Today’s Talk

Since the invasion of Iraq by the imperialist region of the Bush Administration, violence in Iraq has only further crippled the daily lives of Baghdad inhabitants. Stability and security were by far better off under the leadership of Saddam Hussein. Here is an account of one family’s fight for a better life.

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Baklava is a Mediterranean dessert made with dough, nuts, butter, and sugar. After baking, a sweet syrup is immediately poured over the pieces allowing the syrup to be absorbed into the layers. This is a rich dessert that is quite tasty. If you have a patisserie in your town, why not ask for some baklava. It is a dessert that is known world wide.
INGREDIENTS:
1 pound frozen phyllo sheets
1 cup melted butter
2 cups finely chopped walnuts or blanched almonds
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup honey
1 cup water
1 tablespoon lemon juice
PREPARATION:
Directions for baklava Thaw phyllo pastry and separate sheets according to package directions. Keep pastry not being used covered with clean damp dish towel to keep it from drying out. Place half of pastry sheets in a greased 15×10x1-inch baking pan, one by one, brushing each sheet quickly and all over with melted butter, nuts, 1/2 cup sugar, and cinnamon; sprinkle over buttered pastry. Place remaining sheets on top, brushing each with melted butter. Cut baklava pastry into 2-inch diamonds. Bake at 400° until brown and crisp, about 30 to 35 minutes. Meanwhile, in a saucepan, combine remaining 3/4 cup sugar, honey, 1 cup water, and lemon juice; bring to a boil. Boil baklava syrup for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally, until syrupy. Cool and pour over baklava.

From the Republican Party’s disgrace this weekend from the Foley scandal, the president has yet again showed his unfaltering support for a boldface liar named Dennis Hastert. According to the Associate Press the president said “when leadership found out about the lurid [Foley] emails, that they swiftly made clear that Foley must resign and that they promptly called for a professional investigation by the DOJ.” LIE! They knew about it years earlier as reported by his staff but continue to support Foley’s run for a repeated term. President Bush, I ask you, how many lies is it possible for you to spit out of your mouth in one week? Is there no end to the fabrication of your lies to justify your deceitful propaganda?
I leave my readers with a video from Olbermann who tackles this very topic.
Watch video HERE!
Courtesy of Crooks and Liars.com

Nothing could be worst than the incompetent and deplorable acts that we have witness the Republican Party demonstrate this week. Outright lies have been uttered this week so easily by Hastert and his crooked colleagues that all faith and respect has diminished ten folds for this government. The Republican Party has done nothing this week then try to put the blame on their gross negligence on everyone but themselves. The fact of the matter is that they did know about Foley’s behavior years ago and they did nothing to stop it. The fact of the matter is that once this story got out, they did not take ownership of the issue of protecting the pages but rather rationalize they behavior by playing the blame game. The fact of the matter is that Hastert was not interested in protecting the pages but rather protecting himself and raising money for the Republican Party, which received generous amounts of money from Foley.
GOP sources tell “Roll Call” that “Reynolds told Hastert earlier in 2006, shortly after the February 2nd GOP leadership elections.” “All that before today’s A-P report that Hastert’s office was warned about Foley… in 2004.”

Where do the lies stop and where does the truth begin? The fight for power and control of this corrupt government is still taking place and as we have seen, no prisoners no matter if they are young children being prayed upon, will deter the Republican Party for their quest for self-governance.

Welcome back to another blog day free of political news! As you can already see we are going to be talking about Winter Sonata! For anyone who has not heard of this drama yet, have you been living under a rock for the last four years? Do you have a television set? Well, if so let me introduce you to only one part of pop culture in Korea that has taken over by storm.

Those of you that have no idea what you are in store for, let me give you a quick summary of drama series. Drama series are LONG! This is not a video that you can just sit down and watch in 2 hours. Korean dramas are NOT Hollywood films involving tons of violence, sex and things exploding. This is not typical of Korean culture.

Winter Sonata has 20 episodes about one hour each. So yes, if you watch it non stop it will take you about 20 hours! It took me less than 1 week to watch this one only because I became addicted and could not stop myself from seeing what would happen in the next episode.

Korea dramas are certainly better and have risen in popularity against the famous Chinese TVB dramas. Not to mention the fact that since Korea dramas became so popular they are translated into so many languages. English, French, Italian, Vietnamese (Bản Tình Ca Mùa Đông), Chinese, Japanese, Cambodian, Tagalog, Malaysian…. just to name a few. This movie will have you hook on Kang Joon Sang (main character) and the rest as they search for the answer “What would you do if your true love came back…?”

So be prepared to cry and laugh cause this movie has it all! It is truly an emotional film!

Storyline

Winter Sonata is a tragic, but romantic drama that stars Choi Ji Woo as Jung Yu-Jin and Bae Yong Joon as Kang Joon-Sang. Joon-Sang transfers into a school in Chuncheon to look for his “dead? father. Through his extraordinary talents, he acquires thorough attention in his new school. Among them is a girl named Yu-Jin. Although she despises Joon-Sang’s attitude at first, she realizes that she is truly in love with him. Despite their love, however, it suddenly ends one night as Joon-Sang involves in a terrible automobile accident. Joon-Sang dies and Yu-Jin falls into months of dark heartbrokenness. Ten years later, she is dating a man named Kim Sang-Hyuk and is about to get married. However on the engagement day, she sees a man that looks just like Joon-Sang. She runs after him but loses him. Could this be Joon-Sang?

So follow Kang Joon Sang and Jung Yu Jin from their early days in school to early adulthood as love continues to follow each of them.

For all those who have watched it…what were some of your favorite scenes? I have to say that I really like San Hyuk! His true undying love for Yu Jin was something everyman should do for his girl! Do you guys remember when he was in the hospital and he try to commit suicide. That was such an emotional scene. Lets take a walk down memory lane and listen to one of the MV for Winter Sonata!

Buy it here

Few journalists can put into words what is going on in our political system regarding the abuses by the Bush Administration. I am here today to introduce to you one man that can. His name is Keith Olbermann. Watch as he explains the propaganda the Bush Administration had been adamantly boosting.

Welcome back to part 3 (part 1, part 2) of my discussion on crime in America. Today, I will focus on some of the solutions that have been discussed by criminologist to help alleviate crime. The external environment that we are influenced by has drastically changed since the early 1990s. These changes include a shift in social policy reforms, economic opportunities, drug market and the escalation of violent crimes. As crimes continue to become worse, policy makers need to focus more attention on social issues rather then spreading propaganda, engaging in sexual crimes against minors and implementing laws to protect and benefit themselves. Below are just a few of my recommendations towards crime prevention.

Improving social policies to better assistance the poor. The argument has been made that the welfare program is not helping many lower-class families. Is this a reason many chose to turn to drugs and crime due to the inefficiency of the current welfare system? The welfare system must not encourage dependency but rather responsibility in that each welfare recipient is expected to give back in one way or another to the system. Also, greater emphasis must be paid to financially supporting lower class educational facilities in our poorest areas.

Increasing economic aid to poor communities. If the U.S. can spend 14-15% of its GDP on health care each year and still not covering 45 million of its citizens with some reasonable health care plan. I believe the U.S. can afford to enact policies that would give economic aid packages to local communities that are deemed financially handicapped.