Archive for September, 2009
Rockefeller: “The Insurance Industry… Is Running Certain People In This Markup” (VIDEO)
Reacting to an amendment proposed by Sen. Jon Cornyn (R-Texas) during the Senate Finance Committee’s markup of health care reform legislation on Thursday, committee member Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) called his colleague a pawn of the health insurance industry.
“This is a very, very important amendment and it’s a very, very bad amendment,” said Rockefeller. “If there’s anything which is clear, it’s that the insurance industry is not running this markup, but is running certain people in this markup.”
On Wednesday, committee member Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) unintentionally made the same point about himself when he begged for “at least 72 hours for the people that the providers have hired to keep up with all of the legislation that we pass around here, and the regulations that we pass around here, to say, ‘Hey, wait a minute. Have you considered this?’”
Cornyn, for his part, took umbrage.
Full Story: Rockefeller: “The Insurance Industry… Is Running Certain People In This Markup” (VIDEO).
Volcker: Obama Plans Maintain ‘Too Big To Fail’
A top White House economic adviser says the Obama administration’s proposed overhaul of financial rules preserves the policy of “too big to fail,” and could lead to future bailouts.
Former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker said Thursday that by designating some companies as critical to the broader financial system, the plans create an expectation that those firms enjoy government backing in tough times. That implies those financial companies “will be sheltered by access to a federal safety net,” he said.
In testimony prepared for the House Financial Services Committee, Volcker said emergency measures by the Fed, Treasury and Congress during last year’s financial crisis created the expectation that the government would step in to protect failing companies, their bond holders and stockholders.
Full Story: Volcker: Obama Plans Maintain ‘Too Big To Fail’.
The Oil Industry Is on a Roll This Year With New Discoveries
- NYTimes.com – The oil industry has been on a hot streak this year, thanks to a series of major discoveries that have rekindled a sense of excitement across the petroleum sector, despite falling prices and a tough economy.
These discoveries, spanning five continents, are the result of hefty investments that began earlier in the decade when oil prices rose, and of new technologies that allow explorers to drill at greater depths and break tougher rocks.
“That’s the wonderful thing about price signals in a free market — it puts people in a better position to take more exploration risk,” said James T. Hackett, chairman and chief executive of Anadarko Petroleum.
Full Story: The Oil Industry Is on a Roll This Year With New Discoveries – NYTimes.com.
Volcker warns of ‘intractable’ problem with reforms
Former Fed chief to air doubts over regulation
FT.com – Paul Volcker, the former Federal Reserve chairman and adviser to the White House, will on Thursday express continued doubts over the Obama administration’s plan for financial regulatory reform.
In a sign of the continued struggle over the detail of the bill, Mr Volcker warns that the plan to deal with systemically important financial institutions contains an “intractable” problem.
Large companies, under close supervision and held to tougher capital standards by the Federal Reserve, “will feel competitively hobbled by stricter standards. In times of potential crisis, it would be the institution left out of the ‘too big to fail’ club that will fear disadvantage”.
Full Story: FT.com / US & Canada – Volcker warns of ‘intractable’ problem with reforms.
Steinbrück: G20 should tax financial trades
‘Financial market participants are fighting tooth and nail not to pay their fair share
Peer Steinbrück
When the housing bubble burst and financial markets collapsed in its wake, the worldwide slump was the worst since the Great Depression.
Full Story: FT.com / Comment / Opinion – Steinbrück: G20 should tax financial trades.
The Clean-Energy Investment Agenda: A Comprehensive Approach to Building the Low-Carbon Economy
OPS: Podesta is double dipping? How does he have the time for this?
By John Podesta, Kate Gordon , Bracken Hendricks, Benjamin Goldstein |
The United States is having the wrong public debate about global warming. We are asking important questions about pollution caps and timetables, carbon markets and allocations, but we have lost sight of our principal objective: building a robust and prosperous clean energy economy. This is a fundamentally affirmative agenda, rather than a restrictive one. Moving beyond pollution from fossil fuels will involve exciting work, new opportunities, new products and innovation, and stronger communities. Our current national discussion about constraints, limits, and the costs of transition misses the real excitement in this proposition. It is as if, on the cusp of an Internet and telecommunications revolution, debate centered only on the cost of fiber optic cable. We are missing the big picture here.
Let’s be clear: Solving global warming means investment. Retooling the energy systems that fuel our economy will involve rebuilding our nation’s infrastructure. We will create millions of middle-class jobs along the way, revitalize our manufacturing sector, increase American competitiveness, reduce our dependence on oil, and boost technological innovation. These investments in the foundation of our economy can also provide an opportunity for more broadly shared prosperity through better training, stronger local economies, and new career ladders into the middle class. Reducing greenhouse gas pollution is critical to solving global warming, but it is only one part of the work ahead. Building a robust economy that grows more vibrant as we move beyond the Carbon Age is the greater and more inspiring challenge.
Full Story: The Clean-Energy Investment Agenda: A Comprehensive Approach to Building the Low-Carbon Economy.
The public knows the GOP is fibbing
Only Republicans really buy the anti-healthcare reform lies. So why are some Dems settling for such an awful bill?
“I can’t tell you how many foreign leaders who are heads of center-right governments say to me, I don’t understand why people would call you socialist. In my country, you’d be considered a conservative.” — President Obama, Sept. 20, 2009
| Salon – There have always been two basic arguments for health insurance reform: one based in morality, the other self-interest. For a documented 45,000 persons to die prematurely in America each year because they can’t afford proper care is a national disgrace. Almost everybody apart from “conservatives” whose moral imagination is limited to judging other people’s sex lives understands that.
The current cruel, wasteful system is indefensible. Surely that’s why almost three-quarters of physicians polled by the New England Journal of Medicine favor genuine reform. About 63 percent of doctors surveyed nationwide support a public option; 10 percent would prefer a single-payer system, basically Medicare for everybody.
Full Story: The public knows the GOP is fibbing | Salon.
Generic House Polling Suggests the Republicans Could Regain the House in 2010
OPS: Democrats are afraid to Govern and Republicans will sell us all out to Fascism. Now What? Third Party?
The paper accompanying this graph was among the first public predictions of a Democratic takeover in 2006.
Bafumi, Erikson, and Wlezien’s analysis doesn’t go back before 300 days before the election, but if we take the liberty of extrapolating . . . The current state of the generic polls gives the Democrats .412/(.412+.377) = 52% of the two-party vote. Going to the graph, we see, first, that 52% for the Democrats is near historic lows (comparable to 1946, 1994, and 1998) and that the expected Democratic vote–given that their party holds the White House–is around -3%, or a 53-47 popular vote win for the Republicans.
Under the heading, “Republicans not in a position to retake the House (yet),” Chris Bowers estimates that the Democrats have a 41.2%-37.7% lead in recent generic House polling. Bowers writes, “Democrats are, after all, still winning.”
But it’s not so simple. In research published a couple years ago, Joe Bafumi, Bob Erikson, and Chris Wlezien found that, yes, generic party ballots are highly predictive of House voting–especially in the month or two before the election-but that early polling can be improved by adjusting for political conditions. In particular, the out-party consistently outperforms the generic polls.
Full Story: FiveThirtyEight: Politics Done Right.
A world first: Vaccine helps prevent HIV infection
For the first time, an experimental vaccine has prevented infection with the AIDS virus, a watershed event in the deadly epidemic and a surprising result. Recent failures led many scientists to think such a vaccine might never be possible.
The World Health Organization and the U.N. agency UNAIDS said the results “instilled new hope” in the field of HIV vaccine research.
The vaccine — a combination of two previously unsuccessful vaccines — cut the risk of becoming infected with HIV by more than 31 percent in the world’s largest AIDS vaccine trial of more than 16,000 volunteers in Thailand, researchers announced Thursday in Bangkok.
Even though the benefit is modest, “it’s the first evidence that we could have a safe and effective preventive vaccine,” Col. Jerome Kim told The Associated Press. He helped lead the study for the U.S. Army, which sponsored it with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
Full Story: A world first: Vaccine helps prevent HIV infection.
“Court Ruled That Media Can Legally Lie”
Title: “Court Ruled That Media Can Legally Lie”
Title: “Florida Appeals Court Orders Akre-Wilson Must Pay Trial Costs for $24.3 Billion Fox Television; Couple Warns Journalists of Danger to Free Speech, Whistle Blower Protection”
Project Censored - In February 2003, a Florida Court of Appeals unanimously agreed with an assertion by FOX News that there is no rule against distorting or falsifying the news in the United States.
Back in December of 1996, Jane Akre and her husband, Steve Wilson, were hired by FOX as a part of the Fox “Investigators” team at WTVT in Tampa Bay, Florida. In 1997 the team began work on a story about bovine growth hormone (BGH), a controversial substance manufactured by Monsanto Corporation. The couple produced a four-part series revealing that there were many health risks related to BGH and that Florida supermarket chains did little to avoid selling milk from cows treated with the hormone, despite assuring customers otherwise.
According to Akre and Wilson, the station was initially very excited about the series. But within a week, Fox executives and their attorneys wanted the reporters to use statements from Monsanto representatives that the reporters knew were false and to make other revisions to the story that were in direct conflict with the facts. Fox editors then tried to force Akre and Wilson to continue to produce the distorted story. When they refused and threatened to report Fox’s actions to the FCC, they were both fired.(Project Censored #12 1997)
Full Story: 11. The Media Can Legally Lie | Project Censored.
Does Humana Have a Free Speech Right To Mislead The Elderly?
OPS: “In February 2003, a Florida Court of Appeals unanimously agreed with an assertion by FOX News that there is no rule against distorting or falsifying the news in the United States.” The Media can LEGALLY LIE, so why not other Corporations?
Late last week, Medicare officials admonished Humana for using Medicare customer lists to engage in political advocacy and lobbying. Monday, Medicare officials sent a memorandum to all Medicare insurance companies explicitly prohibiting them from doing the same. This action by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) represents a major policy shift from one administration to another and could lead to a legal case with the potential to establish new legal principles within a contested area of First Amendment (free speech) law.
Political Or Commercial Speech?
Tuesday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) took to the floor of the Senate to argue, “This is American — citizens, either as individuals or grouped together in companies, have a fundamental right — a fundamental right — to talk about legislation they favor or oppose in this country. This is the core of the First Amendment’s protection of speech.”
However, Constitutional scholars agree commercial speech is not the “core” of the First Amendment’s protection. Courts consistently give political speech the greatest level of protection under the First Amendment and commercial speech the lowest protection. Courts also hold political speech to the lowest standards of accuracy and commercial speech to the highest standards of accuracy. After that, it gets complicated.
Full Story: Dawn Teo: Does Humana Have a Free Speech Right To Mislead The Elderly?.
A McDonald’s Is Never More Than 107 Miles Away
Saying McDonald’s is ubiquitous in the United States isn’t terribly newsworthy. But blogger Stephen Von Worley has creatively figured out the farthest distance any hamburger-loving American could be from the Golden Arches. (Hat tip to BuzzFeed)
The answer? 107 miles. Here’s Von Worley on the exact spot in the U.S. where you’d be furthest from a Mickey D’s:
“Between the tiny Dakotan hamlets of Meadow and Glad Valley lies the McFarthest Spot: 107 miles distant from the nearest McDonald’s, as the crow flies, and 145 miles by car!”
Full Story: A McDonald’s Is Never More Than 107 Miles Away.
Garbage Men Trained To Fight Crime
OPS: Next, the meter readers, then the Postal Workers, then the Cable guy, the n the next door neighbor. Welcome to 1984. It’s a Brave New World
The Volusia County Sheriff’s Office is training garbage collectors, electricians and other mobile professionals to help fight crime.
WKMG Orlando – The crime initiative, called Operation Bolo for Businesses on the Lookout, will teach workers how to look for telltale signs of crime in an effort to make communities safer.
“We get to see a lot more than what other people get to see,” garbage collector Juan Lebron said.
Lebron and 75 other mobile professionals in Volusia County received training about criminals and how to spot them.
“As the times get harder, as our budget dollars get less, that means we have to reach out more and more for these partnerships,” Sheriff Ben Johnson said.
Full Story: Garbage Men Trained To Fight Crime – Orlando News Story – WKMG Orlando.
Makers of Tylenol Recall Some Kids Medicines
The makers of Tylenol are voluntarily recalling some lots of Infants’ and Children’s Tylenol as a precaution.
NBC Dallas-Fort Worth – The recall covers batches of children’s Tylenol and infant drops made between April and June 2008. (Click here to read a full list of the recalled lots. Lot numbers can be found by looking on the box or on the bottle.)
“It’s kind of scary, because you don’t know if you should buy it or not buy it,” parent Liz Hernandez said. “There’s nothing else to give him. What’s supposed to be safer than Tylenol?”
She said she gives her son children’s Tylenol when he gets sick.
McNeil Consumer Healthcare, Tylenol’s manufacturer, said that bacteria were detected in the raw material of one of the inactive ingredients.
The company said no bacteria were found in any finished Tylenol product.
Full Story: Makers of Tylenol Recall Some Kids Medicines | NBC Dallas-Fort Worth.
Pittsburgh braced for G20 protests
Police seal off city centre to insulate global leaders from potential protests surrounding G20 heads of government summit
The Guardian – A carefully drilled security operation swung into action in Pittsburgh today as police sealed off the centre of the so-called steel city to insulate global leaders from potentially rowdy protests surrounding a contentious G20 heads of government summit.
Nearly 4,000 police and 2,000 national guard troops, plus 11 coastguard vessels, are on standby in Pittsburgh, where President Barack Obama will host talks on issues ranging from the environment to the global economic downturn and restrictions on bankers’ pay. The city was chosen as a venue to showcase its recovery from disused smokestacks to hi-tech growth.
Welcome flags adorned the streets and a banner from one skyscraper read “jobs, good jobs, green jobs”. Catholic and Anglican bishops have asked every church in the district to ring bells at midday tomorrow to mark prayers for the summit. At a 19th-century greenhouse in the city’s botanical gardens, chefs began preparing for an eve-of-summit banquet showcasing local produce, organic foods and sustainable agriculture
Full Story: Pittsburgh braced for G20 protests | World news | The Guardian.
Silly Season: Reaction against Obama’s tire case decision
TradeReform.org - The pro-trade deficit crowd continues coming out against enforcement of trade agreements. They are fine with passing trade deals, because they don’t read them. They are fine with any provisions in the trade deals, so long as the words “free trade agreement” or something similar appears in the title. But don’t enforce any provisions agreed upon by all parties, because enforcement equals protectionism.
In other words, the old-style free traders defend the protectionism of other countries.
Their reaction is petty, ill-informed whimpering. The public does not agree with them. We already did what they recommended, and are reaping the results. But they are still economically dangerous
Full Story: TradeReform.org – Silly Season: Reaction against Obama’s tire case decision.
Goldman May Shed Commercial Banking Charter
There is growing speculation that Goldman Sachs may be looking to shed its commercial banking charter in order to elude some of the tougher restrictions that may soon be imposed on banks.
Dustin Ensinger – economyincisis.org
There is growing speculation among some investors that Goldman Sachs, in order to elude some of the tougher restrictions that may soon be imposed on banks, may be looking to shed its commercial banking charter, Reuters reports.
The once-mighty investment bank and symbol of the financial decadence and excesses of the past two decades was converted into a bank holding company in September 2008 – at the height of the financial crisis – in order to become eligible for federal assistance and better weather the storm.
And weather the storm it has. In the second quarter of this year, the company reported net profits totaling $3.44 billion. Through the first two quarters of the year, Goldman has set aside nearly half of its revenues – $11.3 billion – for employee compensation.
Full Story: Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
The Fallacies of Free Trade
Every economy in the world which is actually growing is doing so through production and exports.
Craig Harrington – economyincisis.org
President Obama’s decision earlier this month to place a 35 percent tariff on imports of Chinese tires has caught a great deal of criticism from corporate media. President Obama’s decision came roughly three weeks before the scheduled G-20 summit in Pittsburgh September 24-25. It is expected to be a major point of emphasis between Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao whenever they meet this week.
TradeReform.org, a trade policy group which advocates for domestic job creation and balanced internatioanl commerce, detailed some of the criticism leveled against the administration. However, the media can do much more to point out the positives of this portion of Obama’s trade policy.
The magazine Economist wrote a scathing piece declaring that the decision to place a tariff on tire imports was “bad politics, bad economics, bad diplomacy and hurts America”. The column guarantees that this move will draw retribution from China and other trading partners as they react to the “protectionist” attack by the United States. Economist is certain that this decision will impede U.S.-China cooperation on environmental policy, North Korea, federal budget financing, and other mutual interests. In their view, this was nothing more than an act of “economic vandalism”.
Full Story: Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
Glenn Beck’s Twisted Brain: Pol Pot Less Reprehensible Than Woodrow Wilson, Tiger Woods, and FDR
by Simon Maloy, Media Matters for America , Knowing who Glenn Beck is, and the type of discourse he engages in, it would be the height of foolishness to expect a reasoned discussion of U.S. history within the pages of Arguing with Idiots. But this is getting absurd.
In his chapter titled, “U.S. Presidents: A Steady Progression of Progressives,” Beck treats us to his list of the “Top Ten Bastards of All Time.” The occupants of that list, in ascending order, are Pol Pot, Robert Mugabe, Teddy Roosevelt, Bernie Madoff, Adolf Hitler, Keith Olbermann, Pontius Pilate, FDR, Tiger Woods, and Woodrow Wilson. That’s right, in Beck’s book, mass slaughter of millions of innocents makes you a less reprehensible person than the presidents who won both World Wars for the United States.
The whole reason the list exists is so Beck can go on an extended tirade against Woodrow Wilson, who earned the top spot because he “[s]hredded our First Amendment by arresting thousands of people for speaking against U.S. involvement in WWI.” This, of course, is in reference to the Espionage Act of 1917 and the Sedition Act of 1918. And Beck is right — both acts were horrible offenses against the First Amendment and resulted in the unjust imprisonment of many Americans, including, ironically, many members of socialist-leaning industrial unions that Beck finds so objectionable.
Anti-Choice Zealots’ Latest Bizarre Ploy
The one good thing about these extremists is that they help reveal the anti-woman, anti-sex agenda of the anti-choice movement.
By Amanda Marcotte, RH Reality Check. – For those of us who hoped that the attempts to sneak in bans on abortion, hormonal contraception, and IVF under proposed laws called “personhood amendments” would disappear after the first attempt at passing such a law on a ballot initiative was thoroughly trumped at the polls in Colorado, well, I hate to tell you, but the anti-choice extremists aren’t going away. The next new battlefield is Florida, where anti-choicers hope they can use the invisibility of most female reproductive processes to convince the voters that there’s little people lurking inside your neighbor’s ladyparts, even if there’s no biological evidence to support that proposition, and that this law will save the wee mythical people.
Obviously, there’s a good reason for pro-choicers to be alarmed when personhood amendments seem like they’re really going to get onto ballots. If they pass, that means that anti-choicers not only have a platform to issue challenges to abortion, but also that they have a chance to go after other anti-choice goals, namely pushing for bans on reliable, female-controlled contraception like the birth control pill and the IUD. Hey, we don’t know that female-controlled contraception doesn’t kill “babies”, since it’s all invisible behind that wall of flesh that separates the uterus from its proper Bible-thumping owners (a wall of flesh most of us call “the woman”), so better to be safe and ban the pill. Those doctors who say the birth control pill doesn’t work that way can’t be 100% sure, so we can discount their opinions entirely. Or, that’s the general gist of the argument, anyhow.
Full Story: Anti-Choice Zealots’ Latest Bizarre Ploy | Reproductive Justice and Gender | AlterNet.
The Era of Xtreme Energy
Our Oil Addiction Is About to Make Life a Lot Nastier. The great age of renewable energy is in our distant future. Before then, energy prices will rise, environmental perils will multiply and conflict will grow. Buckle your seatbelts.
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Life After the Age of Oil
By Michael T. Klare, Tomgram: – The debate rages over whether we have already reached the point of peak world oil output or will not do so until at least the next decade. There can, however, be little doubt of one thing: we are moving from an era in which oil was the world’s principal energy source to one in which petroleum alternatives — especially renewable supplies derived from the sun, wind, and waves — will provide an ever larger share of our total supply. But buckle your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy ride under Xtreme conditions.
It would, of course, be ideal if the shift from dwindling oil to its climate-friendly successors were to happen smoothly via a mammoth, well-coordinated, interlaced system of wind, solar, tidal, geothermal, and other renewable energy installations. Unfortunately, this is unlikely to occur. Instead, we will surely first pass through an era characterized by excessive reliance on oil’s final, least attractive reserves along with coal, heavily polluting “unconventional” hydrocarbons like Canadian oil sands, and other unappealing fuel choices.
There can be no question that Barack Obama and many members of Congress would like to accelerate a shift from oil dependency to non-polluting alternatives. As the president said in January, “We will commit ourselves to steady, focused, pragmatic pursuit of an America that is free from our [oil] dependence and empowered by a new energy economy that puts millions of our citizens to work.” Indeed, the $787 billion economic stimulus package he signed in February provided $11 billion to modernize the nation’s electrical grid, $14 billion in tax incentives to businesses to invest in renewable energy, $6 billion to states for energy efficiency initiatives, and billions more directed to research on renewable sources of energy. More of the same can be expected if a sweeping climate bill is passed by Congress. The version of the bill recently passed by the House of Representatives, for example, mandates that 20% of U.S. electrical production be supplied by renewable energy by 2020.
Full Story: Tomgram: Michael Klare, Energy Xtremism.
Tracking Sex Offenders on Your Phone: Smart or Paranoid?
A hot new iPhone App uses GPS technology to track registered sex offenders everywhere. Are they keeping you safe, or profiting off paranoia?
By Liliana Segura, AlterNet - For a few days this past August, one of the top ten most popular paid iPhone apps of the summer suddenly went missing.
The POM Offender Locator, a product of ThinAir Wireless, hit the scene on June 2, a nifty little way to keep track of registered sex offenders using GPS technology. (“POM” stands for “peace of mind.”) The paid app, which cost 99 cents, provided the convenient capacity for “anyone living in the United States to view Registered Sex Offenders living in their area,” according to its official description.
“Knowledge = Safety” it read, followed by the following sales pitch:
“They know where you and your family are … Now it’s time to turn the tables so that you know where they live and can make better decisions about where to allow your kids to play.”
The app, whose avatar features a creepy cartoon face with menacing eyebrows, quickly became one of the top-selling downloads of the summer — the sixth most downloaded app on the iPhone by late July. It was written up by ABC, USA Today, and assorted techie blogs.
Full Story: Tracking Sex Offenders on Your Phone: Smart or Paranoid? | Rights and Liberties | AlterNet.
The God in the Machine
We Expect Immortality From Medicine — and It’s Destroying Our Health. Our quest for eternal youth enables the country’s dependence on a broken medical industrial complex.
The ordinary course of a cure is carried on at the expense of life: they incise us, they cauterize us, they amputate our limbs, they deprive us of food and blood. One step further, and we are completely cured.
–Michel de Montaigne
– Lapham’s Quarterly – President Barack Obama during his first months in office seldom has missed a chance to liken the country’s healthcare system to an unburied corpse, which, if left lying around in the sun by the 111th Congress, threatens to foul the sweet summer air of the American dream. The prognosis doesn’t admit of a second or third opinion. Whether on call to the Democratic left or the Republican right, the attending politicians and consulting economists concur in their assessment of the risk posed by the morbid emissions. The country now pays an annual fee of $2.4 trillion for its medical treatments (16 percent of GDP); the costs continue to lead nowhere but up. Fail to embalm or entomb the putrefying debt, and it’s only a matter of time—ten years, maybe twenty—before the pulse disappears from the monitors tracking the heartbeat on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.
So say the clinicians in Washington, and I don’t quarrel with the consensus. If I can’t make sense of some of the diagnoses or most of the prescriptions, at least I can understand that what is being discussed is the health of America’s money, not the well-being of its people. The symptoms present as vividly as the manifestations of plague listed in Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War, but they show up as an infection of the body politic caused by the referral of the country’s medical care to the empathy of accountants and the wisdom of drug dealers. Thus the suppurating cruelty and the malignant disparities, among which a few of the most apparent attest to the severity of the disorder:
Full Story: The God in the Machine – Lapham’s Quarterly.
Pot and the Right to Pursue Happiness
For Many Americans, Weed is a Way of Life
By NORM KENT
During his tenure as the Fort Lauderdale Police Chief, the late Ron Cochran was one day asked how he relieved the stress of his tension-filled job: “Like everyone else” he quipped, “I smoke a joint.”
“Only kidding”, he quickly added to the reporter.
Well, I’m not kidding. And neither are twenty million Americans every day. They use marijuana medicinally and recreationally, but the bottom line, is ‘Weeds’ is more than a TV show on HBO. It is a way of life for good and decent people who openly inhale without apology.
Marijuana may be the second-largest cash crop in America. But we will never know until all the farmers who grow can openly distribute it. I can guarantee you this. When the day comes that the weed can be legally grown, openly marketed, and its revenue streams can be lawfully traced, we will have a new growth industry in America that rivals corn. Hemp has multiple uses. Heck, it was used as rope for our paratroopers in World War II. If it worked for George Bush, it can work for you.
Full Story: Norm Kent: Pot and the Right to Pursue Happiness.
Mel Martinez Joins Lobbying Shop Immediately After Quitting Senate
OPS: Enemies of Democracy
Former Sen. Mel Martinez has joined the lobbying shop of major law firm DLA Piper — just two weeks after resigning from the Senate.
Martinez has joined the firm as a partner and will advise on issues ranging from government affairs, litigation, defense, energy and real estate, according to a statement released by DLA Piper.
USA Today reports that Martinez will come to the firm with $456,220 in cash from his campaign committee. DLA Piper made $11.8 million last year lobbying for clients that include the Royal Bank of Scotland and Lockheed Martin.
Full Story: Mel Martinez Joins Lobbying Shop Immediately After Quitting Senate.
13 Natural Hangover Cures: Quick Remedies Or False Hope? (PHOTOS)
Hangovers happen to the very best of us. We all know the familiar story: the evening starts off innocently enough–you go to a party to unwind after a long day and knock back a few cocktails to relax the nerves. The next thing you know you’re drunk-texting your ex while dancing on top of your friend’s coffee table to music you would never listen to sober–well maybe that’s going a bit far. The next morning you wake up feeling like a miniature bomb went off inside your skull. Welcome to hangover-ville. Don’t feel too down–HuffPost Living is here to help you out by recommending a few all-natural remedies to rid you of the hangover blues. But we’ll leave it to you to decide whether these remedies are the real deal or the new-age equivalent of Milli Vanilli.
Full Story: 13 Natural Hangover Cures: Quick Remedies Or False Hope? (PHOTOS) (POLL).
Democrats Soften Financial Bill
- WSJ.com- Congressional Democrats and the White House are softening some elements of the Obama administration’s proposal to overhaul financial-market supervision as they begin a push to win broader support for the bill.
So far, Democrats and the White House haven’t budged on the main tenets of the effort, which include tougher regulation of the country’s largest financial companies and the creation of a new agency to protect consumers. But the changes are nonetheless significant and could eliminate some of the more polarizing aspects of the plan.
Republicans remain opposed to many parts of the proposal, and Democrats will have to count on broad support from within their ranks. Some of the changes reflect ideas pushed by conservative Democrats, which suggests an effort to ensure the party lines up behind the bill.
Full Story: Democrats Soften Financial Bill – WSJ.com.
Stem cell snorting holds promise for treating brain disorders
If you needed stem cells implanted in your brain to treat a disorder, you might be able to just snort them instead. New details from a University of Minnesota researcher’s initial tests show the stem cells actually make it to the brain when snorted rather than implanted through surgery. Talk about a medical improvement.
The research, conducted by Willaim Frey of the University and his colleagues in Germany, shows promise for other drugs that don’t usually penetrate the blood-brain barrier, according to the U.S. News and World Report story. If the cells are suspended in fluid, they quickly reach the brain fully intact. The research was recently published in the European Journal of Cell Biology.
How did they conduct the research? Having mice sniff dropped of adult rat stem cells. Sounds like a task in itself. More from U.S. News and World Report:
Full Story: City Pages – The Blotter.
Moon Water: Probes Find H20 Traces In Dirt
The moon isn’t the dry dull place it seems. Traces of water lurk in the dirt unseen.
Three different space probes found the chemical signature of water all over the moon’s surface, surprising the scientists who at first doubted the unexpected measurement until it was confirmed independently and repeatedly.
It’s not enough moisture to foster homegrown life on the moon. But if processed in mass quantities, it might provide resources – drinking water and rocket fuel – for future moon-dwellers, scientists say. The water comes and goes during the lunar day.
Full Story: Moon Water: Probes Find H20 Traces In Dirt.
Iran replaces the USD with the Euro..and so it begins
Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has ordered the replacement of the US dollar by the euro in the country’s foreign exchange accounts.
The September 12 edict was issued following a decision by the trustees of the country’s foreign reserves, Mehr News Agency reported.
Earlier, the Islamic Republic of Iran had announced that the euro would replace the greenback in the country’s oil transactions. Iran has called on other OPEC members to ditch the sinking dollar in favor of the more credible euro.
Following the switch, the interest rate for the facilities provided from the Foreign Exchange Reserves will be reduced from12 to 5 percent.
Since being introduced by the European Union, the euro has gained popularity internationally and there are now more euros in circulation than the dollar.
The move will also help decouple Iran from the US banking system.
Full Story: Follow The Money – Seeker401 | Iran replaces the USD with the Euro..and so it begins.
New world currency order starts to unfold
- The National Newspaper – The US dollar still retains a disproportionately large representation in international trade transactions, official reserves and exchange rate regimes.
This is largely due to the many institutional arrangements and incumbencies which remain from the Bretton Woods era of 1944 to 1971 when the gold-linked dollar provided the formal anchor for the world monetary system.
Now, though, this privileged, inherited status of the paper dollar is under threat from the falling relative economic size of the US and its cyclical influence and the scale of the excesses that very privilege has allowed.
Full Story: New world currency order starts to unfold – The National Newspaper.
PAUL KIRK Tapped For Kennedy Senate Seat
Fox News’ Major Garrett reports that Paul Kirk has been chosen to fill the Massachusetts Senate seat held previously by Ted Kennedy.
The Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza said on MSNBC Wednesday afternoon that an announcement could come later in the day.
Kirk was chairman of the Democratic National Committee from 1985 to 1989 and a longtime aide to the late Sen. Kennedy. He currently co-chairs the Commission on Presidential Debates, is the chairman of the board of directors of the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation, and is a member of the board of directors of the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate.
Full Story: PAUL KIRK Tapped For Kennedy Senate Seat.
Card Defaults Surge in August to 11.49%, Moody’s Says
- Bloomberg.com – U.S. credit-card defaults rose to a record in August and more losses may lie ahead as delinquencies climbed for the first time since March, according to Moody’s Investors Service.
Write-offs rose to 11.49 percent from 10.52 percent in July, Moody’s said today in a report. Loans at least 30 days delinquent rose to 5.8 percent from 5.73 percent. “Early- stage” delinquencies, or loans overdue 30 to 59 days, surged to 1.65 percent, from 1.41 percent, signaling higher losses in coming months. Banks typically write off loans after 180 days.
Card issuers have struggled with rising defaults as the recession drove up unemployment to 9.7 percent and the impact of income tax refunds waned. Credit-card defaults typically track the U.S. jobless rate since consumers tend to fall behind on payments when their income dries up.
Full Story: Card Defaults Surge in August to 11.49%, Moody’s Says (Update1) – Bloomberg.com.
Al Franken Reads the 4th Amendment to Justice Department Official
The Washington Independent » Just in case he wasn’t familiar with it, Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) decided to read the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution to David Kris, assistant attorney general of the Justice Department’s National Security Division, who was testifying to the Senate Judiciary Committee today to urge reauthorization of expiring provisions of the USA Patriot Act.
Franken, who opened by acknowledging that unlike most of his colleagues in the Senate, he’s not a lawyer, but according to his research “most Americans aren’t lawyers” either, said he’d also done research on the Patriot Act and in particular, the “roving wiretap” provision that allows the FBI to get a warrant to wiretap a an unnamed target and his or her various and changing cell phones, computers and other communication devices.
Noting that he received a copy of the Constitution when he was sworn in as a senator, he proceeded to read it to Kris, emphasizing this part: “no Warrants shall issue but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
“That’s pretty explicit language,” noted Franken, asking Kris how the “roving wiretap” provision of the Patriot Act can meet that requirement if it doesn’t require the government to name its target.
Full Story: The Washington Independent » Al Franken Reads the 4th Amendment to Justice Department Official.
World will need 70 percent more food in 2050
The Raw Story » ROME (AFP) – World food production must increase by 70 percent by 2050, to nourish a human population then likely to be 9.1 billion, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation forecast Wednesday.
“FAO is cautiously optimistic about the world’s potential to feed itself by 2050,” said FAO Assistant Director-General Hafez Ghanem. However, he stressed that feeding everyone in the world by then “will not be automatic and several significant challenges have to be met.”
The agency is preparing for a high-level expert forum in Rome on October 12-13 on “How to Feed the World in 2050″ and plans to gather 300 specialists from academic, non-governmental and private sector institutions.
This forum will pave the way for a World Summit on Food Security in Rome on November 16-18.
Full Story: The Raw Story » World will need 70 percent more food in 2050: FAO.
Supreme Court to weigh if framing suspects worse than frivolous lawsuits
The Raw Story »WASHINGTON–Lawyers representing an Iowa county will argue before the Supreme Court this fall that local prosecutors said to have fabricated evidence in a murder case can’t be sued because they “have absolute immunity at trial.”
Stephen Davis, the attorney for one of the men who spent 25 years behind bars, told Raw Story he had “pretty much assumed” that the Constitution protected his clients if there was prosecutorial misconduct. “I guess it’s controversial,” he added.
In 1978, Iowa teenagers Curtis McGhee Jr. and Terry Harrington were sentenced to life imprisonment after being convicted of murdering a security guard. After serving more than two decades, both men were released after Harrington obtained “previously undisclosed reports from the Council Bluffs Police Department that pointed to the existence of another suspect for the murder,” according to court documents.
Full Story: The Raw Story » Supreme Court to weigh if framing suspects worse than frivolous lawsuits.
Sen. Roberts: We Need To Give Health Insurance Lobbyists ‘At Least 72 Hours’ To Read The Bill
OPS: Insane.
Think Progress » During the Senate Finance Committee’s mark-up session of the health care reform bill today, Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) — who has had a hard time staying awake during these meetings — offered an amendment that would have delayed “a committee vote for two weeks.”
Bunning requested that the Committee put-off a vote on the health care bill until the final legislative language of the bill is made available on the Committee’s website for at least 72 hours. The amendment failed, with all of the Democrats except Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) voting against it. But had the amendment passed, it could potentially have halted the health care debate for weeks.
Before the vote took place, Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS) offered a defense of Bunning’s amendment by arguing that the 72-hour provision was critical because it provides time for senators to consult with health insurance lobbyists:
Full Story: Think Progress » Sen. Roberts: We Need To Give Health Insurance Lobbyists ‘At Least 72 Hours’ To Read The Bill.
Health Insurance Giant Aetna Paying $80,000 For Health Reform ‘Town Hall’ Moderated By CNN Host Tony Harris
Think Progress » Tomorrow, health insurance giant Aetna is sponsoring a “town hall conversation on the national health system reform debate” at the Morehouse School of Medicine in Atlanta. CNN anchor Tony Harris will moderate the panel, which features lobbyists from the health insurance industry and opponents of reform:
– Panelist Mohit Ghose works for Aetna as the VP of Public Affairs, the lobbying division of the company. Ghose has served for years as a spokesman and lobbyist for the health insurance trade group AHIP. Ghose helped push focus-group tested attacks against Michael Moore and his movie SiCKO as part of the industry’s campaign to marginalize the impact of the film.
– Panelist Dr. Sheila Robinson is a representative from the Georgia Medical Association, an organization led by Todd Williamson. Williamson has gone on the record attacking health reform, and has been heavily involved in an anti-reform front group known as “Coalition to Protect Patients’ Rights” (CPPR). CPPR is managed by the lobbying firm DCI Group, which has set up “Smokers’ Rights” groups in the past for the tobacco industry.
King: Same-Sex Marriage Is ‘A Purely Socialist Concept’
Think Progress » Rep. Steve King (R-IA) talks into a microphoneIn April, when the Iowa Supreme Court unanimously struck down a state law defining marriage as solely between a man and a woman, Rep. Steve King (R-IA) called it an “unconstitutional” decision and predicted that it could lead to Iowa becoming “the gay marriage Mecca.” On WorldNetDaily’s radio show today, King was asked what the “impact” of the decision has been on Iowa. He replied by saying that his prediction is becoming true:
KING: Well, we’ve had a significant percentage of people that have come to Iowa as same-sex couples to get married. And that, that percentage is up there some place over a fourth, if I remember correctly on the data that I have seen, and I don’t know that anything is complete at this point. I said that if this is allowed to stand, Iowa will become the Mecca for same-sex marriage and that is becoming the case. I know that there have been buses that have been, have gone to Iowa with loads of people in them in order to get married under the judge-made law.
Full Story: Think Progress » King: Same-Sex Marriage Is ‘A Purely Socialist Concept’.
CNBC Calls Out WellPoint CEO For Lying About How Much Money It Makes Off Its Consumers
Think Progress » – Today at the Clinton Global Initiative conference, CNBC hosts Mark Haines and Maria Bartiromo interviewed WellPoint CEO Angela Braly on the current health reform debate. Bartiromo pressed Braly on the topic of rescissions, an extremely controversial practice where health insurers find reasons to cancel your coverage when you get sick. “Can you give us an understanding of what factors,” asked Baritomo, “go into denying coverage for a customer?” Rather than answering the question, Braly quickly dodged and started praising her own company for the percent of each premium dollar spent on healthcare (known as the medical loss ratio). But after listening to Braly compliment her company for spending 87 cents per a premium dollar for health “delivery,” CNBC host Haines called her out for essentially lying with “clever” language:
HAINES: I believe you just said very cleverly worded 87 cents of every premium dollar goes to the delivery of healthcare. But in fact why don’t we look at your, the amount of payments you make per dollar you take in. It’s more like 80 cents, is it not? You pay 80 cents in benefits for every dollar. [...]
Full Story: Think Progress » CNBC Calls Out WellPoint CEO For Lying About How Much Money It Makes Off Its Consumers.
Census Worker Hanged: Bill Sparkman Found With “Fed” On Body
The FBI is investigating the hanging death of a U.S. Census worker near a Kentucky cemetery, and a law enforcement official told The Associated Press the word ‘fed” was scrawled on the dead man’s chest.
The body of Bill Sparkman, a 51-year-old part-time Census field worker and occasional teacher, was found Sept. 12 in a remote patch of the Daniel Boone National Forest in rural southeast Kentucky. The Census has suspended door-to-door interviews in rural Clay County, where the body was found, pending the outcome of the investigation.
Investigators are still trying to determine whether the death was a killing or a suicide, and if a killing, whether the motive was related to his government job or to anti-government sentiment.
Investigators have said little about the case. The law enforcement official, who was not authorized to discuss the case and requested anonymity, said Wednesday the man was found hanging from a tree and the word “fed” was written on the dead man’s chest. The official did not say what type of instrument was used to write the word.
FBI spokesman David Beyer said the bureau is helping state police with the case.
Full Story: Census Worker Hanged: Bill Sparkman Found With “Fed” On Body.
The Great Fed-Financed Dollar Decline and Stock Market Rally of 2009
“The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to the point where it becomes stronger than the democratic state itself. That in its essence is fascism — ownership of government by an individual, by a group or any controlling private power.”
Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882-1945), 32nd and longest-serving US president
‘I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.’
Thomas Jefferson, (1743-1826), 3rd US President, 1802
The U.S. national debt clock is clicking and it is fast approaching the $12 trillion mark, all the while the Fed (less a central bank than the banks’ Bank) is printing new money like crazy and lending it to its client banks at close to zero interest rates (i.e. at negative interest rates). What is wrong with this picture? It simply means that most Americans are losing big at this game, but a handful of mega-banks and their affiliates are raking in tremendous amounts of money in easily made profits.
Indeed, the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet has more than doubled since August 2007, going from $870 billion to more than $2 trillion. It is expected to keep growing as banks avail themselves of the cheap funds the Fed made available to them. The Fed, indeed, has the unique ability to create new dollars (paper currency) for the accounts of assets (good or bad) that it buys from banks, the Treasury, or other entities. This increases the monetary base (the sum of currency plus total banking reserves), and banks through their lending can expand this money supply even further.
Full Story: Friday, September 25, 2009.
Patriot Act may get renamed, but with a few changes
– chicagotribune.com - The USA Patriot Act, a favorite of the Bush administration’s fight against terrorism, may be renamed later this year as the Justice Act at the hands of congressional Democrats.
But the law, including its provisions that gave FBI agents more leeway to search computers and bank records, is likely to survive, albeit with changes to limit who can be searched.
“Security and liberty are both essential in our free society,” Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said Tuesday in introducing a bill to extend three provisions of the law due to expire Dec. 31.
As a senator from Illinois, Barack Obama was a critic of the Patriot Act. Last week, however, the Obama administration asked Congress to extend the three expiring of its provisions.
Full Story: Patriot Act may get renamed, but with a few changes — chicagotribune.com.
Climate change is killing our people
UN leaders should know: climate change is destroying my village in Uganda – flooding our homes and ruining our crops
guardian.co.uk – There are no seasons any more in eastern Uganda. Before, we had two harvests every year, but now there’s no pattern. Floods like we’ve never seen came and swept up everything. It rained and rained until all the land was soaked and our houses were submerged in the water. This forced us to move to higher ground, where we sought refuge. By the time we came back home, all the houses had collapsed, our granaries were destroyed and food was washed away. The remaining crops were rotten, and our food was no more.
As the ground in the village remained flooded, there were a lot of mosquitoes around, and five of my family members became ill with malaria. Because there was no clean water to drink, some people got cholera and diarrhoea. Many of the people in my village died. Children didn’t go to school since they were too weakened by disease and their parents had no money for school fees.
Our farms were ruined, so we didn’t have food until the government came to help us. This was so humiliating for us, because we had never depended on aid to survive.
Full Story: Climate change is killing our people | Constance Okollet | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk.
One Year After the Bank Bailout, We Still Need a People’s Economic Recovery
One year ago Jobs with Justice, a coalition of labor and community organizations, took to the streets to oppose the Bush Administration’s bailout of Wall Street’s banks and other financial institutions. We warned against transferring public money to private banks through Bush’s Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) without some level of public ownership and control. But the TARP passed as is, entrusting the banks to put money back into the economy and help put the brakes on the recession.
Instead, these corporate criminals stole our money.
The banks said they needed taxpayer money to continue lending and to keep the economy running, yet they refuse to extend credit to viable companies like Hartmarx and Republic Windows and Doors. They are forcing small businesses to close and costing thousands of workers their jobs. Today, unemployment stands at 9.7%.
Mortgage lenders have failed to work with homeowners to curtail foreclosures, even those who qualify for refinancing. Today, nearly 1 in 25 homes is in foreclosure.
Full Story: One Year After the Bank Bailout, We Still Need a People’s Economic Recovery | CommonDreams.org.
A Novel Idea
A Novel Idea
by Ralph Nader, | CommonDreams.org
At a little noticed meeting with Senate Democrats, Warren Buffett, the famous investors’ guru, told the lawmakers that rich people are not paying enough taxes.
A tax increase for the very wealthy? Many of the Senators backed away from that recommendation, even though it came from the world’s second richest man. That is just one reason why Mr. Buffett plays a central role in my first work of fiction, Only the Super Rich Can Save Us! The title is derived from an exchange between Buffett and a woman from New Orleans. Buffett is leading a convoy of critical supplies right after Katrina to help the fleeing poor stranded on the highways without food, water, medicine and shelter. At one stop, Buffett was distributing supplies when a grandmother clasped his hands, looked right into his eyes and cried out: “Only the super-rich can save us!”
Her words jolted Buffett to his core. Arriving back at his modest home in Omaha, he knew what he had to do.
Full Story: A Novel Idea | CommonDreams.org.
Bunning falls asleep during health care bill mark-up.
Think Progress » Yesterday during the Senate Finance Committee’s mark-up of chairman Max Baucus’ (D-MT) health care bill, Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) chastised the whole operation. “I do not support a government takeover of the health-care system,” Bunning complained, saying the bill “confiscates more money from the taxpayers” and “tramples on American freedom and liberties.” Soon after, Bunning decided to take a little nap:
During opening remarks at the Senate Finance Committee session, the Kentucky Republican appeared fast asleep for several minutes, with his head cocked to the side and his eyes closed, before a staffer roused him. Bunning’s head was propped in his hand and his mouth was slightly open while he slept, several witnesses told HOH.
Full Story: Think Progress » Bunning falls asleep during health care bill mark-up..
Bush on visiting a prison ministry program: ‘Everyone was black, of course.’
Think Progress » In his new book, Speechless: Tales of a White House Survivor, former Bush administration Matt Latimer describes a 2008 California GOP fundraiser he attended while working in the White House, where the President gave a speech to donors about his personal struggles with alcoholism. Bush then went on to make racially charged comments about his visit to a prison ministry program (p. 177):
He talked about his own failings with alcoholism as the reason he supported his faith-based initiative. “My philosophy is, find somebody who hurts and do something about it,” he said. “Don’t wait for government to tell you what to do.” He bluntly talked about his own situation. “I was beginning to love alcohol over my wife and kids. It got to a point when Billy Graham came into my life. But I was hardheaded and didn’t want to listen for a while. And then I stopped drinking overnight. I am a one-man faith-based initiative. Alcohol was competing for my affections. And it would have ruined me.”
Full Story: Think Progress » Bush on visiting a prison ministry program: ‘Everyone was black, of course.’.
U.S. Aug mass layoffs rise, manufacturing worst hit
(Reuters) – The number of mass layoffs by U.S. employers rose by 533 in August from July, with the manufacturing sector the hardest hit, Labor Department data showed on Wednesday.
The number of mass layoff actions — defined as job cuts involving at least 50 people from a single employer — rose to 2,690 last month, affecting 259,307 workers. That brought the total of mass layoffs so far this year to 21,184.
A total of 279 mass layoff events were reported in the manufacturing sector in August, the department said.
While the broader economy appears to be recovering from its deepest and longest recession in 70 years, unemployment continues to rise. There are fears rising joblessness could hamper the recovery.
Full Story: U.S. Aug mass layoffs rise, manufacturing worst hit | Reuters.
Study shows U.S. bank CEO pay dwarfs rest of world
(Reuters) - You wouldn’t know it by his pay stubs, but Jiang Jianqing heads the world’s largest bank.
Jiang, chairman of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, made just $234,700 in 2008. That’s less than 2 percent of the $19.6 million awarded to Jamie Dimon, chief executive of the world’s fourth-largest bank, JPMorgan Chase & Co.
The contrast illustrates the massive differences in pay among the CEOs of the world’s top banks. The compensation of the CEOs of the largest U.S. banks towers above what’s paid to banking chiefs in other parts of the world, according to a Reuters analysis of pay at the 18 biggest banks by market value.
Excessive compensation at banks is expected to be discussed this week when the Group of 20 nations meets in Pittsburgh. But consensus on the issue remains a distant hope as there continue to be vast differences in how bankers are paid, from the CEO on down.
Full Story: Study shows U.S. bank CEO pay dwarfs rest of world | Reuters.
TIME TO CHANGE BERNANKE’S MEDICATION?
Greg Palast
Secret White House letter to G-20
I still get a thrill whenever I get my hands on a confidential memo with “The White House, Washington” appearing on the letterhead. Even when—like the one I’m looking at now—it’s about a snoozy topic: This week’s G-20 summit.
But the letter’s content shook me awake, and may keep me up the rest of the night.
The 6-page letter from the White House, dated September 3, was sent to the 20 heads of state that will meet this Thursday in Pittsburgh. After some initial diplo-blather, our President’s “sherpa” for the summit, Michael Froman, does a little victory dance, announcing that the recession has been defeated. “Global equity markets have risen 35 percent since the end of March,” writes Froman. In other words, the stock market is up and all’s well.
Full Story: Greg Palast » TIME TO CHANGE BERNANKE’S MEDICATION?Secret White House letter to G-20.
At Pentagon’s Request, Washington Post Delayed Story on Afghanistan Report
By Howard Kurtz, - washingtonpost.com
To Bob Woodward, it was the modern-day equivalent of the Pentagon Papers. But to Obama administration officials, the classified assessment of the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan, if disclosed by The Washington Post, represented a potential threat to the safety of U.S. troops.
The result was that The Post agreed to a one-day delay in publicizing the report by Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, and that the paper’s top editor engaged in a lengthy discussion Sunday with three top Defense Department officials in a meeting at the Pentagon. The Post published the report, which Woodward had obtained, on Monday.
Woodward said in an interview Tuesday that four White House and administration officials strongly objected to the publication of the full report, telling him, Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli and a Post lawyer in a conference call on Saturday that “if we publish it as is, it could endanger the lives of troops.”
Full Story: At Pentagon’s Request, Washington Post Delayed Story on Afghanistan Report – washingtonpost.com.
Council Closes Account Over Bank Flag Flap
Cherokee County Council Pulls Funds From Bank
– WYFF Greenville - The controversy about the placement of American flags to honor a fallen Marine from Gaffney could cost Bank of America some local government deposit money, and perhaps much more.
Monday night, the Cherokee County Council voted 5 to 1 to withdraw county money from any accounts held by Bank of America.
Councilman Quay Little said that totals more than $500,000, but that number could skyrocket. If all county officials close their accounts, Bank of America would lose more than $1.5 million in customer funds, Little said.
Full Story: Co. Council Closes Account Over Bank Flag Flap – Local News Story – WYFF Greenville.
Explosive Theory – 9/11
Eight years after 9/11, a growing organization of building trades professionals suspect that there was more to the event than the government will admit
By Jay Levin and Tom McKenzie
JUST A FEW YEARS ago Ed Munyak, a fire protection engineer for the city of San Jose, seemed like a lonely, out-there figure, a sometimes-target because of his outspoken position on the events of Sept. 11, 2001. These days, hundreds of other building trade professionals have joined him in challenging the official narrative about the collapse of three buildings at New York’s World Trade Center (WTC) on that fateful, traumatic day.
Munyak, of Los Altos Hills, is a mechanical and fire engineer whose job is to review building plans to ensure they comply with the California Building and Fire Code. In 2007, after speaking out on his own for a few years, Munyak signed on with a then-fledging organization called Architects and Engineers for 911 Truth (AE911 Truth), founded by Bay Area architect Richard Gage.
The right’s middle-finger spirit of contrarianism
By Garrison Keillor, Salon
The president has declined to talk about racism in connection with the carpet-chewers of the right who are suffering road rage over his existence, and he’s wise to turn that one down. The country doesn’t need a sermon on race or civility right now. What it needs is to believe that our leaders are trying to do the right thing, no matter how inconvenient, and if they forge ahead and fix health insurance, then the ragemeisters of the right will find other hobbies.
Mr. Obama is a Chicago guy, and he doesn’t wilt if some gin-crazed cracker from South Carolina calls him a liar, so don’t trouble your pretty head about civility.
It was women’s suffrage that tamed politics. All through the 19th century, going back to Jefferson vs. Adams in 1800, politics was a blood sport. Hecklers followed a candidate like fleas on a dog. Newspapers were rip-snorting partisan and tore into the opposition with gay abandon. The English language is rich in invective and it all got used. When you went after your opponent, you got warmed up by calling him a horse thief, drunkard, agnostic, wife-beater, agent of Satan and tool of Wall Street, and then you got to the serious stuff. But once women appeared, in their little pinafores and corsages, we became, temporarily, a quieter, gentler people than we actually are and sat still at League of Women Voters forums on world federalism and perused the editorial page, written by silver-haired gents with distinguished jowls who penned judicious columns of On The One Hand This, On The Other Hand That, and nobody ever yelled at them except their wives.
Full Story: The right’s middle-finger spirit of contrarianism | Salon.
Press to be limited for Glenn Beck’s city visit
Is someone trying to restrict press access when Glenn Beck is presented with the key to the city of Mount Vernon?
| Seattle Times Newspaper - There will be no press credentials for the sold-out “Welcome Home Glenn Beck” event, 7:30 p.m. Saturday at McIntyre Hall — with the exception of one member of the local press who will accompany Mayor Bud Norris.
Norris, who planned the instantly controversial evening, said the directive came from Fox News and syndicated-radio personality Beck and his representatives, and that he wasn’t told why: “No, I didn’t ask for a reason.” Norris said he would be choosing the one reporter allowed but hadn’t decided who it will be.
Chris Balf, president of Beck’s production company, Mercury Radio Arts, said in a statement Tuesday, “Glenn is very excited about returning home and being a guest at the fundraiser [for Mount Vernon's Lincoln Theatre], but there is a slight misunderstanding as we are guests and are not running the event.”
Staff at McIntyre Hall — a county facility — said it might simply be a capacity issue for the venue whose 680 seats sold out for $25 each in just one day.
Meanwhile, opinions differed Tuesday about how to classify “Welcome Home Glenn Beck.” The mayor … key to the city … making an official proclamation of “Glenn Beck Day” …
“It is a city event. There’s no question about that,” Norris said.
Full Story: Local News | Press to be limited for Glenn Beck’s city visit | Seattle Times Newspaper.
Let the panda die out ‘with dignity’, says BBC expert
OPS: Hmmm… that have wingnuts in the UK too.
- Times Online - The BBC wildlife expert Chris Packham has questioned the millions spent trying to save the giant panda from extinction and suggested that the bamboo-eating bear should be allowed to die out “with a degree of dignity”.
The zoologist, who has replaced Bill Oddie as a presenter on BBC’s Springwatch, risked criticism from wildlife conservationists in an interview with the Radio Times in which he describes the giant panda as a “T-shirt animal” on which too much conservation money is wasted.
“Here is a species that, of its own accord, has gone down an evolutionary cul-de-sac. It’s not a strong species,” he said.
Full Story: Let the panda die out ‘with dignity’, says BBC expert Chris Packham – Times Online.
Dust Turns Sydney Sky Red
OPS: Amazing photos in this one
Blankets City – Never seen before
| Sydney Morning Herald|The dusty blanket that wrapped itself around Sydney this morning pushed air pollution levels to 1500 times their normal levels – the highest on record, a climate scientist says.
Sydneysiders woke to a red dawn this morning as a thick dust storm caused havoc with transport and raised health fears.
The size of the dust cloud surprised weather experts, who say it has covered half of NSW.
Fed increases scrutiny over bank bonuses
Move to ensure bankers’ pay based on real profits
FT.com – US regulators have intensified efforts to gather intelligence on banks’ trading positions in a move that could herald a drive to ensure traders’ bonuses are based on real profits rather than unrealised gains.
Wall Street executives said regulators, led by the Federal Reserve, had been asking banks in recent weeks to provide a breakdown of their balance sheets, with particular attention to trading books.
Full Story: FT.com / US / Economy & Fed – Fed increases scrutiny over bank bonuses.
“The Mysterious Collapse of World Trade Center 7″
AUDIO (click to listen)
David Ray Griffin interviewed by Michel Chossudovsky on the Global Research News Hour on RBN radio, September 10, 2009.
Prof. Griffin’s discusses themes raised in his new book, The Mysterious Collapse of World Trade Center 7: Why the Final Official Report About 9/11 Is Unscientific and False
Full Story: “The Mysterious Collapse of World Trade Center 7″.
Moody’s Whistleblower: Ratings Are Still Inflated, Nothing’s Changed
As the big three credit rating agencies — Moody’s Investor Service, Standard & Poor’s and Fitch Ratings — prepare to face the scrutiny of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform on Thursday, one whistleblower has stepped forward with shocking new allegations about the agencies lack of reform.
As the Wall Street Journal reports today, former Moody’s analyst Eric Kolchinsky is prepared to testify that Moody’s is continuing to issue artificially high ratings for Wall Street’s controversial debt securities. Though the SEC recently proposed new rules for credit rating agencies, there is growing concern among many that the reforms don’t go far enough.
During the financial crisis, credit rating agencies were notorious for slapping AAA ratings on shoddy Wall Street assets, including those issued by AIG – and were blamed by many for helping to fuel last year’s economic meltdown. Kolchinsky told the WSJ that he feels “some moral responsibility for the poor CDO [Collateralized Debt Obligation] ratings” he issued and added, “I was part of the process that did all this damage, and I feel I should try to do something now to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
Full Story: Eric Kolchinsky, Moody’s Whistleblower: Ratings Are Still Inflated, Nothing’s Changed.
Inside the Apocalyptic Soviet Doomsday Machine
Soviets really had doomsday machine 
Valery Yarynich glances nervously over his shoulder. Clad in a brown leather jacket, the 72-year-old former Soviet colonel is hunkered in the back of the dimly lit Iron Gate restaurant in Washington, DC. It’s March 2009—the Berlin Wall came down two decades ago—but the lean and fit Yarynich is as jumpy as an informant dodging the KGB. He begins to whisper, quietly but firmly.
“The Perimeter system is very, very nice,” he says. “We remove unique responsibility from high politicians and the military.” He looks around again.
Yarynich is talking about Russia’s doomsday machine. That’s right, an actual doomsday device—a real, functioning version of the ultimate weapon, always presumed to exist only as a fantasy of apocalypse-obsessed science fiction writers and paranoid über-hawks. The thing that historian Lewis Mumford called “the central symbol of this scientifically organized nightmare of mass extermination.” Turns out Yarynich, a 30-year veteran of the Soviet Strategic Rocket Forces and Soviet General Staff, helped build one.
Full Story: Inside the Apocalyptic Soviet Doomsday Machine.
CA OKs petition drive for pot legalization
Two prominent East Bay marijuana advocates got clearance from the state today to try to put a pot-legalization initiative on the November 2010 California ballot.
Richard Lee, executive director of the medical marijuana dispensary known as Oaksterdam, and Jeff Jones, former director of the Oakland Cannabis Buyers’ Cooperative, are the sponsors of a measure that would allow anyone over 21 to possess or grow marijuana for personal use. It would allow each local government to decide whether to tax and regulate marijuana sales.
The secretary of state’s office approved the initiative for circulation along with a similar measure sponsored by John Donohue of Long Beach. Each needs at least 433,971 signatures of registered voters by Feb. 18 to qualify for the November ballot.
The Lee-Jones initiative would legalize possession of up to an ounce of marijuana. Lee says it would generate billions of dollars in tax revenue.
Full Story: State OKs petition drive for pot legalization.
Media hypes terror plot, despite the fact no one is charged with terror
| Raw Story - It has a familiar ring: “Investigators are looking for about a dozen more people in connection with a wide-ranging terror investigation that has already netted arrests in Colorado and New York City, a source familiar with the investigation said Tuesday.”
That’s the lead sentence of a CNN “breaking news” report filed Tuesday about a frantic search for alleged terrorism plotters within the United States. But a closer inspection of the story — and that of others in the past week — reveals that despite the hoopla, federal authorities have yet to charge the men they’re accusing of a terror-related crime.
In fact, they’re only actually charged with lying to federal agents. But you wouldn’t know that from reading the headlines.
Problematic in this and other recent reports is the use of anonymous law enforcement sources, who repeatedly hype alleged ties to al Qaeda, identify “persons of interest,” and detail dramatic but unspecified plots.
Full Story: Media hypes terror plot, despite the fact no one is charged with terror | Raw Story.
Delegates walk out ‘in disgust’ at Palin speech
| Raw Story – HONG KONG — Former US vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin said the US government was wasting taxpayers’ money and could aggravate poverty, said delegates at her first speech outside North America on Wednesday.
Palin, the former governor of Alaska, gave hundreds of financial big-hitters at the CLSA Investors’ Forum in Hong Kong a wide-ranging speech that covered Alaska, international terrorism, US economic policy and trade with China.
Her performance, which was closed to the media, divided opinion.
Full Story: Delegates walk out ‘in disgust’ at Palin speech | Raw Story.
Kansas town hall erupts into laughter at GOP Rep’s health reform lie
Video at link
The Raw Story » Kansas Republican Congressman Todd Tiahrt (pronounced ‘t-heart’) may have had an easy summer, with health reform town halls stacked to the hilt with right-wing activists willing to believe outrageous myths about the proposed legislation.
But that easy ride seems to have come to an end for the representative.
At a recent Kansas town hall, Tiahrt tried to pass off something of a whopper — claiming that Democrats
want to establish a panel to set doctors’ pay rates.
“[They're] gonna set up a committee to determine what every doctor in America will make,” he claimed. “They will set that fee, every doctor will make the same …”
The audience erupted into laughter and boos.
This video was captured by YouTube user KansasDemocrats, published Sept. 21, 2009.
Full Story: The Raw Story » Kansas town hall erupts into laughter at GOP Rep’s health reform lie.
Could ACORN defunding bill strike military-industrial complex?
The Raw Story » Overly-broad language used by lawmakers intending to pull government funding for community organizing group ACORN may have the unintended effect of forcing the government to also pull funds from much of the military-industrial complex, a Tuesday report revealed.
“The congressional legislation intended to defund ACORN, passed with broad bipartisan support, is written so broadly that it applies to ‘any organization’ that has been charged with breaking federal or state election laws, lobbying disclosure laws, campaign finance laws or filing fraudulent paperwork with any federal or state agency. It also applies to any of the employees, contractors or other folks affiliated with a group charged with any of those things,” wrote Huffington Post reporter Ryan Grimm.
“In other words, the bill could plausibly defund the entire military-industrial complex. Whoops.”
Mother Jones was quick to note that could mean any firm in the Project on Government Oversight’s contractor misconduct database could be facing a removal of government funds — including the private security firm formerly known as Blackwater Worldwide.
Full Story: The Raw Story » Could ACORN defunding bill strike military-industrial complex?.
Regulating the Financial Sector
Economist and former Vice Presidential candidate Pat Choate discusses his new book Saving Capitalism: Keeping America Strong and outlines why the financial sector must be regulated.
States Continue To Shed Jobs
During the month of August, 27 states increased their unemployment rate.
Dustin Ensinger – economyincisis.org - While economists, policymakers and business people claim that the recession has officially ended, it hardly seems so for the nation’s millions of unemployed. Despite the economic recovery, those ranks continue to swell.
According to government data released Friday, during the month of August, 27 states increased their unemployment rate. In 16 other states, the unemployment rate decreased and in another seven states it remained steady.
A total of five states topped 12 percent unemployment for the month of August, with California, Nevada and Rhode Island all reaching record highs.
Full Story: Economyincrisis.org – America’s Economic Report – Daily.
A Look at the Human Hands Behind Our Food
I recently had the opportunity to attend a panel discussion about farmworker justice entitled, “The Fruits of Their Labor.” We’ve read about modern slavery in the tomato fields in Immokalee, Florida. You might ask why the situation in Florida would be any different than, for instance, the large farms in California’s Central Valley.
Turns out, what happens in Florida isn’t unique. Sexual harassment and abuse, non-payment, being forced to drink water from irrigation ditches, having no access to the fresh food harvested for others’ consumption, constant pesticide exposure, heat-related deaths, 12 to 14 hour work days and child labor are all routine in our agricultural system.
In addition, workers toil for an average yearly wage of $7,000-$10,000 per individual or $13,000 per family, without health insurance, sick pay or overtime. The people affected are powerless because they are often undocumented immigrants (often of indigenous heritage) from some of the poorest states in Mexico and Central America. The fact that people are willing to come here to work under such horrible conditions should give you a pretty good idea of how bad things are for poor people in their home countries.
Full Story: http://www.ecosalon.com/fighting-slavery-and-environmental-injustice-in-American-Agriculture | EcoSalon.
Is America Hooked on War?
While You are Minding Your Own Business, The U.S. is Constantly Making War Around the Globe. As much as it might seem that most of us are going along, living peaceful lives, there’s another kind of America that operates on the same soil — a warfare state.
Is America Hooked on War? – By Tom Engelhardt
“War is peace” was one of the memorable slogans on the facade of the Ministry of Truth, Minitrue in “Newspeak,” the language invented by George Orwell in 1948 for his dystopian novel 1984. Some 60 years later, a quarter-century after Orwell’s imagined future bit the dust, the phrase is, in a number of ways, eerily applicable to the United States.
Last week, for instance, a New York Times front-page story by Eric Schmitt and David Sanger was headlined “Obama Is Facing Doubts in Party on Afghanistan, Troop Buildup at Issue.” It offered a modern version of journalistic Newspeak.
“Doubts,” of course, imply dissent, and in fact just the week before there had been a major break in Washington’s ranks, though not among Democrats. The conservative columnist George Will wrote a piece offering blunt advice to the Obama administration, summed up in its headline: “Time to Get Out of Afghanistan.” In our age of political and audience fragmentation and polarization, think of this as the Afghan version of Vietnam’s Cronkite moment.
The Times report on those Democratic doubts, on the other hand, represented a more typical Washington moment. Ignored, for instance, was Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold’s end-of-August call for the president to develop an Afghan withdrawal timetable. The focus of the piece was instead an upcoming speech by Michigan Senator Carl Levin, chairman of the Armed Services Committee. He was, Schmitt and Sanger reported, planning to push back against well-placed leaks (in the Times, among other places) indicating that war commander General Stanley McChrystal was urging the president to commit 15,000 to 45,000 more American troops to the Afghan War.
Full Story: Tomgram: War Is Peace.
Rep. Mike Ross Raises Eyebrows With Healthy Haul
Rep. Mike Ross, Opponent of Public Option, Raises Eyebrows With Healthy Haul From Pharmacy Chain.
- ProPublica – Arkansas Rep. Mike Ross — a Blue Dog Democrat playing a key role in the health care debate — sold a piece of commercial property in 2007 for substantially more than a county assessment [2] (PDF) and an independent appraisal [3] (PDF) say it was worth.
The buyer: an Arkansas-based pharmacy chain with a keen interest in how the debate plays out.
Ross sold the real estate in Prescott, Ark., to USA Drug for $420,000 — an eye-popping number for real estate in the tiny train and lumber town about 100 miles southwest of Little Rock.
“You can buy half the town for $420,000,” said Adam Guthrie, chairman of the county Board of Equalization and the only licensed real estate appraiser in Prescott.
Full Story: Rep. Mike Ross Raises Eyebrows With Healthy Haul – ProPublica.
Are Chicken and Fish as Unhealthy as Red Meat?
In the interest of your health, the environment and even logic, it makes more sense to leave chicken and fish off your plate. Here’s why.
Over the last couple of years, I’ve noticed some similar recurring responses that people have when I tell them I’m vegan.
They go something like this, “Oh, I’m practically a vegetarian. I mean, I don’t eat red meat.” Or, “I don’t eat any land animals, just fish.”
Maybe people equate red meat with more health risks, or maybe people can more readily identify with cows or lambs or pigs, and so they stop eating them. Whatever the reason, it seems the majority is more comfortable forgoing steak rather than sushi.
But, in the interest of logic, ethics and even your health, it makes more sense to leave chicken and fish off your plate.
Why? Well, if you’re concerned with how the animals you eat are treated, hear this: chickens are probably the most abused animals on the planet.
I’m not kidding.
Full Story: Are Chicken and Fish as Unhealthy as Red Meat? | Health and Wellness | AlterNet.
5 Things the Corporate Media Don’t Want You to Know About Cannabis
Paul Armentano, AlterNet. – Recent scientific reports suggest that pot doesn’t destroy your brain, that it doesn’t cause lung damage like tobacco — but you won’t hear it in the corporate media.
Editor’s note: Come see Paul Armentano and many other top marijuana experts and advocates in discussion at NORML’s 38th national conference taking place this week from September 24–26 in San Francisco. Click here to learn more.
Writing in the journal Science nearly four decades ago, New York State University sociologist Erich Goode documented the media’s complicity in maintaining cannabis prohibition.
He observed: “[T]ests and experiments purporting to demonstrate the ravages of marijuana consumption receive enormous attention from the media, and their findings become accepted as fact by the public. But when careful refutations of such research are published, or when later findings contradict the original pathological findings, they tend to be ignored or dismissed.”
A glimpse of today’s mainstream media landscape indicates that little has changed — with news outlets continuing to, at best, underreport the publication of scientific studies that undermine the federal government’s longstanding pot propaganda and, at worst, ignore them all together.
Full Story: 5 Things the Corporate Media Don’t Want You to Know About Cannabis | Media and Technology | AlterNet.
ACORN: The Most Cost-Effective Investment the Government (and Foundations) Have Ever Made
David Morris, AlterNet. – The real purpose of the right’s attacks on ACORN is to destroy a remarkably successful 50-year-old grassroots model for defending the poor and workers.
To understand the current attacks on ACORN, and the organization itself, we need to go back more than 60 years, to the 1930s and the New Deal, when for the first time, the federal government accepted responsibility for directly helping the non-working poor.
These programs were expanded in the 1940s, but in the 1950s, a backlash erupted against the poor, driven by several factors.
The postwar prosperity dramatically reduced the number of poor families, and an increasing number of black women were added to the welfare rolls, injecting race into the debate.
Full Story: ACORN: The Most Cost-Effective Investment the Government (and Foundations) Have Ever Made | Politics | AlterNet.
Why President Obama Can’t Let Himself Be Blackmailed by His Generals
Two days ago, the report was leaked to the press.
This leak could not have been inadvertent, as the leaked copy had been heavily redacted, with classified materials deleted. It is hard to see this as anything but an attempt to box in Obama and put pressure on him to agree to more troops, whether any good strategy supports investing more troops, or not.
But before anyone, let alone Obama, starts bending to military pressure, let’s ask how much deference U.S. generals deserve.
Obama’s war zone commanders are trying to box in his options and have him send thousands more troops to Afghanistan. Here’s why he shouldn’t give in to the pressure.
Full Story: Why President Obama Can’t Let Himself Be Blackmailed by His Generals | World | AlterNet.
Court rejects genetically modified sugar beets
The government illegally approved a genetically modified, herbicide-resistant strain of sugar beets without adequately considering the chance they will contaminate other beet crops, a federal judge in San Francisco has ruled.
The ruling by U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White rejected the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s decision in 2005 to allow Monsanto Co. to sell the sugar beets, known as “Roundup-Ready” because they are engineered to coexist with Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide.
Sugar beets produce 30 percent of the world’s sugar and, according to consumer groups, half the granulated sugar in the United States. This year’s planting, centered in Oregon’s Willamette Valley, is the first to include a full crop of the Monsanto product.
Full Story: Court rejects genetically modified sugar beets.
Why I Still Oppose Genetically Modified Crops
Introduced more than a decade ago, genetically modified crops are now planted on millions of acres throughout the world. But the fundamental questions about them remain — both about their safety and their long-term impact on global food security and the environment.
by verlyn klinkenborg
Yale Environment 360 - For the past dozen years, I’ve been writing editorials opposing the introduction of genetically modified crops. When I began, genetically modified corn and soybeans were still just getting a foothold in American fields. Now, of course, hundreds of millions of acres here and abroad have been planted to these new varieties, which are usually engineered to withstand the application of pesticides — pesticides usually made by the same companies that engineer the seeds. Even wheat and rice producers, latecomers to the genetically modified table, are feeling the pressure to convert.
There has been a frenzy in the grain markets in the past couple of years — a new volatility in futures and in prices on the ground — that seems to favor genetically modified crops. It makes sense. The cost of conventionally-grown grain goes up and up because there is less and less of it. This leaves the world open to the nearly unchecked proliferation of genetically modified varieties.
After a dozen years, I still oppose genetically modified crops. This may sound like sheer truculence on my part — a Luddite reluctance to accept the future. It is certainly dispiriting. Like many people, I feel, as I did a decade ago, that genetically modified crops were introduced with bland assurances of safety based on studies from small test plots, a far different thing from the uncontrolled global experiment we now find ourselves in the midst of.
Full Story: Why I Still Oppose
Genetically Modified Crops by Verlyn Klinkenborg: Yale Environment 360.
What I Saw (And Heard) At The Revolution: Lessons From The `Values Voter Summit’
Talk To Action | I’m back from the Religious Right Bizarro World that is the “Values Voter Summit.” As always, it was quite an experience.
I’ll have a full report on the event in the October Church & State, but I wanted to share some things I learned at the Summit with you today:
* Be As Partisan As You Want To Be: I’m used to Religious Right confabs being GOP rallies, but this one was way over the top. These groups don’t even pretend to be non-partisan any more – yet many of the sponsoring groups (the Family Research Council, the Heritage Foundation and the American Family Association) hold tax-exempt status. Are you listening, IRS?
Full Story: Talk To Action | What I Saw (And Heard) At The Revolution: Lessons From The `Values Voter Summit’.
Neocon Judge’s History of Cover-ups
Note: there are decades of dirt in this article
By Robert Parry, Consortiumnews.com
Laurence Silberman, a U.S. Courts Appeals Court judge and a longtime neoconservative operative – part of what the Iran-Contra special prosecutor called “the strategic reserves” for convicted Reagan administration operatives in the 1980s – is back playing a similar role for the Bush-43 administration.
On Sept. 11, the eighth anniversary of the terror attacks on New York and Washington, Silberman issued a 2-to-1 opinion dismissing a lawsuit against the private security firm, CACI International, brought by Iraqi victims of torture and other abuse at Abu Ghraib prison.
Silberman declared that CACI was immune from prosecution because its employees were responding to U.S. military commands. The immunity ruling blocked legal efforts by 212 Iraqis, who suffered directly at Abu Ghraib or were the widows of men who died, to exact some accountability from CACI employees who allegedly assisted in the torture of prisoners.
“During wartime, where a private service contractor is integrated into combatant activities over which the military retains command authority, a tort claim arising out of the contractor’s engagement in such activities shall be preempted,” Silberman wrote.
Full Story: Consortiumnews.com.
Brazil Asks UN for Emergency Meeting on Honduras
– NYTimes.com - Brazil’s government has asked the United Nations Security Council to convene an emergency meeting over a standoff in Honduras with the nation’s deposed president taking refuge in the Brazilian Embassy.
The official Agencia Brasil news agency says Brazil’s U.N. ambassador, Maria Luiza Viotti, has urged the council to guarantee the safety of the embassy and ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya.
Viotti sent a letter asking for the council meeting after baton-wielding soldiers used tear gas and water cannons Tuesday to chase away thousands of Zelaya’s supporters who were demonstrating outside the embassy.
Zelaya and 70 friends and relatives are trapped inside.
Full Story: Brazil Asks UN for Emergency Meeting on Honduras – NYTimes.com.
Top Ten Ways to Convince the Muslims We’re On a Crusade
Talk To Action | - The Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) was founded in 2005 by U.S. Air Force Academy graduate and Reagan administration White House counsel Mikey Weinstein, after the harassment his own sons faced as Jewish cadets at the Academy led him to discover that the fundamentalist Christian takeover of the Air Force Academy was far from an isolated problem. It was a military-wide issue that needed to be confronted head on. But it quickly became apparent that MRFF’s initial mission of protecting the rights of our men and women in uniform was only addressing part of the problem. The evangelizing and proselytizing of Iraqi and Afghan Muslims by both private religious organizations and U.S. military personnel also had to be exposed and stopped — particularly the materials and media available via the internet and television that could be used by extremists as propaganda for recruiting purposes.
When MRFF began exposing some of what we were finding on the internet, Weinstein was contacted by two Bush administration national security officials, one civilian and one military, confirming that the kind of stuff we were exposing was, in fact, being used as fodder for propaganda, and urging him not to stop what MRFF was doing. The most astounding thing, as you’ll see in the list below, is that it’s not the private religious organizations who are most at fault in spreading the crusader message, but the U.S. military itself.
Full Story: Talk To Action | Top Ten Ways to Convince the Muslims We’re On a Crusade.
In Health Care, Number of Claims Denied Remains a Mystery
By Danielle Ivory – Huffington Post Investigative Fund
Are health insurance companies generally being fair and honest when they reject claims from policy holders?
That would seem to be an important question in deciding how best to fix the U.S. health system. But it hasn’t been a focus of the raging health-care debate — possibly because the answer is not publicly available.
“This is one of the dark corners of the black box that is private health insurance,” said Karen Pollitz, a professor at the Georgetown University Health Policy Institute.
Data on how often insurance claims are denied — and for what reasons — is collected and analyzed by the insurance companies themselves. But except in California, the companies aren’t required to provide those records to any state or federal agency. “The number is knowable, but not known by regulators or policy makers or patients,” Pollitz said.
Full Story: In Health Care, Number of Claims Denied Remains a Mystery | The Huffington Post Investigative Fund.
Chase and Bank of America Revise Policies on Overdraft Fees
– NYTimes.com - Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase, two of the nation’s biggest banks, announced plans on Tuesday to drastically overhaul their debit card programs by lowering or eliminating fees, changing the way they credit transactions and allowing customers to opt out of overdraft protection.
The moves come as lawmakers and regulators in Washington push proposals to reform what critics say are excessive charges of which consumers are unaware. The penalties, known as overdraft fees, bring the banking industry tens of billions of dollars in revenue annually.
Bank of America said it would allow current customers to turn off the ability to spend when their account hits zero, starting Oct. 19. Next June, the bank plans to limit the number of times each year that current customers can overdraw their accounts when using a debit card at a store. It will let new customers choose whether they want overdraft protection when they are opening their accoun
Full Story: Chase and Bank of America Revise Policies on Overdraft Fees – NYTimes.com.
Dr Mark Hyman Discusses Why Cholesterol May Not Be The Cause Of Heart Disease With MSNBC’s Dr Nancy (VIDEO)
HuffPost’s Dr. Mark Hyman was a guest on MSNBC’s show “Dr. Nancy,” hosted by Dr. Nancy Snyderman, to discuss his recent blog in which he examines why cholesterol may not be the cause of heart disease.
Full Story: Huff TV: Dr Mark Hyman Discusses Why Cholesterol May Not Be The Cause Of Heart Disease With MSNBC’s Dr Nancy (VIDEO).
Reid gives GOP direct warning on healthcare
- TheHill.com – Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) gave Republicans his most direct warning to date that he is prepared to use a procedural maneuver to pass healthcare reform with a simple majority.
Reid told Republicans that he would prefer to pass healthcare reform under regular order but warned that he would not hesitate to use budget reconciliation if the legislation stalled in committee. The Senate Finance Committee began marking up a sprawling healthcare reform bill on Tuesday morning.
“If we can’t work this out to do something within the committee structure, then we’ll be forced to do reconciliation,” said Reid, who said the tactic would be used as a “last resort.”
Reid then spelled out how healthcare would pass under budget reconciliation proceedings, giving his colleagues a clear picture of what they face if they fail to reach bipartisan agreement.
“On reconciliation, under the order, there’s only 20 hours of debate,” Reid explained. “There would be a free amendment process, which would take some time.
Full Story: Reid gives GOP direct warning on healthcare – TheHill.com.
GOP senators declare war on Net neutrality
The Raw Story » Plan to keep Internet free of interference from ISPs draws opposition from GOP, service providers
Six Republican senators have introduced an amendment that would block the Federal Communications Commission from implementing its recently announced Net neutrality policy.
Texas Republican Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison introduced the amendment to an appropriations bill. It would prevent the FCC from getting funding for any initiative to uphold Net neutrality. According to The Hill, the co-sponsors are Sen. Sam Brownback (R-KS), Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) Sen. John Ensign (R-NV), Sen. John Thune (R-SD) and Sen. David Vitter (R-LA).
The move appears to be an attempt to pre-empt the FCC’s expected new policy to ensure that Internet service providers don’t discriminate between different types of information on their networks.
On Monday, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski gave a speech in which he outlined the FCC’s plan to enforce Net neutrality, a position President Barack Obama held during his campaign for president.
Full Story: The Raw Story » GOP senators declare war on Net neutrality.
Exclusive: FBI may have destroyed files on Walter Cronkite
The Raw Story » FBI spokesman: ‘We would need warehouses to keep everything we’ve collected’
WASHINGTON — Officials with the Federal Bureau of Investigation said they may have destroyed files on legendary newsman Walter Cronkite in an October 2007 document purge.
Blogger and San Francisco-based gay activist Michael Petrelis filed a Freedom of Information Act request after the CBS anchorman’s death in mid-July for access to FBI documents containing Walter Cronkite’s name. The FBI restricts third-party access to information about individuals while they are still alive, but makes it possible for people to request copies of someone else’s FBI files after they have passed away.
The FBI’s August 25th response, however, indicated only that they may have had files on Cronkite, but if so, those files were likely destroyed roughly two years before Cronkite’s death.
Click on the image below to see the complete FBI response letter in PDF format.
Full Story: The Raw Story » Exclusive: FBI may have destroyed files on Walter Cronkite.
Rep. Steve King: The ‘best vote’ I ever cast in Congress was opposing Katrina relief.
Think Progress » Rep. Steve King In a new interview with The Hill, Rep. Steve King (R-IA) reveals his proudest moment as a lawmaker:
THE HILL: What vote would you like to redo?
KING: I don’t really go back and re-live that sort of thing. Some of the big votes that I’ve thought about, some of the jury’s still out. And at this point, maybe I’d answer that question another way, probably the singular vote that stands out that went against the grain, and it turns out to be the best vote that I cast, was my “no” vote to the $51.5 billion to [Hurricane] Katrina. That probably was my best vote. But as far as doing something different again, I don’t know.
Full Story: Think Progress » Rep. Steve King: The ‘best vote’ I ever cast in Congress was opposing Katrina relief..
Lieberman jokes about running in 2012 as a Republican.
Think Progress » This morning, Politico reported on how some Democratic senators are already preparing for their reelection efforts in 2012, “boosting their campaign coffers, raising millions for an election that is still 37 months away.” In an interview, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) joked that he could potentially run as a Republican:
liebSeveral Senate Democrats up in 2012 have already joined the million-dollar club, including Kent Conrad of North Dakota, Bill Nelson of Florida, Dianne Feinstein of California and Sherrod Brown of Ohio, as well as independent Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, who caucuses with Senate Democrats. Several more are expected to surpass the million-dollar mark when the latest round of campaign finance reports is released Oct. 15.
Lieberman, who had $1.4 million through June 30, said he was unsure whether he would run in 2012 as a Democrat or an independent.
“Or a Republican,” Lieberman jokingly added. “I have all sorts of options.”
Full Story: Think Progress » Lieberman jokes about running in 2012 as a Republican..
Cantor To Uninsured Woman With Growing Tumors: Get ‘An Existing Government Program’ Or Find Charity
OPS: Here’s one from the department of: Republicans are sociopathic animals
Think Progress » At the Richmond Times-Dispatch “public square” forum yesterday, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) fielded open questions from his constituents on the health reform debate for the first time this summer.
Patricia Churchill relayed a story about a close family member who recently lost a high paying job and her health insurance. Churchill told Cantor that her relative was dying of stomach tumors and needs an operation as soon as possible. Cantor responded by suggesting that Churchill’s relative should seek “existing government programs” or find charity.
Cantor, who serves as the chief whip for his party, has said that he cannot support a health reform bill with a public option. But despite his political opposition to government insurance programs, Cantor then emphasized to Churchill that every American should be given an “option” for health care, including a government program:
CHURCHILL: I have a very close relative, a woman in her early forties, who did have a wonderful, high-paying job, owns her own home and is a real contributing member of society. She lost her job. Just a couple of weeks ago, she found out that she has tumors in her belly and that she needs an operation. Her doctors told her that they are growing and that she needs to get this operation quickly. She has no insurance. [...]
Full Story: Think Progress » Cantor To Uninsured Woman With Growing Tumors: Get ‘An Existing Government Program’ Or Find Charity.
Pacific Gas & Electric Company Leaves U.S. Chamber of Commerce Over Its Global Warming Denialism
OPS: GO PG&E, Good on ya!
Think Progress » One of the biggest opponents of climate change legislation has been the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the “world’s largest business federation” that calls itself the “voice of business.” The Chamber has claimed the Obama administration is secretly hiding evidence that climate change isn’t a real threat, claimed that global warming regulations would “strangle the economy,” and even called for a new “Scopes trial” to call into question the science of global warming.
Today, Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) announced that it is quitting the Chamber over its “extreme position” on climate change:
PG&E Corp. (PCG) said Tuesday it is leaving the U.S. Chamber of Commerce over objections to what its top executive called the chamber’s “extreme position on climate change.”
In a letter to the U.S. Chamber published on PG&E’s blog, www next100.com, PG& E Chairman and Chief Executive Peter Darbee wrote that company employees “find it dismaying that the Chamber neglects the indisputable fact that a decisive majority of experts have said the data on global warming are compelling and point to a threat that cannot be ignored.”
Full Story: Think Progress » Pacific Gas & Electric Company Leaves U.S. Chamber of Commerce Over Its Global Warming Denialism.
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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. 
