Confirmed to David that the last "salary" went through. That's for october, actually, and he promised the one for november will go before year's end (which it did, on 31st from his side, and 3rd on the Hungarian side).
Finally wrote that long email for Beatrice and Burt. A quote from his email to which I answered:
Ted Rall insisted that Osh had indeed been overrun by the insurgents. He added that it can be hard to know what’s going on sometimes, when you are in the middle of it. I don’t know if he was explaining Tom’s presumed error (since Tom lived there at the time) or acknowledging the possibility of his own. I also went ahead and asked him your question, perhaps phrasing it differently: “what’s it like to be right about all these things?” He said that he would like to be wrong about these things. For instance, he wanted us to find WMD in Iraq. He wants America to succeed.
I didn't even remember that I asked that question, but never mind. The mountain shook, a mouse was born.
And a part of response to her:
It'll never happen, because no legislator who wants to be re-elected would vote for the huge cuts in defense, farm subsidies, etc. but it would work, and both parties were involved. However, it's the first plan I've seen that shows what could be cut while still leaving necessary safety nets like Social Security and Medicare in place.But it goes against the grain of the current version of capitalism, which is socialism for the rich, capitalism for the rest. Bail out the banks, screw the economy, leave nothing for safety nets. "Gde nema, uzmi, gde ima, dodaj" (where has not, take, where has, add) (haven't indulged in a literal word-for-word translation in years).