Yes, there have been differences between America and Europe. No doubt, there will be differences in the future. But the burdens of global citizenship continue to bind us together. A change of leadership in Washington will not lift this burden. In this new century, Americans and Europeans alike will be required to do more - not less. Partnership and cooperation among nations is not a choice; it is the one way, the only way, to protect our common security and advance our common humanity.
That is why the greatest danger of all is to allow new walls to divide us from one another.
The walls between old allies on either side of the Atlantic cannot stand.
The walls between the countries with the most and those with the least cannot stand.
The walls between races and tribes; natives and immigrants; Christian and Muslim and Jew cannot stand.
These now are the walls we must tear down.
Barack Obama - 24/7/8 Berlin.
Yet again Obama has managed to draw out a huge crowd. Over 200,000 this time - in Berlin. I believe that we are at a major crossroad in our recent history. We can choose, we can choose to continue down the same old path we have been on for the past few years. Or we can actually (well in the U.S. anyway) choose to make a change and elect a leader of the free world who practices what he preaces.
For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle - as we did in the OJ trial - or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright’s sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she’s playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.
We can do that.
But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we’ll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.
That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, “Not this time.” This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can’t learn; that those kids who don’t look like us are somebody else’s problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.
Obama - A More Perfect Union, 18 March
If you get the chance make sure you watch the videos of both speeches. A true politican at work.
I was asked by a fellow student President today about what defines me.
Well my immediate response was:
Computers/Programming
Tramping
Church
I was then asked how much of that I was doing this year given how busy I was.
My response was very muted because all three have been essentially zero. I have started on a computer science project but haven’t touched it in about two months. I have been tramping twice but that is it all my outdoors exercise this year. And church, well I have been twice, I have been to youth group three times as well but given that a quarter of the year has gone by I have not done much of the things that define me.
I was just reading something someone else I know had written, it was a list of goals. The only problem I noticed with this list of goals was that the majority of them actually had nothing to do with the definition of this person and instead were most of the things that this person’s friends define themselves through. So that made me think. Should we be defining ourselves in who we are or who we could pretend to be by copying the acts of others?
I don’t think we would achieve much more then heartache by trying to take the defining aspects of others and stuff them into our lives. Because at the end of the day we are all unique and all different. If we were all the same we would be boring!
Now I am not saying that we should not have goals and not have role models. However, what I am saying is our goals should be what we can achieve and our role models should be people that we want to be like; not clone.
Life. It is a celebration of diversity not of similarity.
The state of having little or no money and few or no material possessions
With this in mind I have to ask is the following quote poverty?
From now on, I am deemed poor… coz I have money I can’t touch…
Is having you can’t touch poor? I don’t think so. If you put up a barrier to money that you have that is your that is your problem. You are not poor. You are simply acting.
Say I was to have $10,000 and I decided to lock $9,900 away into a six month term deposit. I only have $100 left. Can I honestly claim that I am poor. NO. I am not poor I have simply decided to be stubborn with my money to try and claim some sympathy. It is Disgusting Behavior. NOT because you have money. But because that you have money and at the same time you are trying to claim that you don’t. It is deceitful and lying to say that you are poor.
Keep falsehood and lies far from me; give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Proverbs 30:8 NIV
The seven prophetic years in the Biblical Tribulation have a total of 2520 days (7 x 360). The Antichrist will rule during this period and the number of his name is 666. The following combinations of Hillary Clinton’s names yield both of these values:
The sum of the 28 ASCII codes for: ‘HILLARY CLINTON’ (uppercase) + ‘Hillary Clinton’ (title case) is 2520.
The sum of the lowercase ASCII codes for all four of her names: ‘hillary diane rodham clinton’ equals 2664 which equals: 4 x 666.
Now ASCII codes (created c1900s) prove that Hillary is the anti-christ? I think I need a good does of Green Day’s American Idiot song right about now.
Note: I am a Barack Obama supporter and believe that he represents a new era in America and awakening and a liberalising of the States.
Since it was mentioned to me a few weeks ago after church I have been following the net hysteria which is the Obama Anti-Christ Roadshow.
If you do a search for Obama Antichrist you will get hundreds of pages of conspiracy about Barack Obama being the Anti-Christ. In my opinion it is all a lot of nonsense from people out their trying to disrupt democracy instead of encouraging it. You should be campaigning for a candidate and for or against and issue NOT directly against a person.
This morning I came across a video on YouTube about Obama being the Anti-Christ. Watch it below. My comments on the video are below as well.
Mabus? I’m sure if I put other words together I will randomly create other words as well. For instance I can prove that Grandma is the Anti-Christ and that she is using her cookie business to promote global domination. e.g. Grandma Business = grandMABUSiness see the MABUS by running the two words together? Do you think I am nuts and silly? Well running Obama and Bush together is nuts as well. Two other points that I note about this is that if Obama is going to succeed Bush then shouldn’t the words be run together the other way around so it becomes bushobama. Wow I can see HOB in there I guess that means 5 possible things a) (folklore) a small grotesque supernatural creature that makes trouble for human beings b) (folklore) fairies that are somewhat mischievous c) A hard steel edge tool used to cut gears d) A shelf beside an open fire where something can be kept warm e) [Brit] The top of a cooker with hotplates or burners. I love the last one. Yes Obama and Bush together are a hotplate! My second point is this. The Anti-Christ is a christian notion from the Bible. Nostradamus was never a christian so how come we are using non-christian “prophecies” to try and relate them to christian ones?
2012. The world is going to end in 2012 because a calendar ends in 2012? That is the same logic of the Y2K bug. Because we invented this measure of time somehow the world has to obey it. Well the world didn’t end because of the Y2K issue. And it will not end because some Calendar ends.
Pro-abortion. The anti-christ would be Pro-abortion. Do we know this of is the maker of this video assuming? Give me facts, give me truths not assumptions or opinions.
World leader? If Obama does not become the next President someone else will. They will be a world leader. What makes Obama so special from the rest. Nothing!
Peace? I sure hope whoever the next President of the US is wants peace. If not we are all doomed anyway.
Most powerful man on earth? Again regardless of who is elected they will be the most powerful. So how is Obama any different from the rest?
Satan, and Violence? Again opinion, crazy opinion. Where is the evidence? Where are the facts? Where is the true? Whatever happened to innocence until proven guilty? But why do we even need to go that far there is not even a shread of possible factual evidence to even bring these scare mongering claims. I guess some people still use the logic of the Salem Witch Trials. Have we gone nowhere in the last 300+ years?
Not putting your hand on your heart? Gosh if that makes you the anti-christ then you better burn me at the stake now.
The ending. I find the ending of this video the funnest thing of all. I am sure that my bible says that you should bless your enemy and pray for them NOT against them.
I am a firm believer in freedom of speech but hate speech, and untruefull speech is extremely bad because it spreads mistruths and does not allow people to make an informed and honest decision.
We have an extraordinary situation where we have full employment yet our wages are among the lowest in the developed world.
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Profits are way up and business has been so successful here that the Reserve Bank has to keep jacking up the interest rates to slow the economy. The World Bank continues to commend our government for its pro-business policies and rates us number one on Earth when it comes to supporting business.
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Even if we gave workers a $50 weekly tax cut, their wages would still be well behind Australia’s.
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Until now, government initiatives have arguably let low-paying employers off the hook and have institutionalised a poverty trap. For example, rent subsidies paid to low-income workers make no difference because rents have increased in response to soaring house prices. Although the heralded family support is a welcome relief to low-paid parents, it helps sheet in low-paid wages. This comes about because any increase in wages a parent may get is then deducted from their family support, neutralising any benefit.
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New Zealand workers, according to numerous reports, have the most flexible terms of employment and hours of work in the world. We have the highest percentage of people working more than 50 hours a week than any other developed country. Few households can survive on the income of one breadwinner. We have an increasing social dysfunction in our society as many parents are required to spend too much time away from their families because of work demands.
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What we have now is a society where inequity has cemented in. A third of New Zealanders are never going to be able to afford their own home; the average wage earned by the average New Zealander cannot even pay for the basic necessities of life. The minuscule tax breaks that will trickle down to workers next year won’t change a thing whether Labour or National is in power.
Hamas TV on Friday broadcast what it said was the last episode of a weekly children’s show featuring “Farfour,” a Mickey Mouse look-alike who had made worldwide headlines for preaching Islamic domination and armed struggle to youngsters.
In the final skit, Farfour was beaten to death by an actor posing as an Israeli official trying to buy Farfour’s land. At one point, Farfour called the Israeli a “terrorist.”
“Farfour was martyred while defending his land,” said Sara, the teen presenter. He was killed “by the killers of children,” she added.
The weekly show, featuring a giant black-and-white rodent with a high-pitched voice, had attracted worldwide attention because the character urged Palestinian children to fight Israel. It was broadcast on Hamas-affiliated Al-Aksa TV.
Station officials said Friday that Farfour was taken off the air to make room for new programs.
Station manager Mohammed Bilal said he didn’t know yet what would be shown instead.
Israeli officials have denounced the program, “Tomorrow’s Pioneers,” as incendiary and outrageous. The program was also opposed by the state-run Palestinian Broadcasting Corporation, which is controlled by Fatah.
