From today's USA Today:

When President Bush addresses the United Nations this morning, a spokesman says he will tell foreign leaders there is a great sense of urgency to adopt legislation that authorizes the U.S. government to bail out troubled financial institutions.

From the 2008 Republican Party Platform:

We support energetic federal investigation and, where appropriate, prosecution of criminal wrongdoing in the mortgage industry and investment sector.  We do not support government bailouts of private institutions. Government interference in the markets exacerbates problems in the marketplace and causes the free market to take longer to correct itself. We believe in the free market as the best tool to sustained prosperity and opportunity for all.

Emphasis added.  Ain't that a flip-flop.  The GOPers were against it before they were for it.  Then again, so was McCain:

After discovering a president cannot actually dismiss the SEC chief --- he can be relieved of his chairmanship, but not removed from the commission -- McCain changed his language. In a speech in Wisconsin, he called for Cox to step down voluntarily.

McCain also lobbed criticism at the Federal Reserve, saying it should focus on strengthening the dollar and get out of the business of bailouts.

So you see, flip-flopping is becoming the GOP's strategy du jour.

As a day job, I work with back-end computer support, and every once in a while a systems check is performed to make sure everything is running optimal.  Likewise, I think individuals should engage in a 'self-check' every so often.  More so, those that are involved in social affairs should do this especially as to not become immersed in their own manure.

Read below:

Latino registered voters rank education, the cost of living, jobs and health care as the most important issues in the fall campaign, with crime lagging a bit behind those four and the war in Iraq and immigration still farther behind. On each of these seven issues, Obama is strongly favored over McCain--by lopsided ratios ranging from about three-to-one on education, jobs, health care, the cost of living and immigration, to about two-to-one on Iraq and crime.

I don't know if they are ranked in order (too lazy to look at report), but I would put those as my top four.  So in a nutshell, even though I've been MIA, I feel I'm still in touch with the Latino heart.  After all, the Latino heart is a human heart, and these issues are what all Americans are concerned about.  I'd be curious to what issues some readers and writers of Latino Blogs are deemed most important.

Soon...in a few years...whites may be a minority in a few states here and there.  But still, <strike>sadly</strike> ironically (for the future majority), they probably will maintain their status as the economical bottom.

Sad, but true.  The last eight years of misery in Puerto Rico have cause so many people to leave the Island it's not even funny.  And it's getting worse.

Recession drives educated Puerto Ricans to South Florida

As a salesman for a health club in a suburb outside Puerto Rico's capital, Frank Oquendo saw up close how his earnings and the gym's membership base tanked along with Puerto Rico's economy.

Earlier this year, Oquendo's bosses cut his pay by 25 percent as a third of the Caguas club's members canceled their contracts because they were leaving Puerto Rico. After two years of soaring inflation and desperation, Oquendo finally packed up and joined his former clients, moving his family to Miami in July.

He joined thousands of middle-class professionals who have fled Puerto Rico in the past two years, becoming what some people are calling ``FloRicans.''

'Sometimes you feel like a traitor when people ask, `Why don't you stay here and work for your country?' '' said Oquendo, 35. ``How long are we supposed to sacrifice our families for unfulfilled promises? I want to help push Puerto Rico forward, but what about my kids?''

Emphasis added.  You just can't fault the guy.  I left because the opportunities in P.R. just weren't there.  And that was back in 1989, when things were nowhere near as disastrous as they are now.  Even back then, if you had a degree in a field where there was any kind of demand, your opportunities just were fabulously better in the U.S.  But there's more:

''We are committing collective suicide,'' said Elías Gutiérrez, who runs the graduate school of planning at the University of Puerto Rico. ``This is going to become a country of elderly and poor people.''

Census figures show at least 200,000 of Puerto Rico's 4 million people moved to Florida from 2000 to 2006, including 14,000 to Broward County and about 8,000 to Miami-Dade. About half of Florida's nearly 700,000 Puerto Ricans live in Central Florida, particularly the Orlando area.

But census figures do not reflect the wave that began two years ago, when a budget crisis forced the Puerto Rican government to shut down for several weeks. More than 70,000 people were temporarily furloughed, so it was not long before nurses, doctors and police officers joined the teachers and out-of-work public servants who headed for Florida.

Many of them found jobs before leaving Puerto Rico as recruiters from employers as varied as NASA, Disney World and the Baltimore Police Department went to Puerto Rico to find highly skilled bilingual labor. The shutdown was followed by an unprecedented increase in the sales tax to as high as 7 percent, which hit Puerto Rican wallets hard as a political crisis gripped the U.S. territory.

Then gas prices climbed, and people saw their electric bills reach as high as $1,000 a month. Government statistics show food prices have increased 12 percent this year, and housing 15 percent.

''People in Puerto Rico make around $24,000 a year,'' said Oquendo's wife, Wilma Nieves, 39. ``Day care centers and private schools cost $600 or $700 a month. Our car payment -- for a Suzuki -- was $500 a month. We were falling behind in our mortgage and other loans. You can't just stay behind and complain. You have to find opportunities.''

The sales tax actually was 6.6%.  It was supposed to eliminate a flat 6.6% tariff automatically imposed on all products entering the Island.  But a lot of the products in the market that had already been subject to the tariff were then subject to the sales tax.  So many of these products were actually taxed twice at an overall rate of around 13.6% (because you are imposing a sales tax on a product that already reflects the tariff, so it's not like adding them both).

Now, if you're Puertorican, this should piss you off:

University of Puerto Rico professor Jorge Duany, who coauthored a 2006 study of Puerto Rican migration patterns, said the island's government has largely ignored the dilemma, because it offers a much-needed safety valve for an economy experts say shrank by 2 percent last year.

''Unemployment is at 12 percent. If all those people had stayed, it would be 24 percent,'' Duany said. ``In the point of view of the individual who decides to emigrate, for the people looking for a job, it's a solution -- a way out. For Puerto Rico collectively, it's a problem.''

And so it goes.  We leave, and some come back.  But in the end, it's Puerto Rico who is impoverished by this pattern.

While this is true, "Report: Vast Majority of African American and Latino Middle-Class Families Are on Shaky Financial Ground," I think my statement holds more true. I mean, to not include Whites in the study almost implies only Blacks and Latinos are having problems.  But, I see where they are going with this; Latinos and Blacks are being hit harder statistically. 

"I think one of the things that I noted in the report was how much of whatever assets African Americans and Latinos have are tied up with whatever equity they have in their homes, as opposed to any other kind of assets, whether it’s cash in the bank or stocks or bonds or whatever, but that essentially the wealth that exists in black and Latino America is basically the wealth in the equity of their houses, right?"

But, isn't it funny (even sad), that in a downed economy such as we are experiencing now, we still find away to say that we are more shortchanged than everyone else?

I wonder if some people took this and believed that they could trick their bank accounts and credit lines into thinking they had more money than it did.

Forget it children! With it's new party suits, steakhouse, and martini bar, the new super-expensive, five-star baseball stadium is geared to cater to the rich, and leave you watching from your neighborhood bar. Cheers!

``Texas is like our home,'' said Garza, 45, who joined hundreds of Mexicans poring over lists of Texas properties at the four-day event. Garza, who owns manufacturing sites and other land in Mexico, said he and five partners may invest as much as $8 million in Texas. ``We believe there can be some opportunities.''

Individuals who empower themselves...

The Meatrix.

What a crazy, crazy world we live in: $55 for a bottle of water...and you thought gas was more expensive! 

(Watch the video.)

Ever since the birth of my daughter, I've been thinking a lot about money...you know, those S's with the double line through it ($$$).  It's been gnawing at me and gnawing at me, just like that little mouse probably has been doing around the apartment that I haven't caught yet! 

Let me tell you, the human mind amazes me, it puts pieces of the 'puzzle' together in ways you just can't understand:  I was watching the old boob tube today after a nice dinner, and for some reason I stopped at channel 66, The US Senate.  Bush and Fox were clipped talking about how great NAFTA has been for trade between the two three countries (US, Mexico and Canada).

Okay, piece one.

I am subscribed to a financial email newsletter, and today I happened to read it instead of deleting it.  What caught my eye was this"  "The New American Currency."  Fired up Google and this is what I get:

CNBC Interview with Stephen Previs about the Amero.

This video highlights a very serious concern which none of our media is looking into. The Amero is being looked at as the defacto currency of the North American Community (or Union).

Steve Previs: One thing the people who are dollar-based need to focus on is the Amero. That’s the one thing nobody’s talking about that’s going to have a big impact on everybody’s life in Canada, the US and Mexico. If you google it you can find out all about it. The Amero is the proposed new currency for the north American community which is being developed right now between Canada the US and Mexico to make a borderless community much like the EU and the dollar, Canadian dollar, us dollar and the Mexican peso being replaced by the Amero.

Interviewer: You really think that will get any leeway?

Steve Previs: You may want to visit a couple of web sites to see how far along it is. The Canadians are pretty upset about it whereas the Americans apart from the Texans are the only people who know anything about it the rest of the public is really with their heads in the sand on this one. Click here for more.

Source.

And your really, REALLY need to read this.  Canadians are upset; WAKE UP AMERICANS, the dollar is going down the tubes!

This is the reason I don't give too much energy into racism, immigration, and the border - they are all side notes and distractions to this bigger back room deal.

In the mail:

Dear Friends,

Any minute the New Orleans City Council is to vote to demolish 4
public housing units. Protesters gathered inside City Hall chambers
this morning, and crowded outside the building. I've just received
text messages from friends inside who say that police have used
pepperspray and taserguns on protesters, and arrests have been made.
Swat teams are present. You can also see footage on CNN.

The one request protesters are making now to supporters throughout the
country (via text message) is to make calls to Congress and HUD
decrying both the demolition plans, and the crackdown on the
protesters, who have committed themselves to non-violent
demonstration.

CNN has more.

Digital TV is the wave of the future and now is the Law.  Old 'rabbit-ears' television are a goner as the analog signal will be shut down.

VeryFunnyAds.com, has a new Latino side to it featuring some of the most funniest Spanish language commercials.  Some are quite funny.

Because there hasn't been any consensus on Immigration Reform, NY farms are now in jeopardy.  We are talking about an industry with hundreds of million dollars worth of crops (not to say the people who eat them) that may just lay rotting in the fields.