Good Evening Mr.Holt, Another fine broadcast this evening as always. Nice to see you filling in for Mr.Williams tonight. Always wonderful to see Richard on the broadcast!

First of all the Richard's report from inside the city of Ajdabiya where the rebels are street to street fighting against the Gadhafi forces. Seeing the town deserted with shops either closed or destroyed besides having no power showed how people fled the town due to the conflicts. It was tragic to see the home damaged by shrapnel and the famliy can never return. It was scary to hear gunfire when Richard was taking cover behind a bus while the rebels kept firing at Gadhafi forces from behind a wall. I was nervous watching Richard run across the street and relieved when he made it safely to the other side. As Richard stated the rebels hope to capture the city of Ajdabiya which would be a first sign of progress. The rebels are learning better ways to fight and getting new weapons. Much determination to keep in fighting from these rebels.

Excellent Reporting As Always Richard!

The report by Mr.Allen showed much unrest in many of the Mideast regions such as Syria,Yemen and Jordan with brutal violence from security forces onto protestors. The images from Syria were awful with security forces firing upon protestors and killing around 50 people. It appears the leader is not going to step down and stands defiant by using sheer brutality to stay in power. In Yemen protestors taking to the streets demanding the president step down and time is of the essence. And in Jordan with thousands of protestors taking to the streets with much violence erupting the security forces pushing the protestors out to stop the unrest.

A tense situation all over the Middle East. Terrible.

The report by Mr.Bazell from Tokyo on the nuclear crisis with the leaking of radiation from the reactors showed how there has been serious setbacks with much damage found in several of the reactors. Much concern over reactor 3 with damaged fuel rods. One hopes the workers can get the situation of the radiation leaks under control. Thoughts and prayers are with everyone in the region.

The report by Mr.Costello showed the tremendous stress air traffic controllers endure in their job everyday and dealing with all sorts of situations. With so many retiring the new training for controllers is quite intense giving all sorts of obstacles faced each day by controllers. The years of training are certainly needes in this type of occupation.

The piece by Ian Williams from Japan showed the extreme resilience of the people to help eachother get through this terrible momumental crisis. Seeing how they grouped the people in the school by neighborhood reveals true organization. The school is equipped with many things to help the people and one hopes things improve. Yet, it will take much time to recover. The people do exhibit great strength and resilience.

Thank You for the broadcast Mr.Holt. See you on Today and Nightly News over the weekend! Peace to You and to All!

Be Well Everyone!

Stay Extra,Extra Safe and Well Richard! Excellent Reporting as Always! See you on the Rachel Maddow Show tonight!

Take Extra Good Care Richard and Crew!

Lisa

Early out here in Southern California but this was some week. Speaker Boehner never reported up dates from Obama on Libya which cause House/Congress to make stupid comments. Rep. Cantor got 600,000 to stop Obama's plan to protect the American homeowners from Bank fraud and illegal foreclosures. Cantor hopes to step in to replace weak qualified Speaker of the House position that Boehner holds.

The trial of Raj Rajaratnam will expose Goldman Sachs and end the career of CEO Lloyd Blankfine. At lease it gives notice to the US Crimes of the Century that went Global.

Brian should set back and watch the Ringley Brothers& Barnum & Bailey circus we call candidates running for the office of President. These guys are a comedians dream with so much material. Each person entering the race is nutter then the other. What's embarrassing is polls show Charlie Sheen would beat all of the current candidates. Now one lone Republican could give Obama a toe to toe race and she could beat him. Elizabeth Warren is the best Republican to represent that party. Koch Tea Party candidates are crazy and need medical help. Others are just looking to make a buck from donations as they saw how well it worked for Sarah Palin.

see you same time same place

Have been glued to the nightly news for the last 2 weeks following the horrific events in Japan. What strikes me, night after night, is the grace, selflessness, and quiet dignity with which the Japanese people are dealing with these tragedies. Watching the scenes in the school -turned- community shelter as the people were quietly tending to each other, reminded me of the scenes in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina. I am so ashamed of the American people and their selfish behaviours. Just last week on the local news following the tsunami that hit Crescent City, CA on the west coast, there was a fisherman who loudly complained "they can send all that relief aid to everyone else in the world, when are they gonna send some to me?" He was indignant. Yes, this man lost his boat, his means of making a living, but he was still alive, his family was still alive, and his loss was so miniscule in comparison. In Japan, 10,000 people dead, 10,000 more missing...Just another shining example of the "me first" mentality of this country.

Thank you Brian, Lester, and all of the NBC staff for showing how the Japanese people deal with their grief and recovery. They are inspirations to the whole world.

It's well known that the Nightly News producers "borrow" many of their stories from The New York Times. Well, here's a Times story we're not likely to see on Nightly News. On the front page of Friday's Times--above the fold--was a story about the shady and duplicitous tax practices used by General Electric, the former majority owner and current minority owner of NBC. Despite worldwide profits of $14.2 billion ($5.1 billion of that from the U.S.), G.E. is paying no corporate income tax for 2010. According to the article by David Kocieniewski, "[G.E.'s] extraordinary success is based on an aggressive strategy that mixes fierce lobbying for tax breaks and innovative accounting that enables it to concentrate its profits offshore. G.E.’s giant tax department, led by a bow-tied former Treasury official named John Samuels, is often referred to as the world’s best tax law firm. Indeed, the company’s slogan 'Imagination at Work' fits this department well. The team includes former officials not just from the Treasury, but also from the I.R.S. and virtually all the tax-writing committees in Congress."

The entire article can be read at the Times website. Meanwhile, here are some of the highlights:

> "Over the last decade, G.E. has spent tens of millions of dollars to push for changes in tax law, from more generous depreciation schedules on jet engines to 'green energy' credits for its wind turbines. But the most lucrative of these measures allows G.E. to operate a vast leasing and lending business abroad with profits that face little foreign taxes and no American taxes as long as the money remains overseas."
> "The assortment of tax breaks G.E. has won in Washington has provided a significant short-term gain for the company’s executives and shareholders. While the financial crisis led G.E. to post a loss in the United States in 2009, regulatory filings show that in the last five years, G.E. has accumulated $26 billion in American profits, and received a net tax benefit from the I.R.S. of $4.1 billion."
> "Since 2002, the company has eliminated a fifth of its work force in the United States while increasing overseas employment. In that time, G.E.’s accumulated offshore profits have risen to $92 billion from $15 billion."
> "The [tax] shelters are so crucial to G.E.’s bottom line that when Congress threatened to let the most lucrative one expire in 2008, the company came out in full force. G.E. officials worked with dozens of financial companies to send letters to Congress and hired a bevy of outside lobbyists. The head of its tax team, Mr. Samuels, met with Representative Charles B. Rangel, then chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, which would decide the fate of the tax break. As he sat with the committee’s staff members outside Mr. Rangel’s office, Mr. Samuels dropped to his knee and pretended to beg for the provision to be extended — a flourish made in jest, he said through a spokeswoman. That day, Mr. Rangel reversed his opposition to the tax break, according to other Democrats on the committee. The following month, Mr. Rangel and Mr. Immelt stood together at St. Nicholas Park in Harlem as G.E. announced that its foundation had awarded $30 million to New York City schools, including $11 million to benefit various schools in Mr. Rangel’s district. Joel I. Klein, then the schools chancellor, and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, who presided, said it was the largest gift ever to the city’s schools. G.E. officials say the donation was granted solely on the merit of the project. 'The foundation goes to great lengths to ensure grant decisions are not influenced by company government relations or lobbying priorities,' Ms. Eisele [a G.E. spokesperson] said. Mr. Rangel, who was censured by Congress last year for soliciting donations from corporations and executives with business before his committee, said this month that the donation was unrelated to his official actions."

A huge donation to schools in Rep. Rangel's district after he reversed his position and granted tax breaks beneficial to G.E. might be seen by some as quid pro quo. Some might even call it an after-the-fact bribe. Apparently, the Nightly News producers don't call it anything, since they won't be reporting this story.

A little over two years ago (March 4, 2009), Brian Williams shamelessly took two minutes on his broadcast to try to prop up G.E.'s falling stock price. He (along with CNBC's David Faber) desperately tried to reassure the public that G.E. is a rock-solid company with more than enough capital to weather the financial crisis. And on Jan. 21, Brian was more than happy to report that Pres. Obama had picked G.E. CEO Jeff Immelt to lead his Economic Advisory Council. Brian loves to report good news about G.E. But when the news is not flattering, Brian and his producers ignore it. If the Times article had been about a mega-company other than G.E., Lisa Myers would have been all over the story. She would have done a five-minute in-depth investigation about the company's evil accounting practices. Obviously, we're not going to see that story.

In case anyone thinks that the G.E. story was not reported because of all the important breaking news happening in Libya and Japan, I would remind them that this week, Nightly News wasted five minutes alone on two "Making A Difference" stories without a shred of news value--one about a woman who helps obese people lose weight and another about a doctor who is also a nun. Clearly, it was not time constraints that prevented Nightly News from reporting the G.E. story. It was their policy of protecting their former parent company from negative publicity.

I came here to NBC to post the very same comments, and I wanted to ask NBC to do a full story about these G.E. profits of 14.2, yet G.E. did not pay ANY U.S. taxes last year. How can any journalist with any conscience at all work under such a situation and, even more, not report a word about it. Now I have another reason to take NBC shows off my viewing list.

Kudos to Lawrence O'Donnell for taking on the G.E. zero-tax issue on his msnbc show. But the outrageous news that G.E. pays no federal taxes deserved wider play. If Brian Williams can scrupulously come on the air the night following a story on light bulbs to acknowledge the piece should have included the information that NBC's parent company makes L.E.D. bulbs, he can certainly confront this elephant in the room. Mr. Williams and NBC do a pretty adroit job at locating where middle America's pulse is through stories designed to provoke populist outrage, such as the series "The Fleecing of America." It is journalistically unethical to continue pretending this monster of a story doesn't exist.

Lester, another terrific broadcast. In my mind, the reality of the situation in Libya is that it is a new

situation which will transform the Middle East. I support President Obama in the action he has taken.

I picked up Newsweek today, the last copy so just in time, and this headline caught my eye:

Leader of the Freaked-Out World. I'd say. Then there's the protest in London.. One thing after

another. Newsweek got it right: Apocalypse Now. The segment of Making a Difference was such

a sweet story. In our family, we are dog lovers. We do not have a dog now, but our daughter

does and she named her "Baby". Have a nice evening! Phyllis

Lester-the woman in Libya trying to fight back against abuse is soooooooooooooo damn brave, and when I saw her get beaten and shoved into a car and driven off....to be "taken care of"....all I can say is....WE ALL NEED TO PRAY FOR HER, and also pray that the ANIMAL behind all this needs to be EUTHANIZED! PERIOD!

Lester, I was glued to MEET THE PRESS with David Gregory this morning. "Why Libya"? An honest

question. The Rebel Revolution is one of the great revolutions and if successful will change the

shift of power in that region and thus in the Middle East and therefore change the course of history

Good Islamic extremists not necessarily our enemy. I agree. It wouild, in effect, be a

Holy Jihad and eventually transform the Middle East. What's that about who is not against us is

for us. A General? Another general like Eisenhower who saved the day for FDR and Churchill.

The president feels that his hand is being forced and he should cAlled their bluff,. The Republicans

are so inconsistent that no doubt they can justify their inconsistencies. Obama's 9/11 and a

big win for him. Yes, with Hilliary Clinton as Vice President in 2012 About not knowng how it will

turn out. Well, there's no crystal ball and if there were it would be dabbling in witchcraft, so

the president's pragmatic "whatever works" sounds good to me and also Secretay of State Hilliary

CLinton's (In a situation like this, you take it day by day) As for Lugar,s need a plan, it is an

Engineer's truth" If you don't have a backup plan you don't have a plan.. Lester, I will catch you

tonight on Nightly News. Have a nice day. Phyllis

Today's talk shows and the concern and advice by each person makes it clear why the attacks on Obama for the United Nations Mission. Again we're talking oil countries and what will change for the USA. The old leaders of Libya, Syria, Egypt and other Middle Eastern dictators was a dream for the US with backroom deals and corruption. We're seeing how even as the reports for years of Axis of Evil was used the US Oil companies were doing business in those countries and with those Dictators as the smoke screen worked well. Now the fear for the Wealthy Oil companies, US contractors is will those new groups do the same as the old dictators did. Obama is not one to be a Dick Cheney and bleed people and this will effect George H.W. Bush's oil interest. Hillary isn't happening either as she is looking to work with the countries and she isn't dictating to them. McCain/Lieberman the oil company spoke persons aren't able to get this President or Secretary of State to come aboard the Crime/Corruption Team. The fear to the oil paid Law Makers is that Countries will finally have Democracy and corrupt leaders will be a thing of the pass. As both McCain/Lieberman wish this up raising had taken place when Bush/Cheney were in office, the US would be bombing all of the Middle East and going it alone as Bush did with Iraq.

Viicous lies are being spread about President Obama as they were about former president

George W. Bush with one goal in mind to weaken the presidency and America's role in the world

to execute justice. Pres. Obama has stepped up to the plate and shown his true colors: RED WHITE & BLUE The President and First Lady share a mutual love of our country. Phyllis Kunz

Dave, I did not like what President Obama said about his "blunt" talk about Iraq, and I think President

George W. Bush will eventually be vindicated in the Middle East and silence all those Bushbashers and

they know who they are but otherwise a terrific speech by President Obama. Is Dana Perino still working

for Pres. Obama. I may not have her last name right but if she is I would think she would call it quits after

his remark about the Iraq war. Phyllis I missed Brian's interview with the President. Out to dinner with

my husband to celebrate his birthday, an Aries.

Dave, we are celebrating his birthday again this evening. I enjoy his birthdays as well. If I felt any better

I would have to explain it:O) Phyllis I was a big fan of Tony Snow but I am GWB's biggest fan.

Who was that female helicopter pilot? I want to see more of her!!

And I would like to see more of the rebel from Canada interviewed by Richard Engel, such a brave young

man, only 25. My heart ached for him. Phyllis Kunz