Some tid-bits to start your year off...

From The Free Republic A Year in the Life of President Bush (a lot of photos): Part 1 (Jan - Mar 2008) http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2157115/posts

Also from Free Republic: Who says George W. Bush has done "nothing" for conservatives? http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1066122/posts

From the August Review

Toward a North American Union

The global elite, through the direct operations of President George Bush and his Administration, are creating a North American Union that will combine Canada, Mexico and the U.S. into a superstate called the North American Union. There is no legislation or Congressional oversight, much less public support, for this massive restructuring of the U.S. It's primary perpetrators are mostly members of the Trilateral Commission, founded in 1973 to foster a "New International Economic Order." MUST SEE VIDEO: Canadian political party rejects North American Union MUST SEE VIDEO: AIM Editor Cliff Kincaid on Lou Dobbs/CNN MUST SEE VIDEO: CNN Fight against North American Union See Lou Dobbs on North American Union Orwellian Brave New World! See Arizona State University teaching curriculum Building North America

Read more... From Bloomberg

Americans Under 70 May Find 2008 Was Their Least Favorite Year

By Matthew Benjamin

Dec. 31 (Bloomberg) -- This wasn’t just a bad year for the economy. By some measures, it was the worst year any American under age 70 has ever seen.

The loss of jobs in the U.S. may be the biggest since the end of World War II. This year’s declines in stock and home prices haven’t been exceeded since the Great Depression. The slump in holiday spending may set a record; foreclosures already have. Credit markets seized, halting the longest expansion in consumer purchases.

Europe and Japan also sank as U.S. demand faltered, marking the first simultaneous recessions since the Second World War ended. High-flying emerging economies, such as China and India, weren’t immune, signaling the world economy is just as interconnected in bad times as in good.

“It was the year we wish it wasn’t,” ... Read more...

From the Financial Times (FT)

US stocks suffer worst year since Great Depression

By Alistair Gray in New York

Published: December 31 2008 14:09 Last updated: December 31 2008 22:08

The worst annual performance for Wall Street stocks since the Great Depression ended with a modest rally on the final day of trading as the Federal Reserve pushed ahead with its plan to buy mortgage-backed securities.

The central bank’s plan to buy up to $500bn of mortgage bonds by the middle of 2009 helped spur a 1.4 per cent gain on the day for the S&P, which finished 2008 at 903.25. ... Read more...

And last but not least...some flying crap!

Airplane Brawl Investigation Continues

Flight attendant attacked by passenger Posted: 8:38 PM Dec 30, 2008 Last Updated: 8:06 PM Dec 31, 2008 Reporter: Mike McKnight Email Address: mailto:sixonline@wowt.com?subject=Airplane 77 comments Feds Investigate Airplane Brawl

The U.S. attorney for Nebraska said Wednesday he is still waiting on reports from the FBI about an unstable passenger aboard a Continental Air Express commuter jet who attacked a flight attendant. The jet was heading from Houston to Omaha last Friday when a middle-aged man left the plane's lavatory after about 40 minutes covered in his own feces. "Oh, it was awful. It was worse than that." Stacey, from Houston, who asked that we not use her last name, says the plane had just one flight attendant in the cabin, a young man who moved the other passengers forward to empty seats and kept the unkempt passenger in the back row. The flight attendant asked the passenger to go back into the lavatory and clean up. "I hear all of this ruckus and this yelling and I kind of turned around and the poor flight attendant is on his back and the guy is like punching him and I'm like, oh my gosh. It's almost like a scene out of a movie. There were two male passengers behind me that got up and kind of got the guy off of him. The poor steward, he's got a black eye, his eye's swelling. I felt so sorry for him." The injured attendant, with help from the passengers, got the unruly passenger buckled in and calmed down for the landing at Eppley Airfield, which took place without incident an hour later. The airline will not comment on the attendant's condition, but we understand he will be okay. Sources tell Channel 6 News the man resides at a care facility in Iowa and was returning from a Christmas holiday trip alone, completing a trip from Chicago to Houston and then Omaha. The U.S. attorney says the man was not arrested, but detained at the airport by authorities until picked up by trained professionals from the care facility in Iowa. "It certainly may be difficult for us to prove the right mental capacity to prove intent,” says U.S. Attorney Joe Stecher. “Based on the knowledge we had at that time, we did not request detention. The individual was released to people who are very capable of taking care of him and have for some time." "Certainly there was a disturbance. That disturbance was loud. It did get physical. It got violent. We're glad it came to the conclusion that it did, but I can certainly understand anybody on that plane being upset by what they saw." Airlines are provided lists of people restricted from flying. The passenger's name was not on any of those lists. Stecher says even if no criminal charges are brought, the investigation will look into what kind of mental treatment the man has been undergoing and whether that should have kept him from flying alone and unsupervised. Home