Ephedra Is Back - Get It While You Can via NewsMax!

For the third time in a week, NewsMax.Com, "America's news page," has sent me an e-mail offering me Ephedra.

This is the weight loss supplement linked to more than 155 deaths from stroke and heart attack that was banned in the U.S. in 2004.

A few months ago, I signed up for NewsMax bulletins so I could learn about the latest wingnut blather. Not only is NewsMax trying to help me lose weight, but they're also trying to sell me some pie-in-sky scheme where I can "option $5,000 into $170,000 in 335 days."

Here is their pitch for my money and then the one for my life:

It sounds absurd, I know. But when I did the math... and discovered that it was not only possible, but also highly probable... I told my analyst he could guarantee your money back if it didn't happen exactly as described in the pages that follow.

You could have turned:
$5,000 into $64,250 in 2 days (with just one trade)
$5,000 into $22,500 in 13 days (with just one trade)
$5,000 into $50,350 in 41 days (with just one trade)

I know, the numbers don't add up; and indeed it is absurd. But remember this is some right-wing blog, so what can one expect?!?

Now the pitch for drugs:

Finally, the amazing herb banned for being 'too effective' - EPHEDRA(Ma Huang) is available to the public again....

The Bottom line Is: People love ephedra because it is one of the only natural herbs that you can feel working in real-time. There is no doubt about it - ephedra is the most effective and results oriented herb available.

Imagine taking an herb for energy and /or weight loss that is Strong, Smooth, Confident, Athletic and 100% Organic, Safe and Caffeine-Free...you have just had ephedra. Ephedra will improve your performance at whatever you are doing. It also guarantees weight loss. When you take ephedra, you will love it - 100% Guaranteed.

That's right. Ephedra's smooth, athletic, focused and confident energy is not just surprising...We guarantee that it is the best energy and /or weight loss product you have ever taken...or you can have 100% of your money back.

Click Here To Get Your Ephedra Now - Supplies Are Honestly Going
Fast

Maybe NewsMax has known all along that I'm a die-hard blue Democrat. They're trying to take my last penny and then have me croak. But one little query, how in the hell does NewsMax get away with selling something that's been banned?!?

More Polls - IraqWar

Zogby released a poll that shows 72 percent of American troops in Iraq want us to withdraw from Iraq, now.

Well, at least in 2006.

As a faithful Zogby participant, Zogby sent me an e-mail with their latest Iraqi War poll numbers, but participants weren't just anyone. They were American troops in Iraq, and poll numbers can be found here.

While 89% of reserves and 82% of those in the National Guard said the U.S. should leave Iraq within a year, 58% of Marines think so. Seven in ten of those in the regular Army thought the U.S. should leave Iraq in the next year. Moreover, about three-quarters of those in National Guard and Reserve units favor withdrawal within six months, just 15% of Marines felt that way. About half of those in the regular Army favored withdrawal from Iraq in the next six months.

For all those Murtha naysayers, he was right, as each passing day more conspicuously shows.

Without knowing too much about Murtha in the past, when he came out for an immediate pull-out and the media started hyperventilating and sucking all the air out of cable, I was grateful for the added voice but failed to realize what all the fuss was about.

Now it is clear Murtha switched sides because his military friends told him the war was unwinnable. And after recently watching the seminal movie about urban guerrila warfare, "The Battle of Algiers," the story of Nigerian Muslims who successfully fought the French for independence during the 50s (a movie screened to "special operations officials at the Pentagon" in 2003), I have crosssed to the other side.

Pull Out - Now.

Without completely annihilating the enemy, no occupying nation has ever been able to maintain power in the annals of history. The longer we stay, the more money we squander as the casaulty list only grows longer.

Our soldiers in Iraq know the jig is up. We ain't winning and we need to get the hell out of Dodge; this in spite of the fact that 85 percent of the troops think "the U.S. mission is 'to retaliate for Saddam’s role in the 9-11 attacks.'"

Boy, did Bush and his neocon evildoers pull the biggest canard-laden bullshit on our poor soldiers.

Fresh Off the Wire - A Lot of Virginians Say Bush broke the Law

Virginians think Bush disregarded the law when he ordered private citizens to be wiretapped; but so do a lot of folks.

SurveyUSA has a brand spanking new poll that tells a potent story: not one single state polled has a majority of adults who said Bush did not break the law.

Virginia checks in with 39 percent of adults who believe the president clearly broke the law. Thirty Six percent are sure he did not; and 20 percent think it's not clear whether the law was broken or not. More males than females said the president broke the law, 40 percent to 37 percent; and younger Virginians are more likely to say, oh yea, he was clearly breaking the law.

The swing state of Ohio has an incredible 13 percent difference between those who say the president did not breach the law and those who do, 29 percent to 42 percent.

Vermont leads all states with a 52 percent majority who said the president clearly crossed the legal line.

By 40 percent or higher, 19 states said Bush broke the law: Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington and Wisconsin.

Only four states said Bush clearly did not break the law by 40 percent or higher, and just barely: Texas by 40 percent, Alabama and Nebraska by 41 percent, and Oklahoma by 42 percent.

The Trouble with Bloggers in Virginia, Including and Especially Me

To the brave souls who broke the blogosphere frontier early on, more power to you.

And to the poor saps like myself who got into the game late, so be it!

Recently there is been a brouhaha brewing because a blogger had the temerity to lodge his displeasure the way a long-time blogger ranks his lists of Virginia keyboard commandoes.

As a person who often makes mistakes, has to rewrite and rewrite, all the while posting with errors (until I recently dicovered a way to limit errors before posting, as best as possible by a global thinker, not too good with tiny visual details), I confess to being in the lower caste of bloggers.

Yet I think I have a great point of view on local, state and national political affairs; and have been told by a more national blogger who happily links to me, although traffic is paltry.

Of course, the very reason I began to blog is because I love to both write and talk about religion and politics; and I find myself sometimes posting about minor trifflings, as evidenced by the dearth of posts on the subject of religion and social justice.

Well, if you want to link to my blog, fine; but after readying the toadying comments, including my own, on linking by gold, silver and bronze standards, I am speaking out.

Yes, I think the blogger who complained about stratification is right on the $$$. As an old sociologist, I find any kind of stratification offensive to spirit, particularly for people like me at the bottom of the casting barrel.

Whether there are way too many progressive bloggers or not, I say the more the merrier; and if a Johnny-come-lately happens to garner the most clicks, more power to him or her. The Virginia blog carnival is an excellent venue for fellow Virginians to express their political observations and have them read.

Henceforth I will quit obsessing about how many clicks my latest post collected; after all, I blogged for months when the only visitors were spanners. And no, purposefully, I have linked to no post.

Virginia Law - Guilty Unless Proven Innocent for Indigents

The blind hand of justice in Virginia is only for those who can afford costly bifocals; if you should ever face serious criminal charges, you better get a good lawyer and have at least $10,000-$15,000 laying around. Otherwise, you're at the mercy of a tough-on-crime mentality prosecutor who might have eyes on higher office with your scalp as admission ticket

Remember James Gilmore? No, well how about Jerry Kilgore?!? All from the good-old boys network of lock-them-up-and-throw-away-the-key.

This morning The Roanoke Times illustrates why indigent defendants find little due process in the courts.

Virginia ranks 50th in compensation for court-appointed attorneys. Virginia is the only state in the country with unwaiveable caps on fees paid court-appointed lawyers. This means that no matter how many hours the court-appointed attorney spends on a case, he will receive not one dollar more than the cap allows.

Virginia pays court-appointed lawyers $1,186 to represent a client who faces 20 years to life in prison, even if there's a full-fledged trial. The maximum payment for less-serious felonies is $428.

In other words, there is justice of the O.J. Simpson, Claus von Bulow and Susan Cummings variety, and then there are the thousands of poor saps who "wal[k] into court charged with a crime that could result in the loss of liberty for life [and] the only one standing beside [them] in...search for the truth, painstakingly gleaned through the adversarial process, is a lawyer -- paid $1,186 -- or an equally poorly paid public defender."

Seems fair to me, how about you...?

In the House and Senate, bills to "address, in varying degrees, this deplorable situation" were introduced by Dels. David Albo, Terry Kilgore, Lacey Putney and Vincent Callahan Jr. and Sens. Kenneth Stolle and Frederick Quayle, all Republicans save for Putney who is an Independent but caucuses with Republicans.

What a welcome sign that legislators are ready to address the shameful way indigents are defended in Virginia.

Graciously, Times links story to the Virginia Indigent Defense Coalition, a nonprofit organization that campaigns to "fulfill the unkept promises of Gideon v. Wainwright and the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution."

Virginia Law - Guilty Unless Proven Innocent for Indigents

The blind hand of justice in Virginia is only for those who can afford costly bifocals; if you should ever face serious criminal charges, you better get a good lawyer and have at least $10,000-$15,000 laying around. Otherwise, you're at the mercy of a tough-on-crime mentality prosecutor who might have eyes on higher office with your scalp as admission ticket

Remember James Gilmore? No, well how about Jerry Kilgore?!? All from the good-old boys network of lock-them-up-and-throw-away-the-key.

This morning The Roanoke Times illustrates why indigent defendants find little due process in the courts.

Virginia ranks 50th in compensation for court-appointed attorneys. Virginia is the only state in the country with unwaiveable caps on fees paid court-appointed lawyers. This means that no matter how many hours the court-appointed attorney spends on a case, he will receive not one dollar more than the cap allows.

Virginia pays court-appointed lawyers $1,186 to represent a client who faces 20 years to life in prison, even if there's a full-fledged trial. The maximum payment for less-serious felonies is $428.

In other words, there is justice of the O.J. Simpson, Claus von Bulow and Susan Cummings variety, and then there are the thousands of poor saps who "wal[k] into court charged with a crime that could result in the loss of liberty for life [and] the only one standing beside [them] in...search for the truth, painstakingly gleaned through the adversarial process, is a lawyer -- paid $1,186 -- or an equally poorly paid public defender."

Seems fair to me, how about you...?

In the House and Senate, bills to "address, in varying degrees, this deplorable situation" were introduced by Dels. David Albo, Terry Kilgore, Lacey Putney and Vincent Callahan Jr. and Sens. Kenneth Stolle and Frederick Quayle, all Republicans save for Putney who is an Independent but caucuses with Republicans.

What a welcome sign that legislators are ready to address the shameful way indigents are defended in Virginia.

Graciously, Times links story to the Virginia Indigent Defense Coalition, a nonprofit organization that campaigns to "fulfill the unkept promises of Gideon v. Wainwright and the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution."

This is my maiden posting.