Archive for June, 2009
Senate DLCers:
Senate DLCers:
* Blanche Lincoln (AR, founder)
* Dianne Feinstein (CA, by 2001)
* Thomas R. Carper (DE, by 2001; co-chair from 2003)
* Joe Lieberman (CT, founder)
* Bill Nelson (FL, by 2001)
* Evan Bayh (IN, founder)
* Mary Landrieu (LA, founder, co-chair from 2003)
* John Kerry (MA, from 2000)
* Debbie Stabenow (MI, by 2001)
* Kent Conrad (ND, from 2000)
* Ben Nelson (NE, by 2001)
* Tim Johnson (SD, from 2000)
* Maria Cantwell (WA, by 2001)
* Herb Kohl (WI, from 2000)
Senate Approves Tight Regulation Over Cigarettes
Senate Votes to Allow F.D.A. to Regulate Tobacco – - NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON — More than four decades after the surgeon general declared smoking a health hazard, the Senate on Thursday cleared the final hurdle to empowering federal officials to regulate cigarettes and other forms of tobacco for the first time.
The legislation, which the White House said President Obama would sign as soon as it reached his desk, will enable the Food and Drug Administration to impose potentially strict new controls on the making and marketing of products that eventually kill half their regular users. The House, which passed a similar bill in April, may vote on the Senate version as soon as Friday.
“This is a historic step changing the nature of tobacco in society forever,” said Clifford E. Douglas, the director of the University of Michigan Tobacco Research Network, which has extensively studied the health effects of smoking and was one of many groups that have long pushed for tobacco regulation.
via Senate Approves Tight Regulation Over Cigarettes – NYTimes.com.
Fact-Checking Republican Attacks Against The Public Option
Fact-Checking Republican Attacks Against The Public Option
Today during his speech in Green Bay, Wisconsin, President Obama reiterated his support for the public health option. “One of the options in the exchange should be a public insurance option — because if the private insurance companies have to compete with a public option, it will keep them honest and help keep prices down,” Obama said.
Indeed, a new public health insurance plan could restore competition into the consolidated health insurance market, lower health care premiums, lead the way in innovation, and improve health quality.
Republicans have mischaractarized the public option is a “government takeover” of health care. In this morning’s Wall Street Journal, Karl Rove argued that “if Mr. Obama signs into law a ‘public option,’ government-run insurance program as part of health-care reform we won’t be able to undo the damage.”
Rove’s rhetoric echoes the poll-tested talking points of Frank Luntz and other conservatives determined to protect the private insurer’s monopoly over coverage and deny Americans choice. The Wonk Room has compiled a fact-check of common public plan myths:
MYTH 1: A public option is unnecessary: “It’s unnecessary. Advocates say a government-run insurance program is needed to provide competition for private health insurance. But 1,300 companies sell health insurance plans. That’s competition enough.” [WSJ, 6/11/2009]
via Think Progress » Fact-Checking Republican Attacks Against The Public Option.
Climate Pledges Bound to Breach Key Warming Target: Scientists
Climate Pledges Bound to Breach Key Warming Target: Scientists | CommonDreams.org
BONN, Germany – Pledges currently on the table at the UN climate talks will doom Earth to a warming of more than two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit), a figure that has been widely endorsed as a safe limit, scientists said on Thursday.
Warming “is virtually certain to exceed 2 C” (3.6 F) compared to pre-industrial times, said their assessment of national positions.
The study was published online by the British science journal Nature as a new 12-day round of negotiations was in its penultimate day.
There is no scientific consensus on what constitutes a safe level of warming.
However, the 2 C (3.6 F) goal has been described by the UN’s Nobel-winning panel of climate experts as the only practical option for inflicting the least damage to Earth’s climate system.
The figure lies at the heart of efforts to craft a n
via Climate Pledges Bound to Breach Key Warming Target: Scientists | CommonDreams.org.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce: Threat To Capitalism
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce: Threat To Capitalism - | OurFuture.org
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce launched yesterday “a sweeping national advocacy campaign … to defend and advance America’s free enterprise values in the face of rapid government growth and attacks by anti-business activists.”
The Chamber of Commerce doesn’t get it. They aren’t defending capitalism and free enterprise. They are all but destroying it.
Free-market fundamentalists don’t understand that capitalism is a system. It has rules, boundaries and obligations. When those rules are broken, the system falters.
• It’s not football without lines to mark touchdowns and out of bounds.
• It’s not basketball without a referee to call the fouls.
This is more than just a sports metaphor. Capitalism won’t work unless a negotiated price and promise to pay $100 is followed by payment of $100. And someone needs to enforce those rules. Otherwise it’s not capitalism. It’s robbery.
These rules operate at every level.
• My AAA bond valued at $100 million actually needs to be worth $100 million, and it needs AAA assurance of quality — not conflicts of interest where companies issuing securities pay the agencies for their ratings.
via The U.S. Chamber of Commerce: Threat To Capitalism | OurFuture.org.
Bill Would Give FDA Broad Powers to Regulate Tobacco
Bill Would Give FDA Broad Powers to Regulate Tobacco – washingtonpost.com
The Senate approved landmark legislation today that would give the government sweeping new power to oversee tobacco, a centuries-old product used by 20 percent of Americans yet largely unregulated in this country.
The bipartisan measure, approved by a margin of 79 to 17, largely mirrors a measure passed by the House last month. The House will now review the Senate’s version before a bill is sent to President Obama, a smoker who has struggled to quit and who has said he is eager to sign the bill into law. It comes 50 years after the surgeon general first warned of the health effects of tobacco.
Congress has been trying for more than a decade to regulate tobacco, coming close several times but faltering in the face of opposition from the tobacco lobby, the White House or procedural hang-ups. But in the years that the debate has raged, changing social attitudes toward tobacco helped transform the idea of regulation from controversial to common sense.
via Bill Would Give FDA Broad Powers to Regulate Tobacco – washingtonpost.com.
O’Reilly Defends Gay Penguins: ‘God Made The Penguin That Way’
O’Reilly Defends Gay Penguins: ‘God Made The Penguin That Way’
Last night, Bill O’Reilly discussed the “gay penguins” at a zoo in Germany with guest Dennis Miller. O’Reilly shocked Miller by being eminently tolerant of the penguins, saying the zoo should “leave the penguin alone” because “God made the penguin that way”:
O’REILLY: Number one, if the penguin’s gay, leave the penguin alone. God made the penguin that way and I agree — I mean, I’m not one of these guys who thinks you should be converting anybody to anything. If you’re that way, and you’re not hurting anybody, I think you and I agree, we’re libertarians. So who cares? … If they’re happy, they’re happy. That’s my philosophy.
Watch it:
via Think Progress » O’Reilly Defends Gay Penguins: ‘God Made The Penguin That Way’.
Dobson And Disgraced WH Staffer Pay Bush Tribute: He Was ‘The Instrument In God’s Hand’ That Kept Us Safe
Dobson And Disgraced WH Staffer Pay Bush Tribute: He Was ‘The Instrument In God’s Hand’ That Kept Us Safe
This week, James Dobson has been using his Focus on the Family Daily Broadcast to air his 1 1/2-hour interview with Tim Goeglein, a former special assistant to President Bush. The interview — billed as an “Insider’s View of the Bush Presidency” — has actually been a 1 1/2-hour love fest to the former president. Some highlights of Goeglien’s thoughts:
– “George W. Bush kept us safe. Providence kept us safe. But George Bush was the instrument in God’s hand as the leader of the free world.”
– “Of course, this was the great blessing of our first president, George Washington — the original George W. … The greatest trait of Washington was to see things as they were and not as he wanted to see them. That was George W. Bush’s gift when it came to this war. He immediately upon being told of the attacks knew that this was war and that we were being attacked existentially by radical Islam.”
– “I am actually very confident and hopeful, that in the years ahead with the benefit of time and space, that historians will look back at those remarkable and incredibly eventful eight years and say, ‘You know, he made the right decisions about the biggest things during those eight years.’“
Dobson also gave Obama a back-handed compliment, saying that unlike Bush, he can “read without sounding like he’s reading.” “That is a real skill,” added Dobson. “I mean, that’s something not very many people can do. In fact, I think President Obama is in the White House today because of that ability to read off a teleprompter.” Listen to excerpts here:
The Untold Story of the 2001 Anthrax Attacks
Thom talks with Eric Nadler on his Book: Dead Silence
YouTube – The Untold Story of the 2001 Anthrax Attacks.
Us and Them: How Right-Wing Radio Works to Separate Us in the Conversation
Us and Them: How Right-Wing Radio Works to Separate Us in the Conversation
A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS by Chad Rubel
Us and Them.
No, not the Pink Floyd song from “Dark Side of the Moon,” but this is the unofficial slogan of right-wing talk radio. Most BuzzFlash readers would qualify as “them.”
But who is “us”?
We generally see the “us” as being white men (mostly) who feel threatened by the ever-changing world, but they are also people who can be easily swayed into believing that the world is worse for them than it actually is. And in the last few months, real or imagined, they have felt more threatened than at any time in recent years.
“The powerlessness makes them flat out impotent. It enrages them,” said David Neiwert, author of “The Eliminationists: How Hate Talk Radicalized the American Right” as well as three other books on right-wing extremism.
They see President Barack Obama, a biracial man, and Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, a Latina woman, as symbols of a loss of power for insecure white males. “Obama and Sotomayor are points on a spear, but the wound that they feel is their own powerlessness,” Neiwert said.
This is where right-wing talk radio steps in. The radio force validates their fears — racial, social, bigoted – yet at the end of the day, the hosts go home to their rather cushy lifestyles. Not that even right-wing talk show host makes money at the level of a Rush Limbaugh or Bill O’Reilly, but they likely do better financially and socially than their audience.
via Us and Them: How Right-Wing Radio Works to Separate Us in the Conversation | BuzzFlash.org.
Obama admin. announces new mountaintop mining policy
Obama admin. announces new mountaintop mining policy 
Taking aim at mountaintop removal mining, this week, the Obama administration announced a new effort to strengthen federal oversight of the practice and to punish mining companies who fail to protect the environment. The new policy will directly impact mountaintop coal mining in the six Appalachian states of Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia.
A top administration official told reporters, June 11, that while the practice of removing mountaintops and discarding the waste in neighboring valleys in order to extract coal and other natural resources remains legal, it does have real negative effects on drinking water or local animal life.
Mountaintop removal coal mining produces large amounts of waste that is usually deposited in adjacent valleys and streams. Academic studies have revealed that the waters downstream from valley fills are degraded. Plant and animal life can be irreparably harmed, environmental activists point out.
White House Council on Environmental Quality Chair Nancy Suttley said, “This is a practice that we believe does have serious environmental impacts, however, it is a practice that is allowed under current federal law.”
via People’s Weekly World – Obama admin. announces new mountaintop mining policy.
The paralyzing fears of the Right
The paralyzing fears of the Right – Glenn Greenwald
The Obama administration announced today that it will pay $200 million to the tiny Pacific island-nation of Palau in exchange for Palau’s agreement to accept 17 Chinese Uighurs who have been imprisoned at Guantanamo for seven years. The Uighurs have been locked away despite the fact that even the Bush Pentagon concluded years ago that they pose no threat whatsoever and were never “enemy combatants.” They’ve been imprisoned by the U.S. despite being cleared because no other nation was willing to accept them, principally because the Chinese government considers them to be separatists and were demanding they be returned to China, and nobody wanted to offend China by accepting them.
Writing on Michelle Malkin’s blog Hot Air today, war-supporting tough guy Ed Morrissey is petrified about this development and, as a result, he has announced that he is now too fearful to consider visiting that island:
Of course, with a recidivism rate for released Gitmo detainees of around 14%, odds are that a couple of the Uighurs might not be quite as cuddly as Obama promises. Hopefully it will work out all right for Palau and its tourists, but if I were making decisions on expensive South Pacific vacations, I’d start looking elsewhere.
It’s hard to put into words how inebriated with irrational fear someone has to be in order to be so scared of 17 Uighurs — who were never guilty of anything — that they would avoid traveling to whatever place this handful of persecuted individuals is located. But this is the right-wing movement at its core: its leaders cynically ratchet up fear levels as high as possible to justify whatever they want to do (invade Iraq, torture people, spy on Americans with no warrants) and their adherents (along with plenty of others) become more and more paralyzed by their fears of anything Muslim. This, after all, is the same faction that continues to shake with terror at the very idea that accused Terrorists will be brought to the U.S. — in handcuffs, imprisoned, and disappeared into super-max facilities. And it is the same faction that made accepting the Uighurs into the U.S. politically unpalatable by threatening legislation — The Keep Terrorists Out of America Act — that would bar their entrance.
via The paralyzing fears of the Right – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com.
The Latest Public Option Bamboozle, and How to Recognize the Real Thing
The Latest Public Option Bamboozle, and How to Recognize the Real Thing
Robert Reich
Here’s the latest contortion from Senate Dems trying to win over a few Republicans to a “public option:” Let nonprofits create health-care cooperatives, and call them the public option. Kent Conrad came up with this bamboozle. Finance chair Baucus is impressed, and some Republicans — even Grassley — seem interested. Watch your wallets.
Nonprofit health-care cooperatives won’t have any real bargaining leverage to get lower prices because they’ll be too small and too numerous. Pharma and Insurance know they can roll them. That’s why the Conrad compromise is getting a good reception from across the aisle, just as Olympia Snowe’s “trigger” (whereby no public option until some time down the pike, and only if Pharma and Insurance don’t bring down and extend coverage a tad) is also gaining traction.
The truth is that there’s only one “public option” that will truly bring down costs and premiums — one that’s national in scale and combines its bargaining power with Medicare, and is allowed to negotiate lower drug prices and lower doctor and hospital fees. And that’s precisely what Pharma and Insurance detest, for exactly the same reason.
via Robert Reich’s Blog.
American Medical Association tries to walk back its public-plan opposition.
American Medical Association tries to walk back its public-plan opposition.
The New York Times reported today that the American Medical Association (AMA) is opposed to the creation of a public health insurance option, telling the Senate Finance Committee that it “threatens to restrict patient choice by driving out private insurers, which currently provide coverage for nearly 70 percent of Americans.” Facing considerable attention (and criticism), AMA is now trying to spin its opposition:
Today’s New York Times story creates a false impression about the AMA’s position on a public plan option in health care reform legislation. The AMA opposes any public plan that forces physicians to participate, expands the fiscally-challenged Medicare program or pays Medicare rates, but the AMA is willing to consider other variations of the public plan that are currently under discussion in Congress. This includes a federally chartered co-op health plan or a level playing field option for all plans. The AMA is working to achieve meaningful health reform this year and is ready to stand behind legislation that includes coverage options that work for patients and physicians.
via Think Progress » American Medical Association tries to walk back its public-plan opposition..
Vice President Biden confronted with conclusive scientific proof of criminal demolitions on 9/11/01
Vice President Biden confronted with conclusive scientific proof of criminal demolitions on 9/11/01
May 15, 2009, Los Angeles, CA – Vice President Joseph Biden and LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa took a tour of a community housing project of the Esperanza Community Housing Corp.
Jeremy Rothe-Kushel and Bruno Bruhwiler of WACLA Media sat among other members of the local press in the glaring sun in wait for the press conference scheduled to begin after the Vice President and the Mayor toured one of the buildings renovated by the Esperanza Community Housing Corporation. Secret Service officers were present in abundance in the 10′ wide corridor where we were crammed behind residents of the renovated apartment complex. All of us were in close quarters with each other for at least one hour, and we all developed a courteous and jovial relationship with each other. The folks from Fox News were the most vocal, and they were not shy about their dislike for Biden and Obama. Later it turned out that one of the Fox reporters had a hot and healthy obsession with asking the Vice President about Karl Rove. One woman, an admittedly former journalist turned passionate advocate, claimed that although we were sitting in the scorching sun, our current position would probably be envied by most everyone in the rest of the country. It was not entirely clear whether she was referring to the Southern California weather or our proximity to a representative of the Hope and Change Administration™.
The same woman facetiously reminded us that, if we were to believe some of the pundits during the campaign, Obama is, after all, a Muslim, a Marxist and a terrorist. Jeremy clarified that Obama had been associated with a former Weatherman, but went on to inform her that a crucial piece of information left out by the mass media was the infiltration and provocation of groups such as the Weathermen by the FBI’s Cointelpro and other elements of the ‘National Security State’ as a way of discrediting and subverting the larger movement for peace and justice. Bruno asked her if she had seen the documentary THE OBAMA DECEPTION and she shook her head, “What’s it about?” Nodding his head, and smiling profusely Bruno told her, “It’s about the people behind Obama, how they are deceiving us, and how Obama and Hillary disappeared together during the election. You gotta see it.” She enthusiastically wrote the title down in her notes. Jeremy then showed her a printout about the nefarious connections of many of the people throughout the Obama administration. She looked at the printout cautiously but with wheels clearly spinning.
We continued making conversation with reporters about the event, with cameramen about their cameras, and with everyone about the glaring sun. A man, who later turned out to be an aid for Congressman Becerra, was clutching a bunch of pocket-sized Constitutions. Jeremy yelled out. “Are those Constitutions in your hand?” He answered in the affirmative. Jeremy warned him that, in the age of the ‘PATRIOT ACT,’ many law enforcement agencies have been alerted that anybody carrying the Constitution is a potential terrorist. After the event, the man made sure to remind us that anyone can contact their congressperson’s office and get free copies of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, many of which he brings to schools when he visits.
The great deficit scare returns
The great deficit scare returns
Even liberals are getting antsy about debt and government spending. Stop worrying. The deficit hawks are wrong.
By Robert Reich
It’s the kind of thing I expect to hear from deficit hawks and chicken littles — from the self-described “fiscally responsible” right, from the scolds Ross Perot and Pete Peterson, from my former cabinet colleague Bob Rubin. But yesterday I was shown slides developed by the putatively liberal Center for American Progress intended to make the point. And today’s front page story in the New York Times, by the eminent David Leonhardt, entitled “Sea of Red Ink: How It Spread From A Puddle,” puts the issue right before our progressive noses, so to speak.
The Great Debt Scare is back.
Odd that it would return right now, when the economy is still mired in the worst depression since the Great one. After all, consumers are still deep in debt and incapable of buying. Unemployment continues to soar. Businesses still are not purchasing or investing, for lack of customers. Exports are still dead, because much of the global economy continues to shrink. So the purchaser of last resort — the government — has to create larger deficits if the economy is to get anywhere near full capacity, and start to grow again.
via The great deficit scare returns | Salon.
First look: Michael Moore goes after Wall Street in next film
First look: Michael Moore goes after Wall Street in next film
Michael Moore wants his money back. Actually, he wants your money back, if you lost any in the financial meltdown.
And though he knows that probably won’t happen, the filmmaker at least wants to stick it to the people who took it.
The still untitled film, which opens Oct. 2, will zero in on the corporations and politicians he says caused the global financial crash.
Wall Street robber barons are Moore’s new on-screen enemy.
“The movie is not going to be an economics lesson; it’s going to be more like a vampire movie,” the filmmaker jokes. “Instead of the main characters feasting on the blood of their victims, they feast on the money. And they never seem to get enough of it.”
When the collapse walloped the country last September, Moore says he knew not only that it would matter to regular people, but also that the inherent decadence was ripe for his style of satire.
via MichaelMoore.com : First look: Michael Moore goes after Wall Street in next film.
Americans’ net worth shrinks $1.33 trillion in 1Q
Americans’ net worth shrinks $1.33 trillion in 1Q
American households lost $1.33 trillion of their wealth in the first three months of the year as the recession took a bite out of stock portfolios and dragged down home prices.
The Federal Reserve reported Thursday that household net worth fell to $50.38 trillion in the January-March quarter, the lowest level since the third quarter of 2004. The first-quarter figure marked a decline of 2.6 percent, or $1.33 trillion, from the final quarter of 2008.
Net worth represents total assets such as homes and checking accounts, minus liabilities like mortgages and credit card debt.
The damage to wealth in the first quarter came from the sinking stock market. The value of Americans’ stock holdings dropped 5.8 percent from the final quarter of last year.
via Americans’ net worth shrinks $1.33 trillion in 1Q.
O’Reilly Ignores Holocaust Museum Shooting, Wonders Whether It’s Even ‘Newsworthy’
O’Reilly Ignores Holocaust Museum Shooting, Wonders Whether It’s Even ‘Newsworthy’
Last week, Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly went on a tirade against CNN for supposedly failing to cover the shooting of Pvt. William Long, an Army recruiter in Arkansas. Of course, O’Reilly’s claims were blatantly false — but that didn’t stop him from claiming to be “shocked” that he “can’t find any information about” the shooting in the mainstream media.
Exactly one week later, after a white supremacist shot and killed a security guard at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC, O’Reilly never covered the shooting on his show. In fact, the only mention of the act of domestic terrorism came in a segment that, ironically, decried the media’s inadequate coverage of Long’s death:
O’REILLY: But the central question remains according to a new Pew study, the American media spent far more time on the murder of Tiller than on the murder of Private Long. … 10 to 1 the Pew study which was released yesterday, 10 to 1 more coverage. I mean, come on, come on.
[...]
O’REILLY: All right. Now, we had a murder today at the Holocaust Museum in D.C.
HENICAN: That was an awful case. Awful.
O’REILLY: Now, this is an 89-year-old anti-Semite bigot kills an innocent guy in the Holocaust Museum. OK? Now, what about the newsworthiness of this? … Is it as newsworthy as Private Long?
Watch it:
via Think Progress » O’Reilly Ignores Holocaust Museum Shooting, Wonders Whether It’s Even ‘Newsworthy’.
Rove: Bush Administration Has ‘No’ Responsibility For Current Budget Deficits
Rove: Bush Administration Has ‘No’ Responsibility For Current Budget Deficits
Last night on Fox News, former top Bush adviser Karl Rove chastised President Obama for his economic recovery package Congress and passed last February and criticized him for his new proposal to enact “pay as you go” budgeting rules — paying for spending increases by either raising taxes or budget cuts.
“This is a cosmetic gesture. This guy is going to run up a $1.8 trillion deficit. That’s what it’s projected to be this year,” Rove complained. But when host Greta Van Susteren asked if the Bush administration is responsible for any of the deficit, Rove replied, “No.”:
VAN SUSTEREN: Do you take some responsibility, meaning you, the Bush eight years, for this…
ROVE: No.
VAN SUSTEREN: You take absolutely no responsibility? Because…
ROVE: No.
Watch it:
via Think Progress » Rove: Bush Administration Has ‘No’ Responsibility For Current Budget Deficits.
The Right-Wing Media Has Unleashed a Race War that Threatens Our Democracy and Our Personal Safety
The Right-Wing Media Has Unleashed a Race War that Threatens Our Democracy and Our Personal Safety
BUZZFLASH EDITOR’S BLOG by Mark Karlin
In more than 9 years of editing BuzzFlash, nothing has been as profoundly wounding to me since 9/11 as yesterday’s act of domestic terrorism at the Holocaust Museum — its location so tragically symbolic.
Like all BuzzFlash readers, we welcomed the election of Barack Obama as a return to America’s Constitutional, pro-democracy roots — and as a step into a future filled with promise and opportunity, not the destruction, tyranny and lies of the Bush Administration.
But what none of us expected is that the right-wing media shills and their corporate owners would unleash what is becoming an armed rebellion of white males against our governnment: the likes of FOX, Limbaugh, Savage and the whole treasonous crew has lit the match — with a wink and a nod — of the long, historic White Power movement, while inciting the displaced and confused anger of the more casually involved white male who sees the economy and his “entitlement of race and gender” slipping away from him.
Make no mistake about it, these are perhaps the first skirmishes in a right-wing media convergence with the White Power movement and the official military ordinance lobby for both of them — the NRA.
Yesterday’s domestic terrorism act was not just another murder in America’s shooting gallery; it was the clearest sign in a series of recent shooting deaths that the right wing is going to use the White Power movement as its foot soldiers in leading this nation into bloody attacks, assassinations, and chaos — out of which the white Christian nation will “triumph.” If all of this sounds a bit familiar, it’s because the notion of racial purity and power is a horror that we have lived through before.
Inflation, Money Supply, GDP, Unemployment and the Dollar – Alternate Data Series
The SGS Alternate Unemployment Rate reflects current unemployment reporting methodology adjusted for SGS-estimated “discouraged workers” defined away during the Clinton Administration added to the existing BLS estimates of level U-6 unemployment
via Inflation, Money Supply, GDP, Unemployment and the Dollar – Alternate Data Series.
Von Brunn’s friend: ‘The responsible white separatist community condemns this’ because ‘it makes us look bad.’
Von Brunn’s friend: ‘The responsible white separatist community condemns this’ because ‘it makes us look bad.’
The Washington Post reports today on the history of hate of James von Brunn, the reported shooter at the Holocaust Museum. An acquaintance of von Brunn’s, John de Nugent, “who describes himself as a white separatist,” told the Post that von Brunn had been paranoid recently that “someone in Washington” cut his Social Security after “looking at his Web site.” De Nugent also tried to distance von Brunn from what he deemed “the responsible white separatist community”:
De Nugent called von Brunn a genius but described the shooting as the act of “a loner and a hothead.”
“The responsible white separatist community condemns this,” he said. “It makes us look bad.”
In Wake Of Shootings, Conservatives Rush To Defend Disparagement Of DHS Report On Right-Wing Extremism
In Wake Of Shootings, Conservatives Rush To Defend Disparagement Of DHS Report On Right-Wing Extremism
Following yesterday’s tragic shooting at the Holocaust Museum — reportedly carried out by white supremacist James von Brunn — two Fox News personalities, Shepard Smith and Catherine Herridge, suggested that critics of the Department of Homeland Security’s report on right-wing extremism should re-think their criticism. ” “The right went absolutely bonkers,” said Smith, adding that DHS was “warning us for a reason.”
But later on Fox, New York Post columnist Ralph Peters attacked Smith and Herridge for claiming that the shooting “validated” the DHS report. “It had nothing to do with the Department of Homeland Security report,” declared Peters. Watch it:
Officers Involved In Von Brunn Shooting Were Union Members Who Had Pressed For Security Vests
Officers Involved In Von Brunn Shooting Were Union Members Who Had Pressed For Security Vests
This morning on NBC’s Today Show, Sara Bloomfield, director of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, commended the security police professionals who were able to so quickly take down shooter James von Brunn and save the lives of other visitors and staff members at the institution:
BLOOMFIELD: Well, we obviously take security very very seriously. It’s our highest priority — the safety of our visitors and our staff. … But everything happened yesterday as we train for these things. And as I think you’ve reported, two of our officers did attack this assailant and none of our visitors were hurt, so we feel that this actually worked extremely well, in terms of how many lives were saved in this incident. And again, we want to commend our officers who responded so well and pay tribute to Officer Johns, who also behaved so heroically in this incident.
Watch it
G8 Off Track on Increased Aid to Africa – Report
G8 Off Track on Increased Aid to Africa – Report
WASHINGTON – The Group of Eight industrial nations are collectively off course in delivering on a 2005 pact to more than double aid to Africa through 2010, with France and Italy falling far short of their commitments, according to a new report released on Thursday.
he annual report by the ONE anti-poverty campaign charts progress by the G8 in meeting their aid promises made at a summit in Gleneagles, Scotland, in 2005 to more than double aid to Africa to reach $25 billion a year by 2010.
By the end of 2008 the G8 nations had made good on one-third of their aid commitments and by the end of this year, they are expected to meet just half of their Gleneagles targets, the report said.
via G8 Off Track on Increased Aid to Africa – Report | CommonDreams.org.
WHO: Swine flu pandemic has begun, 1st in 41 years
WHO: Swine flu pandemic has begun, 1st in 41 years
GENEVA – The World Health Organization told its member nations it was declaring a swine flu pandemic Thursday — the first global flu epidemic in 41 years — as infections climbed in the United States, Europe, Australia, South America and elsewhere.
In a statement sent to health officials, WHO said it decided to raise the pandemic warning level from phase 5 to 6 — its highest alert — after holding an emergency meeting with its flu experts.
WHO chief Dr. Margaret Chan was expected to make a formal announcement on the pandemic later Thursday.
The long-awaited pandemic decision is scientific confirmation that a new flu virus has emerged and is quickly circling the globe. It will trigger drugmakers to speed up production of a swine flu vaccine and prompt governments to devote more money toward efforts to contain the virus.
via WHO: Swine flu pandemic has begun, 1st in 41 years – Yahoo! News.
Health Professionals Tell Congress They Want Single-Payer
Health Professionals Tell Congress They Want Single-Payer
At a long-awaited House subcommittee hearing on Wednesday, health-care professionals made it clear that they believe a single-payer system to be the best and perhaps only workable option for health care reform.
“Single-payer is the only reform that can control health care costs,” said Walter Tsou, a University of Pennsylvania professor and an adviser to Physicians for a National Health Program. The last 50 years of government policy have protected insurance industry profits at the expense of taxpayers, doctors and hospitals, he said.
“Our most famous radical document begins with the words, ‘We the People.’ Not ‘We the Insurers,’” he said. “It is time for our own generation’s revolution.”
For the most part, the panelists testifying before the Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions Subcommittee agreed that spiraling costs are the greatest problem currently facing the medical community and its patients.
via Health Professionals Tell Congress They Want Single-Payer | CommonDreams.org.
Medical Group Calls for Reducing Use of BPA
Medical Group Calls for Reducing Use of BPA
Hormone-like chemicals in plastics, pesticides and other products pose “significant concern for public health,” possibly causing infertility, cancer and malformations, a medical society announced Wednesday.
There is strong evidence that chemicals that interfere with the hormone system can cause serious health problems, according to a scientific report from the Endocrine Society, now meeting in Washington, D.C. Although scientists still have many questions about the chemicals, the report says that it’s important for people to take a “precautionary approach” by reducing their exposures.
Hormone-disrupting chemicals include bisphenol A, or BPA, often used in plastic baby bottles and the linings of metal cans.
via Medical Group Calls for Reducing Use of BPA | CommonDreams.org.
Wall Street’s False Armistice
Wall Street’s False Armistice | CommonDreams.org
by William Greider
The best names in Wall Street banking have announced victory. Their crisis is over, back to business as usual. So why isn’t the Obama White House celebrating this good news? Because this may not be a lasting peace for the president and his lieutenants. They are left standing in the mudhole of financial ruin, still surrounded by the failing economy and gradually losing their control over events. The leading bankers worked out a rare deal for themselves that essentially says to the government in Washington “heads we win, tails you lose.”
If Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan Chase and Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs turn out to be correct about the financial crisis, their institutions emerge unscathed and restored to their old dominance over the US economy. Minus a few old rivals who went bust.
If the bankers are wrong, Barack Obama will be the big loser–compelled to rescue them again with still more public money. The big dogs of banking know this, so does the president. That’s why he didn’t throw his hat in the air when ten of the largest banks were allowed to pay back the emergency aid they received from the feds, some $68 billion. The financiers could thus declare themselves free and clear of the heavy hand of government meddling. Another triumph of free-market capitalism. A brilliant success for Goldman Sachs socialism. Barack Obama is holding the bag for what happens next.
via Wall Street’s False Armistice | CommonDreams.org.
Eight Reasons for Farmers to Support Global Warming Action
Eight Reasons for Farmers to Support Global Warming Action
The American Clean Energy and Security Act contains many provisions that would benefit farmers while creating clean-energy jobs and cutting pollution, write Jake Caldwell and Alexandra Kougentakis.
Agriculture, energy, and global warming are inextricably linked, which is why America’s farmers must be a part of the solution to global warming. Today the U.S. House Committee on Agriculture conducts a hearing on the American Clean Energy and Security Act, H.R. 2454. A close review of the legislation reveals that it provides a significant opportunity for U.S. farmers to increase their income while safeguarding their livelihoods and the nation’s food and energy supplies.
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack called reductions of carbon dioxide a “new income source [that could] change the old ways of supporting farms.” He has urged farmers to seize the economic opportunities from reducing greenhouse gas pollution and “not to be fearful of this future.” H.R. 2454 recognizes and rewards the benefits farmers can provide to the United States and the world in ending our dependence on fossil fuels and confronting climate change.
H.R. 2454 offers an opportunity for farmers to diversify their sources of income and cut costs by increasing energy efficiency. With modest improvements, ACESA can designate a more explicit role for agriculture in the carbon offset market without jeopardizing the gains for farmers already included in the overall legislation. ACESA rewards good practices and provides the tools to ensure that American farmers can benefit from solutions to global warming.
via Eight Reasons for Farmers to Support Global Warming Action.
The Job Outlook Is Still Bleak
Job Market Still Bleak - Center For American Progress
There is some slight improvement this month, but many employment indicators are hitting historic lows.
Interactive Map: Gender in the Recession: Women Breadwinners Are More Important than Ever
Widespread job losses continued in May, pushing the economy toward a number of dubious achievements. Long-term unemployment is now at an all-time high, jobs have declined for a record number of consecutive months, work hours are the shortest since the Bureau of Labor Statistics began tracking the data, and many other indicators of labor market distress are at or near historic levels.
The Labor Department figures released today were better than many economists predicted. Employers shed 345,000 jobs in May, which is fewer than in recent months. It is good news that the rate of job growth has slowed, but you would need rose-colored glasses to claim that the labor market is anything but grim and the economy isn’t mired in recession. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is beginning to pump money into the economy—$43.7 billion has already been spent—but job growth will take more time.
May’s job losses—excluding the current recession—are the worst one-month performance since 1980. The economy has now shed 6 million jobs since the recession began in December 2007, and nearly half of those (2.9 million) have been lost since the beginning of this year.
via The Outlook Is Still Bleak.
Conrad To Health Care Reformers: You Don’t Have A Vote
OPS: Another republican on the left side of the aisle. With ‘Dems” like these, who needs enemas?
Conrad To Health Care Reformers: You Don’t Have A Vote
Blows Off Health Care Group: “Frankly Not Terribly Interested”
Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) said Wednesday that he is “frankly not terribly interested” in what the major health care reform coalition thinks and is pushing ahead with a proposal the group rejects.
“I am unaware that HCAN has any votes on the floor of the United States Senate,” said Conrad when told that the coalition Health Care for America Now opposed his plan to create regional health care co-ops instead of allowing consumers to have access to a public plan option.
“They have no votes on the floor of the United States Senate. And I am dealing with votes in the finance committee and the floor of the United States Senate. I am frankly not terribly interested in what these myriad groups all think. I am interested in what people who vote think,” he said, flailing his arms and knocking a Politico reporter’s recorder to the marble floor.
“I don’t even respond to that kind of thing. I think it is just chatter. What matters is results, legislative results at the end of the day,” he said.
But aren’t the “myriad groups” he’s referring to the base of the Democratic Party? Shouldn’t he give some weight to their position?
via Conrad To Health Care Reformers: You Don’t Have A Vote.
Shepard Smith Says His Email Is Becoming “More And More Frightening” (VIDEO)
Shep Smith: Email From Anti-Obama Viewers Getting “More And More Frightening”
Fox News’ Shepard Smith’s pretty well known — and oft praised — for the way he can size up a news event and expose his own authentic concern without seeming mawkish or phony. And in the wake of today’s shooting at the Holocaust Museum, Smith went on the air today to talk about the emails he’s been receiving for “the past few months,” and how they’ve been getting “more and more frightening.”
SMITH: There are people now, who are way out there on a limb. And I think they’re just out there on a limb with the email they send us. Because I read it, and they are out there. I mean, out there in a scary place…I could read a hundred of them like this…I mean from today. People who are so amped up and so angry for reasons that are absolutely wrong, ridiculous, preposterous.”
He went on to read an email, filled with the usual paranoid “birther” nonsense, which included an admonishment to Smith. “This is, I promise, a representative sample of the kind of things that we get here,” Smith said.
Time will tell if Smith’s colleagues at Fox stop taking these sorts of emails casually. Smith clearly could do that no longer. I think that’s appropriate!
WATCH:
via Shepard Smith Says His Email Is Becoming “More And More Frightening” (VIDEO).
The Six Top Republicans Obama Listens To
The Six Top Republicans Obama Listens To - – The Atlantic
… Lawmakers Invested In Bailed-Out Firms
Regardless of whether the President’s bipartisan outreach is producing legislative results, there is a handful of conservatives and Republicans that the president and his White House team respect. By respect, I mean, quite simply, the degree to which the White House responds to their worries and needs and believes that the time spent responding is useful and necessary. It is unclear whether the quality of this outreach differs from the respect accorded to Sen. Ben Nelson by the Bush White House.
The Mainers, Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe — They don’t ask for much, but they are among the first senators consulted by the White House on any major decision. Why? Their votes matter. In fact, so far as the White House is concerned, on major issues where a 60-vote supermajority is needed for cloture, they’re the only Republicans who matter. Their every concern is heard by the White House.
Dick Lugar — He gets as much attention from the White House as Snowe and Collins. He is close to Obama, having partnered with him early in the president’s aborted Senate career to combat nuclear trafficking overseas, and Obama regularly consults with the Indiana Republican on matters ranging from defense appropriations to Afghanistan to Russia policy and loose nukes.
via The Six Top Republicans Obama Listens To – The Atlantic Politics Channel.
Clarcon Skin Products Warning: FDA Warns Consumers Not To Use
Clarcon Skin Products Warning: FDA Warns Consumers Not To Use
The FDA has warned consumers not to use Clarcon skin products. From the release:
Risk of bacterial contamination has led the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to warn consumers to not use any products made by Clarcon Biological Chemistry Laboratory Inc.
The Roy, Utah, firm voluntarily recalled some skin sanitizers and skin protectants sold under a variety of brand names after a recent FDA inspection found that the products contained high levels of disease-causing bacteria.
What products are consumers being warned not to use?
Consumers should not use any Clarcon products. Examples of these products include
• Citrushield Lotion
• Dermasentials DermaBarrier
• Dermassentials by Clarcon Antimicrobial Hand Sanitizer
via Clarcon Skin Products Warning: FDA Warns Consumers Not To Use.
Netanyahu Speech May Endorse Palestinian State
OPS: this has been a no-brainer for decades. Bout damn time they came around to it.
Netanyahu Speech May Endorse Palestinian State: AP
JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will attempt to narrow a growing divide with the Obama administration when he delivers a major policy speech in the coming days, his aides say _ perhaps even endorsing the concept of a Palestinian state at the risk of alienating his hawkish coalition.
In one curious twist, Netanyahu’s message _ and his room to maneuver _ could be at least partially linked to the outcome of Friday’s election in Iran.
Painted into a corner by his right-wing coalition and an American president bent on progress toward peace, Netanyahu is facing a moment of truth when he will have to decide between the two. For now, it seems his all-important American allies will be the focus of his efforts, though it’s unclear if he will go far enough for Washington.
via Netanyahu Speech May Endorse Palestinian State: AP.
N.C. – 18,000 Teachers to be Fired
OPS: They LUV ignorance in the South. This is their big chance! Don’t need no book learnin’ ..…The South Shall Rise Again
18,000 Teachers to be Fired
This morning Rep. Tricia Cotham (D – Mecklenburg) hosted a conference call on North Carolina’s budget. The call included Charlotte area elected officials, teachers, advocates, clergy, and neighborhood leaders.
Three weeks ago our budget deficit was 3.3 billion dollars. It was 4.2 billion dollars as of last Monday, and it is 4.6 billion dollars today. This number will likely be revised again.
Conservatives, led by budget and policy experts like Joe the Plumber, have a solution for this problem. Its the solution they have for most problems: cut public service and public servants
The “low-lights” of the proposed cuts are beneath the fold.
1.8 billion in cuts to education, including:
* Reduction in the number of teachers by at least 12,000, this number likely to be increased by 18,000
* ALL teacher assistants in 3rd grade classrooms
* Cuts to the number of social workers working with abused children and foster care children without parents
* Class size increase by 2 additional students per class
* 50 school nurses to be fired
* 7% of all janitors, bus drivers, and cafeteria workers to be fired
* Elimination of 350 administrators, principals, and vice principals, increasing the workload from 750 to nearly a thousand students per administrator
* Termination of assistance for school with a concentration of children living in poverty
* Elimination of Learn and Earn
From higher education:
* 19% increase in Community College tuition
* 8% tuition increase in University tuitions
* Continuing education fees will be doubled
* 12 million dollars cut from cancer research
via 18,000 Teachers to be Fired | BlueNC.
Why So Scared of a Public Plan?
Why So Scared of a Public Plan?
By Joe Conason
Within the coming weeks, Americans will begin to consider critical issues concerning the future of health care for themselves and their children, including universal coverage, taxation of benefits, computerized records and the controlling of costs. But before the debate commences in Congress and the media, big insurance and pharmaceutical companies are lobbying frantically (and spending millions of dollars) to foreclose the possibility of the most promising aspect of health care reform: a public insurance option.
After decades of denigrating government—and worshiping corporations—the idea that a public program might work as well or better than a corporate provider may well sound counterintuitive to many Americans. How can government, which is so widely believed to do nothing well while wasting enormous sums, possibly be expected to outperform the highly efficient, supremely managed and profitably motivated corporate sector? Wouldn’t we be better off if we simply entrust the provision of health care to the insurance industry? How can we trust those Washington bureaucrats with our health?
Actually, many consumers have learned by now that those questions are misleading at best. They know, for instance, that trusting a health insurance company is likely to be an expensive mistake. They know, too, that corporate bureaucrats can be even more ruthless in denying help to a beleaguered individual or family than those who work in government.
via Truthdig – Reports – Why So Scared of a Public Plan?.
Warning: Obama’s constant reversals can be hazardous to your health care
Warning: Obama’s constant reversals can be hazardous to your health care
The answer to health care reform is simple. How to pay for it may be more complicated but what to do isn’t.
via Warning: Obama’s constant reversals can be hazardous to your health care.
Six Weeks into the Single-payer Surge
Six Weeks into the Single-payer Surge – - Progressive Democrats of America
The establishment of a single-payer healthcare system in the U.S. is an idea that has been around for over one hundred years, and so too have health insurers’ fear-laden misrepresentations about it. But never have we been closer to realizing the dream of healthcare as a human right than we are at this moment. The majority of Americans support a single-payer plan, and they are also willing to pay more in taxes to get it.
But today’s corporate healthcare forces, with their billion-dollar war chest, are muscling our senators and representatives to keep the single-payer solution out of the healthcare debate. Despite President Obama’s promise of open and transparent government and Senator Baucus’ claim that all options are on the table, the best option–the single-payer solution–has been shut out of the debate.
Military Hush-Up: Incoming Space Rocks Now Classified
Military Hush-Up: Incoming Space Rocks Now Classified – SPACE.com
For 15 years, scientists have benefited from data gleaned by U.S. classified satellites of natural fireball events in Earth’s atmosphere – but no longer.
A recent U.S. military policy decision now explicitly states that observations by hush-hush government spacecraft of incoming bolides and fireballs are classified secret and are not to be released, SPACE.com has learned.
The satellites’ main objectives include detecting nuclear bomb tests, and their characterizations of asteroids and lesser meteoroids as they crash through the atmosphere has been a byproduct data bonanza for scientists.
The upshot: Space rocks that explode in the atmosphere are now classified.
“It’s baffling to us why this would suddenly change,” said one scientist familiar with the work. “It’s unfortunate because there was this great synergy…a very good cooperative arrangement. Systems were put into dual-use mode where a lot of science was getting done that couldn’t be done any other way. It’s a regrettable change in policy.”
Scientists say not only will research into the threat from space be hampered, but public understanding of sometimes dramatic sky explosions will be diminished, perhaps leading to hype and fear of the unknown.
via SPACE.com — Military Hush-Up: Incoming Space Rocks Now Classified.
Scientists find whales more endangered in Exxon, BP and Rosneft oil areas
Scientists find whales more endangered in Exxon, BP and Rosneft oil areas
Gland, Switzerland – Oil and gas exploration by energy giants Exxon, BP and Rosneft is seriously threatening one of the world’s most critically endangered whales, according to a panel of top scientists in a new report.
Gland, Switzerland – Oil and gas exploration by energy giants Exxon, BP and Rosneft is seriously threatening one of the world’s most critically endangered whales, according to a panel of top scientists in a new report.
The Western Gray Whale Advisory Panel (WGWAP), composed of 11 scientists and representatives from Shell and Sakahlin Energy, met in April to discuss how oil and gas development affect the whales’ main annual feeding area off the northeastern coast of Sakhalin Island, Russia.
The scientists found that in 2008 there was a large decrease in the number of whales in their annual feeding area near the shore during a period of loud industrial activity, including a seismic survey. This is significant because if the whales are displaced from this primary annual feeding area, they will have less success reproducing.
via WWF International – Scientists find whales more endangered in Exxon, BP and Rosneft oil areas.
Court: Coleman must pay Franken $95,000 in court costs
OPS: That’s gotta hurt 
Court: Coleman must pay Franken $95,000 in court costs
A three-judge panel today required Republican Norm Coleman to pay Democrat Al Franken $94,783 to cover court costs in the seven-week U.S. Senate trial.
The ruling, by the panel that heard the trial, approves an administrative decision last month by the Ramsey County clerk’s office. Franken’s team had sought $161,510, but a deputy county clerk rejected a request that Coleman pay Franken for his cost of obtaining public records that made up many of the exhibits in the trial and some other expenses.
Also not included are $16,000 in attorneys fees that Franken wants Coleman to pay for sanctions the panel imposed after Coleman’s lawyers failed to disclose information about Republican election judge Pamela Howell before her testimony.
Coleman will also have to pay interest on the $94,783 until the debt is paid.
via Court: Coleman must pay Franken $95,000 in court costs.
Iranian elections reach tense climax
Iranian elections reach tense climax - FT.com
Thousands in protest at state TV station
Iran’s presidential election campaign moved towards a gripping climax last night, ahead of a poll that has turned into a referendum on Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad’s performance.
Thousands of demonstrators camped around the state broadcaster to protest against a final television address allocated to the controversial incumbent, while hundreds of thousands joined carnival-like parades through the country.
via FT.com / Iran – Iranian elections reach tense climax.
Politics & Foreign policy – US ‘pay tsar’ to vet executive packages
US ‘pay tsar’ to vet executive packages - FT.com
Plans for new ‘say on pay’ legislation
The salaries of the top 100 employees at seven US companies with government bail-out funds will be vetted by a “special master” named by the Obama administration on Wednesday as part of a raft of executive compensation reforms.
The administration is also expected to bring in “say on pay” legislation that would force public companies to hold non-binding shareholder votes on executive pay every year.
via FT.com / US / Politics & Foreign policy – US ‘pay tsar’ to vet executive packages.
Surge in US bond yields sparks concern
Surge in US bond yields sparks concern - FT.com /
Tepid response to Treasury’s debt sale
US long-term interest rates rose to the highest level of the year on Wednesday, threatening the “green shoots” of recovery, after the latest sale of 10-year government debt met with a tepid response from inflation-wary investors.
Concerns about the growth of government borrowing forced the US Treasury to give investors in an auction of $19bn in 10-year notes a yield of 3.99 per cent – 4 basis points higher than the yield available before the auction. That constituted the biggest yield markup since a 10-year auction in May 2003, said Morgan Stanley. Yields on the 10-year note, the benchmark rate for US mortgages, hit a high of 4 per cent during the day, up from 3.6 per cent a week ago.
via FT.com / Capital Markets – Surge in US bond yields sparks concern.
US House approves vouchers for fuel-efficient cars
US House approves vouchers for fuel-efficient cars
A pickup truck being filled with gasoline is reflected in the window of a hydrogen fuel pump in Los Angeles, California. The US House of Representatives on Tuesday approved a measure to provide vouchers of up to 4,500 dollars for customers to trade in their old gas guzzlers and buy new fuel-efficient cars and trucks.
The US House of Representatives on Tuesday approved a measure to provide vouchers of up to 4,500 dollars for customers to trade in their old gas guzzlers and buy new fuel-efficient cars and trucks.
The measure — approved 298 votes against 119 — calls for four billion dollars to be allocated to the program, which is expected to encourage the purchase of one million new vehicles.
Consumers could access the program for one year.
The new personal and work vehicles must be have higher gas mileage than the old trade-in cars.
“This bill is quite a remarkable piece of legislation and the timing is perfect,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“And when they trade in these cars, they will strengthen America?s auto industry, creating jobs and reducing layoffs and save more than 250 million gallons of gas.”
via AFP » US House approves vouchers for fuel-efficient cars.
Green Jobs Grow: 770,000 Americans Already Have One
Wired Science News for Your Neurons
Green Jobs Grow: 770,000 Americans Already Have One
Green jobs growth outpaced other-colored job classifications by nearly 250 percent over the last decade, growing 9.1 percent between 1998 and 2007, versus 3.7 percent for the overall job market.
There are now 770,000 green jobs spread out among 68,200 businesses, according to the new report from the Pew Charitable Trusts. While that’s a tiny slice of the overall American jobs pie, it is already approaching the same scale as the traditional energy sector — coal mining, utilities, big oil — which employs 1.27 million people. As a job creator, it stacks up even better against biotechnology, which (despite a longer history and greater investment) employs only 200,000 people.
The report differs from government projections or most industry association estimates in that it counts individual jobs, not entire industries. In other words, only the electricians who actually install solar panels were counted as green electricians.
“Although our numbers are conservative, our report provides the most precise depiction to date of the clean energy economy in the United States,” the Pew researchers wrote.
via Green Jobs Grow: 770,000 Americans Already Have One | Wired Science | Wired.com.
Periodic table gets a new element
Periodic table gets a new element – BBC NEWS
The table will be one element longer
The ubiquitous periodic table will soon have a new addition – the “super-heavy” element 112.
More than a decade after experiments first produced a single atom of the element, a team of German scientists has been credited with its discovery.
The team, led by Sigurd Hofmann at the Centre for Heavy Ion Research, must propose a name for their find, before it can be formally added to the table.
Scientists continue the race to discover more super-heavy elements.
Professor Hofmann began his quest to add to the periodic table in 1976.
The fusion experiments he and his colleagues carried out at the centre have already revealed the existence of elements with atomic numbers 107-111.
via BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | Periodic table gets a new element.
A.M.A. Opposes Government-Sponsored Health Plan
Doctors’ Group Opposes Public Insurance Plan – NYTimes.com
WASHINGTON — As the health care debate heats up, the American Medical Association is letting Congress know that it will oppose creation of a government-sponsored insurance plan, which President Obama and many other Democrats see as an essential element of legislation to remake the health care system.
The opposition, which comes as Mr. Obama prepares to address the powerful doctors’ group on Monday in Chicago, could be a major hurdle for advocates of a public insurance plan. The A.M.A., with about 250,000 members, is America’s largest physician organization.
While committed to the goal of affordable health insurance for all, the association had said in a general statement of principles that health services should be “provided through private markets, as they are currently.” It is now reacting, for the first time, to specific legislative proposals being drafted by Congress.
via A.M.A. Opposes Government-Sponsored Health Plan – NYTimes.com.
‘We can’t afford these wars’ financially or ’spiritually,’ Kucinich argues on House floor
‘We can’t afford these wars’ financially or ’spiritually,’ Kucinich argues on House floor
Update: Reps. Kucinich and Woolsey call for “steadfast opposition to war funding”
Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), known as a strong advocate for peace, took to the House floor Wednesday morning to argue against the war supplemental.
“The White House’s ever-expanding wartime spending bill could soon exceed $105 billion even as President Barack Obama remains stymied by divisions in Congress and a set of terrorism-related issues that have strained relations in his own party,” Politico reported Tuesday.
Kucinich argued Wednesday, “Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction, had no intention or capability of attacking United States, had nothing to do with Al-Qaida’s role in 9/11, and each and every statement made by the previous administration in support of going to war turned out to be false.”
Cheney still in crosshairs of Senate Intelligence probe
Cheney still in crosshairs of Senate Intelligence probe
Former Vice President Dick Cheney isn’t out of the woods yet for his role in briefing Congress on the Bush Administration’s secretive harsh interrogation program.
In a carefully worded statement to Mother Jones’ David Corn for an article Wednesday, a spokesman for Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Dianne Feinstein indicated that the conduct of individuals who briefed Congressmembers on the CIA’s interrogation program is under review.
“The Senate intelligence committee’s study includes an examination of how the committee was briefed on the CIA’s detention and interrogation program,” Phil LaVelle, a Feinstein spokesperson, was quoted as saying. “This includes briefings of committee leadership, and is not limited by who conducted the briefing.”
The Intelligence Committee’s probe has been ongoing — quietly — since March.
via Raw Story » Cheney still in crosshairs of Senate Intelligence probe.
Avoiding Another Crisis
Avoiding Another Crisis
The Obama administration will detail proposals to fix regulation over the next few weeks which will be laced with controversy.
One way this nation may avoid another financial collapse in the future is to employ better and more efficient regulation and oversight. Regardless of whether or not we end up with more or less regulations and restrictions, the important thing is that the regulators do their jobs well and that everyone benefits mutually.
An area of contention between regulatory agencies has been their tendency to overlap one another with often conflicting programs. In particular the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission – which both monitor complex financial products – have had difficulties with bureaucratic overlap in the past.
The two commissions are overseen by different congressional groups, with different agendas and expertise, and in the past they typically regulated different parts of the economy. However, the complex, nuanced connections between different economic sectors do not exist today as they had in the past. Complex financial products are increasingly falling into the purview of both commissions and being lost in the shuffle.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
Greenhouse Gas Truce: Long Road Ahead
Greenhouse Gas Truce: Long Road Ahead
Washington and Beijing are currently engaged in high-level discussions in the hopes of reaching an agreement to curb greenhouse gases.
Washington and Beijing are currently engaged in high-level discussions in hopes of reaching an agreement to curb greenhouse gases ahead of the next round of global climate treaty talks, according to The New York Times.
If the two nations, which together account for more than 40 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, can find common ground, it could go a long way toward reaching an international agreement in Copenhagen in December.
The most recent treaty, the Kyoto Protocol, is set to expire in 2012. That treaty, however, excluded developing nations such as China and India, which led to former President Bush refusing to sign the agreement. Not including the world’s two largest polluters in the deal rendered it essentially meaningless.
This time around there is hope that things will be different. China seems more willing to negotiate this time around and President Barack Obama is more in tune with the environmental movement than his predecessor.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
April Trade Deficit Increases
April Trade Deficit Increases
Not only will trade not lead the U.S. economy out of the hole that it is in, the trade deficit could render the administration’s economic stimulus package essentially useless.
Exports continued to fall in the month of April and were outpaced by imports leading to yet another increase in the trade deficit, according to data released Wednesday by the Commerce Department.
In April, the total trade deficit in goods and services rose to $29.2 billion from $28.5 billion in March. The increase was fueled largely by an increase in the price of a barrel of oil coupled with weakened exports due to sagging demand worldwide. It is the eighth month out of the past nine that exports have fallen.
Overall exports fell 2.3 percent to $121.1 billion. That marks the lowest level of exports since mid-2006. The drop in exports was fueled by a lack of demand for American industrial engines, machinery and motor vehicles and parts.
The trade deficit with China increased 7.3 percent, from $15.5 billion in March to $16.8 billion in April. Exports to Japan fell to the lowest level in 15 years at just $3.9 billion worth of goods and services. Exports to the European Union fell 9.9 percent to $17.8 billion.
Some economists had hoped that an increase in demand for U.S. goods could lead the nation out of the recession. Those hopes were dashed by the Commerce Department’s report.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
Next Generation Bio-Fuels Taking a Hit
Next Generation Bio-Fuels Taking a Hit
The alternative energy sector took a major hit over the past year as oil prices dropped and short-sighted investors momentarily forgot about the energy crisis.
The alternative energy sector took a major hit over the past year as oil prices dropped and short-sighted investors momentarily forgot about the energy crisis. Now, oil prices are shooting back up and gas prices are actually increasing at a fast pace. This makes alternative energy solutions more viable for the immediate future.
These alternatives go far beyond simple gas-electric hybrid vehicles. Advanced biofuels, solar and wind energy devices and other technologies are leading the way toward entering the market and freeing themselves of government subsidies.
Biofuels are slowly moving away from corn-based ethanol, which is not a viable long-term solution, and toward better products like cellulosic. Wind and solar power generation is becoming cheaper and easier to manage, but they still depend heavily on tax credits. Though they are not yet capable of competing directly with gas and oil, increased competition among alternative energy sectors will produce stronger candidates.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
Liz Cheney Falsely Claims Bush ‘Did Not Say’ Gitmo Detainees Should Be Tried In U.S. Courts
Liz Cheney Falsely Claims Bush ‘Did Not Say’ Gitmo Detainees Should Be Tried In U.S. Courts
Last night, Vice President Cheney’s daughter Liz appeared on a mainstream American television news media outlet, this time on Campbell Brown’s CNN show. During a contentious “Great Debate” segment with Salon’s Joan Walsh, Liz Cheney was trying to argue that bringing Guantanamo Bay detainees to U.S. soil “makes us less safe” and that they should remain where they currently reside.
To make her argument, Cheney also continued her penchant for false claims. At one point in the debate, Walsh noted that military leaders want Gitmo closed and that even President Bush once said it should be closed and that some detainees should tried in the U.S. Cheney, however, disagreed:
WALSH: Liz, the top — the top military leaders of our country want Guantanamo closed. President Bush, in June 2009 [sic], gave a speech where he said he would close it, and he would bring people home and try them here.
CHENEY: No, I’m sorry.
WALSH: President Bush said that.
CHENEY: He did not say he would bring terrorists onto the homeland. Joan, no, he didn’t say that.
Watch it:
Fox News’ Shep Smith: DHS Report Was A ‘Warning To Us All,’ But ‘The Right Went Absolutely Bonkers’
OPS: Smith has a lucid moment on-air. He’ll probably get fired for it.
Fox News’ Shep Smith: DHS Report Was A ‘Warning To Us All,’ But ‘The Right Went Absolutely Bonkers’
This afternoon, a gunman — reportedly white supremacist James von Brunn — shot and killed a security guard at the Holocaust Museum in Washington. Discussing the shooting, Fox News’ Shepard Smith reminded the audience that when the Department of Homeland Security released a report warning of violent, right-wing extremists earlier this year, “the right went absolutely bonkers!” He called the report a “warning to us all,” and said DHS was “warning us for a reason.” Watch it:
House GOP energy plan declares that impact of global warming ‘shall not be considered for any purpose.’
OPS: Suicide in the name of Greed. And they don’t care who they take with them. Conservatives are quite simply insane.
House GOP energy plan declares that impact of global warming ‘shall not be considered for any purpose.’
House Republicans today introduced their alternative energy plan. Developed by the Republican American Energy Solutions Group, the American Energy Act is billed as an “all of the above” energy program. But as The Wonk Room’s Brad Johnson notes, the legislation looks more like an attempt to legislate the threat of global warming “out of existence.” Indeed, the bill specifically states that at no point in implementing their energy plan can the effects of global warming on the environment “be considered for any purpose”:
Johnson remarks, “The Republican response to our dependence on fossil fuels and their pollution is to give billions of dollars in new tax breaks and subsidies to the oil, coal, and nuclear industries.”
Wells Fargo: Too Big to Jail?
Wells Fargo: Too Big to Jail?
by Laura Flanders,
GRITtv looks at Baltimore’s suit against Wells Fargo for discriminating against minority consumers.
via Wells Fargo: Too Big to Jail? | Video | AlterNet.
Scarborough Country: Where Anti-Choice Extremism Is Swept Under the Rug
Scarborough Country: Where Anti-Choice Extremism Is Swept Under the Rug - by Sarah Seltzer
The murder of Dr. George Tiller has been the top news story of the week. But as some have noted, the tragedy has gotten scant notice from one MSNBC personality. The author sees the omission as part of a broader sexist pattern.
The folks over at Fox News have taken to demonizing their MSNBC counterparts, accusing them of being radical tools of the far-left. But MSNBC’s morning program is dominated by one of their own ideological brethren, Joe Scarborough. While the Scarborough of “Morning Joe” has painted a moderate sheen over his (admittedly affable at times) personality, his previous attachment to the more extreme wing of the anti-choice movement combined with a pattern of sexist behavior on television should be the cause of concern for women viewers.
Several times at the beginning of the week of the murder of Dr. George Tiller, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow went into some detail about the long and storied history of the violent anti-choice fringe, beginning with the murder of Dr. David Gunn in Pensacola. What she did not mention was that her colleague Scarborough was initially the pro-bono lawyer for Gunn’s accused and later convicted killer, Michael Griffin. Scarborough, who at the time was about to run for Congress, where he served just under four terms, left the case after three months, leaving only after a final meeting with Griffin and Bob Kerrigan, who became the acting defense attorney on the case.
via Scarborough Country: Where Anti-Choice Extremism Is Swept Under the Rug by Sarah Seltzer.
Khat vs. Coffee: Taxi Drivers’ Wake-Me-Up or Terrorist Drug Threat?
Khat vs. Coffee: Taxi Drivers’ Wake-Me-Up or Terrorist Drug Threat?
E. African taxi drivers in Washington, DC may see their stimulant of choice outlawed because, well, it’s not American — or something.
For hundreds, if not thousands, of years, residents of the Horn of Africa and the southern Arabian Peninsula have partaken of khat, an evergreen plant native to the region. When the fresh leaves of the plant are chewed, they produce a mild stimulating effect. Friends of the plant liken the high to the buzz achieved from drinking strong coffee; foes, typically in law enforcement, are more apt to liken it to an amphetamine high.
But with decades of war and internal strife in the late 20th Century, an East African diaspora occurred, with Ethiopians and Somalis scattering and creating new immigrant population centers across Europe, Australia, Canada, and the US. Not surprisingly, these emigrants brought with them their khat chewing habit.
Khat is not illegal under international law, although two of its active compounds are. Cathinone, the more powerful, is a Schedule I drug under the 1988 UN Convention on Psychotropic Drugs, while cathine, the less powerful, is Schedule IV. Cathinone is found only in fresh leaf, degrading rapidly once the plant is harvested.
via Khat vs. Coffee: Taxi Drivers’ Wake-Me-Up or Terrorist Drug Threat? | DrugReporter | AlterNet.
How Antisemitic Conspiracy Theories and Fearmongering Led to the Holocaust Memorial Shooting
The broadcast of hatred and paranoia have led to perfect storm of mobilized resentment threatening to rain violent bigotry across the US.
Violence, Apocalyptic Aggression, & Conspiracy Theories
Holocaust Museum Shooting, Antisemitic Conspiracy Theories, and the Tools of Fear
The alleged shooter at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum today has an online book excerpt revealing his deep roots in historic White Supremacy and antisemitic conspiracy theories, including references to the hoax document The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. His website includes links to White Supremacist and Holocaust denial sites
People who believe conspiracist allegations sometimes act on those irrational beliefs, and this has concrete consequences in the real world. The shooting today is a prime example of why it is a mistake to ignore bigoted conspiracy theories. Law enforcement needs to enforce laws against criminal behavior. Vicious bigoted speech, however, is often protected by the First Amendment. We do not need new laws or to encourage government agencies to further erode civil liberties. We need to stand up as moral people and speak out against the spread of bigoted conspiracy theories. That’s not a police problem, that’s our problem as people responsible for defending a free society.
via PublicEye.org – The Website of Political Research Associates.
Stop Being Distracted by Loudmouths Like Limbaugh: The Real Problem Is Lousy Democrats Like Evan Bayh and Ben Nelson
Stop Being Distracted by Loudmouths Like Limbaugh: The Real Problem Is Lousy Democrats Like Evan Bayh and Ben Nelson
Republicans are not the obstacle to progressive governance. Instead, Democrats who refuse to support a public option are the obstacle.
Here is a message that progressive organizations and media outlets need to start sending to all Democratic party committees and members of Congress:
We are done attacking Republicans until you pass a public option for health care.
Until a public option is passed, I don’t want to hear about the latest hate and idiocy spewing from Limbaugh, or Tancredo, or Palin, or Gingrich, or whoever. And to tell you the truth, I don’t want to attack them for it, either. Because, right now, Republicans are not the obstacle to progressive governance. Instead, Democrats who refuse to support a public option are the obstacle.
More in the extended entry.
As I wrote last week, passing a public option is the lowest bar for Democrats to cross in passing major progressive legislation right now:
The Purpose Of Bipartisanship
The Purpose Of Bipartisanship
by: Chris Bowers
Susan Collins thinks the goal of health care reform is to pass a bipartisan bill:
“On the Senate side, there is more outreach … to Republicans than was the case during the early days of the stimulus,” said Collins, who said she has heard frequently from the administration and Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., a key architect of the health care effort. “It’s in everyone’s interest to try to advance a bipartisan bill.”
Actually, the goal of health care legislation is to reduce the cost of health care and increase access to health care. By contrast, the goal of bipartisanship is to get Democrats and Republicans to agree with each other. Those are different goals with no inherent connection.
Let’s say, for example, that no changes whatsoever are made to the Senate HELP committee’s health care bill before it is passed into law. Now, what will be the real-world impact of the health care bill in the following two scenarios?
1. It is passed into law with every Republican voting for it.
2. It is passed into law with no Republicans voting for it.
While I don’t know what the exact impact will be in either scenario, I do know that the impact will be exactly the same in both scenarios. This is because legislation doesn’t change based on the number of Republicans who vote for a bill. Rather, Republicans change legislation in order to be able to vote for it.
via Open Left:: The Purpose Of Bipartisanship.
There’s more to life than GDP
There’s more to life than GDP
An industrial disaster sends toxic chemicals spewing into a residential neighbourhood. The cost of the cleanup, lawsuits and ongoing medical treatment for those affected runs into the tens of millions of dollars.
Canadians need a new, holistic measure of societal progress that goes beyond economics
For many years – and particularly since the onset of the global recession – Canadians and people around the world have been bombarded with news about the gross domestic product. Numbers have been issued and then updated. Predictions have been made and then revised. So powerful and predominant has GDP become, that the New York Times referred to it as “a celebrity among statistics, a giant calculator strutting about adding up every bit of paid activity …”
But what is GDP? What does it tell us about how well or poorly we are doing as a society? More important, what does it leave out? And what are the consequences of this omission?
GDP is simply the value of all goods and services produced in a country in a given year. It was first introduced in the U.S. during the Great Depression as a way of measuring how much and how quickly the U.S. economy was shrinking. Over time, GDP has emerged as a surrogate for wellbeing, something it was never
via TheStar.com | Opinion | There’s more to life than GDP.
China alone could bring world to brink of climate calamity, says US official
China alone could bring world to brink of climate calamity, claims US official - | guardian.co.uk
Business as usual in China would lead to 2.7C rise by 2050 even if all other countries slash emissions, says energy assistant
China must be far more ambitious in tackling climate change if the international community wants to prevent calamitous levels of global warming, a senior US official told counterparts in Beijing today.
David Sandalow, assistant secretary of state for energy, said the continuation of business as usual in China would result in a 2.7C rise in global temperatures by 2050 even if every other country slashed greenhouse gas emissions by 80%.
“China can and will need to do much more if the world is going to have any hope of containing climate change,” said Sandalow, who is in Beijing as part of a high-level negotiating team that aims to find common ground ahead of the crucial Copenhagen summit at the end of this year.
No effective deal will be possible without the US and China, which together account for almost half of the planet’s carbon emissions.
Waste management at a profit
Waste management at a profit — GeneSyst International, Inc.
GeneSyst International, Inc., an Ohio based company, has developed a complete system for handling human garbage and animal waste.
The key to the GeneSyst system is their gravity pressure vessel (GPV) that uses geothermal energy as a power source to convert waste to useful products.
The system can 1) recover oil from tires by breaking the carbon sulfur bonds, 2) make ethanol very cheaply using household garbage, animal waste, and plastics, 3) make methane from industrial wastes and, 4) recover and separate glass and metals for recycling.
The ethanol can be used to run garbage trucks that bring the waste to the plant.
One facility in Pike County Virginia expects to produce $20 million of fuel grade ethanol from the waste that will no longer go to a land fill.
via Waste management at a profit — GeneSyst International, Inc..
Obama Charges Backward On Health Care
“Obama, himself, is a principle impediment to real discussion of health care.”
Obama Charges Backward On Health Care – | Black Agenda Report
by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
via Obama Charges Backward On Health Care | Black Agenda Report.
Why Is the American Coal Foundation Setting the Curriculum at Elementary Schools?
Coal Mountain Elementary – In These Times
Big Coal has worked its way into the classroom.
An elementary school curriculum designed by the American Coal Foundation suggests that students learn about the costs and benefits of coal mining by using toothpicks and paper clips to “mine” chocolate chips out of cookies. They also go about “reclaiming” the “land” damaged in the process by tracing the cookies’ outline on graph paper. Costs are to be calculated by the amount of time spent per chip and the expanse of graph paper that needs to be reclaimed.
One of the discussion questions to follow the lesson is: “What do you think are some of the costs associated with mining coal?”
In poet and organizer Mark Nowak’s new book Coal Mountain Elementary, this question is placed on an otherwise blank page. On the adjacent page is a photo from Sago, W. Va., of a sign, in bedraggled removable plastic letters and missing an “i”: “Pray for our mining families.”
via Coal Mountain Elementary — In These Times.
Obama wins an election in the Middle East
Obama wins an election in the Middle East | Salon
Lebanon’s voters gave the White House the victory it wanted — with a lot of help from Hezbollah.
By Juan Cole
President Barack Obama’s speech in Cairo last Thursday may already have borne fruit. His call for political moderates in the Muslim world to fight extremism may have helped tip the weekend’s parliamentary elections in Lebanon to the anti-Syrian March 14 Alliance. Obama did not explicitly call for the defeat of Hezbollah in the elections, but the Lebanese already knew where the administration’s sympathies lay. His speech came three weeks after a Beirut visit by Vice President Joe Biden in which Biden warned at a news conference, “We will evaluate the shape of our assistance programs based on the composition of the new government and the policies it advocates.”
Whatever the size of Obama’s influence, the election has already had a direct impact of the future of Arab-Israeli negotiations and on the realization of U.S. aims in the region. A Hezbollah win would have strengthened the case made by the right-wing Israeli Likud Party that Iran and its proxies are a higher priority for Israel’s foreign policy than trying to restart the peace process with the Palestinians. For Americans and the rest of the world, the Lebanese elections were about whether Iran would be strengthened or weakened in the Levant, and whether Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would have a new pretext for intransigence. The answer to both questions was a resounding no.
But while the consequences may have been global, the politics, as always, were local. Even before Biden’s visit and Obama’s speech, most of the Lebanese public had probably already made up its mind about the arrogant and presumptuous Hezbollah-dominated opposition. The March 14 Alliance won because of the strength of the local economy, the desire for tourism, and anger at Hezbollah for streetfighting in 2008 that left 11 dead, more than a year of protests and sit-ins, and the Hezbollah bloc’s ultimately successful attempt to strong-arm its way to effective veto power in the government.
via Obama wins an election in the Middle East | Salon.
UN Rapporteur: Rumsfeld in Trouble
UN Rapporteur: Rumsfeld in Trouble - Harper’s Magazine
By Scott Horton
The senior United Nations expert on the integrity of legal processes states that beginning next year, Donald Rumsfeld will have difficulties traveling outside of the United States because of his connection to war crimes. The official, Leandro Despouy, drew his conclusions based largely on a review of the recently released report of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which directly connected the mistreatment of prisoners to policy decisions taken by Rumsfeld. Despouy is a well-known Argentine human rights lawyer and diplomat who has served as the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers since 2003.
Despouy also strongly supported the initiative of President Barack Obama to close the detention facility at Guantánamo.
Despouy said the “strong resistance” put forward by the former US administration to current US president Barack Obama’s decision to close the detention centre has nothing to do with the officially cited reason of “national security” considerations. Rather they are fearful that they may be taken to task once the detention centre is closed, said Despouy.
via UN Rapporteur: Rumsfeld in Trouble—By Scott Horton (Harper’s Magazine).
Fear Rules: Who Spent All That Money For What?
Who Spent All That Money For What?
Fear Rules
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
The power of irrational fear in the US is extraordinary. It ranks up there with the Israel Lobby, the military/security complex, and the financial gangsters. Indeed, fear might be the most powerful force in America.
Americans are at ease with their country’s aggression against Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan, which has resulted in a million dead Muslim civilians and several million refugees, because the US government has filled Americans with fear of terrorists. “We have to kill them over there before they come over here.”
Fearful of American citizens, the US government is building concentration camps, apparently all over the country. According to news reports, a $385 million US government contract was given by the Bush/Cheney Regime to Cheney’s company, Halliburton, to build “detention centers” in the US. The corporate media never explained for whom the detention centers are intended.
Most Americans dismiss such reports. “It can’t happen here.” However, In northeastern Florida not far from Tallahassee, I have seen what might be one of these camps. There is a building inside a huge open area fenced with razor wire. There is no one there and no signs. The facility appears new and unused and does not look like an abandoned prisoner work camp.
What is it for?
via Paul Craig Roberts: Fear Rules.
Medical Industry Showers DOD with Free Travel
Medical Industry Showers DOD with Free Travel - Center For Public Integrity
Military Doctors, Pharmacists Took 8,700 Trips
A trip to Paris in September 2006 cost Dr. D. Gray Heppner nothing. GlaxoSmithKline, one of the world’s largest drug manufacturers, paid $7,800 for the lieutenant colonel and chief of the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research’s Department of Immunology to attend the company’s symposium on malaria.
It was Boston in May for John W. Szabo. Medical device manufacturer Cardinal Health paid $5,000 for Szabo, then chief of the Pharmacy Service at the U.S. Army Health Clinic at Schofield Barracks in Hawaii, to attend a leadership conference in 2002. The year before, Szabo went to a diabetes conference in Austin, Texas, and GlaxoSmithKline paid the bill through an unrestricted grant, totaling more than $1,000.
Trips to Tampa Bay and Austin in 2000 for Peter Bulatao were paid for by drug-makers Novartis and GlaxoSmithKline. Bulatao, then chief of the Department of Pharmacy at Lyster Army Community Hospital, in Fort Rucker, Ala., sat on the committee responsible for selecting drugs for the hospital.
via Pentagon Travel – Stories: Medical Industry Showers DOD with Free Travel.
Time for the War on Terror 2.0?
Time for the War on Terror 2.0? 
Two people have been shot at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC. The shooter has been identified as James Wenneker von Brunn, a man with ties to various right-wing hate groups. His Web site is here.
At the risk of putting too fine a point on it, we should note that since September 11, 2001, more innocent American citizens have been killed by anti-abortion activists and other fringe right terrorists than by al Qaeda. Oddly, we’re hearing no calls from Republican legislators or party leaders like Rush Limbaugh (or their Vichy Democrat allies) demanding that we invade Coeur d’Alene.
So are we serious about terror or not?
via Scholars and Rogues » Time for the War on Terror 2.0?.
Abuse victims march in Dublin to demand justice
Abuse victims march in Dublin to demand justice
DUBLIN (Reuters) – Survivors of rape and ritual beatings at Catholic-run schools marched silently to the Irish parliament on Wednesday, carrying children’s shoes and wearing white ribbons symbolizing their lost youth.
Disclosures of floggings, slave labor and gang rape in Ireland’s now defunct system of industrial and reform schools have shamed Irish people, particularly older ones who did not confront what a report last month described as endemic abuse.
“It was as if you were inside prison and when you come out you don’t talk about it,” said Marina Permaul, 66, who was brought up “military style” by nuns in the western county of Galway.
“You don’t talk about it even to your children,” said Permaul, who arrived from London to attend the march. “You’re too ashamed of it all, and in any case would they believe you? You didn’t dare speak out against a religious order.”
Local news reports said about 7,000 people took part in the march, including hundreds of victims of abuse.
via Abuse victims march in Dublin to demand justice | International | Reuters.
People of Laos suffer bomb legacy
People of Laos suffer bomb legacy - BBC NEWS
Sop’ore is a small, remote village in Khammouane province. It’s a group of wooden stilt-houses in traditional Lao style.
I met Mr Ta on his veranda there, as chickens, dogs and pigs scratched and snuffled below. We sat looking out at the mountains, which were covered with lush tropical rainforest and low morning mist.
The serenity of the scene stood in contrast to Mr Ta’s horrific injuries.
Eight years ago, he told me, he was foraging in the forest with his children, looking for food. But they came across a small bomb. When it exploded, he lost both his arms and one of his eyes.
Since then, he explained, life has been very hard.
“I can’t look after myself,” he said. “I can only eat like a dog. My wife has to feed me and care for me, as well as looking after our children.”
via BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | People of Laos suffer bomb legacy.
Film aims to expose dangers in U.S. food industry
Film aims to expose dangers in U.S. food industry
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Bigger-breasted chickens fattened artificially. New strains of deadly E. coli bacteria. A food supply controlled by a handful of corporations.
The documentary “Food, Inc.” opens in the United States on Friday and portrays these purported dangers and changes in the U.S. food industry, asserting harmful effects on public health, the environment, and worker and animal rights.
Big corporations such as biotech food producer Monsanto Co., U.S. meat companies Tyson Food Inc. and Smithfield Foods, and poultry producer Perdue Farms all declined to be interviewed for the film.
But the industry has not stood silent. Trade associations across the $142-billion-a-year U.S. meat industry have banded together to counter the claims. Led by the American Meat Institute, they have created a number of websites, including one called SafeFoodInc.com.
“Each sector of the industry that’s named is doing its part to counter a lot of the misinformation in the movie,” said Lisa Katic, a dietitian and consultant with an unnamed coalition of trade associations representing the food industry.
via Film aims to expose dangers in U.S. food industry | Health | Reuters.
Another Obama Retreat: Wall St. Compensation
Another Missed Opportunity: Obama Retreats on Wall St. Compensation
Posted Jun 10, 2009 10:18am EDT by Aaron Task in Newsmakers, Banking
Related: JPM, C, XLF, BAC, ^DJI, GS, FAS
News the Obama administration plans to back away from dictating compensation for all of Wall Street is a victory for those who worry about overzealous government meddling and the dangers of wage controls.
But it’s also another missed opportunity by the administration to take advantage of the crisis to materially change behavior on Wall Street, which is becoming something of a hallmark of the Obama administration. Obama’s Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel has said “you never want a serious crisis to go to waste,” but that’s exactly what’s happening when it comes to the issue of reforming Wall Street.
In the latest example, the government has abandoned the idea of regulating compensation for all of Wall Street, which was probably doomed from the start. But the administration is also reportedly dropping plans to restrict executive salaries at firms receiving bailout funds, and is only going to restrict bonuses instead.
President Obama and Tim Geithner are now hoping the rest of Wall Street will “voluntarily” follow the same guidelines as firms operating under TARP, similar to the “best practices” banks are asked to abide by, The Wall Street Journal reports.
via Another Missed Opportunity: Obama Retreats on Wall St. Compensation: Tech Ticker, Yahoo! Finance.
Holocaust museum shooting suspect has a history of seething anger as white supremacist
AP Source: Suspect in shooting at Holocaust Museum is anti-government white supremacist. Enabled by the Right Wing Media Igniters of Domestic Terrorism.
Holocaust museum shooting suspect has a history of seething anger as white supremacist -- chicagotribune.com
A frustrated artist and an angry man, the suspect in the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum shooting once tried to kidnap members of the Federal Reserve board, a “caper” thwarted when a guard captured him outside a board meeting carrying a bag stuffed with weapons.
James Von Brunn, 88, a white supremacist and Holocaust denier, describes the assault with apparent pride on his Web site, the source of fulmination against Jews and races other than his own.
Von Brunn was sentenced in 1983 to more than four years in prison for attempted armed kidnapping and other charges in his Fed assault. He was released in 1989.
“The subject resides in my memory like old road-kill,” he wrote. “What could have been a slam-bang victory turned into ignoble failure. Recalling all of this presents an onerous task. I am getting near the end of the diving board.”
Treasuries Tumble After Auction, Russian Threat to Cut Holdings
Treasuries Tumble After Auction, Russian Threat to Cut Holdings
June 10 (Bloomberg) — Treasuries fell, pushing 10-year yields to the highest level since October, as the government sold $19 billion of the securities and Russia said it may switch some of its reserves from U.S. debt.
The notes drew a yield of 3.99 percent, the highest since August 2008. The auction was the second of three sales this week that will raise $65 billion, part of the government’s record borrowing program. A Russian central bank official said the nation may buy International Monetary Fund bonds.
“There are an awful lot of Treasuries being auctioned and there’s going to be more and more and more and more,” said Jay Mueller, who manages about $3 billion of bonds at Wells Fargo Capital Management in Milwaukee.
The yield on the 10-year note rose 12 basis points, or 0.12 percentage point, to 3.98 percent at 1:29 p.m. in New York, according to BGCantor Market Data. It hit 3.99 percent, the highest since Oct. 20. The 3.125 percent security maturing in May 2019 declined 30/32, or $9.38 per $1,000 face amount, to 93 2/32.
The 30-year bond yield touched 4.77 percent, the highest in a year. The government is scheduled to sell $11 billion of the securities tomorrow.
The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index fell 1.1 percent.
via Treasuries Tumble After Auction, Russian Threat to Cut Holdings – Bloomberg.com.
Global warming could create 200 million refugees by 2050
Global warming could create 200 million refugees by 2050
BONN, Germany (AFP) – Tens of millions of people will be displaced by climate change in coming years, posing social, political and security problems of an unprecedented dimension, a new study said on Wednesday.
Estimates of the likely numbers range from 25 to 50 million people by 2010, while the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has pitched a figure of 200 million by 2050.
Whilte not using the word “refugee,” because it has a specific political context, the reality is that global warming will produce tens of millions of refugees, the study asserts.
“Unless aggressive measures are taken to halt global warming, the consequences for human migration and displacement could reach a scope and scale that vastly exceed anything that has occurred before,” its authors warned.
“Climate change is already contributing to migration and displacement.
“All major estimates project that the trend will rise to tens of millions of migrants in coming years. Within the next few decades, the consequences of climate change for human security efforts could be devastating.”
via Raw Story » Global warming could create 200 million refugees by 2050.
Pentagon won’t name 60 percent of detainees it says returned to terrorism
Pentagon won’t name 60 percent of detainees it says returned to terrorism
According to an analysis by a New Jersey law professor, the Pentagon’s recent survey alleging that one in seven Guantanamo Bay prisoners return to terrorism is deeply flawed.
His analysis also reveals the Pentagon has refused to identify 60 percent of the men they claim have returned to terrorism, saying the information is classified.
The latest Pentagon recidivism analysis documents 74 recidivists, but lacks 45 names, adding that of the 29 names given, only half are labeled “confirmed” recidivists. Seton Hall University Professor Mark Denbeaux, who wrote the report, also alleges the analysis includes men who were never held at Guantanamo.
All told, 45 of 74 is 61 percent.
The Defense Department “has issued ‘recidivism’ numbers again, and again they are wrong and make no sense either independently or in comparison with the DoD’s previous numbers, definitions, names or reports,” Denbeaux said in a statement.
via Raw Story » Pentagon won’t name 60 percent of detainees it says returned to terrorism.
Water Stress, Ocean Levels to Unleash ‘Climate Exodus’
Water Stress, Ocean Levels to Unleash ‘Climate Exodus’ | CommonDreams.org
BONN, Germany – Tens of millions of people will be displaced by climate change in coming years, posing social, political and security problems of an unprecedented dimension, a new study said on Wednesday.
“Unless aggressive measures are taken to halt global warming, the consequences for human migration and displacement could reach a scope and scale that vastly exceed anything that has occurred before,” its authors warned.
“Climate change is already contributing to migration and displacement.
“All major estimates project that the trend will rise to tens of millions of migrants in coming years. Within the next few decades, the consequences of climate change for human security efforts could be devastating.”
The report, “In Search of Shelter,” was compiled by specialists from Columbia University in New York and the United Nations University, and from a non-governmental organisation, CARE International.
via Water Stress, Ocean Levels to Unleash ‘Climate Exodus’ | CommonDreams.org.
U.S. War Privatization Results in Billions Lost in Fraud, Waste and Abuse–Report
U.S. War Privatization Results in Billions Lost in Fraud, Waste and Abuse–Report | CommonDreams.org
Half of the personnel the US has working on its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are private contractors. A new report reveals how much of a rip-off this system has been to US taxpayers.
by Jeremy Scahill
At a hearing in Washington today, the federal Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan is releasing a 111-page report that represents its “initial investigations of the nation’s heavy reliance on contractors.” According to a release on the hearing:
More than 240,000 contractor employees, about 80 percent of them foreign nationals, are working in Iraq and Afghanistan to support operations and projects of the U.S. military, the Department of State, and the U.S. Agency for International Development. Contractor employees outnumber U.S. troops in the region. While contractors provide vital services, the Commission believes their use has also entailed billions of dollars lost to waste, fraud, and abuse due to inadequate planning, poor contract drafting, limited competition, understaffed oversight functions, and other problems.
These statistics support a recent DoD report on the extent of the US reliance on contractors. That report also found that there has been a 23% increase in the number of “Private Security Contractors” working for the Department of Defense in Iraq in the second quarter of 2009 and a 29% increase in Afghanistan, which “correlates to the build up of forces” in the country. In Iraq, the Pentagon attributes the increase to better accounting. There are currently more private contractors (counting both armed and unarmed) in Afghanistan (68,197) than US troops (40,000). In Iraq, the number of contractors (132,610) is basically equal to the number of US troops.
via U.S. War Privatization Results in Billions Lost in Fraud, Waste and Abuse–Report | CommonDreams.org.
Film Aims to Expose Dangers in US Food Industry
Film Aims to Expose Dangers in US Food Industry
NEW YORK – Bigger-breasted chickens fattened artificially. New strains of deadly E. coli bacteria. A food supply controlled by a handful of corporations.
The documentary “Food, Inc.” opens in the United States on Friday and portrays these purported dangers and changes in the U.S. food industry, asserting harmful effects on public health, the environment, and worker and animal rights.
Big corporations such as biotech food producer Monsanto Co., U.S. meat companies Tyson Food Inc. and Smithfield Foods, and poultry producer Perdue Farms all declined to be interviewed for the film.
But the industry has not stood silent. Trade associations across the $142-billion-a-year U.S. meat industry have banded together to counter the claims. Led by the American Meat Institute, they have created a number of websites, including one called SafeFoodInc.com.
“Each sector of the industry that’s named is doing its part to counter a lot of the misinformation in the movie,” said Lisa Katic, a dietitian and consultant with an unnamed coalition of trade associations representing the food industry.
via Film Aims to Expose Dangers in US Food Industry | CommonDreams.org.
Daniel Estulin’s “True Story of the Bilderberg Group” and What They May Be Planning Now
Daniel Estulin’s “True Story of the Bilderberg Group” and What They May Be Planning Now - by Stephen Lendman
For over 14 years, Daniel Estulin has investigated and researched the Bilderberg Group’s far-reaching influence on business and finance, global politics, war and peace, and control of the world’s resources and its money.
His book, “The True Story of the Bilderberg Group,” was published in 2005 and is now updated in a new 2009 edition. He states that in 1954, “the most powerful men in the world met for the first time” in Oosterbeek, Netherlands, “debated the future of the world,” and decided to meet annually in secret. They called themselves the Bilderberg Group with a membership representing a who’s who of world power elites, mostly from America, Canada, and Western Europe with familiar names like David Rockefeller, Henry Kissinger, Bill Clinton, Gordon Brown, Angela Merkel, Alan Greenspan, Ben Bernanke, Larry Summers, Tim Geithner, Lloyd Blankfein, George Soros, Donald Rumsfeld, Rupert Murdoch, other heads of state, influential senators, congressmen and parliamentarians, Pentagon and NATO brass, members of European royalty, selected media figures, and invited others – some quietly by some accounts like Barack Obama and many of his top officials.
Always well represented are top figures from the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), IMF, World Bank, Trilateral Commission, EU, and powerful central bankers from the Federal Reserve, the ECB’s Jean-Claude Trichet, and Bank of England’s Mervyn King.
For over half a century, no agenda or discussion topics became public nor is any press coverage allowed. The few invited fourth estate attendees and their bosses are sworn to secrecy. Nonetheless, Estulin undertook “an investigative journey” that became his life’s work. He states:
Goals Shift For Reform Of Financial Regulation
Goals Shift For Reform Of Financial Regulation – washingtonpost.com
Anticipating Resistance, Obama Changes Tack
The Obama administration is pulling back from some of its most ambitious ideas for overhauling the financial system, after determining that the consolidation of power under fewer federal agencies would face grave opposition by lawmakers and regulators, sources familiar with the discussions said.
Although the unveiling of the plan is a week away, several central elements have already been pummeled in public by lawmakers, wary of the concentration of authority in few hands, and in private by some economists and financial executives consulted by senior officials.
The administration had originally sought to eliminate turf wars among agencies and gaps in their oversight, for instance by centralizing the power to oversee banks in one body and combining the two agencies that police financial markets.
via Goals Shift For Reform Of Financial Regulation – washingtonpost.com.
April trade deficit edges up to $29.2 billion
April trade deficit edges up to $29.2 billion
Trade deficit edges higher for second straight month in April, reflects rising oil prices
The U.S. trade deficit edged up in April as crude oil prices hit the highest level since December, but the imbalance so far in 2009 is well below last year’s pace as the recession dampens demand for imports.
The Commerce Department said Wednesday that the deficit rose for a second straight month in April, climbing 2.2 percent to $29.2 billion. That was slightly higher than economists’ expectations.
The politically sensitive deficit with China increased 7.3 percent to $16.8 billion, although that imbalance through the first four months of this year is 11.1 percent below last year’s record pace.
via April trade deficit edges up to $29.2 billion | TPM News Pages.
AIPAC Wall Beginning to Crack
AIPAC Wall Beginning to Crack
For years, AIPAC (The American Israel Public Affairs Committee) has helped to stonewall the Middle East peace process by building a solid wall around the Israeli government, protecting it from criticism in the US. Senators and representatives have feared the wrath of AIPAC come Election Day, even in states and districts where the Jewish vote is negligible. Whatever they may have thought privately about Israel’s policies toward the Palestinians, they’ve remained silent.
I got a first-hand glimpse of the process shortly after last year’s election, when I talked to an aide of a newly elected House member. The new member, who represents a district with hardly any organized Jewish community, knew very little about the Middle East when the campaign began. The representative had been “educated” on the issue, the aide told me, by a handful of wealthy Democrats – none from the member’s district, all generous contributors to the campaign, and all staunch supporters of the AIPAC line. That’s how it works, all over the country.
Or at least that’s how it used to work. Now, for the first time, there are signs of a crack in AIPAC’s vaunted political edifice. The wedge issue is the Obama administration’s public demand that Israel stop all new construction in its West Bank settlements, including what the Israelis call expansion to accommodate “natural growth.”
via Scoop: AIPAC Wall Beginning to Crack.
U.S. mortgage demand withers as loan rates spike
U.S. mortgage demand withers as loan rates spike
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Spiking U.S. mortgage rates drove down total home loan applications last week as demand for refinancing shriveled to the lowest level since November, the Mortgage Bankers Association said on Wednesday.
The swift rate rise crimps affordability, likely cutting offer prices on home sales and prolonging a housing turnaround.
Borrowing costs have soared as bond yields have risen, even as the Federal Reserve has sopped up hundreds of billions of dollars in bonds to keep rates low and stimulate the housing market.
The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate jumped 0.32 percentage point in the June 5 week to 5.57 percent. That was nearly a full point, about 100 basis points, above the record low rate of 4.61 percent in March, the trade group said.
“Clearly, 50 or 100 basis points more on mortgage rates is enough to matter. It effects what people can afford to buy,” said Bill Cheney, chief economist at John Hancock Financial Services in Boston.
via U.S. mortgage demand withers as loan rates spike | U.S. | Reuters.
Climate change blamed for Caribbean coral deaths
Climate change blamed for Caribbean coral deaths
LONDON (Reuters) – Climate change has contributed to a flattening of the complex, multi-layered architecture of Caribbean coral reefs, compromising their role as a nursery for fish stocks and a buffer against tropical storms, a study shows.
The analysis of 500 surveys of 200 reefs, conducted between 1969 and 2008, showed the most complex types of reef had been virtually wiped out across the entire Caribbean.
Such reefs — typified by Table Corals of over 1 meter across and huge antler-shaped Staghorn Corals — act as a sanctuary for local fish stocks and a hunting ground for larger, commercially fished species.
Many have been replaced with the flattest types of rubble-strewn reef, which now cover about three quarters of the Caribbean’s reef area, up from about a fifth in the 1970s, said the study, published in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters.
via Climate change blamed for Caribbean coral deaths | Science | Reuters.
O’Reilly: I never called Tiller ‘Dr. Killer.’
O’Reilly: I never called Tiller ‘Dr. Killer.’
Last night, Bill O’Reilly took issue with a recent San Francisco Chronicle article that pointed out that O’Reilly had referred to the late Dr. George Tiller as ‘Dr. Killer.’ “Transcripts prove what reporter Joe wrote was false,” O’Reilly said. In fact, O’Reilly did refer to Tiller as ‘Dr. Killer’ on June 2.
O’REILLY: In order to terminate a life, that has to be catastrophic. And I think it has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt, in Dr. Killer’s case, that wasn’t what he was doing. But Ms. Ireland, we appreciate you coming him on.
IRELAND: You call him Dr. Killer, and he was murdered. And I think that that is…just outrageous.
Watch a compilation:
via Think Progress » O’Reilly: I never called Tiller ‘Dr. Killer.’.
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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. 
