29-30 June 2005
Well, everybody, I'm back. I had to skip one day, but I've been super busy. Gail and I are going to work on getting a decent new primary income stream, through real estate investments and equity finance consulting. Gail's finishing working on the product line for the second Chinese company we're going to represent on our Trinity Trading Imports website, and when we get that finished, hopefully in the next couple of weeks, we will have several times as many products available for sale. What I expect is to have a really great beginning to what will be a trading line for products to be available by companies from all over the world, producing some of the nicest things that could be bought to adorn a home. While we will start with marketing in North America with our original product line, we will by no means limit ourselves to any one land mass. In the meantime, we hope and expect to expand to some business lines from elsewhere in both India, Brazil, and some other countries. No, we don't think eBay has anything to worry about from us, but we believe that we'll do pretty well.
Anyway, in the meantime, there are some pretty interesting news stories out there. First, there is the interesting new decision by a U.S. Immigration appeals court, deciding that an American male who becomes a female transsexual, could indeed sponsor another man as a spouse to get permanent residence in the USA. This reverses an earlier decision by a local immigration judge, saying that, in effect, once a man, always a man, and no gay marriage is recognized yet, in the USA. The appeals court ruled that, the North Carolina state law, where the matter arose, allowed recognition of sex-changed gender, complete with a new birth certificate, so no actual same-sex marriage when the sponsoring American spouse married a gay man from El Salvador (nice publicity for the macho men from that country). Therefore, the marriage could be recognized, getting a green card for the gay Salvadoran. So, that should make for interesting connections for international relationships in the "fruited plain" in the future.
In the meantime Claudia Rosett of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies has come up with another little criticism of that lovely little organization the United Nations, and its illustrious Secretary-General, Kofi Annan. He, of course has presided over the $40 billion USD Oil for Food scandal in Iraq, where they (including his own son) colluded with Saddam Hussein to get filthy rich while helping Saddam elude U.S.-led U.N. sanctions. Now he wants to tax all rich nations 0.7 percent for "official development assistance." Well, of course, we can all count on the United States to contribute about half of the $82 billion USD that the program would be expected to pull the first year alone. And we can all expect Kofi and the gang to manage the money perfectly properly, and every last penny will go into the hands of the poor. Yeah, and I have ocean front property in the Kalahari, the Gobi, and in Arizona to sell Mr. Kofi the Ethical. The matter will be voted on in September by the U.N. Security Counsel. Of course the USA will veto--thank goodness. Ms. Rosett has been dead on right about the scandals in the U.N. in recent years, check out the article.
In the meantime, Andrew McCarthy, a former U.S. federal prosecutor, and now blog columnist and senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, has a serious story about the commonly-made argument that Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda never had any connection and relationship, much less any connection between Saddam and the conspirators of September 11, 2001. This is done especially after speeches and events like President Bush's highly effective address to the world Tuesday night. Mr. McCarthy points out multiple reasons for the myth in those arguments, and the depth to which Iraq is a very import part of the war against Islamist terrorism. This article is found in the highly respected U.S. magazine, National Review, in its online edition.
The Washington Post has an interesting article on the latest of the ups and downs of the government of Latin America's largest nation, Brazil, and its President, Luis Inacio Lula da Silva. Apparently a huge scandal about Mr. Lula's ruling party, paying bribes to its Congress's legislators to get votes on important laws that he wanted passed. Mr. Lula does not have the paper trail of guilt yet at his door, but close. It remains to be seen on whether he will survive re-election next year.
A really good blog, Red State, which is edited by lawyers, has published a pretty insightful article on the likelihood of who will be likely appointed new Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court. It appears that President Bush is wanting to appoint the first Hispanic justice to the Court, and the third woman, and make sure that highly gifted people pleasing to the devout Christian core of the Republican Party are appointed. True, it's unfortunate that we have degenerated to the point that this issue is all about politics and ideology, but the stakes are high on matters like abortion, gay marriage, and the Court's recent rejection of the U.S. Constitution's own protections of private property from eminent domain. I wrote on the case of Kelo v. City of New London last week, and it is serious indeed, especially for the health of the world's leading economy. There are, fortunately, highly capable men and women who fit those requirements, who are also experienced judges worthy of a place on the most important court of the world's leading superpower. Another place to review most of the most likely candidates is in the online edition of the Wall Street Journal.
Well, more to come tomorrow. Adios.
Anyway, in the meantime, there are some pretty interesting news stories out there. First, there is the interesting new decision by a U.S. Immigration appeals court, deciding that an American male who becomes a female transsexual, could indeed sponsor another man as a spouse to get permanent residence in the USA. This reverses an earlier decision by a local immigration judge, saying that, in effect, once a man, always a man, and no gay marriage is recognized yet, in the USA. The appeals court ruled that, the North Carolina state law, where the matter arose, allowed recognition of sex-changed gender, complete with a new birth certificate, so no actual same-sex marriage when the sponsoring American spouse married a gay man from El Salvador (nice publicity for the macho men from that country). Therefore, the marriage could be recognized, getting a green card for the gay Salvadoran. So, that should make for interesting connections for international relationships in the "fruited plain" in the future.
In the meantime Claudia Rosett of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies has come up with another little criticism of that lovely little organization the United Nations, and its illustrious Secretary-General, Kofi Annan. He, of course has presided over the $40 billion USD Oil for Food scandal in Iraq, where they (including his own son) colluded with Saddam Hussein to get filthy rich while helping Saddam elude U.S.-led U.N. sanctions. Now he wants to tax all rich nations 0.7 percent for "official development assistance." Well, of course, we can all count on the United States to contribute about half of the $82 billion USD that the program would be expected to pull the first year alone. And we can all expect Kofi and the gang to manage the money perfectly properly, and every last penny will go into the hands of the poor. Yeah, and I have ocean front property in the Kalahari, the Gobi, and in Arizona to sell Mr. Kofi the Ethical. The matter will be voted on in September by the U.N. Security Counsel. Of course the USA will veto--thank goodness. Ms. Rosett has been dead on right about the scandals in the U.N. in recent years, check out the article.
In the meantime, Andrew McCarthy, a former U.S. federal prosecutor, and now blog columnist and senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, has a serious story about the commonly-made argument that Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda never had any connection and relationship, much less any connection between Saddam and the conspirators of September 11, 2001. This is done especially after speeches and events like President Bush's highly effective address to the world Tuesday night. Mr. McCarthy points out multiple reasons for the myth in those arguments, and the depth to which Iraq is a very import part of the war against Islamist terrorism. This article is found in the highly respected U.S. magazine, National Review, in its online edition.
The Washington Post has an interesting article on the latest of the ups and downs of the government of Latin America's largest nation, Brazil, and its President, Luis Inacio Lula da Silva. Apparently a huge scandal about Mr. Lula's ruling party, paying bribes to its Congress's legislators to get votes on important laws that he wanted passed. Mr. Lula does not have the paper trail of guilt yet at his door, but close. It remains to be seen on whether he will survive re-election next year.
A really good blog, Red State, which is edited by lawyers, has published a pretty insightful article on the likelihood of who will be likely appointed new Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court. It appears that President Bush is wanting to appoint the first Hispanic justice to the Court, and the third woman, and make sure that highly gifted people pleasing to the devout Christian core of the Republican Party are appointed. True, it's unfortunate that we have degenerated to the point that this issue is all about politics and ideology, but the stakes are high on matters like abortion, gay marriage, and the Court's recent rejection of the U.S. Constitution's own protections of private property from eminent domain. I wrote on the case of Kelo v. City of New London last week, and it is serious indeed, especially for the health of the world's leading economy. There are, fortunately, highly capable men and women who fit those requirements, who are also experienced judges worthy of a place on the most important court of the world's leading superpower. Another place to review most of the most likely candidates is in the online edition of the Wall Street Journal.
Well, more to come tomorrow. Adios.
