Archive for July, 2009
The Economy Is Even Worse Than You Think
The Economy Is Even Worse Than You Think
The average length of unemployment is higher than it’s been since government began tracking the data in 1948
The Bureau of Labor Statistics preliminary estimate for job losses for June is 467,000, which means 7.2 million people have lost their jobs since the start of the recession. The cumulative job losses over the last six months have been greater than for any other half year period since World War II, including the military demobilization after the war. The job losses are also now equal to the net job gains over the previous nine years, making this the only recession since the Great Depression to wipe out all job growth from the previous expansion.
Here are 10 reasons we are in even more trouble than the 9.5% unemployment rate indicates:
- More companies are asking employees to take unpaid leave. These people don’t count on the unemployment roll.
- No fewer than 1.4 million people wanted or were available for work in the last 12 months but were not counted. Why? Because they hadn’t searched for work in the four weeks preceding the survey.
via The Economy Is Even Worse Than You Think.
CBO: House Bill Would Cover 97 Percent Of Americans And Cost $1 Trillion
OPS: What about the remaining 17 million?
CBO: House Bill Would Cover 97 Percent Of Americans And Cost $1 Trillion
The Congressional Budget Office estimated in a letter to Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) on Tuesday that the House health care reform proposal would reduce the number of uninsured by 35 to 37 million people, relative to current projections. The non-elderly insured population would increase to 94 percent.
Excluding illegal immigrants, that brings the total covered under the plan to 97 percent of all Americans. Three million people, the CBO estimates, would switch from employer-based coverage to coverage from an insurance exchange. The exchange would be similar to the health insurance options available to members of Congress, with a required minimum amount of coverage.
Another three million wouldn’t have an offer of employer coverage to decline — a significant number, but far from the tens of millions losing insurance that the GOP has cited.
The CBO estimated the public plan offered by the bill would be roughly 10 percent less expensive than other plans in the insurance exchange and that 9 to 10 million people would enroll in it.
via CBO: House Bill Would Cover 97 Percent Of Americans And Cost $1 Trillion.
Ex-FBI Agent: Why I Support a New 9/11 Investigation
Ex-FBI Agent: Why I Support a New 9/11 Investigation 
In the absence of my being there in New York City to stand with the 9/11 families, first responders and survivors, I offer the following statement in support of your goal of a new investigation into the attacks of September 11th and the NYC CAN campaign to place it on the ballot for November.
coleenrowleyAt the time of 9-11, I had been an FBI agent for over 20 years. My main responsibilities by then were teaching criminal procedure to FBI agents and other law enforcement officers, mostly about 4th Amendment search and seizure, 5th and 6th Amendment law of interrogation, right to attorney and constitutional protection of rights to “free speech”, due process, habeas corpus, and against cruel and unusual punishment. A week before 9-11, I and the rest of the FBI’s ethics instructors were mandated (as a result of an earlier public FBI scandal) to give a one hour PowerPoint presentation, a form of remedial training on “law enforcement ethics” which I accomplished in a fairly perfunctory way, just reading the slides.
After 9-11, with the knowledge I had of the bitter internal dispute inside the FBI that was being hushed up but had kept some of our better agents from possibly uncovering more of the 9-11 plot before it happened, I couldn’t forget two of the slides in that Law Enforcement ethics curriculum: “DO NOT: Puff, Shade, Tailor, Firm up, Stretch, Massage, or Tidy up statements of fact.” And “Misplaced Loyalties: As employees of the FBI, we must be aware that our highest loyalty is to the United States Constitution. We should never sacrifice the truth in order to obtain a desired result (e.g. conviction of a defendant) or to avoid personal or institutional embarrassment.”
via The Raw Story » Ex-FBI Agent: Why I Support a New 9/11 Investigation.
Glenn Beck complains about softball questions to Sotomayor on day that no questions were asked.
Glenn Beck complains about softball questions to Sotomayor on day that no questions were asked.
Yesterday was the first day of the confirmation hearings for Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination to the Supreme Court. The day consisted of opening statements by Sotomayor and by each member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, but no actual questioning. Glenn Beck apparently wasn’t paying much attention. “As our country burns to the ground,” bellowed Beck on Fox News yesterday, “this is the questioning,” as he played clips of senators praising Sotomayor. Watch it:
Rep. Adam Smith Responds To Rove: Administration Leaks ‘Far, Far, Far More’ Than Congress
Rep. Adam Smith Responds To Rove: Administration Leaks ‘Far, Far, Far More’ Than Congress
Last night on Fox News, former Bush policy czar Karl Rove argued that the administration is justified in withholding information from Congress. “It is so dangerous to give Congress information” because they leak it, Rove argued.
ThinkProgress interviewed Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA) earlier today, and asked him to respond to that accusation by Rove:
First of all, leaks come far, far, far more often from the administration than they do from Congress. So if the issue is we can’t tell anyone because they might leak it, well then you better not do it at all, because you’re going to have to tell somebody and somebody’s going to leak it. Vastly more amounts of secret programs have come out of the administration than they have come out of Congress.
McConnell declines to offer support for Ensign’s re-election campaign.
McConnell declines to offer support for Ensign’s re-election campaign.
ensign-mcconnell-webSen. John Ensign (R-NV) told the Las Vegas Sun yesterday that, despite admitting an extramarital affair with a staffer and that his parents paid the woman and her family nearly $100,000 in hush money, he would not be resigning his seat and will be running for re-election in 2012. According to the Sun, Ensign said “his support is coming from his fellow senators as well as those ‘on both sides’ of Senate leadership.” However, it appears that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is not part of that group. Today during a press conference on Capitol Hill, he declined to offer his public support for Ensign:
via Think Progress » McConnell declines to offer support for Ensign’s re-election campaign..
Pentagon Prepares to Maintain Iraq Troop Levels Through Early 2010
Pentagon Prepares to Maintain Iraq Troop Levels Through Early 2010
Announcement Touts Continued Commitment to Iraq
The announcement points out that, despite repeated administration promises of an eventual pullout, the Pentagon is operating under the assumption that they will maintain the current level of troops through at least the beginning of next year. They say this is to prove the “continued commitment of the United States to the security of the Iraqi people.”
At present, there are 131,000 troops in Iraq. The number has lowered slightly over the past several months, from 135,000 in March. General Ray Odierno had previously predicted that the level would be 120,000 by the end of this year, but today’s announcement suggests that already trivial pullback is now being treated as a best case scenario.
via Pentagon Prepares to Maintain Iraq Troop Levels Through Early 2010 — News from Antiwar.com.
New flu unstoppable, WHO says, calls for vaccine
New flu “unstoppable”, WHO says, calls for vaccine | Reuters
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Saying the new H1N1 virus is “unstoppable”, the World Health Organization gave drug makers a full go-ahead to manufacture vaccines against the pandemic influenza strain on Monday and said healthcare workers should be the first to get one.
Every country will need to vaccinate citizens against the swine flu virus and must choose who else would get priority after nurses, doctors and technicians, said Dr. Marie-Paule Kieny, WHO director of the Initiative for Vaccine Research.
Several reports showed the new virus attacks people differently than seasonal flu — affecting younger people, the severely obese and seemingly healthy adults, and causing disease deep in the lungs.
Kieny briefed reporters on the findings of the WHO’s Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization, or SAGE. “The committee recognized that the H1N1 pandemic … is unstoppable and therefore that all countries need access to vaccine,” Kieney said.
via New flu unstoppable, WHO says, calls for vaccine | Reuters.
Turley: Obama admin’s approach to torture undermines international law
Turley: Obama admin’s approach to torture undermines international law
The Obama administration’s approach to investigating possible crimes by the previous Bush administration is undermining half a century’s worth of international law, says a prominent constitutional scholar.
Jonathan Turley, a constitutional law professor at George Washington University, told MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann that it appears Attorney-General Eric Holder’s proposed special prosecutor to investigate allegations of Bush-era crimes will be given too narrow a focus.
According to MSNBC, the special prosecutor would only be able to prosecute “egregious” cases where a person involved in torture went far beyond what was legally authorized. Anyone who participated in torture within the Bush administration’s guidelines would be exempt, as would anyone who exceeded the guidelines but did so “in good faith.”
“What [Holder has] described is more of a bonsai plant than a prosecutor, that you can twist and restrain in any way you want,” Turley said Monday on MSNBC’s Countdown.
via Raw Story » Turley: Obama admin’s approach to torture undermines international law.
$500 billion plan to upgrade U.S. transportation hits federal pothole
$500 billion plan to upgrade U.S. transportation hits federal pothole – - Kansas City Star
Our roads, highways and bridges are crumbling under the strain of overuse and old age.
But a comprehensive solution may have encountered a bottleneck that will postpone for 18 months or longer a push to correct the sorry state of our surface transportation system. Delay is something we can no longer afford because:
•Poor road conditions play a role in many of the 6 million wrecks each year.
•Congestion costs our cities and towns more than $78 billion a year in lost productivity.
•Underinvestment in highway infrastructure added $412 billion to the shipping costs of U.S. companies between 2004 and 2008.
via $500 billion plan to upgrade U.S. transportation hits federal pothole – Kansas City Star.
Obama: Unemployment likely to keep ticking up
Obama: Unemployment likely to keep ticking up
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama on Tuesday declined to predict how high unemployment will climb but made clear he expects it to keep worsening for a while as hiring lags behind other signs of economic recovery.
“How employment numbers are going to respond is not year clear,” the president said on a day when he was headed to Michigan, home of a particularly battered economy. “My expectation is that we will probably continue to see unemployment tick up for several months.”
The unemployment rate stands at 9.5 percent, the highest in 26 years.
Obama, addressing reporters in the Oval Office, said the stabilization of the financial markets has allowed banks to start lending again and some small businesses to stay afloat. But he said his administration is aware that the most important factor is whether people are able to get good-paying jobs.
More than 2 million jobs have been lost since Congress passed Obama’s $787 billion economic stimulus package. Without that government intervention, Obama said, states like Michigan would be even worse shape because they would have had to lay off more teachers, firefighters and other workers.
via The Associated Press: Obama: Unemployment likely to keep ticking up.
Morgan Stanley unit agrees to pay $2.3 million to Fla. for gas-price gouging during hurricane
Morgan Stanley unit agrees to pay $2.3 million to Fla. for gas-price gouging during hurricane
TALLAHASSEE — Florida will receive a record $2.3 million settlement from a Morgan Stanley subsidiary that state officials say unconscionably increased gas prices during Hurricane Ike last year, state officials announced.
It’s at least the second time the company, TransMontaigne, has been involved in a price gouging settlement with the state. The company paid $5,000 for its role in alleged price gouging in Fort Lauderdale and Pensacola in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
After Ike, in September 2008, the company increased the cost of its gas by $1.60 per gallon during the storm, bringing prices to over $5 per gallon. One retailer in Boca Raton, NexStore, shut down its pumps rather increase its pump prices to $5.20 per gallon.
Shell Hydrogen Fueling Station Cluster for NYC
Shell Hydrogen Fueling Station Cluster for NYC
Taking a page out of the playbook of the hydrogen fueling station cluster model in Los Angeles, Shell Hydrogen has taken it upon themselve to do the same around New York City.
Now, I had talked 6 months ago (and before) about the cluster model for grouping hydrogen cars with hydrogen fueling stations in the same geographical locations such as Los Angeles, New York and Washington DC.
Right now in Southern California there is a mish mash of public and private hydrogen fueling stations comprising this cluster with different operators such as Air Products, Praxair, Chevron and Shell. The Shell Hydrogen station is location in Los Angeles on Santa Monica Boulevard.
In the Los Angeles area there are a handful of future hydrogen fueling stations planned which will be operated by different vendors. Shell Hydrogen has decided that it will take the challenge among themselves to open two new H2 stations in the coming weeks.
via Shell Hydrogen Fueling Station Cluster for NYC | Hydrogen Cars and Vehicles.
Jesus plus nothing: Undercover among America’s secret theocrats,
Jesus plus nothing: By Jeffrey Sharlet (Harper’s Magazine)
Undercover among America’s secret theocrats
And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household.—Matthew 10:36
This is how they pray: a dozen clear-eyed, smooth-skinned “brothers” gathered together in a huddle, arms crossing arms over shoulders like the weave of a cable, leaning in on one another and swaying like the long grass up the hill from the house they share. The house is a handsome, gray, two-story colonial that smells of new carpet and Pine-Sol and aftershave; the men who live there call it Ivanwald. At the end of a tree-lined cul-de-sac, quiet but for the buzz of lawn mowers and kids playing foxes-and-hounds in the park across the road, Ivanwald sits as one house among many, clustered together like mushrooms, all devoted, like these men, to the service of Jesus Christ. The men tend every tulip in the cul-de-sac, trim every magnolia, seal every driveway smooth and black as boot leather. And they pray, assembled at the dining table or on their lawn or in the hallway or in the bunk room or on the basketball court, each man’s head bowed in humility and swollen with pride (secretly, he thinks) at being counted among such a fine corps for Christ, among men to whom he will open his heart and whom he will remember when he returns to the world not born-again but remade, no longer an individual but part of the Lord’s revolution, his will transformed into a weapon for what the young men call “spiritual war.”
“Jeff, will you lead us in prayer?”
Towards a Solution to the Debt Crisis in California
Towards a Solution to the Debt Crisis in California
The State could walk away & create its own credit machine
by Ellen Brown
Four Wall Street banks, which received $15-25 billion each from the taxpayers, have rejected California’s IOUs because the State is supposedly a bad credit risk. The bailed out banks would seem to have a duty to lend a helping hand, but they say they don’t want to delay an agreement on further austerity measures. State legislators are not bowing quickly to the pressure, but what is the alternative?
In the latest twist to the California budget saga, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, and JPMorgan Chase (which each got $25 billion in bailout money from the taxpayers) and Bank of America (which got $15 billion) have refused California’s request for a loan to tide it over until October. Until the State can get things sorted out, it has started paying its creditors in IOUs (“I Owe You’s” or promises to pay bearing interest, technically called registered warrants). Its Wall Street creditors, however, have refused to take them. Why? The pot says the kettle is a poor credit risk!
California expects to need to issue only about $13 billion in IOUs through September, and all its Governor has asked for in the way of a loan from the federal government is a guarantee for $6 billion. Total loans, commitments and guarantees to rescue the financial sector and stem the credit crisis have been estimated at $12.8 trillion. But California has not been invited to the banquet. The total sum California needs to balance its budget is $26.3 billion. That is about the same sum given to Citigroup, Wells Fargo and JPMorgan in bailout money; and it is only about one-tenth the sum given to AIG, a mere insurance company. Corporations evidently trump States and their citizens in the eyes of the powers controlling the purse strings. California has a gross domestic product of $1.7 trillion annually and has been rated the world’s eighth largest economy. Its 38.3 million people are one-eighth of the nation’s population and a key catalyst for U.S. retail sales. When the California consumer base falters, businesses are shaken nationwide. If AIG and the other Wall Street welfare recipients are too big to fail, California is way too big to fail.
via Towards a Solution to the Debt Crisis in California.
The Popular Way To Pay for Health Care
The Popular Way To Pay for Health Care
The emerging Democratic plan to pay for health care reform is through a surtax on Americans making $350,000 a year or more:
Instead, Rangel said Democrats will seek to enact one large tax increase targeting wealthier workers to generate the revenue they need to finance their $1 trillion-plus healthcare reform bill.(…)
There would be different surtax rates, ranging from 1 percent to 3 percent, for workers with annual earnings of $350,000, $500,000 and $1 million, Rangel said. Surtaxes are calculated by adding the relevant percentage to workers’ regular yearly tax bill.
Despite the overwhelming, galactic, historic and never before equaled popularity of the “tea party” protests this year, this Democratic plan to pay for health care reform through taxes on the wealthy is an extremely popular public policy route. This is because there really is no constituency for cuts to government spending. A recent poll conducted by Pew showed that spending cuts are a truly fringe position in American politics:
via Open Left:: The Popular Way To Pay for Health Care.
Some Facts About HealthCare The GOP Lobbyist And Conservative Dem’s Don’t Want You To Know
This is a video with different clips on the issue of health care .It has some facts that may or may not surprise some people . I recently talked to a friend that lives in Canada .She confirmed with me along with facts in this video , that we need a single payer system in the U.S. .Even though Canada’s system isn’t perfect , (ours is less then perfect) you wont have to file for bankruptcy , when you get sick . I will not only challenge any righter on this debate but I will destroy you on this debate with the facts .
YouTube – Some Facts About HealthCare The GOP Lobbyist And Conservative Dem’s Don’t Want You To Know.
Obama Drinks Friedman’s Kool-Aid
Obama Drinks Friedman’s Kool-Aid | CommonDreams.org
by Thom Hartmann
Our economy has gone into the toilet over the past 30 years, and President Obama and his advisors think “free trade” is the solution. Like Bill Clinton and both George Bush’s, he’s so enamored of it he’s even recommending it to poor African nations.
Yet “free trade” is a guaranteed ticket to the poorhouse for any nation, and the evidence is overwhelming. The concept was introduced, in fact, by Henry VII, as something that England should encourage other countries to do while it maintained protectionism; a process known as the 1485 Tudor Plan that led to the rapid industrialization of England and the deeper impoverishment of its trading “partners.”
With no evident irony or understanding of how South Korea went about becoming a modern economic powerhouse, on Friday, July 10, 2009, President Obama lectured the countries of Africa from Ghana, where he was visiting. As The New York Times noted (“Obama Wins More Food Aid but Presses African Nations on Corruption” by Peter Baker and Rachel Donadio) on July 11:
via Obama Drinks Friedman’s Kool-Aid | CommonDreams.org.
On Tiny Plots, a New Generation of Farmers Emerges
On Tiny Plots, a New Generation of Farmers Emerges | CommonDreams.org
ROCHESTER, Wash. – Joseph Gabiou walks the fields of Wobbly Cart Farm with a practiced eye. He kicks dirt into place to keep the wind from blowing the protective covering off a row of organic broccoli. The seedlings are vulnerable to the flea beetles that came in the spring, just as longtime farmers in this valley told him they would.
To a new farmer, that’s crucial information. The farm, started five years ago, is young. But so is the 33-year-old Gabiou at a time when the average age of the American farmer is 57, according to the Department of Agriculture. The 2007 agriculture census found that more than one-quarter of all farmers are 65 or older.
Wobbly Cart is also tiny, just 6 acres. Nationwide, the average farm is 449 acres.
But Gabiou and business partner Asha McElfresh, 32, differ from typical farmers in another way. Wobbly Cart, say agriculture specialists, is part of a movement in which young people – most of whom come from cities and suburbs – are taking up what may be the world’s oldest profession: organic farming
via On Tiny Plots, a New Generation of Farmers Emerges | CommonDreams.org.
Stub your toe? Say ‘Sh#!’ You’ll feel better
Stub your toe? Say ‘Sh#!’ You’ll feel better 
Shouting swear words has a powerful pain-killing effect, study shows
Peggy Loper doesn’t know why, but she’s sure that the rapid hissed repetition of her favorite expletive somehow dulls the pain when she’s hammered her thumb rather than the nail she’d aimed for.
“Generally I start swearing even before the pain actually registers,” says the 48-year-old student from Salem, N.J. “And usually, the ouch-ouch dance, where I’m hopping from foot to foot, goes along with it. People have told me that I should try deep breathing, but I personally prefer to swear.” The F-bomb is her curse word of choice; that hard consonant at the end is particularly satisfying, she explains.
As it turns out, Loper may be right. British scientists have shown that swear words can have a powerful pain-killing effect, according to a new study published in the journal NeuroReport.
via Stub your toe? Say ‘Sh#!’ You’ll feel better – Behavior- msnbc.com.
Goldman Sachs execs sold $700m of stock: report
Goldman Sachs execs sold $700m of stock: report
Executives at US banking giant Goldman Sachs sold almost 700 million dollars worth of stock after Lehman Brothers collapsed in September, the Financial Times reported.
Most of the sales, worth 431 million pounds or 500 million euros, occurred when the firm enjoyed the support of 10 billion dollars in US government capital injections, the London-based newspaper said.
The FT based its report on compilings the newspaper had made of filings by banking executives with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
The surge in selling among Goldman partners, at a time when the US Treasury had thrown Wall Street a lifeline through its asset relief programme, is likely to spark criticism from lawmakers in Washington, the FT said.
via The Raw Story | Goldman Sachs execs sold $700m of stock: report.
Pat Buchanan: Palin’s husband should murder Levi
OPS: MSNBC should be held liable if anything happens to Levi – and have it’s license revoked
Pat Buchanan: Palin’s husband should murder Levi
Conservative pundit and onetime Nixon aide Pat Buchanan suggested in an interview Monday that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s husband should murder her daughter’s ex-boyfriend for speaking unfavorably about her campaign and decision to resign.
“Well, first, with regard to Levi, I think First Dude up there in Alaska, Todd Palin, ought to take Levi down to the creek and hold his head underwater until the thrashing stops,” Buchanan quipped.
TIME’s Mark Halperin chuckled and remarked, “That’s a reality show, right there.”
This video is from MSNBC’s Morning Joe, broadcast July 13, 2009.
via Raw Story » Pat Buchanan: Palin’s husband should murder Levi.
Ex-CIA agent: Zubaydah waterboarded before DoJ memos approved
Ex-CIA agent: Zubaydah waterboarded before DoJ memos approved
A former U.S. intelligence agent said in a report published Monday that terror suspect Abu Zubaydah was subjected to simulated drowning months before the Bush administration’s Department of Justice had written memos approving the use of waterboarding.
The claim strikes a serious blow to repeated Bush administration arguments that no laws were broken in the torture of prisoners because legal guidelines had been closely followed.
Former Central Intelligence Agency officer John Kiriakou, speaking with BBC’s Panorama, said that internal communications detailed Zubaydah’s torture beginning “at the very end of May or the very beginning of June 2002.”
Bush administration lawyers did not issue memorandum supportive of torture — a war crime under the Geneva Convention relative to the treatment of prisoners of war — until August of that year.
via Raw Story » Ex-CIA agent: Zubaydah waterboarded before DoJ memos approved.
Fortune’s Favor
Fortune’s Favor
The Global 500 for 2009 list shows beyond any doubt that American companies, far from being competitive internationally, are now becoming nothing more than mediocre.
Fortune magazine puts together an annual list of America’s top companies – the Fortune 500 – based on profits, revenue, and other factors. The popularity of this list has grown to such a degree that Fortune now produces a so-called Global 500 every year as well.
The Global 500 for 2009, hosted by CNNMoney.com, shows some sobering trends for American companies and their competition overseas. The top 10 lists only four American firms – three oil giants and Wal-Mart. The top of the chart, once populated heavily by U.S. companies, is now largely dominated by Japanese and Chinese firms.
The largest companies in the world are almost exclusively energy conglomerates, and banking and financial firms. The one outlier is Wal-Mart, a retailer nearly seven times the size of its closest competitor which specializes in importing goods for American consumption. On one hand the company gives American’s what they want – inexpensive products. On the other hand, Wal-Mart acts as one of the greatest factors in creating our enormous and destabilizing trade deficit.
Only two of the top 30 fastest growing companies in the world are U.S.-based. They are CHS and Archer Daniels Midland, each specializes in wholesaling and food production.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
Number of Homeless Families on Rise in Suburbs
Number of Homeless Families on Rise in Suburbs
In its annual “Homeless Assessment Report to Congress,” the federal agency found that overall in 2008, the number of homeless families in rural and urban areas was up 56 percent.
Although the overall rate of homelessness nationally has remained relatively stable, the number of homeless families in suburbs and rural areas spiked in 2008 as the housing crisis forced many Americans out of their homes, according to a report released Thursday by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
In its annual “Homeless Assessment Report to Congress,” the federal agency found that overall in 2008, the number of homeless families in rural and urban areas was up 56 percent. Homeless individuals in rural and suburban areas increased 34 percent.
“The annual report tells us a great deal but it also begs many questions about how today’s housing crisis and job losses are playing out in our shelters and on our streets,” said HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan in a written statement. “The Administration’s aggressive approach to economic recovery recognizes that during these difficult times, families in certain areas of the country are at extreme risk of falling into homelessness.”
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
NAFTA Superhighway Stalled
NAFTA Superhighway Stalled
The proposed NAFTA superhighway was dealt another blow earlier this month after the Texas state legislature rejected Gov. Rick Perry’s continued push for toll roads.
The proposed NAFTA superhighway was dealt another blow earlier this month after the Texas state legislature rejected Gov. Rick Perry’s continued push for toll roads.
Perry had called a special legislative session at the beginning of the month with hopes of passing legislation that would have allowed the use of public-private toll roads across the state. The measure was defeated in the House and not even taken up by the Senate.
Besides the fact that it could have cost motorists up to 75 cents per mile, critics claim that the move to allow private investors to take over the operation of roadways is a precursor to the NAFTA Superhighway and possibly the North American Union.
“Rick Perry’s interest in the state’s growing transportation problems appears to be limited to protecting the contracts of private firms,” Hans Klingler, a spokesman for gubernatorial candidate Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson (R-TX), told the Dallas Morning News. “The Trans-Texas Corridor and the tolling of roads has been an expensive assault on the rights of property owners.”
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
An American Crisis
An American Crisis
According to the Global 500, produced by Fortune, American titans General Motors and Ford rank 18th and 19th globally and 3rd and 4th in the auto industry.
The collapse of the auto industry during the past several years became headline news again last week. General Motors received court approval for its restructuring program and was able to sell enough valuable assets to emerge from bankruptcy. Despite what may appear to be a positive moment for this vital U.S. industry, American automakers are still in dire straights.
This is easily shown by a quick comparison of global industry leaders. According to the Global 500, produced by Fortune, American titans General Motors and Ford rank 18th and 19th globally and 3rd and 4th in the auto industry in terms of respective size. These two companies hold revenue of almost $300 billion. Unfortunately, in 2008 alone they lost $44 billion in combined profits.
Volkswagon, Daimler, Fiat, Peugot, and BMW are the largest automakers in Europe. These companies held roughly $550 billion in revenue as of 2009. As a larger conglomerate they should be more susceptible to the same global slowdown that destroyed American carmakers. Yet, instead of showing losses, these companies combined for over $7 billion in profit.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
Young America’s Foundation spokesman writes on Facebook that Sotomayor might ’shank’ Scalia.’
Young America’s Foundation spokesman writes on Facebook that Sotomayor might ’shank’ Scalia.’
The Republican establishment has often appeared worried that attacks on Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, the first Latina nominated to the court, could appear racist. But the activists of the conservative movement are less concerned. In May, blogger Debbie Schlussel called Sotomayor “Justice J-Lo.” Now, the Washington Independent’s Dave Weigel reports that Jason Mattera, the spokesman for Young America’s Foundation, has posted a blatantly offensive message about Sotomayor on his Facebook page:
IRS Role In Madoff Scandal Bears Examination
IRS Role In Madoff Scandal Bears Examination – Scoop:
By Sherwood Ross
The Internal Revenue Service(IRS) has collected “untold billions” of tax dollars from investors swindled by fraudster Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi based on “earnings” that never existed.
That’s the view of Lawrence Velvel, dean of the Massachusetts School of Law at Andover, who says IRS “had no constitutional right to tax (Madoff investors) because the Sixteenth Amendment allows it only to tax ‘income,’ not ‘phantom income.’” Madoff, since convicted, told his investors their “profits” were the result of his trades in their behalf when, in fact, he never made the trades but paid them from monies swindled from new investors.
Velvel, who was himself a victim of Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, points out “The IRS will give you a refund of only a few years of those taxes—money which we now know you were cheated out of from the beginning.” (Madoff is thought to have begun his scheme anywhere from 20 to 40 years ago.) And Velvel adds, “Nor will you get back more than a small fraction of your losses by virtue of the IRS’ new theft deduction rule…(which) will extensively benefit only the obscenely wealthy, who will receive scores of millions of tax deductions…”
via Scoop: IRS Role In Madoff Scandal Bears Examination.
‘The Select Few’ Are Cashing in: Shocking Corruption at the Washington Post
‘The Select Few’ Are Cashing in: Shocking Corruption at the Washington Post
By Bill Moyers and Michael Winship
Insiders in Washington are going to keep dealing themselves winning hands until we decide that it isn’t allowed
If you want to know what really matters in Washington, don’t go to Capitol Hill for one of those hearings, or pay attention to those staged White House “town meetings.” They’re just for show. What really happens — the serious business of Washington — happens in the shadows, out of sight, off the record. Only occasionally — and usually only because someone high up stumbles — do we get a glimpse of just how pervasive the corruption has become.
Case in point: Katharine Weymouth, the publisher of The Washington Post — one of the most powerful people in DC — invited top officials from the White House, the Cabinet and Congress to her home for an intimate, off-the-record dinner to discuss health care reform with some of her reporters and editors covering the story.
But CEOs and lobbyists from the health care industry were invited, too, provided they forked over $25,000 a head — or up to a quarter of a million if they want to sponsor a whole series of these cozy get-togethers. And what is the inducement offered? Nothing less, the invitation read, than “an exclusive opportunity to participate in the health-care reform debate among the select few who will get it done.”
via ‘The Select Few’ Are Cashing in: Shocking Corruption at the Washington Post | Politics | AlterNet.
Behind the Govt.’s Idea to Pull Vicodin and Percoset from the Shelves: Is Tylenol to Blame?
Behind the Govt.’s Idea to Pull Vicodin and Percoset from the Shelves: Is Tylenol to Blame?
Why are Vicodin and Percocet packaged with acetaminophen in the first place?
So the news is out, the bell has sounded: Vicodin and Percocet may soon vanish, no longer to aid wisdom-detoothed adolescents in finally really getting Nirvana. A panel of grave-faced doctors with expertise, wisdom, and beards decreed it so.
But the pill-pulling isn’t even due to the addictive aspects of the drugs, which stem from the inclusion of synthetic opiates; it’s the fact that the medications also incorporate acetaminophen, better known under its ubiquitous brand name, Tylenol. (in fact, the pill-pulling isn’t even as guaranteed as it seems; although the NYT expansively asserted that the FDA “is not required to follow the recommendations of its advisory panels, but it usually does,” the 20-17 voting margin hardly rings of consensus, and the Faster Times spoke with a panelist who voiced some reservations about the way the vote was conducted.) Tylenol can cause acute liver failure in doses over 4,000 mg/day, a dose that is fairly easy to reach with prescription opiates in cases of chronic pain management or addiction.
And so with classic media panache, the fact that the something in your medicine cabinet WILL KILL YOU! was eagerly explored in myriad outlets, and immediately followed by measured reassurances that it’ll all be okay that we would’ve taken to heart if we weren’t already in the hospital dying from NyQuil and a lifelong Smartie-smoking habit. But all of this begged the question: why are hydrocodone (Vicodin) and oxycodone (Percocet) packaged with acetaminophen in the first place?
We Need Clear Thinking: There Should Be No Clash Between Public Option and Single Payer
We Need Clear Thinking: There Should Be No Clash Between Public Option and Single Payer
The debate among progressive health reformers has been sometimes nasty, but they have more in common than they might think.
There appears to be a deep divide within the progressive movement over how to fix health care — a sometimes nasty food-fight between advocates of a public insurance option and those who favor a “single-payer” system.
This split is diverting progressive energy from what is probably the most important domestic policy decision of our time. As Washington Post columnist Harold Meyerson noted, while there is extensive institutional support for a public insurance option, there’s little “street heat.” Progressives seem to be too busy arguing amongst themselves to apply effective pressure to sold-out lawmakers who are protecting insurance companies’ profits.
But the public insurance/single-payer rift is a false dichotomy, and it is distracting us from the real fight. Most systems that people think of as single-payer really aren’t. Something approaching single-payer exists in Canada, Australia and the U.K. But even in these countries, buying supplemental insurance from private insurers is commonplace.
The Balance Begins to Tip Against Cheney
The Balance Begins to Tip Against Cheney
Dick Cheney’s accountability moment may finally be arriving.
After years of pulling punches, Democrats in the Senate are throwing them at Cheney, following the revelation that the man who operated as something akin to a co-president during George Bush’s first term ordered the CIA to withhold information about a secret counterterrorism program from Congress.
There “absolutely” needs to be a Senate Intelligence Committee investigation of Cheney’s assault on the system of checks and balances outlined in the essential sections of the US Constitution, argued Senate majority whip Dick Durbin.
“The executive branch of government cannot create programs like these programs and keep Congress in the dark. There is a requirement for disclosure,” the chamber’s number-two Democrat said on ABC’s This Week program. “(Any investigation) has to be done in an appropriate way so it doesn’t jeopardize our national security, but to have a massive program that is concealed from the leaders in Congress is not only inappropriate; it could be illegal.”
via The Balance Begins to Tip Against Cheney.
Press Attorney General Eric Holder to Bring Torture Architects to Justice
Press Attorney General Eric Holder to Bring Torture Architects to Justice
Demand accountability and help topple ugly Bush precedents.
In spite of President Barack Obama’s insistence that the United States “move forward and not backward” on the issue of Bush-era torture policies, Attorney General Eric Holder has recently indicated he may launch an investigation that would call ex-officials to account.
If carried out, Holder’s investigation would rupture some toxic political precedents: The intimate relationship that formed between the White House and the Department of Justice during the Bush years would certainly come into question, as would Obama’s decidedly non-”change”- oriented approach to detention policies. Perhaps most importantly, Holder’s investigation would sanction the criticism and remediation of previous presidents’ crimes.
None of this will be easy. Newsweek‘s Daniel Klaidman notes, launching an investigation “would roil the country, would likely plunge Washington into a new round of partisan warfare, and could even imperil Obama’s domestic priorities, including health care and energy reform.” It would bring Holder face to face with an array of problematic political conundrums.
via Press Attorney General Eric Holder to Bring Torture Architects to Justice | Take Action | AlterNet.
How Bad Will the Economy Get? Really, Really Bad
How Bad Will the Economy Get? Really, Really Bad
By Thomas Greco, Jr
Historically, every financial and economic crisis has been used to further centralize power and concentrate wealth. This one is no different.
Historically, every financial and economic crisis has been used to further centralize power and concentrate wealth. This one is no different, and in fact the moves being promoted by the Obama administration and the central banks of the Western powers will take the whole world to the pinnacle of financial despotism — unless enough people wake up and claim their own “money power.”
In recent months, the Fed has expanded its “assets” from about $800 billion to more than $2,000 billion. Those so-called assets are securities it bought from financial institutions and loans made to central banks in other countries. But the Fed refuses to name the specific recipients of those funds, while admitting that by doing so they are manipulating the value of the US dollar on foreign exchange markets. (Congressman Alan Grayson Grills Fed Vice Chair Donald Kohn.)
Where does the Fed get the money to buy those “assets” or to make those loans? Quite simply, it creates the money. Unlike you or me or any other economic entity, the Fed has the power to create Federal Reserve dollars by effectively writing a check against no funds. This is the function known as “Open Market Operations.”
via How Bad Will the Economy Get? Really, Really Bad | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet.
GOP Sex Scandal Exposes Secretive Conservative Religious Group — ‘The Family’
Rachel Maddow: GOP Sex Scandal Exposes Secretive Conservative Religious Group — ‘The Family’
By Rachel Maddow,
Sen. John Ensign’s affair has brought unwanted attention on a powerful religious network in Washington.
The following is a transcript from The Rachel Maddow Show on Washington D.C.’s “C Street House,” which is now at the center of a media firestorm. Now GOP Senator Tom Coburn, sex-scandal embroiled GOP leaders Senator John Ensign and South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford have been tied to the C Street House, which is registered as a church and provides substantially lower than market rate rent. Coburn and Ensign have lived at the C Street house, while Sanford has participated in its Bible study group.
We start with a mystery — a mystery that’s unfolding alongside the two major political scandals of the summer. It’s a mystery that concerns this house at 133 C Street Southeast in Washington, D.C. I’m calling it a house because that’s what it looks like to me and people do live there.
But if you consult this building’s financial paper trail, you will find that it’s actually considered to be a church. That designation makes C Street a convenient tax-free haven for the secretive organization that runs it, an organization known as the Family. It also makes for some awkward tax and income questions for the at least five, probably seven members of Congress who live at the house, in exchange for what appears to be substantially below market rent.
Administration Seeks to Restrict Antibiotics in Livestock
Administration Seeks to Restrict Antibiotics in Livestock – NYTimes.com
The Obama administration announced Monday that it would seek to ban many routine uses of antibiotics in farm animals in hopes of reducing the spread of dangerous bacteria in humans.
In written testimony to the House Rules Committee, Dr. Joshua Sharfstein, principal deputy commissioner of food and drugs, said feeding antibiotics to healthy chickens, pigs and cattle — done to encourage rapid growth — should cease. And Dr. Sharfstein said farmers should no longer be able to use antibiotics in animals without the supervision of a veterinarian.
Both practices lead to the development of bacteria that are immune to many treatments, he said.
The hearing was held to discuss a measure proposed by Representative Louise M. Slaughter, Democrat of New York and chairwoman of the Rules Committee. It would ban seven classes of antibiotics important to human health from being used in animals, and would restrict other antibiotics to therapeutic and some preventive uses.
via Administration Seeks to Restrict Antibiotics in Livestock – NYTimes.com.
A Vital Part of Healthcare Reform: Change How We Educate Our Doctors
A Vital Part of Healthcare Reform: Change How We Educate Our Doctors
One aspect of healthcare reform that hasn’t received nearly enough media attention is the need to reform the primary care medical education system. The current system teaches disease management and symptom suppression, which is insufficient to meet our healthcare needs. A reformed system needs a new paradigm that stresses health promotion and treatments that attempt to correct the underlying causes of disease.
Primary care physicians are on the front lines of healthcare. They are the first doctors people see, and the ones they return to for long-term care. One trait that tends to draw people into primary care medicine is the desire to develop lasting relationships with their patients. This frequently means that these doctors end up treating entire families, and in the process learning intimate details of a person’s family dynamics and medical conditions. These relationships provide opportunities to help and affect individuals and families in profound ways.
I have the privilege of working with primary care docs all over the country. Many report to me with frustration that their education doesn’t give them the tools they need to provide the highest possible care. While no one can dispute that these professionals work exceedingly hard, they are hampered by two major failings of conventional medical education philosophy: 1) it focuses on suppressing symptoms with drugs, which are considered the primary and only legitimate treatment modality; and 2) it doesn’t teach how to treat the underlying causes of disease.
via Dr. John Neustadt: A Vital Part of Healthcare Reform: Change How We Educate Our Doctors.
The US needs money, not time
The US needs money, not time - guardian.co.uk
Dean Baker
The Obama administration says its stimulus package needs more time to work, but patience alone won’t revive the economy
When her husband was in the oval office, Laura Bush launched an initiative to promote literacy across the United States. Unfortunately, there was no comparable effort to promote numeracy in our nation’s capital. This has been evident in the discussion of the stimulus among politicians and commentators in the week since the June job numbers were released.
Republicans have been anxious to pronounce the stimulus a failure, while Democrats have insisted that the package just needs more time, pointing out that most of the money has not yet been spent. Neither assertion can withstand the test of simple arithmetic.
The basic story is that the stimulus was too small, pure and simple. It would have been too small even if the Obama’s administration’s projections for the severity of the recession had proven accurate. However, since the downturn is considerably steeper than they had projected, the inadequacy of the stimulus is even greater.
via The US needs money, not time | Dean Baker | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk.
Unasked Question about Sam Alito
Unasked Question about Sam Alito
Glenn Greenwald
At his Senate confirmation hearing, Sam Alito used his opening statement to emphasize how his experience as an Italian-American influences his judicial decision-making (video is here):
But when I look at those cases, I have to say to myself, and I do say to myself, “You know, this could be your grandfather, this could be your grandmother. They were not citizens at one time, and they were people who came to this country” . . . .
When I get a case about discrimination, I have to think about people in my own family who suffered discrimination because of their ethnic background or because of religion or because of gender. And I do take that into account.
Two weeks ago, Alito cast the deciding vote in Ricci v. DeStefano, an intensely contested affirmative action case. He did so by ruling in favor of the Italian-American firefighters, finding that they were unlawfully discriminated against, even though the district court judge who heard all the evidence and the three-judge appellate panel ruled against them and dismissed their case. Notably, the majority Supreme Court opinion Alito joined (.pdf) began by highlighting not the relevant legal doctrine, but rather, the emotional factors that made the Italian-American-plaintiffs empathetic.
via Unasked Question about Sam Alito – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com.
Potato famine disease striking home gardens in U.S.
Potato famine disease striking home gardens in U.S. | Reuters
CHICAGO (Reuters) – Late blight, which caused the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s and 1850s, is killing potato and tomato plants in home gardens from Maine to Ohio and threatening commercial and organic farms, U.S. plant scientists said on Friday.
“Late blight has never occurred this early and this widespread in the United States,” said Meg McGrath, a plant pathologist at Cornell University’s extension center in Riverhead, New York.
She said the fungal disease, spread by spores carried in the air, has made its way into the garden centers of large retail chains in the Northeastern United States.
“Wal-mart, Home Depot, Sears, Kmart and Lowe’s are some of the stores the plants have been seen in,” McGrath said in a telephone interview.
The disease, known officially as Phytophthora infestans, causes large mold-ringed olive-green or brown spots on plant leaves, blackened stems, and can quickly wipe out weeks of tender care in a home garden.
McGrath said in her 21 years of research, she has only seen five outbreaks in the United States. The destructive disease can spread rapidly in cooler, moist weather, infecting an entire field within days.
“What’s unique about it this year is we have never seen plants affected in garden centers being sold to home gardeners,” she said.
via Potato famine disease striking home gardens in U.S. | Science | Reuters.
Study finds big rise in job cuts planned at IT shops
Study finds big rise in job cuts planned at IT shops
But the post dot-com crash was worse for IT workers
Forty-six percent of North American IT shops are planning to cut positions this year, up from 24% last year, with one-quarter planning to slash staff by 10% or more, according to a newly released study by Computer Economics.
The findings indicate widespread doubt among IT executives that the recession will end soon.
Only 27% intend to increase headcount, and another 27% plan to keep staffing levels flat, the study also found.
The Irvine, California, research firm also found that the majority of IT budgets are either flat (17%) or decreasing this year (38%). Forty-five percent of respondents reported their budgets will grow this year.
via Study finds big rise in job cuts planned at IT shops.
Liz Cheney: Investigating My Dad Would Prove Americans ‘Can’t Trust’ Democrats With National Security
Liz Cheney: Investigating My Dad Would Prove Americans ‘Can’t Trust’ Democrats With National Security
Dick Cheney talks to his daughter, Liz.On Saturday, the New York Times reported that former Vice President Dick Cheney gave “direct orders” to the CIA, compelling the agency to withhold “information about a secret counterterrorism program from Congress for eight years.” Despite news organizations’ efforts to contact him, Cheney has yet to comment on the revelation.
Following the revelation, congressional Democrats have called for an investigation into the hidden program, which the Wall Street Journal reports involved “an attempt to carry out a 2001 presidential authorization to capture or kill al Qaeda operatives.” But on the Washington Times’ America’s Morning News radio show today, Cheney’s daughter, Liz, lashed back at his critics:
Reed starting ‘hipper’ Christian Coalition.
Reed starting ‘hipper’ Christian Coalition.
After years of scandals and political defeats, it appears Ralph Reed is going to try for a political comeback. Reed is creating a new advocacy group called the Faith and Freedom Coalition, reports the Atlanta Journal Constitution. The latest venture, Reed says, will focus on “finding and training the next generation of conservative leaders, volunteers and activists” and serve as a Christian Coalition 2.0 for conservative voters of faith:
“This is not going to be your daddy’s Christian Coalition,” Reed said in an interview to describe his new venture, the Faith and Freedom Coalition. “It has to be younger, hipper, less strident, more inclusive and it has to harness the 21st century that will enable us to win in the future.” [...]
“Even though I’ve been doing other things, this is kind of like Steve Jobs returning to Apple,” Reed said.
via Think Progress » Reed starting ‘hipper’ Christian Coalition..
Fact-checking Steele’s ‘nonsense’ on the Recovery Act.
Fact-checking Steele’s ‘nonsense’ on the Recovery Act.
ap090713020106Today, Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele made an appearance in New Jersey to support GOP gubernatorial nominee Chris Christie. Noting that President Obama is going to be in the Garden State with incumbent governor Jon Corzine on Thursday, Steele launched into a criticism of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, asking those in the crowd how much stimulus money they’ve seen:
And where is the Governor on this? Does the governor like this bailout nonsense? Oh, I think he does. Does he like that stimulus check? How much of the stimulus check have you seen to create jobs in New Jersey?
via Think Progress » Fact-checking Steele’s ‘nonsense’ on the Recovery Act..
Stress disorder ups dementia risk in older veterans
Stress disorder ups dementia risk in older veterans | | Reuters
CHICAGO (Reuters) – Older veterans who have had post-traumatic stress disorder have nearly double the risk of dementia than other veterans, U.S. researchers said on Monday.
The findings, presented at an Alzheimer’s Association meeting in Vienna, are the first to link PTSD — a debilitating anxiety disorder that can be caused by wartime trauma — with dementia.
“The million-dollar question is why,” Dr. Ronald Petersen of the Alzheimer’s Association and an Alzheimer’s researcher at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, said in a telephone interview.
Some studies have found PTSD was linked with diminished brain volume in the hippocampus, a part of the brain involved in memory and stress response.
Alzheimer’s is the most common form of dementia, which is marked by a loss of memory and other cognitive, or thinking, abilities, including the ability to speak, identify objects or think abstractly.
via Stress disorder ups dementia risk in older veterans | Health | Reuters.
The planet’s future: Climate change ‘will cause civilisation to collapse’ – Climate Change, Environment
The planet’s future: Climate change ‘will cause civilisation to collapse’ – The Independent
Authoritative new study sets out a grim vision of shortages and violence – but amid all the gloom, there is some hope too
An effort on the scale of the Apollo mission that sent men to the Moon is needed if humanity is to have a fighting chance of surviving the ravages of climate change. The stakes are high, as, without sustainable growth, “billions of people will be condemned to poverty and much of civilisation will collapse”.
This is the stark warning from the biggest single report to look at the future of the planet – obtained by The Independent on Sunday ahead of its official publication next month. Backed by a diverse range of leading organisations such as Unesco, the World Bank, the US army and the Rockefeller Foundation, the 2009 State of the Future report runs to 6,700 pages and draws on contributions from 2,700 experts around the globe. Its findings are described by Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the UN, as providing “invaluable insights into the future for the United Nations, its member states, and civil society”.
The impact of the global recession is a key theme, with researchers warning that global clean energy, food availability, poverty and the growth of democracy around the world are at “risk of getting worse due to the recession”. The report adds: “Too many greedy and deceitful decisions led to a world recession and demonstrated the international interdependence of economics and ethics.”
Robert McNamara and Smedley Butler
Robert McNamara and Smedley Butler | CommonDreams.org
by Tom Gallagher
There’s been a lot of ink spilled in the past week over how we ought to think about the late Robert McNamara. (And yes, real ink, not just virtual – even the remaining real newspapers were in on it.) Does the fact that he came to realize that the Vietnam War (“McNamara’s War” to some) was wrong even as he continued to pursue it as Lyndon Johnson’s Defense Secretary make him a better or a worse person? And what of his willingness to say it publicly – but only three decades later? There may be a more useful way to think about him, however. And it involves considering him not in conjunction with, say, Henry Kissinger, who followed a course similar to his but apparently without hesitation, but more in terms of General Smedley Butler, someone who did learn from his experience.
Butler, of course, achieved far greater clarity than the ever-hedging McNamara did. Butler’s story is fairly well known: four years after a military career that included service in Cuba, China, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Mexico, Haiti, and France, he wrote a book called “War is a Racket.” He gave speeches in which he would say things like, “during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle- man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.”
Whether any of this later-in-life understanding made Butler a better or worse person I do not know. What I do know, though, is that what Butler was willing to say and write was extremely helpful to more than one generation of antiwar activists: “Hey, you don’t have to take my word for it. Listen to this guy, he should know.”
via Robert McNamara and Smedley Butler | CommonDreams.org.
HR 2749 – An Agribusiness Empowering Act
HR 2749 – An Agribusiness Empowering Act
by Stephen Lendman
America is the truest example of what George Bernard Shaw meant when he said “Democracy is a form of government that substitutes election by the incompetent many for the appointment by the corrupt few.” Obama is upholding the tradition and then some.
In fact, in less than six months, he’s done the impossible. With congressional Democrats, he’s compiled a worse record than even his fiercest critics feared, worse than George Bush, straight across the board on both domestic and foreign policies that include:
– looting the nation’s wealth, wrecking the economy, and consigning growing millions to impoverishment without jobs, homes, savings, social services, or futures;
– proposing greater Fed empowerment and global monetary control, disguised as financial reform;
– expanding unbridled militarism through continued foreign wars, occupations, and stepped up aggression on new fronts with the largest defense budget in history – greater than the rest of the world combined at a time America has no enemies;
– its first coup d’etat in Honduras against its democratically elected president, an attempted regime change in Iran, and perhaps others ahead against independent leaders called national security threats while continuing to support the world’s most ruthless and corrupt tyrants;
via SteveLendmanBlog: HR 2749 – An Agribusiness Empowering Act.
Texas is ‘number one’ in executions, murders, children in poverty, industrial pollution
Texas is ‘number one’ in executions, murders, children in poverty, industrial pollution
by Len Hart, The Existentialist Cowboy
Texas recently beat Mississippi in a race to dead last in high school graduations. At the same time, Texas may ‘boast’ that it is ‘number one’ in executions, number ‘one’ in the number of children living in poverty, number one the number of murders per one thousand persons, number one in various forms of industrial pollution! Number one in the race to bottom.
I had toyed with headlining this piece: ‘Why Capitalism Must be Eliminated and Replaced’. But the answer was too obvious: Texas! Texas will have proven Marx correct about almost everything! Marx was certainly correct about the source of ‘value’ in any economic system. He was most certainly correct about the incompatibility of capitalism and democracy. Texas is the best evidence Marx didn’t live long enough to cite.
Texas is called the gulag state for good reasons. Certainly, justice in Texas is applied inequitably. Minorities –primarily black and Hispanic –are disproportionately represented in the Texas gulag system but under represented in the State legislature, the various city councils, and the state judicial system. Texas is about 50 years behind the times in this regard.
Texas is a state in which so-called ‘free enterprise’ has robbed millions of children of a decent education and as many poor of justice in a state ruled by elites. As a result of so-called ‘free enterprise’:
* Texas/Bush syle provides the residents of Texas with some of the nation’s very worst crime and incarceration rates;
* Texas subjects the residents of Texas to deteriorating air quality and wanton ecosystem destruction;
* Texas can boast of the the nation’s very worst murder, crime and incarceration rates!
* Texas –a state that now leads the nation in pollution, crime, and illiteracy –should be studied by any other state wish to avoid a similar distastrous fate.
Draw your own conclusions about the distance between Goldman Sachs and the US government
Draw your own conclusions about the distance between Goldman Sachs and the US government
Matt Taibbi
The prosecution wanted to the judge to deny bail, a la Bernie Madoff and Allen Stanford, because the stolen code “could be use to manipulate the market in unfair ways.” The judge, to his credit chose to disagree. This was an alleged crime against GOLDMAN, not, presumably a crime against society. Therefore it was a “garden variety” economic crime, meaning that the normal niceties of “free on bail” were available.
via Is the U.S. Government An Arm of Goldman Sachs? – Graham and Dodd Investor — Seeking Alpha.
Apologies for getting to this late — I’m on deadline on something else and haven’t had much time to post — but this just has to be posted, given the continued debate over Goldman Sachs. Surely plenty of people followed the story last week of Sergey Aleynikov, a Russian computer whiz who, well, defected from the employ of Goldman Sachs, apparently taking with him the bank’s proprietary trading code. There is a lot of backstory here that is key: if you’ve followed Zero Hedge’s speculations dating back months about Goldman somehow manipulating program trading at the NYSE, this is connected to that, as the theory here is that Aleynikov stole the computer program that Goldman may have been using to manipulate the NYSE.
Such speculations until recently may have sounded like conspiracy theories, but then last week Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph Facciponti stood up in court and let loose a whopper. “The bank has raised the possibility that there is a danger that somebody who knew how to use this program could use it to manipulate markets in unfair ways,” he said.
David Swanson: I’ve Seen 1,200 Torture Photos
David Swanson: I’ve Seen 1,200 Torture Photos
BUZZFLASH GUEST COMMENTARY by David Swanson
This moment, in which the Attorney General of the United States claims to be considering the possibility of allowing our laws against torture to be enforced, seems a good one in which to reveal that I have seen over 1,200 torture photos and a dozen videos that are in the possession of the United States military. These are photographs depicting torture, the victims of torture, and other inhuman and degrading treatment. Several videos show a prisoner intentionally slamming his head face-first very hard into a metal door. Guards filmed this from several angles rather than stopping it.
The Special Broadcasting Service (SBS) of Australia revealed several of these photographs, video of the head slamming, and video of prisoners forced to masturbate, as part of a news report broadcast in 2006. But the full collection has not been made available to the public or to a special prosecutor, although it was shown to members of Congress in 2004. When these photos are eventually made public, I encourage you to take a good look at them. After you get over feeling ill, it might be appropriate to consider Congress’ past five years of inaction. You’ll be able to feel sick all over again.
In January 2004, the military seized photos and videos that were on computers and cell phones at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. Those related to the abuse of prisoners amounted, as far as I know, to those in the collection I’ve looked at. So this collection does not include images of torture or mistreatment that may have taken place at Abu Ghraib after that date or at other locations at any time. I have reason to believe that such photos also exist in large quantity and depict types of abuses we have not yet seen.
via David Swanson: I’ve Seen 1,200 Torture Photos | BuzzFlash.org.
Leahy wants truth commission for CIA/Cheney allegations
OPS: Leahy running interference for the REICH – again. This clowns printing press for “get out of jail free” cards for his criminal friends is running overtime
Leahy wants truth commission for CIA/Cheney allegations
Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) says that — rather than a criminal prosecution — he would prefer to see a commission of inquiry into the growing controversy over the CIA misleading Congress and allegations that then-Vice President Dick Cheney ordered the CIA to withhold crucial information.
The New York Times reported Sunday that unnamed sources say Cheney himself gave the order to the CIA not to tell Congress about a certain CIA counter-terrorism program. If the allegations against Cheney are true, then he would have violated the National Security Act, which mandates Congressional oversight of the CIA.
Also on Sunday the Washington Post Co. reported that Attorney General Eric Holder is considering appointing a special prosecutor to look into the allegations of misconduct by Cheney and the CIA.
via Raw Story » Leahy wants truth commission for CIA/Cheney allegations.
The Folly of Comparative Advantage
The Folly of Comparative Advantage
No nation can hope to specialize completely, because the slightest abnormality in demand or supply, or an unforeseen instability, could easily topple the entire economy.
The idea of “comparative advantage” was first put to paper at the turn of the 19th century by English political economist David Ricardo in “On the Principles of Political Economy and Taxation.” His ideas revolutionized the ways in which nations dealt commercially. Comparative advantage is perhaps the greatest cornerstone of “free trade” and modern liberalized economics.
Unfortunately, modern economists have taken the theory far beyond the bounds which Ricardo himself would have seen as reasonable. In Ricardo’s famous example, England specializes in cloth production, and Portugal specializes in wine production – as is their respective comparative advantage. They trade excess cloth for wine, and vice versa, and in the end each has more of both wine and cloth. Had they tried to produce on their own without trading, they are shown to have less of each.
Ralph Gomory, writing for The Huffington Post, has a very different view of Ricardian trade theory. Gomory has a Ph.D in mathematics from Princeton University, is a Research professor at New York University, and among his other professional accomplishments is a president of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
Trade Deficit Negates Stimulus Spending
Trade Deficit Negates Stimulus Spending
At 2.5 percent of GDP, the trade deficit subtracts more from demand for U.S.-made goods and services than President Obama’s stimulus package adds. Moreover, the lift from the Obama stimulus is temporary, whereas the drag from the trade deficit is permanent.
The following article originally appeared on TradeReform.org.
Subsidized manufactures from China and petroleum imports comprise more than 90 percent of the deficit and both will rise as consumer spending and oil prices rebound later in 2009.
At 2.5 percent of GDP, the trade deficit subtracts more from demand for U.S.-made goods and services than President Obama’s stimulus package adds. Moreover, the lift from the Obama stimulus is temporary, whereas the drag from the trade deficit is permanent.
Money spent on Chinese coffee markers and Middle East oil cannot be spent on U.S. made products, unless offset by comparable exports. The resulting shortfall in demand for U.S.-made goods and services is a significant cause of the recession and why the economy needs huge stimulus spending and budget deficits to keep going. The trade deficit could push unemployment above 10 percent for many years.
If President Obama continues to ignore the trade deficit, his policies to fight the recession will result in a moderate recovery in 2010 but the economy will later collapse into a deeper recession when the stimulus money is all spent.
So far, the Obama Administration has failed to challenge Beijing’s more virulent mercantilist practices—its large official purchases of U.S. dollars that suppress the exchange rate for the yuan, subsidize Chinese exports and artificially elevate Chinese savings and suppress U.S. savings. The China-U.S. savings imbalance is hardly entirely a natural phenomenon rooted in consumer behavior.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
Former Top Insurance Exec Blows The Whistle On Health Insurance Companies’ Plot Against Reform
Former Top Insurance Exec Blows The Whistle On Health Insurance Companies’ Plot Against Reform
In an interview with PBS’ Bill Moyers on Friday, former health insurance executive Wendell Potter revealed that health insurance companies had developed a concerted strategy to discredit Michael Moore’s movie SiCKO:
BILL MOYERS: And there was a political strategy. “Position Sicko as a threat to Democrats’ larger agenda.” What does that mean?
WENDELL POTTER: That means that part of the effort to discredit this film was to use lobbyists and their own staff to go onto Capitol Hill and say, “Look, you don’t want to believe this movie. You don’t want to talk about it. You don’t want to endorse it. And if you do, we can make things tough for you.”
BILL MOYERS: How?
WENDELL POTTER: By running ads, commercials in your home district when you’re running for reelection, not contributing to your campaigns again, or contributing to your competitor.
An introduction to New Technologies (Part I) – Your RFID implant
An introduction to New Technologies (Part I)
by Patrick Redmond
Patrick Redmond graduated with a Doctorate in History from the University of London, England in 1972. He taught at the University of the West Indies in Trinidad, then at Adhadu Bello University in Kano, Nigeria before joining IBM. He worked in IBM for 31 years before retiring. During his career at IBM he held a variety of jobs. These included; from 1992 until 2007 working at the IBM Toronto lab in technical, then in sales support. He has written two books and numerous articles. Here is a presentation he gave in Toronto on April 13, 2008.
* * *
I want to thank Yvon for inviting me here to talk about new technologies. What I’m going to do is give you an introduction to three technologies that are becoming more and more important. The first is RFID chips, the second genetic engineering, and the third synthetic biology. This will give you an understanding of what is happening and where science is going.
We will start with RFID chips:
So what are they? They are Radio Frequency Identification Devices. An RFID is a microchip with an attached antenna. The microchip contains stored information which can be transmitted to a reader and then to a computer.
RFID’s can be passive, semi-passive or active. Active RFID’s have an internal power source such as a battery. This allows the tag to send signals back to the reader, so if I have a RFID on me and it has a battery, I can just send a signal to a reader wherever it is. They can receive and store data, and be read at a further distance than the passive RFID’s. The batteries can only last a short while. But the current batteries in the RFID’s can last for over a hundred years, because of their self-generating power. Ultrawideband (UWB) allows the small battery operated RFID tag to be sensed over fairly wide areas. For instance, GE Aircraft Engines in Ohio has installed five readers in the factory and it covers over 30,000 square feet so they can track everything within that area with only the five readers. That gives you an idea of the distance that can be covered by an RFID tag that might be on you or on equipment.
via An introduction to New Technologies (Part I).
Boiling the Frog – Creeping Disasters for the Economy and the Planet
Boiling the Frog - NYTimes.com
Is America on its way to becoming a boiled frog?
Paul Krugman
I’m referring, of course, to the proverbial frog that, placed in a pot of cold water that is gradually heated, never realizes the danger it’s in and is boiled alive. Real frogs will, in fact, jump out of the pot — but never mind. The hypothetical boiled frog is a useful metaphor for a very real problem: the difficulty of responding to disasters that creep up on you a bit at a time.
And creeping disasters are what we mostly face these days.
I started thinking about boiled frogs recently as I watched the depressing state of debate over both economic and environmental policy. These are both areas in which there is a substantial lag before policy actions have their full effect — a year or more in the case of the economy, decades in the case of the planet — yet in which it’s very hard to get people to do what it takes to head off a catastrophe foretold.
And right now, both the economic and the environmental frogs are sitting still while the water gets hotter.
via Op-Ed Columnist – Boiling the Frog – Creeping Disasters for the Economy and the Planet – NYTimes.com.
Japanese PM to call for general election
Japanese PM to call for general election - CNN.com
Japan’s Prime Minister Taro Aso will dissolve the lower house of parliament this month and call for general elections in August, the government said Monday.
Hours later, the main opposition party said it, along with three others, submitted a no-confidence motion against Aso and his Cabinet.
The lower house of the Diet will be dissolved the week of July 21; elections for new lawmakers will be held on August 30, said Jun Matsumoto, the chief Cabinet spokesman.
The beleaguered prime minister has faced increasing pressure from within his party, the conservative Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), to step down as his approval rating plummets amid Japan’s worsening economy.
On Sunday, the LDP suffered a huge defeat in local elections, when it lost its majority in the Tokyo assembly to the opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) and its coalition partner.
via Japanese PM to call for general election – CNN.com.
The events preceding Goldman Sachs’ new “blowout profits”
The events preceding Goldman Sachs’ new “blowout profits” – Salon.com
Glenn Greenwald
Remember all of this — the $700 billion bank bailout, the AIG scandal, dark and scary threats of imminent global meltdown if there wasn’t full-scale capitulation by the citizenry to the immense transfer of public wealth to the private investment banking sector? Such distant, hazy memories: so many exciting celebrity deaths and riveting celebrity resignations ago. If sequences of events like these don’t cause mass citizen outrage, then it’s hard to imagine what will:
The New York Times, September 19, 2008:
WASHINGTON — It was a room full of people who rarely hold their tongues. But as the Fed chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, laid out the potentially devastating ramifications of the financial crisis before congressional leaders on Thursday night, there was a stunned silence at first.
Mr. Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. had made an urgent and unusual evening visit to Capitol Hill, and they were gathered around a conference table in the offices of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“When you listened to him describe it you gulped,” said Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York.
via The events preceding Goldman Sachs’ new “blowout profits” – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com.
How Rove Said He’d Answer Siegelman Queries
How Rove Said He’d Answer Siegelman Prosecution Queries
While the details of Karl Rove’s eight-hour deposition Tuesday before the House Judiciary Committee remain unknown, Rove has provided insight into how he said he intended to answer the panel’s questions. The deposition concerned Rove’s role in the firings of nine US attorneys and the alleged political prosecution of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman.
In March, during a little-known interview on Fox News, where Rove is a contributor, Rove told Chris Wallace that he has already responded to questions about Siegelman’s prosecution and has posted his answers to written questions on his web site, Rove.com.
“My understanding is I am going to be questioned both about the US attorneys [dismissals] and about the allegations that I was responsible for the prosecution of Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman … a lot of these answers, particularly with regard to Siegelman, are already on my web site,” Rove said in the March 8 interview.
via Scoop: How Rove Said He’d Answer Siegelman Queries.
Ex-IBM Employee reveals TV Abandoned Analog Band to Make Room for RFID Chips
Ex-IBM Employee reveals TV Abandoned Analog Band to Make Room for RFID Chips
According to a former 31-year IBM employee, the highly-publicized, mandatory switch from analog to digital television is mainly being done to free up analog frequencies and make room for scanners used to read implantable RFID microchips and track people and products throughout the world.
So while the American people, especially those in Texas and other busy border states, have been inundated lately with news reports advising them to hurry and get their expensive passports, “enhanced driver’s licenses,” passport cards and other “chipped” or otherwise trackable identification devices that they are being forced to own, this digital television/RFID connection has been hidden, according to Patrick Redmond.
Redmond, a Canadian, held a variety of jobs at IBM before retiring, including working in the company’s Toronto lab from 1992 to 2007, then in sales support. He has given talks, written a book and produced a DVD on the aggressive, growing use of passive, semi-passive and active RFID chips (Radio Frequency Identification Devices) implanted in new clothing, in items such as Gillette Fusion blades, and in countless other products that become one’s personal belongings. These RFID chips, many of which are as small, or smaller, than the tip of a sharp pencil, also are embedded in all new U.S. passports, some medical cards, a growing number of credit and debit cards and so on. More than two billion of them were sold in 2007.
Whether active, semi-passive or passive, these “transponder chips,” as they’re sometimes called, can be accessed or activated with “readers” that can pick up the unique signal given off by each chip and glean information from it on the identity and whereabouts of the product or person, depending on design and circumstances, as Redmond explained in a little-publicized lecture in Canada last year. AFP just obtained a DVD of his talk.
via Ex-IBM Employee reveals TV Abandoned Analog Band to Make Room for RFID Chips « Dprogram.net.
87.5% of “Family” & DLC Affiliated Senate Democrats Voted Yes on FISA
87.5% of “Family” & DLC Affiliated Senate Democrats Voted Yes on FISA
In early July 2008 Senate Republicans voted, with astounding conformity, in favor of the controversial electronic surveillance FISA bill update that was condemned by American civil liberties advocates across a wide range of the US political spectrum; two GOP Senators, John McCain and Jeff Sessions, abstained from voting and so 95.9 % of Republicans voted “aye” on FISA. But there was one specialized subgroup within the Democratic Party that voted with almost as much uniformity in favor of the FISA bill – Senate Democrats who belonged both to the DLC and who were members or “friends” of a shadowy fundamentalist group that’s been burrowing, since the Eisenhower years, into the Washington power establishment: The Family.
This is the first in a series which will explore, building off Jeff Sharlet’s new book The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at The Heart Of American Power (excerpt from book and a review), recent influence of The Family within American politics and especially within the Democratic Party. Future installments in this series will cover: (1) the birth of the DLC and the ties of key DLC founders to The Family, (2) treatments of specific DLC members with extensive Family associations (3) possible Family influence in the 2000 US Presidential election (4) methods by which The Family has advanced its ideological agenda, through legislation, supported by Republican-DLC coalitions, designed to attack New Deal and social welfare programs, attack church-state separation and advance other long-term Family goals.
As Constitutional Law expert Jonathan Turley put it, shortly before the July 2008 final U.S. Senate vote on the FISA bill which expanded the power of US presidents to conduct secret surveillance of American citizens, “What the Democrats are doing here with the White House is they’re trying to conceal a crime that is hiding in plain view. … It’s like all those stories where someone is assaulted on the street and a hundred witnesses do nothing. In this case, the Fourth Amendment is going to be eviscerated tomorrow, and a hundred people are going to watch it happen because it’s just not their problem”. Based on data I’ve compiled, from the controversial FISA Senate vote, one could possibly predict, with some accuracy, upcoming Senate votes establishing various components of an emerging, wildly antidemocratic legal apparatus for an American national security state. Secret government surveillance was, of course, a hallmark of Soviet Russia and it is common to many authoritarian regimes. So FISA probably serves as a very good proxy – US Senators willing to cast their votes in favor of FISA will likely be willing to support just about any legislation that’s antidemocratic, at least in spirit if not directly antagonistic to the US Constitution, to come up for a Senate vote.
Overall, only 56% of Senate Democrats voted against FISA. If they had voted with such uniformity as did Republicans on FISA, the bill would not likely have cleared the Senate. But 42% of Senate Democrats, 21 in total, peeled off to join Republicans in backing the FISA bill. A weak majority of Senate Democrats associated with the Democratic Leadership Council, 55%, supported the FISA bill and DLC Democrats comprised the core of Democratic Party FISA support: 71.4%.
Another distinct subgroup within the DLC and pro-FISA democrats supported the FISA bill with what approached the fervor of Senate Republicans; in the Senate, there are seven Democrats who are both Family members or “friends” and also in the DLC. And there is one independent Senator who shares both affiliations too – Joe Lieberman. So, Democrats with both affiliations went 85.7% for FISA and non-Republican Senators with both affiliations broke for FISA at an even higher percentage, 87.5%.
via Bruce Wilson: 87.5% of “Family” & DLC Affiliated Senate Democrats Voted Yes on FISA.
U.S., UBS Negotiating Settlement of Tax Case on 52,000 Accounts
U.S., UBS Negotiating Settlement of Tax Case on 52,000 Accounts – Bloomberg.com
July 13 (Bloomberg) — UBS AG, the largest Swiss bank by assets, is in talks with the U.S. government to settle a lawsuit seeking the names of 52,000 American account holders suspected of using Swiss secrecy laws to evade taxes.
The bank agreed with the U.S. and Swiss governments to seek a settlement and postpone an evidentiary hearing today in a Miami courtroom, according to a court filing. The U.S. sued UBS on Feb. 19, a day after the bank agreed to pay $780 million to defer prosecution for helping wealthy Americans evade taxes.
Under that agreement, UBS also agreed to an unprecedented breach of Swiss secrecy laws by giving the Internal Revenue Service data on more than 250 accounts. Switzerland, which supports UBS in the case, said the U.S. push for data on 52,000 other accounts is a threat to its sovereignty and would force the bank to violate Swiss criminal laws protecting bank secrecy.
“This adjournment gives people at very high levels of both governments time to get involved and consider the implications of this litigation,” said Bryan Skarlatos, a tax lawyer at Kostelanetz & Fink LLP in New York. “The symbolic value of this case is huge. It’s King Kong versus Godzilla. It’s the IRS versus bank secrecy jurisdictions.”
via U.S., UBS Negotiating Settlement of Tax Case on 52,000 Accounts – Bloomberg.com.
Conservatives Want To Change History In The Classroom
OPS: Still making their own ‘Reality’.
YouTube – Conservatives Want To Change History In The Classroom.
UK plans swine flu vaccine for every citizen
UK plans swine flu vaccine for every citizen
As the UK prepares plans for a massive swine flu vaccination campaign for all of the nation’s residents, the US government is planning to spend another $1 billion on flu vaccinations, Reuters reports.
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said a flu vaccination program will launch in mid-October.
ORIGINAL STORY CONTINUES BELOW
With just 15 of its citizens dead from the virus, the United Kingdom is preparing to undertake the largest vaccination program of the last 50 years, with a vaccine for swine flu that may undergo clinical trials as short as five days, according to published reports.
The first round of vaccines will be available in the UK by early autumn, a government spokesman said. It will be administered two doses per person.
No reports have yet suggested the vaccine will be mandatory.
“People are still making decisions over this, but we want to get cracking before we get a second wave, which is traditionally far more virulent,” Peter Holden of the British Medical Association told ITN. “If the virus does (mutate), it can get a lot more nasty, and the idea is to give people immunity. But the sheer logistics of dealing with 60 million people can’t be underestimated.”
via Raw Story » UK plans swine flu vaccine for every citizen.
McCain Offers Full-Throated Defense Of Palin: ‘She Would Make A Fine President’
OPS: Grampy – Still crazy, after all these years. Just insane!
McCain Offers Full-Throated Defense Of Palin: ‘She Would Make A Fine President’
In a recent article for Vanity Fair, Todd Purdum reported that some of John McCain’s closest advisers “believed for certain [Sarah Palin] was nowhere near ready for the job, and might never be.” This morning, McCain bucked those criticisms of Palin, and instead offered a vigorous (and sometimes nauseating) defense of his selection of her as his running mate.
Asked by host David Gregory what he thought of Palin quitting her job as Governor of Alaska, McCain said, “I don’t think she quit,” adding “I don’t know there was a quote, promise” that she made to the voters of Alaska. Gregory pressed:
GREGORY: Senator McCain, you have faced personal torture, personal attacks, political attacks, investigations. You have never resigned from anything. Is it consistent with your qualities of leadership to resign an elected post like this?
McCAIN: Sure.
GREGORY: It is consistent?
McCain said, “I know she’s qualified. … No doubt about it.” He added, “I’m confident she would make a fine president.” Gregory concluded by asking, “Knowing everything you know now, would you pick her again?” McCain unhesitatingly responded, “Absolutely.” Watch it:
via Think Progress » McCain Offers Full-Throated Defense Of Palin: ‘She Would Make A Fine President’.
GOP Responds To Cheney’s Concealment Of CIA Program With Strawmen And Shrugged Shoulders
GOP Responds To Cheney’s Concealment Of CIA Program With Strawmen And Shrugged Shoulders
Earlier this week, seven House Democrats on the Intelligence Committee released a letter revealing that CIA Director Leon Panetta had “recently testified to Congress that the agency concealed information and misled lawmakers repeatedly since 2001″ about an unidentified CIA operation that was an “on-again, off-again” effort until Panetta stopped it in June. The New York Times reports today that former Vice President Dick Cheney gave “direct orders” for the program to be concealed from Congress.
On the Sunday shows this morning, several Republican lawmakers attempted to defend or divert attention away from the revelation about Cheney. “I don’t think we should be jumping to any conclusions,” said Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-AZ) on ABC’s This Week. Kyl claimed that Cheney’s alleged actions were “not out of the ordinary”:
STEPHANOPOULOS: But this allegation of the vice president ordering it be kept secret, you believe that should be investigated?
KYL: Look, the president and the vice president are the two people who have responsibility, ultimately, for the national security of the country. It is not out of the ordinary for the vice president to be involved in an issue like this.
STEPHANOPOULOS: But to order it be kept secret?
KYL: What if it’s a top secret program? Of course he and the president would both be responsible for that. Let’s don’t jump to conclusions is what I’m saying.
The Role of Small Business in the Economy Might be a Mystery to the Washington Post, but Not to Economists
The Role of Small Business in the Economy Might be a Mystery to the Washington Post, but Not to Economists
–Dean Baker
Politicians Don’t Always Say What They Think #34,237: WSJ Edition
The WSJ tells readers that: “Some lawmakers fear mandated clearing and higher capital charges could hurt small businesses that won’t be able to afford customized hedging anymore.”
Yeah, right. This is what the politicians say. The secret that the WSJ apparently has not learned is that some (yeah, right, “some”) politicians are not always truthful. They sometimes make arguments that do not reflect their real motives.
For example, if they want to protect the big profit margins that Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and the rest enjoy on customized derivatives, they might say that restrictions on these derivatives will raise the price so much that Joe’s Diner will no longer be able to use them to hedge the price of hamburger meat.
Even though they could not care less about Joe’s Diner hedging the price of hamburger meat, it makes a much better story line that saying: “I’m worried that the loss of the customized derivative market will hurt the profits of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, who happen to be big contributors to my campaign.” And hey, if you can get the WSJ to buy it, why not tell them about the risks to Joe’s Diner?
–Dean Baker
via Beat the Press Archive | The American Prospect.
Progressive Breakfast: Blue (Cross) Dogs Barking Again
OPS: Blue DOUBLE-CROSS Dogs 
Progressive Breakfast: Blue (Cross) Dogs Barking Again | OurFuture.org
House Health Care Bill Bumped to Next Week
Blue (Cross) Dogs once again get in the way. CQ: “House Democrats acknowledged that they would not be able to release a final version of their legislation Friday as planned, because of opposition by members of the Blue Dog Coalition … Stark said some of the Blue Dogs’ concerns were frustrating to Democratic leaders. ‘It’s difficult to cut Medicare and increase Medicare, which is what they want,’ he said.”
Politico on Blue (Cross) Dogs pushing Big Pharma agenda: “More than 60 Democrats signed a letter authored by freshman Rep. Debbie Halvorson of Illinois and second-term Rep. Heath Shuler of North Carolina asking Waxman to jettison his plan to reinstate drug price controls to help low-income seniors. Instead, they are asking Waxman, Rangel and Education and Labor Chairman George Miller (D-Calif.) to support the drug industry’s offer to spend $30 billion help cover those costs – a deal that is backed by the White House and the Senate Finance Committee. Waxman wanted to reinstate the price controls to save the government tens of billions of dollars over the next decade – money currently paid to prescription-drug makers – so that he could plow those savings back into the system and close a sizeable gap in the current government-funded prescription-drug program. The industry was hoping to avert such controls by pledging $30 billion to help seniors and another $50 billion to help pay for health reform.”
Bloomberg adds: “the Blue Dog Democrats also urged caution about requiring small businesses to provide employees with health-care coverage.”
via Progressive Breakfast: Blue (Cross) Dogs Barking Again | OurFuture.org.
British government under pressure: 13 doctors demand inquest into Dr David Kelly’s death
British government under pressure: 13 doctors demand inquest into Dr David Kelly’s death
Tony Blair sensitive to the accusation that he has ‘blood on his hands’
by Glen Owen and Miles Goslett
Global Research has published a number of articles by British medical doctors initative led by Drs. Stephen Frost and David Halpin on the issue of Dr. David Kelly’s assassination.
What is significant is the fact that the British mainstream media has acknowledged the initiative of the med9ical doctors and the fact, amply documented, that David Kelly’s death was not a suicide as conveyed in the official British government reports. The importance of the medical doctors initiative is far-reaching. It points to the criminalisation of the upper echelons of the British government.
via British government under pressure: 13 doctors demand inquest into Dr David Kelly’s death.
Goldman Sachs May Report Strong Profit
Goldman Sachs Likely to Post Huge Profits, Analysts Say – NYTimes.com
Most of Wall Street, and America, is still waiting for an economic recovery. Then there is Goldman Sachs.
Up and down Wall Street, analysts and traders are buzzing that Goldman, which only recently paid back its government bailout money, will report blowout profits from trading on Tuesday.
Analysts predict the bank earned a profit of more than $2 billion in the March-June period, because of its trading prowess across world markets. If they are right, the bank’s rivals will once again be left to wonder exactly how Goldman, long the envy of Wall Street, could have rebounded so drastically only months after the nation’s financial industry was shaken to its foundations.
The obsessive speculation has already begun, along with banter about how Goldman’s rapid return to minting money will be perceived by lawmakers and taxpayers who aided Goldman with a multibillion-dollar cushion last fall.
via Goldman Sachs May Report Strong Profit – NYTimes.com.
Lawmakers reject tax to pay for health reform | Reuters
Lawmakers reject tax to pay for health reform
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. lawmakers on Sunday criticized a plan to raise taxes on the wealthy to pay for a $1 trillion healthcare overhaul and warned Congress was unlikely to meet President Barack Obama‘s goal of passing the measure by August.
Republican Senator Judd Gregg said finishing a healthcare bill by Congress’ August recess was “highly unlikely” because the Senate Finance Committee had not yet completed a draft. Senator John Kyl, the Republican whip, said there was “no chance” it would be done before the break.
“President Obama was right about one thing. He said if it’s not done quickly, it won’t be done at all. Why did he say that? Because the longer it hangs out there, the more the American people are skeptical, anxious and even in opposition to it,” Kyl told ABC’s “This Week” program.
via Lawmakers reject tax to pay for health reform | Reuters.
Young Republicans: Racism, Hate, Psychotic Paranoia and Intimidation; Just Like the Old Republicans! | BuzzFlash.org
Young Republicans: Racism, Hate, Psychotic Paranoia and Intimidation; Just Like the Old Republicans!
BUZZFLASH EDITOR’S BLOG By Mark Karlin
Sarah Palin and Audra Shay span the United States from North (Alaska) to South (Louisiana), but they share the emotional molten core of the last Alamo stand of the white GOP: “we’ll fight to keep the government white.”
Audra Shay, nearly 40, just won the Presidency of the Young Republicans over a real young Republican, a woman in her 20s. Shay became infamous last week for the discovery of her racist rants and Michele Bachmann-Glenn Beck style proclamations of a nation near an Obama Armageddon meltdown.
Yet, through bullying and procedural foul play, Shay managed to eke out a win in this year’s convention in Indianapolis to prove that the younger Republicans are just like the older ones: racist, bitter, white and hateful.
Frank Rich writes in his June 12th column about Sarah Palin:
Most important, she stands for a genuine movement: a dwindling white nonurban America that is aflame with grievances and awash in self-pity as the country hurtles into the 21st century and leaves it behind….The real wave she’s riding is a loud, resonant surge of resentment and victimization that’s larger than issues like abortion and gay civil rights.That resentment is in part about race, of course….She puts a happy, sexy face on ugly emotions, and she can solidify her followers’ hold on a G.O.P. that has no leaders with the guts or alternative vision to stand up to them or to her.
‘C Street’ group tied to Ensign is linked to yet another secretive group
‘C Street’ group tied to Ensign is linked to yet another secretive group
The powerful and secretive group known as the Fellowship Foundation or the “Family” is quickly gaining notoriety, due to its links to two scandal-plagued Republicans, Senator John Ensign of Nevada and Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina.
According to the Washington Post, however, the Fellowship Foundation is itself linked to an even more secretive religious organization — Youth With a Mission (YWAM), whose Washington, DC branch owns the “C Street House” where Ensign has lived and where Sanford has participated in Bible study.
A diarist at Daily Kos points out that “YWAM founder leader Loren Cunningham has publicly outlined a vision for Christian world-control,” which involves establishing domination over government, education, business, the media, and other areas.
The last time YWAM came to notice was in 2006, when Loren Cunningham’s son, David Cunningham, gained attention as the director of ABC’s bitterly anti-Clinton “docudrama,” The Path to 9/11. According to Talking Points Memo, the younger Cunningham’s ties to YWAM were discovered by Digby and discussed at length on both Daily Kos and Democratic Underground.
via Raw Story » ‘C Street’ group tied to Ensign is linked to yet another secretive group.
Video: Insurance lobby’s secret plan to attack ‘Sicko’ and Michael Moore
video at link
Video: Insurance lobby’s secret plan to attack ‘Sicko’ and Michael Moore
Former CIGNA exec admits Moore’s Sicko ‘hit the nail on the head’; Reveals lobby’s secret plan to discredit film
In an interview with PBS’s Bill Moyers, a former insurance executive reveals a secret plan by the insurance industry to discredit Michael Moore’s health care documentary, ‘Sicko.’ The plan included lobbyists threatening negative, attack-style ads aimed at politicians who supported the formation of a government sponsored public health care option during election campaigns.
Michael Moore alerted us to Friday evening’s PBS Bill Moyers Show interview with Wendall Potter, a former executive with insurance giant CIGNA:
We’ve just been informed that Bill Moyers, on his show tonight, will expose for the first time the health insurance industry’s secret campaign against Michael Moore and his film, “Sicko.” It contains a stunning revelation and admission by a top health insurance executive — the former head of publicity for CIGNA, one of the top health insurance companies in the country — that the disinformation and attacks on Michael and the film were extensive and well-planned. Their job was to stop the movie from reaching a wide audience (and, more importantly, from having the widespread political impact the industry feared “Sicko” would have).
Wendell Potter, former Head of Corporate Communications at CIGNA (which provides health insurance to nearly 70 percent of the Fortune 100 companies) admits that, in fact, “Sicko” “hit the nail on the head” and told the real truth about how much better people in other countries have it when it comes to their health care.
via The Raw Story » Video: Insurance lobby’s secret plan to attack ‘Sicko’ and Michael Moore.
Bush Surveillance Program Was Massive
Bush Surveillance Program Was Massive | CommonDreams.org
WASHINGTON – The Bush administration built an unprecedented surveillance operation to pull in mountains of information far beyond the warrantless wiretapping previously acknowledged, a team of federal inspectors general reported Friday, questioning the legal basis for the effort but shielding almost all details on grounds they’re still too secret to reveal.
The report, compiled by five inspectors general, refers to “unprecedented collection activities” by U.S. intelligence agencies under an executive order signed by President George W. Bush after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
Just what those activities involved remains classified, but the IGs pointedly say that any continued use of the secret programs must be “carefully monitored.”
The report says too few relevant officials knew of the size and depth of the program, let alone signed off on it. They particularly criticize John Yoo, a deputy assistant attorney general who wrote legal memos undergirding the policy. His boss, Attorney General John Ashcroft, was not aware until March 2004 of the exact nature of the intelligence operations beyond wiretapping that he had been approving for the previous two and a half years, the report says.
via Bush Surveillance Program Was Massive | CommonDreams.org.
Bill Moyers Journal: Wendell Potter Speaks About how For-Profit Insurers Stand in the Way of Healthcare Reform
Bill Moyers Journal: Wendell Potter Speaks About how For-Profit Insurers Stand in the Way of Healthcare Reform
With almost 20 years inside the health insurance industry, Wendell Potter saw for-profit insurers hijack our health care system and put profits before patients. Now, he speaks with Bill Moyers about how those companies are standing in the way of health care reform.
Part 2
Judicial Supremacy and the Rise of the High Court
Judicial Supremacy and the Rise of the High Court | CommonDreams.org
by James MacGregor Burns
WHEN THE Senate Judiciary Committee begins confirmation hearings for Judge Sonia Sotomayor tomorrow, Americans will have an opportunity to evaluate her qualifications and judicial philosophy. But it may be more illuminating for us to reexamine the powers of the Supreme Court itself – especially its power to declare unconstitutional laws that are enacted by the democratically elected branches of the federal government. In the Supreme Court’s ruling of June 22 on a challenge to the landmark Voting Rights Act, Justice John Roberts wrote that finding an act of Congress unconstitutional is the “gravest and most delicate” task the justices have. Grave and delicate, indeed.
Let us for a few minutes think like true “originalists” who respect the original intentions of the framers of the Constitution when they drew up their blueprint for American government in 1787.
Why did the framers give the court that extraordinary veto power? The answer: They did not. This was not an oversight. Judicial supremacy had no place in their carefully calculated blueprint for checks and balances.
via Judicial Supremacy and the Rise of the High Court | CommonDreams.org.
Demolishing Appalachia
Demolishing Appalachia | CommonDreams.org
by Debra McCown
A Wise County, Va., woman is among the stars of a controversial film on mountaintop removal mining that premieres today in Charleston, W.Va.
The film, “Coal Country,” looks at the negative effects of surface coal mining on Appalachian residents and communities in four states. Kathy Selvage, a Wise County activist opposed to mining practices used in the region, is among those featured in the documentary.
“I believe our hope is it brings international exposure to that and also that it furthers a conversation about where we go in energy policy in this country,” Selvage said of the film. “I hope it opens people’s minds to the problems that are the side effects of mountaintop removal coal mining. I hope it opens people’s hearts to the suffering that goes on in communities where this mining occurs right where people live.”
After the premiere in Charleston, more screenings are planned at film festivals and in major cities such as New York and Los Angeles, said the film’s executive producer, Mari-Lynn Evans. The 90-minute movie also will be shown in thousands of smaller screenings around the country – including Bristol and Wise County, Va. – before it begins airing on public television.
via Demolishing Appalachia | CommonDreams.org.
Bush Administration Torture Policy May Face Probe From A.G. Holder
Bush Administration Torture Policy May Face Probe From A.G. Holder | CommonDreams.org
by Rich Schapiro
Attorney General Eric Holder is leaning toward launching a probe into the Bush administration’s torture policies, it was reported Saturday.
Sources told Newsweek that Holder, after months of careful consideration, appears likely to appoint an independent prosecutor to investigate whether top Bush lawyers twisted the law in authorizing torture techniques.
The official decision could come in a matter of weeks. If Holder opts to investigate, it will almost certainly increase tensions in a White House that has insisted it wants to focus on the future.
“I hope that whatever decision I make would not have a negative impact on the President’s agenda,” Holder told Newsweek. “But that can’t be a part of my decision.”
via Bush Administration Torture Policy May Face Probe From A.G. Holder | CommonDreams.org.
Forecasting the Crisis
Forecasting the Crisis
Perhaps the more prudent question to ask would be why didn’t anyone see this coming?
A lot of blame has been doled out for the economic collapse in the United States. It started as a recession in December 2007 and turned quickly into a near-depression by 2009. Now experts from across the country and around the world are trying to figure out how to make it all better, and when exactly the crippling slowdown will end.
Perhaps the more prudent question to ask would be why didn’t anyone see this coming? A few academics like Nuriel Roubini and Peter Morici discussed the possibility of an outright economic collapse. Investor turned political upstart Peter Schiff became notorious after many of the predictions in “Crash Proof: How to Profit From the Coming Economic Collapse” – a book he co-authored with John Downes – came to fruition in early 2008.
Warren Buffett, David Walker, Robert Bixby, and several other prominent business and government leaders produced the film “I.O.U.S.A” to delineate the sheer magnitude of the problems we face. By combining our outstanding debts with our future unfunded liabilities the film concludes that the United States is facing a $50-60 trillion debt monster on the horizon.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
Learning from the Competition
Learning from the Competition
If the Big Three ever hope to regain their footing and become prominent and profitable once again, they would be well-served to learn from their competition.
The American auto industry collapsed around itself in 2008 and 2009, and many in the U.S. – from the halls of Congress to water coolers at work – blamed the Detroit Big Three for their own demise. There were problems with quality, service, and pricing that American automakers overlooked for far too long. Furthermore, they allowed technological advances in gas mileage – primarily from Honda and Toyota – to go unchecked and unmatched by similar U.S. innovation.
If the Big Three ever hope to regain their footing and become prominent and profitable once again, they would be well-served to learn from their competition. Twenty years ago Hyundai was the laughing stock of the auto industry. Today, as explained by Julie Halpert of Newsweek, Hyundai is a rapidly growing and prosperous corporation.
The company was once derided for its low quality and lack of a sound business model. Now Hyundai boasts what is still the industries longest power-train warranty, and most Hyundai models meet and surpass the quality and environmental standards of American vehicles.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
Fortune’s Favor
Fortune’s Favor
The Global 500 for 2009 list shows beyond any doubt that American companies, far from being competitive internationally, are now becoming nothing more than mediocre.
Fortune magazine puts together an annual list of America’s top companies – the Fortune 500 – based on profits, revenue, and other factors. The popularity of this list has grown to such a degree that Fortune now produces a so-called Global 500 every year as well.
The Global 500 for 2009, hosted by CNNMoney.com, shows some sobering trends for American companies and their competition overseas. The top 10 lists only four American firms – three oil giants and Wal-Mart. The top of the chart, once populated heavily by U.S. companies, is now largely dominated by Japanese and Chinese firms.
The largest companies in the world are almost exclusively energy conglomerates, and banking and financial firms. The one outlier is Wal-Mart, a retailer nearly seven times the size of its closest competitor which specializes in importing goods for American consumption. On one hand the company gives American’s what they want – inexpensive products. On the other hand, Wal-Mart acts as one of the greatest factors in creating our enormous and destabilizing trade deficit.
via Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
American children in poverty on the rise
American children in poverty on the rise
More facing threat of hunger with parents unemployed
WASHINGTON — A growing number of American children are living in poverty and with unemployed parents, and are facing the threat of hunger, according to a new federal report released yesterday.
According to “America’s Children: Key National Indicators of Well-Being,” 18 percent of all children 17 and under were living in poverty in 2007 — up from 17 percent in 2006. The percentage of children who had at least one parent working full time was 77 percent in 2007 — down from 78 percent in 2006. And those living in households with extremely low “food security” — where parents described children as being hungry or having skipped a meal or gone without eating for an entire day — increased from 0.6 percent in 2006 to 0.9 percent in 2007, the report said.
Federal officials said the statistics released this week pre-date the current economic downturn and forecast darker times for the country’s 74 million children 17 and under, when data on children’s lives during the recession become available.
“It foreshadows greater changes we’ll see when we look at these figures next year,” said Dr. Duane Alexander, director of the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development at the National Institutes of Heath, one of the government agencies that participated in the study.
via American children in poverty on the rise.
The Banks’ Massive Theft
The Banks’ Massive Theft | The Progressive 
Dennis Kucinich
Why we desperately need monetary reform
Congress was taken for a ride, and the American people’s wealth went with it.
So now you have a system of checks and balances. The Treasury writes all the checks, and Congress doesn’t know what the balance is.
Trillions of dollars are being taken both from the Treasury and the Federal Reserve, which is printing money, which you, the American taxpayer, have to back up.
We need to begin to have a serious discussion of monetary reform because what’s been allowed to happen is that banks have been permitted to create money out of nothing, and they have not held sufficient reserves against their investments that could go sour. This caused the collapse of a financial system that’s being shored up with U.S. tax dollars and with trillions of dollars printed by the Fed as backup.
This is a moment in American history that should not escape us. This is a massive theft that goes far beyond anything that’s ever occurred in the history of this country. What’s happening is they’re using government to accelerate the wealth upward and they’re using the Treasury to grab the resources of the public and to enable the banks to get extraordinary amounts of resources and they’re still not loaning money to let people save their homes.
We desperately need monetary reform.
via The Banks’ Massive Theft | The Progressive.
NSA Security running amok to plug leaks about 9/11
NSA Security running amok to plug leaks about 9/11
By Wayne Madsen
(WMR) — WMR has learned that the National Security “Q” Group, responsible for security, has grown to an immense security and counter-intelligence force, with an estimated one thousand government employees, contractors, and paid informants. NSA’s Security force is reportedly primarily tasked with plugging any leaks of classified or other information that points to U.S. government’s involvement with the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.
NSA Security has doggedly pursued a number of NSA employees, some in “sting” operations, others in frequent polygraphs and repeated security interviews where threats are made by thuggish NSA security agents with and without the presence of FBI agents, and others in constant surveillance operations at their homes, churches, and other locations away from the Fort Meade, Maryland, headquarters of the agency.
The most egregious NSA Security operation against an NSA employee was the 2004 arrest of NSA analyst Ken Ford, Jr. Ford became a target of opportunity for NSA Security and the FBI after Vice President Dick Cheney noted his name on an NSA signals intelligence report on Saddam Hussein’s government that stated that there was no proof from interceptions of Iraqi communications that Saddam Hussein possessed “weapons of mass destruction.”
Cheney and other neocons in the Bush White House arranged for a “sting” operation to be mounted as retribution against Ford. Ford was charged with taking classified papers home from NSA headquarters, something that is quite impossible considering the stringent security in place at one of the most-secured complexes in the world.
Ford was convicted by a tainted jury and sentenced to seven years in federal prison. Ford, who is African-American, originally had an African-American federal trial judge. However, the judge was replaced by a pro-Iraq war Jewish U.S. judge, Peter Messitte, who set out to ensure a guilty conviction of Ford in cahoots with Jewish U.S. Attorney for Maryland Rod Rosenstein, and Jewish Assistant U.S. Attorney for Southern Maryland David Salem, both Bush appointees. Nothing was done by the judge or prosecutors to dismiss from the jury a contractor whose company had major contracts with NSA. The trio of Messitte, Rosenstein, and Salem have also “rocket-docketed” a number of cases, resulting in slam-dunk convictions, against Arab- and Iranian-Americans in the southern district of Maryland.
NSA’s Security chief is Kemp Ensor III. Ensor has built up what amounts to a massive law enforcement and intelligence agency in Maryland that operates as a virtual independent operation that answers to no one. Maryland’s congressional delegation has shown little interest in oversight over the security operation.
via NSA Security running amok to plug leaks about 9/11.
She Broke the G.O.P. and Now She Owns It
She Broke the G.O.P. and Now She Owns It - – NYTimes.com
Frank Rich
SARAH PALIN and Al Sharpton don’t ordinarily have much in common, but they achieved a rare harmonic convergence at Michael Jackson’s memorial service. When Sharpton told the singer’s children it was their daddy’s adversaries, not their daddy, who were “strange,” he was channeling the pugnacious argument the Alaska governor had made the week before. There was nothing strange about her decision to quit in midterm, Palin told America. What’s strange — or “insane,” in her lingo — are the critics who dare question her erratic behavior on the national stage.
Sharpton’s bashing of Jackson’s naysayers received the biggest ovation of the entire show. Palin’s combative resignation soliloquy, though much mocked by prognosticators of all political persuasions, has an equally vociferous and more powerful constituency. In the aftermath of her decision to drop out and cash in, Palin’s standing in the G.O.P. actually rose in the USA Today/Gallup poll. No less than 71 percent of Republicans said they would vote for her for president. That overwhelming majority isn’t just the “base” of the Republican Party that liberals and conservatives alike tend to ghettoize as a rump backwater minority. It is the party, or pretty much what remains of it in the Barack Obama era.
via Op-Ed Columnist – She Broke the G.O.P. and Now She Owns It – NYTimes.com.
CLG Pandemic Action Alerts
CLG Pandemic Action Alerts
Citizens For Legitimate Government
Sign petition: Refuse and Resist Mandatory Flu Vaccines http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/refuse-and-resist-mandatory-flu-vaccine
Target:
President Obama, US Congress
Sponsored by:
Lori Price, Citizens For Legitimate Government
We petition President Barack Obama, the US Congress, and all US security and health agencies to abort any plans for mandatory influenza vaccines. Also, we pledge to refuse and resist any government laws that require us to submit to forced vaccines and drugs. We recognize that mandatory vaccines are thinly-veiled attempts to grow the pandemic in order to enrich the coffers of US pharmaceutical and security corporations — the actual architects of the flu pandemic.
We will not comply.
We, the undersigned, recognize that the US government and pharmaceutical industries have been conspiring for years to engender a flu pandemic:
Killer flu recreated in the lab 07 Oct 2004 Scientists have shown that tiny changes to modern flu viruses could render them as deadly as the 1918 strain which killed millions. A US team added two genes from a sample of the 1918 virus to a modern strain known to have no effect on mice.
Experimental Infection of Pigs with the Human 1918 Pandemic Influenza Virus By Hana M. Weingartl, et al. 18 Feb 2009 –Received 19 Nov 2008/ Accepted 6 Feb 2009 Swine influenza was first recognized as a disease entity during the 1918 “Spanish flu” pandemic. The aim of this work was to determine the virulence of a plasmid-derived human 1918 pandemic H1N1 influenza virus (reconstructed 1918, or 1918/rec, virus) in swine using a plasmid-derived A/swine/Iowa/15/1930 H1N1 virus (1930/rec virus), representing the first isolated influenza virus, as a reference.
Baxter working on vaccine to stop swine flu, though admitted sending live pandemic flu viruses to subcontractor 26 Apr 2009 Specialty drug maker Baxter International Inc. will work with the World Health Organization to develop a vaccine that could stem an outbreak of a deadly swine flu strain in Mexico. Baxter spokesman Christopher Bona said Saturday that the Deerfield, Ill.-based company has asked the WHO for a sample of the flu strain. He says Baxter has patented technology that allows the company to develop vaccines in half the time it usually takes — about 13 weeks instead of 26.
We also recognize the hazards of an untested, unchecked, unnecessary and possibly deadly vaccine:
Administration readies $350 million for state, local responders to combat flu pandemic –The Obama administration said today that it has billions of dollars available to help pay for a national H1N1 flu vaccine program that could be ready starting in mid-October. 08 Jul 2009 Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius made the announcement at an all-day summit on the outbreak of what is more commonly known as swine flu. Sebelius said the government has “already appropriated about a billion dollars to buy the bulk ingredients” [i.e., influenza viruses, Neomycin, Polymyxin, Gentamycin, Thimerosal (mercury), Betapropiolactone, Nonoxynol, Octoxinol 9, Formaldehyde - yum yum! -LRP]
more…..
via Citizens For Legitimate Government.
Dr. Doom Has Some Good News
Dr. Doom Has Some Good News – The Atlantic
n March 28, 2007, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke appeared before the congressional Joint Economic Committee to discuss trends in the U.S. economy. Everyone was concerned about the “substantial correction in the housing market,” he noted in his prepared remarks. Fortunately, “the impact on the broader economy and financial markets of the problems in the subprime market seems likely to be contained.” Better still, “the weakness in housing and in some parts of manufacturing does not appear to have spilled over to any significant extent to other sectors of the economy.” On that day, the Dow Jones industrial average was above 12,000, the S&P 500 was above 1,400, and the U.S. unemployment rate was 4.4 percent.
That assurance looks bad in retrospect, as do many of Bernanke’s claims through the rest of the year: that the real-estate crisis was working itself out and that its problems would likely remain “niche” issues. If experts can be this wrong—within two years, unemployment had nearly doubled, and financial markets had lost roughly half their value—what good is their expertise? And of course it wasn’t just Bernanke, though presumably he had the most authoritative data to draw on. Through the markets’ rise to their peak late in 2007 and for many months into their precipitous fall, the dominant voices from the government, financial journalism, and the business and financial establishment under- rather than overplayed the scope of the current disaster.
With the celebrated exception of Nouriel Roubini, an economist from the Stern School of Business of New York University. At just the time Bernanke was testifying about the “contained” real-estate problem, Roubini was publishing a paper arguing that the depressed housing market was nowhere near its bottom, that its contraction would be the worst in many decades, and that its effects would likely hurt every part of the economy. In September 2006, with markets everywhere still on the rise, he told a seminar at the International Monetary Fund’s headquarters that the U.S. consumer was just about to “burn out,” and that this would mean a U.S. recession followed by a global “hard landing.” An economist who delivered a response dismissed this as “forecasting by analogy.” The IMF’s in-house newsletter covered Roubini’s talk as a curiosity, under the headline “Meet Dr. Doom.”
via Dr. Doom Has Some Good News – The Atlantic (July/August 2009).
Brain worms: one in five are infested
Brain worms: one in five are infested
BRAIN WORMS: ‘Toxoplasma gondii’
It’s worm-like, really, in only one stage of its life-cycle:
This parasite is a protozoa (one-celled creature) that dwells in the body of mammals and spreads by contact with infectious cat feces or ingestion of undercooked meat. The brain worm protects itself by encysting and is
amazingly hardy, able to survive in hostile environments outside of the host body, even in salt water, dirt, or sewage treatment plants, for many months.
Only high prolonged temperatures are capable of killing the “oocysts” that protect the worm.
There is a serum test for toxoplasmosis which indicates it’s one of the most common of humans infections throughout the world, mostly in warm climates in North and South America — and France, where they eat undercooked meat, truffles and other unsavory things.
According to the Government’s third National Health and Nutritional Assessment Survey (NHANES III) between 1988 and 1994, Toxoplasma “brain worms” were found in 22.5% of the US population, more than 60 million infestations.
The Toxoplasma gondii is unusual in that it can cause behavioral changes in the host, some of which seem to aid in its reproductive cycle. For example, mice infected with brain worms lose their fear of cat urine, and thus are more readily ingested by cats, leading to infestation of the predating cat, and further spread of the oocysts in that cat’s feces over the next few weeks.
via OpEdNews » Brain worms: one in five are infested.
On the Edge with Max Keiser – 10 July 2009
China is buying up the 3rd World Farm land
YouTube – On the Edge with Max Keiser – 10 July 2009 – (pt3 of 3).
BILL MOYERS JOURNAL | Insurance companies vs. Michael Moore.
Insurance companies vs. Michael Moore. Bill Moyers interviews former health insurance industry executive Wendell Potter, who left the field after almost 20 years to become a health reform advocate. Check out Potters take on the campaign against Michael Moores film Sicko and tune in to Bill Moyers Journal, Friday, July 10, 2009 at 9PM on PBS (check local listings http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/abo… for his experiences inside the health insurance industry, their work fighting a public option, and the insurance companies close ties to Washington. The entire interview will be available after broadcast at
YouTube – BILL MOYERS JOURNAL | Preview: Wendell Potter pt 2 | PBS.
Lawmaker won’t deny secret CIA program was ‘Cheney assassination ring’
Lawmaker won’t deny secret CIA program was ‘Cheney assassination ring’
Early Friday morning, MSNBC followed up on a theory posted Thursday on the Huffington Post which alleged that a secret CIA program shut down in June by director Leon Panetta could have been related to a purported effort led by Vice President Dick Cheney to assassinate intelligence targets abroad.
This past March, as RAW STORY reported, investigative reporter Seymour Hersh dropped a bombshell when he told an audience at the University of Minnesota that the Bush Administration was running an “executive assassination ring” which reported directly to former Vice President Dick Cheney.
“It’s an executive assassination ring essentially, and it’s been going on and on and on,” Hersh stated. “Under President Bush’s authority, they’ve been going into countries, not talking to the ambassador or the CIA station chief, and finding people on a list and executing them and leaving. That’s been going on, in the name of all of us.”
via Raw Story » Lawmaker won’t deny secret CIA program was ‘Cheney assassination ring’.
Americans swap homes for hotels as recession bites
Americans swap homes for hotels as recession bites | Reuters 
CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts (Reuters) – Some Americans are swapping homes for motels as the ranks of the homeless swell during the recession, crowding out shelters and forcing cities and states across the country to find new types of housing.
In Massachusetts, a record number of families are being put up in motels due to high unemployment and the rising number of homes going into foreclosure, costing taxpayers $2 million per month but providing a lifeline for desperate families.
“I feel like this has saved my life,” said Tarya Seagraves-Quee, a 37-year-old former nurse.
Seagraves-Quee has lived in a cramped one-bedroom suite in a hotel in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with three of her four children for nearly two months. “I’m managing the best way possible. I’ve learned to make things in the microwave oven.”
In Massachusetts, homeless shelters are at capacity. State law requires temporary accommodation for those without shelter, leading authorities to place 830 families, including 1,125 children, in 39 motels — an unprecedented number.
via Americans swap homes for hotels as recession bites | Reuters.
Sanford’s Affair Might Have Jeopardized Top-Secret Clearance
Sanford’s Affair Might Have Jeopardized Top-Secret Clearance - (usnews.com)
South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford‘s love-struck romp in Buenos Aires with his Argentine “soul mate” wasn’t just a threat to his marriage, job, and presidential aspirations. It also jeopardizes his Department of Homeland Security clearance and raises new questions about his candor on the steamy affair. Didn’t know the Republican had one? Well, as a chief of state and head of the South Carolina National Guard, Sanford has a top-secret security status that lets him in on classified information such as possible terrorist threats and emergency tips. But with that need to know come intelligence community rules of conduct, a key one being that relationships with foreigners must be revealed. The reason: Those in the know can leave themselves open to blackmail from rival intelligence services about a compromising dalliance.
via Sanford’s Affair Might Have Jeopardized Top-Secret Clearance – Washington Whispers (usnews.com).
The Healthiest Foods On Earth
The Healthiest Foods On Earth – Forbes.com
What is the best diet for human beings?
Vegetarian? Vegan? High-protein? Low-fat? Dairy-Free?
Hold on to your shopping carts: There is no perfect diet for human beings. At least not one that’s based on how much protein, fat or carbohydrates you eat.
People have lived and thrived on high-protein, high-fat diets (the Inuit of Greenland); on low-protein, high-carb diets (the indigenous peoples of southern Africa); on diets high in raw milk and cream (the people of the Loetschental Valley in Switzerland); diets high in saturated fat (the Trobriand Islanders) and even on diets in which animal blood is considered a staple (the Massai of Kenya and Tanzania). And folks have thrived on these diets without the ravages of degenerative diseases that are so epidemic in modern life–heart disease, diabetes, obesity, neurodegenerative diseases, osteoporosis and cancer.
The most important consideration in constructing a healthy diet: Eat whole food with minimal processing. These 12 foods do the trick.
via The Healthiest Foods On Earth – Forbes.com.
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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. 
