Archive for February, 2010

Doctors’ group: Obama plan leaves millions uninsured, boosts private insurers

| Physicians for a National Health Program -

President Obama’s health care proposal, preserving as it does a central role for the for-profit, private health insurance industry, is incapable of achieving the kind of universal, comprehensive and affordable reform the country needs, a spokesman for a national doctors’ group said Wednesday.

“Regrettably, the president’s proposal is built on some of the worst aspects of the Senate bill,” said Dr. Quentin Young, national coordinator of Physicians for a National Health Program, an organization of 17,000 doctors who support a single-payer, Medicare-for-All approach to reform. Young’s statement comes on the eve of the president’s bipartisan summit in Washington.

“For example, the president’s proposal would ship hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars to the private health insurance industry in the form of subsidies,” Young said. “And to help finance this, it would impose a new tax on health benefits of workers, especially those in high-cost states.

Full Story: Doctors’ group: Obama plan leaves millions uninsured, boosts private insurers | Physicians for a National Health Program.

Dems Get Religion on Health Care Antitrust Exemption

- Matt Taibbi -

MY health insurer here in California is Anthem Blue Cross. So far, my group policy hasn’t been affected by Anthem’s planned rate increase of as much as 39 percent for its customers with individual policies — but the trend worries me, as it should everyone. Rates are soaring all over the country. Insurers have been seeking to raise premiums 24 percent in Connecticut, 23 percent in Maine, 20 percent in Oregon and a wallet-popping 56 percent in Michigan. How can insurers raise prices as much as they want without fear of losing customers?

Astonishingly, the health insurance industry is exempt from federal antitrust laws, which is why a handful of insurers have become so dominant in their markets that their customers simply have nowhere else to go. But that protection could soon end: President Obama on Tuesday announced his support of a House bill that would repeal health insurers’ antitrust exemption, and Speaker Nancy Pelosi signaled that she would put it toward an immediate vote.

via Op-Ed Contributor – Bust the Health Care Trusts – NYTimes.com.

This is how politics is supposed to work. Well, not really — in reality, you’d like to see your leaders actually lead, i.e. do the right thing first, before being forced into it by circumstance. But we’ll take the latter.

The sequence: Obama and the Dems got whipped in Massachusetts and it suddenly occurred to them that they might want to start doing things that would be popular outside their Rolodex of campaign contributors. A bailout tax was one early idea. They started searching the landscape for outrages they could get on the other side of and found a good one: Anthem Blue Cross in California raising rates by 39 percent.

Full Story: Dems Get Religion on Health Care Antitrust Exemption – Matt Taibbi – Taibblog – True/Slant.

Bust Up the Health Insurance Trusts

Robert Reich -

Years ago I worked at an agency in Washington called the Federal Trade Commission. The FTC predates the New Deal. It was set up in 1914 during the administration of Woodrow Wilson, at a time when many of America’s industries had combined into giant trusts that had enormous market and political power. The FTC was designed to root out such unfair practices. It ought to take on the health insurance trusts.

A few weeks back I mentioned that my health insurer here in California is Anthem Blue Cross. So far, my group policy hasn’t been affected by Anthem’s planned rate increase of as much as 39 percent for its customers with individual policies — but the trend worries me, as it should everyone. Rates are soaring all over the country. Insurers have been seeking to raise premiums 24 percent in Connecticut, 23 percent in Maine, 20 percent in Oregon and a wallet-popping 56 percent in Michigan. How can insurers raise prices as much as they want without fear of losing customers?

Astonishingly, the health insurance industry is exempt from federal antitrust laws, which is why a handful of insurers have become so dominant in their markets that their customers simply have nowhere else to go. But that protection might soon end: President Obama on Tuesday announced his support of a House bill that would repeal health insurers’ antitrust exemption, and Speaker Nancy Pelosi signaled that she would put it toward an immediate vote.

Full Story: Robert Reich (Bust Up the Health Insurance Trusts).

Geithner’s Gotta Go

By MIKE WHITNEY -

How Goldman Sachs and AIG Got Top Dollar for Worthless Assets

Would it be wrong to take out a $1,000,000 policy on your wife and then put strychnine in her double-tall nonfat mocha?

Not if you are Goldman Sachs it wouldn't. In fact–according to an article on today's Bloomberg News–that's exactly what they did. They slapped together $17.2 billion in garbage CDOs and then insured the hell out of them with credit default swaps (CDS) issued by AIG. As soon as the CDS blew up, G-Sax collected 100 cents on the dollar for their ingenuity. (G Sax received $14B altogether)

Richard Teitelbaum's excellent article “Secret AIG Document Shows Goldman Sachs Minted Most Toxic CDOs ” is a must read for anyone who wants a peak into the sleazy underworld of high finance and the Ponzi scamsters who run it.

“Representative Darrel Issa, the ranking Republican on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, placed into the hearing record a five-page document itemizing the mortgage securities on which banks such as Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Societe Generale SA had bought $62.1 billion in credit-default swaps from AIG.

Full Story: Mike Whitney: Geithner’s Gotta Go.

Leaked ACTA draft reveals plans for internet clampdown

ISPs must snoop on subscribers or face being sued by content owners

The US, Europe and other countries including New Zealand are secretly drawing up rules designed to crack down on copyright abuse on the internet, in part by making ISPs liable for illegal content, according to a copy of part of the confidential draft agreement that was seen by the IDG News Service.

It is the latest in a series of leaks from the anticounterfeiting trade agreement (ACTA) talks that have been going on for the past two years. Other leaks over the past three months have consisted of confidential internal memos about the negotiations between European lawmakers.

The chapter on the internet from the draft treaty was shown to the IDG News Service by a source close to people directly involved in the talks, who asked to remain anonymous. Although it was drawn up last October, it is the most recent negotiating text available, according to the source.

Full Story: Computerworld > Leaked ACTA draft reveals plans for internet clampdown.

Basically, It’s Over

Charles Munger -

A parable about how one nation came to financial ruin.

In the early 1700s, Europeans discovered in the Pacific Ocean a large, unpopulated island with a temperate climate, rich in all nature’s bounty except coal, oil, and natural gas. Reflecting its lack of civilization, they named this island “Basicland.”

The Europeans rapidly repopulated Basicland, creating a new nation. They installed a system of government like that of the early United States. There was much encouragement of trade, and no internal tariff or other impediment to such trade. Property rights were greatly respected and strongly enforced. The banking system was simple. It adapted to a national ethos that sought to provide a sound currency, efficient trade, and ample loans for credit-worthy businesses while strongly discouraging loans to the incompetent or for ordinary daily purchases.

Full Story: A parable about how one nation came to financial ruin. – By Charles Munger – Slate Magazine.

U.S.: Gov’t Sued Over Cell Phone Tracking

If you are a U.S. resident who owns a cell phone, you should care about the outcome of a court case that “could well decide whether the government can use your cell phone to track you – even if it hasn’t shown probable cause to believe it will turn up evidence of a crime.”

That was the warning issued to the public by several major civil liberties organisations as they appeared in federal court in Philadelphia to argue for more privacy protections in the use of cell phones as tracking devices by law enforcement agents.

The case is at the heart of the constitutional crisis now being played out in the U.S. federal court. Civil liberties groups are asking the court to require that the government show probable cause before it can track your whereabouts.

Full Story: U.S.: Gov’t Sued Over Cell Phone Tracking.

Anthem Blue Cross Fails to Defend Rate Increases Before House Subcommittee: ‘The Insurance Model is Fundamentally Broken’

As you may have seen in my piece from earlier today, I was impressed by the eloquence of the Anthem Blue Cross policy holders who testified before the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations today.braly CEO wellpt.

I was significantly less impressed with the arguments offered by the second panel of witnesses. Angela Braly, CEO of Anthem’s parent company WellPoint, Inc. and Cynthia Miller, WellPoint’s chief actuary, spent most of their time trying to justify the 39 percent increase in premiums they’d requested by falling back on some pretty tired defenses.

They said that young, healthy people were dropping their insurance due to the recession. They blamed the increase in costs on doctors and hospitals charging more for services. They defended multi-million dollar retreats in Hawaii as ways to connect with their corporate customers.

Full Story: Anthem Blue Cross Fails to Defend Rate Increases Before House Subcommittee: ‘The Insurance Model is Fundamentally Broken’ | BuzzFlash.org.

Vermont Senate Votes to Close Nuclear Plant

In an unusual state foray into nuclear regulation, the Vermont Senate voted 26 to 4 Wednesday to block a license extension for the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant, citing radioactive leaks, misstatements in testimony by plant officials and other problems.

Unless the chamber reverses itself, it would be the first time in more than 20 years that the public or its representatives decided to close a reactor.

The vote came barely over a week after President Obama declared a new era of rebirth for the nation’s nuclear industry, announcing federal loan guarantees of $8.3 billion to assure the construction of a twin-reactor plant near Augusta, Ga.

Vermont Yankee’s recent troubles are viewed by some as a challenge to arguments that reactors are clean, well run and worth the enormous investment involved in building and operating them.

Full Story: Vermont Senate Votes to Close Nuclear Plant – NYTimes.com.

New home sales fall to a record low

Sales of new homes plunged to a record low in January, government figures showed Wednesday, as the weak economy and a glut of foreclosed homes continue to weigh on the market.

The seasonally adjusted annual rate of new home sales plummeted 11.2% to 309,000 last month, compared with a revised rate of 348,000 in December, the Census Bureau said. That’s a decline 6.1% from January 2009.

t was the lowest rate since the government began keeping records in 1963 and comes after declines in November and December.

Full Story: New home sales fall to a record low – Feb. 24, 2010.

US court urged to define ‘material support’ for terrorism

The US Supreme Court was urged Tuesday to help pin down the definition of “providing material support to terrorism,” a charge widely used in the United States since the September 11, 2001 attacks.

In a case brought by both the government and a rights group, the Humanitarian Law Project, the nine justices were called upon to define what kind of support can be included in such a broad allegation.

The justices however appeared to be just as divided as the lawyers for both sides.

An appeals court has already ruled that providing “personnel” could be used to bring such charges, whereas “training” and “services” were considered too vague. On a fourth term included in the charge of providing “expert advice or assistance,” the appeals court returned a split decision.

Full Story: US court urged to define ‘material support’ for terrorism – Yahoo! News.

Bill Gates’ $10 billion vaccine scam

The “richest man in the world,” Microsoft’s Bill Gates, recently announced that he was making a $10 billion donation towards finding vaccines to prevent some of the world’s worst diseases.

Malaria is the number one killer in Africa. From what I’m hearing about $1 billion of BIll Gates donation/tax write-off is for research to find a vaccine to prevent malaria.

The African country of Eritrea, where I live, has reduced malaria mortality by 85 percent in the last seven years. How? By using basic public health methods. By distributing pesticide treated mosquito nets and organizing the pesticide retreatment every three months of mosquito nets. By habitat eradication. And by community medical clinics for immediate treatment.

Malaria is a parasite-based disease noted for its variety and quick development of resistance to medication. Any “vaccine,” if even a billion dollars is able to produce such, would have a limited lifetime and new, patented medications would have to be bought by Africa’s poor every few years.

Full Story: Bill Gates’ $10 billion vaccine scam.

The Democratic Party’s deceitful game

Democrats perpetrate the same scam over and over on their own supporters, and this illustrates perfectly how it’s played:

Politics Daily, October 4, 2009:

Jay Rockefeller on the Public Option: “I Will Not Relent”

Glenn Greenwald -

Jay Rockefeller has waited a long time for this moment. . . . He’s [] a longtime advocate of health care for children and the poor — and, as Congress moves toward its moment of truth on health care, perhaps the most earnest, dogged Senate champion of a nationwide public health insurance plan to compete with private insurance companies.

“I will not relent on that. That’s the only way to go,” Rockefeller told me in an interview. “There’s got to be a safe harbor.”

President Obama often says a public option is needed to drive down costs and keep insurance companies honest.  To Rockefeller, it’s both more basic and more vital:  The federal government is the only institution people can count on in times of need.

Full Story: - Salon.com.

Utah A.G. may gain broader power to demand Internet, cell-phone records

A proposal that would broaden the power of the Attorney General’s Office to demand Internet and cell phone companies turn over information about customers won broad approval Tuesday from a Utah House committee.

HB150, sponsored by Rep. Brad Daw, R-Orem, would grant prosecutors the ability to obtain an administrative subpoena, compelling Internet and phone companies to turn over the names, addresses, phone numbers, and bank information of customers using an Internet address or cell phone number at a given time.

No judge would have to review the information. Representatives from the Attorney General’s Office say it is intended to develop an initial lead when investigating a crime.

Last year, the Legislature granted prosecutors e subpoena power when they suspect a child-sex crime has been committed. Since the bill took effect, more than 200 such subpoenas have been issued, or slightly more than one a day.

Full Story: Utah A.G. may gain broader power to demand Internet, cell-phone records – Salt Lake Tribune.

The Spy at Harriton High

This investigation into the remote spying allegedly being conducted against students at Lower Merion represents an attempt to find proof of spying and a look into the toolchain used to accomplish spying. Taking a look at the LMSD Staff List, Mike Perbix is listed as a Network Tech at LMSD. Mr. Perbix has a large online web forum footprint as well as a personal blog, and a lot of his posts, attributed to his role at Lower Merion, provide insight into the tools, methods, and capabilities deployed against students at LMSD. Of the three network techs employed at LMSD, Mr. Perbix appears to have been the mastermind behind a massive, highly effective digital panopticon.

The primary piece of evidence, already being reported on by a Fox affiliate, is this amazing promotional webcast for a remote monitoring product named LANRev. In it, Mike Perbix identifies himself as a high school network tech, and then speaks at length about using the track-and-monitor features of LanRev to take surreptitious remote pictures through a high school laptop webcam. A note of particular pride is evident in his voice when he talks about finding a way outside of LANRev to enable “curtain mode”, a special remote administration mode that makes remote control of a laptop invisible to the victim. Listen at 35:47, when he says:

Full Story: Stryde Hax: The Spy at Harriton High.

Second Strike Paralyzes Greece

Flights at Greek airports were canceled, public transportation was halted, and schools closed Wednesday as public-sector employees and private-sector workers walked off their jobs in the second 24-hour strike in two weeks against austerity measures.

The government is under intense pressure to plug a budget deficit estimated at 12.7 percent of gross domestic product and to avert the first national default among the 16 countries that use the euro.

The day was largely peaceful, though police officers fired tear gas to disperse around 50 young demonstrators who pelted them with stones and paint near the Parliament building in the city center. They were part of a crowd of more than 20,000 who marched holding banners reading “tax the rich” and “hands off our pension funds.”

Full Story: Second Strike Paralyzes Greece – NYTimes.com.

Tax Status Of Lawmakers’ Religious Refuge Disputed

The three-story, brick townhouse at 133 C Street S.E. sits a half-block from the Cannon House Office Building, roughly three blocks from the Capitol — the home-away-from-home for a regular contingent of fundamentalist Christian members of Congress, who can pray in the living room and walk to work.

The C Street Center, which owns the 1880-vintage townhouse, claims status as a church. And as with other religious organizations, the IRS takes the center’s word that it is a church. As a result, the center doesn’t have to file public tax returns, as most non-profit organizations must do.

The arrangement fits the C Street Center’s practically invisible public presence. But now a group of 13 ministers has asked the IRS to revoke that church status.

Full Story: Tax Status Of Lawmakers’ Religious Refuge Disputed : NPR.

Senate approves tax breaks for new hires

Senate passes $35 billion jobs bill

Companies that hire the unemployed would claim new tax breaks under a jobs-promoting bill the Senate passed Wednesday, delivering President Barack Obama and Democrats a much-needed victory.

The 70-28 vote sends the bill back to the House, which passed a far more costly measure in December. Many in the House consider the Senate bill too puny, but they may simply adopt it and send it to Obama in order to get a win. Democratic leaders promise more so-called jobs bills are on the way.

The bill contain two major provisions. First, it would exempt businesses hiring the unemployed from the 6.2 percent Social Security payroll tax through December and give them an additional $1,000 credit if new workers stay on the job a full year.

Full Story: Senate approves tax breaks for new hires – Yahoo! News.

Italian court convicts 3 Google executives of privacy violations

Receive suspended six-month sentence for allowing video of autistic boy being abused to be posted online

Three Google executives were convicted of privacy violations Wednesday in Italy because bullies posted a video online of an autistic boy being abused — a case closely watched due to its implications for Internet freedom.

In the first such criminal trial of its kind, Judge Oscar Magi sentenced the three to a six-month suspended sentence and absolved them of defamation charges. A fourth defendant, charged only with defamation, was acquitted.

Google called the decision “astonishing” and said it would appeal.

Full Story: Italian court convicts 3 Google executives of privacy violations – The Globe and Mail.

$645 MILLION in Lipstick for a Dead Radioactive Pig

Harvey  Wasserman -

The mystery has been solved.

Where is this “new reactor renaissance” coming from?

There has been no deep, thoughtful re-making or re-evaluation of atomic technology. No solution to the nuke waste problem. No making reactors economically sound. No private insurance against radioactive disasters by terror or error. No grassroots citizens now desperate to live near fragile containment domes and outtake pipes spewing radioactive tritium at 27 US reactors.

No, nothing about atomic energy has really changed.

Except this: $645 MILLION for lobbying Congress and the White House over the past ten years.

As reported by Judy Pasternak and a team of reporters at American University’s Investigative Reporting Workshop, filings with the Senate Office of Public Records show that members of the Nuclear Energy Institute and other reactor owner/operators admit spending that money on issues that “include legislation to promote construction of new nuclear power plants.”

Full Story: $645 MILLION in Lipstick for a Dead Radioactive Pig | BuzzFlash.org.

Want ‘Free Market’ Health Reform? Try Antitrust Repeal, House Dems Say

Republicans are fond of saying that they prefer healthcare reform based on the “free market.” What reform could be more free-market than the repeal of the antitrust exemption that the health insurance industry has enjoyed for more than half a century? ask House Democrats.

The House on Wednesday will take up legislation to do just that, to inject increased competition into an industry that’s enjoyed an antitrust advantage that’s helped make the U.S. health system “one of the most dysfunctional and one of the most expensive in the world,” according to a former insurance executive who supports repeal.

The House antitrust vote comes just a day before a televised bipartisan White House summit to try to get Democrats and Republicans to move ahead with broader healthcare reform legislation.

Full Story: On The Hill: Want ‘Free Market’ Health Reform? Try Antitrust Repeal, House Dems Say.

Saturn Moon ‘Spitting’ PHOTO: NASA Shoots Picture Of Dramatic Plumes On Moon’s Surface

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft captured unusual photos of Saturn’s moon Enceladus ‘bursting at the seams.’

In a tweet, NASA described Enceladus as ‘spitting something’ from its surface, and indeed the images show a series of plumes emanating from the planet’s surface.

NASA explains the images:

Dramatic plumes, both large and small, spray water ice out from many locations along the famed “tiger stripes” near the south pole of Saturn’s moon Enceladus. The tiger stripes are fissures that spray icy particles, water vapor and organic compounds.

More than 30 individual jets of different sizes can be seen in this image and more than 20 of them had not been identified before. At least one jet spouting prominently in previous images now appears less powerful.

Full Story: Saturn Moon ‘Spitting’ PHOTO: NASA Shoots Picture Of Dramatic Plumes On Moon’s Surface.

REPORT: WellPoint Raising Rates by Double Digits in at Least 11 States

If Democrats move to pass health care reform after tomorrow’s summit, their newfound momentum can be at least partly attributed to WellPoint’s decision to drastically increase premiums in California’s individual health insurance market. The rate increases highlighted the broken health care system and pressured lawmakers to drastically reform the individual health insurance market. The administration’s strong response also enunciated the differences in lawmakers’ approach to reform and may have pushed the President to add stronger cost control provisions into his health care blue-print.

WellPoint’s hikes created a political opportunity for reform, but California policy holders aren’t the only ones experiencing drastic rate increases. A new survey from the Center for American Progress Action Fund has found that “double-digit hikes have been implemented or are pending in at least 11 other states among the 14 where WellPoint’s Blue Cross Blue Shield companies are active: California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Indiana, Maine, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, Virginia, and Wisconsin.” Below is a sample:

Full Story: Think Progress » REPORT: WellPoint Raising Rates by Double Digits in at Least 11 States.

DNA’s Dirty Little Secret

A forensic tool renowned for exonerating the innocent may actually be putting them in prison.

Three days before Christmas 1972, a twenty-two-year-old nurse named Diana Sylvester wrapped up her night shift at the University of San Francisco Medical Center and made her way to her apartment, halfway between the hospital and Golden Gate Park. She arrived around 8:00 a.m. and set her newspaper and purse on the kitchen table. A few minutes later, Sylvester’s landlord, Helen Nigidoff, heard loud thuds and screams emanating from Sylvester’s unit upstairs. With her apron still on, Nigidoff rang the doorbell before opening a door leading up to Sylvester’s apartment, where she came face-to-face with a stranger. “Go away,” he growled angrily. “We’re making love.” As Nigidoff raced downstairs to call the police, the man ran out of the building holding a denim jacket over his face.

When the officers arrived a half hour later, they found a gruesome scene. Sylvester lay motionless next to the Christmas tree on her living-room floor, her mouth unnaturally agape, blood oozing from her chest like molten lava. An autopsy revealed that Sylvester’s attacker had forced her to perform oral sex and then strangled her, before plunging a knife into her chest two times. One stab pierced her heart. The other tore through her left lung, drowning her in her own blood.

Police immediately scoured Sylvester’s apartment and questioned the landlady, who offered a description of the assailant: white, medium height, and heavy-set, with curly brown hair and a beard. But neither these details nor the bits and pieces of evidence they collected in the months-long investigation that followed were enough to pinpoint the culprit. The few leads investigators turned up fizzled, and the case went cold.

Full Story: DNA’s Dirty Little Secret – Michael Bobelian.

Garrison Keillor: The appeal of unreality

Conservatives keep screaming for small government, as if their darlings, Reagan and Bush II, hadn’t enlarged it

Ever since that night in June when we filed onto the football field in our mortarboards and gowns and the distinguished speaker (what was his name?) informed us that we were entering a time of rapid and unparalleled change, we’ve been waiting and hoping, but here we are, all grown up, and the same soupy music is dripping from the ceilings of lobbies, the internal combustion engine rules the land, ditto the hamburger, fashion is retro, movies tend to be remakes, and Congress is more like itself than it ever was before. The same stuffed peppers are harrumphing and pontificating and posing for photos with the 4-H’ers and the winners of the 2010 Western Regional Wiener Eating Contest and reading prepared statements on C-SPAN denouncing folks who would throw grandmothers down the stairs and meanwhile hustling the money and working the angles and keeping their eyes focused on their very own tasseled loafers.

When Al Franken ran for the Senate, people questioned his credentials, but good grief, people, comedy is hard work compared to harrumphing. It takes brains and elegance and courage to make people laugh. A comedian who joins the Senate has taken a step down on the social scale and everybody knows it.

Full Story: - Salon.com.

Wellpoint Raising Rates by Double Digits in at Least 11 States

Double-Digit Premium Increases Are Not Just in California

The recent news that WellPoint’s Anthem Blue Cross health insurance company in California wanted to increase premiums for individual policyholders as much as 39 percent is further evidence the current health system is not sustainable. And a survey by the Center for American Progress Action Fund found that California isn’t the only state where WellPoint is hiking individual premium rates by double-digit percentages. In fact, double-digit hikes have been implemented or are pending in at least 11 other states among the 14 where WellPoint’s Blue Cross Blue Shield companies are active: California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Indiana, Maine, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, Virginia, and Wisconsin.

In Maine, where WellPoint-owned Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield is by far the largest insurer, the company is seeking to raise individual rates an average of 23 percent this year. This comes after five consecutive years of double-digit premium increases by the company on these policies.

Full Story: Wellpoint Raising Rates by Double Digits in at Least 11 States.

CIA briefed 68 lawmakers on interrogation program

CIA officials briefed at least 68 U.S. lawmakers between 2001 and 2007 on enhanced interrogation methods like simulated drowning that were being considered or used against captured al Qaeda members, according to declassified documents released on Tuesday.

The once-secret CIA papers, obtained in a lawsuit by the conservative legal foundation Judicial Watch, shed new light on which lawmakers knew the details of the controversial interrogation program and when.

Human rights groups have argued the harsh interrogation methods were forms of torture and violated U.S. obligations under the Geneva Conventions on treatment of war prisoners. President Barack Obama banned the techniques shortly after taking office in January 2009.

The declassified memos show the program began after the capture of al Qaeda lieutenant Abu Zubaydah, a Saudi-born Palestinian who was the group’s operations director, in the city of Faisalabad in central Pakistan in March 2002.

Full Story: CIA briefed 68 lawmakers on interrogation program | Reuters.

That answers why there will NEVER be an investigation

Freddie Mac loses $7.8B in 4Q

Freddie Mac lost $7.8 billion in the final three months of last year, but the mortgage finance company didn’t need a federal cash infusion for the third quarter in a row.

Freddie Mac, which has been controlled by federal regulators since September 2008, lost $2.39 a share, the company said Wednesday. The loss included $1.3 billion in dividends paid to the Treasury Department, which has an almost 80 percent stake in the McLean, Va., company.

The results were a marked improvement over the fourth quarter 2008 when Freddie lost $23.9 billion, or $7.37 a share.

During the most recent quarter, Freddie suffered $7.1 billion in credit losses and a $3.4 billion write-down in low income tax credit investments. That move “increases the likelihood” that the company will require more cash from the Treasury Department, the company warned in a regulatory filing

Full Story: Freddie Mac loses $7.8B in 4Q – Yahoo! News.

Dennis Kucinich New Idea For Jobs Creation

Kucinich making sense again.

Howard Dean speaks in Brattleboro

“people would rather see a strong health reform bill than bipartisanship”

Howard Dean talks about health care and politics at the Ramada Inn in Brattleboro, Vt., Wednesday, Feb. 17. Dean’s speech can be viewed, uncut in its entirety, at www.reformer.com. 02/17/10

Max Keiser With Karl Denninger Discuss How the Banker Crooks Hid the Debt

Max Keiser also speaks to The Market Ticker’s Karl Denninger about CDOs, synthetic CDOs and hiding Greek debt.

One Thousand Architects and Engineers Still Want To Know:

How did 200,000 tons of steel disintegrate and drop in 11 seconds?

A lingering technical question about the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks still haunts some, and it has political implications: How did 200,000 tons of steel disintegrate and drop in 11 seconds? A thousand architects and engineers want to know, and are calling on Congress to order a new investigation into the destruction of the Twin Towers and Building 7 at the World Trade Center.

“In order to bring down this kind of mass in such a short period of time, the material must have been artificially, exploded outwards,” says Richard Gage, a San Francisco architect and founder of the nonprofit Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth.

Mr. Gage, who is a member of the American Institute of Architects, managed to persuade more than 1,000 of his peers to sign a new petition requesting a formal inquiry.

Full Story: Inside the Beltway – Washington Times.

Obama’s nuclear vision suffers setback as Vermont plant faces shutdown

Vermont would be the first state to close a nuclear reactor after 38-year-old Yankee’s history of leaking cancer-causing tritium

Barack Obama’s new dream of a nuclear renaissance faces a major reality check tomorrow when the state of Vermont is expected to shut down an ageing nuclear reactor with a history of leaks.

It would be the first time a state has moved to shut down such a reactor, and follows Obama’s announcement last week of $8.3bn (£5.4bn) in loan guarantees for the construction of two new reactors in Georgia. White House officials said the money would help spur a burst of new construction – the first since the Three Mile Island meltdown.

The Vermont Yankee, one of America’s oldest reactors, has had several leaks of radioactive tritium dating back to 2005, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said yesterday.

Full Story: Obama’s nuclear vision suffers setback as Vermont plant faces shutdown | Environment | guardian.co.uk.

The Power Of Choice: Does Your Life Reflect Your Moral Compass?

Last month, I joined tens of thousands of Americans in donating to relief organizations after Haiti’s cataclysmic earthquake. Today, we continue to give in many ways — planning rebuilding assistance trips through our churches, picking up the slack for co-workers who are away in Haiti or the Dominican Republic helping, or simply sending an email to friends requesting donations. Both of my boys are regularly praying for the people of Haiti at night and are organizing fund-raisers in their elementary school classes. Haiti’s crisis was the rare moment that fixed our national attention and called us to spend our money and time in a way that reflected our moral impulses. But how often do we align our moral compasses with the rest of our lives?

Like Haiti, the nation’s economic crisis presents another opportunity for all of us to reconsider the choices we make. In my new book Rediscovering Values: On Wall Street, Main Street and Your Street, I argue that the financial collapse is a transformational moment in which we can bring changes to American laws, society, culture, and our own lives that reflect our oldest and best values and would help prevent another Great Recession from happening.

Full Story: Jim Wallis: The Power Of Choice: Does Your Life Reflect Your Moral Compass?.

Lone GOP Health Care Supporter, Losing Financial Backing

The lone Republican lawmaker to support Democratic health care legislation has seen his fundraising drop by nearly 40 percent since his vote, and he is quickly burning through a dwindling bank account after resorting to a costly national fundraising operation.

Rep. Anh “Joseph” Cao, the unlikely congressman from New Orleans, is facing the perils of bipartisanship unlike any other lawmaker in Washington – trying to please a heavily Democratic constituency while relying on core conservatives for money to fuel his campaign.

Although Republican leaders have continued supporting Cao with money from their campaign committees despite his health care position, the conservative donors he’s courting around the country may not be so forgiving.

Full Story: Anh ‘Joseph’ Cao, Lone GOP Health Care Supporter, Losing Financial Backing.

Democrat Youth Support Dwindling

Whither the youth vote? A year after backing Barack Obama by an overwhelming 2-to-1 ratio, young adults are quickly cooling toward Democrats amid dissatisfaction over the lack of change in Washington and an escalating war in Afghanistan.

A study by the Pew Research Center, being released Wednesday, highlights the eroding support from 18-to-29 year olds whose strong turnout in November 2008 was touted by some demographers as the start of a new Democratic movement.

The findings are significant because they offer further proof that the diverse coalition of voters Obama cobbled together in 2008 – including high numbers of first-timers, minorities and youths – are not Democratic Party voters who can necessarily be counted on.

Full Story: Democrat Youth Support Dwindling.

Transparency: America’s Wealthiest Religions

It’s no secret that the distribution of wealth is inequitable in the United States across racial, regional, and socio-economic groups. But there is a distinct variance among and within America’s faiths as well. This transparency takes a look at the income levels of America’s major religious groups, as compared to the average U.S. income distribution.

Full Story: Transparency: America’s Wealthiest Religions – Transparency – GOOD.

Dylan Ratigan Calls Out Joe Wilson For Calling US Health Care System “Best” In The World (VIDEO)

Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) believes that the U.S. has the best health care system in the world.

The congressman made the pronouncement during an appearance Tuesday on The Dylan Ratigan Show and then went on to talk about the “nice hospital” in one of South Carolina’s poorest counties. Ratigan promptly corrected Wilson.

Rep. Wilson: I’ll take you to the poorest county in South Carolina, Allendale, a very nice hospital. I’ll take you to another county which is very depressed.

Ratigan: South Carolina has the 33rd worst health care in America, according to The Commonwealth Fund. America has the most expensive health care in the world and the 37th highest quality. We pay more than any country in the world. We have huge amounts of money going to special interests. Our budget is dominated by health care and people don’t have coverage.

Watch the excerpted exchange below. Click here to watch the full segment.

WATCH

Full Story: Dylan Ratigan Calls Out Joe Wilson For Calling US Health Care System “Best” In The World (VIDEO).

Gates: Peace is a Danger To Peace

Gates Calls European Mood a Danger to Peace

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, who has long called European contributions to NATO inadequate, said Tuesday that public and political opposition to the military had grown so great in Europe that it was directly affecting operations in Afghanistan and impeding the alliance’s broader security goals.

“The demilitarization of Europe — where large swaths of the general public and political class are averse to military force and the risks that go with it — has gone from a blessing in the 20th century to an impediment to achieving real security and lasting peace in the 21st,” he told NATO officers and officials in a speech at the National Defense University, the Defense Department-financed graduate school for military officers and diplomats.

A perception of European weakness, he warned, could provide a “temptation to miscalculation and aggression” by hostile powers.

Full Story: Gates Calls European Mood a Danger to Peace – NYTimes.com.

US diplomats add a moat to their expenses at $1bn London embassy

The United States has unveiled plans for its new $1 billion high-security embassy in London — the most expensive it has ever built.

The proposals were met with relief from both the present embassy’s Mayfair neighbours and the residents and developers of the Battersea wasteland where the vast crystalline cube, surrounded by a moat, will be built.

The decision to abandon the former site in Grosvenor Square by 2016 came after a prolonged battle with residents angered by the security measures demanded after the September 11 attacks. More than a hundred residents took out a full-page advertisement in The Times to oppose tighter measures that they said would leave the area more vulnerable to attack.

Full Story: US diplomats add a moat to their expenses at $1bn London embassy – Times Online.

OPS:   A phucking moat!  Your tax dollars at work

‘Volcker Rule’ Stalls in Senate

Key senators are expected to scrap President Barack Obama’s proposal to prohibit commercial banks from certain risky trading activities, people familiar with the matter said, a setback for the administration’s bid to limit the size and scope of the largest U.S. banks.

The proposal, dubbed the “Volcker rule” after former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, would have essentially prevented any commercial bank with federally insured deposits from owning a division that makes speculative bets with its own capital.

But after resistance from lawmakers from both parties, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd (D., Conn.) and other legislators are expected to introduce a plan next week that would give regulators more discretion to limit and potentially ban risky trading at banks, especially if it poses a risk to the broader economy. The measure would stop short of banning such trading outright.

Full Story: ‘Volcker Rule’ Stalls in Senate – WSJ.com.

Health Insurance 39% Rate Hike Will Go Forwards, Says Anthem Blue Cross.

About 150 physical therapists and patients protested outside the offices of Anthem Blue Cross California today, while company executives faced lawmakers up in Sacramento, who grilled them about their planned rate hike for individual policy holders of up to 39%.

Anthem is the largest health insurer in California. The proposed change would affect about 700,000 people. Anthem's remaining 7.3 million customers in California are covered by employer-sponsored plans and would not be affected

Due to take effect on March 1st, Anthem agreed to postpone the increase to May 1st, and said today that it plans to go forward with the rate hikes.

Today Kate Turbitt walked the picket line outside Anthem Blue Cross offices in Woodland Hills today alongside the physical therapist she cannot afford anymore.

Full Story: Health Insurance Rate Hike Will Go Forwards, Says Anthem Blue Cross. | NBC Los Angeles.

White House slammed after declaring ‘not enough support’ for public option

Progressive bloggers and activists are up in arms about White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs’ assertion Tuesday that “there isn’t enough political support” to pass a public option for health care through Congress.

Asked why President Obama’s health reform proposal, unveiled Monday, didn’t include a public option, Gibbs said, “There are some that are supportive of this,” evidently referring to the 23 US senators who have signed a letter urging the public option to be passed through the reconciliation process.

But “there isn’t enough political support in the majority to get this through,” Gibbs said.

Full Story: White House slammed after declaring ‘not enough support’ for public option | Raw Story.

Manufacturing Operations Returning to the U.S.

The top reason companies outsource production remains cost-savings, according to the survey. However, a recent study contradicts those findings.

Many American companies are finding that outsourcing does not pay, and as a result are increasingly moving production back to America in a phenomenon known as “back shoring.”

According to strategy + business, many manufacturers that rely on high-end technology are ceasing production in Asian and the Pacific regions and moving their manufacturing processes back to America, realizing that manufacturing in low-cost nations is not all that profitable.

Concerns over shipping costs, intellectual property theft, the rising cost of raw materials overseas and lack of responsiveness to customer’s needs have all contributed to growing “back shoring” trend.

Full Story: Manufacturing Operations Returning to the U.S. | Economy In Crisis.

Emerging from the Economic Crisis

The following is the tenth and final installment of a 30 minute interview with Eamonn Fingleton.

Award winning author and economist Eamonn Fingleton discusses how the U.S. can emerge from the economic crisis and how it can learn from other other countries.

Full Story: Emerging from the Economic Crisis | Economy In Crisis.

Globalization’s Impact on U.S.

When facing an uncertain future, the United States may now be in the worst position in its history.

An international movement toward “free trade” and globalization shaped the latter half of the 20th century. Most nations have built in significant protections and regulatory frameworks to keep globalizing forces in line. One developed nation, the United States, has eschewed this protection almost completely; much to its detriment.

Globalization is likely to shape the beginning of the 21st century in a similar way, but it remains to be seen how this will play out for the United States. It is obvious that the U.S. cannot keep up with the growth seen in the developing world. It is also obvious that the U.S. has fallen behind developed nations on strategically important issues like education, health care and basic infrastructure.

During previous boom times the U.S. was at the center of technological developments that drove progress. Now, there is little reason to think that we will be at the focal point of such breakthroughs; and there is little understanding of what those breakthroughs might be.

Full Story: Globalization’s Impact on U.S. | Economy In Crisis.

Stop The Nukespeak: Tell Us The Truth About Nuclear Power!

Nearly twenty years ago I co-wrote Nukespeak, a cultural history of the selling of nuclear technology for both peaceful and military purposes.

My co-authors and I dedicated the book to George Orwell, whose literary creation of ‘newspeak’ in the classic novel 1984 illustrated the power to control reality through the adroit manipulation of language. The euphemisms, obfuscations and omissions employed by nuclear boosters throughout both industry and government – what one writer has called the “linguistic cosmetics” used “to avoid communicating uncomfortable or threatening thoughts so that the nuclear industry can control the images and perceptions of nuclear power” — were so clearly reminiscent of Orwellian thought control that the homage seemed, if anything, perhaps a little too obvious.

Thus, in Nukespeak, proponents speak of “health effects” when they really mean “cancer.” Accidents such as the infamous one at Three Mile Island are merely “anomalies,” “significant events” or “abnormal occurrences” — and when they recur, they are re-dubbed “normal abnormalities.” Radioactive substances such as Strontium-90 are measured in “sunshine units,” and when deadly plutonium somehow goes missing, it’s simply a “MUF – material unaccounted for.” “Boundless energy” to save us from “freezing in the dark” would be “too cheap to meter” – if we only went nuclear…

Full Story: Media Channel 2.0 — Blog — Stop The Nukespeak: Tell Us The Truth About Nuclear Power!.

OPS: How long before they bring back the term “Sunshine Dust”

The Unemployed Have Begun to Organize Their Own Union to Press Fight for Jobs

It’s been only a month that a union for the unemployed has come into existence through an ingenious grass-roots organizing campaign. In case you haven’t heard about it, the union’s name is “UR Union of the Unemployed” or its nickname, “UCubed,” because of its unique method of organizing.

UCubed is the brain-child of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM), whose leaders feel that the millions of unemployed workers need a union of their own to join in the struggle for massive jobs programs.

The idea is that if millions of jobless join together and act as an organization, they are more likely to get Congress and the White House to provide the jobs that are urgently needed. They can also apply pressure for health insurance coverage, unemployment insurance and COBRA benefits and food stamps. An unemployed worker is virtually helpless if he or she has to act alone.

Joining a Cube is as simple as it is important. (Please check the union web site: www.unionofunemployed.com). Six people who live in the same zip code address can form a Ucube. Nine such UCubes make a neighborhood. Three neighborhood UCubes form a power block that cntains 162 activists. Politicians cannot easily ignore a multitude of power blocks, nor can merchants avoid them.

Full Story: LaborTalk: The Unemployed Have Begun to Organize Their Own Union to Press Fight for Jobs.

Heather Graham and MoveOn Team Up for Huge Push on Congress to Pass the Public Option

Progressive Change’s Adam Green accuses the White House of having a ‘loser mentality’ on the public option despite public support, and MoveOn unleashes Heather Graham

If you followed the cues sent by the White House, you’d think the public option was dead. But on the heels of polls showing strong public support for a government health care plan, activists are pushing back hard — and getting results.

Just days ahead of President Obama’s bipartisan health care summit, scheduled for Thursday, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee announced that it, together with CREDO Action and Democracy for America, has succeeded in getting the signatures of 120 House members and 23 senators on letters pledging their support for passing a public option through the reconciliation process, a parliamentary maneuver that cannot be blocked by a Senate filibuster. And MoveOn.org Political Action, declaring, “THE PUBLIC OPTION IS BACK,” released a new version of its ad featuring actress Heather Graham (of Austin Powers fame) personifying the public option in a race against older, unattractive and out-of-shape insurance company executives. (Video at the bottom of this story.)

Full Story: Heather Graham and MoveOn Team Up for Huge Push on Congress to Pass the Public Option | News & Politics | AlterNet.

The Last Thing We Need is More Money for Prisons, But That Is What Obama Wants

At the same time the Obama administration is talking about a dramatic “spending freeze,” it’s requesting more money to lock people up.

At the same time the Obama administration is talking about a dramatic “spending freeze” on any and all projects unrelated to war-making, this is exactly what’s in store, it is quietly increasing the federal budget for even more prisons.

On February 1, Attorney General Eric Holder announced the administration would request $2.9 billion for the Department of Justice 2011 budget — “a 5.4 percent increase in budget authority,” according to the DOJ. Approximately $527.5 million would go to the federal Bureau of Prisons, a chunk of which would provide “bed space” to house prisoners currently at Guantanamo Bay (and ostensibly slated for transfer to the supermax prison in Thomson, IL).

“We have an obligation to protect our country in smart, reliable ways at every level,” Holder said, invoking both the “fight against global terrorism” as well as the need to enforce “civil rights and the rule of law.”

Full Story: The Last Thing We Need is More Money for Prisons, But That Is What Obama Wants | Civil Liberties | AlterNet.

Are Priobiotics Really the Secret to Good Health (Or Just the Latest Crackpot Supplement Fad?)

Proponents claim probiotics can prevent asthma and cure irritable bowel syndrome, colic, yeast infections, acne — even autism. Have the claims of benefit gone too far?

For some Americans, the world’s happiest headline is “You may be entitled to cash.” Luckily for them, that sentence crowns a press release that went out this week which also includes the phrase “You could receive up to $100,” and describes “a $35,000,000 fund,” then boosts its cred with: “A federal court authorized this notice.”

And all because a California woman ate yogurt thinking it would regulate her digestion, but — according to the lawsuit she filed — it didn’t.

A statement released February 16 by the San Diego, California-based law firm Blood, Hurst & O’Reardon announced that the claim period has just opened in a class-action lawsuit against Dannon. Two years in the making, the suit claims the yogurt company “falsely advertised the health benefits of its Activia and DanActive branded products.”

Dannon, which promoted these yogurts as being probiotic and digestion-friendly, has pledged to refund every eligible claimant professing to have bought Activia or DanActive since these products were first introduced in 2006 and 2007. If so many forms are filed as to exhaust the initially-agreed-upon $35 million, the fund goes up another $10 million.

Full Story: Are Priobiotics Really the Secret to Good Health (Or Just the Latest Crackpot Supplement Fad?) | Food | AlterNet.

Exposing the Great American Bubble Barons: Join the Investigation

Join AlterNet’s collective investigative project into the bubble barons who got obscenely rich as they destroyed our economy. Help hold them accountable with Citizen Journalism

A century ago, the robber barons at the helm of the U.S. economy were easily identifiable titans of industry: Andrew Carnegie of Carnegie Steel, John D. Rockefeller of Standard Oil, financier and steel magnate J.P. Morgan. It was easy to draw the link between the robber barons’ brutal business practices and their immense wealth; it was clear that these businessmen were, quite literally, robbing the American people in the course of amassing their fortunes.

The influence of today’s super-rich is significantly harder to trace. Much of their wealth is managed in opaque Wall Street investment vehicles and byzantine corporate structures. They are less likely to slap their names on their ventures, and their profitable relationships with the most destructive segments of our economy are hidden behind layers of corporate control. In our post-industrial economy, they amass wealth not by producing things with actual value, but rather by riding waves of speculation, such as the housing bubble, to dizzying heights of wealth.

Today’s super-rich are not robber barons, but bubble barons: they extract their fortunes from intensifying cycles of imaginary wealth creation and destruction, live at a far remove from their businesses, and evade accountability in the public spotlight. The robber barons stood behind their economic crimes; the bubble barons, for the most part, do not.

Full Story: Exposing the Great American Bubble Barons: Join Us in the Investigation | Investigations | AlterNet.

Colorado students fight for gun rights

University’s bid to prevent Virginia-style rampage is stalled by campus opposition

What seemed like common sense to some is nothing less than an assault on the US Constitution to others, which is why a governors meeting at Colorado State University today to approve a ban on students bearing concealed weapons on its main campus in Fort Collins is likely to be rowdy.

Preventing bloodshed is the first thing on the board’s mind. It is three years since the shooting rampage at Virginia Tech that took the lives of 32 students and staff and just under two weeks since Amy Bishop, a professor at the University of Alabama, allegedly shot six of her colleagues, killing three of them.

Yet there has been such a push-back against the plan that the board may defer a decision today to await further public comment. The proposed change in the rules has reignited emotions about the place of guns in American culture. It is a debate that gets snarled in the conflicting logic of gun ownership rights and the simple notion that bullets and blackboards don’t mix.

Full Story: Colorado students fight for gun rights – Americas, World – The Independent.

Forgiveness for Haiti? We should be begging theirs

Naomi Klein  -

The very idea of Haiti as debtor needs to be abandoned. We in the west should pay arrears for years of violations

If we are to believe the G7 finance ministers, Haiti is on its way to getting something it has deserved for a very long time: full “forgiveness” of its foreign debt. In Port-au-Prince, Haitian economist Camille Chalmers has been watching these developments with cautious optimism. Debt cancellation is a good start, he told al-Jazeera English, but: “It’s time to go much further. We have to talk about reparations and restitution for the devastating consequences of debt.” In this telling, the whole idea that Haiti is a debtor needs to be abandoned. Haiti, he argues, is a creditor – and it is we, in the west, who are deeply in arrears.

Our debt to Haiti stems from four main sources: slavery, the US occupation, dictatorship and climate change. These claims are not fantastical, nor merely rhetorical. They rest on multiple violations of legal norms. Here, far too briefly, are highlights of the Haiti case.

The slavery debt. When Haitians won their independence from France in 1804, they had every right to claim reparations from the powers that had profited from three centuries of stolen labour. France, however, was convinced that it was Haitians who had stolen the property of slave owners, by refusing to work for free. So in 1825, with a flotilla of warships stationed off the Haitian coast threatening to re-enslave the former colony, King Charles X came to collect 90m gold francs – 10 times Haiti’s annual revenue at the time. With no way to refuse, and no way to pay, the young nation was shackled to a debt that would take 122 years to pay off.

Full Story: Forgiveness for Haiti? We should be begging theirs | Naomi Klein | Comment is free | The Guardian.

Bernie Sanders compares climate skeptics to Nazi deniers

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is comparing climate change skeptics to those who disregarded the Nazi threat to America in the 1930s, adding a strident rhetorical shot to the already volatile debate over climate change.

“It reminds me in some ways of the debate taking place in this country and around the world in the late 1930s,” said Sanders, perhaps the most liberal member of the Senate, during a Senate hearing Tuesday. “During that period of Nazism and fascism’s growth-a real danger to the United States and democratic countries around the world- there were people in this country and in the British parliament who said ‘don’t worry! Hitler’s not real! It’ll disappear!”

Sanders’ reference to the Nazi threat is sure to enrage Republicans who are already skeptical of the science behind climate change. But Sanders wasn’t the only one throwing bombs at a hearing that was ostensibly about the EPA’s fiscal 2011 budget. Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), who has called global warming a “hoax,” is asking for an investigation into the science used in the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the governing body on climate science.

Full Story: Bernie Sanders compares climate skeptics to Nazi deniers – Marin Cogan – POLITICO.com.

‘Buy farmland and gold,’ advises Dr Doom

The world’s most powerful investors have been advised to buy farmland, stock up on gold and prepare for a “dirty war” by Marc Faber, the notoriously bearish market pundit, who predicted the 1987 stock market crash.

The bleak warning of social and financial meltdown, delivered today in Tokyo at a gathering of 700 pension and sovereign wealth fund managers.

Dr Faber, who advised his audience to pull out of American stocks one week before the 1987 crash and was among a handful who predicted the more recent financial crisis, vies with the Nouriel Roubini, the economist, as a rival claimant for the nickname Dr Doom.

Speaking today, Dr Faber said that investors, who control billions of dollars of assets, should start considering the effects of more disruptive events than mere market volatility.

Full Story: ‘Buy farmland and gold,’ advises Dr Doom – Times Online.

Recall may not solve problem, Toyota executive tells Congress

Toyota’s top U.S. executive insisted to lawmakers on Tuesday that electronic problems weren’t the cause of sudden acceleration problems in some of its cars, but added that the company’s recall of millions of vehicles may not “totally solve” the problem.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood testified, however, that the possibility of an electronic problem couldn’t be ruled out.

At a hearing mixed with harrowing personal testimony and precise technical explanations, James Lentz, the president of Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A., admitted to a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee that the Japanese automaker hasn’t “lived up to the high standards that our customers and the public have come to expect from Toyota.

Full Story: Recall may not solve problem, Toyota executive tells Congress | McClatchy.

Inside the Administration’s Deal with the Pharmaceutical Lobby

by Sebastian Jones, ProPublica –

Last August, the Los Angeles Times reported that a deal had been reached between the White House and the lobbying group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA). The pharmaceutical industry promised to deliver $80 billion in cost savings and to run television ads supporting the health care reform effort. In exchange, the White House would prevent Medicare renegotiation of drug prices and the re-importation of drugs from abroad.

Now, in a methodically researched report drawing on public records and press accounts, the Sunlight Foundation has gone back and forensically examined how the deal came to be.

To get a full picture of the interlocking interests at work, the full piece is worth a read. Here are a few of the key findings:

Full Story: On The Hill: Inside the Administration’s Deal with the Pharmaceutical Lobby.

Shock Doctrine double down

In The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, Naomi Klein convincingly argued that “free market” capitalism did not spread worldwide because people welcomed it freely, but because it was forced on them against their will, imposed through a series of shocks–military coups, financial crises, physical disasters–that left people, and entire societies reeling, unable to get their bearings, much less respond critical to the most critical of situations.

Now, however, we’ve reached a critical turning point: the entire system that was built up by Shock Doctrine strategy is itself coming apart at the seams–and now, rather than standing back, and saying, “Now wait a minute!” the elite consensus in most quarters is to double down on our past mistakes. Now, the very shock of the systems collapse is being used to try to extend it–not just a little further, but far further than ever before.

The main focal point of this effort is the two-pronged battle to (1) prevent anything close to an adequate fiscal response to generate a full-employment recovery, and (2) prevent anything close the necessary re-regulation of the financial sector, so that the national and world economy can be restored to a sound financial foundation. The Obama Administration double-faulted on these twin challenges within its first few weeks in office, and things have been going downhill ever since.

Full Story: Open Left:: Shock Doctrine double down.

Exclusive: Newt Gingrich ‘Sharing Resources, Coordinating Efforts’ With Oil Lobby

Newt Gingrich, through his political attack group “American Solutions for Winning the Future” (ASWF), has organized tea party protests, conservative legislative efforts, and is best known for driving the Republican “Drill Here, Drill Now” campaign in 2008. Until now, the only known financial backers of ASWF were the donors disclosed on his 527 IRS forms, like Peabody Coal and investor Rex Sinquefield. Gingrich — who once believed in climate change science and believed the U.S. must act “urgently” to reduce carbon emissions — has moved far to the right on environmental issues, and has allied himself with polluters fighting tooth and nail against clean energy reform.

While his support from King Coal is widely known, new revelations reveal that Gingrich has established direct support from the oil lobby. The American Petroleum Institute (API) is the umbrella trade association for the oil industry, lobbying on behalf of corporations like ExxonMobil and Chevron, as well as for refineries and pipeline companies. In addition to spending millions on political lobbying, API has blanketed the country with pro-oil drilling ads and has coordinated “grassroots” rallies to oppose clean energy reform.

Full Story: Think Progress » Exclusive: Newt Gingrich ‘Sharing Resources, Coordinating Efforts’ With Oil Lobby.

Alan Greenspan Wins ‘Dynamite Award’ For Economist Who Did Most To Fuel The Financial Crisis

This award won’t be going on Alan Greenspan’s mantle.

The once-lauded Federal Reserve chairman has been awarded the “Dynamite Prize In Economics” by his fellow economists, according to the blog Real-World Economics Review. The blog solicited votes for the economists most responsible for the financial crisis from its 11,000 subscribers — most of which, the blog claims, are economists.

Finishing second was Milton Freidman, the staunch free market advocate (3,349 votes), followed by Lawrence Summers (3,023 votes), Obama’s chief economic adviser and former president of Harvard.

From the blog:

This blog established the prize in response to attempts by economists to evade responsibility for the crisis by calling it an unpredictable, “Black Swan” event. In reality, the public perception that economic theories and policies helped cause the crisis is correct.

Full Story: Alan Greenspan Wins ‘Dynamite Award’ For Economist Who Did Most To Fuel The Financial Crisis.

Federal Bureau of Invention? Anthrax Case Closed

Microbiologist Meryl Nass Responds to FBI Closing Anthrax Case

The FBI’s report, documents and accompanying information (only pertaining to Ivins, not to the rest of the investigation) were released on Friday afternoon… which means the FBI anticipated doubt and ridicule. The National Academies of Science (NAS) is several months away from issuing its $879,550 report on the microbial forensics, suggesting a) asking NAS to investigate the FBI’s science was just a charade to placate Congress, and/or b) NAS’ investigation might be uncovering things the FBI would prefer to bury, so FBI decided to preempt the NAS panel’s report.

Here are today’s reports from the Justice Department, AP, Washington Post and NY Times. The WaPo article ends,

The FBI’s handling of the investigation has been criticized by Ivins’s colleagues and by independent analysts who have pointed out multiple gaps, including a lack of hair, fiber other physical evidence directly linking Ivins to the anthrax letters. But despite long delays and false leads, Justice officials Friday expressed satisfaction with the outcome.

The evidence “established that Dr Ivins, alone, mailed the anthrax letters,” the Justice summary stated.

Full Story: Scoop: Federal Bureau of Invention? Anthrax Case Closed.

Pfizer’s Ghostiwritten Journal Articles

But one look at the US National Library of Medicine database shows the bogus, ghostwritten papers Wyeth (now Pfizer) planted in medical journals in a ghostwriting scandal that reached Congress last year, still stand unretracted.

“Is there an association between hormone replacement therapy and breast cancer?” asks an unretracted article in the Journal of Women’s Health, 1998 Dec;7(10):1231-46–a question a fourth grader could answer.

The “author” William T. Creasman, MD, neither wrote or initiated the article but was suggested by Jeff Solomon of Wyeth, according to documents posted on the University of California, San Francisco’s Drug Industry Document Archive (Dida) http://dida.library.ucsf.edu.
Full Story: Scoop: Pfizer’s Ghostiwritten Journal Articles.

Budget Increases for Nuclear Weapons Production at the Expense of Social Programs

In the new budget request for 2011 the Obama Administration proposes to freeze discretionary domestic spending for programs such as education, nutrition, air traffic control and national parks for three years while dramatically increasing funding for new US nuclear weapons production facilities. Meanwhile the proposed budget for dismantling warheads retired from the stockpile is down by 40%. Funding for a new nuclear facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory to be used in direct support of plutonium pit production, the CMRR-NF, is increased to $225 million requested from $97M in FY10 (+132%). After FY11, funding is proposed to triple the FY10 amount to $300 million for each of the following four consecutive years.

Funding for a new “Uranium Processing Facility” (UPF) at the Y12 production plant near Oak Park Ridge, TN, is proposed to increase to $115M from $94M in FY10 (+22%). However, its big money is in the following four consecutive years, climbing to $320 million by 2015 (in all a 240% increase from FY10 funding). Totals costs for both the CMRR and UPF are still “TBD” [To Be Determined], meaning they don’t know, but each will probably cost $3 billion or more.

Outside of the federal budget, groundbreaking is expected this Spring on a new privately-financed ~$700 million Kansas City Plant for nonnuclear components production for US nuclear weapons, subsidized by Kansas City municipal bonds. This pretty well spans the spectrum of future US nuclear weapons production, with big increases for new facilities for plutonium, uranium and nonnuclear components. At the same time, the Obama budget proposes to cut dismantlement from $96.1 million in FY 2010 to $58 million.

Full Story: Budget Increases for Nuclear Weapons Production at the Expense of Social Programs.

OPS: Is this REALLY the trade off we want to make?  Do we really want to deny ourselves here at home so our Milirtary can kill people in other countries whom we’ve never met and only hate our policies, not us?

Over 1000 architects and engineers have signed petition to reinvestigate 9-11 destruction

“At some level of government, at some point in time, there was an agreement not to tell the people the truth about what happened.” John Farmer, Senior Counsel to the 9-11 Commission in his book The Ground Truth (Page 4)

Architects and Engineers for 9-11 Truth founder, Richard Gage, AIA,   began the conference quoting Mark Twain who said, “If you don’t read the newspapers you’re uninformed. If you do read them you’re misinformed.” Gage said he hoped the assembled press would help to rectify that situation. “Today I’m quite pleased to announce that now we have more than one thousand architects and engineers signed on to the A&E911Truth petition demanding of Congress a new and truly independent, unimpeachable investigation into the destruction of the three World Trade Center skyscrapers on 9-11,” Gage said to a cheering audience.

Full Story: Over 1000 architects and engineers have signed petition to reinvestigate 9-11 destruction.

Whole Foods Market “Organic” food made in China

I was shocked to watch ABC I-Team news about your organic products. The show pointed out how you have been deceiving your customers for years including me. Your products stated certified organic Californian etc while it printed with small letters in the back Made in China. We all know the Chinese products are not certified organic by FDA and there is no way you can insist they are.

Athens: The First Domino?

Justice will not come to Athens until those who are not injured are as indignant as those who are injured.–Thucydides

The shadow of classical Greece has always loomed large over Western civilization–whether in literature, philosophy, art, mathematics, history or politics, it has been, in so many ways, the fons et origo of us all. Modern Greece suddenly seems poised to play that same outsized role, but by no means in the same civilizing way. Athens’s fiscal crisis could very well ignite the next global financial crisis–just as the world hoped it might be starting a slow exit from the last one.

After meeting with fellow European leaders in Brussels in early February, where he argued the case for help in solving the hefty budget deficit he’d inherited on taking office last fall, Prime Minister George Papandreou flew home to Athens to tell his countrymen that he’d returned with a half-full cup of promises–and no assurance of the serious backing Greece needs to weather its woes. Global markets, which had been fibrillating nervously for three months about Greece’s (and the euro’s) financial health, skipped several beats after Papandreou’s speech, after already suffering a long sell-off that wiped out much of Wall Street’s shaky recovery. All eyes are anxiously casting about for Delphic signs of what Europe’s finance ministers will do when they meet to hear Greece make its case again, this time in hard numbers.

The situation has the makings of an Aeschylean tragedy. If help isn’t forthcoming, little Greece–whose economy is just 3 percent of Europe’s GDP–could, against its will, set off a chain reaction that pulls down Portugal, Ireland, Spain, perhaps even Italy, and thereby throws Europe’s, and then America’s and the rest of the world’s, fragile recoveries into reverse.

Full Story: Athens: The First Domino?.

OPS: Wasn’t Iceland the first?

Docs: Toyota Surges Related to [Software]

CBS News Exclusive: Internal Document Shows Software Redesigned in 2005;  Company Denies Fix Was for Unintended Acceleration

A federal grand jury in New York has subpoenaed documents related to the sudden acceleration problems on some of Toyota’s cars.

Toyota’s president will testify before Congress Wednesday. He’ll likely be asked about an internal company memo that shows the car manufacturer saved $100 million in 2007 by persuading government regulators to narrow their investigation. The regulators agreed to just a limited recall.

Congress already has thousands of pages of Toyota documents to sift through, but CBS News obtained one internal document that could be devastating to Toyota’s claims that electronics aren’t at issue.

Full Story: Docs: Toyota Surges Related to Electronics – CBS News.

OPS:  2005 is apparently BS. US authorities knew about Toyota acceleration problem in 2003

Mega Deals: $1 billion outsourcing contracts may come to India

Mega Deals: $1 billion outsourcing contracts may come to India

NEW DELHI: Large outsourcing contracts worth up to $1 billion look set for a comeback this year, as companies from segments like retail, banking, telecom and utilities, apart from government bodies, seek to cope with renewed demand for their services and also lower their operational expenses.

Outsourcing experts and industry officials told ET last week that auto customers too are looking to award large contracts for managing their business and IT systems this year. British Petroleum’s IT contract worth $1.5 billion awarded to Indian vendors TCS, Infosys and Wipro early this year was one such mega deal.

There are several such projects lined up in the country’s power sector as well, said Everest Group country head Gaurav Gupta. “Governments in the US and other western markets tend to account for a big chunk of mega deals, but Indian companies are not strong contenders,” he said, adding that large deals for Indian companies are typically in the range of $50-100 million, though some Indian IT services vendors currently have some mega outsourcing contracts in the pipeline.

Full Story: Mega Deals: $1 billion outsourcing contracts may come to India- ITeS-Infotech-The Economic Times.

Keep ‘Made in Asia’ label off the U.S. nuclear revival

Chinese parts in American Nuclear Reactors?

Set aside your views on the safety and efficacy of nuclear power for a minute and think about this: Is it desirable to trade America’s dependence on foreign oil for dependence on renewables and nuclear energy manufacturing abroad? Worse yet, should we allow our tax dollars to make this possible?

Sadly, that may be our reality. A made-in-China Texas wind farm project last year was slated for federal assistance. Fortunately, a public outcry and outrage from Congress will likely ensure that more of its wind energy components are manufactured in the U.S. But, a potentially bigger battle lies ahead.

With the Obama administration’s announcement of $8.33 billion in federal loan guarantees for two proposed reactors in Burke, Ga., tax dollars may in fact be headed to Asia to support the manufacture of nuclear components. Already, Japan — home of recall-plagued Toyota — may approve financing for the nuclear project, an indication that some high-value components will be made there. And, given China’s keen interest in rapidly developing its own nuclear power generating and manufacturing capability, it is highly likely that Chinese manufacturers of steel and other nuclear components have some skin in the game, as well.

Full Story: Keep ‘Made in Asia’ label off the U.S. nuclear revival – TheHill.com.

Medicade: Still Needed

NYTimes – Editorial

In June 2009, some 46.9 million people were enrolled in Medicaid programs nearly 3.3 million more than in the previous June. That is the biggest one-year increase ever

Here is another chilling indicator of how Americans are struggling in the recession: In June 2009, some 46.9 million people were enrolled in Medicaid programs throughout the country, nearly 3.3 million more than in the previous June. That is the biggest one-year increase ever, according to a survey just released by the Kaiser Family Foundation. This year’s Medicaid enrollments are almost certain to rise even higher and faster.

Medicaid, which is jointly financed by the federal and state governments, provides health insurance for poor people whose annual incomes fall below levels specified by each state. The insurance pays their medical, hospital and nursing home bills and makes it more likely that they will receive the health care they need.

As part of last year’s stimulus bill, Congress made the sound decision to temporarily enhance — by a projected $87 billion — the federal matching money for state Medicaid programs. The money has already proved enormously important in offsetting the cost of new enrollees, avoiding harmful program cuts, stabilizing state budgets, and saving jobs in the health care industry.

Unfortunately, the extra stimulus money runs out at the end of this year. Unless Congress acts soon to extend the funding for at least six months, many hard-pressed states will be forced to reduce Medicaid benefits or make other cuts in services that are likely only to deepen the recession.

Full Story: Editorial – Still Needed – NYTimes.com.

Debt Dynamite Dominoes: The Coming Financial Catastrophe

Assessing the Illusion of Recovery

Understanding the Nature of the Global Economic Crisis

The people have been lulled into a false sense of safety under the ruse of a perceived “economic recovery.” Unfortunately, what the majority of people think does not make it so, especially when the people making the key decisions think and act to the contrary. The sovereign debt crises that have been unfolding in the past couple years and more recently in Greece, are canaries in the coal mine for the rest of Western “civilization.” The crisis threatens to spread to Spain, Portugal and Ireland; like dominoes, one country after another will collapse into a debt and currency crisis, all the way to America.

In October 2008, the mainstream media and politicians of the Western world were warning of an impending depression if actions were not taken to quickly prevent this. The problem was that this crisis had been a long-time coming, and what’s worse, is that the actions governments took did not address any of the core, systemic issues and problems with the global economy; they merely set out to save the banking industry from collapse. To do this, governments around the world implemented massive “stimulus” and “bailout” packages, plunging their countries deeper into debt to save the banks from themselves, while charging it to people of the world.

Then an uproar of stock market speculation followed, as money was pumped into the stocks, but not the real economy. This recovery has been nothing but a complete and utter illusion, and within the next two years, the illusion will likely come to a complete collapse.

Full Story: Debt Dynamite Dominoes: The Coming Financial Catastrophe.

GM to add 1,200 jobs at Lordstown, Ohio, plant in summer

General Motors Corp. said today it is bringing 1,200 autoworkers back to work this summer to start producing the Chevrolet Cruze compact car at a factory in northeast Ohio.

About 300 laid-off GM workers in the area will be brought back first, and the remaining jobs at the Lordstown factory will be open to GM employees across the U.S., said Diana Tremblay, GM’s head of manufacturing.

The jobs will be added to a third assembly-line shift sometime in the third quarter.

The Cruze, due out later this year, is a key product for GM as it tries to compete in the growing market for small cars. Production was recently put on hold because GM wasn’t happy with how it drove.

Full Story: GM to add 1,200 jobs at Lordstown, Ohio, plant in summer.

Navy will soon let women serve on subs

The Pentagon has moved to lift a decades-old policy that prohibits women from serving aboard Navy submarines, part of a gradual reconsideration of women's roles in a military fighting two wars whose front lines can be anywhere.

At issue is the end of a policy that kept women from serving aboard the last type of ship off-limits to them. The thinking was that the close quarters aboard subs would make coed service difficult to manage.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates notified Congress in a letter signed Friday that the Navy intends to repeal the ban on women sailors on subs. Congress has 30 days to weigh in.

Full Story: News from The Associated Press.

CBO: Stimulus bill added up to 2.1 million jobs

It lowered jobless rate by up to 2.1 percent in fourth quarter, report finds

The massive stimulus package passed last year to blunt the impact of the worst U.S. recession in 70 years created up to 2.1 million jobs in the last three months of 2009, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office said Tuesday.

The package boosted the economy by up to 3.5 percent and lowered the unemployment rate by up to 2.1 percent during that period, CBO said.

The report comes as President Barack Obama and his fellow Democrats are pushing further measures to bring down the 9.7 percent unemployment rate before the November congressional elections.

Full Story: CBO: Stimulus bill added up to 2.1 million jobs – Economy at a Crossroads- msnbc.com.

School Laptop Spying Case Goes to Court

A suburban Philadelphia school district has agreed to preserve webcam evidence on student laptops as a lawsuit alleges that officials spied on students at home. (Feb. 22)

The Drive to Eliminate Social Security in America

In Washington each new day brings a fresh call to “reform entitlement programs” — Social Security, Medicare, etc., (in Congress, the word “reform” now means to eliminate, or drastically reduce). Tackling Social Security has been on the to-do list of the corporate elite for years, and they’re not waiting any longer. After years of promoting this cause, conservative think tanks have now garnered solid support from the political establishment as a whole, which includes the Republican and Democratic parties.

The newest liberal recruit to the destruction of Social Security is Thomas Friedman, the influential columnist for The New York Times, who wrote recently:

“The president needs to persuade the country to invest in the future and pay for the past… We have to pay for more new schools and infrastructure than ever, while accepting more entitlement cuts than ever [Social Security, Medicare, etc.] when public trust in government is lower than ever.” (February 20, 2010).

The nonchalance which Friedman calls for cutting Social Security is indicative of the climate inWashington, where the last remnants of liberalism have been suffocated under the heavy demands of profit-hungry corporations, especially financial institutions and big banks. For political hacks like Friedman — and there are thousands of them — the ONLY solution to curing the U.S. deficit is cutting social services in general, while specifically targeting Social Security and Medicare.

But President Obama revealed these assertions to be lies, when he recently announced, “fixing Social Security would be simple.” The Associated Press explains:

“The system is funded with a tax on earnings, up to $109,000 a year. Obama says lifting that cap to tax a larger share of income would be one way to extend the system of monthly payments for retirees. It also would be unpopular with some.” (February 19, 2010).

Full Story: The Drive to Eliminate Social Security in America.

$250,000 A Year Is Not Middle Class Anywhere In America

David Sirota -

Last year, the New York Times told us it’s difficult for people to make ends meet on $500,000 a year, and the Washington Post insisted that it’s hard to “squeak by” on $300,000 a year. Now the Denver Post insists that if you make $250,000 a year, you may only be “middle class”:

The $250,000 income cutoff has become a near-mythical figure in American politics, setting up a heated and sometimes highly personal debate…Are (those who make $250,000 a year) rich? Or, as some define that income range, simply middle class?

This follows CNN’s Kiran Chetry famously insisting that “Some would argue that in some parts of the country” $250,000 a year “is middle class” — which itself was a follow-on of ABC anchor Charlie Gibson making a similar assertion at a 2008 presidential debate. Put it all together, and you have a pretty intense misinformation campaign to make us believe that the very wealthy are, in fact, poor.

It is, of course, misinformation. Even in the wealthiest, highest-cost-of-living places in America, $250,000 is most decidedly not “middle class”:

Full Story: $250,000 A Year Is Not Middle Class Anywhere In America | The Smirking Chimp.

Hartmann: Why Isn’t Cheney In Jail ?

CPAC Washington Thom Hartmann streaming live segment on war criminal Cheney whilst Cheney & Liz Cheney are right behind him @ CPAC.

The military’s war on the Earth

Use as many low-energy lightbulbs as you like, turn down the thermostat and drive a hybrid car, but whatever you do as an individual — indeed, the sum of what we all do for the environment –does almost nothing to alleviate the U.S. military's destruction of the earth.

***

In The Green Zone: The Environmental Costs of Militarism, Barry Sanders writes that like other capitalist institutions, “each military branch … must grow larger and fatter each year; expansion is the life blood of imperialism.” Further, Sanders asserts, “The military can brook limits of no kind whatsoever. … The Pentagon conducts its business behind very thick and very closed doors. It writes its own rules and either follows them or violates them, depending on the situation.”

Almost all “military numbers remain off of official reports, secret and out of sight.” Sanders obtained the information he cites in the book by gleaning what he could from “arcane reports” and obscure Web sites belonging to the Department of Defense and Government Accounting Office, plus books and articles.

Sanders describes, in horrifying detail, how the military is “the largest single source of pollution in this country and in the world: the United States military — in particular the military in its most ferocious and stepped-up mode — namely, the military at war.” He goes on to say, “When we declare war on a foreign nation, we now also declare war on the Earth, on the soil and plants and animals, the water and wind and people in the most far-reaching and deeply infecting ways.”

Full Story: The military’s war on the Earth | The Bloomington Alternative.

Renato Fisichella, Vatican Bioethics Official, Refuses To Resign After Defending Abortion

The Vatican’s top bioethics official on Monday dismissed calls for his resignation following an uproar over his defense of doctors who aborted the twin fetuses of a 9-year-old child who was raped by her stepfather.

Monsignor Renato Fisichella told The Associated Press he refused to respond to five members of the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy for Life who questioned his suitability to lead the institution.

Fisichella wrote an article in the Vatican’s newspaper in March saying the Brazilian doctors didn’t deserve excommunication as mandated by church law because they were saving the girl’s life. The call for mercy sparked heated criticism from some academy members who said it implied the Vatican was opening up to so-called “therapeutic abortion” to save the mother’s life.

To quiet their complaints, the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a clarification in July, repeating the Catholic Church’s firm opposition to abortion and saying Fisichella’s words had been “manipulated and exploited.”

Full Story: Renato Fisichella, Vatican Bioethics Official, Refuses To Resign After Defending Abortion.

2010 Midterm Elections To Be Most Expensive Ever: Analysis

The upcoming midterm elections will cost at least $3.7 billion, making them the most expensive midterm elections of all time, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

“With so much on the line, the outpouring of big money into federal campaigns looks likely to continue at a brisk pace,” said CRP’s Sheila Krumholz in a statement.

CRP calls its estimate “conservative.” The number is based on spending trends for Senate and House candidates, political parties, and outside groups known as 527 committees and political action committees during the past four midterm elections, which tends to increase by between 31 percent and 35 percent.

The 2006 midterms cost $2.8 billion, the 2002 midterms cost $2.1 billion, and the 1998 midterms cost just $1.6 billion. The amount spent by the average winning candidate has followed a similar pattern, with winners outspending losers in a big way. That, of course, is why members of Congress spend so much of their time on fundraising.

Full Story: 2010 Midterm Elections To Be Most Expensive Ever: Analysis.

Thinking the Unthinkable: What if China Devalues the Renminbi?

Conventional wisdom holds that the Chinese are due (as in overdue) for a revaluation of their currency, the renminbi. For instance, a recent report from Goldman argues that China will raise the value of the RMB against the dollar by 5% this year. The argument is that the move is needed to slow down an overheating economy.

But to a large degree, whether you agree with that as a remedy depends on what one’s reading is not just of China’s notoriously misleading statistics, but of the underlying growth dynamics, which are well out of bounds of any previous pattern, and not in a good way, either.

We question whether a revaluation is the right answer for them, and more important, whether the Chinese themselves see a revaluation as a plus. The government has engineered an enormous increase in money and credit in the past year. In fact, it seems to be as great as 5 years’ growth in credit in the previous Chinese bubble. The increase in money and credit is so great and so abrupt that you tend to get a high inflation quite quickly even if there are under utilised resources. Add to this the fact that China simultaneously is providing massive fiscal stimulus.

Full Story: Thinking the Unthinkable: What if China Devalues the Renminbi? « naked capitalism.

White House Handling Of Public Option Still A ‘Complete Failure’

One other point on the public option: This has been a complete and utter failure of White House leadership. They need to give this effort their support, or they need to kill it by publicly stating their opposition. But they can’t simply wait for someone else to make the decision for them, which has been their strategy until now.

If the White House decides that reviving the public option is a good idea, there’s reason to believe the Senate would follow them on that. It would make some sense, after all: The public option is popular, its death was partly the product of industry pressure, and the sudden spate of high-profile rate increases offers a nice rhetorical pivot for anyone who wants to argue that individuals should be able to choose an insurer who’s not a profit-hungry beast. Plus, Democrats need an excited base going into the 2010 election, and this may be the only way to get it.

If the White House decides to stick with the effort to look like hopeful bipartisans in the face of Republican opposition, that would make sense, too. The sell on reconciliation is that it’s a few final tweaks to a bill that has already passed. The White House’s health-care proposal reflected that theory. Resuscitating the public option is a very different play: It’s a big change rather than a small tweak, and it’s a polarizing decision after weeks of rhetoric emphasizing comity.

Full Story: Ezra Klein – A failure of White House leadership.

Republicans Attack Size of House Health Care Bill – Now it’s too small

Republican House leader John Boehner, appearing on Fox News today, criticized the House health care legislation released Thursday as a bloated bill that his office claims will “raise the cost of health insurance for most American families, kill jobs with new tax increases and new mandates, and cut seniors’ Medicare benefits.”

“All you need to know is there are 1,990 pages,” Boehner said. “That should tell you everything.”

It should be noted that spending bills routinely exceed 1,000 pages, as do some other bills. President Bush’s 2007 budget bill was 1,482 pages long.

Full Story: Republicans Attack Size of House Health Care Bill – Political Hotsheet – CBS News.

Rahm Emanuel’s rescue mission: His own image

Like many Americans, White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel has been forced to work two jobs to get through tough times.

Emanuel’s main job is serving as President Barack Obama’s not-so-mild-mannered point man on the renewed, possibly quixotic final push for health care reform.

But in his spare time, the White House chief of staff and his allies have sought to defend Emanuel against a growing chorus of critics who blame him for nearly everything that has gone wrong in Obama’s first year.

One of the more surprising details to emerge from this back and forth is that Emanuel’s allies are letting it be known around town that he never wanted to make it the administration’s top priority for Year One. That may come as a surprise to Democrats on the Hill who’ve been lobbied relentlessly by Emanuel to get a bill done — and fast.

Full Story: Rahm Emanuel’s rescue mission: His own image – Glenn Thrush and Eamon Javers – POLITICO.com.

Conservatives Turn On Scott Brown Over Jobs Bill Vote: ‘Low Life Scum Hypocrite!’

Not long ago, Scott Brown (R-Mass.) was elected to the United States Senate and a nation rejoiced, because he was going to drive down to Washington D.C. and become the President of Filibusters. But a funny thing happened yesterday, when Brown decided not to cast the 41st vote, and instead to vote as if he’d like to one day get re-elected to office in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts:

“It’s a small step, but it’s still a step,” Brown told reporters after casting a procedural vote in favor of the Democratic jobs bill, bucking his party leaders and the strategy of opposition they have carried out since President Obama took office.

For Senate Democrats, it was much bigger step. Four Republicans followed Brown’s lead, giving the jobs legislation 62 votes, two more than needed to cut off a GOP filibuster.

Full Story: Conservatives Turn On Scott Brown Over Jobs Bill Vote: ‘Low Life Scum Hypocrite!’.

Whaling Commission Proposes Return to Commercial Whaling

A working group of the International Whaling Commission today released a draft proposal that would allow the return of commercial whaling. An IWC moratorium on commercial whaling has been in place since 1986.

The compromise is aimed at unblocking the long-stalled negotiation process between IWC member countries opposed to commercial whaling and those that want to kill whales.

The draft Consensus Decision by the Small Working Group on the Future of IWC would allow only the countries that currently take whales under the “research” provisions of the treaty to hunt them under the proposed management regime. Those countries are Japan, Norway, Iceland and the Faroe Islands, which together kill some 1,500 whales a year. Indigenous subsistence whaling also would be allowed to continue.

Full Story: Whaling Commission Proposes Return to Commercial Whaling.

US Raps Europe for Underfunding Defense

Europe has demilitarized too much since the end of the Cold War and its underfunded defense budgets are undermining shared security goals, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Tuesday.

Gates, addressing a NATO seminar in Washington, said too few helicopters and cargo aircraft for the NATO mission in Afghanistan were “directly impacting operations.” NATO also needed more aerial refueling tankers and surveillance aircraft.

“Despite the need to spend more on vital equipment for ongoing missions, the alliance has been unwilling to fundamentally change how it sets priorities and allocates resources,” Gates said.

Full Story: US Raps Europe for Underfunding Defense | CommonDreams.org.

Coal industry challenges of safety violations swamp system

Coal operators in Kentucky and other states have dramatically increased challenges to federal citations for safety violations in the past few years — swamping the appeals process.

Some members of Congress contend that the vast backlog of cases under review — more than 15,000 — is the result of potentially unsafe mines gaming the system to stay in business.

“This growing backlog indicates that certain mine operators are abusing their right to challenge a violation,” said Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, which is scheduled to hold a hearing Tuesday on the issue.“These appeals are clogging the system and putting miners in danger.”

In Kentucky, 80 percent of 536 high-dollar fines for the “significant and substantial” safety violations — the most serious kind — are being contested by the mine operators, according to federal Mine Safety and Health Administration records. Some citations are more than two years old.

Full Story: Coal industry challenges of safety violations swamp system | courier-journal.com | The Courier-Journal.

“It Could Happen Here: America on the Brink”

“It Could Happen Here: America on the Brink”   By Bruce Judson

Reviewed by Thom Hartmann

In some important ways, Judson’s book follows perfectly on a line of thought presented in three of my previous Buzzflash book reviews:

In “Reinventing Collapse,” Dmitry Orlov talked about his experience as a teenager in Russia when the USSR collapsed and how now, as an American resident, he sees the same dynamics at play here – only we’re less well prepared than was the former Soviet state.

In “The Great Crash of 1929,” John Kenneth Galbraith laid out how Republican/conservative economic policies played out through three successive Republican presidencies led directly to the Great Depression in 1929, and implicitly how thirty years of Reaganomics/Clintonomics is leading us in the same direction now.
And in “The Impact of Inequality” Richard Wilkinson shows how the more unequal a society is, the more sick and unstable it becomes – and documents how the United States is now the most unequal industrial society in the world.

Full Story: “It Could Happen Here: America on the Brink” — Thom Hartmann’s Independent Thinker Review | BuzzFlash.org.

Guns are now permitted — but not necessarily welcomed — in national parks – latimes.com

As the controversial law takes effect Monday, critics argue it could increase wildlife poaching, violence between visitors and against rangers, and destruction of historic and cultural monuments.

A federal law taking effect Monday may alter the standard checklist for many Americans as they pack to visit their national parks: insect repellent, snacks, hiking boots . . . double-barreled shotgun.

Visitors now can pack heat in any national park from Gates of the Arctic to Everglades, provided they comply with the firearms laws of the park’s home state, according to the new law that was passed as an amendment to credit-card legislation.

In some instances, they may carry concealed and loaded firearms, including at campsites in Yosemite Valley, along trails at Yellowstone and at the rim of the Grand Canyon.

Full Story: Guns are now permitted — but not necessarily welcomed — in national parks – latimes.com.

Max Keiser – 20 February 2010

Max interviews Prof. Samuel Bowles, who has an interesting take on the concepts of wealth and property. He defines the term “guard labor” and points out it constitutes about 25% of US economic activity. Add 20% of economic activity spent on health care and it’s no wonder Americans are spinning their wheels but not going forward.

YouTube – On the Edge with Max Keiser – 20 February 2010 – (2/3).

Part 3/3

‘A business decision’

Walking Away from your Mortgage

W ayne B, a 62-year-old executive who works at an airport, and his wife Orapin, a dental assistant, are about to do something odd. The couple, with a pristine credit history, have decided to default on their $500,000 (£325,000, €370,000) mortgage on a townhouse in Livermore, a respectable city in California's San Francisco Bay area.

It is not that they are unable to afford the $4,600 monthly mortgage outgoings: they have never missed a payment. But the house they bought for $582,000 in May 2006 – at the peak of the US housing boom – is now not likely to be worth more than $315,000.

“The process towards a default has started,” says Wayne, whose lender does not yet know it will soon be left nursing losses on yet another foreclosed house – and one whose owner, among the top-rated in terms of creditworthiness, is an implausiblesounding default risk. “We plan to retire in four years and will not be able to afford the mortgage payments then,” he explains. “The loss if we sell will be so large that, after doing a lot of research, we have made a business decision to walk away.”

Full Story: FT.com / UK – ‘A business decision’.

Boeing prepares to cut nearly 800 IT workers

The Boeing Co. late last week issued 1,000 layoff notices to employees, many of them working in IT.

The company sent 60-day layoff notices to the workers, who are at risk of being laid off on April 23. Of those notices, about 800 went to employees of Boeing's engineering, operations and technology unit; most of the people in that unit are in IT, according to Tim Healy, a company spokesman.

The aerospace company employs 158,500 people, including 18,000 in its engineering and technology group.

Healy said that between now and the layoff date, retirements and other forms of attrition could eliminate the need for some of the cuts, “although it’s impossible to predict how often that could happen or how many employees will actually leave the company,” he said.

This layoff plan is a continuation of the company’s efforts to cut 10,000 jobs.

Full Story: Boeing prepares to cut nearly 800 IT workers.

World’s coral reefs could disintegrate by 2100

Researchers at Carnegie Institution say corals are being overwhelmed by rising carbon dioxide in the atmosphere

The world’s coral reefs will begin to disintegrate before the end of the century as rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere make the oceans more acidic, scientists warn.

The research points to a looming transition in the health of coral ecosystems during which the ability of reefs to grow is overwhelmed by the rate at which they are dissolving.

More than 9,000 coral reefs around the world are predicted to disintegrate when atmospheric carbon dioxide levels reach 560 parts per million.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere today stands at around 388ppm, but is expected to reach 560ppm by the end of this century.

Full Story: World’s coral reefs could disintegrate by 2100 | Environment | guardian.co.uk.

Senate sitting on 290 bills already passed by House; tension mounts – TheHill.com

Exasperated House Democratic leaders have compiled a list showing that they have passed 290 bills that have stalled in the Senate.

The list is the latest sign that Democrats in the lower chamber are frustrated with their Senate counterparts.

An aide to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) says the list is put together during each Congress, but that this year’s number is likely the largest ever. However, he said Pelosi blames GOP senators, not Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) or Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.).

“The Speaker believes that the filibuster has its place, but clearly Senate Republicans are taking what was once a rare procedural move and abusing it to the detriment of progress for America’s working families,” said Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill.

But some House Democrats and their aides have shown no reticence in blaming Senate Democrats, who enjoyed a supermajority until Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) was sworn in earlier this month.

Full Story: Senate sitting on 290 bills already passed by House; tension mounts – TheHill.com.

OPS: Because Reid and Durbin are cowards.

Death of U.S. capitalism: The final 10 scenes

Munger warns 2012 is our tipping point on ‘road to ruin’

Paul B. Farrell – MarketWatch –

Good news, Americans are “downbeat about today. Upbeat about tomorrow,” says the latest USA Today/Gallup Poll. “Americans feel battered by hard times, record home foreclosures, stubbornly high unemployment rates and war.”

And yes, we are “fed up with Washington and convinced more than 3 to 1 that the nation is heading in the wrong direction,” yet there’s “confidence that there will be better times ahead, that the classic American dream endures and hasn’t been extinguished. It’s not even at its low ebb.” Why? Because we’re in denial!

Do Main Street’s 95 million investors know something Warren Buffett’s long-time partner, Charlie Munger, doesn’t know? Munger is warning us “It’s Over” for America. Yes, “o-v-e-r,” America’s in decline, at the end-of-days, coming to “financial ruin,” says Munger.

Full Story: Death of U.S. capitalism: The final 10 scenes Paul B. Farrell – MarketWatch.

OPS: Keep in mind that this is the “Murdoch Journal’s” perspective

U.S. consumer confidence falls 11 points

Consumer confidence fell sharply in February as Americans turned more pessimistic about job prospects and the U.S. economy, the Conference Board reported. Just a month after touching a 16-month high, the board’s Consumer Confidence index sank 11 points to 46.0 from an upwardly revised 56.5 in January. It’s the lowest reading since April 2009. Economists surveyed by MarketWatch, who were looking for a slight drop to 55.5 points from the previously reported January level of 55.9

Full Story: U.S. consumer confidence falls 11 points – MarketWatch.

Glenn Beck Admits He’s Secretly Liberal?!

Beck’s comparison is insane:

Historians slam Beck: