Archive for March, 2009
Despite Obama’s Vow, Combat Brigades Will Stay in Iraq
Despite Obama’s Vow, Combat Brigades Will Stay in Iraq – by Gareth Porter
WASHINGTON – Despite President Barack Obama’s statement at Camp LeJeune, North Carolina Feb. 27 that he had “chosen a timeline that will remove our combat brigades over the next 18 months,” a number of Brigade Combat Teams (BCTs), which have been the basic U.S. Army combat unit in Iraq for six years, will remain in Iraq after that date under a new non-combat label.
March 25 (Bloomberg) — California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said a make-shift tent city for the homeless that sprang up in the capital city of Sacramento will be shut down and its residents allowed to stay at the state fairgrounds.
Schwarzenegger said he ordered the state facility known as Cal-Expo to be used for three months to serve the 125 tent city residents, some of them displaced by the economic recession. The encampment may be shut down within a month, said Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson. The move comes after the Sacramento City Council last night agreed to spend $880,000 to expand homeless programs.
“Together with the local government and volunteers, we are taking a first step to ensure the people living in tent city have a safe place to stay, with fresh water, healthy conditions and access to the services they need,” Schwarzenegger said in a statement. “And I am committed to working with Mayor Johnson to find a permanent solution for those living in tent city.”
via Despite Obama’s Vow, Combat Brigades Will Stay in Iraq | CommonDreams.org.
Schwarzenegger Opens California Fairgrounds to Homeless Camp
Schwarzenegger Opens California Fairgrounds to Homeless Camp
March 25 (Bloomberg) — California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said a make-shift tent city for the homeless that sprang up in the capital city of Sacramento will be shut down and its residents allowed to stay at the state fairgrounds.
Schwarzenegger said he ordered the state facility known as Cal-Expo to be used for three months to serve the 125 tent city residents, some of them displaced by the economic recession. The encampment may be shut down within a month, said Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson. The move comes after the Sacramento City Council last night agreed to spend $880,000 to expand homeless programs.
“Together with the local government and volunteers, we are taking a first step to ensure the people living in tent city have a safe place to stay, with fresh water, healthy conditions and access to the services they need,” Schwarzenegger said in a statement. “And I am committed to working with Mayor Johnson to find a permanent solution for those living in tent city.”
via Schwarzenegger Opens California Fairgrounds to Homeless Camp – Bloomberg.com.
Houston Chronicle To Cut 12 Percent Of Staff
Houston Chronicle To Cut 12 Percent Of Staff
Unspecified Number Of Jobs To Be Eliminated
The Houston Chronicle said it will lay off about 12 percent of its work force.
In a story posted Tuesday on the Chronicle’s Web site, publisher Jack Sweeney blamed the cuts on the troubles of the newspaper industry, though he noted that all kinds of companies are being forced to slash expenses. Sweeney did not specify how many jobs are to be cut or what departments they serve. Laid-off workers will receive two weeks of pay for each year of service, up to one year’s pay. They also will be offered career transition services.
…snip…
- March 17, 2009: Seattle Newspaper Abandons Print
- March 16, 2009: Seattle Post-Intelligencer To Be Web-Only
- March 16, 2009: Ex-Rocky Mountain News Workers Starting Site
- February 27, 2009: Rocky No More: Paper Bids Colo. ‘Goodbye’
- February 25, 2009: San Francisco Chronicle Facing Closure
- February 23, 2009: Pair Of Philly Papers File For Bankruptcy
via Houston Chronicle To Cut 12 Percent Of Staff – Money News Story – KMGH Denver.
Online Age Quiz Is a Window for Drug Makers
Online Age Quiz Is a Window for Drug Makers
Americans yearn to be young. So it is little wonder that RealAge, which promises to help shave years off your age, has become one of the most popular tests on the Internet.
According to RealAge, more than 27 million people have taken the test, which asks 150 or so questions about lifestyle and family history to assign a “biological age,” how young or old your habits make you. Then, RealAge makes recommendations on how to get “younger,” like taking multivitamins, eating breakfast and flossing your teeth. Nine million of those people have signed up to become RealAge members.
But while RealAge promotes better living through nonmedical solutions, the site makes its money by selling better living through drugs.
via Online Age Quiz Is a Window for Drug Makers – NYTimes.com.
Howard Dean Wants 250,000 Signatures For Public Option
Howard Dean Wants 250,000 Signatures For Public Option
Give America a choice. We support healthcare reform that allows individual Americans to choose either a universally available public healthcare option like Medicare or for-profit private insurance. A public option is the only way to guarantee healthcare for all Americans and its inclusion is non- negotiable.
Any legislation without the choice of a public option is only insurance reform and not the healthcare reform America needs.
via Howard Dean Wants 250,000 Signatures For Public Option | discuss, debate, decide.
Jobless claims rise to 652,000
OPS: Understand that this is the U3 figure. A more accurate figure for unemployment is the U6 – find out more here
Jobless claims rise in latest week
The number of people continuing unemployment benefits climbs to another record high.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — The number of people filing initial claims for unemployment benefits rose last week, while those filing continuing claims hit a fresh all-time high, according to a government report released Thursday.
In the week ended March 21, a total of 652,000 people filed initial jobless claims, up 8,000 from the previous week’s revised figure of 644,000.
Economists had expected 650,000 new claims, according to a survey by Briefing.com.
However, in a sign that more jobless are having trouble finding work, 5,560,000 people continued claiming unemployment in the week ended March 11 – the latest week for which data wefe available. That’s an increase of 122,000 from the previous week.
via Jobless claims rise – Mar. 26, 2009.
Exclusive: Why House Committee wanted Rove behind closed doors
Exclusive: Why House Committee wanted Rove behind closed doors – Larisa Alexandrovna
The House Judiciary Committee chose to interview former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove behind closed doors because they wanted more time to question him, and not as a concession to Bush Administration representatives, sources say.
“It was our choice,” one House Judiciary aide told Raw Story.
According to two Judiciary Committee aides, the committee opted for the private testimony so that they could depose Rove for an extended period of time. During a public hearing, each committee member would have only a few minutes to ask questions.
“We could question him for 12 hours if we choose to,” said one of the aides.
Both aides confirmed that Rove would not be sworn in before his testimony but explained that testimony before Congress is de facto sworn testimony and any false statements would in fact be perjury regardless.
via The Raw Story | Exclusive: Why House Committee wanted Rove behind closed doors.
Economy shrinks most in 25 years; 6.3%; Unemployment continues climb
Economy shrinks most in 25 years; Unemployment continues climb
AP BREAKING /// The economy shrank at a 6.3 percent pace at the end of 2008, the worst showing in a quarter-century, and probably isn’t doing much better now.
“The Commerce Department on Thursday reported that the economy was sinking a bit faster than the 6.2 percent annualized drop for the October-December quarter estimated a month ago.
“And the pain has persisted in the current quarter. New claims for unemployment benefits last week rose to a seasonally adjusted 652,000 from the previous week’s revised figure of 644,000, the Labor Department said Thursday. The total number of people claiming benefits jumped to 5.56 million, higher than economists’ projections of 5.48 million, and a ninth straight record-high.
“The figures indicate the labor market remains weak even as some other economic indicators come in better than expected….
via The Raw Story | Economy shrinks most in 25 years; Unemployment continues climb.
My Uterus, Husband and I All Agree — No Children
My Uterus, Husband and I All Agree — No Children
Why choose to be child free? The list of reasons is endless.
I am a woman. I have all the biological requirements to have a child. Yet, I do not have the instincts or rational desire to do so. Does that make me less of a woman to not want to have a child either by using my body, my eggs, or my money to adopt?
My parents are the only people who, when I said I didn’t want to have kids, responded with, “Sounds like a good idea.” They married because I was on the way and had two more after me. They know how hard it is to raise kids, but they also love us very much. They wouldn’t change what had happened, but they wouldn’t force their want for a grandchild on me. Besides they have two already (I’m off the hook!)
How many times have I heard after saying that I don’t want children:
via My Uterus, Husband and I All Agree — No Children | Reproductive Justice and Gender | AlterNet.
The Reva: Why Americans May Never See the Best New Car on the Road
OPS: If they can do it in India…. the only thing stopping US are the Detroit elites.
The Reva: Why Americans May Never See the Best New Car on the Road
” The Reva is the world’s most successful electric vehicle.”
By Daniel Pepper, AlterNet. Posted March 24, 2009.
Forget the Tata Nano, the hottest car is the Reva, which is wooing Europeans and Asians. But will we ever see it in the U.S.?
The capillaries of India’s cities are clogged with every imaginable form of cacophonous conveyance: hulking buses, braying bullock carts and motorbikes stacked with families of five all jostle for space on the roads.
The result is that most of India’s commuters idle angrily in traffic for hours every day. The government is trying to play catch-up with a long string of mass transit projects, but most residents pine for the status, peace and luxury of a car all their own.
After almost a year of delays, the Indian automobile manufacturer Tata is finally set to answer that call by releasing the world’s cheapest car next month. Priced at about $2,000, the Tata Nano is a five-seat, air-conditioned, gasoline-powered car. It is also a nightmare for environmentalists, who predict sky-high sales will further pollute India’s already smog-filled air.
via The Reva: Why Americans May Never See the Best New Car on the Road | ForeignPolicy | AlterNet.
Powerful Banks and Government Handouts to the Rich: It’s Time for Protest
Powerful Banks and Government Handouts to the Rich: It’s Time for Protest
By Zephyr Teachout, AlterNet. Posted March 25, 2009.
A new grassroots group has organized protests for April 11 in 11 cities so far, and the ranks of signups are swelling fast.
Editor’s Note:
Click here to join the protest!
The Rip Off Must Be Stopped!
Big bankers ruined our economy and now they are gaming the political system so they can profit even more off the crisis they caused. They must be stopped.
On April 11th, 2009, the public will come out in cities across the country to express their frustration and disapproval with how our elected officials have handled the economic crisis. No one has been left unscathed; this protest is yours.
***
Somehow, we’ve created a system that protects some of America’s wealthiest individuals by letting them build institutions that are “too big to fail.” Large scale banking has left our economy unstable, and overly dependent upon too few institutions. Greed for short-term profit, and competitive exuberance, has led to incomprehensible financing schemes and rewards for companies that sold people things they couldn’t afford.…more
Hemp Is Not Pot: It’s the Economic Stimulus and Green Jobs Solution We Need
Hemp Is Not Pot: It’s the Economic Stimulus and Green Jobs Solution We Need – By Dara Colwell,
We can make over 25,000 things with it. Farmers love it. Environmentalists love it. You can’t get high from it. So why is it still illegal?
While Uncle Sam’s scramble for new revenue sources has recently kicked up the marijuana debate — to legalize and tax, or not? — hemp’s feasibility as a stimulus plan has received less airtime.
But with a North American market that exceeds $300 million in annual retail sales and continued rising demand, industrial hemp could generate thousands of sustainable new jobs, helping America to get back on track.
“We’re in the midst of a dark economic transition, but I believe hemp is an important facet and has tremendous economic potential,” says Patrick Goggin, a board member on the California Council for Vote Hemp, the nation’s leading industrial hemp-farming advocacy group. “Economically and environmentally, industrial hemp is an important part of the sustainability pie.”
via Hemp Is Not Pot: It’s the Economic Stimulus and Green Jobs Solution We Need | Environment | AlterNet.
Congress Votes ‘Yes’ to Sweeping Public Lands Protection Act
Congress Votes ‘Yes’ to Sweeping Public Lands Protection Act
WASHINGTON, DC, March 25, 2009 (ENS) – Congress today approved a massive public lands bill that protects 200 million acres of wilderness in nine states and a thousand miles of rivers, a 50 percent increase in the wild and scenic river system. It establishes new national trails, national parks and a new national monument and provides legal status for the National Landscape Conservation System, which will protect some of the country’s most spectacular landscapes.
The package of 164 separate bills bundled together, known as the Omnibus Public Lands Management Act of 2009 (H.R.146), has been stalled several times on its way to approval, most recently on March 11, when the measure fell two votes short of the two-thirds majority in the House required at that time.
Today, only a simple majority was required and the House passed the bill by a vote of 285 to 140. The bill was approved by the Senate last week and now goes to President Barack Obama for his signature into law. President Obama is expected to sign the measure.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said today is “a day of celebration for all who treasure and enjoy our natural and cultural heritage.”
via FCongress Votes ‘Yes’ to Sweeping Public Lands Protection Act.
Geithner Update: Grab Yer Ankles and Say “Uncle Sam”
Geithner Update: Grab Yer Ankles and Say “Uncle Sam” – by Mike Whitney
Timothy Geithner refuses to take underwater banks into receivership and resolve them, but has no problem turning the FDIC into a hedge fund. That’s right; under Geithner’s “Public Private Investment Partnership” (PPIP) FDIC chief Sheila Bair will assume the mantle of Bernie Madoff and oversee the establishment of Hedge Fund USA, a behemoth government-owned operation that will enlist the talents of five or six Wall Street managers to conduct auctions for toxic home loans and other repellent securities. The new program, which will provide lavish subsidies to investors, marks the first time that a standing government has transformed itself into a financial institution for the sake of its primary constituents, the banks. The PPIP creates a state-funded clearinghouse for overpriced junk derivatives and then passes the windfall on to over-leveraged Wall Street speculators. Go figure?
Here’s what everyone needs to know: The US government (you) will provide up to 94 percent of the financing (low interest, of course) for dodgy mortgage-backed assets that no one in their right mind would ever buy so that wealthy and politically-connected banksters can scrub up to $1 trillion of red ink from their balance sheets. Ugh!
via Dissident Voice : Geithner Update: Grab Yer Ankles and Say “Uncle Sam”.
The 50-Vote Senate
The 50-Vote Senate
Could an obscure Senate rule free Barack Obama from the filibuster and enable health-care reform?
It’s hard to imagine another town in which the most divisive thing you could do would be called “reconciliation.” But this is Washington. Last Wednesday, The Washington Post reported that “senior administration officials” were pressuring congressional Democrats to pursue health reform and energy legislation through the reconciliation process. Judd Gregg, the ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, did not respond in terms that brought to mind peace and unity. “That would be the Chicago approach to governing: Strong-arm it through,” he said. “You’re talking about the exact opposite of bipartisan. You’re talking about running over the minority, putting them in cement and throwing them in the Chicago River.”
Whoa.
When my former classmates at Santa Cruz talked about “reconciliation processes,” they meant something that involved sharing feelings and listening openly and empathically to others. When congressional observers talk about the reconciliation process, they mean the budget reconciliation process. Originally a way to expedite the process of merging the first budget resolution the Congress passed at the beginning of each year with the second budget resolution it passed near the end, reconciliation has drifted far from its origins and now means one thing to both sides: 50 votes. No filibuster.
That’s the beauty of the reconciliation process: It restores the primacy of the up-or-down vote. In the “regular order” — which is to say, the Senate’s customary procedure — the time for debate is unlimited, and if a minority of 40 senators refuses to stop talking, then you need 60 of them to invoke the rule that shuts the others up and allows the bill to come to vote. If you don’t have 60 votes to break the filibuster, it doesn’t matter if you have 50 votes to pass the bill.
via The 50-Vote Senate | The American Prospect.
Financial experts say recession ends by year’s end
OPS: From Yahoo Finance – buy this if it helps you get through the night. Without Manufacturing and laws protecting jobs in THIS country - will this be simply re-inflating the bubble for a short time?
Financial experts say recession ends by year’s end
Financial experts predict economic turnaround by year’s end
A group of financial wizards looked into their crystal ball Tuesday and saw some good news.
The recession will ease by the end of this year and companies will begin adding workers, signaling the end of the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression.
It was the 64th day of the Obama administration and Chicago-based Dow Jones Indexes assembled a group of financial experts to assess the impact of government actions, whether they will work to stem the recession and what opportunities that might present investors.
The recession has affected every region of the country and nearly every sector of the economy, said Gus Faucher, director of macroeconomics at Moody’s Economy.com, which conducts independent research and provides economic forecasts.
“It’s really unprecedented in the U.S. to have nearly the entire country in a recession simultaneously,” he said.
The good news is there’s an end in sight.
The economy will pull out of the recession at the end of this year, marking a duration of 24 months, about twice as long as the average post-World War II recession, Faucher said.
via Financial experts say recession ends by year’s end – Yahoo! Finance.
The Civil Heretic
The Civil Heretic
How Revered Scientist Became A Global-Warming Heretic
FOR MORE THAN HALF A CENTURY the eminent physicist Freeman Dyson has quietly resided in Princeton, N.J., on the wooded former farmland that is home to his employer, the Institute for Advanced Study, this country’s most rarefied community of scholars. Lately, however, since coming “out of the closet as far as global warming is concerned,” as Dyson sometimes puts it, there has been noise all around him. Chat rooms, Web threads, editors’ letter boxes and Dyson’s own e-mail queue resonate with a thermal current of invective in which Dyson has discovered himself variously described as “a pompous twit,” “a blowhard,” “a cesspool of misinformation,” “an old coot riding into the sunset” and, perhaps inevitably, “a mad scientist.” Dyson had proposed that whatever inflammations the climate was experiencing might be a good thing because carbon dioxide helps plants of all kinds grow. Then he added the caveat that if CO2 levels soared too high, they could be soothed by the mass cultivation of specially bred “carbon-eating trees,” whereupon the University of Chicago law professor Eric Posner looked through the thick grove of honorary degrees Dyson has been awarded — there are 21 from universities like Georgetown, Princeton and Oxford — and suggested that “perhaps trees can also be designed so that they can give directions to lost hikers.” Dyson’s son, George, a technology historian, says his father’s views have cooled friendships, while many others have concluded that time has cost Dyson something else. There is the suspicion that, at age 85, a great scientist of the 20th century is no longer just far out, he is far gone — out of his beautiful mind.
via Magazine Preview – The Civil Heretic – Freeman Dyson – Profile – NYTimes.com.
One in six psychiatrists has tried to ‘turn gays straight’
One in six psychiatrists has tried to ‘turn gays straight’
Therapists admit using harmful practices to ‘cure’ homosexuals despite evidence they do not work
Psychotherapists are offering to help “cure” gays and lesbians of their homosexuality without any evidence that such treatment is beneficial or safe. One in six said they had tried to turn gays straight, or reduce their gay or lesbian feelings, even though the mainstream medical view is that this is impossible.
The idea that homosexuality can be cured has a long and dubious history and the disclosure that a significant minority of therapists and doctors still think it is possible is “worrying”, Professor Michael King, of the University College Medical School, said. “Heaven knows what they do. We didn’t attempt to ask them because there is no evidence that anything works. We didn’t expect it to be happening at this rate and we are really rather concerned. It ought to stop. It is distressing and harmful and there is absolutely no evidence it works,” he said.
A study of more than 1,400 psychiatrists and therapists in BMC Psychiatry found that 222 (17 per cent) said they had treated at least one client to alter their homosexual feelings at some point. The researchers expected the cases to be concentrated in the past, but the 400 to 500 cases recorded were distributed evenly across the decades. “It is happening up to the present moment,” Professor King said. It might only be the “tip of the iceberg”.
Cities Deal With a Surge in Shantytowns
Cities Deal With a Surge in Shanty Towns
FRESNO, Calif. — As the operations manager of a outreach center for the homeless here, Paul Stack is used to seeing people down on their luck. What he had never seen before was people living in tents and lean-tos on the railroad lot across from the center.
“They just popped up about 18 months ago,” Mr. Stack said. “One day it was empty. The next day, there were people living there.”
Like a dozen or so other cities across the nation, Fresno is dealing
with an unhappy déjà vu: the arrival of modern-day Hoovervilles, illegal encampments of homeless people that are reminiscent, on a far smaller scale, of Depression-era shantytowns. At his news conference on Tuesday night, President Obama was asked directly about the tent cities and responded by saying that it was “not acceptable for children and families to be without a roof over their heads in a country as wealthy as ours.”
via Cities Deal With a Surge in Shantytowns – NYTimes.com.
US ballpark to sell 4,800-calorie burger
US ballpark to sell 4,800-calorie burger
A baseball park in Michigan has created an artery-busting hamburger containing 4,800 calories and is daring fans to eat the “snack,” promising a free t-shirt to anyone who succeeds.
In an apparent bid to cook up some comfort food during hard economic times, the West Michigan Whitecaps are offering fans a behemoth dubbed the Fifth Third Burger, named after the team’s ballpark and the meal’s five beef patties, which each weigh one third of a pound (136 grams).
The burger is smothered with chili, salsa, sour cream and a dollop of melted nacho-style cheese — topped off with Frito chips, lettuce, tomato and five slices of American cheese and laid out in a bun made with a pound (454 grams) of dough.
“Besides being unique and large and bizarre, it tastes good,” Whitecaps president Scott Lane told the Grand Rapids News.
via The Raw Story | US ballpark to sell 4,800-calorie burger.
Beck: Obama Is A ‘Manchurian Candidate’ Because He Uses A Teleprompter — But I Use One Too
OPS: These people are insane. They really shouldn’t be allowed out
Beck: Obama Is A ‘Manchurian Candidate’ Because He Uses A Teleprompter — But I Use One Too
If there are two things Fox News’ Glenn Beck loves, it’s conspiracy theories and a good right-wing attack line on President Obama. So it’s no surprise that he embraced the conservatives’ current outrage over Obama’s use of a teleprompter, spending the first 10 minutes of his radio show today railing about it.
Beck being Beck, he took it a step beyond others’ complaints, declaring that Obama’s use of a teleprompter is evidence that he’s a “Manchurian candidate”:
Rep. Barton: Climate change is ‘natural,’ humans should just ‘get shade.’
Rep. Barton: Climate change is ‘natural,’ humans should just ‘get shade.’
In a hearing today on adapting to climate change, Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX) denied the consensus on man-made climate change, saying it is “natural.” His solution to the warming planet? Just get some “shade”:
BARTON: I believe that Earth’s climate is changing, but I think it’s changing for natural variation reasons. And I think man-kind has been adopting, or adapting, to climate as long as man has walked the Earth. When it rains we find shelter. When it’s hot, we get shade. When it’s cold, we find a warm place to stay. Adaptation is the practical, affordable, utterly natural reflex response to nature when the planet is heating or cooling, as it always is.
“Nature doesn’t seem to adjust to people as much as people adjust to nature,” he added. “Adaptation to shifts in temperature is not that difficult.” Watch it:
via Think Progress » Rep. Barton: Climate change is ‘natural,’ humans should just ‘get shade.’.
Why secretly funded DEA surveillance planes aren’t flying | McClatchy
Why secretly funded DEA surveillance planes aren’t flying
WASHINGTON — The first sign of trouble with the Drug Enforcement Administration’s new surveillance planes surfaced almost immediately. On the way from the manufacturer to the agency’s aviation headquarters, one of them veered off a runway during a fuel stop.
The malfunction last spring was only the beginning. A month later, the windshield unlatched in mid-flight and smashed into the engine. Then, in a third incident on the same plane, a connection between the propeller and the engine came loose and forced an emergency landing.
In January, after less than 10 months of operation, the cascade of mechanical problems forced the DEA to ground the planes.
The planes recently were scheduled to be “cannibalized” so the DEA could sell the parts and recover as much of its money as possible.
via Why secretly funded DEA surveillance planes aren’t flying | McClatchy.
Nobel Laureate Dr. Joseph Stiglitz Says “The Geithner Plan Amounts To Robbery Of The American People”
Nobel Laureate Dr. Joseph Stiglitz Says “The Geithner Plan Amounts To Robbery Of The American People”
Joseph Stiglitz lambasted the White House bailout plan for Wall Street this morning. It’s a brutal rebuttal to the lies and half-truths we were fed all day yesterday by Timmaaay’s minions. Geithner’s plan is a thinly-veiled attempt to funnel even more taxpayer cash directly onto the balance sheets of failed banks.
It is intellectually dishonest and morally bankrupt. Congress voted a certain amount for TARP, and now Geithner is multiplying that sum without going back to Congress by doing all manner of clever-clever things with FDIC guarantees. That might be a good way of raising lots of cash for the banking system, but it’s a very bad way of getting political support.
From the Reuters interview:
The U.S. government plan to rid banks of toxic assets will rob American taxpayers by exposing them to too much risk and is unlikely to work as long as the economy remains weak, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz said on Tuesday.
“The Geithner plan is very badly flawed,” Stiglitz told Reuters in an interview during a Credit Suisse Asian Investment Conference in Hong Kong.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s plan to wipe up to US$1 trillion in bad debt off banks’ balance sheets, unveiled on Monday, offered “perverse incentives,” Stiglitz said.
Journalist William Greider & Bill Moyers
Journalist William Greider
by: Bill Moyers Journal
PBS Airtime: Friday, March 27, 2009, at 9:00 p.m. EST on PBS check local listings.
For years, best-selling author William Greider sounded the alarm about Washington’s unholy alliance with Wall Street and the failure of the Federal Reserve and other regulators to take preventive measures to avoid disaster. Now, he offers some suggestions to the question everyone is asking: “What do we do now?” Also, the Journal profiles James Thindwa, whose campaign for economic fairness for working people in Chicago has brought him up against the city’s powerful political establishment and corporate giant Wal-Mart. For Thindwa, the battle is never over.
via t r u t h o u t | Journalist William Greider.
Exclusive: Diebold ‘Nukes’ Humboldt County!
Exclusive: Diebold ‘Nukes’ Humboldt County!
Terminates all contracts – including voter registration system – following California county’s discovery, disclosure of major flaws in Diebold/Premier voting systems…
At the California Secretary of State’s public hearing regarding the possible decertification of Diebold’s tabulator systems, GEMS v1.18.19, in relation to the “Deck Zero” covert deletion of 197 ballots in the November election, the audit log’s magical “clear” button, and the GEMS audit logs failing to report when ballots were manually deleted by the operator, Diebold/Premier representatives tried to shift blame for the 197 deleted ballots onto Humboldt County, CA’s Registrar of Voters Carolyn Crnich.
Crnich responded, “If you’re saying that your system needs to be checked every damn time we turn it on, I agree with you.”
via The BRAD BLOG : Exclusive: Diebold ‘Nukes’ Humboldt County!.
The Argument for Health Reform
Download the full report (pdf)
Doctors and patients, employees and employers, the insured and the uninsured, and hospitals and taxpayers are all stakeholders in the health care reform debate now beginning in Washington. They may disagree on any number of reform measures, but they all agree on one basic fact—the U.S. health insurance market is broken. Lack of competition in this critical marketplace means poor transparency and accountability, resulting in costly health care that harms our national health, bleeds our personal finances and the federal budget, and hinders our economic competitiveness. None of this is acceptable amid the worst slide in economic growth in 60 years.
Fortunately, our nation’s health insurance market can be fixed with a big dose of what fixes most sectors of our economy—healthy, well-supervised competition. One of the best ways to introduce this much-needed competition is for the federal government to offer a public health insurance plan that can compete with private insurers within an insurance “exchange” that ensures public and private health insurance plans compete equally and transparently in the public marketplace.
via Competitive Health Care: A Public Health Insurance Plan that Delivers Market Discipline.
Wrestling fans ‘hate George W. Bush more than the sledgehammer molester.’
Wrestling fans ‘hate George W. Bush more than the sledgehammer molester.’
Peter Rugg, a blogger for The Pitch, a local Kansas City arts and entertainment newspaper, wrote yesterday about his experience the previous evening attending WWE’s Monday Night Raw. Rugg noted that during the show, “there were two touching tributes to the military men and women serving in the Middle East,” one of which came from former President Bush. And according to Rugg, once Bush appeared on the arena’s television screens, he received “thunderous boos“:
via Think Progress » Wrestling fans ‘hate George W. Bush more than the sledgehammer molester.’.
Ford spokesman responds: ‘I agree with you about the rantings of the hopelessly pig-headed Mr. O’Reilly.’
Ford spokesman responds: ‘I agree with you about the rantings of the hopelessly pig-headed Mr. O’Reilly.’
fMark Schirmer, a spokesman for Ford Motor Company (which owns Lincoln and Volvo), contacted ThinkProgress this afternoon, in response to your emails calling on O’Reilly’s corporate advertisers to stop supporting the O’Reilly Harassment Machine. Schirmer said he agrees with the thrust of ThinkProgress’ criticisms of O’Reilly, but explained that Ford advertises on the show because it has high ratings:
Hope in the Mountains
Hope in the Mountains – by Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Yesterday was a great day for the people of Appalachia and for all of America. In a bold departure from Bush-era energy policy, the Obama administration suspended a coal company’s permit to dump debris from its proposed mountaintop mining operation into a West Virginia valley and stream. In addition, the administration promised to carefully review upward of 200 such permits awaiting approval by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
With yesterday’s action, President Obama has signaled his intention to save this region. His moratorium on these permits will allow the administration to develop a sensible long-term approach to dealing with this catastrophic method of coal extraction.
I join hundreds of Appalachia’s embattled communities in applauding this news. Having flown over the coalfields of Appalachia and walked her ridges, valleys and hollows, I know that this land cannot withstand more abuse. Mountaintop-removal coal mining is the greatest environmental tragedy ever to befall our nation.
via Hope in the Mountains | CommonDreams.org.
Plans to Kill Plants Along US/Mexico Border Reminiscent of Agent Orange Use
Plans to Kill Plants Along US/Mexico Border Reminiscent of Agent Orange Use – by Dane Schiller
The U.S. Border Patrol plans to poison the plant life along a 1.1-mile stretch of the Rio Grande riverbank as soon as Wednesday to get rid of the hiding places used by smugglers, robbers and illegal immigrants
If successful, the $2.1 million pilot project could later be duplicated along as many as 130 miles of river in the patrol’s Laredo Sector, as well as other parts of the U.S.-Mexico border.
Although Border Patrol and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials say the chemical is safe for animals, detractors say the experiment is reminiscent of the Vietnam War-era Agent Orange chemical program and raises questions about long-term effects.
“We don’t believe that is even moral,” said Jay Johnson-Castro Sr., executive director of the Rio Grande International Study Center, located at Laredo Community College, adjacent to the planned test area.
“It is unprecedented that they’d do it in a populated area,” he said of spraying the edge of the Rio Grande as it weaves between the cities of Laredo and Nuevo Laredo, Mexico.
via Plans to Kill Plants Along US/Mexico Border Reminiscent of Agent Orange Use | CommonDreams.org.
US Interior Chief Touts Renewable Energy Zones
US Interior Chief Touts Renewable Energy Zones
by Russell Blinch
WASHINGTON – The Obama Administration is carving out renewable energy zones across the country and offshore, and is preparing to work with critics who object to wind turbines or solar farms near wilderness or tourist areas, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said on Tuesday.
“You have a map that starts out as a very huge map that shows you have the huge potential for solar energy in the Southwest but then you have to overlay that with areas such as national parks and national monuments, where we won’t allow any development of renewable energy facilities,” Salazar said.
He said planners also will figure out ways to obtain alternative energy while still protecting endangered species.
While the process won’t be easy, Salazar said the country needs to develop its huge potential in renewable energy, especially off the Atlantic coast where he forsees rapid development of massive wind farms.
“You are going to see significant conflict over renewable energy and how we site renewable energy facilities,” Salazar told Reuters in an interview.
via US Interior Chief Touts Renewable Energy Zones | CommonDreams.org.
Federal Judge Says No to Modified Crops on US Refuge Land
Federal Judge Says No to Modified Crops on US Refuge Land – by Bill Lambrecht
WASHINGTON – In a court case with potential impact in Missouri and across the country, a federal judge in Delaware ruled today that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife should not have permitted farming with genetically modified crops on a national wildlife refuge.
U.S. District Judge Gregory Sleet wrote that the Fish and Wildlife agency erred by failing to conduct environmental studies to determine whether farming with genetically modified crops at the Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge in Delaware was compatible with conservation and habitat preservation.
The Fish and Wildlife Service, Sleet wrote, does “not contest that their own biologists determined that these activities posed significant environmental risks to Prime Hook, including biological contamination, increased weed resistance and damage to soils.”
The successful suit was brought by the Audubon Society in Delaware and two Washington-based nonprofits, the Center for Food Safety and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.
via Federal Judge Says No to Modified Crops on US Refuge Land | CommonDreams.org.
Study: Range of Pharmaceuticals in Fish Across US
Study: Range of Pharmaceuticals in Fish Across US – by Martha Mendoza
Fish caught near wastewater treatment plants serving five major U.S. cities had residues of pharmaceuticals in them, including medicines used to treat high cholesterol, allergies, high blood pressure, bipolar disorder and depression, researchers reported Wednesday.
Findings from this first nationwide study of human drugs in fish tissue have prompted the Environmental Protection Agency to significantly expand similar ongoing research to more than 150 different locations.
“The average person hopefully will see this type of a study and see the importance of us thinking about water that we use every day, where does it come from, where does it go to? We need to understand this is a limited resource and we need to learn a lot more about our impacts on it,” said study co-author Bryan Brooks, a Baylor University researcher and professor who has published more than a dozen studies related to pharmaceuticals in the environment.
A person would have to eat hundreds of thousands of fish dinners to get even a single therapeutic dose, Brooks said. But researchers including Brooks have found that even extremely diluted concentrations of pharmaceutical residues can harm fish, frogs and other aquatic species because of their constant exposure to contaminated water.
via Study: Range of Pharmaceuticals in Fish Across US | CommonDreams.org.
Obama Channeling Bush on State Secrets Claim
Obama Channeling Bush on State Secrets Claim - by Carrie Johnson 
Like Predecessor, New Justice Dept. Claiming Privilege
Civil liberties advocates are accusing the Obama administration of forsaking campaign rhetoric and adopting the same expansive arguments that his predecessor used to cloak some of the most sensitive intelligence-gathering programs of the Bush White House.
The first signs have come just weeks into the new administration, in a case filed by an Oregon charity suspected of funding terrorism. President Obama’s Justice Department not only sought to dismiss the lawsuit by arguing that it implicated “state secrets,” but also escalated the standoff — proposing that government lawyers might take classified documents from the court’s custody to keep the charity’s representatives from reviewing them.
The suit by the al-Haramain Islamic Foundation has proceeded further than any other in challenging the use of warrantless wiretaps, threatening to expose the inner workings of that program. It is the second time the new Justice Department has followed its predecessors in claiming the state-secrets privilege, which would allow the government to exclude evidence in a civil case on grounds that it jeopardizes national security.
via Obama Channeling Bush on State Secrets Claim | CommonDreams.org.
Stimulus Appears to Be Sparking Alt-Energy Revival
Stimulus Appears to Be Sparking Alt-Energy Revival -by: Nathanial Gronewold
But clean-tech still must clear the hurdle of a frozen credit market.
New York – There are signs that the federal stimulus might be pumping a little life into the alternative-energy industry.
Financiers and law firms specializing in renewable energy say they see growing interest in reviving moribund projects and breaking ground on new deals. And while big banks that have braced the industry’s backbone are still on the fence, some hedge funds and private equity and venture capital firms are cautiously looking to take advantage of stimulus provisions that temporarily eliminate the need for tax equity financing, which has long been a mainstay for renewable energy projects.
via t r u t h o u t | Stimulus Appears to Be Sparking Alt-Energy Revival.
Cheney War Crimes: Just Look at the Statute
Cheney War Crimes: Just Look at the Statute – by Matthew Rothschild
President Obama needs to tell Attorney General Eric Holder to indict Dick Cheney, right now, for war crimes.
Just look at the statute, Title 18 of the U.S. Criminal Code, Section 2441. It says that someone is guilty of a war crime if he or she commits a “grave breach of common Article 3″ of the Geneva Conventions. And then it defines what a grave breach would be.
One such breach is torture, or the conspiracy to commit torture, which Cheney was clearly in on, as when he repeatedly defended waterboarding and talked about the need to go to the “dark side” Here’s the language from the statute: “The act of a person who commits, or conspires to commit, an act specifically intended to inflict severe physical or mental pain or suffering . . . upon another person within his custody or physical control for the purpose of obtaining information or a confession, punishment, intimidation, coercion, or any reason based on discrimination of any kind.”
Another grave breach is “cruel or inhuman treatment,” or the conspiracy to inflict such treatment. Again, Cheney was supervising such treatment in the White House, which would qualify as committing this crime. One time, it got so ghoulish that Attorney General John Ashcroft asked the other principals, “Why are we talking about this in the White House? History will not judge this kindly.”
Here’s the language on “cruel or inhuman treatment”: “The act of a person who commits, or conspires or attempts to commit, an act intended to inflict severe or serious physical or mental pain or suffering . . . including serious physical abuse, upon another within his custody or control.”
via Cheney War Crimes: Just Look at the Statute | CommonDreams.org.
Pentagon Exploring Robot Killers That Can Fire on Their Own
OPS: It’s sure going to be easier to go to war once we have these babies! Then we can remotely patrol our neighborhoods, schools, offices…..
Pentagon Exploring Robot Killers That Can Fire on Their Own – by Robert S. Boyd
WASHINGTON – The unmanned bombers that frequently cause unintended civilian casualties in Pakistan are a step toward an even more lethal generation of robotic hunters-killers that operate with limited, if any, human control.
The Defense Department is financing studies of autonomous, or self-governing, armed robots that could find and destroy targets on their own. On-board computer programs, not flesh-and-blood people, would decide whether to fire their weapons.
“The trend is clear: Warfare will continue and autonomous robots will ultimately be deployed in its conduct,” Ronald Arkin, a robotics expert at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, wrote in a study (.pdf) commissioned by the Army.
“The pressure of an increasing battlefield tempo is forcing autonomy further and further toward the point of robots making that final, lethal decision,” he predicted. “The time available to make the decision to shoot or not to shoot is becoming too short for remote humans to make intelligent informed decisions.”
via Pentagon Exploring Robot Killers That Can Fire on Their Own | CommonDreams.org.
Pistachios recalled over fears of salmonella –
Pistachios recalled over fears of salmonella - by Lynne Terry, The Oregonian
First peanuts, now pistachio nuts.
The Georgia Nut Co., which is based in Illinois, said today it is recalling pistachio nuts after lab tests came up positive for salmonella.
The recall, issued by the Food and Drug Administration, covers shelled pistachios sold in packages and in bulk in stores in Wisconsin and Illinois and through the company’s Web site.
None of the nuts were sold in Oregon, said Doug Plunkett, spokesman for Georgia Nut Co.
He said routine testing showed there was salmonella in one batch from one supplier. He said pistachio nuts from that company had already been sold to retailers, prompting the recall.
“This has nothing to do with peanuts,” he said, adding that no illnesses have been associated with the nuts.
This is not the first salmonella-related recall associated with pistachio nuts, said Stephanie Kwisnek, a spokeswoman for the FDA.
via Pistachios recalled over fears of salmonella – OregonLive.com.
Insurance Industry is Simply a Parasite Feeding on the US Health System
OPS: I”ve been calling the health care Insurance Industry a Parasitic Dinosaur for years. Good to have others see it that way too.
Insurance Industry is Simply a Parasite Feeding on the US Health System – By Dave Lindorff
As the country contemplates a major reform and restructuring of the way we run our national health care system (if it can even be called that), it needs to be pointed out that the mammoth health insurance industry is nothing but a parasite on that system.
Health insurance companies add zero value to the delivery of health care. Indeed, they are a significant cost factor that sucks up, according to some estimates such as one by the organization Physicians for a National Health Program, as much as 31 percent of every dollar spent on medical services (a percentage that has been rising steadily year after year).
Insurance companies are damaging in more ways than simply cost, though.
They also actively interfere in the delivery of quality medical care, as anyone who has had to battle with some “nurse” on the phone at an insurance company to get required pre-authorization for needed procedure can attest. Just recently, the editor of a local weekly alternative paper in Philadelphia, Brian Hinkey, the victim of a near fatal hit-and-run accident last year who spent several days in a coma, and has been working hard to regain the use of all his limbs and faculties, reported in an opinion piece in the Philadelphia Inquirer on how his insurer after a few successful weeks of in-hospital rehab, denied him coverage for six critical weeks for out-patient rehab services, though every specialist on head injuries knows that early, consistent therapy is crucial to recovery of lost brain function.
This kind of human abuse is standard operating procedure for companies whose bottom lines are fattened the more services they can deny to insured clients. My own father, once doomed by a metastasized cancer following prostate surgery, was saved by a procedure offered by a physician in Atlanta that his Blue Cross plan in Connecticut refused to pay for. He had to finance the expensive treatment himself.
via Insurance Industry is Simply a Parasite Feeding on the US Health System | AfterDowningStreet.org.
Diebold CFO steps down in wake of revenue-recognition probe
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Diebold Inc. said Wednesday that its chief financial officer stepped down after he received a notice of possible enforcement action by regulators, in connection with an ongoing probe into how the company booked revenue from 2003 to 2006.
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Diebold Inc. said Wednesday that its chief financial officer stepped down after he received a notice of possible enforcement action by regulators, in connection with an ongoing probe into how the company booked revenue from 2003 to 2006.
via Diebold CFO steps down in wake of revenue-recognition probe – MarketWatch.
Howard Dean To Announce Major New Campaign On Health Care Reform
Howard Dean To Announce Major New Campaign On Health Care Reform
Looks like Howard Dean is well on his way to finding a post-DNC niche, and he won’t be needing the Obama administration to find it for him.
On a conference call with supporters later today, Dean will make a surprise announcement, unveiling a major new health care campaign that will gear up his political operation to pressure the White House and Congress to preserve a public insurance option as part of health care reform, I’m told.
The campaign will be called “Stand With Dr. Dean,” and its immediate goal is to build up a membership of a quarter million in the next few months, relying on the million-strong email list of Democracy for America, Dean’s political operation. The eventual goal is to organize and door-knock to build support for the public insurance option in Congressional districts across the country, DFA executive director Arshad Hasan tells me.
Supporters of Dean — a former doctor who has been looking for a meaningful way of impacting the coming health care reform push — were furious with Obama aides for not giving Dean a health care-related spot in the administration. This new project to push Obama and Congress towards a public option is Dean’s post-DNC solution, and his political operation could have a real impact on the coming health care debate.
via Howard Dean To Announce Major New Campaign On Health Care Reform | The Plum Line.
The Weight Loss Hype: Why Counting Calories Never Works
The Weight Loss Hype: Why Counting Calories Never Works
We’ve known for more than a decade that the key to weight-loss is to consume fewer calories than you’re burning–in other words, eat less, exercise more, or both. That dietary adage was confirmed last week by researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health, with a widely reported study in the New England Journal of Medicine.
In the study, researchers put 811 overweight adults on one of four weight loss plans, which were supposed to vary widely in fat, protein, and carbohydrate content. Most of the reporting discussed Atkins-style high protein diets as similar to the diet’s high protein plan and Ornish-style low fat vegetarian diets as similar to the study’s low fat plan. Since everyone who cut out 750 calories per day from their diets lost basically the same amount of weight, the take home message seemed to be that none of the popular diets are any better than any of the others.
But upon closer analysis, a very different conclusion emerges.
via Kathy Freston: The Weight Loss Hype: Why Counting Calories Never Works.
Young Americans See Colbert, Stewart Replacing Traditional News Outlets: Poll
Young Americans See Colbert, Stewart Replacing Traditional News Outlets: Poll
A new poll released Wednesday by Rasmussen Reports found that about one-third of Americans under the age of 40 believe that shows like The Daily Show and The Colbert Report are replacing “traditional” news outlets.
Thirty-two percent (32%) of adults ages 30-39 believe this to be true, while 42% disagree, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.
Thirty percent (30%) of those ages 18-29 say programs like the two Comedy Central shows that feature news reports with a comic twist are replacing traditional news outlets, but 35% disagree and another 35% are not sure.
via Young Americans See Colbert, Stewart Replacing Traditional News Outlets: Poll.
Sen. Sanders Blocking Vote to Confirm Obama Nominee Who Worked to Deregulate Credit Default Swaps
OPS: Video, Audio, Transcript, MP3 download
Sen. Sanders Blocking Vote to Confirm Obama Nominee Who Worked to Deregulate Credit Default Swaps
Democracy Now!
We speak with Independent Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who is attempting to block President Obama’s nominee to head the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Gary Gensler, a former Goldman Sachs employee. “Gensler worked with Sen. Phil Gramm and Alan Greenspan to exempt credit default swaps from regulation, which led to the collapse of A.I.G. and has resulted in the largest taxpayer bailout in U.S. history,” Sanders said. [includes rush transcript]
Sen. Bernie Sanders, independent senator from Vermont. He was elected to the Senate in 2006 after serving sixteen years in the House. He is the longest-serving independent member of Congress in American history.
Clinton: Mexico Violence Fueled By America’s ‘Insatiable’ Demand For Drugs
OPS: No Hill – it’s fueled by stupid, failed, antiquated, draconian, Authoritarian and Fascistic Drug Laws. Just like previous prohibition laws. And you hold some responsibility for these.
Clinton: Mexico Violence Fueled By America’s ‘Insatiable’ Demand For Drugs
MEXICO CITY — U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Wednesday that America’s “insatiable” demand for illegal drugs and inability to stop weapons smuggling into Mexico are fueling an alarming spike in violence along the U.S.-Mexican border.
Clinton said the United States shares responsibility with Mexico for dealing with the violence. She said the administration will work with Mexican authorities to improve security on both sides of the border.
“Our insatiable demand for illegal drugs fuels the drug trade,” she said. “Our inability to prevent weapons from being illegally smuggled across the border to arm these criminals causes the deaths of police officers, soldiers and civilians.”
via Clinton: Mexico Violence Fueled By America’s ‘Insatiable’ Demand For Drugs.
Bill Bennett: Conservative Idea That Press In Love With Obama Disproven (VIDEO)
Bill Bennett: Conservative Idea That Press In Love With Obama Disproven (VIDEO)
Conservative radio host and CNN contributor Bill Bennett shot down conservatives who claim the press is in love with President Obama during Tuesday night’s post-conference analysis on CNN.
“There is a conservative strand of thinking that says the press is in love with Barack Obama. Not tonight,” Bennett said. “He went through a murderer’s row, from Jake Tapper to Chip Reid and CNN’s own Ed Henry. And you saw a flash of anger from the President at Ed Henry.”
Henry’s exchange with President Obama, seen below, was one of the evening’s more memorable moments, with Henry repeating his question about AIG bonuses after being dissatisfied with the President’s response.
via Bill Bennett: Conservative Idea That Press In Love With Obama Disproven (VIDEO).
No joke in April Fool’s Day computer worm
No joke in April Fool’s Day computer worm
(CNN) — A computer-science detective story is playing out on the Internet as security experts try to hunt down a worm called Conficker C and prevent it from damaging millions of computers on April Fool’s Day.
The anti-worm researchers have banded together in a group they call the Conficker Cabal. Members are searching for the malicious software program’s author and for ways to do damage control if he or she can’t be stopped.
They’re motivated in part by a $250,000 bounty from Microsoft and also by what seems to be a sort of Dick Tracy ethic.
“We love catching bad guys,” said Alvin Estevez, CEO of Enigma Software Group, which is one of many companies trying to crack Conficker. “We’re like former hackers who like to catch other hackers. To us, we get almost a feather in our cap to be able to knock out that worm. We slap each other five when we’re killing those infections.”
The malicious program already is thought to have infected between 5 million and 10 million computers.
more………….via No joke in April Fool’s Day computer worm – CNN.com.
IBM Preparing For US Layoffs in Services Unit
IBM Preparing For US Layoffs in Services Unit
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Aaron Brown: Photography
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IBM announced on Wednesday it will lay off a large number of U.S. employees in its global-businesses services unit and many of the positions will be transferred to IBM employees in India, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The number of jobs that will be affected was not reported.
The planned domestic layoff is a said to be a sign that more companies are turning toward cheaper Asian labor in order to slash costs and navigate through the global recession.
White House team to overhaul fiendish US tax code
White House team to overhaul fiendish US tax code
The White House Wednesday announced a new task force headed by former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker to reform the Byzantine US tax code in the hope of recouping billions in lost revenue.
White House budget chief Peter Orszag said Volcker and four other top economists will report their recommendations back to President Barack Obama by December 4, and their review will cover three main areas.
“One is tax simplification, the second is closing tax loopholes and reducing tax evasion, and the third is reducing corporate welfare,” the director of the Office of Management and Budget told reporters.
Orszag said the Volcker panel would also examine offshore tax havens, a major agenda item for Obama and other Group of 20 leaders at a summit convening in London next week to address the global economic crisis.
via The Raw Story | White House team to overhaul fiendish US tax code.
FBI Director Asks Lawmakers to Renew Patriot Act Provisions
FBI Director Asks Lawmakers to Renew Patriot Act Provisions – By Carrie Johnson
FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III today urged lawmakers to move swiftly to renew intelligence-gathering measures set to expire in December, calling them “exceptional” tools to help protect national security.
Mueller told members of the Senate Judiciary Committee that he hoped that the reauthorization of two provisions contained in the Patriot Act would be far less “controversial” than in previous years. During the Bush administration, the law drove a wedge between investigators seeking to detect terrorist threats and advocates warning that it trampled on Americans’ civil liberties.
In response to a question from Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Mueller said that his agents had used a provision that helped authorities secure access to business records about 220 times between 2004 and 2007. Data for last year was not yet available, Mueller said.
The measure, known as section 215 after its location in the Patriot Act, has been criticized by the American Civil Liberties Union as allegedly violating the First Amendment rights of U.S. citizens. It allows investigators probing terrorism to seek a suspect’s records from third parties such as financial services, travel and telephone companies without notifying the suspect.
“It has been exceptionally helpful in our national security investigations,” the FBI director said.
via FBI Director Asks Lawmakers to Renew Patriot Act Provisions.
Obama doesn’t call on a single major US newspaper at press conference
Obama doesn’t call on a single major US newspaper at press conference
While President Obama took great pains to call on reporters from ethnic and foreign news establishments at Tuesday’s press conference, the president didn’t call on a single major US newspaper.
As once mighty Grey Ladies across the country are ceasing publication or cutting their print editions entirely to publish only online, the president’s decision to not call on any of the country’s most respected papers raises the question of whether anyone, outside of print reporters, truly cares about the continued demise of newspapers.
via The Raw Story | Obama doesn’t call on a single major US newspaper at press conference.
Dean smacks down Scarborough: Budget criticism ‘total nonsense’
Dean smacks down Scarborough: Budget criticism ‘total nonsense’
Two days after joining CNBC as a contributor, former DNC chair Howard Dean tangoed with the conservative leaning host of a morning show on a sister network.
On his Morning Joe show, MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough criticized President Obama’s budget proposal Wednesday morning, claiming that it was similar to what the GOP did during “eight years of recklessness.”
“Did we choose this? He always talks about moving this in a new direction. Fiscally, this is going down the same path that George Bush and Republicans took us down eight years,” Scarborough asserted.
Dean interrupted, “Joe, that’s total nonsense.”
via The Raw Story | Dean smacks down Scarborough: Budget criticism ‘total nonsense’.
Cantor: The Public Is ‘Finally Waking Up’ To The Fascist ‘One-Party Government’ In Washington D.C.
Cantor: The Public Is ‘Finally Waking Up’ To The Fascist ‘One-Party Government’ In Washington D.C.
C-SPAN’s Washington Journal hosted House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) this morning. During the segment, a caller phoned in to “thank” Cantor “and [Rep.] Michele Bachmann [R-MN] and all of the conservatives that are doing such a great job.”
The caller then said it’s “insanity” that there are “people” drinking “from the kool-aid” who “seem to think that there is a magical tree of money behind Washington,” adding that the country is descending into “fascism.” In response, Cantor said the public is “finally waking up” to this and that the GOP is trying to bring President Obama “back into the mainstream”:
CALLER: But what really is scaring the rest of us, the other half of us, is the fascism. I mean the true fascism that is happening in this country today. […] The belligerent takeover of a one-party system. […]
CANTOR: Now as far as a one-party government in here, I think what the public is doing they’re finally waking up and everybody is realizing that checks and balances are a part of the system and divided government is something that is beneficial to a balanced debate, and something that can produce a better outcome. Which is exactly why Republicans in the House have said, “Look, we want to work with our colleagues on the other side of the aisle. We want to try to bring this president back into the mainstream.”
Watch it: at link
Its not surprising that instead of denouncing the caller’s attacks, Cantor simply ran with them, as it appears that demonizing President Obama’s agenda is all the Republicans on Capitol Hill can come up with in opposition.
Indeed, shortly after Obama’s election victory, one GOP congressman compared one of Obama’s proposals to “what Hitler did in Nazi Germany.” In fact, Cantor’s colleagues in the Republican leadership have been fanning the flames as well. House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) called Obama’s budget proposal “a new American socialist experiment” while Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN), the third-ranking House Republican, denounced Obama’s economic agenda as “European-style socialism.”
Transcript:
Iran considering the death penalty for ‘offensive’ bloggers.
OPS: Dude! Bet thy got the idea from Cheney
Iran considering the death penalty for ‘offensive’ bloggers.
Al Jazeera’s Nazanin Sadri reports that Iran is considering a new law that would allow the death penalty for “offensive” bloggers:
Under a strict interpretation of Islamic law, Individuals can be sentenced to death for two main categories of crime. The first is murder. The second is known as ‘fasad,’ which means spreading mischief or undermining the authority or stability of the state. What that constitutes is open to interpretation. In the past it has been applied to rape, adultery, drug-related offenses, and homosexual behavior. Iran now wants to introduce the death penalty for bloggers who write about and promote illegal activities.
via Think Progress » Iran considering the death penalty for ‘offensive’ bloggers..
The Right-Wing Echo Chamber In Action: How A Conspiracy Travels From Drudge To Obama, Via Fox News
The Right-Wing Echo Chamber In Action: How A Conspiracy Travels From Drudge To Obama, Via Fox News
Earlier this week, China’s Central bank Governor Zhou Xiaochuan suggested the need for a “super-sovereign reserve currency,” a move most passed off as China trying to “flex some muscle.” And yet, within days, Fox News’ Major Garrett was demanding whether President Obama supported a “global currency.”
So how did a story that has effectively no basis in reality — and has nothing to do with a global currency — end up as one of the few questions posed to President Obama last night? It started with a blaring banner on the instigator of conservative and media memes, the Drudge Report:
Within hours, right-wing fanatic Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) was demanding that Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke pledge to never adopt a “global currency.” Soon, Fox News’ resident conspiracy theorist Glenn Beck was ranting that a U.N.-imposed global currency was the first step toward world government:
TAKE ACTION: Tell O’Reilly’s Advertisers To Stop Supporting The O’Reilly Harassment Machine
TAKE ACTION: Tell O’Reilly’s Advertisers To Stop Supporting The O’Reilly Harassment Machine
Fox News host Bill O’Reilly employs producers charged with the specific mission of ambushing and harassing those who have said critical things about him. O’Reilly has not only stalked and accosted ThinkProgress deputy editor Amanda Terkel, but he has also targeted at least 40 other individuals in much the same way.
If O’Reilly wanted statements from his opponents, there are alternative, more responsible ways of eliciting responses. Amanda was never asked to appear on The O’Reilly Factor, nor did the show ever reach out to ThinkProgress for comment prior to their decision to stalk her.
This isn’t “journalism” — it’s a mafia-style harassment operation. It’s a campaign of intimidation and an unethical practice that amounts to an invasion of privacy. As Amanda said of her own altercation with O’Reilly’s crew: “It was incredibly disturbing. The rest of the weekend, I was constantly looking over my shoulder, wondering how long they had been following me, if they’re still following me.”
Specter takes quarter million dollars from union buster in 2008 then turns back on workers
Specter takes quarter million dollars from union buster in 2008 then turns back on workers
Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) has spent a career crafting an image of independence and integrity. Yesterday he sacrificed both when he turned his back on the working people in his state. Specter announced that he would not vote to allow the Employee Free Choice Act to receive an up or down vote on the Senate floor; a move that some consider fatal to the legislation. In a statement on the Senate floor he waxed eloquent about his belief that a difficult economic climate is no time for workers to receive a living wage.
CalPERS, CalSTRS Take BofA to Court
CalPERS, CalSTRS Take BofA to Court
NEW YORK CITY-The nation’s two largest state public pension funds, California Public Employees Retirement System and California State Teachers Retirement System, filed a joint motion in federal court here seeking to be designated lead plaintiff in a suit against Bank of America stemming from its merger with Merrill Lynch. The motion was filed Monday in US District Court for the Southern District of New York.
The California pension funds–which together own 21 million Bank of America shares, and both of which are active in commercial real estate nationwide–join eight other shareholder lawsuits filed against the Charlotte, NC bank. CalPERS says filing for lead plaintiff enables lawsuits to be consolidated and managed effectively.
Geoffrey Miller, New York University law professor, tells GlobeSt.com that CalPERS frequently acts as a lead plaintiff because “under the governing statute it is quite often the party with the largest financial stake in the litigation, and because it has a bit of an activist stance towards managerial issues.”
via CalPERS, CalSTRS Take BofA to Court.
Commentary: GOP means ‘Got 0 Plans’
Commentary: GOP means ‘Got 0 Plans’
(CNN) — I love Alex Castellanos. Heck, somebody has to. Truth is, we’ve been known to break bread after our CNN gigs. He is engaging and amusing and whip-smart.
But when he said Tuesday night on CNN that President Obama is already looking like a one-term president, he’s full of more beans than a burrito at Matt’s El Rancho back home in Austin, Texas.
Obama inherited an ungodly mess: a $1.2 trillion deficit, an economy that was careening from recession into depression, a collapse in effective demand, the disintegration of the real estate market and a financial meltdown that spanned the globe and brought multibillion-dollar institutions to their knees. That’s not to mention Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, North Korea and the Mexican drug war.
If this were “Sesame Street,” the announcer would be saying, “This program brought to you by the letters G, O and P.” None of the crises the president is addressing were of his creation. All of them were created or worsened by the Republicans who ran the House of Representatives, Senate and White House for years.
via Commentary: GOP means ‘Got 0 Plans’ – CNN.com.
How The News Networks Lie by Telling the Truth
How The News Networks Lie by Telling the Truth
Watch and learn how the news media can tell you the truth yet still lie. It is a very simple yet very common form of media deception. Learn to spot it so you won’t get fooled any more!
via How The News Networks Lie by Telling the Truth.
Jindal defends those who want Obama to fail
Jindal defends those who want Obama to fail
- It’s OK for Republicans to want President Obama to fail if they think he’s jeopardizing the country, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal told members of his political party Tuesday night.
Jindal described the premise of the question — “Do you want the president to fail?” — as the “latest gotcha game” being perpetrated by Democrats against Republicans.
“Make no mistake: Anything other than an immediate and compliant, ‘Why no sir, I don’t want the president to fail,’ is treated as some sort of act of treason, civil disobedience or political obstructionism,” Jindal said at a political fundraiser attended by 1,200 people. “This is political correctness run amok.”
Since conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh said that he hoped that Obama would fail, Republicans have been pressed by Democrats and the media about Limbaugh’s comments.
Jindal, a potential 2012 presidential candidate, told the Republican audience he would “not be brow beaten on this, and I will not kowtow to their correctness.”
via Jindal defends those who want Obama to fail – CNN.com.
Tell Specter: Let the Senate Vote on Employee Free Choice
Tell Senator Specter:
Allow the Senate to vote on the Employee Free Choice Act
Last month we sent an email asking whether Senator Specter was on the side of Rush Limbaugh or on the side of working families. Yesterday he answered the question. Specter came down solidly on the side of Limbaugh and the CEOs of Citigroup, Bank of America and Goldman Sachs.
Specter said he will not allow a Senate vote on the Employee Free Choice Act. In a textbook example of irony, Specter said his reason was his belief in the sanctity of majority voting as a cornerstone of our democracy.
Specter said he will impose his will and refuse to allow the Senate to vote on the Employee Free Choice Act, despite the fact that it is favored by a majority of his fellow Senators, a majority in the House of Representatives, and most importantly, a majority of the American people. Specter said he will use an antiquated Senate rule that allows a minority to block votes to keep this popular bill from passing.
via Keystone Progress Blog: Tell Specter: Let the Senate Vote on Employee Free Choice.
Evan Bayh: from possible Obama VP to backstabber
Evan Bayh: from possible Obama VP to backstabber
A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS by Chad Rubel
If we go back all the way to the third full week in August 2008, we saw that there were three unofficial nominees for Barack Obama’s running mate: now VP Joe Biden, Virginia Governor Tim Kaine, and Senator Evan Bayh (D-IN). Bayh seemed to be the odd figure in that group: he was plenty conservative and a huge Hillary Clinton supporter when she ran for president. But despite the differences and potential awkwardness, Obama thought highly of him to seriously consider him for the job.
You would think that such trust and appreciation would lend itself well in future interactions. But seven months later, Bayh is leading a group of Democrats committed to halting necessary legislation that Obama thinks we need to get this country moving forward again.
As the O’Jays put it, “They smile in your face; All the time they want to take your place; The back stabbers.”
Everyone is aware that there are moderate Democrats, some of them bending over backwards to please the Republican overlords. Watching Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) on Rachel Maddow’s show was nauseating enough. And some of those moderate Democrats don’t always feel the same way on several key issues.
via Evan Bayh: from possible Obama VP to backstabber | BuzzFlash.org.
Danish Theologian Criticizes Pope: Benedict XVI ‘Scorns Reality’
Benedict XVI ‘Scorns Reality’
A prominent Danish theologian, who is part of a commission set up to modernize the Vatican and the papacy, says that Pope Benedict XVI is out of touch with reality.
Pope Benedict XVI is the wrong man for the job in what has become a complex society, according to a Danish theologian who is part of a commission seeking to modernize the papacy.
“I have the greatest respect for Pope Benedict’s intellectual capacity. Theologically he is well-founded — he knows it all. But I don’t think he is the right man for the job. He forgets life,” says Professor Emeritus Peder Nørgaard-Højen in an interview with politiken.dk.
Ignoring Reality
Nørgaard-Højen, who has studied the Vatican and papacy for many years, has recently returned from meetings in an unusual Vatican commission composed of eight Catholics and eight Protestants. The commission is seeking to find ways to modernize the Vatican in an increasingly complex world.
Amsterdam launches ambitious electric cars scheme
Amsterdam launches ambitious electric cars scheme
Amsterdam wants all cars in the city to be electric by 2040.
The ‘Amsterdam Electric’ scheme was launched on Wednesday by the city’s environment alderman Marijke Vos, in a bid to cut exhaust emissions. The goal is to have 200,000 battery-driven vehicles in Amsterdam in 30 years’ time.
The city council plans to open 200 electric charging stations by 2012, with the first of them ready by the summer of this year. It proposes to introduce financial incentives for people to buy electric cars. Special parking spaces will also be reserved for electric vehicles.
via nrc.nl – International – Amsterdam launches ambitious electric cars scheme.
Israel: White Phosphorus Use Evidence of War Crimes
Israel: White Phosphorus Use Evidence of War Crimes
Source: Human Rights Watch
Reuters and AlertNet are not responsible for the content of this article or for any external internet sites. The views expressed are the author’s alone.
(Jerusalem) – Israel’s repeated firing of white phosphorus shells over densely populated areas of Gaza during its recent military campaign was indiscriminate and is evidence of war crimes, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today.
The 71-page report, “Rain of Fire: Israel’s Unlawful Use of White Phosphorus in Gaza,” provides witness accounts of the devastating effects that white phosphorus munitions had on civilians and civilian property in Gaza. Human Rights Watch researchers in Gaza immediately after hostilities ended found spent shells, canister liners, and dozens of burnt felt wedges containing white phosphorus on city streets, apartment roofs, residential courtyards, and at a United Nations school. The report also presents ballistics evidence, photographs, and satellite imagery, as well as documents from the Israeli military and government.
Militaries use white phosphorus primarily to obscure their operations on the ground by creating thick smoke. It can also be used as an incendiary weapon.
“In Gaza, the Israeli military didn’t just use white phosphorus in open areas as a screen for its troops,” said Fred Abrahams, senior emergencies researcher at Human Rights Watch and co-author of the report. “It fired white phosphorus repeatedly over densely populated areas, even when its troops weren’t in the area and safer smoke shells were available. As a result, civilians needlessly suffered and died.”
via Reuters AlertNet – Israel: White Phosphorus Use Evidence of War Crimes.
In Congressional Hearing on Bush’s Labor Dept. Ignoring and Lying to Workers, GOP Lawmakers Cry Wolf
In Congressional Hearing on Bush’s Labor Dept. Ignoring and Lying to Workers, GOP Lawmakers Cry Wolf
War On Families
AN ONGOING BUZZFLASH SERIES ON THE GOP ECONOMIC WAR AGAINST AMERICAN WORKING FAMILIES - by Meg White
A report out today from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) details widespread neglect and outright lies coming out of the Department of Labor’s office that records and investigates labor law violation complaints.
The report, through analysis of both actual cases as well as cases called in by undercover investigators posing as tipsters and stiffed workers, concluded that the division failed to investigate serious cases 19 percent of the time.
Gregory Kutz, managing director of Forensic Audits and Special Investigations at the GAO testified before the House Education and Labor Committee this morning about the investigation. He noted that the laxity at Wage and Hour Division (WHD) allowed some employers to feel safe in violating labor laws.
Dr. Doom Finds Promise in Obama’s Toxic-Asset Plan
OPS: Well, here’s one in favor anyway.
New York Times Deal Book: Dr. Doom Finds Promise in Obama’s Toxic-Asset Plan
Dr. Doom Finds Promise in Obama’s Toxic-Asset Plan
“Nouriel Roubini, a/k/a “Dr. Doom,” is giving the Obama administration’s new plan to buy toxic assets the thumbs up”
That may be surprising given how critical Mr. Roubini, the bearish economics professor at New York University, has been in the past regarding various government plans to fix the economy. But Mr. Roubini seems to have seen something he liked for a change.
“My take is generally positive, with a couple of caveats,” Mr. Roubini told DealBook about the new plan. He said he liked that the government was finally stepping up to clear the toxic assets off the bank’s balance sheet and that private capital would come in to make a market for it.
“Having five people bid on a toxic asset, rather than a clueless government, will ensure that the government doesn’t overpay,” Mr. Roubini said in a telephone interview. “People say, ‘the government is putting in 95 cents on the dollar, so why not put 100,’ to do it all by itself. It’s because private-sector participants have the incentive to get the best price.”
It wasn’t all positive: Mr. Roubini said he did not like that banks have the option not to sell an asset after the auction concludes, as this would create confusion and frustration on the part of the buyers. He also believes the government should use its leverage over the banks to force them to participate, whether they want to or not.
via RGE – New York Times Deal Book: Dr. Doom Finds Promise in Obama’s Toxic-Asset Plan.
Monsanto Planting Seeds in the White House?
OPS: geezuzkrist – Monsanto in charge of Food Safety!?
Monsanto Planting Seeds in the White House? – by Asher Miller
Apparently, President Obama is considering appointing Michael Taylor to head the new Food Safety Working Group. Who’s Michael Taylor? From Food Politics (care of Jill Richardson):
Mr. Taylor is a lawyer who began his revolving door adventures as counsel to FDA. He then moved to King & Spalding, a private-sector law firm representing Monsanto, a leading agricultural biotechnology company. In 1991 he returned to the FDA as Deputy Commissioner for Policy, where he was part of the team that issued the agency’s decidedly industry-friendly policy on food biotechnology and that approved the use of Monsanto’s genetically engineered growth hormone in dairy cows.
via OpEdNews » Monsanto Planting Seeds in the White House?.
US sperm bank offers stimulus deals
US sperm bank offers stimulus deals
One of the oldest banks of its kind in the United States, Xytex International, on Tuesday rolled out a stimulus package for customers who are hurting in these tough economic times.Xytex is a sperm bank, and it’s offering up to 200 dollars off a vial of sperm to clients wishing to start or add to their family, but need a little help.
“We’re all feeling the effects of the economy and, especially for families seeking reproductive options, every dollar counts,” Xytex spokeswoman Danielle Moores told AFP.
via US sperm bank offers stimulus deals.
Argentina moves to nationalise Lockheed AT-63 plant
OPS: How’s that NAFTA /CAFTA thing workin for ya now? 
This is a good omen for American Workers. If more of this happens to more Corporations, maybe they will see the wisdom of keeping their plants HERE.
Argentina moves to nationalise Lockheed AT-63 plant – By Stephen Trimble
Argentinian officials have decided to reassert state control over the country’s major aerospace manufacturing hub in Cordoba that was outsourced to Lockheed Martin in 1995.
A bill sent to Argentina’s legislature by President Cristina Kirchner would, if approved, take back the factory now operated by Lockheed Martin Aircraft Argentina (LMAASA). This maintains the Argentinian air force’s AT-63 Pampa jet trainers, manufactures parts for various US and Chilean aircraft, and also provides maintenance services for Bolivia, Colombia and Brazil.
Kirchner’s government is seeking to nationalise the manufacturing centre’s 1,100 jobs. Announcing the proposed legislation, she said the move is aimed at reversing a strategy of “dissembling the instruments of autonomy and national sovereignty”.
via Argentina moves to nationalise Lockheed AT-63 plant.
Now ‘Big Brother’ targets Facebook
Civil liberties
Now ‘Big Brother’ targets Facebook
Minister wants government database to monitor social networking sites
Millions of Britons who use social networking sites such as Facebook could soon have their every move monitored by the Government and saved on a “Big Brother” database.
Ministers faced a civil liberties outcry last night over the plans, with accusations of excessive snooping on the private lives of law-abiding citizens.
The idea to police MySpace, Bebo and Facebook comes on top of plans to store information about every phone call, email and internet visit made by everyone in the United Kingdom. Almost half the British population – some 25 million people – are thought to use social networking sites. There are already proposals under a European Union directive – dating back to after the 7 July 2005 bombs – for emails and internet usage to be monitored and added to a planned database to track terror plots.
via Now ‘Big Brother’ targets Facebook – UK Politics, UK – The Independent.
Helen Sun Handcuffed Self To Husband In Attempt At Reconciliation (AUDIO)
Helen Sun Handcuffed Self To Husband In Attempt At Reconciliation (AUDIO)
SCROLL DOWN FOR AUDIO
FAIRFIELD, Conn. – Police in Connecticut say a woman attempting to reconcile with her husband handcuffed herself to him as he slept and then bit him on his torso and arms.
Police say 37-year-old Helen Sun told them she wanted to have a conversation with husband Robert Drawbough without him leaving. Police say she changed the locks on their bedroom and handcuffed herself to Drawbough while he was sleeping Monday.
Read the rest of the story here.
via Helen Sun Handcuffed Self To Husband In Attempt At Reconciliation (AUDIO).
The WTO Pulls One Over on Ron Kirk
The WTO Pulls One Over on Ron Kirk
USTR Ron Kirk falsely claimed victory last week as the WTO ruled against U.S.
In yet another example of the clandestine and undemocratic nature of the World Trade Organization, the Chinese government claimed victory last week as the international trade group’s Dispute Settlement Panel ruled against U.S. interests in a case brought to the organization two years ago.
The case revolved around the fact that the Chinese government has utterly failed to protect and enforce intellectual property rights, especially copyrights and trademarks. The U.S. claimed that American films, music and books were frequently pirated by Chinese citizens, which the Chinese government does little to prevent.
The International Intellectual Property Alliance estimates the Chinese piracy costs at approximately $3.7 billion in lost sales each year.
For anyone who follows the actions of the fatally flawed WTO, it should be absolutely no surprise that the U.S. essentially came out the loser in this trade dispute. The U.S. has been ruled against in nine out of 10 trade disputes brought before the organization. This time was no different.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
The Need For Clean Energy
The Need For Clean Energy
The United States needs to follow the lead of Japan and Europe – and to some extent China – and put its money into an investment for our future. We have already gotten the ball rolling, now is time to put the full force of our nation behind the cause.
As it currently stands, we spend tens of billions of dollars annually on imported oil. The only way to stop this outflow is to stop using oil. Not only would this keep our money out of the hands of foreign countries – many of whom are not particularly friendly toward the United States – but it could also put the U.S. at the head of the movement to decrease pollution worldwide.
The previous presidential administration largely dragged its feet on this issue, and Congress did very little to pass legislation to lead the way. However, President Obama has made clean, renewable, alternative energy sources a major part of his platform. Appropriations were included in the $787 billion stimulus program for alternative energy sources, but it was not nearly enough. This country needs to step up and put real time and investment into potentially world-changing technological breakthroughs.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
Has America Passed the Point of No Return?
Has America Passed the Point of No Return?
Either President Obama puts a halt to America’s over-consumption of subsidized foreign goods with over-borrowed foreign cash, or his recovery plan fails. It’s that simple.
America’s woes cannot be relieved unless solid, sustainable economic growth is restored at home. The 1,900 domestic manufacturers of the U.S. Business and Industry Council called on President Obama to address America’s withering economy last week, urging him to refocus his international trade policies on combating foreign protectionism and addressing America’s depleting manufacturing base.
While the rest of the world cries foul on U.S. Buy-American policies, America still remains the gold standard of openness. Foreign protectionists have added numerous new trade barriers recently, yet the the U.S. continues to fervently apologize for adding necessary protectionist measures favoring our manufacturers.
Many countries have raised import duties or passed stimulus measures with trade distorting subsidies. In a report released last week, the World Bank said that since November, 17 members of the Group of 20 have adopted 47 measures aimed at restricting trade.
“Russia has raised tariffs on used cars. China has tightened import standards on food, banning Irish pork, among other things. India has banned Chinese toys. Argentina has tightened licensing requirements on auto parts, textiles and leather goods. And a dozen countries, are subsidizing embattled automakers or car dealers,” according to the New York Times.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
We Need to Regulate the Financial Instruments That Took AIG Down
We Need to Regulate the Financial Instruments That Took AIG Down
By George Soros, The Financial Times.
AIG failed because it sold large amounts of credit default swaps (CDS) without properly offsetting or covering their positions.
In all the uproar over AIG, the most important lesson has been ignored. AIG failed because it sold large amounts of credit default swaps (CDS) without properly offsetting or covering their positions. What we must take away from this is that CDS are toxic instruments whose use ought to be strictly regulated: Only those who own the underlying bonds ought to be allowed to buy them. Instituting this rule would tame a destructive force and cut the price of the swaps. It would also save the U.S. Treasury a lot of money by reducing the loss on AIG’s outstanding positions without abrogating any contracts.
CDS came into existence as a way of providing insurance on bonds against default. Since they are tradable instruments, they became bear-market warrants for speculating on deteriorating conditions in a company or country. What makes them toxic is that such speculation can be self-validating.
Obamas Heed The Grassroots Plea To Give Peas A Chance
Obamas Heed The Grassroots Plea To Give Peas A Chance
Faithful followers of Obama Foodorama, the food politics blog whose house specialty is a perfect blend of substance
and froth, were treated to an especially tasty scoop yesterday–the news that there will, indeed, be a vegetable garden at the White House.
As they say in my native San Fernando Valley, OMG. This turn of events is not just epic, it’s biblical: ask, and ye shall receive.
I’m not talking about the slacktivists who sit around railing and wailing, “why bother?” I refer, rather, to the asktivists like Roger Doiron, the founder of Kitchen Gardeners International who looked at that vast expanse of lawn circling the White House like a gaudy green bauble and asked, “why not grow food instead of grass?”
via Kerry Trueman: Obamas Heed The Grassroots Plea To Give Peas A Chance.
Chicago ‘Top Cop’ Apologizes To Court
Chicago ‘Top Cop’ Apologizes To Court
The Chicago Crusader, News Report, J.Coyden Palmer,
It’s not every day that you will see a major city police chief ordered into court and chastised by a federal judge, but that’s exactly what happened to Chicago Police Supt. Jody Weis earlier this week. The city’s top cop was ordered to appear before Judge Robert Gettleman on March 9th after he defied an order to release a list of nearly 2,000 police officers who’ve had multiple citizen complaints logged against them. Gettleman was upset at how Weis “blew off” the order and said because of his position he needed to set a better example.
“You of all people should not be defying a court order,” Gettleman snapped.
Weis eventually turned the list over before a deadline had passed where a warrant could have been issued for his arrest. But he was still held in contempt and ordered to appear. Weis said the media is making a bigger deal out of the situation than it is. He spoke with reporters afterwards and said his defiance wasn’t to embarrass or show-up the judge, but out of concern for his officers.
“I don’t want my officers, who have to make split-second decisions, having any hesitation or being timid in any way wondering if an allegation, which may or not prove true, is made against them and they would be on a list,” Weis explained. “This situation is merely a discovery dispute I had with the court.”
Weis added that many names on the list are officers who were accused of wrongdoing but nothing was ever founded against them. The city attorneys argued hard for the list to be kept secret, fearing it would smear the name of dozens of good officers. The city also claims that people often make false allegations against officers seeking some sort of revenge or initially file a complaint but then never follow-up on it when investigators try to reach them.
via Chicago ‘Top Cop’ Apologizes To Court – NAM.
Do the Secret Bush Memos Amount to Treason? Top Constitutional Scholar Says Yes
Do the Secret Bush Memos Amount to Treason? Top Constitutional Scholar Says Yes - By Naomi Wolf
Legal expert Michael Ratner calls the legal arguments made in the infamous Yoo memos, “Fuhrer’s law.”
In early March, more shocking details emerged about George W. Bush legal counsel John Yoo’s memos outlining the destruction of the republic.
The memos lay the legal groundwork for the president to send the military to wage war against U.S. citizens; take them from their homes to Navy brigs without trial and keep them forever; close down the First Amendment; and invade whatever country he chooses without regard to any treaty or objection by Congress.
It was as if Milton’s Satan had a law degree and was establishing within the borders of the United States the architecture of hell.
I thought this was — and is — certainly one of the biggest stories of our lifetime, making the petty burglary of Watergate — which scandalized the nation — seem like playground antics. It is newsworthy too with the groundswell of support for prosecutions of Bush/Cheney crimes and recent actions such as Canadian attorneys mobilizing to arrest Bush if he visits their country.
Brain-Dead Economic Reporting: If Wall Street Approves of Obama’s Plan, It Must Be a Winner!
Brain-Dead Economic Reporting: If Wall Street Approves of Obama’s Plan, It Must Be a Winner! -By Brad Reed
Our press corps has discovered an important scoop: Rich people approve of using taxpayer money to help rich people.
Immediately after the Obama administration unveiled its cunning plan to help the titans of Wall Street avoid the hit that should result from their bad decisions, members of our national press corps fanned out across the land to ask investment bankers, hedge-fund managers and stock traders whether Obama’s plan went far enough in lining their pockets with taxpayer cash.
Setting the tone for the rest of our media, CNBC dutifully dubbed President Barack Obama’s plan a potential “game-changer” because it got a big thumbs-up from people like Quincy Krosby, the chief investment strategist at the Hartford Financial Services Group. Krosby said that the investment community’s response to the plan will likely be “positive,” although she cautioned that the government would have to provide “written guarantees” that it wouldn’t do anything silly — such as, say, heavily taxing the undeserved bonuses of executives living on corporate welfare.
‘It’s time to break up the banks’
‘It’s time to break up the banks’
Editor’s Note: Zephyr Teachout, a veteran of various progressives causes and campaigns now based in Durham, NC, is a co-instigator behind A New Way Forward, an effort to push for structural change on Wall Street.
By Zephyr Teachout
Special to Facing South
The great corporations … are the creatures of the State, and the State not only has the right to control them wherever need of such control is shown… The immediate necessity in dealing with trusts is to place them under the real, not the nominal, control of some sovereign to which, as its creatures, the trusts owe allegiance, and in whose courts the sovereign’s orders may be enforced.”
- Teddy Roosevelt, Address at Providence, 1902
In Raleigh, North Carolina and Charleston, South Carolina, and twelve other cities across the country, progressive are planning protests on April 11, against the bank bailouts. These are the product of a bottom-up, grassroots, group of citizens, with a simple, direct and powerful demand: break up the banks, and make sure that no bank ever gets too big to fail.
via ISS – VOICES: ‘It’s time to break up the banks’.
AIG is chump change — let’s find corporate America’s hidden billions
OPS: Good thoughts but let’s keep in mind that Presidents have been eliminated for less. This investigation would have to be done in a special way.
AIG is chump change — let’s find corporate America’s hidden billions – By Joe Conason
It’s time to reform offshore banking, and see what untaxed wealth big business is hiding in overseas tax shelters.
The popular urge to claw back the bogus bonuses paid by American International Group is irresistible and fully justified, but should the Treasury someday retrieve every single bonus dollar, that total of $165 million will make no difference to anyone except a few disgruntled traders. From the jaded perspective of the financiers, the uproar over the AIG bonuses may provide a welcome distraction from far more important (and lucrative) abuses in the world’s offshore tax havens.
So rather than continue arguing over chump change, it is long past time for the United States, with its international friends and allies, to demand accountability from the long list of tiny countries and principalities, from Andorra and the Cayman Islands to Singapore and Switzerland, where corporations, wealthy clients and unrepentant evildoers hide their assets.
The big claw-back will reach into quaint islands and mountainous principalities, because the same banks, hedge funds and private equity firms responsible for the world financial meltdown keep their profits in those “secrecy spaces” — alongside the ill-gotten gains of numerous drug dealers, dictators and delinquents of every description.
via AIG is chump change — let’s find corporate America’s hidden billions | Salon.
National Popular Vote Advancing Across the States
National Popular Vote Advancing Across the States
Our presidential election system – where a handful of states determine the winner and the candidate with the most support does not always win – is perhaps the most widely recognized symbol these days of how far we still remain from a free and equal democracy in which all voters have their voices equally heard. Fixing our dysfunctional Electoral College system by enacting an agreement among the states to implement a national popular vote (NPV) is a key priority for PSN and other progressive groups across the nation. In today’s Dispatch we outline recent developments in the movement for a national popular vote, as well as the key reasons that NPV remains a crucial reform for progressives, for states, and for the nation as a whole.
via National Popular Vote Advancing Across the States | Progressive States Network.
Senate Bill Would Allow Tax-Exempt Status for Newspapers
OPS: It’s time we gave local News a n exemption and take away the exemptions for religious organizations.
Senate Bill Would Allow Tax-Exempt Status for Newspapers – By Mark Fitzgerald
CHICAGO Newspapers perform a public service for democracy and should be allowed to operate as tax-exempt non-profits, U.S. Sen. Benjamin Cardin, D.-Md., proposed Tuesday.
Cardin introduced a bill that would explicitly include newspapers among organizations eligible for 501(c)(3) status. The non-profit status is the same that public radio and television have now.
The legislation would give a national green light for newspapers to adopt the so-called Low Profit Limited Liability Company business model, often shortened to L3C.
The L3C model, which the Newspaper Guild supports as an alternative newspaper ownership model, is the subject of a feature story in the current print issue of Editor & Publisher.
Under Cardin’s legislation, newspaper revenue would be tax-exempt, and contributions to papers would be tax deductible. The status would also allow non-profits to invest in newspapers, something that is forbidden now.
Cardin said action is needed to help preserve local newspapers.
via Senate Bill Would Allow Tax-Exempt Status for Newspapers.
Don’t Do a Google Image Search for “Agent Orange”
Don’t Do a Google Image Search for “Agent Orange”
The Border Patrol is planning to use Agent Orange to clear brush along the Rio Grande near Laredo. That is simply horrific, and this story needs to spread far and wide. Really, don’t do that google search unless you need motivation for spreading the story that our government is spreading this horrific chemical in our water supply, near our homes.
Commentary By: Steven Reynolds
I’ve learned my lesson. I will never do such a google search again. The images of horribly deformed children, without arms, eyes, etc., are completely enough to make me weep. Perhaps it’s the hormones from being a Dad now, but those images even further reinforce in my brain the crimes we committed in Vietnam, not just against the environment, where Agent Orange plays havoc certainly, but in the gene pool. We will never know how many tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians we damaged through the use of Agent Orange, but the lawsuits seem over, at least in Canada, the USA, Vietnam and Australia. This was Toxic Avenger on steroids in the late 60’s and 70’s, our government allowing a sick demented genie out of the bottle so it could destroy and twist the very genes of our fellow humans. Man, what is more basic a civil right than to have one’s genes left alone?
via All Spin Zone » Don’t Do a Google Image Search for “Agent Orange”.
World’s Cheapest Car is Launched at £1340
Priced at just 100,000 rupees, the eco-friendly Tata NANO has sparked interest from around the world.
Designed to bring four-wheel travel to India’s motorbike-obsessed masses, the newly launched Tata ‘NANO’ is officially the world’s cheapest car.
With the basic model priced at a mere 100,000 rupees plus tax (approx £1,337) for the first 100,000 owners, the NANO is already stirring up a storm both in India and around the world.
Officially unveiled by Tata Motors’ chairman, Ratan Tata, yesterday at the Delhi Auto Expo, the first batch of NANOs are set to roll onto garage forecourts in July. Interested parties will, however, be given the opportunity to pre-book their budget-vehicle between 6th and 25th April, provided they can part with the near-100% deposit required.
via World’s Cheapest Car is Launched at £1340.
Dobbs falsely claimed Pelosi said “immigration law enforcement is, quote-unquote, ‘un-American”
OPS: WHAT?! The Pillsbury Dough-Boy Lied….again? Say it ain’t so….
Dobbs falsely claimed Pelosi said “immigration law enforcement is, quote-unquote, ‘un-American” – Media Matters -
Summary: On his radio show, Lou Dobbs asked his guest for his “reaction” to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “saying last week that enforcement in the workplace, immigration law enforcement is, quote-unquote, ‘un-American.’ ” In fact, Pelosi criticized as “un-American” immigration raids that separate undocumented parents from their documented children, not “immigration law enforcement.”
On the March 23 broadcast of his syndicated radio show, Lou Dobbs asked Center for Immigration Studies senior research fellow Jerry Kramer for his “reaction” to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) “saying last week that enforcement in the workplace, immigration law enforcement is, quote unquote, ‘un-American.’ ” In fact, Pelosi did not say that “immigration law enforcement” in general is “un-American.” Rather, during a March 7 speech Pelosi gave as part of the national Family Unity tour led by leaders of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Pelosi criticized as “un-American” immigration raids that separate undocumented parents from their documented children.
From Pelosi’s speech (full video available here and here):
Fedco Seeds: The David to Monsanto’s Goliath
Fedco Seeds: The David to Monsanto’s Goliath
Seed money for start-ups may be evaporating faster than California’s dwindling reservoirs, but this rocky economy is proving to be fertile ground for the seed industry. Cash-strapped consumers, scared by the specter of an empty fridge, are investing in the ultimate low-tech, high-yield start-up: the kitchen garden. The National Gardening Association estimates that some 43 million Americans are gearing up to grow at least some of their own food this spring.
And no wonder. As Roger Doiron, founder of Maine-based Kitchen Gardeners International, has documented, a few dozen seed packets costing $130 can yield more than two thousand dollars worth of produce over the course of the growing season. “We have a fabulous opportunity,” C.R. Lawn, the founder of another Maine mainstay, Fedco Seeds, told an audience at the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture’s Farming For The Future conference last month. “The challenge is on us to come through.” Lawn, an endearingly shaggy character who looks a bit like a pale Papa Smurf, rocked gently from side to side as he spoke of the challenges that his company faced following the acquisition of Fedco’s largest seed supplier, Seminis, by monolithic Monsanto back in 2005.
via Fedco Seeds: The David to Monsanto’s Goliath.
“The Millionaire Patriot wants YOU armed and trained”!
“The Millionaire Patriot wants YOU armed and trained”!
by Mark Crispin Miller
The last Depression was quite fertile ground for right-wing paramilitary groups, likeFather Coughlin’s Christian Front, William Dudley Pelley’s Silver Shirts, and other quasi-fascist mass formations (driven largely by anti-semitism).
Something like that is now happening again, as we continue sliding into this Depression;and Ignatius Piazza would appear to be a major figure in the current movement.There’s quite a lot on-line about Piazza, who believes that gun enthusiasts should notpretend to be mere sportsmen, but stand up and assert their rights to arm themselvesfor (defensive) combat–under the Second Amendment, as Piazza understands it.
He seems less keen on organizing “a well-run militia” than on handing out a lot of Springfield Pistols, and teaching people how to use them against others.
What people, though? And at which “others” would they fire? The text below, withits reference to “the potential for civil unrest in every major city,” suggests clearlythat the goal is to get white suburbanites prepared to take aim at the urban poor–in “self-defense.”
We saw this sort of “self-defense” when Hurricane Katrina shattered New Orleans,and cops there opened fire on two families trying to flee the devastation by crossingthe Danziger Bridge. Two people were killed, and four others wounded (one hadher arm blown off completely). At the time we heard that they were “snipers,”whom the cops had shot in self-defense; but then it turned out that the only peopledoing any shooting were the cops, who ended up indicted for the slaughter:
via News From Underground: “The Millionaire Patriot wants YOU armed and trained”!.
FedEx Trys Extortion on the Americna People
FedEx may delay plane buys if union bill passes
FedEx may delay plane buys if union bill passes…. “and we’ll just buy our planes from Airbus then”
NEW YORK (AP) — FedEx Corp. is trying to play a little hardball with Congress.
The package delivery company revealed it might delay purchasing 30 new Boeing 777 cargo planes if Congress reclassifies the company under a different labor act, which would make it easier for its employees to unionize.
A bill currently in front of Congress would place the company under the jurisdiction of the National Labor Relations Act, instead of the National Railway Labor Act. The Railway Labor Act allows for the union organization of workers, but all those workers must vote at the same time. This has served as an impediment to unions which could not afford a nationwide campaign. If FedEx Express workers were to be reclassified under the National Labor Relations Act, then workers could be organized one terminal at a time.
via News from The Associated Press.
FRONTLINE: TenTrillion and Counting
OPS: Watch the Full Episode at the link. Also see the OPS Graph on the US Debt Here.
All of the federal government’s efforts to stem the tide of the
financial meltdown have added hundreds of billions of dollars to an already staggering national debt, a sum that is expected to double over the next 10 years to more than $23 trillion. In Ten Trillion and Counting, FRONTLINE traces the politics behind this mounting debt and investigates what some say is a looming crisis that makes the current financial situation pale in comparison.
The journey begins as FRONTLINE correspondent Forrest Sawyer takes viewers to a secret location: the Treasury’s debt auction room, where the U.S. government sells securities backed by the “full faith and credit of the United States.” On this day, the government is auctioning $67 billion of Treasury securities. The money borrowed will be used to fund services and programs that the government cannot pay for through tax revenues alone.
Observers warn that the United States’ reliance on borrowing to fund essential programs is a dangerous gamble. For the first time, investors are beginning to question the ability of federal government to meet its growing financial obligations, and fading confidence can have dire consequences. “You might have a situation where there is one day when the government says we need to sell several billion dollars of bonds, and nobody shows,” Economist reporter Greg Ip tells FRONTLINE. “No money to pay the Social Security checks, no money to give to the states for their Medicaid programs. Cut, cut, cut, cut, cut.”
via FRONTLINE: ten trillion and counting: introduction | PBS.
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Republicans Don't Care about Voter Fraud....owa Republicans are trying to dismiss claims that the vote count in Tuesday's Iowa Caucus was wrong. An Iowa voter told a local TV station yesterday that he noticed a 20-vote discrepancy in the count - and that Rick Santorum was the real winner of the Caucuses. Republican Party officials, though, are sticking to their first count - showing Mitt Romney as the winner by 8-votes - and there will be no recount.The Republican Party has launched a war on voters around the nation this year with strict new laws that will disenfranchise over 5 million Americans. They claim these laws are necessary to combat so-called voter fraud. Yet in Iowa - where there are no such laws - and where a very, very close and questionable election was just held - Republicans don't seem to care at all about getting it right.Clearly - the war on voters isn't about making sure the people's voices are represented accurately - it's about making sure poor people, young people, and minorities who tend to vote for Democrats - can't vote at all.-Thom(Who do you think won? Tell us here.) -
LEGALIZE Democracy
" We the corporations" On January 21, 2010, with its ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Supreme Court ruled that corporations are persons, entitled by the U.S. Constitution to buy elections and run our government. __________
MOVE to AMEND
a project of the CAMPAIGN TO LEGALIZE Democracy
Help end Corporate personhood
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The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. 
