Archive for May, 2009
US trade gap widens after seven months of decline
US trade gap widens after seven months of decline – The Raw Story |
The US trade deficit widened in March after seven consecutive months of decline, with exports sinking to a 2004 low as the global economic crisis hobbles trade, Commerce Department data showed Tuesday.
The March trade gap rose slightly to a seasonally adjusted 27.6 billion dollars, from a revised 26.1 billion in February.
The March trade deficit was narrower than analysts’ consensus forecast of 29.0 billion dollars.
A higher imported oil bill and an increase in the politically sensitive massive trade gap with China helped widen the deficit.
via The Raw Story | US trade gap widens after seven months of decline.
Retail sales drop unexpectedly in April
Retail sales drop unexpectedly in April
WASHINGTON (AP) — Retail sales fell for a second straight month in April, a disappointing performance that raised doubts about whether consumers were regaining their desire to shop. A rebound in consumer demand is a necessary ingredient for ending the recession.
The Commerce Department said Wednesday that retail sales fell 0.4 percent last month. Many economists had expected a flat reading, and the April weakness followed a 1.3 percent drop in March that was worse than first estimated.
Retail sales had posted gains in January and February after falling for six straight months, raising hopes that the all-important consumer sector of the economy might be stabilizing. But the setbacks in March and April could darken some forecasts because consumer spending accounts for about 70 percent of economic activity.
via News from The Associated Press.
Chrysler to cut 800 dealers on Thursday
AP Source: Chrysler to cut 800 dealers on Thursday
DETROIT (AP) — Chrysler LLC plans to fire up to 800 of its 3,200 dealers on Thursday, a lawyer seeking to represent the dealers said on a conference call.
The lawyer, Stephen Lerner, who heads the bankruptcy and restructuring practice of the law firm Squire Sanders, told dealers on the Tuesday call that the automaker plans to reject at least 800 franchise agreements, according to a dealer who listened to the call.
Chrysler will file a list of dealers it wants to retain with the U.S. bankruptcy court, said the dealer, who asked not to be identified because the call was confidential.
via News from The Associated Press.
Key coral reefs ‘could disappear’
Video included at link
Key coral reefs ‘could disappear’ – BBC NEWS
The world’s most important coral region is in danger of being wiped out by the end of this century unless fast action is taken, says a new report.
The international conservation group WWF warns that 40% of reefs in the Coral Triangle have already been lost.
The area is shared between Indonesia and five other South East Asian nations and is thought to contain 75% of the world’s coral species.
It is likened to the Amazon rainforest in terms of its biodiversity.
Temperature change
The WWF report paints a bleak picture. If the world’s richest coral reef is destroyed, the fish that people rely on for food could be gone.
By the end of the century, 100 million people across South East Asia could be on the march, looking for something to eat. Communities might be breaking down and economies destroyed.
via BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | Key coral reefs ‘could disappear’.
Officials knew of AIG bonuses at least five months before they were paid; Did nothing
Officials knew of AIG bonuses at least five months before they were paid; Did nothing - Raw Story »
The Federal Reserve Bank of New York knew that American International Group (AIG) was planning to pay out $165 million in bonuses at least five months before they were to be paid out, The Washington Post reveals Wednesday.
Documents show that senior officials at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York received details about the bonuses more than five months before the firestorm erupted [about eight months ago from today] and were deeply engaged with AIG as well as outside lawyers, auditors and public relations firms about the potential controversy. But the New York Fed did not raise the alarm with the Obama administration until the end of February.
Timothy F. Geithner, who became Treasury secretary early this year, was the head of the New York Fed when it became aware of the bonus details. But his name is not among those of senior New York Fed officials mentioned in the summaries of phone calls, correspondence and other documents obtained by The Washington Post…
The massive bonuses — which caused a political firestorm because the massive insurance group had received more than $180 billion in federal bailouts — and drew pledges from some executives to pay them back. But according to the Post, officials knew as early as September that the bonuses were to be paid, and did nothing to stop them.
via Raw Story » Officials knew of AIG bonuses at least five months before they were paid; Did nothing.
Tillman’s parents want general’s record reviewed
Tillman’s parents want general’s record reviewed - The Raw Story »
WASHINGTON – The parents of slain Army Ranger and NFL star Pat Tillman voiced concerns Tuesday that the general who played a role in mischaracterizing his death could be put in charge of military operations in Afghanistan.
In a brief interview with The Associated Press, Pat Tillman Sr. accused Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal of covering up the circumstances of the 2004 slaying.
“I do believe that guy participated in a falsified homicide investigation,” Pat Tillman Sr. said.
via The Raw Story » Tillman’s parents want general’s record reviewed.
Undersupplied US soldiers forced to steal water in Iraq
OPS: It’s Obama and the Dems problem NOW!
Undersupplied US soldiers forced to steal water in Iraq - Raw Story »
You thought the lack of armor-plated Humvees was bad.
US soldiers are now being forced to steal water in Iraq. With supplies tight, and the number of trucks carrying potable water even tighter, troops have resorted to stealing water from civilian contractors. Many have also reportedly suffered from dysentery because they were forced to drink untreated water from Iraqi wells.
The shocking news aired Wednesday on Houston-based CBS affiliate KHOU.
It gets worse. Soldiers say the situation has become so dire they were forced to raid the United States’ own airbase in Baghdad for bottled water. They found the water stored in pallets held by civilian contractors, who were supposed to be distributing it.
via Raw Story » Undersupplied US soldiers forced to steal water in Iraq.
Live video: Senate hearing on torture
Live video: Senate hearing on torture - Raw Story »
“Former State Department counselor Philip Zelikow will tell a Senate panel this morning that Bush administration officials engaged in a ‘collective failure’ on detention and interrogation of suspected terrorists, according to testimony submitted in advance of the first congressional hearing to address allegations of torture,” the Washington Post reports.
According to his advance testimony, which was embargoed until the scheduled start of the 10 a.m. hearing, Zelikow will say that the memo is undergoing declassification review. He says that unnamed administration officials sought to collect copies and destroy them in early 2006, but that they were unsuccessful.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), who will lead this morning’s hearing of the Judiciary Committee’s panel on administrative oversight and the courts, said much of the story remains classified, muddled by ideology, or unknown.
In a prepared statement he will deliver this morning, Whitehouse decries a “near avalanche of falsehood” on the subject of detainee treatment that he says has been “intensely frustrating” to witness.
“We were told that waterboarding was determined to be legal, but were not told how badly the law was ignored, bastardized and manipulated by the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel nor were we told how furiously government and military lawyers rejected the defective OLC opinions,” Whitehouse says in his statement.
This live video feed is from MSNBC…..
via Raw Story » Live video: Senate hearing on torture.
Cheney: For diplomacy to work, U.S. must threaten to bomb Iran.
Cheney: For diplomacy to work, U.S. must threaten to bomb Iran. – Think Progress » 
Yesterday, former Vice President Cheney “swung quietly” through New York City to watch Liz Cheney, his daughter and a former State Department official, debate Iran policy. Continuing his long advocacy for military strikes to halt Iran’s nuclear program, Cheney said at a dinner after the debate that the only way for President Obama’s diplomacy with Iran to work is if Obama also threatens to bomb the country:
The former Vice President characterized the Iranian goal in negotiations on ending that country’s nuclear program as mere stalling for time, and the Europeans as trying to “restrain the U.S.” from military action. “Everybody’s in a giant conspiracy to achieve a different objective than the one we want to achieve,” Cheney said. The negotiations are “bound to fail unless we are perceived as very credible” in threatening military action against Iran, he said.
via Think Progress » Cheney: For diplomacy to work, U.S. must threaten to bomb Iran..
Conservatives Set To Block Dawn Johnsen’s Nomination
OPS: “PARTY OF NO…. Table for one”
Conservatives Set To Block Dawn Johnsen’s Nomination - Think
Progress »
Roll Call reports that conservatives look poised to successfully block the nomination of Dawn Johnsen to head the White House Office of Legal Counsel (OLC). Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) declared that his hands were tied without the assistance of a few Republican votes:
“Right now we’re finding out when to do that,” Reid said, responding to a question about the status of Indiana University law professor Dawn Johnsen’s nomination to the Justice post. “We need a couple Republican votes until we can get to 60.”
It’s unclear why 60 votes are needed to confirm Johnsen, considering her predecessor, Jay Bybee — who went on to authorize illegal torture — won easy confirmation in 2001 through a simple voice vote. Bybee’s successor, Jack Goldsmith, was also approved by a voice vote. Steven Bradbury served for three years as an acting OLC head, and so did not have to come up for a vote. Having a full — and filibuster-proof — Senate vote on Johnsen would be an unusual break with recent precedent.
via Think Progress » Conservatives Set To Block Dawn Johnsen’s Nomination.
Would You Call 60,000 Cows Fenced Together on a Dirt Patch a “Farm?”
Would You Call 60,000 Cows Fenced Together on a Dirt Patch a “Farm?”
Between 2002 and 2007, the United States lost 43,603 real farms — we can’t let agribusiness control our food supply.
When the Agriculture Department released its 2007 census recently, the news appeared surprisingly good: For the first time since World War II, the United States did not lose farms, it gained them — 75,810, to be exact, for a total of 2.2 million.
But on closer inspection, the numbers aren’t so hopeful. The discrepancy stems from this tricky question: What is a farm? The census has changed its definition nine times since 1850, most recently to “any place from which $1,000 or more of agricultural products were produced and sold, or normally would have been sold, during the census year.”
This loose definition is meant to err on the side of inclusion, but ultimately it just errs. Take, for example, the four chickens I keep in my back yard. I sometimes sell eggs to neighbors, and at the going rate I could make $500 a year. If I got four more hens, my suburban home could qualify as a farm.
via Would You Call 60,000 Cows Fenced Together on a Dirt Patch a “Farm?” | Environment | AlterNet.
No One’s Falling for Big Health’s Bogus Promise to “Reform”
OPS: No one’s falling for it, but that doesn’t mean they won’t get away with the farce.
No One’s Falling for Big Health’s Bogus Promise to “Reform”
Corporate Dems are fawning over the industry’s “promise” to hold down costs. A broad progressive coalition is pushing for a real solution.
This week, the health care lobby scored a cunning propaganda victory by feigning interest in fixing the perennial rip-off we call a health care system.
With much fanfare, Big Health trotted out a six-month old “promise” — a toothless, non-binding pledge lacking any specifics — to make various nips and tucks that would slow the rate at which health costs grow to “only” 4.7 percent annually. It was hailed by the Obama administration and many observers as a breakthrough in the battle for reform.
Until recently, the health care industry has been dead-set on preserving a disastrous but profitable status quo (The U.S. spends close to twice as much per person on care than other wealthy countries, and gets consistently poorer results; among residents of 30 rich countries polled by Gallup, Americans came in 18th in terms of satisfaction with their care). But now the “disease care” industry is portraying itself as an agent of change. Fearful of a growing movement towards real, substantive reform, it’s trying to co-opt the process under the guise of “getting a seat at the table.” That they’ve given up, for now, their oppositional stance is what has so many tongues wagging about the significance of the proposal.
But it’s nothing new — “voluntary
via No One’s Falling for Big Health’s Bogus Promise to “Reform” | Health and Wellness | AlterNet.
How to Make the Neocons Crazy About the Middle East: Tell Them the Truth
How to Make the Neocons Crazy About the Middle East: Tell Them the Truth
Hamas has long endorsed a two-state solution, but when the NY Times reported it, kooky neocon Charles Krauthammer went unhinged.
Old Charlie Krauthammer, the neocon who won’t go away, is at it again.
Now he’s hammering at an old favorite target — the Hamas party and its political leader, Khaled Meshal — and its new accomplice, that scurrilously liberal newspaper, the New York Times.
The Times‘ latest moral fault (according to Krauthammer) was to send two of its top Middle East reporters to interview Meshal and then actually report some of what he said (though the five-hour interview was boiled down to a brief article and a handful of quotes). “Hamas Says It Grounded Rockets,” the Times headline announced; Meshal explained that firing rockets from Gaza is not now a useful strategy for pursuing Hamas’ goals.
But for Krauthammer the important news is Meshal’s endorsement of a two-state solution, with a Palestinian state only in the West Bank and Gaza, currently occupied by Israel. “We are with a state on the 1967 borders, based on a long-term truce,” Meshal said. Asked what “long-term” meant, he said, “10 years.”
via How to Make the Neocons Crazy About the Middle East: Tell Them the Truth | ForeignPolicy | AlterNet.
Cheerios Are a Drug? FDA’s Surprising Letter to General Mills
Cheerios Are a Drug? FDA’s Surprising Letter to General Mills
FDA to General Mills: “We have determined that [Cheerios cereal] is promoted for conditions that cause it to be a drug.”
Popular US breakfast cereal Cheerios is a drug, at least if the claims made on the label by its manufacturer General Mills are anything to go by, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has said.
“Based on claims made on your product’s label, we have determined that your Cheerios Toasted Whole Grain Oat Cereal is promoted for conditions that cause it to be a drug,” the FDA said in a letter to General Mills which was posted on the federal agency’s website Tuesday.
Cheerios labels claim that eating the cereal can help lower bad cholesterol, a risk factor for coronary heart disease, by four percent in six weeks.
Pipeline-Istan: Everything You Need to Know About Oil, Gas, Russia, China, Iran, Afghanistan and Obama
Pipeline-Istan: Everything You Need to Know About Oil, Gas, Russia, China, Iran, Afghanistan and Obama
Nothing of significance takes place in Eurasia without an energy angle.
As Barack Obama heads into his second hundred days in office, let’s head for the big picture ourselves, the ultimate global plot line, the tumultuous rush towards a new, polycentric world order. In its first hundred days, the Obama presidency introduced us to a brand new acronym, OCO for Overseas Contingency Operations, formerly known as GWOT (as in Global War on Terror). Use either name, or anything else you want, and what you’re really talking about is what’s happening on the immense energy battlefield that extends from Iran to the Pacific Ocean. It’s there that the Liquid War for the control of Eurasia takes place.
Yep, it all comes down to black gold and “blue gold” (natural gas), hydrocarbon wealth beyond compare, and so it’s time to trek back to that ever-flowing wonderland — Pipelineistan. It’s time to dust off the acronyms, especially the SCO or Shanghai Cooperative Organization, the Asian response to NATO, and learn a few new ones like IPI and TAPI. Above all, it’s time to check out the most recent moves on the giant chessboard of Eurasia, where Washington wants to be a crucial, if not dominant, player.
We’ve already seen Pipelineistan wars in Kosovo and Georgia, and we’ve followed Washington’s favorite pipeline, the BTC, which was supposed to tilt the flow of energy westward, sending oil coursing past both Iran and Russia. Things didn’t quite turn out that way, but we’ve got to move on, the New Great Game never stops. Now, it’s time to grasp just what the Asian Energy Security Grid is all about, visit a surreal natural gas republic, and understand why that Grid is so deeply implicated in the Af-Pak war.
TVA sends spilled coal ash to impoverished black communities in Georgia and Alabama
OPS: “Clean Coal” It’s HERE!
TVA sends spilled coal ash to impoverished black communities in Georgia and Alabama -ISS
The Tennessee Valley Authority has begun shipping toxic coal ash from the massive spill that occurred last December at its Kingston power plant in east Tennessee’s Roane County to landfills in the neighboring states of Georgia and Alabama as part of a test to determine a final resting place for the waste.
The counties where the ash is going have large black populations and high poverty rates, raising questions about environmental justice.
via ISS – TVA sends spilled coal ash to impoverished black communities in Georgia and Alabama.
Senate Approves Coburn Gun Amendment…in Credit Card Bill
Senate Approves Coburn Gun Amendment…in Credit Card Bill - The Washington Independent »
The Senate on Tuesday night easily passed an amendment to credit card reform legislation that would allow concealed weapons in national parks. The vote was 67 to 29.
The question now is this: Will a controversial gun proposal attached to popular underlying legislation be the poison pill that sinks that larger bill? That’s been the case with legislation allowing the District of Columbia a voting representative in Congress, to which the Senate attached language scrapping many of Washington’s strict gun control laws. As a result of that gun amendment, the DC-vote bill remains stalled in the House months after it passed the upper chamber.
Now, Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), the chief sponsor of the credit card reform bill, is wondering whether the same might be the fate of his credit card proposal. “My concern is about what the underlying bill — what happens to it,” Dodd said on the chamber floor just before the vote. “I hate to see us lose this opportunity to make a difference with credit card reform.”
Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), who sponsored the concealed weapons bill, said he supports many of Dodd’s credit card provisions, and didn’t have in mind to offer his amendment just for the purpose of killing the larger bill. “I don’t want to see it fail on this,” Coburn said. “But nor do I want to see the Second Amendment trampled on.”
So much for an easy, clean, must-pass credit card reform bill.
via The Washington Independent » Senate Approves Coburn Gun Amendment…in Credit Card Bill.
Research measures sustainability of organics
Research measures sustainability of organics – Massey University
A Massey University researcher has found organic fruit growing operations are environmentally sustainable and could trade carbon credits in the future.
Girija Page graduated yesterday with a PhD in Agricultural and Horticultural Systems and Management. She developed a framework to assess the sustainability of organic fruit growing, which will help gauge the efficacy of horticultural systems.
Her research analysed energy efficiency and environmental impacts of organic kiwifruit and organic apple growing operations in the Bay of Plenty and the Hawke’s Bay.
“New Zealand has a reputation for producing export goods that are thought to have less impact on the environment,” Dr Page says. “International markets are seeking goods that have been produced in this way, so this research fits well with the Government’s focus on sustainability and life cycle analysis.”
via Massey University – Research measures sustainability of organics.
Will Allen: Agriculture Is One of the Most Polluting and Dangerous Industries
Will Allen: Agriculture Is One of the Most Polluting and Dangerous Industries : Chelsea Green
While the regulators were twiddling their thumbs and looking the other way, they were getting away with murder. No, I’m not talking about Wall Street. I’m talking about the Industrial Agriculture Complex. Unsustainable farming practices, synthetic fertilizers, and widespread pesticide use accounts for a massive portion of total US carbon output—and not just carbon dioxide: methane and nitrous oxide, which are far worse. And that’s not all. The monstrous excesses of Big Ag include killing the soil, polluting our water, and mistreating millions of animals.
Will Allen, author of The War on Bugs, takes on Big Agriculture in this piece for Alternet:
via Will Allen: Agriculture Is One of the Most Polluting and Dangerous Industries : Chelsea Green.
Road to Ruin: Mortgage Fraud Scandal Brewing
Road to Ruin: Mortgage Fraud Scandal Brewing | American News Project
Criminal fraud may be the most underreported aspect of our current financial crisis. In this “Road to Ruin” report, former subprime lenders from Ameriquest, once the country’s largest lender, describe a system rife with fraud. They describe how a “by-any-means-necessary” policy pushed employees to cut corners and falsify documents on bad mortgages and then sell the toxic assets to Wall Street banks eager to make fast profits.
via Road to Ruin: Mortgage Fraud Scandal Brewing | American News Project.
Stop the “Entitlement Crisis” Fear-Mongering
Stop the “Entitlement Crisis” Fear-Mongering | OurFuture.org
Today, the trustees of the Social Security and Medicare systems issued their annual reports and, as expected, the occasion has prompted the usual suspects to reiterate their fear-mongering misrepresentations about an “entitlement crisis.”
Let us be clear (and truthful): Social Security is not broken, and Medicare can only be fixed by comprehensive health care reform.
The Trustees project that Social Security’s trust fund reserves will be exhausted in 2037. If absolutely nothing is done over the next 28 years, the program would then pay about 75 percent of scheduled benefits, rather than full benefits. There is no crisis requiring immediate action. Medicare, on the other hand, will exhaust its trust fund for hospital expenses by 2019 unless we work to get skyrocketing health care costs under control.
To understand the fear-mongering, let’s review the way these programs are funded.
Both programs are financed by workers and employers, each paying a flat tax of 6.2 percent of an employee’s salary for Social Security and 1.45 percent apiece for Medicare. The Social Security tax applies only to the first $106,800 a worker receives (a ceiling that floats up with inflation every year) while the Medicare tax has no ceiling. Because the payroll tax receipts far exceed the program’s expenses, the excess has been invested in U.S. Treasury securities—more than $2.5 trillion so far. U.S. Treasury securities are widely considered the safest investment in the world, which is why China and Japan have invested nearly $1.4 trillion in such securities.
via Stop the “Entitlement Crisis” Fear-Mongering | OurFuture.org.
RealtyTrac: April foreclosures rise 32 percent
RealtyTrac: April foreclosures rise 32 percent
MIAMI – The number of U.S. households faced with losing their homes to foreclosure jumped 32 percent in April compared with the same month last year, with Nevada, Florida and California showing the highest rates, according to data released Wednesday.
More than 342,000 households received at least one foreclosure-related notice in April, RealtyTrac Inc. said. That means one in every 374 U.S. housing units received a foreclosure filing last month, the highest monthly rate since the Irvine, Calif.-based foreclosure listing firm began its report in January 2005.
April was the second straight month with more than 300,000 households receiving a foreclosure filing, as the number of borrowers with mortgage troubles failed to abate.
The April number, however, was less than one percent above that posted in March, when more than 340,000 properties were affected. The March data was up 17 percent from February and 46 percent from a year earlier.
via RealtyTrac: April foreclosures rise 32 percent.
Senator Russ Feingold ‘Appalled’ Federal Auto Bailout Not Saving U.S. Jobs
Senator Russ Feingold ‘Appalled’ Federal Auto Bailout Not Saving U.S. Jobs - On The Hill
Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.) says he supported federal help for struggling U.S. automakers to help preserve jobs in his home state and elsewhere, but now is “appalled” that those corporations are now planning to ship jobs overseas to save money.
“We need an American auto industry, but it can’t be ‘American’ in name only -– American jobs must be protected,” Feingold says in a speech yesterday from the Senate floor. “Unfortunately, the auto restructuring plans that have been put forward contain proposals to ship jobs overseas. That is not acceptable to me or to my constituents. The taxpayer dollars that are propping up the industry should be used to preserve family-supporting jobs in Wisconsin and around the country.”
The ongoing economic downturn has pushed U.S. carmakers — particularly General Motors and Chrysler — to the brink of bankruptcy, as the firms have come to rely on billions in funds from the federal government.
via On The Hill: Senator Russ Feingold ‘Appalled’ Federal Auto Bailout Not Saving U.S. Jobs.
DENNIS KUCINICH: THIS IS A HOAX! IT IS A SWINDLE! WAKE UP AMERICA!
YouTube – THIS IS A HOAX! IT IS A SWINDLE! WAKE UP AMERICA! DENNIS KUCINICH.
“This is a hoax. It is a swindle.”
Keep in mind that the health insurance companies have about a 31% overhead (last number I saw). That means that out of every dollar spent on the health care insurance companies, 31 cents goes toward them and not health care. Let’s see…$200,000,000,000,000 * .31 = $620,000,000,000. That’s $620 billion in overhead for the insurance companies, that’s not going toward our health care.
Health insurance is, as it is practiced in the US today, a hoax. It is a swindle. It is a national disgrace. And the best we’re likely to get out of this current series of health care ‘reforms’ is window dressing.
The massive expansion of America’s “Hard Left”
The massive expansion of America’s “Hard Left” - Glenn Greenwald – Salon
Jesse Ventura was on CNN with Larry King on Monday night and this exchange occurred, illustrating how simple, clear and definitively non-partisan is the case for investigations and prosecutions for those who ordered torture (video below):
VENTURA: I don’t watch much TV. This year’s reading, I covered Bush’s life. I covered Guantanamo and a few other subjects.
And I’m very disturbed about it.
I’m bothered over Guantanamo because it seems we’ve created our own Hanoi Hilton. We can live with that? I have a problem.
I will criticize President Obama on this level; it’s a good thing I’m not president because I would prosecute every person that was involved in that torture. I would prosecute the people that did it. I would prosecute the people that ordered it. Because torture is against the law.
KING: You were a Navy SEAL.
VENTURA: That’s right. I was water boarded, so I know — at SERE School, Survival Escape Resistance Evasion. It was a required school you had to go to prior to going into the combat zone, which in my era was Vietnam. All of us had to go there. We were all, in essence — every one of us was waterboarded. It is torture.
KING: What was it like?
VENTURA: It’s drowning. It gives you the complete sensation that you are drowning. It is no good, because you — I’ll put it to you this way, you give me a waterboard, Dick Cheney and one hour, and I’ll have him confess to the Sharon Tate murders.
via The massive expansion of America’s “Hard Left” – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com.
Army suicides soar past 2008′s pace
Army suicides soar past 2008′s pace | Salon News
The day after the shooting at a combat stress clinic in Iraq, new data released to Salon shows soldiers committing suicide at a record-setting pace. Is combat stress the reason?
The Army is on a pace this year to shatter the record suicide rate set among soldiers in 2008, according to data released by the Army to Salon. And the numbers, obtained a day after a patient at a combat stress clinic in Iraq killed five, suggest that combat stress may be contributing to the spike in suicides.
During the first four months of 2009, 91 soldiers committed suicide, including suspected suicides still under investigation. During all of last year, 140 Army soldiers committed suicide, resulting in the highest rate on record. If Army suicides continue at the rate recorded from Jan. 1 to April 30, more than 270 soldiers will be dead by their own hands at the end of this year. The large majority of suicides are among enlisted soldiers, privates, specialists and sergeants.
The only bright spot in the new suicide data is some evidence that Army efforts to improve suicide prevention — among other things, implementing “chain teaching” among troops on suicide risk, hiring more mental health workers and releasing suicide prevention videos — seem to be taking hold. While 31 soldiers committed suicide in January, that number dropped to 28 in February, then 22 in March and then to 10 in April. (The month-by-month chart of suicides that the Army released to Salon is reproduced in its original form on Pages 2 and 3 of this story.)
via Army suicides soar past 2008′s pace | Salon News.
GOP, RNC to rebrand Democrats as ‘Socialists’ – Roger Simon
OPS: This is the best they can do? They can’t manage to re brand them selves so… OK, then Dems should re brand the Republicans Party the Fascist Party
GOP, RNC to rebrand Democrats as ‘Socialists’
Roger Simon: A member of the Republican National Committee told me Tuesday that when the RNC meets in an extraordinary special session next week, it will approve a resolution rebranding Democrats as the “Democrat Socialist Party.”
When I asked if such a resolution would force RNC Chairman Michael Steele to use that label when talking about Democrats in all his speeches and press releases, the RNC member replied: “Who cares?”
Which pretty much sums up the attitude some members of the RNC have toward their chairman these days.
Steele wrote a memo last month opposing the resolution. Steele said that while he believes Democrats “are indeed marching America toward European-style socialism,” he also said in a (rare) flash of insight that officially referring to them as the Democrat Socialist Party “will accomplish little than to give the media and our opponents the opportunity to mischaracterize Republicans.”
via GOP, RNC to rebrand Democrats as ‘Socialists’ – Roger Simon – POLITICO.com.
Conservatives Outraged Over Release Of Torture Photos, But Not Over Actual Torture
Conservatives Outraged Over Release Of Torture Photos, But Not Over Actual Torture - Think Progress »
On April 23, the Obama administration announced it would release hundreds of photos of detainee interrogation, obeying a court order from a lawsuit filed by the ACLU. Predictably, conservatives furious with the Obama administration’s attempt at greater transparency denounced the move. Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT) wrote to President Obama asking him not to release the photos because they could inflame potential terrorists:
The release of these old photographs of past behavior that has now clearly been prohibited will serve no public good, but will empower al-Qaeda propaganda operations, hurt our country’s image, and endanger our men and women in uniform. We know that many terrorists captured in Iraq have told American interrogators that one of the reasons they decided to join the violent jihadist war against America was what they saw on Al-Qaeda videos of abuse of detainees at Abu Ghraib,” wrote Graham and Lieberman.
via Think Progress » Conservatives Outraged Over Release Of Torture Photos, But Not Over Actual Torture.
House Republicans: Look How Many Layoffs We Helped Create
House Republicans: Look How Many Layoffs We Helped Create- Think Progress »
Today, the Washington Post reported that “eleven weeks after Congress settled on a stimulus package that provided $135 billion to limit layoffs in state governments, many states are finding that the funds are not enough and are moving to lay off thousands of public employees.” Washington state will be forced to layoff several thousand educators and Massachusetts which “cut 1,000 positions late last year, just announced 250 layoffs, with more likely to come soon.”
Apparently missing the article’s point — that the stimulus should have included more budget stabilization funding for states — the House GOP featured the article on their website today, suggesting that the report vindicated their unanimous opposition to the recovery act. Later in the day, they linked to the article on twitter and gleefully quipped, “Look how many layoffs the stimulus created“:
In reality, of course, the economic recovery didn’t “create” layoffs at the state level. Had the recovery plan included no money at all for state level budget stabilization — as the House Republicans proposed — layoffs of public servants at the state level would have been far more widespread.
via Think Progress » House Republicans: Look How Many Layoffs We Helped Create.
Credit-Card Law Has Painful Impact
Credit-Card Law Has Painful Impact
Editor’s Note: President Barack Obama and members of Congress are promising a new law to stop credit card companies from using fine print to exploit cardholders. But there’s a catch in the bill – a one-year delay so the companies have time to adjust their business models, essentially another loophole that is hastening rate hikes and credit-limit cuts before the new law can take effect.
Sadly, this rush to beat the new restrictions is hitting the most vulnerable Americans the hardest, from recently laid-off workers to U.S. soldiers whose low pay and frequent deployments make them easy prey for credit card rip-offs, as Brent Budowsky notes in this guest essay first published at The Hill:
As Memorial Day arrives, veterans and military families will be victimized by continued credit card interest rate and fee hikes, and under the House-passed credit card bill, abuses will continue until next Memorial Day, because the effective date of the key provisions of the House bill is a year from enactment.
via Consortiumnews.com.
Health Bloc – In Support of National Single Payer Health Care
Health Bloc – In Support of National Single Payer Health Care
Goal:
Gain national single payer health care for all citizens. Demand that your elected officials support H.R. 676 & S.703 the national single payer health care reform bills.
Why:
* A majority of the American people and doctors want national single payer health care.
* Healthcare expenses are the leading cause of bankruptcy filings.
* All wealthy industrialized nations support universal healthcare except the USA
* Both parties continue to leave the option of single payer health care off the table in debating the solutions to our health care crisis.
* Insurance companies profit greatly from the current health care system and devote tremendous resources toward influencing government policy in their favor.
For additional information – click here
*NEW* MSNBC Video – click here
How:
Join this voting bloc to let your elected representatives know where you stand on the issue and what they need to do in order to earn your vote.
We will keep you informed with email updates as to which candidates have earned your vote on this issue through their support of S.703 & H.R. 676.
You can also track the legislation now in Congress using the Bill Tracker at the bottom of this page.
Neo-Nazis attack concentration camp survivors during memorial service for 345,000 dead
OPS: Maybe there are some groups that should be wiped from the face of the earth. Nazi’s come 
under that heading
Neo-Nazis screaming ‘Heil Hitler’ attack concentration camp survivors during memorial service for 345,000 dead
Survivors of a Nazi death camp were shot at and abused as they gathered to remember their liberation.
Masked neo-Nazi thugs screamed ‘Heil Hitler!’ and ‘This way for the gas!’ at ten elderly Italian men and women, who returned to the site of the Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria.
The gang also fired air guns at a group of 15 French survivors, many dressed in the striped pyjama-style uniforms they wore as inmates. One suffered a head wound while another was injured by a shot in the neck. The four thugs managed to escape.
Jewish leaders in Austria were appalled by the weekend scenes that marred events marking the 64th anniversary of the camp’s liberation by American troops.
via Neo-Nazis attack concentration camp survivors during memorial service for 345,000 dead | Mail Online.
Dodd: Predatory Lending Legislation On Hold In Senate
OPS: And you thought they were going to do something on YOUR behalf Charlie Brown?
Predatory Lending Legislation On Hold In Senate: Dodd
Predatory lending legislation passed in the House last week will have to get in line in the Senate, Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) said Tuesday.
“We’ll get to that at some point,” said Dodd, chairman of the Senate banking committee. “We’ve got a lot on our plate. We’ve got other things to do.”
The issue is less than pressing for Dodd, he said, because the credit crunch has dried up predatory and subprime lending. Problems that are currently ongoing need to be addressed first, he said — such as broad financial regulatory reform, a rescue of the auto industry, and oversight of the Wall Street bailout.
“There’s a greater sense of urgency I have about those issues than a non-existing problem today,” he said. “There isn’t a lot of predatory lending going on right now. There’s very little subprime lending, so while it would certainly plug a hole for what happened before, there’s other, I’m sorry, there are other issues I’m grappling with that are current issues. And I’m not minimizing what happened before, and I don’t want to see a repetition of it, but there’s not subprime lending going on today.”
via Predatory Lending Legislation On Hold In Senate: Dodd.
Sears Tower Bombing Plot: 5 Of 6 Convicted Of Planning To Blow Up Sears Tower, FBI Offices
Sears Tower Bombing Plot: 5 Of 6 Convicted Of Planning To Blow Up Sears Tower, FBI Offices
MIAMI — Five men were convicted Tuesday of plotting to join forces with al-Qaida to destroy Chicago’s Sears Tower and bomb FBI offices in hopes of igniting an anti-government insurrection.
The jury in Miami acquitted another member of the so-called “Liberty City Six” in the sixth day of deliberations. Two previous trials ended in mistrials when jurors could not agree on the men’s guilt or innocence.
They were arrested in June 2006 on charges of plotting terrorism with an undercover FBI informant they believed was from al-Qaida. Defense attorneys said terrorist talk recorded on dozens of FBI audio and video tapes was not serious and the men wanted only money.
Ringleader Narseal Batiste, 35, was the only one
via Sears Tower Bombing Plot: 5 Of 6 Convicted Of Planning To Blow Up Sears Tower, FBI Offices.
Splitting the Sky vs Bush: Civil Resistance in the 21st Century – Documentary Video
Splitting the Sky vs Bush: Civil Resistance in the 21st Century – Documentary Video | After Downing Street
Splitting the Sky vs Bush: Civil Resistance in the 21st Century
Produced by Wayne Prante on behalf of the “Coalition of the Willing” at WarCriminalsOut.com
It is a full length, 1.5 hour documentary concerning the visit by former U.S. President and accused war criminal George W. Bush to Calgary, Alberta, on March 17th, 2009, about efforts by citizen groups to have Bush either barred or arrested for his alleged crimes, and the one man who attempted to arrest Bush, and the reasons why.
This man is a native Mohawk named Dacajeweiah which translates to “Splitting the Sky”. His colonialized name is John Boncore. He is a life long activist for Indigenous Peoples, for Truth, Justice, Freedom and Peace.
For his actions, he was arrested and charged with ‘Obstruction of a Peace Officer’. He will plead NOT guilty. His legal defense will be ‘Civil Resistance’.
Professor of Law, Francis Boyle (U. of Illinois) states that:
“In ‘civil resistance’ cases, you have individuals, acting peaceably, who are attempting to prevent the ongoing commission of international crimes for the express purpose of upholding the Rule of Law, the Constitution, International Law, and Human Rights. Such measures must not be confused with acts of ‘civil disobedience’ as traditionally defined, where protesters were conscientiously violating domestic laws for the express purpose of changing them.”
The documentary begins with a TV interview featuring Gail Davidson of Lawyers Against the War, an interview with a former Canadian soldier who formerly hunted war criminals, TV coverage of the demonstration, and then footage of the arrest of Splitting the Sky. This section concludes with political commentary by Canadian comic Alan Park of Driving Tunes.
From there, we carry on to Vancouver where Splitting the Sky spoke to supporters on April 11th, 2009. He discusses his motivations, detailed what happened in Calgary, and speaks about Civil Resistance and what he hopes to achieve with his court case. He is introduced by Wayne Prante, who provides some historical context for the presentation by Splitting the Sky, and some biographical information.
Brad Sherman Hammers Treasury: “It’s Not Illegal If Wall Street Wants It”
Brad Sherman Hammers Treasury: “It’s Not Illegal If Wall Street Wants It”
In remarks on the House floor Tuesday, Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) railed against the Treasury Department’s plans to recycle bailout dollars paid back by companies participating in the bailout, aka the Troubled Asset Relief Program. Citing a part of the bailout bill that states that revenue from the sale of troubled assets “shall be paid into the general fund of the Treasury for reduction of the public debt,” Sherman said the administration is following a theme: “It’s not illegal if Wall Street wants it.”
“It is being widely accepted in the press and on Wall Street and in Washington that whatever the [Treasury] Secretary gets back from the banks will instead be part of some revolving fund from which the Secretary of the Treasury may make additional bailouts in addition to the first $700 billion of expenditures,” Sherman said. “Well, the statute is very clear to the contrary. Whatever is returned to the Treasury goes into the general fund.”
In April, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner testified that the the bailout fund would benefit from $25 billion paid back by banks. Over the weekend, a source told the Washington Post that the Treasury expected to recycle $35 billion. In an email to the Huffington Post, a Treasury spokeswoman said that the department was free to re-use principal repaid by firms participating in the TARP’s Capital Purchase Program, which invested in preferred stock, not troubled assets.
via Brad Sherman Hammers Treasury: “It’s Not Illegal If Wall Street Wants It”.
Palin distinguishes herself as the only governor to refuse energy conservation funds.
Palin distinguishes herself as the only governor to refuse energy conservation funds. – Think Progress »
Every single governor except Sarah Palin (R-AK) has written to Energy Secretary Steven Chu accepting millions of stimulus dollars meant to increase energy conservation and efficiency. Last month, Palin rejected $28.6 million for energy conservation work because she said it would force Alaska buildings to adhere to a “universal energy code.” Newsminer points out that the Energy Department has accepted other states’ pledges to simply work with local governments to improve efficiency, and that no “universal” requirement is needed:
The federal stimulus law requires states to pledge they will meet energy efficiency standards on 90 percent of new and renovated commercial and residential square footage by 2017.
Rove: Ending Torture Gives Terrorists ‘A Tool To Make It More Attractive To Recruit People’
OPS: Amazing. Everything, everything is contrary to, and exactly opposite of reality. And the brain-dead rank-and-file buy it!
Rove: Ending Torture Gives Terrorists ‘A Tool To Make It More Attractive To Recruit People’ – Think Progress »
As conservatives continue to rally around torture, Karl Rove last night praised Dick Cheney for his “reasoned, thoughtful series of observations” about how President Obama has made the U.S. less safe. He also conjectured that ending the practice of torture will provide al Qaeda with a great “tool” to help them recruit new terrorists:
ROVE: Taking, for example, the memoranda about the enhanced interrogation techniques and making them public has been a value to our enemy. It has served, frankly, I think, as a recruiting tool. They can now take these memoranda and go to prospective, you know, recruits and say, This is the worst that the enemy, the United States, would ever do to you, and they’ve even forsworn these things. We can help you, prepare you to deal with these things, but even the enemy is so weak they’re not going to use these techniques on you. And it’s given them a tool to make it more attractive to recruit people, and you know, this kind of thing is harmful to us over the long haul.
Watch it:
How K Street ‘Pimps’ America
How K Street ‘Pimps’ America – by Len Hart, The Existentialist Cowboy
K street –DC’s lobby district –pimps America but it is the American people who get screwed! The US government is increasingly answerable to foreign governments rather than to the American electorate. A previous EC article charged that Rupert Murdoch and his crooked Fox network ‘shilled’ Bush’s war crime against Iraq and profited from it. However important its support of Bush, Fox is small potatoes compared to the growing influence exerted by foreign governments upon the government of the United States.
There are historical analogies. It was Didius Julianus who bought the Roman empire from the same praetorians who had assassinated Pertinax, his imperial predecessor. The Praetorian Guard ‘pimped’ an empire.
The US is, likewise, whored to big spenders. Acts of ‘state’ prostitution are ongoing and institutionalized. Like Rome, the US economy now depends upon conquest. Iraq had oil. The US needed it. The question is: did the US go to war because it was beholden to foreign entities or foreign governments? Did the US go to war because of the growing power of the Israeli lobby?
The Military/Industrial complex may be compared to a clearing house, broker, pimp! To this end, the US is regularly sold to the highest bidders. By the time the Roman Empire was sold at auction to one Didius Julianus, Rome’s currency had already collapsed, as the dollar is likewise endangered. The smart money had already dumped sestercius for Greek Drachmas and the sale of the empire was concluded in Greek currency –not Roman.
The most powerful lobbies are not American citizens or even US corporations but foreign governments or foreign corporations. Today, the ‘auctioning off of America’ takes place on and around K Street in DC. Because K street pimps the government to foreign interests not subject to the US Constitution, US citizens have little or no influence on Congress, less upon the ‘Presidency’, and none upon the un-elected army of lobbyists and bribe brokers.
Foreign governments have traditionally worked through diplomatic channels, primarily embassies. About 100 countries do precisely that. Lately, however, the work of diplomats and embassies is increasingly replaced by PR firms and well-financed lobbies. Like war, diplomacy has been ‘privatized’; diplomacy ‘corporatized’
via The Existentialist Cowboy: How K Street ‘Pimps’ America.
Baucus Arrests Five More Doctors, Nurses, Activists
Baucus Arrests Five More Doctors, Nurses, Activists – OpEdNews »
by David Swanson
Dr. Margaret Flowers, who was arrested along with seven others at the first Senate Finance Committee hearing on healthcare, just phoned me from the second one. As Chairman Max Baucus called the hearing to order, about 20 members of the California Nurses Association (CNA) stood and turned their backs on the committee. Pasted on their backs were signs reading: “Nurses Say: Patients First,” “Stop AHIP,” (referring to health insurance lobbyists), “Pass Single Payer.”
This was the second hearing at which, despite majority support for single-payer in polls, not a single advocate for single-payer was permitted to participate. The nurses were asked to leave and did so. But five people spoke up for single-payer and were arrested: Dr. Judy Desovich; DeAnn McEwen, a nurse from Longbeach Memorial Medical Center ICU; Sue Cannon, a nurse from UC-Irvine; Dr. Steven Fenichel from New York; and Jerry Call from Maine.
Flowers phoned me from the sidewalk at Constitution Avenue and First Street at 10:30 a.m. as the arrestees were being brought outside one by one and a crowd was cheering and chanting. About 10 nurses staged a brief sit-in on the sidewalk while we were on the phone. Numerous TV cameras and boom mics were present from Bill Moyer’s Journal, CBS, and other networks.
via OpEdNews » Baucus Arrests Five More Doctors, Nurses, Activists.
It’s called Tainting The Jury Pool, people
Outrageous: Torture Lawyer John Yoo Gets a Column at the Philadelphia Inquirer
Yoo joins an ‘increasingly rightward-tilting lineup’ that includes former Senator Rick Santorum and torture fan Michael Smerconish.
It was jarring enough (and more than a bit bizarre) to see the notorious John Yoo weigh in on the Obama administration’s pick for a Supreme Court justice to replace David Souter, in the form of an op-ed this weekend in the Philadelphia Inquirer titled “Obama needs a neutral justice.” A crass offensive on the notion of “judicial empathy,” Yoo contrasted Obama’s stated belief that “justice isn’t about some abstract legal theory or footnote in a case book,” but something that affects “the daily realities of people’s lives” unfavorably to the judicial philosophies of conservative justices John Roberts or Samuel Alito.
“In his 2005 confirmation hearings, Roberts compared judges to neutral umpires in a baseball game,” Yoo wrote. “Sen. Obama did not vote to confirm Roberts or Alito, but now proposes to appoint a Great Empathizer who will call balls and strikes with a strike zone that depends on the sex, race, and social and economic background of the players. Nothing could be more damaging to the fairness of the game, or to the idea of a rule of law that is blind to the identity of the parties before it.”
Obnoxious, yes. Yet I kept reading Yoo’s op-ed, at least until I reached that inevitable moment, the Wait, why am I even reading this? moment. The This is the scum whose enthusiasm for torture and zeal for unfettered executive power is so extreme, he once responded to the theoretical question “If the president deems that he’s got to torture somebody, including by crushing the testicles of the person’s child, there is no law that can stop him?” with “I think it depends on why the President thinks he needs to do that” moment.
I stopped reading.
via It’s called Tainting The Jury Pool, people | AlterNet.
In Ad Campaign, Health Care Group Calls Out Democrats By Name
In Ad Campaign, Health Care Group Calls Out Democrats By Name
The health reform alliance Health Care for America Now (HCAN) has launched an ad campaign in states with conservative Democrats and moderate Republicans to pressure so-called centrists into support a public option in health care. Here’s the ad running in Delaware.
video at link
via In Ad Campaign, Health Care Group Calls Out Democrats By Name | TPMDC.
An Accidental Moment Of Candor From Judd Gregg: With Franken Tied Up, ‘We Can Do A Lot With 40 Votes’
An Accidental Moment Of Candor From Judd Gregg: With Franken Tied Up, ‘We Can Do A Lot With 40 Votes’
A Congressional Quarterly article about GOP efforts to get conservative Democrats to oppose major legislation contains an interesting admission from Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH).
Acording to the piece, Republicans “have vowed to block, reshape or defeat a number of Democratic initiatives in coming months, even though Specter’s defection has left the Senate Republican caucus with just 40 members.”
But in a 99-member Senate, 40 votes are enough to keep Democrats from cutting off debate on major legislation. “Usually you need 41 votes to get anything done around here. But right now, you can do a lot with 40 votes,” said Judd Gregg
In a 99-seat Senate, 40 votes isn’t nearly enough to “get anything done.” Not at all. It is rather the bare minimum necessary to make sure nothing gets done. And it explains why so many Republican senators will routinely vote against cloture on major Democratic agenda items. It’s called a filibuster–and it isn’t typically thought of as way to “get stuff done.”
Bush Failure To Disclose Waterboarding Appears To Violate Law
Bush Failure To Disclose Waterboarding Appears To Violate Law
The furor over when and whether House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was briefed about the use of waterboarding has distracted attention from what is, perhaps, a far more problematic revelation regarding the Bush administration’s interrogation of suspected terrorists.
According to the testimony of two high-ranking Democrats and recently declassified CIA and Justice Department documents, the Bush White House failed to disclose the use of waterboarding until roughly half a year after it was first deployed. Other writers — notably Marcy Wheeler — have picked up on this timeline. But it is worth restating and highlighting again because, if accurate, it appears to constitute a violation of law by the former White House.
As documented by the Congressional Research Service, the President is required to ensure “that the congressional intelligence committees are kept ‘fully and currently informed’ of U.S. intelligence activities, including any ‘significant anticipated intelligence activity.’” The basis of this is the 1991 Intelligence Authorization Act, which places a statutory obligation on the President to not just keep relevant committees “fully and currently informed” but to disclose “any significant anticipated intelligence activity.”
via Bush Failure To Disclose Waterboarding Appears To Violate Law.
Record home price slide 14%
Home prices slide 14%
National median home price falls to $169,000 in first quarter, due to market flooded with lower-priced foreclosures and short sales.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — The steep slide in home price accelerated at a record pace during the first three months of 2009, according to an industry report issued Tuesday.
The national median home price of single family homes sold during the first quarter fell 13.8% to $169,000 year over year, and 6.2% compared with the last quarter 2008, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR). That was the largest year-over-year decline in the 30-year history of the report.
NAR attributed much of the loss to two factors: First-time homebuyers, who are often entry-level buyers, accounted for about half of all purchases during the quarter. And many buyers took advantage of the deeply discounted prices of foreclosed properties and short sales. These “distressed properties” typically sell for 20% less than traditional homes, according to NAR. These homes also accounted for about half of all transactions.
via Record home price slide – May. 12, 2009.
Vitter lifts hold on FEMA director nominee.
Vitter lifts hold on FEMA director nominee. - Think Progress »
On May 1, Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) announced — with almost no explanation why — that he had put a hold on President Obama’s nominee to head FEMA, Craig Fugate. Last week, the White House responded by calling Vitter’s hold “political posturing,” while Vitter continued to insist that he had “not received the information he has requested about how FEMA would treat certain issues of importance to Louisiana.” Today, however, Vitter announced that he’s lifting his hold. He said a letter he received Monday from FEMA officials assured him that the agency was working hard to resolve an issue related to reconstruction delays that resulted from the agency’s “interpretation of rules that prohibit federal financing of construction projects in flood zones.”
via Think Progress » Vitter lifts hold on FEMA director nominee..
Did newly announced top Afghan general run Cheney’s assassination wing?
Did newly announced top Afghan general run Cheney’s assassination wing? - The Raw Story
It was reported on Tuesday that Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal will be taking over command of US forces in Afghanistan, pending Senate approval.
McChrystal is presently director of the Joint Chiefs staff, but from September 2003 to August 2008, he headed the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), which oversees such elite units as the Army’s Delta Force and the Navy SEALs.
Famed investigative reporter Seymour Hersh recently described the JSOC as an “executive assassination wing” controlled for many years by the office of former Vice President Dick Cheney.
Speaking to a University of Minnesota audience in March, Hersh called JSOC “a special wing of our special operations community that is set up independently. … They do not report to anybody, except in the Bush-Cheney days, they reported directly to the Cheney office. … Congress has no oversight of it. … It’s an executive assassination ring essentially, and it’s been going on and on and on.”
Although McChrystal’s efforts with JSOC were not widely reported at the time, Newsweek did run a brief article on him in June 2006:
via The Raw Story » Did newly announced top Afghan general run Cheney’s assassination wing?.
New Afghan commander fingered in Tillman coverup
New Afghan commander fingered in Tillman coverup -Raw Story »
President Barack Obama’s new choice to lead US operations in Afghanistan, Lt. Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, suspected that former football star Pat Tillman had been killed by friendly fire but approved a Silver Star regardless.
According to military testimony acquired by the Associated Press in 2007, McChrystal went so far as to warn top US generals that Tillman’s death was suspicious. In the memo, he implored “our nation’s leaders,” specifically “POTUS” — the President of the United States — “to avoid using the award citation’s language of “devastating enemy fire” in their speeches.”
McChrystal himself had signed off on the award.
Ultimately, the Pentagon’s acting inspector general said McChrystal should be held “accountable for the inaccurate and misleading assertions” in his Silver Star award recommendation and for failing to notify officials of his suspicions.
But Army general William Wallace concluded that McChrystal had behaved “reasonably” and no action was taken.
via Raw Story » New Afghan commander fingered in Tillman coverup.
Pension Privateers
Pension Privateers —By David Cay Johnston | Mother Jones
Who Ran Away With Your 401K?
How the boss absconded with your benefits.
via Pension Privateers | Mother Jones.
Turley: Cheney interview could be used against him in court
Turley: Cheney interview could be used against him in court
In an appearance Sunday on Face the Nation, former Vice President Dick Cheney repeated his call for the release of CIA memos that he says will prove the torture program was an “honorable approach” which saved American lives. Cheney also revealed that former President Bush “knew a great deal about the program — he basically authorized it.”
Law professor Jonathan Turley told MSBNC’s Keith Olbermann on Monday that Cheney is “almost becoming the Martha Mitchell of this administration” — a reference to the wife of Watergate conspirator John Mitchell, who repeatedly called the press with revelations about the conspiracy in the Nixon White House.
“He’s making the legal case all the stronger for a criminal investigation and prosecution,” Turley explained. “He most certainly just supplied a critical block that would have been the subject of investigation. We now have almost the entire puzzle.”
Turley emphasized that anything Cheney says in television interviews can be used against him in court and that even though Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is still insisting there may not be enough facts for a criminal investigation, “You got Dick Cheney saying, ‘Yeah, here’s how it went. The president knew about it, authorized it. I was all in favor of it. We did it.’”
via Raw Story » Turley: Cheney interview could be used against him in court.
Archbishop Rembert Weakland, Former Catholic Bishop Of Milwaukee, Says He’s Gay
Archbishop Rembert Weakland, Former Catholic Bishop Of
Milwaukee, Says He’s Gay
NEW YORK — A Roman Catholic archbishop who resigned in 2002 over a sex and financial scandal involving a man describes his struggles with being gay in an upcoming memoir about his decades serving the church.
Archbishop Rembert Weakland, former head of the Milwaukee archdiocese, said in an interview Monday that he wrote about his sexual orientation because he wanted to be candid about “how this came to life in my own self, how I suppressed it, how it resurrected again.”
Called “A Pilgrim in a Pilgrim Church: Memoirs of a Catholic Archbishop,” the book is set to be released in June.
“I was very careful and concerned that the book not become a Jerry Springer, to satisfy people’s prurient curiosity or anything of this sort,” Weakland told The Associated Press. “At the same time, I tried to be as honest as I can.”
via Archbishop Rembert Weakland, Former Catholic Bishop Of Milwaukee, Says He’s Gay.
Fox Condemns Sykes’s Act: If A Talk Radio Host Compared Obama To A Terrorist, He Would Be Fired
Fox Condemns Sykes’s Act: If A Talk Radio Host Compared Obama To A Terrorist, He Would Be Fired - Think Progress »
Last night on Fox News, Sean Hannity and Dick Morris expressed outrage at comedian Wanda Sykes’s act at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner. Sykes joked that “maybe Rush Limbaugh was the 20th hijacker, but he was so strung out on Oxycontin he missed his flight,” and said she hoped his kidneys fail. Specifically, Hannity couldn’t believe that she compared Limbaugh to a terrorist, saying her jokes were far worse than waterboarding detainees. He and guest Dick Morris then claimed that if a conservative radio host ever made such a comparison, he could be fired or arrested:
HANNITY: Calling him a terrorist, comparing him to bin Laden, et cetera, et cetera, and then wishing kidney failure. Now for all the moral indignation and outrage over waterboarding, what would be worse, wishing an American citizen who has a different point of view that his kidneys fail and to waterboard a terrorist to get information? [...]
HANNITY: Now there is a double standard. Now can you imagine if we go through this list here of — what if somebody called Barack Obama, compared him to a terrorist? What if somebody wished him ill? That he wouldn’t do well? [...]
MORRIS: He would be carted off in handcuffs. And they should be. No one should make a joke about the president dying and frankly no one should make a joke about someone in political life like that dying.
Ironically, a few seconds later, Hannity asked why Sykes didn’t bring up President Obama’s tenuous link to former Weatherman Bill Ayers. Watch it:
Obama administration threatens Britain to keep torture evidence concealed
Obama administration threatens Britain to keep torture evidence concealed - Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com
Ever since he was released from Guantanamo in February after six years of due-process-less detention and brutal torture, Binyam Mohamed has been attempting to obtain justice for what was done to him. But his torturers have been continuously protected, and Mohamed’s quest for a day in court repeatedly thwarted, by one individual: Barack Obama. Today, there is new and graphic evidence of just how far the Obama administration is going to prevent evidence of the Bush administration’s torture program from becoming public.
In February, Obama’s DOJ demanded dismissal of Mohamed’s lawsuit against the company which helped “render” him to be tortured on the ground that national security would be harmed if the lawsuit continued. Then, after a British High Court ruled that there was credible evidence that Mohamed was subjected to brutal torture and was entitled to obtain evidence in the possession of the British government which detailed the CIA’s treatment of Mohamed, and after a formal police inquiry began into allegations that British agents collaborated in his torture, the British government cited threats from the U.S. government that it would no longer engage in intelligence-sharing with Britain — i.e., it would no longer pass on information about terrorist threats aimed at British citizens — if the British court disclosed the facts of Mohamed’s torture.
As I wrote about in February, those threats from the U.S. caused the British High Court to reverse itself and rule that, in light of these threats from the U.S., it would keep seven paragraphs detailing Mohamed’s torture concealed. From the British court’s ruling:
Biden says unions are way to rebuild middle class
Biden says unions are way to rebuild middle class – Salon.com
May 12th, 2009 | WASHINGTON — Vice President Joe Biden tells union leaders the best way to rebuild the middle class is to help labor unions grow.
Biden says the White House is committed to passing a bill that would make it easier for workers to form unions.
The Employee Free Choice Act is organized labor’s top priority this year, but business groups are adamantly opposed. Senate lawmakers are working on a compromise version of the measure they hope can garner 60 votes to overcome an expected GOP filibuster.
Biden made his remarks at a conference of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which has about 1.6 million members.
via Biden says unions are way to rebuild middle class – Salon.com.
US reverses Bush stance in antitrust drive
US reverses Bush stance in antitrust drive – Financial Times
The US will take a more interventionist approach to antitrust issues, reversing the stance of George W. Bush’s administration and moving closer to the way European regulators operate.
Christine Varney, head of the Department of Justice’s antitrust division, yesterday said she was revoking a Bush administration antitrust doctrine that she said advocated “extreme hesitancy in the face of potential abuses by monopoly firms”.
“In a free society government must intervene when competition is threatened,” she said, adding that continuing a minimal approach to tackling monopolistic behaviour was the wrong path, even in a financial crisis. “It’s clear we have a new sheriff in town,” said Ed Black, a lawyer and head of the Computer & Communications Industry Association. “There’s so much that was left ignored by the last administration, so a main job will be catching up.”
A former lawyer specialising in the internet, Ms Varney’s appointment and apparent willingness to scrutinise large technology companies may concern Google, Intel, Microsoft and IBM, all of which have faced previous antitrust action
via FT.com / UK – US reverses Bush stance in antitrust drive.
Downturn bottomed out, Trichet signals
OPS: And I have this bridge…..
Downturn bottomed out, Trichet signals
…but NOT for the US
Jean-Claude Trichet signalled on Monday that the global downturn had bottomed out with some large economies already able to put the recession behind them and look forward to renewed growth.
The European Central Bank president’s comments on Monday in Basel, Switzerland, had added weight because he was speaking on behalf of the world’s leading central bankers, not just for the eurozone.
His remarks came as the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development said there were signs of a “pause” in the economic slowdown in France, Italy, the UK and China.
The tentative signs of green shoots across the global economy have already led to a 40 per cent increase in global equity prices since the trough in March, according to the FTSE All World ex Japan index.
via FT.com / Global Economy – Downturn bottomed out, Trichet signals.
Philadelphia Inquirer hires John Yoo as a columnist.
OPS: What’s wrong with the people at the PI?
Philadelphia Inquirer hires John Yoo as a columnist.
The Philadelphia Inquirer already has a long line-up of conservative columnists, including Michael Smerconish and Rick Santorum (who reportedly makes $1,750 per column). Attytood’s Will Bunch reveals that the Inquirer now has one more: torture architect John Yoo. The Inquirer hired Yoo in late 2008, but according to Bunch, didn’t give him a byline as an “Inquirer columnist” until Sunday. Bunch wrote to Inquirer editorial page editor Harold Jackson and received this response:
John Yoo has written freelance commentaries for The Inquirer since 2005, however he entered into a contract to write a monthly column in late 2008. I won’t discuss the compensation of anyone who writes for us. Of course, we know more about Mr. Yoo’s actions in the Justice Department now than we did at the time we contracted him. But we did not blindly enter into our agreement. He’s a Philadelphian, and very knowledgeable about the legal subjects he discusses in his commentaries. Our readers have been able to get directly from Mr. Yoo his thoughts on a number of subjects concerning law and the courts, including measures taken by the White House post-9/11. That has promoted further discourse, which is the objective of newspaper commentary.
via Think Progress » Philadelphia Inquirer hires John Yoo as a columnist..
‘Smokey’ Joe Barton: Regulating CO2 Could ‘Close Down The New York And Boston Marathons’
‘Smokey’ Joe Barton: Regulating CO2 Could ‘Close Down The New York And Boston Marathons’ – Think Progress »
Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX), known as “Smokey Joe” for his efforts on behalf of big polluters, is one of Congress’s most aggressive deniers of man-made climate change. For instance, in March, he said that the climate is changing “for natural variation reasons” and that to deal with it, humans should just “get shade.”
In a new interview with Newsmax, Barton continued his nonsensical approach to the issue, claiming that the Obama administration’s efforts to regulate carbon dioxide would potentially “close down the New York and Boston marathons“:
Barton says the average healthy adult exhales between four-tenths of a ton and seven-tenths of a ton of CO2 a year.
“So if you put 20,000 marathoners into a confined area, you could consider that a single source of pollution, and you could regulate it,” Barton says. “The key would be whether the EPA said that 20,000 people running the same route was one source or not.”
Analysis: Carbon cash to energy committee shapes climate debate.
Analysis: Carbon cash to energy committee shapes climate debate. – Think Progress »
At a White House meeting last week, President Obama and Vice President Biden urged the Democrats on the House energy committee to take “quick action” on comprehensive green economy legislation. Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA), a co-sponsor of the American Clean Energy and Security Act with Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), has explained that the legislation can’t move forward without the cooperation of fellow Democrats, many of whom are representing “the coal sector, with the steel, with the auto sector, with the refining sector.” A Wonk Room analysis has found that the average energy committee member opposed to, or wavering on, the green economy legislation has received six times as much lifetime climate polluter cash as the average supporter:
Waxman-Markey Total Carbon Contributions
Carbon-sector contributions to members of the House Committee on Energy & Commerce. Click for more.
“The obstructionist politicians working to weaken the ACES Act,” the Wonk Room’s Brad Johnson writes, “are ironically threatening the future of the industries who fill their campaign coffers. The nation needs to set strong standards for energy efficiency, renewable energy, and global warming pollution in order to compete in the 21st century economy.”
via Think Progress » Analysis: Carbon cash to energy committee shapes climate debate..
FBI Whistleblower Testimony: Gonzales Imposed Brutal Interrogation Tactics
FBI Whistleblower Testimony: Gonzales Imposed Brutal Interrogation Tactics - ABC News
Ali Soufan Also To Testify CIA Torture Program Architect Was Unqualified
As President Bush’s top lawyer, Alberto Gonzales pressed counterterror officials to use brutal interrogation techniques on terror suspect Abu Zubaydah in 2002, even when those techniques hindered Zubaydah’s cooperation, a former FBI agent who was present is expected to testify Wednesday before Congress.
via FBI Whistleblower Testimony: Gonzales Imposed Brutal Interrogation Tactics – ABC News.
The giant rubber ‘sea snakes’ that could generate electricity for tens of thousands of UK homes
Wave of the future: The giant rubber ‘sea snakes’ that could generate electricity for tens of thousands of UK homes
It looks and moves like a like a giant snake, but according to scientists this weird device could be generating energy off Britain’s coast within five years.
Each ‘anaconda’, which could be more than 200 yards long and made almost entirely of a rubber tube, may be capable of producing 1MW (megawatt) of power.
The plan is to have ‘shoals’ or ‘schools’ of the devices around the coast, where they would be harnessed to ‘swim’ just below the surface.
Groups of 50 anacondas could each generate enough electricity to power 50,000 homes at an ‘excitingly low’ cost, the developers Checkmate Group said.
A ten-yard version of the anaconda is currently in the final stage of ‘proof of concept’ testing at a 300-yard wave test tank run by QinetiQ in Gosport, Hampshire.
Creation on Command
Creation on Command
What We Know
From Jackson Pollock to John Coltrane — how creativity springs from a choreographed set of mental events.
Al Kooper didn’t know what to play. He’d told some half-truths to get into Bob Dylan’s recording session — the musicians were working on some song tentatively titled “Like A Rolling Stone” — and Kooper had been assigned the Hammond organ. There was only one problem: Kooper didn’t play the organ. He was a guitarist.
The first takes were predictably terrible — Kooper was just trying not to get kicked out of the studio. But on take four, he suddenly found his chords. Kooper’s playing was pure improv — “I was like a little kid fumbling in the dark for a light switch,” he would later remember — but he ended up inventing one of the most famous organ riffs in modern music.
There is something profoundly mysterious about this kind of creativity. Kooper didn’t have time to think — the chorus was about to happen — and so he just started banging on the ivory keys. This same impromptu process defines some of the most famous creations of modern art, from John Coltrane letting loose on “A Love Supreme,” to Jackson Pollock dripping paint haphazardly on a canvas. These are works made entirely in the moment — their beauty is spontaneous.
via Creation on Command § SEEDMAGAZINE.COM.
Psychological Pathologies 101: Bailing Out Gambling Addicts Encourages More Gambling
Psychological Pathologies 101: Bailing Out Gambling Addicts Encourages More Gambling – OPENLEFT
by: David Sirota
A top Federal Reserve official has finally said what we all knew, but what most pro-bailout politicians and pundits have refused to say: Namely, that bailing out the professional gamblers on Wall Street actually encouraged them to gamble even more:
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. government protection of its financial industry encouraged excessive risk-taking at the heart of the current financial crisis and ought be rolled back, a top U.S. Federal Reserve official said on Monday.”The financial safety net, especially those parts that were more implicit and perceived than explicit and written into the laws, played a significant role in the accumulation of risks that ultimately led to the turmoil we are still experiencing,” said Richmond Federal Reserve President Jeffrey Lacker.
Now, I know that all the voices who opposed the bailout were originally called Stupid Unserious Luddites Who Wanted the Country to Go Into a Depression, and that all the Establishment voices calling for a no-strings-attached bailout trumpeted themselves as Serious Statesmen Saving the Republic. So, I’m hoping that perhaps now, with a top Fed official saying us supposed Luddites were right, that the paradigm will shift just a little bit – and that maybe, just maybe, the anti-bailout voices will have a little bit more standing.
via Open Left:: Psychological Pathologies 101: Bailing Out Gambling Addicts Encourages More Gambling.
How Stereotypes Defeat the Stereotyped
How Stereotypes Defeat the Stereotyped - TIME
As explicit discrimination has receded in the last two decades, culminating in the elevation of an African-American to the Presidency, a woman to the House Speakership and a black woman to the galactic dominance known as being Oprah Winfrey, those who study the effects of racism and sexism have had to cope with a difficult question: If discrimination is less powerful, why do some groups in society continue to fare worse than others? Has bias merely become better hidden, or are there other forces at work?
Amsterdam, the Netherlands: New research that uses an innovative approach to study, for the first time, the relative contributions of food and exercise habits to the development of the obesity epidemic has concluded that the rise in obesity in the United States since the 1970s was virtually all due to increased energy intake. How much of the obesity epidemic has been caused by excess calorie intake and how much by reductions in physical activity has been long debated and while experts agree that making it easier for people to eat less and exercise more are both important for combating it, they debate where the public health focus should be.
A study presented on Friday at the European Congress on Obesity is the first to examine the question of the proportional contributions to the obesity epidemic by combining metabolic relationships, the laws of thermodynamics, epidemiological data and agricultural data.
“There have been a lot of assumptions that both reduced physical activity and increased energy intake have been major drivers of the obesity epidemic. Until now, nobody has proposed how to quantify their relative contributions to the rise in obesity since the 1970s. This study demonstrates that the weight gain in the American population seems to be virtually all explained by eating more calories. It appears that changes in physical activity played a minimal role,” said the study’s leader, Professor Boyd Swinburn, chair of population health and director of the World Health Organization Collaborating Centre for Obesity Prevention at Deakin University in Australia.
via How Stereotypes Defeat the Stereotyped – TIME.
Increased food intake alone explains the increase in body weight in the United States
Increased food intake alone explains the increase in body weight in the United States – Science News
Amsterdam, the Netherlands: New research that uses an innovative approach to study, for the first time, the relative contributions of food and exercise habits to the development of the obesity epidemic has concluded that the rise in obesity in the United States since the 1970s was virtually all due to increased energy intake. How much of the obesity epidemic has been caused by excess calorie intake and how much by reductions in physical activity has been long debated and while experts agree that making it easier for people to eat less and exercise more are both important for combating it, they debate where the public health focus should be.
A study presented on Friday at the European Congress on Obesity is the first to examine the question of the proportional contributions to the obesity epidemic by combining metabolic relationships, the laws of thermodynamics, epidemiological data and agricultural data.
“There have been a lot of assumptions that both reduced physical activity and increased energy intake have been major drivers of the obesity epidemic. Until now, nobody has proposed how to quantify their relative contributions to the rise in obesity since the 1970s. This study demonstrates that the weight gain in the American population seems to be virtually all explained by eating more calories. It appears that changes in physical activity played a minimal role,” said the study’s leader, Professor Boyd Swinburn, chair of population health and director of the World Health Organization Collaborating Centre for Obesity Prevention at Deakin University in Australia.
The 2010 Science Budget
The 2010 Science Budget – ScienceNOW Daily News
Fans of U.S. scientific research will have a lot to be happy about in the 2010 budget proposal released today by President Barack Obama. But with legislators concerned about the budget’s impact on a trillion-dollar deficit, the $21 billion in stimulus cash awarded to science agencies in February is sure coming in handy. Compared with the spending plan passed by Congress for this year, the levels in the proposal Obama released today are flat or provide only slight increases for most science agencies. But any suggestion of a drooping science budget next year is “illusory,” said White House science adviser John Holdren at a midday briefing, noting that the federal commitment to science stands at a record level thanks to the boost from the stimulus package and regular appropriations.
The National Institutes of Health, for example, is slated for a 1.4% increase over fiscal year 2009, growing its budget to $31.0 billion. But that excludes the $10.4 billion in stimulus funds that NIH got. Cancer research across NIH, however, would receive a 5% bump to $6 billion as part of an effort to double research on this disease over 8 years.
Those in the physical sciences should be as pleased as their biomedical colleagues are because Obama proposed to increase the Department of Energy’s Office of Science from $4.8 billion to $4.9 billion, again, not taking into account the gaudy $1.6 billion awarded in February, which must be spent by next year. The Department of Energy’s total includes $280 million for setting up eight so-called Energy Innovation Hubs, to be funded at $25 million per year, which would each focus on one specific area, including solar fuels and nuclear energy.
via The 2010 Science Budget — Kintisch et al. 2009 (507): 1 — ScienceNOW.
Keep Biofuels Out of the Gas Tank
Keep Biofuels Out of the Gas Tank - ScienceNOW Daily News
Biofuels work better if you don’t put them directly into your car. That’s the conclusion of a new study that shows that ethanol derived from corn and switchgrass allows cars to drive farther and emit less greenhouse gases if these crops are converted to electricity for powering electric vehicles rather than pouring the ethanol into the gas tank.
Biofuels are widely considered a better environmental alternative than fossil fuels. Even though they release carbon dioxide (CO2) when burned, the same amount of CO2 is reabsorbed as the next crop of plants grows. What hasn’t been well-understood is whether it’s better to convert crops to ethanol that can be burned in conventional internal combustion engines or to burn the crops to generate electricity that can power electric vehicles.
To find out, Elliott Campbell, an environmental engineer at the University of California, Merced, and his colleagues carried out a life-cycle analysis of bioethanol and bioelectric technologies. The analysis took into account not only the energy produced by each technology but also the energy consumed in producing the vehicles and fuels.
Bioelectricity was the clear winner. Cars would travel 81% farther on the energy in biofuels if it were first converted to electricity, the team reported today in Science. Powering an electric vehicle using crops would also prevent the release of up to 10 tons of CO2 per acre compared with a similar sized gasoline-powered car. That “offset” of unreleased CO2 is roughly double that of bioethanol-powered cars. According to Campbell, the primary reason bioelectricity came out looking so much better is that electric engines are far more efficient than are internal combustion engines. “Even the best ethanol-producing technologies with hybrid engines aren’t enough to overcome this,” he says.
via Keep Biofuels Out of the Gas Tank — Service 2009 (508): 3 — ScienceNOW.
Was It a Sucker’s Rally?
OPS: Answer – A Bull rally within a Bear Market
Was It a Sucker’s Rally? - WSJ
You can have a jobless recovery but you can’t have a profitless one.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average has bounced an astounding 30% from its March 9 low of 6547. Is this the dawn of a new era? Are we off to the races again?
I’m not so sure. Only a fool predicts the stock market, so here I go. This sure smells to me like a sucker’s rally. That’s because there aren’t sustainable, fundamental reasons for the market’s continued rise. Here are three explanations for the short-term upswing:
- Armageddon is off the table. It has been clear for some time that the funds available from the federal government’s Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) were not going to be enough to shore up bank balance sheets laced with toxic assets.
On Feb. 10, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner rolled out another, much hyped bank rescue plan. It was judged incomplete — and the market sold off 382 points in disgust.
Citigroup stock flirted with $1 on March 9. Nationalizations seemed inevitable as bears had their day.
Still, the Treasury bought time by announcing on the same day as Mr. Geithner’s underwhelming rescue plan that it would conduct “stress tests” of 19 large U.S. banks. It also implied, over time, that no bank would fail the test (which was more a negotiation than an audit). And when White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel clearly stated on April 19 that nationalization was “not the goal” of the administration, it became safe to own financial stocks again.
via Was It a Sucker’s Rally? – WSJ.com.
Goldman Sachs Settles Subprime Inquiry For $60 Million
OPS: $60 mil bribe. Cheap insurance at twice the price
Goldman Sachs Settles Subprime Inquiry For $60 Million
BOSTON (AP) — Investment banker Goldman Sachs has agreed to pay a $10 million fee and let some 714 Massachusetts homeowners rework their mortgages in a settlement reached as part of a state investigation into subprime lending.
Attorney General Martha Coakley said the rewritten mortgages could save about $50 million for residents across the state, the bulk of them living in Boston, Brockton, Lawrence, Springfield and Worcester.
Goldman will reduce the principal on first mortgages by up to 35 percent, and work with its affiliate, Litton Loan Servicing LP, on refinancing terms.
Borrowers will be contacted by their lender or should contact the person to whom they make their mortgage payment, Coakley said.
While Goldman did not admit to any legal wrongdoing, it provided capital for mortgage lenders who provided the high-risk loans to marginal borrowers. Goldman, in turn, packaged the loans into stock market commodities through a process known as “securitization.”
via Goldman Sachs Settles Subprime Inquiry For $60 Million.
“Daily Show” Mocks Talking Heads For Defending Torture While Decrying Wanda Sykes (VIDEO)
“Daily Show” Mocks Talking Heads For Defending Torture While Decrying Wanda Sykes (VIDEO)
Two days after Wanda Sykes appeared at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner and joked that Rush Limbaugh was the 20th hijacker on 9/11 but missed the plane because he was so strung out on Oxycontin, all hell has broken loose with commentators and politicians alike chiming in on why they hated what Wanda said. Frankly, if you took all the offensive things Rush Limbaugh has said over the years and compared them to all the offensive things Wanda Sykes has said, I’m guessing the former would have a much longer list.
Stewart looked at the reactions to Sykes’ performance last night and determined that “bad jokes and gay marriage are destroying this country, but torture can save it.” John Oliver followed up with a similarly-themed segment, using the language of torture defenders to defend Sykes.
WATCH:
via “Daily Show” Mocks Talking Heads For Defending Torture While Decrying Wanda Sykes (VIDEO).
FED WANTS BANKS TO STRESS-TEST THEMSELVES
OPS: Oh…that’ll work 
– They’ll have to be careful if they Stress Test themselves. they might go blind….or grow hair on the palms….or…. Hey, go stress test yourself and leave me alone. Hope they don’t forget to wash their hands aftward
Bernanke Says U.S. Banks Must Test More to Identify Other Risks – - Bloomberg
May 12 (Bloomberg) — Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said efforts by U.S. banks to raise capital are “encouraging” and called on firms to identify other risks through internal stress tests.
The banks, especially those with “trading and investment banking businesses,” should keep monitoring “operational, liquidity and reputational risks,” which weren’t addressed by the exam concluded last week, Bernanke said in a speech yesterday at a Fed conference in Jekyll Island, Georgia.
The remarks signal that the Fed and other U.S. regulators will keep a closer eye on firms such as Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley after last year’s collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and near-failure of Bear Stearns Cos. The Fed-led tests of the 19 largest U.S. banks showed last week that 10 firms need to raise a total of $74.6 billion in capital.
“Ideally, the stress tests used in the assessment program should be part of a broader palette of internal stress tests conducted by firms,” Bernanke said at the event hosted by the Atlanta Fed district bank. “Indeed, we do not intend that the capital assessments should be taken as all that those firms need to do.”
via Bernanke Says U.S. Banks Must Test More to Identify Other Risks – Bloomberg.com.
Big Test Coming: ‘WSJ’ to Launch ‘Micropayments’ at Sites This Fall
Big Test Coming: ‘WSJ’ to Launch ‘Micropayments’ at Sites This Fall – Editor & Publisher
NEW YORK In an article at the Financial Times today, Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson and Kenneth Li report that News Corp. is planning to introduce micro-payments for individual articles, plus premium subscriptions, to the Wall Street Journal’s website this year.
They call it “a milestone in the news industry’s race” to find better online business models.
“A sophisticated micro-payments service” will launch this autumn, Robert Thomson, editor-in-chief of Dow Jones and managing editor of the Journal, told the Financial Times.
FT comments: “The move will position the Journal as the first big newspaper title to adopt a model many are cautiously studying as they seek to reduce their dependence on plunging advertising revenues.
“It comes as John Kerry, the senator leading congressional hearings on the future of journalism, told the FT it was conceivable that publishers could be given limited exemption from antitrust laws to discuss online models.”
via Big Test Coming: ‘WSJ’ to Launch ‘Micropayments’ at Sites This Fall.
WALL STREET WINS, PEOPLE LOSE IN SENATE VOTE
WALL STREET WINS, PEOPLE LOSE IN SENATE VOTE – by Jim Hightower
Listen to this Commentary at link
What is it about Democrats in Washington that makes them clang a slam dunk?
They have the greedheaded, boneheaded Wall Street bankers back on their heels, exposed as frauds and finaglers. They also have the broad public shouting that those being ripped off by the bankers ought to get some semblance of justice. Yet, on April 30th, Senate Democrats flubbed an easy shot to support hard-pressed American homeowners who’re being unfairly squeezed by banksters.
At issue was a common-sense proposal by Sen. Dick Durbin – a top Democrat – to allow bankruptcy judges to lower the monthly mortgage payments of homeowners trapped by exploding interest rates imposed by banks. This would keep families in their homes, stop the decline in housing prices, and boost our economy.
But Wall Street screamed, spooking a number of pusillanimous Democrats. “Timid Timothy” Geithner, the treasury secretary, meekly cautioned that there should only be “carefully designed changes” to the bankruptcy laws, so as not to create “uncertainty” for Wall Street. Never mind the uncertainty that millions of homeowners face.
via Jim Hightower | WALL STREET WINS, PEOPLE LOSE IN SENATE VOTE.
Gordon Brown Spills the Beans on the IMF
Make Iceland Pay for Incompetent British Bank Deregulation!
Gordon Brown Spills the Beans on the IMF
By MICHAEL HUDSON
Last month the G-20 authorized the International Monetary Fund to increase its loan resources to $1 trillion. It’s not hard to see why. Weakening currencies in the post-Soviet states threaten to raise default rates on foreign-currency mortgages as collapse of the Baltic real estate bubble drags down Swedish banks, while the Hungarian property plunge threatens Austrian banks. It seems reasonable to infer that creditor-nation banks hope to be bailed out. The IMF is expected to lend the Baltic, central European and other debtor-country governments money to pay them. These hapless debtor economies are then to follow IMF “conditionalities” to squeeze enough money out of their populations to pay foreign creditors – and repay the Fund by imposing yet more onerous taxes on their labor and industry, making them even more high-cost and therefore pushing them even further into trade and credit dependency. This is why there have been so many riots recently in Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Ukraine, as was the case for so many decades throughout the Latin American countries that introduced the term “IMF riot” to the global vocabulary.
For fifty years the IMF has organized such payouts to creditor nations. Loans are made to debtor-country governments to “promote exchange-rate and price stability.” In practice this means pouring tens of billions of dollars into currency markets to make bad gambles against raiders. This is supposed to avert the beggar-my-neighbor nationalism and financial protectionism that aggravated depression in the 1930s. But the practical effect of IMF lending is to demand that debtor countries impose onerous IMF “conditionalities” that stifle their domestic markets. This is why the IMF was left with almost no customers until last year’s debt crisis deranged the world’s foreign exchange markets.
via Michael Hudson: Gordon Brown Spills the Beans on the IMF.
Q & A Session on Bad Advice: Bush’s Lawyers In The War On Terror
Q & A Session on Bad Advice: Bush’s Lawyers In The War On Terror
By JOHN W. DEAN
Harold Bruff is a former U.S. Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) attorney; currently, he is a professor of law (and former Dean) at the University of Colorado (Boulder) Law School. In his new book, Bad Advice: Bush’s Lawyers In The War On Terror, Bruff has taken a critical look at the legal advice provided to President Bush and Vice President Cheney to deal with their “war on terror.” His findings, as reported in the book, are not pretty. (I discovered Professor Bruff’s book when browsing the University of Kansas Press catalogue. The Press is the future publisher of a work-in-progress that I am co-authoring with a young historian about the Watergate cover-up trial.)
Part I of Bad Advice examines the role of lawyers who are advising presidents. This material is timeless. Part II looks at the post-9/11 legal advice Bush was given regarding dealing with terrorists and terrorism. In particular, it addresses advice on matters such as the legality of warrantless surveillance by the National Security Agency, the indefinite detention of enemy combatants, evading the Geneva Conventions, conducting military (not civilian) trials of detainees, and employing aggressive interrogation techniques. This material could not be timelier.
Given Harold Bruff’s considerable experience and professional credentials, not to mention the objectivity and candor of his analysis, his findings are disquieting to say the least. Rather than review his book, however, I thought it might be more interesting to seek answers from him to a few of the questions that had occurred to me when I was reading the book. The University of Kansas Press arranged for me to contact Professor Bruff, and our exchange went as follows:
via Q & A Session on Bad Advice: Bush’s Lawyers In The War On Terror.
Relief from the Stress Tests
Relief from the Stress Tests | Common Dreams
The stress test results are good news. It’s time for taxpayer bailouts to end and for the banks to stand on their own
by Dean Baker
US Treasury secretary Timothy Geithner told the country last week that the banks are essentially OK, based on his stress tests of the country’s 19 largest banks. Geithner’s call may not seem quite right. After all, the bad case in the stress tests assumed that unemployment would average 8.9% for all of 2009, and we just hit that last week. But there’s no reason not to take the Treasury secretary at his word.
So, we are told that the banks have the means necessary to get through the downturn. In that case, why should we spend hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars to keep these healthy institutions afloat?
As long as the banks were on their death beds there was a plausible argument that taxpayer dollars were needed to keep the financial system from collapsing. But if the banks now have a clean bill of health from the Treasury, then it’s time for the banks to stop relying on taxpayer handouts.
First and foremost, this should mean the end of the Public Private Investment Partnership (PPIP) programme that was designed to clear the toxic assets from the banks’ books. PPIP involved a massive subsidy to the banks since it provided enormous leverage to buyers of toxic assets, while assigning them very little risk.
via Relief from the Stress Tests | CommonDreams.org.
The Health Care Industry’s PR Scam: Will Obama Fall for It?
The Health Care Industry’s PR Scam: Will Obama Fall for It? | Common Dreams -by James Ridgeway
In a much-anticipated statement [yesterday], Barack Obama announced what is largely a public relations end-run by the health care industry, designed to trim a few scraps off of the nation’s porcine health care budget, while preserving its basic system of medicine for profit.
In a letter to Obama that was released over the weekend, executives from the Advanced Medical Technology Association (the medical device manufacturers lobbying group), the American Hospital Association, the American Medical Association, America’s Health Insurance Plans, and the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, as well as the Service Employees International Union, pledged to “do our part” to reduce health care costs. Their vague, pie-in-the sky promise amounts to just a 1.5 percent reduction in the growth rate of health care spending. Such is the explosion in health care costs that even this miniscule reduction represents a potential $2 trillion saving over 10 years. But there’s no guarantee this figure will be achieved. As the Washington Post points out:
The groups did not spell out yesterday how they plan to reach such a target, and…they offer only a broad pledge, not an outright commitment….In addition, White House officials said, there is no mechanism to ensure that the groups live up to their offer, only the implicit threat of public embarrassment.
via The Health Care Industry’s PR Scam: Will Obama Fall for It? | CommonDreams.org.
The Century of The Rights of Mother Earth
The Century of The Rights of Mother Earth – Common Dreams
Perhaps the most impressive statement in the speech of the President of Bolivia Evo Morales Ayma to the General Assembly of the U.N. on April 22nd, when that date was proclaimed the International Day of Mother Earth, was: “If the 20th Century is recognized as the century of human rights; individual, social, economic, political and cultural, the 21st Century will be known as the Century of the Rights of Mother Earth, of the animals, plants, all living creatures and all beings, whose rights must also be respected and protected.”
We now stand before a new paradigm, centered in the Earth and in life. We are no longer mired in anthropocentrism, which failed to recognize the intrinsic value of each being, independent of the use we made of it. A clear awareness is growing, that everything that exists deserves to exist, and that everything that lives deserves to live.
We must therefore broaden our concept of democracy, as a biocracy, or sociocosmic democracy, because every element of nature, each at its own level, forms a part of human sociability. Would our cities still be human without the plants, the animals, the birds, the rivers, and pure air?
via The Century of The Rights of Mother Earth | CommonDreams.org.
45 Centrist Democrats Protest Secrecy of Health Care Talks
OPS: Interesting headline from the NYTimes – ‘Centrist’. Blue Dogs are Not “Centrist” they are right wing.
45 Centrist Democrats Protest Secrecy of Health Care Talks - – NY Times
WASHINGTON — Forty-five House Democrats in the party’s moderate-to-conservative wing have protested the secretive process by which party leaders in their chamber are developing legislation to remake the health care system.
The lawmakers, members of the fiscally conservative Blue Dog Coalition, said they were “increasingly troubled” by their exclusion from the bill-writing process.
They expressed their concerns in a letter delivered Monday to three House committee chairmen writing the bill, which House leaders hope to pass this summer.
Representative Mike Ross, an Arkansas Democrat who is chairman of the coalition’s health task force, said: “We don’t need a select group of members of Congress or staff members writing this legislation. We don’t want a briefing on the bill after it’s written. We want to help write it.”
via 45 Centrist Democrats Protest Secrecy of Health Care Talks – NYTimes.com.
Social Investment Funds Back Labor Union Organizing Measure
Social Investment Funds Back Labor Union Organizing Measure
(Bloomberg) — A group of mutual and pension funds that invest in social causes is urging Congress to support legislation that would make it easier for workers to join unions.
The 26 funds, led by Domini Social Investments, Progressive Asset Management Inc. and Merseyside Pension Fund, sent a letter to lawmakers saying that business opposition has damaged the prospects for the Employee Free Choice Act, known as the card- check bill. The group of investors says they represent $372 billion in assets.
“The business community has come out really aggressively against this bill, but not all businesses or investors are unified in their thinking,” Adam Kanzer, managing director of Domini, said in an interview.
The legislation, organized labor’s top goal for the year, would allow workers to chose to form a union when a majority sign cards requesting one, bypassing secret-ballot elections that employers often require before unionization occurs.
via Bloomberg.com: News.
How Cheney Remembers His Oath
How Cheney Remembers His Oath – By Andrew Sullivan
Here’s how he recounts it in his interview yesterday:
Now, if you’d look at it from the perspective of a senior government official, somebody like myself, who stood up and took the oath of office on January 20th of ‘01 and raised their right hand and said we’re going to protect and defend the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic, this was exactly, exactly what was needed to do it.
Here’s the actual oath:
I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.
My italics, of course. Is Cheney’s ultimate defense is that he didn’t understand the oath he took?
via The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan.
Americans are planting seeds of hope in recession gardens
Americans are planting seeds of hope in recession gardens
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Formerly plagued by crime, the Highland Gardens community in Hollywood, Florida, has planted 19 gardens in a large city-owned lot. The city gave the community permission to use the lot for gardening because no construction has been scheduled since a $20 million contract for a workforce-housing project fell through in this difficult economy. Fruits, vegetables, and flowers now grow where trash and bullet casings used to be strewn on the ground.
Maria Jackson is credited with coming up with the gardening idea, which has been heralded by area residents as the most positive thing to happen to the neighborhood in decades. Jackson said, “We’re hoping that we’re going to have a big salad party soon.”
The success of the Hollywood garden is mirrored by the success of First Lady Michelle Obama’s White House Kitchen Garden, as well as “recession gardens” that are sprouting up nationwide. The leading American seed store has seen a 25-30% jump in seed and plant sales this year, prompting the CEO to marvel, “I’ve been in the business for 30 years, and I’ve never seen anything like it — even remotely like it.”
via Miami Interfaith Spirituality Examiner: Americans are planting seeds of hope in recession gardens.
H.R. 676 FAQ | John Conyers
OPS: Want to check to see if YOUR Rep has signed on to this? Click Here. If they haven’t, call them an give them your thoughts on this. Here’s how to contact your Rep
H.R. 676 FAQ
* Universal Health Care
What is H.R. 676?
H.R. 676, also called the United States National Health Insurance Act, is a bill to create a single-payer, publicly-financed, privately-delivered universal health care program that would cover all Americans without charging co-pays or deductibles. It guarantees access to the highest quality and most affordable health care services regardless of employment, ability to pay or pre-existing health conditions.
What is “single-payer”?
The term single-payer describes the kind of financing system that H.R. 676 uses. It means that one entity–in this case, established by the government–handles all billing and payment for health care services. Right now, there are thousands upon thousands of “payers”– HMOs, PPOs, bill collection agencies, etc. The sheer volume of paperwork required by our current system means that administrative waste accounts for roughly 31% of the money spent on health care. The single-payer system would eliminate the wasteful paperwork and administrative costs, redirecting more of our health care dollars to providing care.
Medicare is perhaps the best known single-payer system. Essentially, H.R. 676 would improve Medicare and expand it, so that it covers all Americans, regardless of their income.
Who will be eligible for health care coverage under H.R. 676?
All Americans will be eligible for health care coverage. Every person who enrolls in the program and receive a United States National Health Insurance Card and individual ID number, and that is all anyone will need to receive care.
What health care services are covered?
via H.R. 676 FAQ | John Conyers for Congress.
Deal Reached On Credit Card Legislation
Deal Reached On Credit Card Legislation — Hartford Courant
WASHINGTON (AP) – Consumers behind on their credit-card payments could regain their older, lower interest rates if they pay their bills on time for six months, a compromise reached by lawmakers seeking changes in federal law governing the credit card industry.
Companies could still raise interest rates retroactively under the Senate proposal brokered between Republicans, who say lenders should be able to take into account a person’s behavior, and Democrats, who contend that the practice of hiking rates on past balances prevent consumers from climbing out of debt.
Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd, D-Conn., said Monday that the agreement was part of a broader package on credit card reform. The bill was expected to pass this week with President Barack Obama’s support.
Dodd had originally proposed an outright ban on retroactive rate increases. But without Republican support, his bill was considered unlikely to overcome procedural hurdles in the Senate.
via Deal Reached On Credit Card Legislation — Courant.com.
Report: Senator Opposing Public Health Option Takes $2M From Health, Insurance Industries
Report: Senator Opposing Public Health Option Takes $2M From Health, Insurance Industries
Sen. Ben Nelson, over his three Senate campaigns, ranks fourth in the Senate in lifetime contributions from insurance interests, only trailing three senators who have run for president, according to a new report.
Nelson — who has received nearly $1.2 million in campaign contributions from these insurance interests alone, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics — finds himself in the crosshairs of progressives following remarks on the Senate floor in which the centrist Nebraska Democrat rejected a public option for healthcare reform.
“Sen. Nelson’s statement last week that he will oppose a public health plan raises serious questions regarding who he represents in Washington – insurance companies and their profits, or Nebraskans who want reform of our wasteful and inefficient health care system,” says David Donnelly, Public Campaign Action Fund’s national campaigns director.
Private health-insurance companies get ready to self-medicate
Private health-insurance companies get ready to self-medicate | Salon
Big healthcare industry players promise the White House they’ll get on board with reform — so they don’t get trampled by it.
| WASHINGTON — If Harry and Louise were around today, the fictional couple from political ads that helped kill healthcare reform 15 years ago would probably still be worrying about their coverage. But instead of complaining that the government was trying to make healthcare decisions for them, they — like millions of other Americans — might be wondering why their insurance premiums keep rising or how they’d pay their medical bills if they lost their jobs.
That, at least, was the message coming out of the White House Monday. Major players in healthcare, from the drug companies to the insurance providers to hospitals and doctors, joined President Obama to commit to serious reform by the end of the year. Some of the organizations that have fought hardest against changing the system in the past are — for now, at least — saying they’ll work for it this time around. To demonstrate how serious they are, they joined Obama Monday to say they’ll work voluntarily to cut the growth rate of healthcare costs by 1.5 percent each year for the next decade. Unchecked, costs would increase by more than 6 percent a year, so the administration says the country — private employers and the government combined — would save $2 trillion from the effort. An average family of four could save $2,500 a year within five years.
But the announcement could mean more politically than financially — especially since the administration admitted there’s no way to force the groups to do what they say they’ll do. The proposal from the healthcare players was light on specifics, but it was fairly heavy on symbolism; getting everyone from the Service Employees International Union to Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America on the same page before serious debate on healthcare legislation begins means the White House has the political momentum, and opponents of reform don’t.
via Private health-insurance companies get ready to self-medicate | Salon News.
5 Reasons You Should Pick-Your-Own This Summer
5 Reasons You Should Pick-Your-Own This Summer
Summer is getting closer, and the days of fresh vegetables and local harvests are near. But this doesn’t mean only those with farms and gardens should feel the amazingness of picking their own crops. You may recall a moment last year when your friend asked, “Are those your blueberries?” when you brought pie to the potluck.
“Uh, no,” you may have replied, “Ummm. Yeah. No. Umm. Zabars.” Well, this summer is different. This summer you can say, “Yes. Those are my blueberries. I picked them, I froze them, and I used them for this pie.” Not just for bragging rights. This is cause for celebration, I think; it’s possible for even the most urban people to can their own jam and harvest their own rhubarb.
Yep. Anyone can farm for a day, and then have a freezer stocked with fresh goods for the rest of the season. And the news gets better. You don’t need to quit your job, move to the country, and plant a blueberry patch. No indeed. You don’t even need an urban garden or a square-foot window box. In fact, for all those people out there without your own gardens and without the desire to tend one ever, you can still have your own fresh food—all you have to do is pick your own.
via 5 Reasons You Should Pick-Your-Own This Summer : Chelsea Green.
American Scientist Revisits Limits to Growth
American Scientist Revisits Limits to Growth
The May–June 2009 issue of American Scientist looks back at the predictions of the landmark environmental work Limits to Growth by Donella Meadows, Jorgen Randers, and Dennis Meadows, first published in 1972, and finds that its startling environmental warnings were generally right on the money.
The Earth’s population continues to grow at a geometric rate, while the planet’s commensurate increase in food production and standard of living has been made possible only because of our dependence on fossil fuel—a finite resource. In other words, the amount of food produced has only been able to keep pace with population growth because fossil fuels have been propping up our agricultural system. And many scientists believe Hubbert’s peak has come and gone, and that oil production is on the decline. If this doesn’t scare you, you’re not paying attention.
From American Scientist:
In recent decades there has been considerable discussion in academia and the media about the environmental impacts of human activity, especially those related to climate change and biodiversity, but far less attention has been paid to the diminishing resource base for humans. Despite our inattention, resource depletion and population growth have been continuing relentlessly. The most immediate of these issues appears to be a decline in oil reservoirs, a phenomenon commonly referred to as “peak oil
via American Scientist Revisits Limits to Growth : Chelsea Green.
94 Billion Reasons to Rethink Afghanistan
94 Billion Reasons to Rethink Afghanistan
Video
US airstrikes in Afghanistan like the one that killed over 100 civilians last week have reached all-time destructive highs. According to Air Forces Central, US warplanes dropped a record 438 bombs in Afghanistan during April. The number of dropped bombs has increased steadily over the past few months, and just yesterday, Gen. James Jones claimed the US will continue conducting airstrikes despite President Karzai’s admonishment that these bombings are counterproductive, turning Afghan civilians against the United States. Yet as the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan continues to deteriorate, Congress will decide this week whether to approve $94.2 billion in supplemental wartime spending.
Veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan like retired Corporal Rick Reyes are meeting with members of Congress early this week, urging them not to approve this massive supplemental wartime funding bill until more critical questions are answered about the war. We still don’t know, for instance, how the Obama administration intends to prevent increases in US airstrikes and military presence from becoming recruiting tools for Taliban extremists or al Qaeda terrorists. We still don’t know how the administration will be able to stop military escalation from further destabilizing a nuclear-armed Pakistan. Nor has the administration been forthright about benchmarks or an exit strategy, or whether funding more war will hamper US economic recovery.
via Video | AlterNet.
Democrats Give Wall Street a Big, Wet Kiss
Democrats Give Wall Street a Big, Wet Kiss
By Jim Hightower,
Yet more evidence that the banks own Washington.
Sam Rayburn, a longtime speaker of the U.S. House, once said, “Every now and then, a politician ought to do something just because it’s right.”
Recently, 45 U.S. senators dodged an excellent chance to do just what Mr. Sam advised. At issue was a straightforward, common-sense amendment proposed by Dick Durbin, D-Ill. It would have allowed bankruptcy judges to help hundreds of thousands of financially strapped homeowners who now find themselves trapped by exploding, exorbitant interest rates that bankers had attached to their loans.
Here was a conspicuous opportunity for even the most ethically blind of our congress-critters to take a principled stand, for Durbin’s bill practically had a flashing red-and-yellow neon arrow attached to it, declaring, “Vote Here for the People Against Greedy Bankers.”
via Democrats Give Wall Street a Big, Wet Kiss | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet.
Unemployed, and Not Getting a Job Anytime Soon? Why Not Build a Better World?
Unemployed, and Not Getting a Job Anytime Soon? Why Not Build a Better World? - Alternet
You may be poorer than you’ve ever been, but you have more free time to express anger and urgency.
In most parts of the world, mass unemployment brings the specter of mass social unrest. Not in the U.S., though, where 13 million people have accepted joblessness with nary a peep of protest.
Many reasons — from Prozac to Pentecostalism — have been cited to explain American passivity in the face of economic violence. But the truth might be far simpler: In America, being unemployed doesn’t mean you have nothing to do but run around burning police cars. Unemployment has been reconfigured as a new form of work.
Nowhere is this clearer than in the white-collar world, where the laid-off are constantly advised to see job searching as a full-time job. As business self-help guru Harvey Mackay advises: “Once you’re fired, you already have a job. The job you have is tougher than the last one. It’s more demanding.” How demanding? He says you need to “plan on 12 to 16 hours a day.”
via Unemployed, and Not Getting a Job Anytime Soon? Why Not Build a Better World? | | AlterNet.
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Republicans Don't Care about Voter Fraud....owa Republicans are trying to dismiss claims that the vote count in Tuesday's Iowa Caucus was wrong. An Iowa voter told a local TV station yesterday that he noticed a 20-vote discrepancy in the count - and that Rick Santorum was the real winner of the Caucuses. Republican Party officials, though, are sticking to their first count - showing Mitt Romney as the winner by 8-votes - and there will be no recount.The Republican Party has launched a war on voters around the nation this year with strict new laws that will disenfranchise over 5 million Americans. They claim these laws are necessary to combat so-called voter fraud. Yet in Iowa - where there are no such laws - and where a very, very close and questionable election was just held - Republicans don't seem to care at all about getting it right.Clearly - the war on voters isn't about making sure the people's voices are represented accurately - it's about making sure poor people, young people, and minorities who tend to vote for Democrats - can't vote at all.-Thom(Who do you think won? Tell us here.) -
LEGALIZE Democracy
" We the corporations" On January 21, 2010, with its ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Supreme Court ruled that corporations are persons, entitled by the U.S. Constitution to buy elections and run our government. __________
MOVE to AMEND
a project of the CAMPAIGN TO LEGALIZE Democracy
Help end Corporate personhood
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The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. 
