Archive for August, 2011
Labor’s Last Stand
| The Nation :-:
Emboldened by November’s election results, corporations and their right-wing allies have launched what they hope will be their final offensive against America’s unions. Their immediate target is government workers’ unions. While New Jersey’s Republican Governor Chris Christie has gained national fame by beating up on public school teachers, the threat to unionized workers is playing out in all fifty states, to the drumbeat in the media about states going broke because of government workers’ wages, pensions and benefits. By late January, with the swearing-in ceremonies complete in the twenty-one states where Republicans have a “trifecta,” controlling the governor’s office and both statehouses, hundreds of bills had been introduced seeking to hem in unions if not ban them altogether. On February 11, Wisconsin’s new Republican Governor Scott Walker made what amounts to a declaration of all-out war on public sector workers in his historically progressive state, moving to deprive them of the very right to bargain collectively on matters essential to their economic security.
Walker’s gambit has rightly elicited outrage, but considering the breadth of the attack unions are facing nationally, it is only the tip of the iceberg. Right-to-work legislation has been filed in twelve states; this is in addition to the twenty-two that already have such laws on the books. In technical terms, this legislation makes it illegal for employers to condition employment on union membership or the equivalent dues payments even when a majority of workers vote to form a union; practically speaking, it makes building and maintaining a strong union very difficult, which in turn makes it harder to organize new workplaces because there are few positive examples of unions to point to. In Virginia, the corporations and right-wing ideologues decided that the existing right-to-work law wasn’t sufficient, and introduced a measure to embed the right-to-work provisions in the state Constitution. Three more states—Montana, Ohio and Wisconsin—are expected to have bills introduced converting their legal status to right-to-work.
Alabama passed legislation in January that bans public employee unions from collecting dues unless the unions first prove that none of the money will be used for supporting election campaigns. In every subsequent year after the initial certification, the union must submit itemized reports accounting for how its money is being spent. This law, sold as “paycheck protection” by the right but known as “paycheck deception” among union activists, has been introduced in four other states this year, including Arizona, Kansas, Mississippi and Missouri. In California there has already been ballot initiative language submitted to do the same. Using a variety of legal tools, these measures prohibit the use of union dues for political activity. Union advocates are expecting twelve more states to file bills or initiatives banning the collection of union monies for politics.
Full Story Here: Labor’s Last Stand | The Nation.
S&P Blames GOP For U.S. Credit Problem, Associated Press, Politico Cover It Up
The Standard & Poors’ rating agency decision to reduce the United States’ long term debt from AAA to AA+ was explained in a press release that specifically mentioned “the majority of Republicans in Congress continue to resist any measure that would raise revenues,” should, itself, make headlines like “Standard And Poors Blames U.S. Credit Rating Reduction On Republicans.”
But the fact is, some publications, most notable The Associated Press and Politico, are working (thus far) to cover up S&P’s finger-pointing at Republicans. Instead, they appear to be pointing their own fingers at President Obama – someone not mentioned in the Standard and Poor’s press release.
Take Jonathan Allen in Politico:
Full Story Here: S&P Blames GOP For U.S. Credit Problem, Associated Press, Politico Cover It Up : Zennie Abraham : City Brights.
MIT Lincoln Laboratory researchers develop a technique to cure a broad range of viruses
Viral pathogens pose serious health threats worldwide. For clinical viruses such as HIV or hepatitis, emerging viruses such as avian or swine influenza, and highly lethal viruses such as Ebola or smallpox that might be used in bioterrorist attacks, relatively few therapeutics or prophylactics (preventatives) exist. Most therapeutics that do exist are highly specific for one virus, are ineffective against virus strains that become resistant to them, or have adverse effects on patients.
As part of the PANACEA (for Pharmacological Augmentation of Nonspecific Anti-pathogen Cellular Enzymes and Activities) project, researchers from MIT Lincoln Laboratory have developed and demonstrated a novel broad-spectrum antiviral approach, called DRACO (for Double-stranded RNA [dsRNA] Activated Caspase
Oligomerizer). DRACO selectively induces apoptosis, or cell suicide, in cells containing any viral dsRNA, rapidly killing infected cells without harming uninfected cells. As a result, DRACO should be effective against virtually all viruses, rapidly terminating a viral infection while minimizing the impact on the patient.
Dr. Todd Rider, senior staff scientist in MIT Lincoln Laboratory’s Chemical, Biological, and Nanoscale Technologies Group, invented PANACEA and the DRACO therapeutics, and led the team that developed them: Scott Wick, in charge of DRACO production; Christina Zook, in charge of cell testing; Tara Boettcher, in charge of mouse trials; and Jennifer Pancoast and Benjamin Zusman, who performed additional experiments.
Full Story Here: MIT Lincoln Laboratory: News: DRACO.
UBS Money Laundering: What Did Phil Gramm Know?
In recent days yet another wealthy private customer of the Swiss-based banking conglomerate UBS admitted to criminal fraud in a growing parade of perp walks that could extend into the thousands. It is a case that threatens to ensnare former Sen. Phil Gramm, the Texas Republican who is vice chairman of UBS’ investment banking business. Given the widespread involvement of UBS in what the Justice Department alleges were systematic efforts to violate US tax laws, it must be asked: Did Gramm as a top executive have no inkling about what was going on?
Perhaps, but for Gramm this has to be a moment that at the very least tests his ideological commitment to the radical deregulation of banking that he championed during his twenty-four years in Congress. He joined UBS soon after the bank acquired Enron, a company that had gone bankrupt after jumping through the “Enron loophole” in the Commodity Futures Modernization Act, which Gramm had pushed though Congress. Gramm’s wife, Wendy, had been an Enron board member and head of its audit committee but failed to sound the alarm before the Houston-based company collapsed. Then UBS itself ran into big trouble because of $37 billion in bad mortgage debt made possible by derivatives market deregulation engineered by then-Sen. Gramm. US taxpayers have had to pony up money to heal UBS’ self-inflicted wound. But the bank’s involvement with tens of thousands of secret accounts tied to allegations of tax evasion raises starker issues–of possible criminal fraud through practices that Gramm as a senator helped keep opaque.
In his last years in the Senate, Gramm succeeded in blocking legislation that, as The New York Times editorialized, would have made it easier “to crack down on offshore tax havens” and “would have expanded rules that require banks to find out more about individuals and foreign jurisdictions they are dealing with.” The Times noted, “The legislation won bipartisan support but was blocked by Senator Gramm of Texas, a foe of government regulation….”
Full Story Here: UBS Money Laundering: What Did Phil Gramm Know? | The Nation.
S&P’s list of AAA Rated Countries, All of Which Have Socialized Health Care
The debt ceiling debacle was reminiscent of the Tea Party political temper tantrums thrown while President Obama attempted to make Health Care reform a law, giving everyone a chance to enjoy the benefits of decent health care and well being.
While right wing politicians demonized socialized health care, some of them have actually benefited from it.
Republicans, Conservatives and Tea Partiers united, saying Socialized Health Care would wreak havoc on our economy. They proceeded to deem President Obama as an evil Socialist trying to turn this country into an evil-Marxist-Maoist-Communist [just fill in the blank] entity, but the following countries have socialized medicine and they have an AAA status with Standard & Poor’s.
Now that the USA no longer has a stellar AAA status, all remaining countries with AAA ratings have socialized medicine.
Full Story Here: FreakOutNation » S&P’s list of AAA Rated Countries, All of Which Have Socialized Health Care.
Nibiru – great arrival of Planet X + Timeline of 2012. cataclysm
“A secret document prepared for Prime Minister Putin by Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs is claiming that President Medvedev confirmed in his extended meeting with Pope Benedict XVI in February 2011 that the new planet named Tyche (pronounced ty-kee) by NASA will be appearing in the Earth’s night sky by 2012. Though the existence of this planet had long been known to the ancients, it has only been in the past year that Western scientists have begun informing their citizens about this unprecedented event soon to occur, but who are, also, still failing to tell how catastrophic its appearance will be. Tyche was the name coined for this ancient celestial body by the two astrophysicists proposing it for “planet” status, Daniel Whitmire and John Matese from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.
From the United States Time Magazine article about this new planet we can further read:
“Tyche is suspected to be four times the mass of Jupiter with an orbit around 15,000 times further from the Sun than Earth’s, and 375 times further than Pluto’s. It will probably be composed mainly of hydrogen and helium, with an atmosphere just like Jupiter’s. Professor Whitmire added that the planet-in-waiting will have its own moons, like other outer planets, and its surface will be covered in colorful spots, bands and clouds.”
More interesting to note, however, about the name Tyche given to this new planet is that it is also the name of the ancient Greek god governing over the destiny of mankind, and who were all long familiar with this nemesis to our Earth as best exampled by the Russian-born American independent scholar Immanuel Velikovsky in his 1945 seminal work titled “Theses for the Reconstruction of Ancient History” wherein he postulated:
Full Story Here: Makeahistory.
Tel Aviv exchange halts trade after 6% fall
Trading on Israel’s Tel Aviv stock exchange was temporarily halted on Sunday after the market fell six percent at the open on news of a US credit rating downgrade, Israeli public radio reported.
Trading opened as normal on Sunday, the first day of Israel’s working week, but mandatory suspensions went into effect minutes into the session as the stock exchange plunged.
The leading TA-100 indice was down 5.73 percent at 988.24 points by the time trading was halted, while the blue-chip TA-25 had fallen 5.42 percent to 1,092.41, according to the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange website.
Full Story Here: Tel Aviv exchange halts trade after 6% fall – FRANCE 24.
Navy veteran and former contractor suing Rumfeld for alleged torture
Navy veteran and former contractor Donald Vance is suing former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld over the torture he alleges he suffered in Iraq when he was held by the U.S. military at Camp Cropper in Baghdad for 97 days.
He says that when he went to Iraq in 2004, he found employees of his company building weapons to sell to Iraqi officials, some of them with ties to Iraqi militants. The FBI asked him to work undercover, but when his cover was blown, the special forces team that rescued him turned out to be working with the same corrupt officials. That was how he wound up in a prison camp undergoing “enhanced interrogation.”
Vance appeared Friday on Countdown with Keith Olbermann. He explained that he is suing Donald Rumsfeld because he believes Rumsfeld would have to have signed off on his torture personally. He has no real idea of how he wound up in the situation where he found himself, but he suggested that the people in the U.S. military who were dealing with corrupt Iraqi officials may have been trying to find out how much he knew about the corruption
Full Story Here: Navy veteran and former contractor suing Rumfeld for alleged torture | Raw Replay.
45,000 Verizon workers strike
Unions representing 45,000 Verizon Communications workers called for a strike as negotiations failed for a new labor contract that expired at midnight on Saturday.
Verizon and the unions — The Communications Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers – had been in talks since late June.
The workers who went on strike on Sunday are technicians and customer support employees in Verizon’s wireline business, which provides Internet and land phone lines to homes and businesses in the U.S. Northeast.
Verizon is looking to keep costs in check at its wireline business, which has been declining for a decade as customers have disconnected their home phones in favor of cellphone and Internet services.
Full Story Here: 45,000 Verizon workers strike | The Raw Story.
Facing Backlash For Disenfranchising Voters, Gov. Walker Reverses Course On Plan To Close Several DMV Offices
In a sharp reversal, the state of Wisconsin announced yesterday it will expand Department of Motor Vehicle (DMV) services to accommodate the increased demand for photo identification in the wake of a controversial new Voter ID law. As ThinkProgress reported last week, after signing a Voter ID law earlier this year that disenfranchises tens of thousands of Wisconsin voters, Gov. Scott Walker (R) then called for closing as many as 16 DMV offices across the state, making it even more difficult for residents to obtain the ID they needed to regain their electoral voice.
Walker’s undemocratic plan prompted widespread criticism and has apparently compelled the administration to completely change its position:
Department of Transportation Secretary Mark Gottlieb said the expansion leaves all current offices open, increases the total number of offices across the state from 88 to 92 and drastically expands the hours of operation for some 40 counties.
The change, expected to cost about $6 million the first year and $4 million every year going forward, was called for by Gov. Scott Walker’s 2011-13 budget and was meant to address an increase in demand for photo IDs in the wake of the state’s new law requiring voters to show ID at the polls.[...]
Full Story Here: Facing Backlash For Disenfranchising Voters, Gov. Walker Reverses Course On Plan To Close Several DMV Offices | ThinkProgress.
Why S&P’s Downgrade is No Joke
The real impact of S&P’s downgrade is political, not economic.
It’s tempting to dismiss Standard & Poor’s downgrade of U.S. long-term Treasury bonds as no big deal in the real world. It’s also tempting to describe it as a broad criticism of the whole political system, a pox-on-both-your-houses curse at the intransigence of both Republicans and Democrats.
Both of those conclusions would be mistakes.
It’s probably true that S&P’s first-ever downgrade of U.S. Treasuries from AAA to AA+ will have little impact on interest rates. Credit ratings, though hugely important, are only one of many factors affecting the cost of borrowing. The more important factors are broad forces of supply and demand for Treasuries, and the outlook for inflation and growth. That’s why Japan has been downgraded three different times in the past decade (it’s currently AA-) yet its long-term rates are lower than those on U.S. Treasuries.
Full Story Here: Why S&P’s Downgrade is No Joke – Edmund L. Andrews – NationalJournal.com.
The Biggest Religious Movement You Never Heard of: Nine Things You Need to Know About Rick Perry’s Prayer Event
Perry’s endorsers are not just a random group of radical evangelists but part of a large and little-understood international religious movement.
When Texas Gov. Rick Perry decided to stage a Texas-size prayer event — dubbed “The Response” — on Aug. 6, it no doubt seemed like the right thing to do at the time. It received little critical scrutiny when he announced it back in early June, except on websites that track these sorts of things. But after Rachel Maddow, drawing on these sites, did a segment highlighting some of the more bizarre statements made by Perry’s high-profile religious endorsers, things cooled considerably — even though the real story is still not remotely well-understood.
“Perry’s endorsers are not just a random group of radical evangelists making outrageous statements,” researcher Rachel Tabachnick subsequently wrote at Alternet.org. “These are the apostles and prophets of the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR), the biggest international religious movement you never heard of.” Almost simultaneously, investigative rePeter Forrest Wilder of the Texas Observer published an extensive article on Perry’s prayer event and his endorsers, “Rick Perry’s Army of God.”
Full Story Here: The Biggest Religious Movement You Never Heard of: Nine Things You Need to Know About Rick Perry’s Prayer Event | Belief | AlterNet.
Stop Sacrificing US Soldiers for Afghan Debacle
The fatal crash late on Friday in the Wardak province was the deadliest yet for US forces after nearly ten years of war in Afghanistan. Let’s tell President Obama that the best way to pay tribute to the soldiers who have died—and to address our financial crisis--is to bring the rest of the troops home.
The 38 deaths in Saturday’s helicopter crash in Afghanistan include 31 Americans, making this the deadliest day for U.S. forces since the war began. The tragic loss of American lives might be worth the sacrifice if it was making America safer, or if our presence was significantly improving the well-being of the Afghan people. But neither of these is true.
Our presence in Afghanistan is not making us safer because Afghanistan is not a threat to us. This was clearly acknowledged by a senior Obama administration official in a background briefing to reporters on June 21.“United States hasn’t seen a terrorist threat from Afghanistan, for the past seven or eight years,” he said. He noted that Al Qaeda had moved on to Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia.
Meanwhile, thanks to President Obama’s surge, over 100,000 U.S. troops are bogged down chasing an indigenous Afghan ragtag army, the Taliban, which has no interest in attacking anyone inside the United States. The only reason they are attacking U.S. soldiers is that U.S. soldiers are occupying their country.
Full Story Here: Stop Sacrificing US Soldiers for Afghan Debacle | Common Dreams.
Why the insurance industry gets climate change
Insurance companies understand risk – which is why, unlike our myopic political class, they do not have their heads in the sand
When it comes to climate change, the US Congress is a hornets’ nest of political dysfunction. Last month, President Barack Obama nominated energy executive John Bryson to lead the commerce department. From the response of congressional Republicans, you might have thought Obama had nominated Ed Abbey and Rachel Carson’s imaginary love child.
In 2009, Bryson had the audacity to support a cap-and-trade system to address climate change and, 40 years earlier, he helped launch the Natural Resource Defence Council. This spurred Darrell Issa (Republican, California) to deride him as a “green evangelist”, while Senator John Barrasso (Republican, Wyoming) called Bryson an “environmental extremist” and Senator James Inhofe (Republican, Oklahoma) pegged him as “a founder of a radical environmental organisation”.
Symptomatic of climate change deniers driving the Beltway discussion, the Washington Post recently relegated global warming to “second-tier issue” status. However, for one powerful sector of the economy – and one that’s a hefty contributor to congressional campaigns – it’s a first-tier issue: the insurance industry.
Full Story Here: Why the insurance industry gets climate change | Jules Boykoff | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk.
Solar Storms Could Debilitate Earth this Decade: NOAA – International Business Times
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, a federal agency that focuses on the condition of the oceans and atmosphere, said that a severe solar storm could cause global chaos, debilitating satellite communications and taking down the most important global power grids.
The NOAA predicted four extreme solar emissions which could threaten the planet this decade. Similarly, NASA warned that a peak in the sun’s magnetic energy cycle and the number of sun spots or flares around 2013 could enable extremely high radiation levels.
Government studies revealed that extreme solar flare emissions could cause blackouts, possibly for years, in large portions of the U.S.
Full Story Here: Solar Storms Could Debilitate Earth this Decade: NOAA – International Business Times.
Is the U.S. Credit Rating a Victim of GOP Sabotage?
The fiscal clown show continues. A few days after Congress and the White House agreed to raise the debt ceiling and cut spending, Standard & Poor’s has downgraded the United States of America’s credit rating from AAA to AA+.
S&P, which covered itself in a substance other than glory during the mortgage crisis, may have a poor record and strange methodology when it comes to sovereign ratings. France, which has a far higher debt per capita ratio than the U.S., still enjoys a AAA rating. And a downgrade, alone, doesn’t mean U.S. interest rates will spike — on Monday or at any time in the future. Japan’s credit rating was downgraded several years ago, when the interest rates its government paid on bonds was already extremely low, and they’ve generally trended lower in the years since.
Market conditions, the trajectory of economic growth and relative value can play as big — if not a bigger — of a role in determining interest rates than a rating.
Full Story Here: Is the U.S. Credit Rating a Victim of GOP Sabotage? | Daniel Gross – Yahoo! Finance.
Massive Solar Flares’ Effects Arriving On Earth
The impact of a series of eruptions on the sun began arriving at Earth on Friday and could affect some communications for a day or so.
Operators of electrical grids are working to avoid outages, but the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says some satellite communications and Global Positioning Systems could face problems.
Three solar flares erupted on the sun starting Tuesday, and the strongest electromagnetic shocks were being felt Friday by the ACE spacecraft, a satellite that measures radiation bursts a few minutes before they strike Earth, said Joseph Kunches, a scientist at NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center in Boulder, Colo.
Full Story Here: Massive Solar Flares’ Effects Arriving On Earth.
Record-high radiation detected at Fukushima
The company that owns Japan’s stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant says it has detected record-high radiation on site.
Almost five months after Japan’s government announced a nuclear emergency, the company which owns the Fukushima nuclear plant, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), says radiation levels have reached at least 10 sieverts per hour near Fukushima’s No. 1 and No. 2 reactors.
The radiation levels are more than double the previous record high that was reached in early June.
One nuclear expert predicts the clean-up from the March 11 earthquake and tsunami will be even more difficult, but there is speculation that the reading could be an aberration.
Peter Burns, former chief executive officer of the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency, says given the scale of the Fukushima emergency, the high reading is to be expected.
Full Story Here: Record-high radiation detected at Fukushima – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation).
Connect to the Internet through a lightbulb
German physicist Harald Haas wants to reach for the stars in terms of data speeds and Internet connectivity. Or, if not the stars, at least the ceiling.
In a TEDTalk, Haas explained technology that would make it possible to send data through LED light bulbs instead of via radio waves. He calls it D-Light, or “data through illumination.”
Watch Haas’ TEDTalk below.
Video at link:
Full Story Here: Connect to the Internet through a lightbulb | Raw Replay.
USPS posts $3.1 billion loss in Q3, warns of default
The U.S. Postal Service posted a net loss of $3.1 billion in its third quarter and warned again it would default on payments to the federal government if Congress did not step in.
Total mail volume for the quarter that ended June 30 fell to 39.8 billion pieces, a 2.6 percent drop from the same period a year earlier, as consumers turn to email and pay bills online.
The mail carrier, which does not get taxpayer funds, has struggled to overhaul its business as mail volumes fall. It has said personnel costs weigh heavily and is facing a massive retiree health benefit prepayment next month.
Full Story Here: USPS posts $3.1 billion loss in Q3, warns of default – Yahoo! News.
Once Upon a Time in the West
This week, the United States nearly allowed itself to succumb to economic disaster. Increasingly, the divided country has more in common with a failed state than a democracy. In the face of America’s apparent political insanity, Europe must learn to take care of itself.
The word “West” used to have a meaning. It described common goals and values, the dignity of democracy and justice over tyranny and despotism. Now it seems to be a thing of the past. There is no longer a West, and those who would like to use the word — along with Europe and the United States in the same sentence — should just hold their breath. By any definition, America is no longer a Western nation.
The US is a country where the system of government has fallen firmly into the hands of the elite. An unruly and aggressive militarism set in motion two costly wars in the past 10 years. Society is not only divided socially and politically — in its ideological blindness the nation is moving even farther away from the core of democracy. It is losing its ability to compromise.
America has changed. It has drifted away from the West.
The country’s social disintegration is breathtaking. Nobel economist Joseph Stiglitz recently described the phenomenon. The richest 1 percent of Americans claim one-quarter of the country’s total income for themselves — 25 years ago that figure was 12 percent. It also possesses 40 percent of total wealth, up from 33 percent 25 years ago. Stiglitz claims that in many countries in the so-called Third World, the income gap between the poor and rich has been reduced. In the United States, it has grown.
Full Story Here: Opinion: Once Upon a Time in the West – SPIEGEL ONLINE – News – International.
Thom Hartmann :- : S&P Blames Republicans, MSM Fails to Report It
Thom Hartmann :- :
Have you seen, anywhere, in any media, or even heard reported or repeated on NPR, the following sentence?
“We have changed our assumption on this because the majority of Republicans in Congress continue to resist any measure that would raise revenues, a position we believe Congress reinforced by passing the act.”
It’s right there on Page 4 of the official Standard & Poor’s “Research Update” — the actual report on what they did and why — published on August 5th as the explanation for why they believe Congress — and even the Gang of Twelve — will be unable to actually deal with the US debt crisis. Perhaps it’s just lazy — the bullet points at the beginning of the report don’t mention the Republicans or taxes, but instead just say, for example (part of one of six quick bullet-points):
“[T]he downgrade reflects our view that the effectiveness, stability, and predictability of American policymaking and political institutions have weakened at a time of ongoing fiscal and economic challenges”
Full Story Here: OpEdNews – Article: S&P Blames Republicans, MSM Fails to Report It.
S&P and the USA
Paul Krugman :-:
OK, so Standard and Poors has gone ahead with the threatened downgrade. It’s a strange situation.
On one hand, there is a case to be made that the madness of the right has made America a fundamentally unsound nation. And yes, it is the madness of the right: if not for the extremism of anti-tax Republicans, we would have no trouble reaching an agreement that would ensure long-run solvency.
On the other hand, it’s hard to think of anyone less qualified to pass judgment on America than the rating agencies. The people who rated subprime-backed securities are now declaring that they are the judges of fiscal policy? Really?
Just to make it perfect, it turns out that S&P got the math wrong by $2 trillion, and after much discussion conceded the point — then went ahead with the downgrade.
Full Story Here: S&P and the USA – NYTimes.com.
The Wrong Worries
Paul Krugman :-:
The economy isn’t recovering, and Washington has been worrying about the wrong things.
In case you had any doubts, Thursday’s more than 500-point plunge in the Dow Jones industrial average and the drop in interest rates to near-record lows confirmed it: The economy isn’t recovering, and Washington has been worrying about the wrong things.
It’s not just that the threat of a double-dip recession has become very real. It’s now impossible to deny the obvious, which is that we are not now and have never been on the road to recovery.
For two years, officials at the Federal Reserve, international organizations and, sad to say, within the Obama administration have insisted that the economy was on the mend. Every setback was attributed to temporary factors — It’s the Greeks! It’s the tsunami! — that would soon fade away. And the focus of policy turned from jobs and growth to the supposedly urgent issue of deficit reduction.
Full Story Here: The Wrong Worries – NYTimes.com.
Time for a U.S. infrastructure bank
President Barack Obama talked at his news conference Monday about creating a national infrastructure bank that could help rebuild and repair America’s roads, bridges and ports and also address our serious unemployment problem. He cited the bank as one crucial way to stimulate the economy.
I would urge the president to move forward on this so we can begin to restore America’s infrastructure and strengthen our economy for the long term.
Even as Congress debates fiscal strategies, our country’s competitors and partners around the globe make massive investments in public infrastructure. Meanwhile, our nation’s roads and bridges, schools and hospitals, airports and railways, ports and dams, waterlines and air-control systems are rapidly and dangerously deteriorating.
We should view infrastructure financing as an investment rather than an expense and should establish a national, capital budget for infrastructure. This idea is not new.
Full Story Here: Opinion: Time for a U.S. infrastructure bank – Felix G. Rohatyn – POLITICO.com.
China Tells U.S. ‘Good Old Days’ of Borrowing Are Over
China bluntly criticised the United States Saturday one day after the superpower’s credit rating was downgraded, saying the “good old days” of borrowing were over.
Standard & Poor’s cut the U.S. long-term credit rating from top-tier AAA by a notch to AA-plus Friday over concerns about the nation’s budget deficits and climbing debt burden.
China — the United States’ biggest creditor — said Washington only had itself to blame for its plight and called for a new stable global reserve currency.
“The U.S. government has to come to terms with the painful fact that the good old days when it could just borrow its way out of messes of its own making are finally gone,” China’s official Xinhua news agency said in a commentary.
After a week which saw $2.5 trillion (1.52 trillion pounds) wiped off global markets, the move deepened investors’ concerns of an impending recession in the United States and over the euro zone crisis.
Full Story Here: China Tells U.S. ‘Good Old Days’ of Borrowing Are Over – NYTimes.com.
Wisconsin Dem State Rep. Kicked Out Of ALEC Conference
Wisconsin Dem State Rep. Kicked Out Of ALEC Conference | Wisconsin State Rep. Mark Pocan (D) was kicked out the American Legislative Exchange Council conference in New Orleans today despite being a a dues-paying member of the organization and receiving an invitation to the event, Wisconsin blog Dane101 reports. “I was still kicked out of the cigar reception by an employee of ALEC. ALEC has become a secret society where they will kick out anyone with a video camera, tape recorder or an original opinion,” he said in a statement. In addition to attending the conference for legislative reasons, Pocan was covering the event for a progressive publication, but ALEC was not allowing many reporters, including ThinkProgress’ Lee Fang and Scott Keyes, who were violently removed from the conference yesterday.
Full Story Here: Wisconsin Dem State Rep. Kicked Out Of ALEC Conference | ThinkProgress.
Rick Perry Pushes ALEC-Backed Education Policies To Turn Texas Universities Into Businesses
Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R), a potential presidential candidate, has been quietly pushing initiatives that would transform the state’s public university system into a business-style model driven by “efficiency and profitability,” The Washington Post reported today. The reforms Perry is seeking to implement are favored by one of his top campaign donors and the conservative Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF), an affiliate of the American Legislative Exchange Council.
ALEC is a conservative public policy organization that often drafts model legislation for use in state legislatures across the country, and Republicans in several states have used its model legislation directly.
Perry’s push to turn the university system into profit-driven business centers began in 2008 with a higher-education summit led by oilman Jeff Sandefer — a long-time Perry family friend, a consistent top contributor to his campaigns and a TPPF board member. The proposals, based on “Seven Breakthrough Solutions” offered by TPPF, including measuring professors as “profit or loss centers,” separating research and teachers budgets to avoid wasting time on “esoteric, unproductive research” and basing professor pay, in part, on anonymous student evaluations. Perry’s alma mater, in fact, has already begun implementing some of these policies, the Post reports:
Full Story Here: Rick Perry Pushes ALEC-Backed Education Policies To Turn Texas Universities Into Businesses | ThinkProgress.
Town Hall Attendee Tells GOP Rep. Joe Walsh: ‘Let’s Tax The Rich’
At a Thursday town hall meeting in Wauconda, Illinois, Tea Party Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) railed against defense cuts and entitlement programs, telling attendees that Americans refuse to have a discussion about how best to rein in the nation’s deficit and debt. But when Walsh asked how Americans planned to pay for those programs, he was caught off guard by a quick answer from one of the event’s attendees:
WALSH: This country, for years, has put off the discussion, how are we going to pay for that? Let’s have the discussion!
MAN: Let’s tax the rich.
WALSH: Let’s tax the rich, they say! (Applause) All I’m saying is —
MAN: We used to!
WALSH: Don’t know where you’re going to get the money.
Watch it, courtesy of Americans United for Change:
Full Story Here: Town Hall Attendee Tells GOP Rep. Joe Walsh: ‘Let’s Tax The Rich’ | ThinkProgress.
15 Food Companies That Serve You ‘Wood’
Are you getting what you pay for on your plate?
The recent class-action lawsuit brought against Taco Bell raised questions about the quality of food many Americans eat each day.
Chief among those concerns is the use of cellulose (read: wood pulp), an extender whose use in a roster of food products, from crackers and ice creams to puddings and baked goods, is now being exposed. What you’re actually paying for — and consuming — may be surprising.
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Cellulose is virgin wood pulp that has been processed and manufactured to different lengths for functionality, though use of it and its variant forms (cellulose gum, powdered cellulose, microcrystalline cellulose, etc.) is deemed safe for human consumption, according to the FDA, which regulates most food industry products. The government agency sets no limit on the amount of cellulose that can be used in food products meant for human consumption. The USDA, which regulates meats, has set a limit of 3.5% on the use of cellulose, since fiber in meat products cannot be recognized nutritionally.
Full Story Here: 15 Food Companies That Serve You ‘Wood’ – TheStreet.
S & P Downgrades U.S. Credit For First Time In History, Repeatedly Cites GOP Intransigence On Taxes
Reuters reports: “The United States lost its top-notch AAA credit rating from Standard & Poor’s on Friday, in a dramatic reversal of fortune for the world’s largest economy.” The new rating is AA+.
In explaining their decision Standard & Poors cites both the decision by Republicans in Congress to turn the debt ceiling into a political football and the Republicans intransigence on tax increases. Some excerpts from the release:
[...]The political brinksmanship of recent months highlights what we see as America’s governance and policymaking becoming less stable, less effective, and less predictable than what we previously believed. The statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default have become political bargaining chips in the debate over fiscal policy.
[...]It appears that for now, new revenues have dropped down on the menu of policy options.
[...]The act contains no measures to raise taxes or otherwise enhance revenues, though the committee could recommend them.
Full Story Here: BREAKING: S & P Downgrades U.S. Credit For First Time In History, Repeatedly Cites GOP Intransigence On Taxes | ThinkProgress.
Delayed Katrina Justice
With all the hate going around, individual examples fade from memory, but let us revisit the time when Crawford Caligula was fiddling, New Orleans was drowning, and Brownie was doing a “heck of a job.” If you remember, police murdered two unarmed black citizens on the Danziger Bridge. Friday, the beginning of justice arrived, long overdue after almost six years.
A jury convicted New Orleans police officers of violating the civil rights of two people killed a week after Hurricane Katrina devastated the city in 2005. A fifth was found guilty of a later cover-up, along with the other four.
Jurors deliberated three days to convict the officers of all 25 counts they were accused of. They are to be sentenced Dec. 14 by U.S. District Judge Kurt D. Engelhardt in New Orleans. The four who fired shots at the bridge are in custody. The fifth, a detective, is free on bail.
The civil rights violations caused the deaths of James Brissette, 17, and Ronald Madison, 40, the jury found separately, meaning the maximum punishment for the four officers directly involved is life in prison.
Full Story Here: Delayed Katrina Justice » Politics Plus.
Michael Moore: :30 Years Ago Today: The Day the Middle Class Died
Michael Moore
From time to time, someone under 30 will ask me, “When did this all begin, America’s downward slide?” They say they’ve heard of a time when working people could raise a family and send the kids to college on just one parent’s income (and that college in states like California and New York was almost free). That anyone who wanted a decent paying job could get one. That people only worked five days a week, eight hours a day, got the whole weekend off and had a paid vacation every summer. That many jobs were union jobs, from baggers at the grocery store to the guy painting your house, and this meant that no matter how “lowly” your job was you had guarantees of a pension, occasional raises, health insurance and someone to stick up for you if you were unfairly treated.
Young people have heard of this mythical time — but it was no myth, it was real. And when they ask, “When did this all end?”, I say, “It ended on this day: August 5th, 1981.”
Beginning on this date, 30 years ago, Big Business and the Right Wing decided to “go for it” — to see if they could actually destroy the middle class so that they could become richer themselves.
And they’ve succeeded.
On August 5, 1981, President Ronald Reagan fired every member of the air traffic controllers union (PATCO) who’d defied his order to return to work and declared their union illegal. They had been on strike for just two days.
Full Story Here: 30 Years Ago Today: The Day the Middle Class Died | MichaelMoore.com.
Where Have All The Liberals Gone? (Long Time Passing)
“If there is no struggle there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation…want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters…. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.” Frederick Douglass
Has “American character” turned into an oxymoron?
There are two of my comments I am transitioning into a post right now in a quest for any OS thoughts on the moral (or, in my opinion, the primarily amoral) state of America and, the really hard part, what are we going to do about it.
The first comment I made at Jonathan Wolfman’s latest post, “The Moral Core of the Current Debate” and the second one (two parts) I made in response to a comment by skypixieo on my latest post, ”War Criminal Named Obama Smells Sweeter Than One Named Bush?” I hope skypixieo does not mind my re-posting his very profound and motivating comment to me here, also.
Here is my first comment to Jonathan Wolfman which was also a continuation of my thoughts stirred on by skypixieo:
Full Story Here: Where Have All The Liberals Gone? (Long Time Passing) – libbyliberalnyc – Open Salon.
Noam Chomsky: America in Decline
Noam Chomsky:-:
“It is a common theme” that the United States, which “only a few years ago was hailed to stride the world as a colossus with unparalleled power and unmatched appeal is in decline, ominously facing the prospect of its final decay,” Giacomo Chiozza writes in the current Political Science Quarterly.
The theme is indeed widely believed. And with some reason, though a number of qualifications are in order. To start with, the decline has proceeded since the high point of U.S. power after World War II, and the remarkable triumphalism of the post-Gulf War ’90s was mostly self-delusion.
Another common theme, at least among those who are not willfully blind, is that American decline is in no small measure self-inflicted. The comic opera in Washington this summer, which disgusts the country and bewilders the world, may have no analogue in the annals of parliamentary democracy
Full Story Here: America in Decline | Truthout.
The comic opera in Washington this summer, which disgusts the country and bewilders the world, may have no analogue in the annals of parliamentary democracy.<br>
Next ‘Giant Sucking Sound’: U.S. Senate Leaders Reach Accord on Three New ‘Free Trade’ Agreements
Earlier today, Brad Friedman reported that, despite high unemployment and food stamp usage at an all-time record high, U.S. corporations were experiencing record profits.
Simultaneously, Los Angeles Times reported that Senate leaders have reached an accord to pass three more NAFTA-like “free trade” agreements (Panama, Colombia, and South Korea) when Congress returns from its August recess. The Times stated: “Proponents [e.g., the U.S. Chamber of Commerce] say the trade agreements…will pump as much as $14 billion into the U.S. economy and add more than 250,000 jobs.”
The reality was better captured by Ross Perot during a 1992 Presidential Debate when he warned (video reminder below) that NAFTA would produce “a giant sucking sound of jobs headed South”…
Full Story Here: The BRAD BLOG : Next ‘Giant Sucking Sound’: U.S. Senate Leaders Reach Accord on Three New ‘Free Trade’ Agreements.
FBI widens News Corp inquiry after alleged computer hacking by subsidiary
US authorities reportedly looking into ‘larger pattern of behaviour’ by Murdoch companies following claims of strong-arm tactics
The FBI is widening its investigation of News Corporation’s activities within the US to look at whether alleged computer hacking by one of its subsidiaries was an isolated case or part of a “larger pattern of behaviour”, Time magazine is reporting.
Time suggests that the FBI inquiry has been extended from a relatively narrow look at alleged malpractices by News Corp in America into a more general investigation of whether the company used possibly illegal strong-arm tactics to browbeat rival firms.
The allegation of computer hacking was made by the retail advertising company Floorgraphics against the advertising branch of News Corp, News America. In a civil lawsuit against News Corp in 2004, Floorgraphics told a court that its website, protected by password security, had been breached 11 times over four months without authorisation.
Full Story Here: FBI widens News Corp inquiry after alleged computer hacking by subsidiary | Media | The Guardian.
Why Unions Matter: The Numbers
A few months ago I wrote a piece for the magazine arguing that the decline in unionization over the past three decades has been a key factor of the decline of the American left over the same period. But it’s a hard case to prove because there are so many moving parts to it. So I was intrigued earlier this week when my colleague Josh Harkinson linked to a new study that attempts to quantify the effects of unionization on income inequality using a rigorous regression analysis of census data.
The study comes from Bruce Western and Jake Rosenfeld and was published this month in the American Sociological Review. The authors use a model that accounts for both individual membership in unions as well as overall unionization rates in specific industries and regions. It also controls for education, age, race, ethnicity, and gender, which allows them to estimate the effect of unionization both between groups (e.g., the evolution of income inequality between high school dropouts and high school grads) and within groups (e.g., the evolution of income inequality within the entire subset of high school grads).
Once their model was in place, Western and Rosenfeld could manipulate their variables to estimate what income inequality would look like if union density had remained at its 1973 level. So what did they find? Answer: Among men, if you account only for the effect of individual membership in unions, it would be about a fifth lower, which agrees pretty well with previous estimates. But if you also account for the effect of unions on surrounding nonunion employers (who often raised wages to compete with union employers and to avert the threat of unionization in their own workplace), the effect is larger: Unionization at 1973 levels would decrease income inequality by a full third. You can see this in the chart below. For intragroup differences (which account for nearly the entire effect of unionization) the top line shows the actual rise of income inequality since 1973, while the red line is a prediction of what it would look like if union density were still at 1973 levels:
Full Story Here: Why Unions Matter: The Numbers | Mother Jones.
Does an Old EPA Fracking Study Provide Proof of Contamination?
This post has been updated with the industry’s response.
For years the drilling industry has steadfastly insisted that there has never been a proven case in which fracking has led to contamination of drinking water.
Now Environmental Working Group, an advocacy organization engaged in the debate over the safety of fracking, has unearthed a 24-year-old case study by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that unequivocally says such contamination has occurred. The New York Times reported on EWG’s year-long research effort and the EPA’s paper Wednesday.
The 1987 EPA report, which describes a dark, mysterious gel found in a water well in Jackson County, W.Va., states that gels were also used to hydraulically fracture a nearby natural gas well and that “the residual fracturing fluid migrated into (the resident’s) water well.”
Full Story Here: The Washington Current: Does an Old EPA Fracking Study Provide Proof of Contamination?.
S&P downgrades U.S. credit rating
Credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s on Friday downgraded the credit rating of the United States, stripping the world’s largest economy of its prized AAA status.
In July, S&P placed the United States’ rating on “CreditWatch with negative implications” as the debt ceiling debate devolved into partisan bickering.
To avoid a downgrade, S&P said the United States needed to not only raise the debt ceiling, but also develop a “credible” plan to tackle the nation’s long-term debt.
In its report Friday, S&P ruled that the U.S. fell short: “The downgrade reflects our opinion that the … plan that Congress and the Administration recently agreed to falls short of what, in our view, would be necessary to stabilize the government’s medium-term debt dynamics.”
Full Story Here: S&P downgrades U.S. credit rating – Aug. 5, 2011.
A Secret War in 120 Countries: The Pentagon’s New Power Elite
Somewhere on this planet an American commando is carrying out a mission. Now, say that 70 times and you’re done… for the day. Without the knowledge of the American public, a secret force within the U.S. military is undertaking operations in a majority of the world’s countries. This new Pentagon power elite is waging a global war whose size and scope has never been revealed, until now.
After a U.S. Navy SEAL put a bullet in Osama bin Laden’s chest and another in his head, one of the most secretive black-ops units in the American military suddenly found its mission in the public spotlight. It was atypical. While it’s well known that U.S. Special Operations forces are deployed in the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq, and it’s increasingly apparent that such units operate in murkier conflict zones like Yemen and Somalia, the full extent of their worldwide war has remained deeply in the shadows.
Last year, Karen DeYoung and Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post reported that U.S. Special Operations forces were deployed in 75 countries, up from 60 at the end of the Bush presidency. By the end of this year, U.S. Special Operations Command spokesman Colonel Tim Nye told me, that number will likely reach 120. “We do a lot of traveling — a lot more than Afghanistan or Iraq,” he said recently. This global presence — in about 60% of the world’s nationsand far larger than previously acknowledged — provides striking new evidence of a rising clandestine Pentagon power elite waging a secret war in all corners of the world.
Full Story Here: A Secret War in 120 Countries: The Pentagon’s New Power Elite | Common Dreams.
Big Food Recalls Once Again Reveal the Hidden Costs of our Big Food System
Back in March, we tried to imagine through a short video what it would be like if the President got a wake-up call about his proposed food safety budget cuts and how they might affect one his favorite meals: a hamburger. On second thought, make that a turkey burger. Cargill Value Added Meats Retail, a subsidiary of Cargill Meat Solutions Corporation, just recalled 36 MILLION POUNDS of ground turkey products because of possible Salmonella contamination. This is exactly why it’s not a good idea to cut critical food and safety protections from the federal budget.
Cargill, the third largest turkey processor in the United States, is recalling the turkey products because of a strain of bacteria called Salmonella Heidelberg, which has sickened 76 consumers and caused one death. The fact that Salmonella Heidelberg is antibiotic-resistant certainly reinforces the need for ending the overuse of antibiotics in livestock production.
Tracing the contamination back to its source — no easy task when you’re talking about 36 million pounds of processed food distributed to 26 states — has been the task of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in conjunction with USDA and state health agencies. In case you’re wondering how long it takes to figure out where food contamination originated, in this case it took five months since the first reported case of food illness was reported until they linked the public health threat to Cargill’s ground turkey.
Full Story Here: Big Food Recalls Once Again Reveal the Hidden Costs of our Big Food System | Food & Water Watch.
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Double-Dip Recession May Be Returning
Double dip may be back.
It has been three decades since the United States suffered a recession that followed on the heels of the previous one. But it could be happening again. The unrelenting negative economic news of the past two weeks has painted a picture of a United States economy that fell further and recovered less than we had thought.
When what may eventually be known as Great Recession I hit the country, there was general political agreement that it was incumbent on the government to fight back by stimulating the economy. It did, and the recession ended.
But Great Recession II, if that is what we are entering, has provoked a completely different response. Now the politicians are squabbling over how much to cut spending. After months of wrangling, they passed a bill aimed at forcing more reductions in spending over the next decade.
Full Story Here: Double-Dip Recession May Be Returning – NYTimes.com.
Obama’s anti-jobs agenda
-
David Sirota – :-
The president’s proposed tax cuts and trade deals will leave even more Americans out of work
For months, polls have reported that reducing unemployment is Americans’ top political priority — and certainly a much bigger priority than reducing the deficit. This makes economic sense because of the connection between the two issues. As any Economics 101 course shows, creating new jobs is one of the best ways to reduce a nation’s long-term deficits, because creating jobs generates tax revenues and grows an overall economy, thus shrinking debt both in real terms and as a percentage of GDP.
Somehow, though, Americans’ top priority is Washington’s lowest. That’s not what you hear, of course. On Tuesday, President Obama insisted to great fanfare that he’s completely focused on creating new jobs. But a look past the spin and to actions shows that the rhetoric is the typical up-is-down Orwellian nonsense that has come to define the Obama era. What we are in fact witnessing is the final epic inverse of the New Deal and Great Society, as Washington openly declares war on American jobs.
Full Story Here: Obama’s anti-jobs agenda – David Sirota – Salon.com.
Rupert Murdoch’s American Scandals
All the corruption exposed in England – hacking, political payoffs, dirty cops, hush-money settlements – is also happening here
Rupert Murdoch would like you to believe that the voicemail-hacking scandal at the News of the World “went against everything that I stand for.” In his recent testimony before Parliament, the 80-year-old billionaire insisted that the criminal wrongdoing at the London tabloid betrayed the 53,000 “ethical and distinguished professionals” he commands from the pinnacle of News Corp. — the world’s second-largest media empire. Besides, he claimed, the scandal at the News of the World involved “a tiny part of our business,” which he helpfully quantified as “less than one percent of our company.”
At first glance, the systemic campaign of bribery and wiretapping at the News of the World certainly does seem extraordinary. Reporters and editors at what was the largest-circulation Sunday paper in the English-speaking world stand accused of bribing police, hacking the private voicemails of everyone from the royal family to the parents of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, and paying more than $2 million in gag settlements to victims — allegedly with the full knowledge of Murdoch’s son and heir apparent, James.
But the corruption exposed at the News of the World is not the work of a “rogue” element within News Corp. — it’s a reflection of the lawless culture that defines the company. As CEO, Murdoch not only tolerates employees and executives who push the boundaries of legality and good taste, he celebrates them — at least until the cops show up. “There’s a broader culture within the company,” Col Allan, editor of Murdoch’s New York Post, crowed in 2007. “We like being pirates.” Whatever veneer of integrity News Corp. may have accrued after its purchase of The Wall Street Journal the very same year masks an ingrained corporate ethos that believes integrity is for suckers. The attitude passed down from the top, says one veteran of Murdoch’s tabloids, is aggressive and straightforward:
Full Story Here: Rupert Murdoch’s American Scandals | Rolling Stone Politics.
Our Commando War in 120 Countries: Uncovering the Military’s Secret Operations In the Obama Era
Somewhere on this planet an American commando is carrying out a mission. Now, say that 70 times and you’re done… for the day. Without the knowledge of the American public, a secret force within the U.S. military is undertaking operations in a majority of the world’s countries. This new Pentagon power elite is waging a global war whose size and scope has never been revealed, until now.
After a U.S. Navy SEAL put a bullet in Osama bin Laden’s chest and another in his head, one of the most secretive black-ops units in the American military suddenly found its mission in the public spotlight. It was atypical. While it’s well known that U.S. Special Operations forces are deployed in the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq, and it’s increasingly apparent that such units operate in murkier conflict zones like Yemen and Somalia, the full extent of their worldwide war has remained deeply in the shadows.
Full Story Here: Our Commando War in 120 Countries: Uncovering the Military’s Secret Operations In the Obama Era | | AlterNet.
Disastrous Developments Still Coming from NAFTA
Many years after we were supposed to reap the alleged benefits of the North American Free Trade Agreement, it continues to threaten American jobs. Since it went into effect in 1994, NAFTA has been a job-destroying machine in the United States, and it shows no signs of relenting. This misguided agreement must be reversed or amended if the United States is ever to regain its economic prowess.
Prior to the enactment of NAFTA, the United States had a trade surplus with Mexico. After NAFTA was put into effect, that surplus became a trade deficit, destroying scores of American jobs. According to the Economic Policy Institute, the U.S. trade deficit with Mexico alone had displaced 682,900 U.S. jobs as of 2010. This figure will most likely continue to increase with the enactment of an additional provision of the trade agreement.
Full Story Here: Disastrous Developments Still Coming from NAFTA | Economy In Crisis.
Money Still Owed In Federal Bailout: $1.5 Trillion Still Owed to Treasury, Federal Reserve
A new study released today by the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) shows that, despite rosy statements about the bailout’s impending successful conclusion from federal government officials, $1.5 trillion of the $4.8 trillion in federal bailout funds are still outstanding.
The analysis, presented in charts and an online table and program profiles, is based entirely on government records. This comprehensive assessment of the bailout goes beyond the relatively small Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) program to look at the rest of the Treasury and Federal Reserve’s multi-trillion dollar response to the financial crisis. It shows that while the TARP bailout of Wall Street (not including the bailout of the auto industry) amounted to $330 billion, the government also quietly spent $4.4 trillion more in efforts to stave off the collapse of the financial and mortgage lending sectors. The majority of these funds ($3.9 trillion) came from the Federal Reserve, which undertook the actions citing an obscure section of its charter.
Full Story Here: Money Still Owed In Federal Bailout: $1.5 Trillion Still Owed to Treasury, Federal Reserve | Common Dreams.
CBO Report Finds Dept. of Energy Undercharging Energy Companies for Nuclear Loan Guarantees
A new report released today from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) shows that the Department of Energy is dramatically undercharging energy companies for federal loan guarantees to build new nuclear reactors. The report, requested by Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) last year as Chairman of the domestic policy panel of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, shows that the model used by the Department of Energy underestimates the risk of default of nuclear loans and undercharges energy companies for their guarantees.
Congressman Elijah Cummings (D-MD), Ranking Member of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) today requested a meeting with Department of Energy Secretary Steven Chu to discuss the CBO report and to discuss how to protect taxpayers from the cost of nuclear reaction loan defaults.
“[I] in light of CBO’s findings, the continued use of this current model to establish credit subsidy fees for nuclear reactor construction projects could expose taxpayers to the risk of billion dollar bailouts,” write Kucinich and Cummings.
Full Story Here: CBO Report Finds Dept. of Energy Undercharging Energy Companies for Nuclear Loan Guarantees | Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich.
Arctic sea ice hits record low for July: satellite data
Sea ice coverage remained below normal everywhere except the East Greenland Sea
Arctic sea ice extent in July 2011 broke its previous record low set for that month in 2007, the National Snow and Ice Data Center said today.
Arctic ice cover reached the lowest level for July recorded by satellites from 1979 to 2011.
Average ice extent for this past July was 7.92 million square kilometres. That’s 210,000 km below the previous record low for the month, set in July 2007, reported the NSIDC’s Colorado-based scientists on Aug. 3.
Full Story Here: NunatsiaqOnline 2011-08-03: NEWS: Arctic sea ice hits record low for July: satellite data.
Oxygen In Space? ‘Breathable’ Oxygen Molecules Found By Herschel Telescope
Scientists are saying that for the first time, they’ve found proof of the oxygen molecule in space.
This new find, some 230 years since the discovery of oxygen gas, marks the first time the life-giving molecule has ever been found in deep space, according to NASA. For decades, researchers have used balloons, as well as grounded and space-based telescopes, to try and spot the elusive molecule in space.
From NASA:
Individual atoms of oxygen are common in space, particularly around massive stars. But molecular oxygen, which makes up about 20 percent of the air we breathe, has eluded astronomers until now.
Full Story Here: Oxygen In Space? ‘Breathable’ Oxygen Molecules Found By Herschel Telescope.
Earth’s 2 Moons? It’s Not Lunacy, But New Theory
In a spectacle that might have beguiled poets, lovers and songwriters if only they had been around to see it, Earth once had two moons, astronomers now think. But the smaller one smashed into the other in what is being called the “big splat.”
The result: Our planet was left with a single bulked-up and ever-so-slightly lopsided moon.
The astronomers came up with the scenario to explain why the moon’s far side is so much more hilly than the one that is always facing Earth.
The theory, outlined Wednesday in the journal Nature, comes complete with computer model runs showing how it might have happened and an illustration that looks like the bigger moon getting a pie in the face.
Outside experts said the idea makes sense, but they aren’t completely sold yet.
Full Story Here: Earth’s 2 Moons? It’s Not Lunacy, But New Theory.
United States’ AAA credit rating still under threat
The United States could still faces an unprecedented downgrade of its triple-A credit rating, despite the government’s last minute moves to avoid defaulting on its debt Tuesday.
But even if powerful raters Standard & Poor’s, Moody’s and Fitch decide that Washington’s growing deficit and debt are too big to merit their top grade, markets might not pay much attention.
As expected, Moody’s and Fitch both reaffirmed their AAA rating of US debt shortly after President Barack Obama signed Tuesday the bill that raised the country’s borrowing ceiling — without which the Treasury would have had to begin sharp spending cuts, and possibly default on debt payments.
But both warned they were still studying the legislation’s deficit-cutting measures to see if they were adequate.
Full Story Here: United States’ AAA credit rating still under threat | The Raw Story.
Romney Advisor Robert Bork: Civil Rights Act Is ‘Unsurpassed Ugliness,’ But Contraception And Porn Bans Are Fine
Yesterday, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R) announced his presidential campaign’s “Justice Advisory Committee,” along with its co-chair Robert Bork.
The Senate rejected Bork’s 1987 Supreme Court nomination in a bipartisan 58-42 vote, but Bork has since emerged as the slain martyr at the center of the conservative legal movement’s creation myth. In this sense, Bork’s involvement is a coup for a campaign that is struggling to prove Romney’s hard right credentials in the face of his decision to ensure that all people in his state enjoy access to affordable health care.
For the majority of Americans who are uninterested in hard right governance, however, Bork’s record raises very serious questions about whether someone who would take legal advice from him has any business appointing judges and Supreme Court Justices:
Full Story Here: Romney Advisor Robert Bork: Civil Rights Act Is ‘Unsurpassed Ugliness,’ But Contraception And Porn Bans Are Fine | ThinkProgress.
Obama Nominates Top Advisor To Tea Party Senator As U.S. Attorney
President Obama nominated a very odd candidate to be the next U.S. Attorney in Utah, the chief legal advisor to the Senate’s most radical tenther, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT):
President Barack Obama tapped Sen. Mike Lee’s legal counsel to be the next U.S. attorney for Utah, a move that infuriated Democrats from the state and ended a lengthy political drama over who would claim the high-profile position.
The White House on Tuesday announced the nomination of David Barlow. He will need to win Senate confirmation before he can claim the spot as Utah’s top federal prosecutor, a job that has remained vacant since the end of 2009.
As ThinkProgress explained after news broke that Barlow was being vetted for this job, Barlow’s close association with Lee raises very serious questions about whether he can be trusted to enforce laws intended to protect ordinary Americans ability to earn a living, be safe from natural disasters and enjoy a secure retirement. Before the Senate even considers confirming Barlow to be the top federal attorney in Utah, Barlow should be required to answer a number of difficult questions about whether he shares any of Lee’s most indefensible positions on the Constitution:
Full Story Here: Obama Nominates Top Advisor To Tea Party Senator As U.S. Attorney | ThinkProgress.
Eric Cantor Defends Airlines Pocketing Taxes During FAA Shutdown: ‘That’s What Business Does’
The FAA shut down over House Republicans’ insistence on including anti-union provisions in the agency’s re-authorization bill and the airlines are poised to collect $1.3 billion or more of extra profits in forgone taxes. With the FAA unable to collect the $28.6 million a day in aviation taxes it usually takes in, some of the nation’s largest airlines, including United and Delta, are pocketing the windfall, instead of passing their savings onto customers.
Appearing on Fox News this afternoon, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) defend this practice, saying, “That’s what business does”:
CANTOR: And what airlines have done is have stepped in and said, well, if we’re not going to pay that money to the federal government, we’re going to keep it towards our own bottom line. And I guess that’s what business does.
Full Story Here: Eric Cantor Defends Airlines Pocketing Taxes During FAA Shutdown: ‘That’s What Business Does’ | ThinkProgress.
O’Reilly Blames Women’s Health Care ‘Breast Feeding Stuff’ For High Unemployment
Fox host Bill O’Reilly has worked himself into a lather over the Obama administration’s recent decision to require new health insurance plans to cover birth control without co-pays. Last week he declared that women don’t deserve government subsidized birth control because they’re too “blasted out of their minds” during sex to use it. Yesterday during an interview with Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), O’Reilly went a step further in his tirade against women’s health care and said it was the reason businesses aren’t hiring:
O’REILLY: Now the federal government is ordering the health insurance companies to pay for all breast feeding stuff, all female birth control stuff, all preventative measures for doctors for ladies that go in. What do you think that’s gonna do? That’s going to inhibit hiring even more!
KUCINICH: Frankly, we ought to be very concerned about women’s health care.
Full Story Here: O’Reilly Blames Women’s Health Care ‘Breast Feeding Stuff’ For High Unemployment | ThinkProgress.
Iowa’s GOP Governor Vetoes Tax Break For The Poor Because It Didn’t Lower Corporate Taxes
Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad (R) has a curious justification for vetoing a tax break last week for 240,000 Iowa families making $45,000 or less a year: the plan didn’t also include a tax break for corporations. Members of both parties in the Iowa House and Senate agreed to increase the state’s Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), which reduces the amount of income taxes lower-income families owe:
The change would have saved Iowa families an estimated $28.5 million in taxes over two years.
Branstad vetoed that part of the bill writing that it is his desire to approach tax policy in a more comprehensive and holistic manner. [...]
Branstad additionally campaigned last year to slash Iowa’s corporate income tax rate by 50 percent, which he said would attract businesses while costing the state about $200 million a year in lost revenue. That proposal also failed.
Full Story Here: Iowa’s GOP Governor Vetoes Tax Break For The Poor Because It Didn’t Lower Corporate Taxes | ThinkProgress.
Assange speaks about ‘burning mass media to the ground’
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange spoke to a forum at the Splendour in the Grass music festival in Queensland Friday, saying that the current generation was “burning the mass media to the ground.”
“We are becoming the agents of perspective,” he said. “This generation is burning the mass media to the ground.”
Assange continued: “We are reclaiming our rights to world history. We are ripping open secret archives from Washington to Cairo. We don’t know yet exactly where we are. But we can see where we are going. The change in perspective that has happened over the last year is what this generation is going to use to find our lighthouse.”
“And when we get there, we’ll turn the fucking spotlight on.”
Watch this video, uploaded to YouTube July 28, 2011.
Full Story Here: Assange speaks about ‘burning mass media to the ground’ | Raw Replay.
American allowed to sue Rumsfeld over torture
A US judge has ruled that former Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld can be sued personally for damages by a former military contractor who says he was tortured during a nine-month imprisonment in Iraq.
The lawsuit lays out a dramatic tale of the disappearance of the then-civilian contractor, an Army veteran in his 50s whose identity is being withheld from court filings for fear of retaliation.
Attorneys for the man, who speaks five languages and worked as a translator for Marines collecting intelligence in Iraq, say he was preparing to come home to the United States on annual leave when he was abducted by the US military and held without justification while his family knew nothing about his whereabouts or even whether he was still alive.
The government says he was suspected of helping pass classified information to the enemy and helping anti-coalition forces get into Iraq. But he was never charged with a crime, and he says he never broke the law and was risking his life to help his country.
Full Story Here: American allowed to sue Rumsfeld over torture | Stuff.co.nz.
The wilful ignorance that has dragged the US to the brink
The Tea Party version of the American Revolution is not just fundamentalist. It is also Disneyfied, sentimentalised, and whitewashed
Here’s a monumental historical irony: a moment in the origins of the United States that every American schoolchild learns to view with pride, the Boston Tea Party, has now become a symbol of our (inter)national shame. In one sense, it is difficult to know what to say in response to the utter irrationality of the Tea Party’s self-destructive decision to sabotage the American political process – and thus its own country’s economy, and the global economy.
Last week, while the US government was locked in stalemate and risked defaulting on its national debt for the first time in its history (and thus also defying the Constitution that Tea Partiers supposedly hold sacred, which declares in the 14th Amendment that it is illegal for Congress to default), Michele Bachmann instructed her followers not to listen to those who attempted to “scare” them with untruths that the US would default if it didn’t raise the debt ceiling. When, of course, that is precisely what it would have done. But the Tea Party has never let facts get in the way of its belief system, and now that belief system is genuinely threatening the wellbeing of the nation they claim to love.
Full Story Here: Sarah Churchwell: The wilful ignorance that has dragged the US to the brink – Commentators, Opinion – The Independent.
The Provocation: Kingdom of God on Earth? Some Want a U.S. Theocracy
THE NEWS: Dominionist Christians are working to turn the United States into a theocracy. These are the same people who continually spout off about America being a “Christian nation” founded by men and women who shared their warped fundamentalist view of the world. Their latest target: video games.
According to Os Hillman, an author and key figure in the movement, “Culture is most defined by arts and entertainment because this is where people’s values can be shaped and games can play a major role in reinforcing Christian values.”
THE PROVOCATION: Never heard of the dominionists? They don’t necessarily go around calling themselves that. They prefer to advertise themselves as Christians who are devoted to the teachings of Jesus. Or they’ll say they’re born again. But there’s more to them than just that: They have designs on turning the United States into one nation under their god, indivisible by such petty inconveniences as diversity and freedom of religion.
Full Story Here: The Provocation: Kingdom of God on Earth? Some Want a U.S. Theocracy.
Food Stamp Use Surges By Most In Years As Alabama Foodstamp Recipients Double In May
It appears that GDP data revisions are not the only thing that the administration enjoys fudging with in order to make the Chinese ministry of Truth seem like a real ministry of truth. After last month the data for April food stamp recipients indicated the we may, just may, be reaching an inflection point in the foodstamp participation following a mere 60 thousand jump in those receiving Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), today’s just released data confirmed that the BLS and BEA may have had a hand or two when determining this latest data series. Because the just announced jump in foodstamp usage of over 1.1 million is entirely out of the blue, and as the chart below shows, is the highest single monthly jump in Foodstamp participation since mid 2009, when eligibility requirements were adjusted. Yes, that’s 45.8 million people (obviously an all time record) living on foodstamps which amount to the whopping $133.80 per person (an increase of $0.54 M/M) and $283.65 (an increase of $1.29) per household. Obviously, annualizing the latest monthly rate of 1.1 million people, it means that over 13 million Americans will live on about one third what the cheapest iPad costs in about a year.
Full Story Here: Food Stamp Use Surges By Most In Years As Alabama Foodstamp Recipients Double In May | ZeroHedge.
Extortion Politics: Koch Brothers Operative Confirms That Tea Party in Congress Is Not There to Negotiate
Like you, I’m sick to death of the debt ceiling crisis, but before we move on, there was one moment in the debate in the media that requires attention. On MSNBC’s “Hardball” Monday, Matt Kibbe, a longtime Republican Party operative who is the president of Freedomworks, the Koch brothers-funded tea party astroturf group, confirmed to Chris Matthews that members of the tea party in Congress are not there to negotiate — in other words, to govern. They are not there, he says, “to cut deals,” which means, by default, they are there to use the politics of extortion to impose their will on the American people. Where is that in the Constitution?
Transcript, starting around minute 5:00:
MATTHEWS: This is the problem with your argument. You have an ideology behind you which makes sense. But the trouble with it, when it comes down to running the United States government, you guys don’t accept the fiduciary responsibility to be part of the United States government, do you? Your base is still carrying placards, and you’re still standing outside the Capitol yelling. But you’re not willing to come inside the building and help run the government, which means paying the bills, because you don’t accept that responsibility, do you? To pay the bills.
Full Story Here: Extortion Politics: Koch Brothers Operative Confirms That Tea Party in Congress Is Not There to Negotiate.
Tepco Says Highest Radiation Yet Is Detected at Fukushima Dai-Ichi
Tokyo Electric Power Co., operator of Japan’s crippled Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant, said it detected the highest radiation to date at the site.
Geiger counters, used to detect radioactivity, registered more than 10 sieverts an hour, the highest reading the devices are able to record, Junichi Matsumoto, a general manager at the utility, said today. The measurements were taken at the base of the main ventilation stack for reactors No. 1 and No. 2.
The Fukushima plant, about 220 kilometers (137 miles) north of Tokyo, had three reactor meltdowns after the March 11 magnitude-9 earthquake and tsunami knocked out power and backup generators. Radiation leaks displaced 160,000 people and contaminated marine life and agricultural products.
Full Story Here: Tepco Says Highest Radiation Yet Is Detected at Fukushima Dai-Ichi – Bloomberg.
Underwater Discovery Sparks Rumors Of Crashed UFO In Baltic Sea Between Finland And Sweden
For now, it’s an unidentified submerged object. But a strange circular formation deep below the Baltic Sea has sparked great excitement among UFO believers who think it might be a crashed flying saucer.
While searching for shipwrecks in the waters between Finland and Sweden on June 19, a Swedish team of nautical salvagers say they uncovered a “very strange anomaly” — a round object about 60 feet across resting about 300 feet below sea level.
“You see a lot of weird stuff in this job, but during my 18 years as a professional I have never seen anything like this. The shape is completely round,” Peter Lindberg, leader of The Ocean Explorer team, told the local press, according to MSNBC.
The circular object — described by Gizmodo as resembling Star Wars’ Millenium Falcon — is also trailed on one side by what appears to be a lengthy patch of displaced seabed.
That has lead some UFO believer to surmise the strange circle is a wrecked UFO, which crashed onto the seafloor and left behind a path of destruction measuring some 900 feet, according to News.com.
Full Story Here: Underwater Discovery Sparks Rumors Of Crashed UFO In Baltic Sea Between Finland And Sweden.
Olbermann on debt deal: ‘You’ve got to get mad!’
An outraged Keith Olbermann Monday urged his viewers to take to the streets to protest a recent deal between Republicans and Democrats to raise the nation’s debt ceiling.
“We have, in this deal, declared that we hold these truths to be self-evident: that all political incumbents are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Re-nomination, re-election, and the pursuit of hypocrisy,” Olbermann explained.
“We have superceded Congress to facilitate 750 billion dollars in domestic cuts including Medicare in order to end an artificially-induced political hostage crisis over debt, originating from the bills run up by a Republican president who funneled billions of taxpayer dollars to the military-industrial complex by unfunded, unnecessary, and unproductive wars, enabled in doing so by the very same Republican leaders who now cry for balanced budgets – and we have called it compromise.”
“Where is the outrage to come from?” he asked. “From you!”
Full Story Here: Olbermann on debt deal: ‘You’ve got to get mad!’ | Raw Replay.
VIDEO: GOP Presidential Campaign Town Halls Become Lobbyist Theater As Oil Industry Front Group Plants Questions
ThinkProgress and the Des Moines Register have reported on the Iowa Energy Forum, a new oil industry front group designed to manipulate the GOP presidential primary. The group, financed by some of the world’s largest oil companies, sends activists to GOP primary events in Iowa to ask candidates about oil industry priorities, like building the Keystone XL pipeline, opening new land to drilling/fracking, and protecting subsidies to big oil.
ThinkProgress witnessed the Iowa Energy Forum in action on a recent reporting trip. At a local Republican event at the Pizza Ranch buffet, a man affiliated with the group pressed Rick Santorum to commit to supporting the Keystone XL pipeline as another person with the group videotaped the exchange. The same dynamic happened again later that week at a Tea Party event with Herman Cain.
We came across a Youtube account affiliated with the Iowa Energy Forum. In addition to hosting an infomercial from the American Petroleum Institue, the trade association sponsoring the Forum, the channel features videos of astroturfed questions planted with GOP presidential candidates like Cain, Santorum, Tim Pawlenty, and Newt Gingrich. Many of the exchanges appear as authentic dialogue between a candidate and a regular Iowan. However, the questions are part of a well-crafted effort by oil lobbyists steer, and to some extent control, the GOP primary. Watch a compilation of planted questions at town hall events:
Full Story Here: VIDEO: GOP Presidential Campaign Town Halls Become Lobbyist Theater As Oil Industry Front Group Plants Questions | ThinkProgress.
REPORT: Debt Ceiling Deal Will Cost 1.8 Million Jobs In 2012
The Economic Policy Institute, a top nonpartisan think tank, estimates that the deal struck this weekend to raise the nation’s debt limit will end up costing the economy 1.8 million jobs by 2012. Today the Senate is expected to approve the package passed yesterday by the House and send it to President Obama. But while the unemployment rate remains above 9 percent, the deal does nothing to address chronic joblessness.
The agreement would reduce spending by at least $1 trillion over 10 years, but even the near-term cuts could shrink already sluggish GDP growth by 0.3% in 2012. According to EPI, the plan “not only erodes funding for public investments and safety-net spending, but also misses an important opportunity to address the lack of jobs.” In particular, the immediate spending cuts and the “failure to continue two key supports to the economy (the payroll tax holiday and emergency unemployment benefits for the long term unemployed) could lead to roughly 1.8 million fewer jobs in 2012.”
Full Story Here: REPORT: Debt Ceiling Deal Will Cost 1.8 Million Jobs In 2012 | ThinkProgress.
OPS: Heckova job Brownie
Debt Ceiling Deal: The Democrats Take a Dive
Matt Taibbi:-:
So the debt deal has finally been reached. As expected, the agreement arrives in a form that right-thinking people everywhere can feel terrible about with great confidence.
The general consensus is that for the second time in three years, a gang of financial terrorists has successfully extorted the congress and the White House, threatening to blow up the planet if they didn’t get what they wanted.
Back in 2008, the congress and George Bush rewarded Hank Paulson and Wall Street for pulling the Cleavon-Little-”the-next-man-makes-a-move-the-n—er-gets-it” routine by tossing trillions of bailout dollars at the same people who had wrecked the economy.
Full Story Here: Debt Ceiling Deal: The Democrats Take a Dive | Rolling Stone Politics | Taibblog | Matt Taibbi on Politics and the Economy.
Day 1: Thousands of Texas Teachers Losing Jobs
DAY 1: Thousands of Texas teachers will not have jobs to return to in the fall.
Just a month before the end of the school year, Bryan McClintock, a special education teacher with the Little Elm Independent School District, was told that his contract would not be renewed in the fall. McClintock had anticipated he might be laid off because he has only taught for two years. He saw the writing on the wall during the special legislative session, when lawmakers passed a school finance plan that cut $4 billion from districts statewide.
Though legislators encouraged administrators to keep as much money as possible in classrooms, the majority of public education dollars are spent on personnel — meaning job cuts can’t be avoided. During the legislative session, The Associated Press reported that up to 100,000 of the state’s 330,000 teachers might lose their positions. Officials at the Texas State Teachers Association estimate that about 12,000 teachers have lost their jobs so far, and they warn more teachers could be laid off in the second year of budget cuts. The Austin Independent School District has already given pink slips to nearly 500 employees.
Full Story Here: Day 1: Thousands of Texas Teachers Losing Jobs — Public Education | The Texas Tribune.
With No New Stimulus on Horizon, Financial Indicator Warns Of Double-Dip Recession Risk
The floundering U.S. economy could well plunge back into recession, according to one new economic indicator. And this time, federal policymakers are not publicly contemplating any fresh rescue measures.
As Washington focuses on raising the federal debt ceiling, there are signs that the rest of the economy is running into trouble, according to the Dow Jones Economic Sentiment Indicator (ESI).. In July, the ESI dropped to 41.5 from a reading of 44 in June. The indicator has now fallen for two consecutive months for a cumulative decline of 5.1, the worst two-month drop since the fall of 2008, according to Dow Jones.
“It would be easy to blame the dip in the ESI on the U.S. debt crisis, but much of the gloom stems from Main Street rather than Washington,” says Dow Jones Newswires columnist Alen Mattich. “The readings this summer have fallen enough that it seems to suggest a slide back into recession is a real risk.”
Full Story Here: The Washington Current: With No New Stimulus on Horizon, Financial Indicator Warns Of Double-Dip Recession Risk.
Our Step-By-Step Guide to Understanding ALEC’s Influence On Your State Laws
For decades, a discreet nonprofit has brought together state legislators and corporate representatives to produce business-friendly “model” legislation. These “model” bills form the basis of hundreds of pieces of legislation each year, and often end up as laws. As media scrutiny of the non-profit—the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC—has grown, we’ve built both a guide and a searchable database so that you can see for yourself how ALEC’s model bills make their way to statehouses.
Following the steps we lay out may reveal some interesting connections. Last month, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel political columnist Daniel Bice looked into an obscure, ALEC-approved bill to tax chewing tobacco by weight rather than price. The ALEC model legislation calls this a “fairness” issue, noting that “taxes that create a consumer preference within a product category impede free market commerce.” It does not note that Altria, the parent company of Philip Morris and a member of ALEC’s private enterprise board, sells pricier “premium” brands of chewing tobacco and stands to benefit from the tax change.
Full Story Here: The Washington Current: Our Step-By-Step Guide to Understanding ALEC’s Influence On Your State Laws.
Yielding To Censorship: Mo. School Board Bans Books That Are `Contrary To The Bible’
Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Slaughterhouse-Five is considered a modern classic. That doesn’t mean it’s a particularly easy read. Indeed, it deals with some fairly heady topics. When I first encountered it in high school, I wasn’t sure what to make of it. But it sure made me think, which, in my view, is what a good novel should do.
Funny thing about that thinking – some people see it as dangerous. And a few of those people sit on the school board in Republic, Mo.
The board voted 4-0 recently to ban Slaughterhouse-Five and another book, Sarah Ockler’s Twenty Boy Summer, after a local resident complained that the books teach ideas contrary to the Bible.
Wesley Scroggins had originally targeted three books, but the board voted to keep one, Laurie Halse Anderson’s award-winning Speak, on the shelves. According to the Springfield News-Leader, Scroggins “challenged the use of the books and lesson plans in Republic schools, arguing they teach principles contrary to the Bible.”
Full Story Here: | Yielding To Censorship: Mo. School Board Bans Books That Are `Contrary To The Bible’.
What is global warming costing us?
From crop failures to flood damages, climate change is draining billions of dollars out of the world economy
Admittedly, it is a rather difficult proposition: to put a price on climate change.
Global Post Even the numbers people don’t want to put a number on it. It’s very complicated, they say, and largely dependent on uncertainties like when and where the world’s worst-ever storm will hit.
But dollar signs tend to drive the point home, especially when they come before, say, 13 figures. And so it is with climate change.
Deciding the cost of a heatwave — like the one that recently swept the United States — helps determine how quickly something is done about it.
In other words, numbers drive policy.
Here’s another uncomfortable, and inconvenient, truth about climate change:
Full Story Here: What is global warming costing us? – GlobalPost – Salon.com.
The President Surrenders
A deal to raise the federal debt ceiling is in the works. If it goes through, many commentators will declare that disaster was avoided. But they will be wrong.
For the deal itself, given the available information, is a disaster, and not just for President Obama and his party. It will damage an already depressed economy; it will probably make America’s long-run deficit problem worse, not better; and most important, by demonstrating that raw extortion works and carries no political cost, it will take America a long way down the road to banana-republic status.
Start with the economics. We currently have a deeply depressed economy. We will almost certainly continue to have a depressed economy all through next year. And we will probably have a depressed economy through 2013 as well, if not beyond.
Full Story Here: The President Surrenders on Debt Ceiling – NYTimes.com.
Rep. Conyers: Obama Demanded Social Security Cuts–Not GOP
“We’ve got to educate the American people at the same time we educate the President of the United States. The Republicans, Speaker Boehner or Majority Leader Cantor DID NOT call for Social Security cuts in the budget deal. THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES CALLED FOR THAT,” declared US Representative John Conyers in a press conference held by members of the House “Out of Poverty’ Caucus on 07/27/11.”
Conyers added “”My response to him (President Obama) is TO MASS THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE IN FRONT OF THE WHITE HOUSE TO PROTEST THIS.”
(Source: click here)
This declaration is significant both politically and morally as Conyers is not only the second most senior representative in the House, but was also the first member of Congress to endorse candidate Obama. Conyers doesn’t merely draw a moral “line in the sand’ but he presents a candid picture of violent contrasts between himself and the first African-American president.
John Conyers vs. Barack Obama”a study in political contrasts
Rep. Conyers served as a force for civil rights since his heavy involvement in the 1960 s. Conyers marched, organized and pushed the movement. Elected to Congress in 1964; Conyers championed the Voting Rights Act of 1965, a dangerous and deadly time for civil rights champions. Conyers also introduced the bill designating January 15th (Dr. King’s birthday) as a national holiday–4 DAYS AFTER THE KING ASSASSINATION in 1968. (Source: click here)
Full Story Here: OpEdNews – Article: Rep. Conyers: Obama Demanded Social Security Cuts–Not GOP.
What Gets Cut If The Debt Commission Doesn’t Agree?
A majority of the deficit reduction in the plan being proposed to resolve the debt ceiling crisis is supposed to come from the recommendations of a special commission. And to create an incentive for the commission to write a proposal that passes congress, there’s a “trigger” mechanism leading to automatic spending cuts if the commission proposal isn’t adopted. Half of those cuts come from defense, and half come from the non-defense side. But the sequestration mechanism “would exempt Social Security, Medicaid, unemployment insurance, programs for low-income families, and civilian and military retirement. Likewise, any cuts to Medicare would be capped and limited to the provider side.”
So what’s left? Here are Matt Cameron’s calculations:
Full Story Here: What Gets Cut If The Debt Commission Doesn’t Agree? | ThinkProgress.
Debt Deal Would End Subsidized Loans To Grad Students, Produce Savings Equal To Only Three Months In Afghanistan
Congress is currently preparing to vote on a debt ceiling deal struck between President Obama and congressional Republicans, with many observers expecting the vote to be close.
One aspect of the debt ceiling deal that has been under-reported is the way it would change the federal student aid program. While it admirably boosts Pell Grant appropriations in order to maintain the maximum grant, keeping the program strong for American students, it severely cuts another important federal aid program.
Under the text of the bill, the federal subsidized graduate student loan program would be ended, with an estimated savings of $26.3 billion from 2012 from 2021:
Full Story Here: Debt Deal Would End Subsidized Loans To Grad Students, Produce Savings Equal To Only Three Months In Afghanistan | ThinkProgress.
Mitch McConnell Vows To Hold Debt Ceiling Hostage In The Future: ‘We’ll Be Doing It All Over’
While a deal has been struck to raise the debt ceiling for now, many progressives have worried that the damaged has been already been done in that Republicans learned that “raw extortion works and carries no political cost,” as the New York Times’ Paul Krugman wrote today. “Irresponsible brinksmanship” is now “a proven effective negotiating tactic,” ThinkProgress’s Matt Yglesias noted.
This afternoon, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) confirmed this fear when he told Fox News’ Neil Cavuto that Republicans will hold the debt ceiling hostage in the future, saying this debate “set the template for the future”:
MCCONNELL: It set the template for the future. In the future, Neil, no president — in the near future, maybe in the distant future — is going to be able to get the debt ceiling increased without a re-ignition of the same discussion of how do we cut spending and get America headed in the right direction. I expect the next president, whoever that is, is going to be asking us to raise the debt ceiling again in 2013, so we’ll be doing it all over.
Full Story Here: Mitch McConnell Vows To Hold Debt Ceiling Hostage In The Future: ‘We’ll Be Doing It All Over’ | ThinkProgress.
Krugman: Obama-Tea Bagger Budget-Ceiling Deal Will Kill Jobs
The Republicans [Said], “We’ll Blow up the World Economy Unless You Give Us Exactly What We Want” and the President Said, “Okay”
KRUGMAN: From the perspective of a rational person, in other words, a progressive on the stump, we shouldn’t even be talking about spending cuts at all now. We have 9 percent unemployment. These spending cuts are going to worsen unemployment. It’s even going to hurt the long-run fiscal picture because we have a situation where more and more people are becoming permanently long-term unemployed.
And if you have a situation in which you are permanently going to raise the unemployment rate — which is what this is going to do — that’s actually going to reduce future revenues.
These spending cuts are even going to hurt the long-run fiscal position, let alone cause lots of misery. Then on top of that, we’ve got these budget cuts, which are entirely — basically the Republicans [saying], “We’ll blow up the world economy unless you give us exactly what we want” and the president said, “Okay.” That’s what happened…
Full Story Here: Krugman: Obama-Tea Bagger Budget-Ceiling Deal Will Kill Jobs.
Once Upon a Time…: Tell Me Again: Who’s the Stupid/Weak/Incompetent One?
I’ve made this point numerous times before. I’ll make it again, because, Jesus Fuck Me Christ, a lot of you are truly, deeply, stupefyingly dumb.
So we have the debt ceiling deal, yet another step on the road to the impoverishment, brutalization and death of all those who are not sufficiently blessed to be part of the ruling class or of the ruling class’s endlessly helpful adjunct, the media-blogger complex. For the cognitively impaired, which seems to be most people, that complex includes all “leading” bloggers on both right and left — that is, Instapundit and his fellow gangsters on the right, and Atrios, Digby, et al. and their fellow gangsters on the left. I use “right” and “left” as those terms are commonly used. Let us please skip the onanistic pleasures of analyzing at interminable length what might make up the “true” right or left: most of those who contemplate such matters are only perpetuating the existing system while pretending they aren’t. If you regularly engage with the present political system, you’re perpetuating it. The rest is details. More on that issue soon.
Lots of people are celebrating or moaning about the “triumph” of the Tea Party. Apologies: I meant to say the crazy Tea Party. Which triumphed! I betcha some of those who say they will fight to the death to defend Social Security, Medicare, etc. would like to be “crazy” like that. They might actually succeed! Well, they might if you assume their actual and proclaimed goals are the same. Usually, and almost always in politics, they aren’t.
Full Story Here: Once Upon a Time…: Tell Me Again: Who’s the Stupid/Weak/Incompetent One?.
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Republicans Don't Care about Voter Fraud....owa Republicans are trying to dismiss claims that the vote count in Tuesday's Iowa Caucus was wrong. An Iowa voter told a local TV station yesterday that he noticed a 20-vote discrepancy in the count - and that Rick Santorum was the real winner of the Caucuses. Republican Party officials, though, are sticking to their first count - showing Mitt Romney as the winner by 8-votes - and there will be no recount.The Republican Party has launched a war on voters around the nation this year with strict new laws that will disenfranchise over 5 million Americans. They claim these laws are necessary to combat so-called voter fraud. Yet in Iowa - where there are no such laws - and where a very, very close and questionable election was just held - Republicans don't seem to care at all about getting it right.Clearly - the war on voters isn't about making sure the people's voices are represented accurately - it's about making sure poor people, young people, and minorities who tend to vote for Democrats - can't vote at all.-Thom(Who do you think won? Tell us here.) -
LEGALIZE Democracy
" We the corporations" On January 21, 2010, with its ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Supreme Court ruled that corporations are persons, entitled by the U.S. Constitution to buy elections and run our government. __________
MOVE to AMEND
a project of the CAMPAIGN TO LEGALIZE Democracy
Help end Corporate personhood
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The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. 
