Archive for May, 2009

Crimes Against Future Generations Need to Become Taboo

Crimes Against Future Generations Need to Become Taboo   | CommonDreams.org

Montreal/Hamburg – May 29 – How can we prevent and prosecute activities today that severely threaten the living conditions and health of those living in the future? This was the theme at the symposium of 120 international law experts in Montréal on May 28-29, where the World Future Council (WFC) presented its pioneering work on Crimes against Future Generations for discussion.

“We are today using international law in a heartless fashion, for we think only of those who are alive here and now and shut our eyes to the rest of the vast family of humanity who are yet to come. This forecloses to future generations their rights to the basic fundamentals of civilized existence: acknowledging them as holders of rights in the eyes of our law” says Judge C.G. Weeramantry, former Vice-President of the International Court of Justice and WFC Councillor.

In international declarations, the global community has already emphasised the duties of current generations to conserve the environment, to use natural resources with caution and to create a healthy environment for future generations. But the legal enforcement of these agreements is still very limited. “If the half-life of some of the radioactive elements that are being tinkered with deliberately when building nuclear weapons is 24.000 years, can any responsible legal system permit such acts to be committed, which will so grievously affect a thousand generations to come?” continues Weeramantry.

The consequences of many of our decisions and actions today endanger the health and livelihoods of future generations of life. Over-fishing our oceans or destroying our rainforests and local communities when oil-drilling, to name a few examples, breach fundamental human rights to health, food, and a safe environment.

via Crimes Against Future Generations Need to Become Taboo | CommonDreams.org.

In Pakistan, an exodus that is beyond biblical

In Pakistan, an exodus that is beyond biblical  — - The Independent

Locals sell all they have to help millions displaced by battles with the Taliban

The language was already biblical; now the scale of what is happening matches it. The exodus of people forced from their homes in Pakistan’s Swat Valley and elsewhere in the country’s north-west may be as high as 2.4 million, aid officials say. Around the world, only a handful of war-spoiled countries – Sudan, Iraq, Colombia – have larger numbers of internal refugees. The speed of the displacement at its height – up to 85,000 people a day – was matched only during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. This is now one of the biggest sudden refugee crises the world has ever seen.

Until now, the worst of the problem has been kept largely out of sight. Of the total displaced by the military’s operations against the Taliban – the army yesterday claimed a crucial breakthrough, taking control of the Swat Valley’s main town, Mingora – just 200,000 people have been forced to live in the makeshift tent camps dotted around the southern fringe of the conflict zone. The vast majority were taken in by relatives, extended family members and local people wanting to help.

via In Pakistan, an exodus that is beyond biblical – Asia, World – The Independent.

Single-Payer Actions Planned in Over Fifty Cities

Single-Payer Actions Planned in Over Fifty Cities  | CommonDreams.org

Activists of every stripe take to the streets to support single-payer

NATIONWIDE – May 28 – As the Obama administration calls for health reform to be done this year, people in support of improved Medicare for all, a single-payer national health system, take to the streets in over 50 cities around May 30th. Single-payer advocates support the removal of for-profit insurers from providing basic health care, which would create enough savings, an estimated $400 billion a year, to guarantee health care to all. The Obama administration has repeatedly stated that single-payer is not being considered as an option for reform.

Town hall meetings, protests at insurance companies, rallies in state capitols, and vigils in memory of the 22,000 people who die each year because they lack health insurance will be taking place across the country. Members of Healthcare-NOW!, Progressive Democrats of America, the California Nurses Association, Physicians for a National Health Program, and the Green Party have largely mobilized around the day of action under the umbrella of the Leadership Conference for Guaranteed Health Care, a coalition of national organizations supporting national single-payer legislation.

A 2008 study shows 59 percent of U.S. physicians now favor government legislation to establish national health insurance. This alongside a recent CBS Poll showing 59 percent of Americans in favor of government-provided national health insurance reflects the growing support for single-payer. Supporters are angered as leading advocates supporting this solution are left out of the national debate on health reform.

Earlier this month, a total of 13 people, physicians, nurses and activists, were arrested for standing up in the Senate Finance Committee roundtable on health and demanding single-payer be considered. There have been 41 witnesses in the Senate Finance Committee discussions on health reform, without one single-payer advocate.

“A growing majority of physicians support a national health program because they cannot practice quality medicine until private insurers are removed from interfering in medical decisions and denying needed care. Health care providers are now willing to engage in acts of civil disobedience in order to show that health care reform is about improving patients’ health, not bailing out insurers. Health care is the civil rights issue of this decade,” states Dr. Margaret Flowers, one of the physicians arrested in the Senate Finance Committee.

“Advocates for single-payer represent the marginalized majority. The people deserve a fair hearing on health care reform. The nationwide day of actions shows that single-payer advocates refuse to be silent.” states Katie Robbins, Assistant Coordinator, Healthcare-NOW!

As of yet, a single-payer system is the only plan that would be truly universal and guaranteed to contain sky rocketing health care costs. Many of the best health care systems in the world are single-payer systems. In addition to saving lives, it would end bankruptcies caused by medical debt and remove financial barriers to care.

“The single-payer solution meets President Obama’s three core principles,” said Tim Carpenter the national director of Progressive Democrats of America. “It would reduce costs, guarantee choice, and ensure all Americans have quality, affordable health care; it provides far more in savings than any other option being considered.”

via Single-Payer Actions Planned in Over Fifty Cities | CommonDreams.org.

Further Evidence America Needs a VAT

Further Evidence America Needs a VAT

International trade is inherently unfair if everyone plays the game by a different set of rules.

Just before signing the North American Free Trade Agreement and mutually lowering its official import tariffs against the United States, the Canadian government instituted a so-called Goods and Services Tax. The GST is a multi-level valued-added tax no different than the VAT used in other countries around the world.

Canada is the United States’ largest trading partner – just ahead of China – yet it is allowed to maintain a value-added tax. Not all goods coming out of Canada are rebated, and not all U.S. goods are taxed at the border – for instance, automobiles are exempted.

However, some American-produced goods are taxed, and some imports into the United States are rebated by the Canadian government. This is an overt example of unfair “free trade” policies, and it is right on our border. Mexico also maintains a similar tax scheme against imported goods, including U.S. items.

via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.

U.S. Foreign Policy Falling by the Wayside

U.S. Foreign Policy Falling by the Wayside

After tarnishing much of our legacy during the Bush administration and allowing our economy to rot for nearly four decades, the U.S. is on the outside looking in.

The United States has lost much of its ability to leverage foreign policy. We used to be world leaders, policy creators and a model to be followed. Now, after tarnishing much of our legacy during the Bush administration and allowing our economy to rot for nearly four decades, the U.S. is on the outside looking in.

A perfect example of our standing is our approach to international currency manipulation, and the prosecution of manipulators. There are various international statutes that were signed and agreed upon by large consortiums of the global community regarding how countries must deal with their currencies.

Nonetheless, China and several others are allowed to predatorily peg their currencies against our own, massively devaluing them for the sake of boosting exports. This is an overt violation of international law, yet is goes unpunished. The Chinese government has built up so much leverage against the U.S., that they no longer push our policies.

Treasury Secretary Timot

via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.

Unemployment in U.S. Probably Surpassed 9% in May

OPS:  What they mean is that the U3 is at 9% – The actual unemployment number ( U6)  was  15.8 in April  Check it out here

Unemployment in U.S. Probably Surpassed 9% in May

May 31 (Bloomberg) — Unemployment in the U.S. probably surpassed 9 percent in May for the first time in more than 25 years, underscoring forecasts that the economy will be slow to pull out of the worst recession in half a century, economists said before a report this week.

The jobless rate climbed to 9.2 percent, the highest level since September 1983, according to the median of 59 estimates in a Bloomberg News survey before the June 5 Labor Department report. Other data may show manufacturing and service industries shrank at a slower pace and consumer spending dropped.

“The economy is decaying at a slower rate and that is the best you can say,” said Steven Ricchiuto, chief economist at Mizuho Securities USA Inc. in New York. “I can’t tell you we are out of the woods yet.”

Economists forecast the jobless rate will head to almost 10 percent by the end of the year, depriving Americans of the income needed to propel spending and stoke a vigorous recovery. Access to credit will likely also be limited as record defaults and foreclosures make banks reluctant to lend.

The unemployment rate is predicted to rise from 8.9 percent in April. Payrolls probably fell by 521,000 this month after declining by 539,000 in April, the median of 60 estimates showed. Job losses peaked at 741,000 in January, the most since 1949.

via Unemployment in U.S. Probably Surpassed 9% in May (Update1) – Bloomberg.com.

Technological advances in cancer treatment lead to debt, false positives

Technological advances in cancer treatment lead to debt, false positives

As the American Society of Clinical Oncology(ASCO) began its annual conference today in Orlando, physicians prepared to deal with a topic that is rarely addressed but highly relevant to today’s cancer care providers: comparing the rising cost of treatment to the smaller and smaller benefits that treatment provides.

A report from the American Cancer Society released in February found that even people who have health insurance can be bankrupted if they test positive for cancer. Of those with insurance, one in five people living with cancer use up all or most of their savings. One of the report’s authors, Christy Schmidt, told ABCnews.com, “Just because you’re insured doesn’t mean that you’re not going to have… very, very serious financial problems,” she said. “The very design of insurance policy itself can cause significant expenditures, even leading to bankruptcy or loss of home for some people.”

“Decades of investment in cancer research have led to important advances in screening and treatment, and vastly improved cancer survival rates,” said ASCO President Richard L. Schilsky, MD.

via Raw Story » Technological advances in cancer treatment lead to debt, false positives.

GOP address: Midwesterners ‘target of an imperialistic policy’

GOP address: Midwesterners ‘target of an imperialistic policy’

At the end of a week-long Memorial Day Congressional recess, the Republican party ramped up their attack on the Democrat’s House climate bill with a three-minute internet and radio address by Governor Mitch Daniels of Indiana, calling the bill “a poster child for government that cannot work.”

The bill, sponsored by Reps. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and Edward Markey, D-Mass, utilizes a cap-and-trade system to set a limit on carbon emissions and taxing polluters, simultaneously reducing our impact on the environment and lowering the budget deficit. The climate control bill, introduced in April, would set a quota on how many tons of greenhouse gasses are permitted to be released each year. Each industry would be allowed a certain proportion of the total national quota, and corporations could trade their emissions permits amongst themselves. If the pollution exceeds the allowed level, the offending corporation will be penalized with taxes.

Gov. Daniels, in his address, portrayed the proposed cap-and-trade legislation as a conspiracy of the coasts against the lifestyle of the Midwest. “Even if one believes the administration’s own computer models, which they claim can predict temperatures 50 years away, the CO2 reductions from their bill could not budge the world thermometer by a tenth of a degree. It has become clear that the Pelosi bill has little to do with a cooler planet and everything to do with raising money for the out-of-control federal spending now underway in Washington. Please, excuse us Midwesterners for feeling a bit like the targets of an imperialistic policy, devised in places like California and New York and Massachusetts for their benefit and our expense.”

Daniels cited ethanol, biodiesel, wind power, increased coal efficiency, and conservation programs as an alternative solution to the House’s climate bill, which he called “a classic example of unwise government.” The Obama administration has acknowledged that as many sustainability projects as possible need to be implemented if the nation is to overcome climate change.

via Raw Story » GOP address: Midwesterners ‘target of an imperialistic policy’.

Ex-Interrogators Are Mad as Hell About Torture, and They’re Not Gonna Take Cheney Anymore

Ex-Interrogators Are Mad as Hell About Torture, and They’re Not Gonna Take Cheney Anymore

MoveOn, VoteVets, and Brave New Foundation amplify testimonies of former interrogators.

More and more former interrogators and counterinsurgency experts are using Dick Cheney’s recent ubiquity to expose his iniquity regarding the torture and abuse of detainees. Earlier this week, I wrote about Major Matthew Alexander, the former Senior Interrogator who conducted over 300 interrogations in Iraq and supervised 1,000 more. Alexander relied upon conventional means of interrogation, and his efforts led to the capture and killing of al-Qaeda leader Abu Mousab al-Zarqawi. Yet Alexander also witnessed the perilous consequences of Cheney’s torture policy.

In an exclusive interview with Brave New Foundation, Alexander said, “At the prison where I conducted interrogations, we heard day in and day out foreign fighters who had been captured state that the number one reason they had come to fight in Iraq was because of torture and abuse, what had happened at Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib.”

via Ex-Interrogators Are Mad as Hell About Torture, and They’re Not Gonna Take Cheney Anymore | Politics | AlterNet.

Who Is to Blame for the Next Attack?

Who Is to Blame for the Next Attack? – NYTimes.com

Frank Rich

AFTER watching the farce surrounding Dick Cheney’s coming-out party this month, you have to wonder: Which will reach Washington first, change or the terrorists? If change doesn’t arrive soon, terrorists may well rush in where the capital’s fools now tread.

The Beltway antics that greeted the great Cheney-Obama torture debate were an unsettling return to the post-9/11 dynamic that landed America in Iraq. Once again Cheney and his cohort were using lies and fear to try to gain political advantage — this time to rewrite history and escape accountability for the failed Bush presidency rather than to drum up a new war. Once again Democrats in Congress were cowed. And once again too much of the so-called liberal news media parroted the right’s scare tactics, putting America’s real security interests at risk by failing to challenge any Washington politician carrying a big stick.

Cheney’s “no middle ground” speech on torture at the American Enterprise Institute arrived with the kind of orchestrated media campaign that he, his boss and Karl Rove patented in the good old days. It was bookended by a pair of Republican attack ads on the Web that crosscut President Obama’s planned closure of the Guantánamo Bay detention center with apocalyptic imagery — graphic video of the burning twin towers in one ad, a roar of nuclear holocaust (borrowed from the L.B.J. “daisy” ad of 1964) in the other.

via Op-Ed Columnist – Who Is to Blame for the Next Attack? – NYTimes.com.

The Dark Side of Plan Colombia

The Dark Side of Plan Colombia

On May 14 Colombia’s attorney general quietly posted notice on his office’s website of a public hearing that will decide the fate of Coproagrosur, a palm oil cooperative based in the town of Simití in the northern province of Bolívar. A confessed drug-trafficking paramilitary chief known as Macaco had turned over to the government the cooperative’s assets, which he claims to own, as part of a victim reparations program.

Macaco, whose real name is Carlos Mario Jiménez, was one of the bloodiest paramilitary commanders in Colombia’s long-running civil war and has confessed to the murder of 4,000 civilians. He and his cohorts are also largely responsible for forcing 4.3 million Colombians into internal refugee status, the largest internally displaced population in the world after Sudan’s. In May 2008, Macaco was extradited to the United States on drug trafficking and “narco-terrorism” charges. He is awaiting trial in a jail cell in Washington, DC.

Macaco turned himself in to authorities in late 2005 as part of a government amnesty program that requires paramilitary commanders to surrender their ill-gotten assets–including lands obtained through violent displacement. Macaco offered up Coproagrosur as part of the deal.

via The Dark Side of Plan Colombia.

Chicago police unleash violent attack on Bash Back! convergence action without warning

Chicago police unleash violent attack on Bash Back! convergence action without warning

Reports are beginning to surface that at least three particpants from the Bash Back! convergence in Chicago were arrested in a brutal suprise attack by Chicago police, which occurred without warning or provocation and constitutes the latest in a series of state-sponsored hate-crimes, by any definition:

Police Brutality at Bash Back! Convergence

Just hours ago, a bunch of radical queers took to the streets in Boystown Chicago, singing chants and dancing to music being blasted through a boombox. Minutes after we started marching, cops showed up. We proceeded to march and wait for them to tell us to get out of the street. But they didn’t. Instead they ran a police car into the back of the march, running over one person. Then they proceeded to run out of the cop cars with their weapons raised high and chase down whomever they could. Randomly picking some people out of the crowd, they beat them continuously, dragging them through the streets, pushing people down, etc, yelling faggots as they hit them.

via Pittsburgh Grassroots Examiner: Chicago police unleash violent attack on Bash Back! convergence action without warning.

Scientists hunt for green building materials

Scientists hunt for green building materials

The plank looks like a polished piece of plywood, and someday people may build coffee tables with it. But this wood was not grown in a forest — it was born from the greenhouse gasses seeping from landfills.

The Stanford University researchers who produced this wood alternative are part of a movement to support greener buildings by developing construction materials that are created and disposed of in an environmentally friendly way.

Green buildings are not only about replacing standard light bulbs with fluorescent ones or toilets with low-flush alternatives. Because manufacturing traditional building materials requires large amounts of energy and emits greenhouse gases, finding green alternatives will improve a building’s overall environmental footprint.

However, inventors still must convince the construction industry that these products can replace centuries-old building materials.

“When it comes to construction and the environment, structural engineers make a mess and environmental engineers clean it up,” said Sarah Billington, the Stanford researcher who leads the wood project. “We wanted to fix the mess from the start.”

via Scientists hunt for green building materials – Inside Bay Area.

New Military Base in Colombia Would Spread Pentagon Reach Throughout Latin America

OPS:  Iran – Pakistan – Columbia – WTF!  Tell me again WHY this is more important than Healthcare or jobs for Americans?

New Military Base in Colombia Would Spread Pentagon Reach Throughout Latin America -  CIP Americas Program |

Americas Program, Center for International Policy (CIP)

The Pentagon budget submitted to Congress on May 7 includes $46 million for development of a new U.S. military base in Palanquero, Colombia.

The official justification states that the Defense Department seeks “an array of access arrangements for contingency operations, logistics, and training in Central/South America.”

The military facility in Colombia will give the United States military increased capacity for intervention throughout most of Latin America. The plan is being advanced amid tense relations between Washington and Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador, and despite both a long history and recent revelations about the Colombian military’s atrocious human rights record.

President Obama told hemispheric leaders last month that “if our only interaction with many of these countries is drug interdiction—if our only interaction is military—then we may not be developing the connections that can over time increase our influence and have a beneficial effect.”1

In this Obama is on point. This base would feed a failed drug policy, support an abusive army, and reinforce a tragic history of U.S. military intervention in the region. It’s wrong and wasteful, and Congress should scrap it.

via CIP Americas Program | New Military Base in Colombia Would Spread Pentagon Reach Throughout Latin America.

George Tiller shot to death at Wichita church

George Tiller shot to death at Wichita church   | Wichita Eagle

WICHITA – George Tiller, the Wichita doctor who became a national lightning rod in the debate over abortion, was shot to death this morning as he walked into church services.

Tiller, 67, was shot just after 10 a.m. at Reformation Lutheran Church at 7601 E. 13th, where he was a member of the congregation. Witnesses and a police source confirmed Tiller was the victim.

No information has been released about whether a suspect is in custody.

Homicide detectives and Sedgwick County District Attorney Nola Foulston have arrived at the church.

Members of the congregation who were inside the sanctuary at the time of the shooting were being kept inside the church by police, and those arriving were being ushered into the parking lot. Witnesses are being transported downtown for interviews and other members of the congregation are slowly being released from inside the sanctuary.

via George Tiller shot to death at Wichita church | News Updates | Wichita Eagle.

The Cost of Doing Nothing on Health Care

Interactive Map:: The Cost of Doing Nothing on Health Care – CFAP

Lost Productivity Costs States $124 billion to $248 billion

Interactive map from Peter Harbage and Ben Furnas shows that lack of health insurance brings steep economic costs to states in the form of lost productivity.

It may seem like now is the wrong time for the United States to fix our broken health system. It’s true that we are still dealing with the recent financial crisis and the continuing economic downturn. But health reform is actually exactly what we need to help get the American economy back on its feet.

Our analysis shows that the broken health care system will cost us between $124 billion and $248 billion in lost productivity this year alone due to the almost 52 million uninsured Americans who live shorter lives and have poorer health. In fact an analysis by the Institute of Medicine found that, “the estimated benefits across society in healthy years of life gained by providing health insurance coverage are likely greater than the additional social costs of providing coverage to those who now lack it.”

These findings are based on a 2008 analysis by the New America Foundation, which found that the national economic cost from lost productivity in 2007 was between $104 billion and $207 billion. Economic costs from lost productivity have increased by about 20 percent during the two years since the New America Foundation conducted its analysis. The low bound of this estimate represents just the cost from uninsured Americans’ shorter lifespan. The high bound represents both the cost of shortened lifespan and the loss of productivity due to the reduced health of the uninsured.

via Interactive Map: The Cost of Doing Nothing on Health Care.

Cheyneytown

Cheyneytown.

McClatchy

McClatchy.

McClatchy

McClatchy.

McClatchy

McClatchy.

Ban Touchscreen Voting

OPS:  Petition to sing is at the link

Ban Touchscreen Voting

via Ban Touchscreen Voting | Democrats.com.

Coleman, Franklin prep to face off on appeal

Coleman, Franklin prep to face off on appeal  - TheHill.com -

Monday’s oral arguments before the Minnesota Supreme Court may finally bring an end to the state’s protracted Senate race, and both sides are proclaiming readiness.

Lawyers for former Sen. Norm Coleman (R) and Democrat Al Franken have prepped for the better part of a month and a half to ready their cases after Coleman appealed a three-judge panel’s decision in an election contest handing Franken a narrow victory in the race.

via TheHill.com – Coleman, Franklin prep to face off on appeal.

States Target the Rich

OPS: Poor Babies. See today’s quote for more insight

States Target the Rich – ABC News

Revenue-Hungry States Are Raising Taxes on Their Wealthiest Residents

Forbes 400 member B. Thomas Golisano built his fortune in New York and has run for governor there three times. In May he changed his official residency to Naples, Fla. Why? In April New York socked millionaires with a 31% tax hike–raising the tax rate on income over $500,000 from 6.85% to 8.97%. (It also added a 7.85% rate for income over $300,000 for a couple.) Florida has no state income tax.

After decades of competing to cut income tax rates, revenue-hungry states are raising them, especially on wealthy folks. “States are piggybacking off the Obama rhetoric,” says Joseph Henchman, at the Tax Foundation in Washington, D.C.

via States Target the Rich – ABC News.

Single Payer: Not Cash Cows, but Good Neighbors

Single Payer: Not Cash Cows, but Good Neighbors-  by Caroline Arnold

I’ve never been good at believing conspiracy theories. Most of them presume conspirators who are supernaturally smart, know things they couldn’t possibly know, and are inhumanly successful in organizing and carrying out devious plots and grand schemes.

Yet in the current rococo debate about overhauling our health care system I find myself drawn to the argument that the health-insurers are trying to maintain a system that extracts profits from the misfortunes of sick people and poor people. I invoke the notion of moral hazard: a policy that tempts entities to do morally questionable things.

Example: In 2003, when I had chest pains, I was whisked through tens of thousands of dollars worth of tests and a hundred thousand dollars in triple-bypass surgery. It probably prolonged my life, though less expensive treatments might have done just as well. Who knows?

via Single Payer: Not Cash Cows, but Good Neighbors | CommonDreams.org.

Letter to President Obama

Letter to President Obama   | CommonDreams.org

by Ralph Nader

The hour is late. You seem bent on an orchestrated bankruptcy for General Motors on June 1, 2009. Before any irreversible moves are made– the GM/task force reorganization plan should be submitted to Congress for deliberative review and decision. There are several major concerns with a precipitous bankruptcy declaration that have emerged

over the last several days.

First, the previously understood rationale for bankruptcy-namely obstinate bondholders–no longer applies. Recent developments indicate that GM and the auto task force have revised the proposed allocation of equity in a restructured GM, and reached agreement with at least the most prominent bondholders. Although a June 1 bond payment is due,

it certainly seems that that payment could easily be wrapped into the new bondholder offer, as effectively will be the case if GM enters

bankruptcy.

With the bondholder problem moving toward resolution, or at least now clearly resolvable, there is no evident rationale for bankruptcy other than an unstoppable momentum of some hidden agendas. Given the high stakes, including job losses, communities devastated, the effects on consumer confidence in the GM brand and the socio-economic impacts of

potentially excessive downsizing, a last chance to avoid the tyranny against the weak that is a Chapter 11 bankruptcy court.

via Letter to President Obama | CommonDreams.org.

Everyone Should See ‘Torturing Democracy’

Everyone Should See ‘Torturing Democracy’ | CommonDreams.org

by Bill Moyers and Michael Winship

In all the recent debate over torture, many of our Beltway pundits and politicians have twisted themselves into verbal contortions to avoid using the word at all.

During his speech to the conservative American Enterprise Institute last week — immediately on the heels of President Obama’s address at the National Archives — former Vice President Dick Cheney used the euphemism “enhanced interrogation” a full dozen times.

Smothering the reality of torture in euphemism of course has a political value, enabling its defenders to diminish the horror and possible illegality. It also gives partisans the opening they need to divert our attention by turning the future of the prison at Guantanamo Bay into a “wedge issue,” as noted on the front page of Sunday’s New York Times.

According to the Times, “Armed with polling data that show a narrow majority of support for keeping the prison open and deep fear about the detainees, Republicans in Congress started laying plans even before the inauguration to make the debate over Guantanamo Bay a question of local community safety instead of one about national character and principles.”

via Everyone Should See ‘Torturing Democracy’ | CommonDreams.org.

Health Care Activists Lament Single-Payer Snub

Health Care Activists Lament Single-Payer Snu

Frustrated by the exclusion of government-financed medical care from the debate to revamp the nation’s troubled health system, advocates of a “single-payer” plan are increasingly turning to demonstrations and civil disobedience as a way to get their message across.

During Senate Finance Committee hearings May 5 and 12 on health reform, 13 doctors, nurses, lawyers and activists stood up to complain that no single-payer proponent had been invited to take part and were arrested for disrupting the proceedings.

On Friday in San Francisco, about 200 single-payer proponents held a rally in front of the Federal Building and headed in small groups to Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s office to urge the speaker of the House, who was in China, to back single-payer legislation and give its supporters a seat at the table of the health reform debate. The public appeals were part of a series of demonstrations being held in more than 50 U.S. cities over the next few days to encourage lawmakers to enact a single-payer plan.

Some advocates of a nationalized health plan are calling for activists to become even more militant.

via Health Care Activists Lament Single-Payer Snub | CommonDreams.org.

The Future of Manufacturing, GM, and American Workers (Part I)

The Future of Manufacturing, GM, and American Workers (Part I)

What’s the Administration’s specific aim in bailing out GM? I’ll give you my theory later.

Robert Reich

For now, though, some background. First and most broadly, it doesn’t make sense for America to try to maintain or enlarge manufacturing as a portion of the economy. Even if the U.S. were to seal its borders and bar any manufactured goods from coming in from abroad–something I don’t recommend–we’d still be losing manufacturing jobs. That’s mainly because of technology.

When we think of manufacturing jobs, we tend to imagine old-time assembly lines populated by millions of blue-collar workers who had well-paying jobs with good benefits. But that picture no longer describes most manufacturing. I recently toured a U.S. factory containing two employees and 400 computerized robots. The two live people sat in front of computer screens and instructed the robots. In a few years this factory won’t have a single employee on site, except for an occasional visiting technician who repairs and upgrades the robots.

Factory jobs are vanishing all over the world. Even China is losing them. The Chinese are doing more manufacturing than ever, but they’re also becoming far more efficient at it. They’ve shuttered most of the old state-run factories. Their new factories are chock full of automated and computerized machines. As a result, they don’t need as many manufacturing workers as before.

Economists at Alliance Capital Management took a look at employment trends in twenty large economies and found that between 1995 and 2002–before the asset bubble and subsequent bust–twenty-two million manufacturing jobs disappeared. The United States wasn’t even the biggest loser. We lost about 11% of our manufacturing jobs in that period, but the Japanese lost 16% of theirs. Even developing nations lost factory jobs: Brazil suffered a 20% decline, and China had a 15% drop.

via The Future of Manufacturing, GM, and American Workers (Part I) | Robert Reich’s Blog.

What The Hell Have We Become?

If we continue to allow the people who authorized torture to escape prosecution, and act like we don’t care that it even took place, we have to ask ourselves “what the hell have we become?” That’s the question that Mike Papantonio asks in this week’s fiery Pap Attack.

via YouTube – What The Hell Have We Become?.

Petraeus: US violated Geneva Conventions

US violated Geneva Conventions, Bush Iraq commander says

The head of the US Central Command, General David Petraeus, said Friday that the US had violated the Geneva Conventions in a stunning admission from President Bush’s onetime top general in Iraq that the US may have violated international law.

“When we have taken steps that have violated the Geneva Conventions we rightly have been criticized, so as we move forward I think it’s important to again live our values, to live the agreements that we have made in the international justice arena and to practice those,” Gen. Petraeus said on Fox News Friday afternoon.

Petraeus made the comment in the context of being asked about the Bush administration’s so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques.” The now-Central Command chief said he believed that banning the more extreme techniques had taken away “a tool” employed by “our enemies” as a moral argument against the United States.

via Raw Story » US violated Geneva Conventions, Bush Iraq commander says.

Court document: Republican election judge bought votes with OxyContin

Court document: Republican election judge bought votes with OxyContin

Clay County, Kentucky has a reputation for corrupt government. After years of federal investigations and numerous authorities landing in jail, each progressive revelation becomes that much less shocking.

But this one still packs a punch.

According to local media:

A former Clay County election officer plans to plead guilty to a charge that he took part in a vote-buying scheme with prominent public officials.

The attorney for Paul E. Bishop filed a motion Thursday seeking a hearing for him to plead guilty to one count of racketeering.

That charge alleges that members of the conspiracy used the county Board of Elections as a vehicle to corrupt voting between 2002 and 2007 so they could hold on to power and enrich themselves and others.

Other officials suspected to be involved include a county clerk, the school superintendent, a circuit judge, the democratic election commissioner and another elections official. No word as yet whether Bishop has plans to testify against his co-defendants.

But here’s the real juicy bit:

via The Raw Story » Court document: Republican election judge bought votes with OxyContin.

Obama’s new war doctrine: ‘Cyber dominance’

Obama’s new war doctrine: ‘Cyber dominance’

The US military is moving ahead with plans to create its first “cyber command” designed to bolster America’s potential to wage digital warfare as well as defend against mounting cyber threats, officials said on Friday.

After President Barack Obama announced Friday his plans to overhaul cyber security policy, Defense Secretary Robert Gates was expected to soon formally propose the new cyber command that will be overseen by a four-star officer, Pentagon officials told AFP.

The move reflects a shift in military strategy with “cyber dominance” now part of US war doctrine and growing alarm over the perceived threat posed by digital espionage coming from China, Russia and elsewhere.

US officials say China has built up a sophisticated cyber warfare program and that a spate of intrusions in the United States and elsewhere can be traced back to Chinese sources.

Defense officials say the cyber command would focus on security efforts for US networks along with offensive capabilities to ensure “freedom of action in cyberspace” to protect America’s interests.

The precise details of US cyber military power remain secret, but it includes technology capable of penetrating and jamming networks, including the classified Suter airborne system, analysts say.

via Raw Story » Obama’s new war doctrine: ‘Cyber dominance’.

U.S. Hyperinflation to Reach Zimbabwe Level

U.S. Hyperinflation to Reach Zimbabwe Level

Zimbabwe’s economy was destroyed by the worst hyperinflation in recent history.

The United States may be setting itself up for hyperinflation in the near future. The Treasury and Federal Reserve have frivolously pumped hundreds of billions of dollars into the economy. That total will likely reach several trillion dollars within one year, with more increases in years to come.

This is precisely the situation that developed in economies experiencing hyperinflation in the past. Germany in the interwar period was crippled by inflation, many Latin American economies were destroyed by inflation in the past several decades, and Zimbabwe – once a strong and independent African economy – experienced the worst hyperinflation in recent history.

Investor Marc Faber, speaking to Bloomberg News, fully expects something like this to happen in the United States. Faber said that he was “100 percent certain” that the U.S. would experience hyperinflation, as the dollar is devalued to the point of collapse and prices on all goods rise beyond control.

via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.

Time for America to Join the Fight and Revive Vital Industries

Time for America to Join the Fight and Revive Vital Industries

American firms like Nucor Corp. produce steel using state of the art methods which reduce waste, pollution and energy demand.

The American steel industry has been one of the hardest hit sectors in the economy over the past two decades. It has shed thousands of jobs and has largely been pushed out of open market competition by overseas firms. Making matters worse is the fact that one-fifth of the remaining U.S. steel mills are foreign owned. They could either sell to overseas investors or close their doors forever.

American companies are more than capable of competing with foreign mills; firms like Nucor Corp. produce steel using state of the art methods which reduce waste, pollution and energy demand.

This firm has been given the misfortune of being improperly labeled as “protectionist” when all it is doing is demanding that other nations adhere to the agreements and commitments that they signed. The United States does not violate its WTO accords, yet other countries around the world are allowed to do so without any repercussions.

The simple fact is that nations around the world, particularly China, India, and Russia, illegally subsidize their steel industries and dump material into the market. American producers – following the letter of the law – are unable to compete with prices and are driven from the market.

via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.

Tancredo: ‘I don’t know’ if the Obama administration ‘hates white people.’

Tancredo: ‘I don’t know’ if the Obama administration ‘hates white people.’

Recently, Rush Limbaugh declared that the way to get promoted in the Obama administration is “by hating white people.” On MSNBC this afternoon, when David Shuster asked right-wing extremist Tom Tancredo whether he agreed, Tancredo refused to object to Limbaugh’s characterization:

SHUSTER: Mr. Tancredo, do you agree that the Obama administration hates white people?

TANCREDO: Oh [sighs], I don’t know. But I’ll tell you this –

SHUSTER: You don’t know? In other words, they might?

TANCREDO: What do I — I have no idea whether they hate white people or not!

Shuster also asked Tancredo whether he wanted to apologize for calling the the nation’s largest Hispanic civil rights organization a “Latino KKK.” Tancredo laughed at the idea of an apology. Watch it:

via Think Progress » Tancredo: ‘I don’t know’ if the Obama administration ‘hates white people.’.

Horton confirms reports that unreleased torture photos show rape and sexual assault.

Horton confirms reports that unreleased torture photos show rape and sexual assault.

This week, the Daily Telegraph reported that the torture photos President Obama recently decided to withhold from the public depict “rape and sexual abuse.” The Pentagon denied the report, saying, “None of the photos in question depict the images that are described in that article.” But yesterday, Scott Horton reported that he has confirmed that the photos do, in fact, “depict sexually explicit acts,” including “a government contractor engaged in an act of sodomy with a male prisoner and scenes of forced masturbation,” as well as “penetration involving phosphorous sticks and brooms.” Horton writes further:

A senior military officer familiar with the photos told me that they would likely provoke a storm of outrage if released. … Some show U.S. personnel engaged in sexual acts with prisoners and each other. In one, a female prisoner appears to have been forced to expose her breasts to be photographed. In another, a prisoner is suspended naked upside down from the top bunk of a bed in a stress position. [...]

Still other withheld photographs have been circulating among U.S. soldiers who served in Iraq. One soldier showed them to me, including a photograph in which a male in a U.S. military uniform receives oral sex from a female prisoner.

via Think Progress » Horton confirms reports that unreleased torture photos show rape and sexual assault..

LEHMAN HAS TONS OF NUKE ‘WA$TE’

LEHMAN HAS TONS OF NUKE ‘WA$TE’

It turns out we were looking in the wrong place for weapons of mass destruction.

They weren’t in Iraq.

They were in Lehman Brothers’ portfolio.

The bankrupt investment bank holds as much as 500,000 pounds of uranium yellowcake — enough to make a nuclear bomb — it was learned yesterday.

And it’s at least as radioactive as the toxic subprime mortgages that brought down the storied Wall Street icon.

And not only does Lehman have the yellowcake, it may have to eat it, too.

It can’t get rid of the ore, because with the possible exception of North Korea, nobody is willing to cough up the price it wants — because the uranium market has tanked, sources told The Post

via LEHMAN HAS TONS OF NUKE ‘WA$TE’ – New York Post.

Christopher Hitchens on Lebanon and Syria

The Swastika and the Cedar  | vanityfair.com

In newly liberated Lebanon, the signposts on “the Arab street” point in opposite directions. The author’s experiences—he was buoyed by a huge rally for democracy in downtown Beirut, then beaten up by Fascist bullies—show how much this diverse society offers hope but is still threatened by the Syrian dictatorship next door.

by Christopher Hitchens

As Arab thoroughfares go, Hamra Street in the center of Beirut is probably the most chic of them all. International in flavor, cosmopolitan in character, it boasts the sort of smart little café where a Lebanese sophisticate can pause between water-skiing in the Mediterranean in the morning and snow-skiing in the mountains just above the city in the afternoon. “The Paris of the Middle East” used to be the cliché about Beirut: by that exacting standard, I suppose, Hamra Street would be the Boulevard Saint-Germain.

Not at all the sort of place you would expect to find a spinning red swastika on prominent display. Yet, as I strolled in company along Hamra on a sunny Valentine’s Day last February, in search of a trinket for the beloved and perhaps some stout shoes for myself, a swastika was just what I ran into. I recognized it as the logo of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party, a Fascist organization (it would be more honest if it called itself “National Socialist”) that yells for a “Greater Syria” comprising all of Lebanon, Israel/Palestine, Cyprus, Jordan, Kuwait, Iraq, and swaths of Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Egypt. It’s one of the suicide-bomber front organizations—the other one being Hezbollah, or “the party of god”—through which Syria’s Ba’thist dictatorship exerts overt and covert influence on Lebanese affairs.

via Christopher Hitchens on Lebanon and Syria | vanityfair.com.

Defense Budget Shell Game

Defense Budget Shell Game  – -- In These Times

Behind the hoopla, military spending continues to rise.

On April 15, large, angry and somewhat wacky crowds of Republican-backed and Fox News-supported “tea party” protesters joined the usual groups of more sedate and earnest peace activists to demonstrate against President Barack Obama’s proposed 2010 budget

Whether they were mad about deficit spending and high taxes or military spending, Obama’s budget of $3.55 trillion is a lot of money.

Much of those trillions are oriented toward trying to fix the problems of almost a decade of corporations-can-do-no-wrong profligacy. There is a lot to applaud in the budget, like increased spending on healthcare, education and developing sustainable energy. But there are still huge military outlays. Obama’s first Department of Defense budget requests $534 billion in spending, continuing a decade-long trend of uninterrupted increases. (Indeed, under Bush, the Pentagon’s baseline budget rose by 82 percent between FY 2002 and FY 2009, adjusted for inflation.) On April 6, Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced the detailed budget with a small bit of fanfare, declaring that his budget is intended to “reshape the priorities of America’s defense establishment,” and that his recommendations will “profoundly reform how this department does business.”

via Defense Budget Shell Game — In These Times.

9/11 families angered by US support for Saudis

9/11 families angered by US support for Saudis

NEW YORK (AP) — Relatives of Sept. 11 victims say they’re angry that the Justice Department is supporting the Saudi royal family’s bid to be removed from a 9/11 lawsuit.

The families of some victims have accused the royal family of financially backing terrorist groups that carried out the 2001 attacks.

The Justice Department filed a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday. It supports the Saudis’ argument that the royal family as a sovereign state cannot be sued in a U.S. court.

Bill Doyle’s son was killed at the World Trade Center. He says the Obama administration’s court filing undermines the nation’s fight against terrorism.

Several lower courts have dismissed the lawsuit. The Supreme Court has not decided whether to hear the case.

via The Associated Press: 9/11 families angered by US support for Saudis.

Senator Schumer makes health reform promises today!

Senator Schumer makes health reform promises today!

Members of a single  payer supporting New York Democratic Party “Club” in Representative Charlie Rangels district met with Senator Chuck Schumer today. Boy did they do good!

Follow me for all the wonky and political details of what Schumer promised.

The pitch to Schumer was that if Schumer really wants a public option he should be facilitating single payer being “at the table”.  They included a request for CBO scoring of single payer.*

They said we knew that Schumer knew single payer was superior.

Schumer confirmed!

My PNHP colleague who was part of the group who was there for this particular meeting (I was not) says she thinks Schumer responded well to being engaged on his plan.  He continually insisted on his support for single payer and his desire to design a public option plan which would become single payer.

The group presented a 5 point critique of Schumer’s public option plan as reported in the NY Times:

via Senator Schumer makes health reform promises today! | ePluribus Media.

High-Deductible Health Insurance Is Not Always a Bargain

The Many Hidden Costs of High-Deductible Health Insurance  – NYTimes.com

IS your medical insurance bad for your health? If you have a high-deductible plan, the answer may be yes.

The investment firm Fidelity recently surveyed employees at various companies who had opted for a high-deductible health plan linked to a health savings account. About half of those workers said they or a family member had chosen not to seek medical care for minor ailments as many as four times in the last year to avoid paying the out-of-pocket expenses.

As any doctor will tell you, small health problems left untreated can become big problems, warns Kathleen Stoll, director of health policy at the health care advocacy group Families USA. “This is just one of the many high-deductible pitfalls consumers need to watch out for,” Ms. Stoll said.

via Patient Money – High-Deductible Health Insurance Is Not Always a Bargain – NYTimes.com.

A controlled demolition brought down the WTC: Richard Gage on KMPH Fox 26 in Fresno

Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth — Check out more info at:
http://www.ae911truth.org/

YouTube – Richard Gage on KMPH Fox 26 in Fresno, CA.

Also, if you’re from the Fresno area, join the local WeAreChange group to help us in these endeavors:
http://www.wacfresno.org/

Green Promise Seen in Switch to LED Lighting

Green Promise Seen in Switch to LED Lighting

To change the bulbs in the 60-foot-high ceiling lights of Buckingham Palace’s grand stairwell, workers had to erect scaffolding and cover precious portraits of royal forebears.

So when a lighting designer two years ago proposed installing light emitting diodes or LEDs, an emerging lighting technology, the royal family readily assented. The new lights, the designer said, would last more than 22 years and enormously reduce energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions — a big plus for Prince Charles, an

ardent environmentalist. Since then, the palace has installed the lighting in chandeliers and on the exterior, where illuminating the entire facade uses less electricity than running an electric teakettle.

In shifting to LED lighting, the palace is part of a small but fast-growing trend that is redefining the century-old conception of lighting, replacing energy-wasting disposable bulbs with efficient fixtures that are often semi-permanent, like those used in plumbing.

via Green Promise Seen in Switch to LED Lighting – Series – NYTimes.com.

The White House – Press Office – Transparency and Open Government

OPS:  Ok, When?

Transparency and Open Government

MEMORANDUM FOR THE HEADS OF EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENTS AND AGENCIES

SUBJECT: Transparency and Open Government

My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government. We will work together to ensure the public trust and establish a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration. Openness will strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness in Government.

Government should be transparent. Transparency promotes accountability and provides information for citizens about what their Government is doing. Information maintained by the Federal Government is a national asset. My Administration will take appropriate action, consistent with law and policy, to disclose information rapidly in forms that the public can readily find and use. Executive departments and agencies should harness new technologies to put information about their operations and decisions online and readily available to the public. Executive departments and agencies should also solicit public feedback to identify information of greatest use to the public.

Government should be participatory. Public engagement enhances the Government’s effectiveness and improves the quality of its decisions. Knowledge is widely dispersed in society, and public officials benefit from having access to that dispersed knowledge. Executive departments and agencies should offer Americans increased opportunities to participate in policymaking and to provide their Government with the benefits of their collective expertise and information. Executive departments and agencies should also solicit public input on how we can increase and improve opportunities for public participation in Government.

via The White House – Press Office – Transparency and Open Government.

Buying Ambassadorships Redux: Four Obama Nominees Were Big-Money Bundlers

Buying Ambassadorships Redux: Four Obama Nominees Were Big-Money Bundlers  -  The Center for Public Integrity |

President Barack Obama’s pledge to change the ways of Washington doesn’t yet seem to apply to the diplomatic selection process, if yesterday’s round of ambassadorial nominations is any guide.

Last August the Center reported on “Checkbook Diplomacy” — the longstanding practice of presidents appointing ambassadors based on their campaign contributions and loyalty — as part of our Buying of the President 2008 project. But with the $2,300 per-election limit on presidential campaign contributions, White House hopefuls now rely on big money bundlers instead. So it comes as no surprise that four of Obama’s new ambassadorial nominees bundled more than $100,000 each for his 2008 campaign.

They are:

• Ambassador to Denmark-designate Laurie Fulton, who raised at least $100,000 for Obama;

• Ambassador to the United Kingdom-designate Louis Susman, who raised at least $200,001 for Obama and donated at least $30,000 to pro-Obama political committees;

• Ambassador to France-designate Charles Rivkin, who raised at least $500,001 for Obama;

• Ambassador to Japan-designate John Roos, who with his wife Susan, raised at least $500,001 for Obama.

via The Center for Public Integrity | PaperTrail Blog – MONEY & POLITICS: Buying Ambassadorships Redux: Four Obama Nominees Were Big-Money Bundlers.

Kennedy Health Plan Would Include Public Insurance

Kennedy Health Plan Would Include Public Insurance    – Bloomberg.com

May 29 (Bloomberg) — Senator Edward Kennedy, chairman of a Senate panel drafting a health-care overhaul, is circulating a plan that would require everyone to have insurance and would create a government program to compete with private insurers, said people familiar with the plan.

The proposal would pay health-care providers participating in a public plan 10 percent more than they would get under Medicare, according a summary provided by the people.

Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat and chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, said in an op- ed piece yesterday in the Boston Globe that a key way to expand health-care coverage to the 46 million uninsured Americans is through a new program run by the U.S. government.

“An important foundation of our legislation is the following principle: If you like the coverage you have now, you keep it,” Kennedy wrote. “But if you don’t have health insurance or don’t like the insurance you have, our bill will give you new, more affordable options.”

Kennedy’s plan would require employers to provide health insurance or pay a subsidy to help support the public plan, according to the summary. It would set a federal standard for Medicaid, the federal program for the poor, to cover people who earn up to 150 percent of the poverty level. States currently set their own standards for coverage.

CHIP Program

via Kennedy Health Plan Would Include Public Insurance (Update2) – Bloomberg.com.

How To Make Waxman-Markey A Better Clean Energy Jobs Bill: Strengthen The Renewable Electricity Standard

How To Make Waxman-Markey A Better Clean Energy Jobs Bill: Strengthen The Renewable Electricity Standard

Now that the Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy Security Act (H.R. 2454) has been approved by the House Energy and Commerce Committee, progressive and environmental activists are asking how to save this critical green economy legislation from corporate polluter influence.

The biggest challenge is the political one — how to convince lawmakers that standing up for a truly just and green future is both necessary and wise, when the rewards of defending corporate interests against change are so evident. Congress lags behind the American public in recognizing the urgency and scope of the climate threat, and lags behind the American public in recognizing the opportunity and reward of clean energy leadership.

Even as the greatest challenge in passing green economy legislation is energizing the American public and giving confidence to Congress to become champions of clean energy reform, efforts need to be made to improve the underlying text of Waxman-Markey. Here’s one policy recommendation:

via Wonk Room » How To Make Waxman-Markey A Better Clean Energy Jobs Bill: Strengthen The Renewable Electricity Standard.

NASA – New Solar Cycle Prediction

New Solar Cycle Prediction

May 29, 2009: An international panel of experts led by NOAA and sponsored by NASA has released a new prediction for the next solar cycle. Solar Cycle 24 will peak, they say, in May 2013 with a below-average number of sunspots.

“If our prediction is correct, Solar Cycle 24 will have a peak sunspot number of 90, the lowest of any cycle since 1928 when Solar Cycle 16 peaked at 78,” says panel chairman Doug Biesecker of the NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center.

Right: A solar flare observed in Dec. 2006 by NOAA’s GOES-13 satellite.

It is tempting to describe such a cycle as “weak” or “mild,” but that could give the wrong impression.

“Even a below-average cycle is capable of producing severe space weather,” points out Biesecker. “The great geomagnetic storm of 1859, for instance, occurred during a solar cycle of about the same size we’re predicting for 2013.”

The 1859 storm–known as the “Carrington Event” after astronomer Richard Carrington who witnessed the instigating solar flare–electrified transmission cables, set fires in telegraph offices, and produced Northern Lights so bright that people could read newspapers by their red and green glow. A recent report by the National Academy of Sciences found that if a similar storm occurred today, it could cause $1 to 2 trillion in damages to society’s high-tech infrastructure and require four to ten years for complete recovery. For comparison, Hurricane Katrina caused “only” $80 to 125 billion in damage.

via NASA – New Solar Cycle Prediction.

Tancredo: ‘I don’t know’ if the Obama administration ‘hates white people.’

OPS: Tommy is one racist Mother Fxxxer

Tancredo: ‘I don’t know’ if the Obama administration ‘hates white people.’

Recently, Rush Limbaugh declared that the way to get promoted in the Obama administration is “by hating white people.” On MSNBC this afternoon, when David Shuster asked right-wing extremist Tom Tancredo whether he agreed, Tancredo refused to object to Limbaugh’s characterization:

SHUSTER: Mr. Tancredo, do you agree that the Obama administration hates white people?

TANCREDO: Oh [sighs], I don’t know. But I’ll tell you this –

SHUSTER: You don’t know? In other words, they might?

TANCREDO: What do I — I have no idea whether they hate white people or not!

Shuster also asked Tancredo whether he wanted to apologize for calling the the nation’s largest Hispanic civil rights organization a “Latino KKK.” Tancredo laughed at the idea of an apology. Watch it:

via Think Progress » Tancredo: ‘I don’t know’ if the Obama administration ‘hates white people.’.

Organic Dairies Watch the Good Times Turn Bad

Organic Dairies Watch the Good Times Turn Bad – - NYTimes.com
RANDOLPH CENTER, Vt. — When Ken Preston went organic on his dairy farm here in 2005, he figured that doing so would guarantee him what had long been elusive: a stable, high price for the milk from his cows.

Sure enough, his income soared 20 percent, and he could finally afford a Chevy Silverado pickup to help out. The dairy conglomerate that distributed his milk wanted everything Mr. Preston could supply. Supermarket orders were skyrocketing.

But soon the price of organic feed shot up. Then the recession hit, and families looking to save on groceries found organic milk easy to do without. Ultimately the conglomerate, with a glut of product, said it would not renew his contract next month, leaving him with nowhere to sell his milk, a victim of trends that are crippling many organic dairy farmers from coast to coast.

via Organic Dairies Watch the Good Times Turn Bad – NYTimes.com.

MSNBC turns pro-choice into ‘abortion backer’

MSNBC turns pro-choice into ‘abortion backer’

People who support women’s right to choose are really just the abortion lobby –or so an MSNBC headline would have you believe.

In a particularly fatuous faux-pas, the network chopped up a Washington Post headline, leaving out the key word “rights” (the original headline was “Abortion Rights Backers Get Reassurances on Nominee.”) MSNBC turned it into “Abortion backers get reassurances on nominee.”

via The Raw Story » MSNBC turns pro-choice into ‘abortion backer’.

VIDEO: Craig T. Nelson ‘s Glenn Beck Tax Rant

VIDEO: Craig T. Nelson ‘s Glenn Beck Tax Rant

As the Huffington Post’s Jason Linkins pointed out, Actor Craig T. Nelson, perhaps best known his role in the TV series Coach, appeared on the Glenn Beck show last night and unleashed an impassioned rant against taxes. Railing against — what appeared to be — the entire idea of government in general, Nelson told Beck he is “really thinking about” not paying any income taxes.

Nelson went on to refer to himself as “a fiscally responsible grandfather” and said he’s being roped into paying for government programs he doesn’t believe in. “I’ve been on welfare and food stamps…did anyone help me?” Nelson said, perhaps not realizing that welfare and food stamps are actually forms of government aid.

Watch the video below:

via VIDEO: Craig T. Nelson ‘s Glenn Beck Tax Rant.

Schwarzenegger Would Close 220 State Parks To Cut Deficit

Schwarzenegger Would Close 220 State Parks To Cut Deficit

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s budget cuts could mean the closing of up to 220 state parks, among them the home of the world’s tallest tree and other attractions that draw millions of visitors.

Schwarzenegger this week recommended eliminating $70 million in parks spending through June 30, 2010. An additional $143.4 million would be saved in the following fiscal year by keeping the parks closed.

“This is a worst-case scenario,” said Roy Sterns, a spokesman at the state parks department. “If we can do less than this, we will try. But under the present proposal, this is it.”

Among the parks that could be closed, the parks department said Thursday, are Lake Tahoe’s Emerald Bay, Will Rogers’ Southern California ranch and Humboldt Redwoods State Park, which boasts the world’s tallest tree, a giant that tops 370 feet. Even the Governor’s Mansion in Sacramento is on the list.

The Legislature last year rejected the governor’s proposal to close 48 state parks. But lawmakers said that with California’s budget deficit now at $24.3 billion, the situation is so dire that it is likely some parks will close.

“Things that were previously dead on arrival are a lot more viable in a crisis like this,” said Democrat Jared Huffman, chairman of the Assembly’s parks and wildlife committee. “I think some cuts are coming to the parks, and they’ll be cuts I won’t like and the public won’t like.”

The state parks department said a $70 million cut would leave it with enough money to run just 59 of California’s 279 state parks.

via Schwarzenegger Would Close 220 State Parks To Cut Deficit.

US failing to investigate war crimes: UN investigator

US failing to investigate war crimes: UN investigator

GENEVA – An independent UN human rights investigator has said that the United States is failing to properly investigate alleged war crimes committed by its soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Although some cases are investigated and lead to prosecutions, others aren’t or result in lenient sentences, said Philip Alston, the UN Human Rights Council’s special rapporteur on extra-judicial killings.

“There have been chronic and deplorable accountability failures with respect to policies, practices and conduct that resulted in alleged unlawful killings – including possible war crimes – in the United States’ international operations,” Alston said in a report dated May 26 and published on a UN website.

A spokesman for the US mission in Geneva, Dick Wilbur, said Alston’s conclusions and recommendations would be reviewed closely.

“We support the independence and work of all UN special rapporteurs and meet regularly with those who examine issues in the US, including Mr. Alston,” he said.

via US failing to investigate war crimes: UN investigator – World – NZ Herald News.

Iacocca losing pension, car in Chrysler plan

OPS:  This is the point of teh Bankruptcy. Killing Pension obligations and busting the Unions

Iacocca losing pension, car in Chrysler plan

Car exec credited with saving carmaker to lose benefits in bankruptcy

NEW YORK – Lee Iacocca, the car executive credited with saving Chrysler from bankruptcy in the 1980s, is to lose a big chunk of his pension and a guaranteed life-long company car due to the U.S. automaker’s bankruptcy filing two decades later.

Chrysler CEO Robert Nardelli told a U.S. bankruptcy court on Thursday that Iacocca’s pension would be among the obligations Chrysler will no longer have to pay if it gets bankruptcy court approval to sell itself to a “New Chrysler” to be owned by its union, the U.S. and Canadian governments and Fiat SpA.

Iacocca, the storied former chairman and CEO who revived Chrysler in the 1980s and appeared in car commercials, has participated in a supplemental executive retirement plan that was comprised of non-IRS qualified pension funds and is subject to bankruptcy.

via Iacocca losing pension, car in Chrysler plan – Autos- msnbc.com.

New report appears to directly contradict White House denial on abuse photos

OPS:  Well, Sy Hersh has said that he has seen these videos – put your money is on Hersh

New report appears to directly contradict White House denial on abuse photos

A new report appears to directly contradict denials by the White House and the Pentagon that abuse photographs the Obama administration has withheld are worse than previously known.

In a posting Friday, an American reporter says he’s confirmed allegations printed in British newspapers that unreleased photographs of US servicemembers abusing prisoners include graphic images of rape, sexually explicit acts, sodomy and forced masturbation.

Probably most notable is an alleged photograph showing a man in a US military uniform receiving oral sex from a female prisoner.

The detailed descriptions of the photographs may provide new insight into what’s actually included among the images the administration has said it won’t release in response to a civil liberties group’s lawsuit.

via Raw Story » New report appears to directly contradict White House denial on abuse photos.

Democratic congressman subpoenaed over lobbyist ties

Breaking: Democratic congressman subpoenaed over lobbyist ties

Indiana Democratic congressman Pete Visclosky has been subpoenaed by a federal grand jury over his ties to The PMA Group — a lobbying concern whose staff members contributed $150,000 to his campaigns since 2001. The group’s clients netted $23 million in earmarks for 2008 alone.

In a statement issued to Politico, Visclosky said:

“Federal law enforcement officials have issued grand jury subpoenas to my congressional office, campaign committees, and certain employees to request documents relating to PMA.”

“It is my intention to fully cooperate with the investigation consistent with my constitutional obligations to Congress and my duties and responsibilities to my constituents.

via The Raw Story » Breaking: Democratic congressman subpoenaed over lobbyist ties.

Obama Offers Prime Posts to Top Campaign Contributors

Obama Offers Prime Posts to Top Campaign Contributors

May 29 (Bloomberg) — Louis Susman has one thing in common with many of his predecessors nominated to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom: money.

Susman, 71, a retired Citigroup Inc. senior investment banker, raised between $200,000 and $500,000 for President Barack Obama’s presidential campaign and another $300,000 for his inauguration. On Wednesday, Obama nominated Susman to the post formally known as the Court of St. James.

Like Andrew Mellon, Joseph Kennedy and Walter Annenberg before him, Susman’s credentials stem more from involvement in financing party politics than foreign policy experience.

Even with his pledges to change government, Obama is following the tradition of his predecessors by offering some ambassadorships to top campaign backers, including four of the 12 nominations this week. The president acknowledged in a news conference in January that donors might get plum postings.

“The practice of rewarding donors is a remnant of the spoils system that we abolished in the civil service,” said career diplomat Ronald Neumann, president of the American Academy of Diplomacy and a former ambassador to Afghanistan. “It is a dismal testimony to the importance of money in our electoral system.”

via Bloomberg.com: News.

The Bilderberg Plan for 2009: Remaking the Global Political Economy

The Bilderberg Plan for 2009: Remaking the Global Political Economy – by Andrew G. Marshall

From May 14-17, the global elite met in secret in Greece for the yearly Bilderberg conference, amid scattered and limited global media attention. Roughly 130 of the world’s most powerful individuals came together to discuss the pressing issues of today, and to chart a course for the next year. The main topic of discussion at this years meeting was the global financial crisis, which is no surprise, considering the list of conference attendees includes many of the primary architects of the crisis, as well as those poised to “solve” it.

The Agenda: The Restructuring of the Global Political Economy

Before the meeting began, Bilderberg investigative journalist Daniel Estulin reported on the main item of the agenda, which was leaked to him by his sources inside. Though such reports cannot be verified, his sources, along with those of veteran Bilderberg tracker, Jim Tucker, have proven to be shockingly accurate in the past. Apparently, the main topic of discussion at this year’s meeting was to address the economic crisis, in terms of undertaking, “Either a prolonged, agonizing depression that dooms the world to decades of stagnation, decline and poverty … or an intense-but-shorter depression that paves the way for a new sustainable economic world order, with less sovereignty but more efficiency.” Other items on the agenda included a plan to “continue to deceive millions of savers and investors who believe the hype about the supposed up-turn in the economy. They are about to be set up for massive losses and searing financial pain in the months ahead,” and “There will be a final push for the enactment of Lisbon Treaty, pending on Irish voting YES on the treaty in Sept or October,”[1] which would give the European Union massive powers over its member nations, essentially making it a supranational regional government, with each country relegated to more of a provincial status.

Shortly after the meetings began, Bilderberg tracker Jim Tucker reported that his inside sources revealed that the group has on its agenda, “the plan for a global department of health, a global treasury and a shortened depression rather than a longer economic downturn.” Tucker reported that Swedish Foreign Minister and former Prime Minister, Carl Bildt, “Made a speech advocating turning the World Health Organization into a world department of health, advocating turning the IMF into a world department of treasury, both of course under the auspices of the United Nations.” Further, Tucker reported that, “Treasury Secretary Geithner and Carl Bildt touted a shorter recession not a 10-year recession … partly because a 10 year recession would damage Bilderberg industrialists themselves, as much as they want to have a global department of labor and a global department of treasury, they still like making money and such a long recession would cost them big bucks industrially because nobody is buying their toys…..the tilt is towards keeping it short.”[2]

via The Bilderberg Plan for 2009: Remaking the Global Political Economy.

The NYTimes Finally Reports the Economic Disaster of New Nukes

The NYTimes Finally Reports the Economic Disaster of New Nukes  | CommonDreams.org

by Harvey Wasserman

In a devastating pair of financial reports that might be called “The Emperor Has No Pressure Vessel,” the New York Times has blazed new light on the catastrophic economics of atomic power.

The two Business Section specials cover the fiasco of new French construction at Okiluoto, Finland, and the virtual collapse of Atomic Energy of Canada. In a sane world they could comprise an epitaph for the “Peaceful Atom”. But they come simultaneous with Republican demands for up to $700 billion or more in new reactor construction.

The Times’s “In Finland, Nuclear Renaissance Runs Into Trouble” by James Kanter is a “cautionary tale” about the “most powerful reactor ever built” whose modular design “was supposed to make it faster and cheaper to build” as well as safer to operate.

But four years into a construction process that was scheduled to end about now, the plant’s $4.2 billion price tag has soared by 50% or more. Areva, the French government’s front group, won’t predict when the reactor will open. Finnish utilities have stopped trying to guess.

via The NYTimes Finally Reports the Economic Disaster of New Nukes | CommonDreams.org.

Exxon Mobil CEO Tells Shareholders That Fossil Fuels Have Long Future

Exxon Mobil CEO Tells Shareholders That Fossil Fuels Have Long Future  | CommonDreams.org

DALLAS – Exxon Mobil Chairman Rex Tillerson issued a ringing defense of the oil titan at the company’s annual meeting Wednesday, where 11 shareholder proposals, all opposed by management, were roundly defeated in a spirited gathering at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center.

Tillerson praised Exxon’s record-breaking financial performance in 2008, its handsome returns to shareholders in recent years, technological advances that have greatly enhanced oil and natural gas recovery, and its efforts to reduce the environmental harm of its far-ranging operations. He defended the company’s large buybacks of company stock, saying that they have increased value to shareholders.

In comments at the meeting and a news conference afterward, Tillerson said U.S. gasoline consumption has probably peaked and will slowly decline as a result of increased fuel economy and a growing reliance on low-sulfur diesel fuel. But he said the world isn’t anywhere close to reaching “peak oil,” the point at which oil production will crest and then begin an irreversible decline as a result of dwindling petroleum deposits. A full-scale transition from fossil fuels could be “100 years away,” he said.

Company focus intact

via Exxon Mobil CEO Tells Shareholders That Fossil Fuels Have Long Future | CommonDreams.org.

Underlying the Economic Crisis is a Human Rights Time Bomb

Underlying the Economic Crisis is a Human Rights Time Bomb | CommonDreams.org

The Economic crisis has only exacerbated human rights abuses

Underlying the economic crisis is an explosive human rights crisis. The economic downturn has aggravated abuses, distracted attention from them and created new problems. In the name of security, human rights were trampled on. Now, in the name of economic recovery, they are being relegated to the back seat. The world needs a new global deal on human rights – not paper promises but commitment and concrete action from governments.

This crisis is about shortages of food, jobs, clean water, land and housing, and also about deprivation and discrimination, growing inequality, xenophobia and racism, violence and repression across the world. Billions of people are suffering from insecurity, injustice and indignity.

China and Russia are proof that open markets have not led to open societies. Human rights activists, journalists, lawyers, trade union representatives and other civil society leaders were harassed, attacked, or killed with impunity in every world region last year. From Gaza to Darfur and from eastern DRC to northern Sri Lanka, the human toll of conflict has been horrendous, and the lukewarm response of the international community shocking.

via Underlying the Economic Crisis is a Human Rights Time Bomb | CommonDreams.org.

Global Warming Causes 300,000 Deaths a Year, Says Kofi Annan thinktank

Global Warming Causes 300,000 Deaths a Year, Says Kofi Annan thinktank  | CommonDreams.org

Climate change is greatest humanitarian challenge facing the world as heatwaves, floods and forest fires become more severe

Global Warming is already responsible for 300,000 deaths a year and is affecting 300m people, according to the first comprehensive study of the human impact of global warming.

It projects that increasingly severe heatwaves, floods, storms and forest fires will be responsible for as many as 500,000 deaths a year by 2030, making it the greatest humanitarian challenge the world faces.

Economic losses due to climate change today amount to more than $125bn a year – more than the all present world aid. The report comes from former UN secretary general Kofi Annan’s thinktank, the Global Humanitarian Forum. By 2030, the report says, climate change could cost $600bn a year.

Civil unrest may also increase because of weather-related events, the report says: “Four billion people are vulnerable now and 500m are now at extreme risk. Weather-related disasters … bring hunger, disease, poverty and lost livelihoods. They pose a threat to social and political stability”.

via Global Warming Causes 300,000 Deaths a Year, Says Kofi Annan thinktank | CommonDreams.org.

Sonia Sotomayor is not Clarence Thomas

Sonia Sotomayor is not Clarence Thomas   | Salon

Why do Republicans think Sotomayor is a mediocre beneficiary of affirmative action? Because they had their own.

By Joe Conason

For Sonia Sotomayor, nothing could be quite so predictable at this moment as her vicious denigration by Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Karl Rove, the denizens of the Corner at National Review Online and the myriad squawking noisemakers on Fox News. With instantaneous unanimity, the right-wing verdict against the judge was handed down. She is “dumb,” or at least “not that bright,” a slur that requires no evidence because she is obviously an “affirmative action” nominee for the high court.

And we all know what that means, don’t we? Just ask Clarence Thomas.

The conservative campaign to dismiss Sotomayor’s accomplishments and diminish her qualifications follows a pattern that is by now all too familiar. Yet she is measurably smarter than most of her critics — if a summa cum laude degree from Princeton and a spot on the Yale Law Review are worth anything — and overcame disadvantages that suburban sons and daughters of privilege (such as Coulter and Limbaugh) probably cannot imagine.

via Sonia Sotomayor is not Clarence Thomas | Salon.

Money smuggling scheme busted by deputies

OPS:   Texas, Land of the Free? If you have cash,  you MUST be a criminal.

In Texas it is a third degree felony to travel with more than $10,000 in cash, a second degree felony to travel with over $100,000 in cash and a first degree felony to travel with over $200,000 cash.

Money smuggling scheme busted by deputies

GREENVILLE — A Chicago woman who cooked up a scheme to smuggle over $100,000 in a household appliance has ended up in jail, and her cash seized.

The Hunt County Sheriff’s Office Narcotics Division made the seizure in Greenville Wednesday night, according to Hunt County Undersheriff Joe Knight.

Allegedly, Maria Torres was a female passenger in a vehicle reportedly traveling from Chicago, Illinois in route to Dallas. The vehicle made a stop while passing through Greenville. As it was stopped, she met Hunt County Narcotics Deputy Harry Washington. A consensual search revealed a large sum of cash.

Further investigation showed that Torres had in her care luggage including a brand new, packaged microwave. “It seemed very odd that she would be traveling with a microwave,” said Knight. “Who buys a microwave in Chicago to take to Dallas?”

Deputies requested assistance from Greenville Police Officer Robert Pemberton and his narcotic detecting K9. The K9 alerted on the package containing the microwave.

via The Herald Banner, Greenville, TX – Money smuggling scheme busted by deputies.

Sirota: Democracy in need of a bailout

Democracy in need of a bailout – The Denver Post

David Sirota

Without a bailout, newspapers will lay off staff, fewer journalists will report important stories, there will be no Fourth Estate check on state and corporate power, and the country will suffer. So goes the pro-democracy case for government and/or altruistic investors to save the newspaper industry with an infusion of cash.

Except, amid the debate about such a bailout, it seems government and investors are already subsidizing the industry with in-kind contributions of damning honesty. These outbursts of candor are so brazen and self-explanatory as to require almost zero reportorial resources for blockbuster scoops.

It started in January, when it seemed America would need enterprising journalists to find out whether President Obama’s Wall Street-connected economic team was focused on helping average Americans, or on protecting the super-wealthy speculator class.

Typically, newspapers have to go all Woodward and Bernstein to answer such questions of influence and loyalties. They have to circumvent diversionary press-secretary spin, dig up documents and ferret out leaks — and all of that takes money they increasingly do not have.

But then Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner came right out and said, “We have a financial system that is run by private shareholders, managed by private institutions, and we’d like to do our best to preserve that system.” As Bloomberg News correctly noted, the White House was open about its primary “goal of preserving the private banking system.” Motives admitted, objectives acknowledged, no expensive investigative reporting necessary.

via Sirota: Democracy in need of a bailout – The Denver Post.

Outsourced! Jim is replaced by a writer in India

Outsourced! Jim is replaced by a writer in India

I’ve been writing my weekly print column for 20 years. But this week they found someone cheaper. In Hyderabad.

via Outsourced! Jim is replaced by a writer in India | MNN – Mother Nature Network.

Kerry’s Panel Follows the Money in Probes From Iran to Mexico

Kerry’s Panel Follows the Money in Probes From Iran to Mexico – Bloomberg.com

May 29 (Bloomberg) — John Kerry has never run for sheriff. As chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee he is starting to act like one, and the world is his jurisdiction.

The Massachusetts Democrat is wielding his gavel with an investigative zeal, and plans to take on Iran’s nuclear program, gun-running on the Mexican border, terrorism, narcotics and human trafficking, all through the prism of money laundering. He has hired a former investigative reporter, an ex-CIA agent and a one-time managing director of Bear Stearns Cos. LLC to help him.

“There are lots of big pieces out there that depend on money moving,” he said in an interview in his office in the Senate, where he is serving his 24th year.

Kerry, who was a prosecutor and attorney in Massachusetts before starting his political career in 1982, said the lack of congressional oversight during the Bush administration left behind a target-rich environment for his panel. The Treasury Department “has its hands full” and is “inadequately resourced” to pursue these inquiries, he said.

“For the last eight years we’ve had an administration that has done its utmost to protect, hide, obfuscate, neglect, void, simply not even care about these issues,” said Kerry, 65.

via Kerry’s Panel Follows the Money in Probes From Iran to Mexico – Bloomberg.com.

Who Is Rick Scott And What Type Of Health Care System Is He Advocating?

VIDEO REPORT: Who Is Rick Scott And What Type Of Health Care System Is He Advocating?

This Sunday, the front group Conservatives for Patients’ Rights will be airing a 30-minute documentary with “horror stories” aimed at chipping away public support for reforming our health care system. Ironically, the leader and financier of the organization, private health care executive Rick Scott, is actually credited with transforming the American health care system into the profit above-all-else culture that is currently plaguing America.

Rick Scott is not only known for his efforts to build the “McDonald’s” of the health care industry, but his company was also forced to pay a $1.7 billion fraud settlement, the largest health care fraud settlement in U.S. history, for systematically stealing from taxpayers.

ThinkProgress has compiled a video report detailing who Rick Scott is, and what type of health care system he is defending. Watch it:

via Think Progress » VIDEO REPORT: Who Is Rick Scott And What Type Of Health Care System Is He Advocating?.

Russia signs a $306 million deal with NASA to ferry astronauts to space station in 2012

OPS:  We’ve  – Lost In Space.

Russia signs a $306 million deal with NASA to ferry astronauts to space station in 2012   – Los Angeles Times

MOSCOW (AP) — The Russian space agency says it has signed a $306 million deal with NASA to ferry its astronauts to the international space station in 2012.

Roscosmos said Friday the agreement covers four launches aboard the three-person Soyuz capsules to swap out crews in the orbiting laboratory.

NASA said Russia would supply comprehensive support for six NASA crew members taking part in long-duration missions.

The pact extends Russia’s existing contract with NASA for transporting station crew, but seems to represent an increase in Russia’s transport charges.

Space tourist Charles Simonyi said he paid about $35 million for his Soyuz flight to the station in April.

via Russia signs a $306 million deal with NASA to ferry astronauts to space station in 2012 – Los Angeles Times.

GM trying to unload Saturn, Hummer

Saturn, Hummer on auction, or chopping, block - msnbc.com

GM, facing bankruptcy, trying to unload once-promising brands

Whether or not General Motors files for bankruptcy protection, the carmaker has made clear that its future plans do not include two brands — Saturn and Hummer — that once seemed to hold immense promise for the company.

GM has said it will decide this year whether to sell or discontinue both brands as part of the stringent cost-cutting measures aimed at trying to restore the ailing company’s financial stability. The overall effort also has created an uncertain future for two other GM divisions, Saab and Opel.

via GM trying to unload Saturn, Hummer – Autos- msnbc.com.

Jesse Ventura Interview With Keith Olbermann

YouTube – Jesse Ventura Interview With Keith Olbermann.

Fox’s Major Garrett Picks Up Right-Wing Chrysler Conspiracy Theory

YouTube – Fox’s Major Garrett Picks Up Right-Wing Chrysler Conspiracy Theory.

Countdown – WTF: Destitute Republican-owned car dealerships

YouTube – Countdown – WTF for 28 May, 2009: Destitute Republican-owned car dealerships.

NYC Could have it’s own 9-11 Commission

Three 9-11 family members ask unanswered questions about September 11th, part of an appeal by the New York Coalition for Accountability Now (NYCCAN) for a new, independent 9-11 commission. For more information go to NYCCAN.org.

via YouTube – Vote for Answers.

The Olson/Boies Challenge to California’s Proposition 8: A High-Risk Effort

The Olson/Boies Challenge to California’s Proposition 8: A High-Risk Effort

By JOHN W. DEAN

This week, famously, the California Supreme Court issued its decision, Strauss v. Horton, upholding Proposition 8, the voter-adopted prohibition against same-sex marriages. Within twenty-four hours, former U.S. Solicitor General Ted Olson and celebrated trial attorney David Boies had together filed a federal lawsuit seeking to overturn this controversial provision of the California Constitution.

Olson and Boies are best known for their roles in Bush v. Gore. In their challenge to Proposition 8, Olson, the conservative, and Boies, the progressive, represent two California couples who are precluded from marrying in light of Proposition 8′s changes to California law.

Clearly, with the high-profile Olson and Boies in charge, this is a carefully- considered move in taking same-sex marriage to federal court. However, for many good reasons, some in the Gay and Lesbian community, and some of the attorneys who have been toiling in this field for many years, are concerned about their action. It is an aggressive undertaking that could end marriage discrimination against gays, but it could also backfire, and set back efforts that have been proceeding state by state, with considerable success, over the past decade.

Allow me to broadly sketch the situation and the potential problems it raises.

via The Olson/Boies Challenge to California’s Proposition 8: A High-Risk Effort.

Pentagon Plans New Arm to Wage Wars in Cyberspace

Pentagon Plans New Arm to Wage Wars in Cyberspace   – NYTimes.com

WASHINGTON — The Pentagon plans to create a new military command for cyberspace, administration officials said Thursday, stepping up preparations by the armed forces to conduct both offensive and defensive computer warfare.

The military command would complement a civilian effort to be announced by President Obama on Friday that would overhaul the way the United States safeguards its computer networks.

Mr. Obama, officials said, will announce the creation of a White House office — reporting to both the National Security Council and the National Economic Council — that will coordinate a multibillion-dollar effort to restrict access to government computers and protect systems that run the stock exchanges, clear global banking transactions and manage the air traffic control system.

via Pentagon Plans New Arm to Wage Wars in Cyberspace – NYTimes.com.

Report: Climate change crisis ‘catastrophic’

Report: Climate change crisis ‘catastrophic’   – CNN.com

LONDON, England (CNN) — The first comprehensive report into the human cost of climate change warns the world is in the throes of a “silent crisis” that is killing 300,000 people each year.

More than 300 million people are already seriously affected by the gradual warming of the earth and that number is set to double by 2030, the report from the Global Humanitarian Forum warns.

“For the first time we are trying to get the world’s attention to the fact that climate change is not something waiting to happen. It is impacting seriously the lives of many people around the world,” the forum’s president, former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, told CNN.

Speaking to CNN’s Becky Anderson in London on Friday, Annan said the migration of people from newly uninhabitable areas presents a security issue that needs to be addressed by the United Nations Security Council.

“This is one of the reasons why I’ve described climate change as all encompassing,” he told CNN. “This threat to our health, this threat to food production, this threat to security. It raises political tensions, it will have people on the move — and they are on the move — and many more which will bring tensions.”

The report, titled “Human Impact Report: Climate Change — The Anatomy of a Silent Crisis” comes just six months before the United Nations Climate Conference in Copenhagen to forge a post-Kyoto climate agreement for 2012 and beyond.

via Report: Climate change crisis ‘catastrophic’ – CNN.com.

US Army base shuts down after rise in suicides

US Army base shuts down after rise in suicides

The flag-drapped coffin containing the body of one of three soldiers and two medical officers shot dead by a fellow US soldier at a mental health counseling clinic in Baghdad. The commander of Fort Campbell army base in Kentucky has ordered a three-day suspension of regular duties to focus on a spike in suicides among his troops amid concern over a wider trend across the armed services.

The commander of Fort Campbell army base in Kentucky has ordered a three-day suspension of regular duties to focus on a spike in suicides among his troops amid concern over a wider trend across the armed services.

The “stand-down” on Friday entered its third day at Fort Campbell, which is home to the famed 101st Airborne Division and has recorded the highest rate of suicide in the army, with at least 11 confirmed or suspected suicides.

Brigadier General Stephen Townsend announced the stand-down to focus attention on the problem after two more soldiers took their lives last week.

“It’s bad for soldiers, it’s bad for families, bad for your units, bad for this division and our army and our country and it’s got to stop now. Suicides on Fort Campbell have to stop now,” he told troops.

“Suicide is a permanent solution to what is only a temporary problem,” Townsend said.

via AFP » US Army base shuts down after rise in suicides.

Problem Bank List Exceeds 300

Problem Bank List Exceeds 300

The list of “problem banks” grew to its highest level since 1993.

The list of “problem banks” grew to its highest level since 1993 during the first three months of the year due to mounting loan losses, according to the government.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Company said Wednesday that its list of “problem banks” – those thought to be most likely to fail – swelled to 305 in the first quarter of 2009. That is up 21 percent from the 252 banks on the list in the fourth quarter of 2008.

Although the banks on the list are considered to be the most likely to fail, it is not a foregone conclusion. In fact, just 13 percent of the institutions on the list have historically failed.

via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.

Washington Post Touts Benefits of the Value Added Tax

Washington Post Touts Benefits of the Value Added Tax

Whether you look at the VAT from the standpoint of a fair trade advocate or a fiscal conservative the conclusion is the same: America needs this or something like it.

The United States still faces a major obstacle in international trade which most people simply know nothing about. This obstacle is the Value Added Tax (VAT) and it costs this economy hundreds of millions of dollars in extra fees every year. Making matters worse is the fact that over nearly 150 nations around the world use a VAT system to protect their economy while the United States remains idle.

The simple fact is that governments need money to operate, and they generate this revenue in many ways. In the United States our government operates only on funds generated through income and property taxation. The sales tax – a form of consumption tax – is marginal in the grand scheme. Most other countries put much more emphasis on consumption taxes like the VAT.

The VAT rewards exports while largely blocking imports. This guarantees domestic demand for domestically produced goods, thereby ensuring that the taxpaying citizens are gainfully employed.

via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.

More Paralyzing Wall St Risks on the Horizon

More Paralyzing Wall St Risks on the Horizon

Little has been done to prevent Wall Street’s outrageous compensation packages in the future.

Incentivized risk-taking was the root cause of the financial collapse, yet nothing has been done to reform the system and prevent future financial gambles that have the potential to bring the world economy to its knees, according to Alan S. Binder, professor of economics at Princeton University and former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve Board.

Outlandish compensation packages that encouraged making big bets with other peoples money presented a win-win situation for bank traders and other Wall Street players, according to Binder.

“Unfortunately, their compensation schemes exacerbate these natural tendencies by offering them the following sort of go-for-broke incentives when they place financial bets: Heads, you become richer than Croesus; tails, you get no bonus, receive instead about four times the national average salary,” he writes in The Wall Street Journal.

The real losers in this real life game of “Risk” are the shareholders whose money is being gambled away in the hopes that it will return a huge profit and an even bigger bonus – in normal times. In extreme cases, such as the worst recession facing the country since the 1930s, that pain is spread from investors to the entire country. This scenario is evident now in the form of collapsing home prices, tight credit markets and tanking retirement accounts.

via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.

The Increasing Panama Problem

The Increasing Panama Problem

The proposed Panama Free Trade Agreement is a holdover from the Bush administration which President Obama has, for some unknown reason, clung to upon taking office.

The proposed Panama Free Trade Agreement is a holdover from the Bush administration which President Obama has, for some unknown reason, clung to upon taking office. There is a growing coalition of congressional Democrats who have organized against this and other “free trade” deals. Their hope is to absolve the U.S. of the failed Bush policies that helped reduce America’s economy to ruin.

Representative Mike Michaud (D-Maine) has championed tearing down this and other FTAs. His intent is to protect American workers who have been completely left behind by “free trade” practices during the past two decades.

The Panama FTA contains the same loopholes and incentives contained in our NAFTA and WTO commitments. These loopholes allow foreign investors to take advantage of U.S. market conditions while allowing U.S. companies to move production overseas at no cost. These incentives have resulted in millions of lost manufacturing jobs in the United States, and every new FTA accelerates the decline.

Another major provision of the Panama FTA that has upset fair trade minded politicians is Panama’s continued status as an international tax haven. At the very least they have called on the Obama administration to include an amendment to the agreement in which Panama tackles the banking corruption that encourages investors to offshore millions of dollars tax-free.

via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.

Research Proves Marijuana is Not a “Gateway Drug”

Research Proves Marijuana is Not a “Gateway Drug”

The surging debate surrounding the legalization of marijuana has brought with it the resurrection of the “gateway theory,” which alleges that experimenting with marijuana leads to the use of harder drugs like cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine. The gateway debate was reborn last week, thanks to a video of FBI director Robert Mueller testifying before Congress that marijuana should be illegal because it leads to more dangerous drug use.

Although the Mueller video has provoked amusement on pot-friendly websites, the unfortunate reality is that the “gateway drug” stigma continues to present an impediment to the reform of marijuana laws. A new Rasmussen poll found that a large percentage of Americans believe the gateway argument:

The new survey also shows that nearly half of voters (46%) believe marijuana use leads to use of harder drugs. Thirty-seven percent (37%) do not see marijuana as a “gateway” drug.

Revealingly, the percentage who opposed marijuana legalization and the percentage who believed in the gateway theory were identical, both coming in at exactly 46%. As we look for ways to persuade those who remain opposed to marijuana reform, it’s clearly in our interest to work towards demolishing the pernicious gateway theory once and for all. Let’s take a look at what the data shows.

In 1999, drug czar Barry McCaffrey commissioned a major study on medical marijuana conducted by the venerable Institute of Medicine, which included an examination of marijuana’s potential to lead to other drug use. In simple terms, the researchers explained why the gateway theory was unfounded:

via Research Proves Marijuana is Not a “Gateway Drug” | Stop the Drug War (DRCNet).

Raising awareness of the consequences of drug prohibition

New Drug Czar Doesn’t Care About Medical Marijuana

In an interview with National Journal, Gil Kerlikowske didn’t have much to say about medical pot:

NJ: Do you have plans to review potential changes to the country’s medical marijuana policies?

Kerlikowske: I have not had my meeting with the attorney general, who had made some statements, but I plan on following up with that pretty closely.

NJ: Will you at least be conducting a study on the topic?

Kerlikowske: I don’t know. I think it is a little premature, and frankly, looking at the overdose deaths — there is such a huge increase in people dying from prescription drug overdoses — is a little higher on my priorities right now than the medical marijuana issue….

Well that makes sense, but considering that there’s a raging controversy in America right now over the federal government’s war on medical marijuana, maybe the drug czar should at least be able to provide a little insight instead of changing the subject. Of course, it’s likely that Kerlikowske’s attempts to downplay the issue are actually intended to dismiss potential controversy surrounding the new administration’s positive statements on the issue, i.e. medical marijuana isn’t a top concern, so don’t give us a hard time for not raiding dispensaries.

This ‘medical marijuana isn’t a priority’ stuff is fine for now if it means they won’t be interfering with state laws, but it’s a pretty weak cop-out in the long run. Eventually, Washington will have to come to terms with the deep unpopularity of the war on medical marijuana. That means declaring an end to federal raids based on firm moral and scientific grounds, rather than vague policy statements.

They seem to understand that public opinion requires a new direction with regards to medical marijuana policy, but if that much is understood, why tiptoe around it? If the goal is to avoid controversy, then tell us exactly what we want to hear, follow through on it, and the matter will be closed.

via Raising awareness of the consequences of drug prohibition | Stop the Drug War (DRCNet).

Small Is Better: Big Houses Are Out and Downsizing Is In

Small Is Better: Big Houses Are Out and Downsizing Is In

With economic and environmental factors colliding, tiny houses are suddenly becoming the biggest rage.

It all traced back to two summers spent living in a 100-square-foot canvas yurt on an ashram in New York. (A yurt is a tent-like dwelling built around a circular frame that was first used by sheep-herding nomads in central Asia; an ashram is a place of religious retreat.) The experience left Chase Rogers convinced that she was ready to join the growing number of people nationwide who are downsizing for the sake of saving money, minimizing energy use and reducing their carbon footprint.

via Small Is Better: Big Houses Are Out and Downsizing Is In | Environment | AlterNet.

How Much Has Changed? Obama Administration Deals Series of Anti-Environmental Blows

How Much Has Changed? Obama Administration Deals Series of Anti-Environmental Blows

The Dems have unleashed a slew of anti-environmental policies that would have enraged any reasonable conservationist during the Bush years.

With little more than 100 days in office, the Democrats, under the leadership of President Barack Obama, have unleashed a slew of anti-environmental policies that would have enraged any reasonable conservationist during the Bush years.

Take the delisting of the gray wolf in the western Great Lakes and parts of the northern Rockies, which was announced during the waning days of the Bush era and upheld by Obama earlier this spring.

About 200 packs of wolves live in the northern Rocky Mountains today. But only 95 of these packs are led by breeding pairs, which is significantly less than half of what most biologists consider to be a healthy number in order to fend off imminent decline and long-term genetic problems for the species.

In Idaho, free-roaming wolves have been radio-collared, allowing their human killers to track and gun them down by helicopter. Freed from the protections of the Endangered Species Act, the state plans to permit hundreds of these wolves to be slaughtered this coming winter. Only a few environmental groups have stepped up in the wolves’ defense, with the Center for Biological Diversity, based in Tucson, Ariz., leading the charge.

via How Much Has Changed? Obama Administration Deals Series of Anti-Environmental Blows | Environment | AlterNet.

Money, Marriage, and the Economic Downturn: Are Marital Storms Ahead?

Money, Marriage, and the Economic Downturn: Are Marital Storms Ahead? -  | National Sexuality Resource Center (NSRC)
The nation’s recent economic woes have led Americans to question many aspects of their lives that, until recently, they likely took for granted. Can they afford their homes? Will they have a job next week, let alone a secure retirement? Will their personal relationships, and especially their marriages, withstand the new pressures that couples are facing on a daily basis? How, in other words, will American marriages work given this new economic reality?

On these latter questions, history offers us some guidance. Consider the Great Depression, which is quickly becoming the point of reference for the current situation. In the 1930s, the divorce rate did, in fact, slow. This deceleration was no small feat, given that the rate had been rising ever since the late 1880s, when the government first started to track the annual number of divorces in the United States. Some social commentators in the 1930s looked at the numbers and expressed satisfaction that Americans were finding strength in their families. Several historians, for instance, have pointed to a newspaper editorial that boldly asserted, “Many a family that has lost its car has found its soul.” That some families were able to use hard times as a rallying point, rather than as an excuse to fall apart, seemed to offer proof that many husbands, wives, and children would survive the Depression with a strong family orientation in tact.

Not all social commentators, however, agreed with this optimistic point of view. First, there was dismay that many couples simply did not have the economic resources to get married. Some estimates, in fact, suggest that as many as one million couples postponed their trips to the altar during the Depression. At a time when becoming a wife was the pinnacle of achievement for most women, this development meant that hundreds of thousands of women would essentially be forced to live their adult lives as “failures.” Plus, the longer that couples did not get married, the more likely they were to engage in premarital sexual activity, a possibility that struck fear in religious leaders, marriage experts, and parents alike.

via Money, Marriage, and the Economic Downturn: Are Marital Storms Ahead? | National Sexuality Resource Center (NSRC).

America’s ‘Emerging Church’

America’s ‘Emerging Church’  – By The Rev. Howard Bess

Will a New Post-Evangelical Christianity Reflect More Tolerant Views? Christian publications are abuzz with talk about the “emerging church,” which seems to be more science and gay friendly.

Editor’s Note: Over the past several decades, Evangelicalism has reshaped the U.S. political process, challenging the traditional American principle of separation of church and state – and often demanding a more judgmental attitude toward those who don’t accept Christian fundamentalism.

Now, however, that movement appears to be in a state of flux, giving way to a more tolerant “emerging church,” as the Rev. Howard Bess notes in this guest essay:

In the last half of the 20th century, Evangelicalism swept the American religious scene.

This period of American religious history will go down as the age of Billy Graham. He may have been light on theological prowess, but he was a spell-binding preacher and an organizational genius.

His call to Christ was supported by the establishment of new colleges, new seminaries, parochial schools, home schooling, new publishing companies, new magazines, radio and television networks, and new ministries such as Campus Crusade, World Vision, Youth for Christ, and Pioneer Boys and Girls.

Evangelicalism changed the face of America. Predictably the change is not permanent and the next phase is setting in.

Church historians and sociologists are now talking about post-Evangelicalism. The most popular buzz term is the emerging church. Change is constant and the American religious scene is not static.

via Consortiumnews.com.

Seasteading: Libertarians Set to Launch a (Wet) Dream of ‘Freedom’ in International Waters

Seasteading: Libertarians Set to Launch a (Wet) Dream of ‘Freedom’ in International Waters

A fringe brand of libertarians have been planning to escape the iron fist of democracy by founding a new country in the middle of the ocean.

Ever since the Democrats’ November rout, various factions of the conservative movement have demonstrated widely varied but always amusing methods of coping.

The economic conservatives have held tea-bagging summits, where they protested President Barack Obama for raising their taxes, even though he didn’t actually raise their taxes.

The neoconservatives have formed a virtual death cult surrounding Dick Cheney and torture advocacy that’s eerily reminiscent of the bomb worshipers in Beneath the Planet of the Apes.

The militia wing of the movement, meanwhile, has devolved into bizarre conspiracies about Obama’s birth certificate or outright public weeping.

Gone largely unnoticed, however, has been a fringe brand of libertarians who have been planning to escape the iron fist of democracy by founding a new country in the middle of the ocean.

via Seasteading: Libertarians Set to Launch a (Wet) Dream of ‘Freedom’ in International Waters | Politics | AlterNet.

Is Larry Summers Taking Kickbacks From the Banks He’s Bailing Out?

Is Larry Summers Taking Kickbacks From the Banks He’s Bailing Out?  – By Mark Ames,

Why did Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Morgan Stanley steer millions to a company Larry Summers directed while he administered “stress tests” on them?

Is Larry Summers taking kickbacks from the banks he’s bailing out?

Last month, a little-known company where Summers served on the board of directors received a $42 million investment from a group of investors, including three banks that Summers, Obama’s effective “economy czar,” has been doling out billions in bailout money to: Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, and Morgan Stanley. The banks invested into the small startup company, Revolution Money, right at the time when Summers was administering the “stress test” to these same banks.

A month after they invested in Summers’ former company, all three banks came out of the stress test much better than anyone expected — thanks to the fact that the banks themselves were allowed to help decide how bad their problems were (Citigroup “negotiated” down its financial hole from $35 billion to $5.5 billion.)

The fact that the banks invested in the company just a few months after Summers resigned suggests the appearance of corruption, because it suggests to other firms that if you hire Larry Summers onto your board, large banks will want to invest as a favor to a politically-connected director.

Last month, it was revealed that Summers, whom President Obama appointed to essentially run the economy from his perch in the National Economic Council, earned nearly $8 million in 2008 from Wall Street banks, some of which, like Goldman Sachs and Citigroup, were now receiving tens of billions of taxpayer funds from the same Larry Summers. It turns out now that those two banks have continued paying into Summers-related businesses.

via Is Larry Summers Taking Kickbacks From the Banks He’s Bailing Out? | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet.

Why a GM Bankruptcy Would Be a Disaster

Why a GM Bankruptcy Would Be a Disaster    -  BusinessWeek

Obama isn’t just ruling on the fate of a single company. A GM bankruptcy could devastate the very economy he is attempting to stabilize

President Obama is nearing the most important decision a President has made in modern times regarding the American economy. On or about June 1, he will push General Motors (GM), the nation’s largest industrial company, into bankruptcy. The key trigger may be on May 26, when GM’s offer to bondholders to accept 10¢ on the dollar fails to win acceptance from 90% of them, a criterion that Obama has set for continued loans to GM.

But there’s a strong probability the decision to push GM into bankruptcy will be disastrous. The mere threat of bankruptcy caused GM’s U.S. sales to fall by 50% in the first quarter from already depressed levels. If GM were to declare Chapter 11 bankruptcy, sales would decline even further.

The reality—which the investment bankers and bankruptcy lawyers guiding Obama don’t seem to understand—is that the auto industry is unique in the way it is built on long-term confidence. Buying a vehicle is second only to home buying as the most important financial decision people make, and Americans want to know that the company making their vehicle will exist for at least five more years, that their dealer will continue in business, that their auto loan won’t be summarily revoked, and that parts and servicing will be available. That is a fundamentally different psychology from when a consumer buys a ticket from a bankrupt airline or purchases electronics or clothing from a bankrupt retailer. In those instances, there is an expectation of onetime or short-term use.

via Why a GM Bankruptcy Would Be a Disaster – BusinessWeek.

Ralph Nader: Corporate Frankensteins

Corporate Frankensteins

The Final Conquest

By RALPH NADER

Once upon a time early in the 19th century, corporations came into existence by state legislatures approving charters, which were granted for a limited period of time and for limited purposes. These corporations – producing textiles and other products in New England – raised capital in part because their investors had limited liability. That meant they could not lose any more than their investment if things went wrong.

Since corporations were artificial legal entities and not human, these lawmakers feared that without some strong leashes, they could be creating Frankensteins.

Over the following two hundred years, these ever larger corporations and their attorneys have been driving relentlessly, dynamically to erect systems of privileges and immunities that give the corporations themselves limited liability.

Their first big move was to take the chartering authority from the state legislature and place it inside an executive agency where chartering became automatic, shorn of the conditions the lawmakers once imposed.

Once chartering became automatic, perpetual and open-ended, corporate lawyers moved to have the courts – not the legislatures – turn corporations into “persons” for purposes of constitutional rights.

Their big breakthrough came with the Santa Clara case in 1886 when the U.S. Supreme Court allowed its summary headnotes to declare that the railroad in the case was a “person” for purposes of the 14th amendment. Through elaborations in later Supreme Court decisions, that meant that companies like Aetna, General Electric, Exxon and Lockheed had most of the same constitutional rights as real people like you.

Soon it was off to the races and the promised land of no-fault corporate behavior. Early in the 20th century, companies erected “no-fault” workers compensation schemes limiting damages for the horrors of worker injuries and workplace diseases in those mines, factories, and foundries.

via Ralph Nader: Corporate Frankensteins.

Foreclosures, mortgage delinquencies climb at record rate

Foreclosures, mortgage delinquencies climb at record rate | McClatchy

WASHINGTON — A record 12 percent of all U.S. mortgages were at least one payment behind or in the foreclosure process during the first three months of this year, a report said Thursday.

In a reminder that the nation’s economic problems aren’t going away anytime soon, the report also found that the foreclosure rate on prime fixed-rate loans to financially healthy borrowers has doubled in the past 12 months. For the first time since the explosion in subprime lending to borrowers with weaker credit began early in this decade, in fact, the largest percentage of new foreclosures in January, February and March were on prime fixed-rate loans.

In its National Delinquency Survey, the Mortgage Bankers Association, an industry trade group, reported that one in four new foreclosure proceedings in the first quarter were on prime mortgages, up from one in five during the last three months of 2008

via Foreclosures, mortgage delinquencies climb at record rate | McClatchy.

Colin Powell: No Good Samaritan

Colin Powell: No Good Samaritan  – By Ray McGovern

Watching retired Gen. Colin Powell cite Jesus’s parable of the Good Samaritan during Sunday’s Memorial Day ceremonies on the Mall in Washington, it struck me that Powell was giving hypocrisy a bad name.

Those familiar with the parable of the Good Samaritan and the under-reported behavior of Gen. Powell, resurgent star of the Fawning Corporate Media (FCM), know that the two do not mesh.

Powell’s well-documented disregard for those who have borne the brunt of the battle places him in the company of the priest and the Levite – in the Good Samaritan parable – who, seeing the man attacked by robbers on the side of the road, walked right on by.

Sadly, Powell has a long record of placing the wounded and the vulnerable on his list of priorities far below his undying need to get promoted or to promote himself. Powell’s rhetoric, of course, would have us believe otherwise.

At the Memorial Day event, Powell hailed our “wounded warriors” from Iraq and Afghanistan as the cameras cut to several severely damaged veterans. Lauding the “love and care” they receive from their families, Powell noted in passing that some 10,000 parents are now full-time care providers for veterans not able to take care of themselves.

via Consortiumnews.com.

Solving the Immigration Problem Means Addressing the Realities of Corporate Globalization

Solving the Immigration Problem Means Addressing the Realities of Corporate Globalization

The current immigration crisis stems from deeper U.S. policy failures that must be addressed.

This article is a response to Joseph H. Carens’s Case for Amnesty, and part of a New Democracy Forum on immigration.

Joseph Carens has advanced a strong moral argument in favor of amnesty for irregular migrants in the United States. I agree with the need for some kind of legalization program and share his ethical concerns. The current immigration crisis, however, stems from deeper U.S. policy failures that must be addressed, or the problem of undocumented migration will simply recreate itself.

The core of the U.S. immigration dilemma is Mexico. Of the roughly eleven million people in the United States with undocumented status, about 60 percent — some 6.5 million people — come from Mexico. The next closest case is El Salvador, with around 570,000 undocumented migrants, followed by Guatemala at 400,000; the numbers drop off rapidly from there. If we deal effectively with migration from Mexico, other immigration problems become small by comparison and much easier to resolve.

via Solving the Immigration Problem Means Addressing the Realities of Corporate Globalization | Immigration | AlterNet.

The end of American exceptionalism

The end of American exceptionalism –   MinnPost –

By Eric Black

Prof. Andrew Bacevich of Boston University gave a great interview to “Midmorning” host Kerri Miller yesterday about his book, “The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism.”

I’ve believed for years that a self-justifying “exceptionalism” was a major barrier to Americans thinking clearly about our role in the world. But Bacevich, who has been writing about the problem for years, took my understanding to a new level.

For starters, Bacevich, who describes himself as a believing Catholic, clarified the quasi-religious nature of exceptionalism. For me, the term referred to a self-serving belief that the rules that apply to other nations don’t apply to ours. If any other nation, let’s say a nation that the U.S. views as untrustworthy, declared a doctrine authorizing itself to start “pre-emptive” wars on the say-so of its own leader, Americans would know what to call it. Terms like agression, imperialism, bullying, rogue nation come to mind. And pretty soon, the leader involved would be compared to Hitler. But when the U.S. does it, Americans are so convinced of the basic good motives (spreading democracy, punishing evildoers, protecting the weak from the strong, making war to keep the peace, etc.) that the rules for international conduct simply don’t apply to a country so moral, unselfish, peace-loving, well-intentioned and so clearly on the right side of history.

But here’s how Bacevich defined “American exceptionalism”:

via MinnPost – The end of American exceptionalism.

Battling Over Employee Free Choice

Battling Over Employee Free Choice — In These Times

The fate of labor’s top legislative priority is in the Senate’s hands.

When Congress votes on the Employee Free Choice Act, it will decide not only whether workers will be able to organize unions more easily and whether America will build a stronger economy based on shared prosperity. It will also decide how democratic America will be.

The fate of the proposed legislation hinges on a few senators under intense pressure from corporations. But labor leaders remain optimistic that the legislation will pass—most likely with some tweaks.

“We’re definitely in a tough fight,” says Stewart Acuff, assistant to AFL-CIO president John Sweeney. “This is the largest grassroots campaign in labor history. We’re going to play it out as hard and strong as we can.”

The legislation, a top union priority supported by President Obama, would provide legal recognition of a union at a workplace if a majority of workers signed statements of support. Now, even if a huge majority of workers sign union cards, employers can demand that the National Labor Relations Board hold an election, giving the company and anti-union consultants time to bully employees into voting against unionization.

The bill would…

via Battling Over Employee Free Choice — In These Times.

A Shot in the Arm

OPS: Assuming that actual REFORM actually comes out of this. “The type of universal health insurance coverage policy proposed by President Obama will clearly promote the freedom of workers to leave their jobs to start new companies.” No, but Single Payer would.

Special Report: A Shot in the Arm

How today’s health care reform can create tomorrow’s entrepreneurs.

his spring, some conservative and libertarian bloggers, aghast at Barack Obama’s expansive government agenda, began calling on investors and entrepreneurs to protest by “going Galt”—that is, withdrawing their money and productive energies from the economy. The allusion is to John Galt, the hero in Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, who leads America’s creative entrepreneurs in a strike against a wealth-sapping collectivist establishment and brings the economy to its knees.

Of course, the fact that the economy is already on its knees might blunt the point of such a strike today. Still, entrepreneurs do play a vital role in the prosperity of this country. So it’s worth asking how their behavior might be affected by Obama’s policies. An excellent starting point is the biggest single initiative in President Obama’s budget, a down payment toward universal health insurance coverage for all Americans. In this case at least, the protests are obviously misplaced. Universal health insurance, far from suppressing entrepreneurship, could be a boon to it.

The main reason for this is a phenomenon known as “job lock,” a term coined during the last round of debate over universal health coverage in the early 1990s. Job lock refers to the fact that workers are often unwilling to leave a current job that provides health insurance for another position that might not, even if they would be more productive in that other position. This is because employer-provided insurance is traditionally the only reliable form of fairly priced private insurance coverage available in the U.S. The alternative is to purchase insurance in the nongroup market, where insurance prices and availability are typically not regulated, so insurance companies can drop individuals when they become ill or charge them exorbitant prices. As a result, individuals feel “locked” into less productive jobs.

via A Shot in the Arm – Jonathan Gruber.