how much this 61st. speaker in the House of Representatives can get done without the Democrats support. The feuding will continue, but that's the democratic process, at the expense of the taxpayers that President Obama wants desperately to help. That's why he agreed whole-heartedly to go along with the Bush tax cuts, and for that I commend both Obama and Bush. As for Bush, that may be the lone major single thing he had done right in office for the citizens of the United States, but you just have to mention that he instilled false hopes and claims that it is because of him the country is safe. He is too blind to see that the 911 disaster, along with the tragedy in New Orleans, along with the two wars that he started fall squarely on his lap. In comparison, just 6 months or so went by in President Bush's first term when the tragedy of 911 unfolded. Did he protect the country from terrorism then? It happened on his watch..   Likewise, did anything happen during the first 2 years of President Obama's Presidency. For one thing, President Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize, something President Bush never attained his entire 8 years in office. Yes, a few terrorist threats during Obama's watch, but they were consumed by the law and handled as they should.
Change, change, change.... That is all you hear. Everyone from both sides needs to change, but when one side or another comes up with change that would help the country, the other side claims that it is not right.

Conservatism against Liberalism. How can this country possibly survive?

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Haiti Earthquake - Hurricane Katrina - Very Different Catastrophes

Some people are already comparing the earthquake in Haiti with the likings of Hurricane Katrina. Devastation usually reigns, sometimes either in a small or large scale.  Both generally result in a loss of life, and there can be tremendous suffering because of it. But the one main difference is that with a hurricane, there is most always sufficient warning for people to get out of the way. But when it comes to an earthquake, how can anyone prepare for it? The answer is simple. In poverty stricken countries like Haiti, you just can't prepare for it. It happens, people get trapped, crushed and killed, sometimes in a few seconds, but other times the death resulting from an earthquake can be a slow one. In Haiti, people were using their hands, pulling up one stone at a time to help free their friends and relatives. It's been nearly 5 days since the earthquake rocked Haiti, and there are people that are still trapped, some without food or water. Most likely those people may already be dead, because of starvation and the lack of fluids.
President Obama is outwardly reaching to Haiti, and providing necessary help and relief efforts in an attempt to help bring this tragedy to a close. But the scares of this earthquake will be felt by native Haitians for years and decades. Lives and homes have been lost. Even the Presidential Palace ended up in ruins. In a recent conversation with the President of Haiti, he told the reporter that he did not have a place to live or even a place to sleep. There are no national emergency measures in force at this time, and without the help of outside countries, there would be a monumental loss of life, along with disease and famine spreading wild.
Many peace keeping countries around the world are sending aid to the earthquake stricken country. Countries around the world are swinging behind a huge aid effort for quake-ravaged Haiti, with at least 30 nations having sent or readying help, a US official said on Friday.
Eight search-and-rescue teams were already on the ground in Port-au-Prince comprising about 260 personnel, who had joined the grim search for survivors among the ruins, State Department spokesman PJ Crowley said.
"Obviously this is still a very growing list, but our estimate is that at least 30 countries have meaningful assistance that has already reached Haiti or is en route," he said.
"So not only is the United States' commitment to Haiti growing, but also the international commitment as well."
Apart from a US team on the ground, there were also staff in place from Iceland, Spain, Chile, he said, adding they had helped free to people from the ruins.
UN chief Ban Ki-moon announced earlier that relief workers from China, the Dominican Republic, France and Venezuela had also joined the huge operation to help the Haitians devastated by Tuesday's 7.0 quake.
Crowley also confirmed news of the first American to have been killed by the massive temblor, identifying her as the US cultural affairs officer in Haiti, Victoria DeLong, who had served in the country since 2009.
"It's a tragedy for the State Department, for our family and the public diplomacy and public affairs world," Crowley said, adding she died when her home collapsed.

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Reflections of the Country with President Barack Obama in 2009

Less than a week to go, and you can only help but reflect on how this year is ending and why things happened the way they have for the President after just one year in office.
How many people are just plain tired of hearing about this health care thing? President Obama during his run for office stated that tackling the health care issue was one of his immediate goals as President, so it shouldn't be much of a surprise that he approached it the way that he did.  I must admit that it is important to most Americans, but enough is enough. Finally, a joint vote that would require just a simple majority vote in January, and the whole health care thing will be put to rest. Amen brother!!!!!
This upcoming vote most likely is one of the most scary votes that President Obama has to witness. His success and future as President kind of rides on this vote. But, it would basically take the members in his own party to defeat it, since the Democrats have more seated senators than the Republicans.
It has been a long hard fought race, very similar in nature to his Presidential run, but if the vote is in his favor, the President will gain another wind to continue to repeal the workings of the prior Republican governments before him. After the Health care vote, then would be the time for him to try and mend fences again to try and muster the American people again to his favor. Now only if people would only gain jobs, and the markets started to boom again. He would fulfill previously made promises to the U.S. people. The Republicans will continue to make claim that the stock markets were going to bounce back anyway, always negating any credit deserved of to the President. On the other hand, the Democrats will take full credit for the successes of President Obama.
To summarize my view on the Congress this year, I'm not so sure that I'd agree with the fact that the Democrats should take credit. Actually, I believe that both houses of Congress performed a terrible job for President Obama. One delay after another in both the House and the Senate for just about everything that went through the Senators chambers. At the end, things seem to turn out in President Obama's favor, but what is it going to take to get the Senators to act on what is right instead of just always voting towards party lines and their own party's own point of view.
Many people believe that this country is doomed, and they say so for all kinds of reasons. The Republicans sincerely believe that President Obama is bankrupting the country. They forget that when President Bush took office for his first term, this country was in the 'green' and was not in debt, thanks to President Bill Clinton, a Democrat. But what happened as soon as Bush became President. Yes, the outcome of 911 could have been predicted and even prevented if President Bush's Congress, FBI and Secret Service performed as they should. There is tons of proof that the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the CIA knew of the terrorist threats to the United States, but President Bush was not advised as he should have been, and the inevitable happened, unfortunately for the lives of thousands of Americans in New York City, Virginia, and Pennsylvania on that fateful day of Sept. 11, 2001.
President Obama now happens to be the man chosen by this country to put the pieces back together, and he is doing it his way. He wasn't the person in-charge when this country was attacked, George Bush was. He wasn't the person in charge when Iraq was invaded, George Bush was. He wasn't the person in charge when thousands of Americans started loosing their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan, George Bush was. He wasn't the person who did absolutely nothing to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina, George Bush was. He wasn't the person in charge when the country experienced one of the worst economic collapses since the depression, George Bush was. So where was George Bush all this time? Besides fighting the terrorists in Iraq and almost forgetting about the Al-Queda home of Afghanistan, President Bush spend allot of his time in retreat at Camp David, and what do you guess he was doing so much of his time.. How about reading books!?$#!?#@$! That my friends, is a known fact!!!!
The last thing President Obama wanted to become was a war President. Unfortunately for him, he inherited that title from the previous president, thanks to the one and only George Bush. Now for a man like Bush to have acquired so much 'bad luck' if that's what you want to call it, you can only wonder how he can live with himself. But now, just like the health care issue, it's time to put George Bush to bed too. Regardless of who you voted for in 2008, Barack Obama is our President, and will be for at least another 3 years. After all that he's done already, he would be the first to tell you that he's just getting started. He must be doing things right.. How many war Presidents have secured the Nobel Peace Prize. Zero, zilch, nota... Not a single war President has. That's because no other President in recent history has tried to bring together so many nations with the common theme of peace amongst everyone. He truly has no boundaries when it comes to promoting peace. He speaks to leaders that the Republican presidents would never utter a word too. How else can you break the barrier between people of nations who kind of despise each other. So far, President Obama has displayed the correct decisions, whether people agree with him or not. Time will tell if his tenure as President was a good one.

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Bush on His Legacy: I 'Liberated' Iraqis

The following is an article by Jennifer Parker, and I just wanted to highlight this article here. We have come to a time at a crossroads in history, with a war raging on the other side of the world, to 9/11 and the collapse of the economy here at home. President Bush - the 43rd President of the United States, wants to be remembered for Liberating Iraqis and HIV / AIDS Work in Africa. But what will he really be known for..... One thing is for sure... He sure left allot of work for President-Elect Barack Obama to clean up ! ! ! ! !

The real truth will be shown after the reprint of the following article by ABC News Jennifer Parker........




President Says He Wants to Be Remembered for Liberating Iraqis and HIV / AIDS Work in Africa.

By JENNIFER PARKER
Nov. 28, 2008

In a personal and wide-ranging interview conducted by his sister about his legacy, his faith and the influence of his father, President George W. Bush said he hopes to be remembered as a liberator of the Iraqi people.

US President George W. Bush and First Lady Laura Bush arrive back at the White House after a trip to New York in Washington, DC, in this file photo.

"I'd like to be a president [known] as somebody who liberated 50 million people and helped achieve peace," Bush told his sister, Dorothy Bush Koch, in a conversation recorded for the oral-history organization StoryCorps for the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress.

An excerpt of the interview was aired on National Public Radio Thursday, and the White House released additional excerpts with both the president and first lady Laura Bush today.

"I would like to be a person remembered as a person who, first and foremost, did not sell his soul in order to accommodate the political process," Bush said, according to White House excerpts.
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What Do You Think BUSH will be remembered for?

1st and FOREMOST....

CASUALTIES OF THE WAR IN IRAQ - Tragedy #1
A GRAND TOTAL OF 4,207 DEATHS AND COUNTING just because he fooled the American people in thinking there were nuclear weapons in Iraq.... he started a war, and forgot the troups in Afghanistan and the real target for terrorism - Osama Bin Laden.. How does he sleep at night... and then he has the gull to say........
"I'd like to be a president [known] as somebody who liberated 50 million people and helped achieve peace,"

9/11 Tragedy in New York City - Tragedy #2

There were 2,974 fatalities, excluding the 19 hijackers: 246 on the four planes (from which there were no survivors), 2,603 in New York City in the towers and on the ground, and 125 at the Pentagon. An additional 24 people remain listed as missing. All of the fatalities in the attacks were civilians except for 55 military personnel killed at the Pentagon. More than 90 countries lost citizens in the attacks on the World Trade Center. In 2007, the New York City medical examiner's office added Felicia Dunn-Jones to the official death toll from the September 11 attacks. Dunn-Jones died five months after 9/11 from a lung condition which was linked to exposure to dust during the collapse of the World Trade Center.

Where was the Central Intelligence Agency that actually was warned just prior to the attacks. This is like a sequel to another American disaster, the bombing of Pearl Harbor, as the warnings of the impending attacks fell on deaf ears.

HURRICANE KATRINA - Tragedy #3 in New Orleans
As if one disaster wasn't enough referring to 9/11, America was also witness to Hurricane Katrina, a natural disaster caused by no human, until President Bush put his signature on it by not responding in time to help the dieing and homeless in New Orleans. Do you think he will be remembered for that?

HIGH GASOLINE PRICES
When President Bush took office on January 20, 2001, the national average gas price was $1.46 per gallon. Six and a half years later, on August 27, 2007, the national average gas price had jumped to $2.76, roughly 89% higher. Eight years later, prior to the economic collapse, the price of gasoline was nearly $4.00 a gallon. The American people feel hostage to his policies and actions or the lack of during his presidency.

Now, let’s compare the numbers over the same time period for President Clinton.

When Clinton took office on January 20, 1993, the national average gas price was $1.06 per gallon. six and a half years later, the national average gas price had jumped to $1.22, roughly 15% higher. Compounded annually, this represents about a 2% jump each year.

YES, I don't think that the American people will have a hard time remembering what President Bush was all about, they most certainly will never forget.

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