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Andrew K. McCain “Resigns”

Today McCain’s son, Andrew K. McCain, has “resigned” from his position as Director of the Silver State Bancorp. Silver State is headquartered in Nevada, and is the parent company of Silver State Bank. Now, he became director of this company in April… this is July. What happened here? And why was his resignation announced on a Saturday?

Prior to this, he was the Director of Choice Bank of Arizona. Choice was established in 2003, and merged into Silver State Bank this year. I have no idea who held the directorship of Silver State before it was given to McCain during this merger. But it’s very interesting that he is now “resigning”.

After reviewing the FDIC data on Silver State Bank, I am unable to determine if they are experiencing any kind of financial trouble.  However, I would like to quote from a statement given by the FDIC yesterday when the announced the failure of the seventh bank to collapse this year.  This bank is also located in NV: “No advance notice is given to the public when a financial institution is closed.”

http://www.fdic.gov/bank/individual/failed/fnbnv.html

The Bush News Network

Keith Olbermann confirmed tonight on Countdown, by way of Chris Matthew’s Hardball interview of Scott McClellan, that the White House has been using FOX News as its official propaganda headquarters.  Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity were specifically named as recipients of these daily talking point summations.

The conservative bias of the “fair and balanced” network has long been an unofficial official fact for conservatives and liberals alike.  This latest revelation from Scott McClellan just takes the “unofficial” out of the equation.

How Serious Is McCain’s Internet Ignorance?

With the speed at which the political climate can change, it seems relatively serious.  In McCain’s own words, he is “an illiterate who has to rely on his wife for any assistance he can get”.   Cindy and a staff of aides are certainly there to  check emails and conduct internet searches for him, but his inability to do these things himself can put him at a disadvantage. 

 

A group called Generations On Line works to educate senior citizens about current technology.  Tobey Dichter, the CEO of the company, has said that “There are too many people surrounding John McCain who are willing to print an email for him… But that cheats him of an opportunity to let his own mind take him to the next link.  If he doesn’t know what links are available, he will only get what he’s asking for, and nothing more”. 

 

McCain really needs to be able to research issues himself.  Take the recent Iran/Pakistan Border gaffe.  It was possibly just a misspeak, but a Presidential nominee primarily running on his military experience should not be confusing Iraq and Iran.  Those are two countries that each present different foreign relations challenges- BIG challenges.  Secretary of State Condolezza Rice and five other nations met with Iran in Ireland this weekend, and Iran is reportedly not cooperating in reaching an agreement on it’s nuclear arms program.

 

Things change quickly in politics, and we are in a time of war.  McCain should be able to review information himself, and as Tobey Dicther said, be able to “let his own mind take him to the next link”.  Until then, McCain can continue using this “updated” map of the Middle East:

http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/07/the_iraqpakistan_border.php

Food Safety Impacting American Economy

It’s not enough to worry- or “whine”, as Phil Gramm put it- about the rising cost of food, we now have to worry about the safety of it.  Obama and McCain are too busy one-upping each other on the Iraq War to address food safety issues.  But why isn’t Bush?  Safety concerns impact our ability to export food.  In June, thousands of South Korean citizens protested against the possible reintroduction of American beef.  Some of their demonstrations resulted in riots that required police intervention.  South Korea’s concern is Mad Cow Disease.  They greatly restricted US beef imports in 2003 after the disease was found in meat.  Among several stipulations reached in an agreement between our governments was the requirement that beef imported to South Korea be from slaughtered cows under the age of 2.5 years.

 

We’ve of course had our food issues here at home.  In early June the FDA warned that certain types of tomatoes were linked to an outbreak of Salmonella that sickened over 1200 people in 43 states.  Later that month, the Kroger grocery store chain recalled over 5 million pounds of beef in 20 different states.  Their contaminated beef, purchased from a supplier in Nebraska, transferred E. Coli to 34 different people.  Two months after the FDA’s initial warning about tomatoes, the public is now being told that jalapenos were the Salmonella culprit.  Unfortunately for tomatoe farmers, they’ve already lost $100 million over this – too much money for their personal economic stimilus payments to cover. 

 

If we are truly in a “psychological” recession, Bush’s lack of attention to these matters is not helping.  Consumers are still concerned about the safety of tomatoes and tomatoe based products.  Now that jalapenos have been named, we can expect a decrease in those sales for farmers as well.

 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080719/ap_on_bi_ge/tomato_growers

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2008/06/south_korean_protests_over_us.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/22/world/asia/22korea.html

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,371503,00.html

http://www.healthnews.com/alerts-outbreaks/salmonella-outbreak-tomatoes-is-expanding-1210.html

Mama’s House

www.mamashouse.org

Go there!