The Bailout and What's Next
Dear Friend,
Yesterday marked a day that will go down in history, when Congressional Democrats and Republicans alike took on full responsibility to protect the interests of taxpaying Americans, and defeated the deceptive bail out bill, defying the dictates of the Administration, the House Majority Leadership, the House Minority Leadership and the special interests on Wall Street.
Obviously Congress must consider quickly another course. There are immediate issues which demand attention and responsible action by the Congress so that the taxpayers, their assets, and their futures are protected.
We MUST do something to protect millions of Americans whose homes, bank deposits, investments, and pensions are at risk in a financial system that has become seriously corrupted. We are told that we must stabilize markets in order for the people to be protected. I think we need to protect peoples' homes, bank deposits, investments, and pensions, to order to stabilize the market.
We cannot delay taking action. But the action must benefit all Americans, not just a privileged few. Otherwise, more plans will fail, and the financial security of everyone will be at risk.
The $700 billion bailout would have added to our existing unbearable load of national debt, trade deficits, and the cost of paying for the war. It would have been a disaster for the American public and the government for decades and maybe even centuries to come.
To be sure, there are many different reasons why people voted against the bailout. The legislation did not regard in any meaningful way the plight of millions of Americans who are about to lose their homes. It did nothing to strengthen existing regulatory structures or impose new ones at the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Federal Reserve in order to protect investors. There were no direct protections for bank depositors. There was nothing to stop further speculation, which is what brought us into this mess in the first place.
This was a bailout for some firms (and investors) on Wall Street, with the idea that in doing so there would be certain, unspecified, general benefits to the economy.
This is a perfect time to open a broader discussion about our financial system, especially our monetary system. Such a discussion is like searching for a needle in a haystack, and then, upon finding it, discussing its qualities at great length. Let me briefly describe the haystack instead.
Here is a very quick explanation of the $700 billion bailout within the context of the mechanics of our monetary and banking system:
The taxpayers loan money to the banks. But the taxpayers do not have the money. So we have to borrow it from the banks to give it back to the banks. But the banks do not have the money to loan to the government. So they create it into existence (through a mechanism called fractional reserve) and then loan it to us, at interest, so we can then give it back to them.
Confused?
This is the system. This is the standard mechanism used to expand the money supply on a daily basis not a special one designed only for the "$700 billion" transaction. People will explain this to you in many different ways, but this is what it comes down to.
The banks needed Congress' approval. Of course in this topsy turvy world, it is the banks which set the terms of the money they are borrowing from the taxpayers. And what do we get for this transaction? Long term debt enslavement of our country. We get to pay back to the banks trillions of dollars ($700 billion with compounded interest) and the banks give us their bad debt which they cull from everywhere in the world.
Who could turn down a deal like this? I did.
The globalization of the debt puts the United States in the position that in order to repay the money that we borrow from the banks (for the banks) we could be forced to accept International Monetary Fund dictates which involve cutting health, social security benefits and all other social spending in addition to reducing wages and exploiting our natural resources. This inevitably leads to a loss of economic, social and political freedom
.
Under the failed $700 billion bailout plan, Wall Street's profits are Wall Street's profits and Wall Street's losses are the taxpayers' losses. Profits are capitalized. Losses are socialized.
We are at a teachable moment on matters of money and finance. In the coming days and weeks, I will share with you thoughts about what can be done to take us not just in a new direction, but in a new direction which is just.
Thank you,
Dennis Kucinich
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Monday, September 29, 2008
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
European Friends Write: "Are You Americans Crazy?"
By Bernard Weiner, The Crisis Papers
Dear Wolfgang and Jacqueline:
Yes, I know that you and other European friends are, as you put it, "totally confused" by what's happening here in the U.S. right now. Welcome to the club. I wish I could answer all your questions about America's current political/economic crisis with definitive certainty. But the situation is moving real fast, with one disaster after another, and with politicians flip-flopping all over the place.
As a result, it's difficult to know precisely what's going on, but I'll do the best I can. Here are my responses to your italicized questions about McCain, Obama, the financial crisis and bailout, and electoral corruption:
1. BEYOND THE "CRAZY" FACTOR
"Bush, with his policies and wars, has nearly wrecked the U.S. Constitution and economy and America's moral standing abroad. We don't understand why your John McCain, so closely associated with the Bush policies that brought these disasters upon your country and the world, should be nearly even in the polls with Obama. Have you guys gone crazy?"
Link to con.
By Bernard Weiner, The Crisis Papers
Dear Wolfgang and Jacqueline:
Yes, I know that you and other European friends are, as you put it, "totally confused" by what's happening here in the U.S. right now. Welcome to the club. I wish I could answer all your questions about America's current political/economic crisis with definitive certainty. But the situation is moving real fast, with one disaster after another, and with politicians flip-flopping all over the place.
As a result, it's difficult to know precisely what's going on, but I'll do the best I can. Here are my responses to your italicized questions about McCain, Obama, the financial crisis and bailout, and electoral corruption:
1. BEYOND THE "CRAZY" FACTOR
"Bush, with his policies and wars, has nearly wrecked the U.S. Constitution and economy and America's moral standing abroad. We don't understand why your John McCain, so closely associated with the Bush policies that brought these disasters upon your country and the world, should be nearly even in the polls with Obama. Have you guys gone crazy?"
Link to con.
Kucinich’s Main Street Recovery Plan
1. Health Care for All: Insurance companies make money not providing health care. As the co-author of HR 676, a universal, single-payer, not-for-profit health care system, Medicare for All, I understand millions of Americans want health care that is accessible and affordable.
Medicare for All will help businesses large and small, create jobs as well as save the jobs of thousands of people including those of doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers who are currently leaving medicine because it is run by the insurance companies. $1 in every 3 dollars of the $2.4 trillion spent annually in America for health care goes to the insurance companies. If we take that money ($800 billion in unproductive wasteful spending) and put it directly into care, we will have enough money to cover everyone. We are already paying for Medicare for all, but not receiving it. HR 676 changes that!
2. Prescription Drug Benefit for Seniors: HR 6800 is the MEDS Act, which provides a fully paid prescription drug benefit, under Medicare, for all seniors. I wrote this bill to help alleviate the economic pressure that comes from the high cost of prescription drugs. We can pay for it by letting the government negotiate drug prices with the pharmaceutical companies as well as by permitting re-importation.
3. Stop the Oil Companies’ Price Gouging: As you know, I was the first one to step up to challenge of the corrupt price gouging and market speculation of the oil companies by proposing a windfall profits tax, on oil and natural gas companies, with revenues put into tax credits for the purchase of fuel-efficient American-made cars. However, it may be that nationalization is the only way to put an end to the oil companies' sharp practices.
4. Protecting the American Homestead: As Chairman of the Domestic Policy Oversight Subcommittee, I am working to protect your basic right to have a roof over your head, whether as an owner or renter. I have investigated and helped to expose the manipulation of mortgage markets, and I am crafting a new federal policy so that neighborhoods with the highest number of foreclosures get the most help.
5. Jobs for All: Congressman LaTourette and I have co-authored the bi-partisan New Deal-type jobs program, HR 3400, "Rebuilding America's Infrastructure." It will create millions of good-paying new jobs rebuilding our roads, bridges, water systems and sewer systems.
6. American Manufacturing Policy: I am drafting the American Manufacturing Policy Act, which for the first time, will state that the maintenance of U.S. steel, automotive, and aerospace industries are vital to our national economic security and must be maintained through integrated public-private cooperation, new trade policies, and investment.
7. Works Green Administration: I am also drafting plans for a green New Deal jobs program, in which the government creates millions of jobs by incentivizing the design, engineering, manufacturing, distribution and maintenance of millions of wind and solar micro-technologies for millions of homes and businesses, dramatically lowering energy costs and reducing our dependence on oil.
8. Fair Trade: The U.S. has lost millions of good-paying jobs, and more jobs have been out-sourced. As you know, I have helped to lead the way in opposition to trade giveaways. I strongly urge repeal of NAFTA. We must include workers' rights, human rights and environmental quality principles in all trade pacts. We must also protect the Great Lakes' water resources from the reach of multi-national corporations.
9. Education for All: I know families need help with the rising cost of day care. That is why I introduced HR 4060, a universal pre-kindergarten program to ensure that all children ages 3-5 have access to full-day, quality day care.
10. Protecting Pensions: I am working to change bankruptcy laws so pensioners' claims will be first, ahead of banks, and that corporate executives who misuse workers' pension funds are subject to criminal penalties. I want to fully fund the Pension Benefit Guarantee Board.
11. Social Security: From my first moments in Congress, I have exposed Wall Street's efforts to privatize Social Security and attacked it in the Democratic Caucus when it was being proposed. Can you imagine where seniors would be today if Social Security had been turned over to the stock market? Social Security is solid through 2032 without any changes.
12. Protect Bank Deposits: I will work to make sure the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) has sufficient funds to provide for insurance of deposits up to $200,000 at all banks and savings and loans. This is an urgent matter since so many banks are said to be vulnerable.
13. Protect Investors: Bring back strong regulation to Wall Street. As Chairman of the Domestic Policy Subcommittee, I challenged the Wall Street hedge fund speculators as a threat to small investors. I intend to keep active watch over the machinations on Wall Street.
14. Strength through Peace: You'll remember when I led the effort against the ill-conceived Iraq war, which has now cost more than 4,100 US soldiers' lives, cost U.S. taxpayers between $3 trillion and $5 trillion, and resulted in the deaths of more than a million Iraqis. We must bring our troops home and end the war. We must engage in diplomacy. We must reduce the military budget, and we must stop outrageous cost overruns by the likes of Halliburton.
15. Safety in America: I am proud of my work for peace. In July 2001, I introduced a bill, which today is HR 808, that for the first time creates a comprehensive plan to deal with the issues of violence in American society, particularly domestic violence, spousal abuse, child abuse, gang violence, gun violence, racial violence, and violence against gays by establishing a Cabinet-level Department of Peace and Restorative Justice. This proposal has sparked a national movement and when implemented will save tax payers millions of dollars.
16. Monetary Policy: It is long past the time that we looked at the implications of our debt based monetary system, the privatization of money created by the 1913 Federal Reserve Act, the banks fractional reserve system and our debt-based economic system. Unless we have dramatic reform of monetary policy, the entire economic system will continue to accelerate wealth upwards. I am currently working on drafting legislation for an 'American Monetary Act' to address these and other issues in order to protect the economic wellbeing of America.
1. Health Care for All: Insurance companies make money not providing health care. As the co-author of HR 676, a universal, single-payer, not-for-profit health care system, Medicare for All, I understand millions of Americans want health care that is accessible and affordable.
Medicare for All will help businesses large and small, create jobs as well as save the jobs of thousands of people including those of doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers who are currently leaving medicine because it is run by the insurance companies. $1 in every 3 dollars of the $2.4 trillion spent annually in America for health care goes to the insurance companies. If we take that money ($800 billion in unproductive wasteful spending) and put it directly into care, we will have enough money to cover everyone. We are already paying for Medicare for all, but not receiving it. HR 676 changes that!
2. Prescription Drug Benefit for Seniors: HR 6800 is the MEDS Act, which provides a fully paid prescription drug benefit, under Medicare, for all seniors. I wrote this bill to help alleviate the economic pressure that comes from the high cost of prescription drugs. We can pay for it by letting the government negotiate drug prices with the pharmaceutical companies as well as by permitting re-importation.
3. Stop the Oil Companies’ Price Gouging: As you know, I was the first one to step up to challenge of the corrupt price gouging and market speculation of the oil companies by proposing a windfall profits tax, on oil and natural gas companies, with revenues put into tax credits for the purchase of fuel-efficient American-made cars. However, it may be that nationalization is the only way to put an end to the oil companies' sharp practices.
4. Protecting the American Homestead: As Chairman of the Domestic Policy Oversight Subcommittee, I am working to protect your basic right to have a roof over your head, whether as an owner or renter. I have investigated and helped to expose the manipulation of mortgage markets, and I am crafting a new federal policy so that neighborhoods with the highest number of foreclosures get the most help.
5. Jobs for All: Congressman LaTourette and I have co-authored the bi-partisan New Deal-type jobs program, HR 3400, "Rebuilding America's Infrastructure." It will create millions of good-paying new jobs rebuilding our roads, bridges, water systems and sewer systems.
6. American Manufacturing Policy: I am drafting the American Manufacturing Policy Act, which for the first time, will state that the maintenance of U.S. steel, automotive, and aerospace industries are vital to our national economic security and must be maintained through integrated public-private cooperation, new trade policies, and investment.
7. Works Green Administration: I am also drafting plans for a green New Deal jobs program, in which the government creates millions of jobs by incentivizing the design, engineering, manufacturing, distribution and maintenance of millions of wind and solar micro-technologies for millions of homes and businesses, dramatically lowering energy costs and reducing our dependence on oil.
8. Fair Trade: The U.S. has lost millions of good-paying jobs, and more jobs have been out-sourced. As you know, I have helped to lead the way in opposition to trade giveaways. I strongly urge repeal of NAFTA. We must include workers' rights, human rights and environmental quality principles in all trade pacts. We must also protect the Great Lakes' water resources from the reach of multi-national corporations.
9. Education for All: I know families need help with the rising cost of day care. That is why I introduced HR 4060, a universal pre-kindergarten program to ensure that all children ages 3-5 have access to full-day, quality day care.
10. Protecting Pensions: I am working to change bankruptcy laws so pensioners' claims will be first, ahead of banks, and that corporate executives who misuse workers' pension funds are subject to criminal penalties. I want to fully fund the Pension Benefit Guarantee Board.
11. Social Security: From my first moments in Congress, I have exposed Wall Street's efforts to privatize Social Security and attacked it in the Democratic Caucus when it was being proposed. Can you imagine where seniors would be today if Social Security had been turned over to the stock market? Social Security is solid through 2032 without any changes.
12. Protect Bank Deposits: I will work to make sure the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) has sufficient funds to provide for insurance of deposits up to $200,000 at all banks and savings and loans. This is an urgent matter since so many banks are said to be vulnerable.
13. Protect Investors: Bring back strong regulation to Wall Street. As Chairman of the Domestic Policy Subcommittee, I challenged the Wall Street hedge fund speculators as a threat to small investors. I intend to keep active watch over the machinations on Wall Street.
14. Strength through Peace: You'll remember when I led the effort against the ill-conceived Iraq war, which has now cost more than 4,100 US soldiers' lives, cost U.S. taxpayers between $3 trillion and $5 trillion, and resulted in the deaths of more than a million Iraqis. We must bring our troops home and end the war. We must engage in diplomacy. We must reduce the military budget, and we must stop outrageous cost overruns by the likes of Halliburton.
15. Safety in America: I am proud of my work for peace. In July 2001, I introduced a bill, which today is HR 808, that for the first time creates a comprehensive plan to deal with the issues of violence in American society, particularly domestic violence, spousal abuse, child abuse, gang violence, gun violence, racial violence, and violence against gays by establishing a Cabinet-level Department of Peace and Restorative Justice. This proposal has sparked a national movement and when implemented will save tax payers millions of dollars.
16. Monetary Policy: It is long past the time that we looked at the implications of our debt based monetary system, the privatization of money created by the 1913 Federal Reserve Act, the banks fractional reserve system and our debt-based economic system. Unless we have dramatic reform of monetary policy, the entire economic system will continue to accelerate wealth upwards. I am currently working on drafting legislation for an 'American Monetary Act' to address these and other issues in order to protect the economic wellbeing of America.
Monday, September 22, 2008
Flashbacks from My Red Diaper Youth
A New Cold War Comes to Latin America
By JOHN ROSS
In the old sepia photo my sister sent me last month, friends and family are gathered around the old couple, Dr. Milton Leof and his wife Jenny, on the occasion of their 50th wedding anniversary. The living room of the apartment on Riverside Drive is crowded with lefties honoring one of their own - Dr. Leof lived through the Russian revolution and still believed in it. Sometimes when I visited, he would tell me stories of bloodthirsty Cossacks and six foot-deep snow drifts and how socialism would be victorious in the end.
In the photo, my drop-dead gorgeous mom is seated with Jean Boudin - they had gone to summer camp together in the 1920s. Leonard Boudin, Paul Robeson's lawyer who, with his partner the late Victor Rabinowitz, defended many notable commies, pinkos, and fellow travelers, is also sprawled on the couch, his arm thrown around button-eyed little Kathy for whom I sometimes baby-sat. My sister thinks that I.F. Stone is lurking in the back row - Izzie was the retiring type.
The photo was taken sometime between 1950 and 1952 at the height of the Cold War and terrible things were happening to these people and their friends. Comrades had been jailed, blacklisted, fled into exile, chose suicide over imprisonment, recanted. Julius and Ethel Rosenberg would soon be executed by the U.S. government for treason. Why then is every one smiling?
Link to con.
A New Cold War Comes to Latin America
By JOHN ROSS
In the old sepia photo my sister sent me last month, friends and family are gathered around the old couple, Dr. Milton Leof and his wife Jenny, on the occasion of their 50th wedding anniversary. The living room of the apartment on Riverside Drive is crowded with lefties honoring one of their own - Dr. Leof lived through the Russian revolution and still believed in it. Sometimes when I visited, he would tell me stories of bloodthirsty Cossacks and six foot-deep snow drifts and how socialism would be victorious in the end.
In the photo, my drop-dead gorgeous mom is seated with Jean Boudin - they had gone to summer camp together in the 1920s. Leonard Boudin, Paul Robeson's lawyer who, with his partner the late Victor Rabinowitz, defended many notable commies, pinkos, and fellow travelers, is also sprawled on the couch, his arm thrown around button-eyed little Kathy for whom I sometimes baby-sat. My sister thinks that I.F. Stone is lurking in the back row - Izzie was the retiring type.
The photo was taken sometime between 1950 and 1952 at the height of the Cold War and terrible things were happening to these people and their friends. Comrades had been jailed, blacklisted, fled into exile, chose suicide over imprisonment, recanted. Julius and Ethel Rosenberg would soon be executed by the U.S. government for treason. Why then is every one smiling?
Link to con.
Should biotech piggy go to market?
Consumer advocates worry that the FDA is throwing open the barn door to genetically engineered animals too quickly.
By Rebecca Clarren
Behind locked doors, past a shower, where humans are required to rinse, more than 25 pink pigs crowd into hay-covered pens at the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada. They look like regular Yorkshire pigs: Their eyes gleam like black marbles, they snort, and they scarf dinner from a trough. "These pigs behave like pigs; they do everything a pig would do," says John Kelley of Mars Landing, a Canadian agricultural development program. Except for one thing.
These pigs have been modified to carry a gene from an innocuous strain of E. coli that has been spliced with a protein from a mouse. This doesn't give the pigs a newfound affinity for cheese. Rather, the added gene enables the animals to produce the enzyme phytase in their saliva. This enzyme, say Guelph researchers, could solve one of the major environmental problems associated with industrial pig farms.
Normal pigs can't break down phytate, a phosphorus-rich compound in their gut. When manure lagoons on hog factories overflow or breach into nearby rivers or seep into groundwater, the high phosphorus content creates algae blooms, killing fish and other marine life. Trademarked the Enviropig, these genetically modified pigs produce 60 percent less phosphorus in their manure than their conventional cousins.
Link to con.
Consumer advocates worry that the FDA is throwing open the barn door to genetically engineered animals too quickly.
By Rebecca Clarren
Behind locked doors, past a shower, where humans are required to rinse, more than 25 pink pigs crowd into hay-covered pens at the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada. They look like regular Yorkshire pigs: Their eyes gleam like black marbles, they snort, and they scarf dinner from a trough. "These pigs behave like pigs; they do everything a pig would do," says John Kelley of Mars Landing, a Canadian agricultural development program. Except for one thing.
These pigs have been modified to carry a gene from an innocuous strain of E. coli that has been spliced with a protein from a mouse. This doesn't give the pigs a newfound affinity for cheese. Rather, the added gene enables the animals to produce the enzyme phytase in their saliva. This enzyme, say Guelph researchers, could solve one of the major environmental problems associated with industrial pig farms.
Normal pigs can't break down phytate, a phosphorus-rich compound in their gut. When manure lagoons on hog factories overflow or breach into nearby rivers or seep into groundwater, the high phosphorus content creates algae blooms, killing fish and other marine life. Trademarked the Enviropig, these genetically modified pigs produce 60 percent less phosphorus in their manure than their conventional cousins.
Link to con.
Cash for Trash
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Some skeptics are calling Henry Paulson’s $700 billion rescue plan for the U.S. financial system “cash for trash.” Others are calling the proposed legislation the Authorization for Use of Financial Force, after the Authorization for Use of Military Force, the infamous bill that gave the Bush administration the green light to invade Iraq. There’s justice in the gibes. Everyone agrees that something major must be done. But Mr. Paulson is demanding extraordinary power for himself — and for his successor — to deploy taxpayers’ money on behalf of a plan that, as far as I can see, doesn’t make sense.
Some are saying that we should simply trust Mr. Paulson, because he’s a smart guy who knows what he’s doing. But that’s only half true: he is a smart guy, but what, exactly, in the experience of the past year and a half — a period during which Mr. Paulson repeatedly declared the financial crisis “contained,” and then offered a series of unsuccessful fixes — justifies the belief that he knows what he’s doing? He’s making it up as he goes along, just like the rest of us.
So let’s try to think this through for ourselves. I have a four-step view of the financial crisis:
1. The bursting of the housing bubble has led to a surge in defaults and foreclosures, which in turn has led to a plunge in the prices of mortgage-backed securities — assets whose value ultimately comes from mortgage payments.
2. These financial losses have left many financial institutions with too little capital — too few assets compared with their debt. This problem is especially severe because everyone took on so much debt during the bubble years.
Link to con.
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Some skeptics are calling Henry Paulson’s $700 billion rescue plan for the U.S. financial system “cash for trash.” Others are calling the proposed legislation the Authorization for Use of Financial Force, after the Authorization for Use of Military Force, the infamous bill that gave the Bush administration the green light to invade Iraq. There’s justice in the gibes. Everyone agrees that something major must be done. But Mr. Paulson is demanding extraordinary power for himself — and for his successor — to deploy taxpayers’ money on behalf of a plan that, as far as I can see, doesn’t make sense.
Some are saying that we should simply trust Mr. Paulson, because he’s a smart guy who knows what he’s doing. But that’s only half true: he is a smart guy, but what, exactly, in the experience of the past year and a half — a period during which Mr. Paulson repeatedly declared the financial crisis “contained,” and then offered a series of unsuccessful fixes — justifies the belief that he knows what he’s doing? He’s making it up as he goes along, just like the rest of us.
So let’s try to think this through for ourselves. I have a four-step view of the financial crisis:
1. The bursting of the housing bubble has led to a surge in defaults and foreclosures, which in turn has led to a plunge in the prices of mortgage-backed securities — assets whose value ultimately comes from mortgage payments.
2. These financial losses have left many financial institutions with too little capital — too few assets compared with their debt. This problem is especially severe because everyone took on so much debt during the bubble years.
Link to con.
(THE BEST POLITICIAN IN AMERICA.....REALLY!!!)
Kucinich: No 'cash for trash,' give taxpayers a stake in bailout
Nick Juliano
With the White House and Wall Street pressuring Congress to quickly approve a massive taxpayer-funded bailout package this week, several Democrats are coming forward with proposals they say would benefit average Americans alongside financial executives. Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) outlined a proposal he said would create "a genuine ownership society," by giving taxpayers a stake in the companies the government will be saving with its proposed $700 billion package.
“Simply purchasing bad debt, 'cash for trash' and not receiving anything of value or giving $700 billion and not having a commensurate equity interest in Wall Street firms is unacceptable," Kucinich said in a news release Monday. "No 'cash for trash.'"
The former Democratic presidential candidate said he would be introducing a bill this week to create a "United States Mutual Trust Fund" to convert assets purchased by the governemnt into shares that would be distributed to every man, woman and child in the country. Every American would receive about $2,300 worth of shares because that is the cost of the bailout package to each individual, Kucinich said.
Link to con.
Kucinich: No 'cash for trash,' give taxpayers a stake in bailout
Nick Juliano
With the White House and Wall Street pressuring Congress to quickly approve a massive taxpayer-funded bailout package this week, several Democrats are coming forward with proposals they say would benefit average Americans alongside financial executives. Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) outlined a proposal he said would create "a genuine ownership society," by giving taxpayers a stake in the companies the government will be saving with its proposed $700 billion package.
“Simply purchasing bad debt, 'cash for trash' and not receiving anything of value or giving $700 billion and not having a commensurate equity interest in Wall Street firms is unacceptable," Kucinich said in a news release Monday. "No 'cash for trash.'"
The former Democratic presidential candidate said he would be introducing a bill this week to create a "United States Mutual Trust Fund" to convert assets purchased by the governemnt into shares that would be distributed to every man, woman and child in the country. Every American would receive about $2,300 worth of shares because that is the cost of the bailout package to each individual, Kucinich said.
Link to con.
Sunday, September 21, 2008
(Thanks to SH for this one)
Organic Farm Blossoms in Kenya's Largest Slum
by Xan Rice in Nairobi
Victor Matioli's organic pumpkins are plump, his coriander aromatic and his spinach "very soft, sweet, and tasty". His half-acre farm is a former rubbish dump in the heart of east Africa's biggest slum. So arresting is the sight of tall sunflowers growing amid the rust-coloured shacks and dirt paths of Kibera that Matioli and his fellow growers have had to put up a "No photographing" sign to allow them to work in peace. Their reputations - the farmers are all reformed criminals - mean the warning is seldom ignored.
The unlikely story of Kibera's first "organic" farm - its only farm of any scale - has its roots in the chaos that gripped Kenya at the start of the year. For weeks the sprawling, densely packed slum, home to up to a million people, was gripped by ethnic clashes and street battles between riot police and protesters demonstrating over flawed presidential elections.
Among those concerned about a looming hunger crisis was Su Kahumbu, managing director of Green Dreams, one of Kenya's pioneer organic produce companies.
Initially, she hoped to organise a mass distribution of seeds to small-scale farmers in the Rift Valley to enable them to plant before the April rains. After a lack of funding halted the plan, a friend told her about a group of young, unemployed men in Kibera who wanted to learn how to farm - inside the slum.
Link to con.
Organic Farm Blossoms in Kenya's Largest Slum
by Xan Rice in Nairobi
Victor Matioli's organic pumpkins are plump, his coriander aromatic and his spinach "very soft, sweet, and tasty". His half-acre farm is a former rubbish dump in the heart of east Africa's biggest slum. So arresting is the sight of tall sunflowers growing amid the rust-coloured shacks and dirt paths of Kibera that Matioli and his fellow growers have had to put up a "No photographing" sign to allow them to work in peace. Their reputations - the farmers are all reformed criminals - mean the warning is seldom ignored.
The unlikely story of Kibera's first "organic" farm - its only farm of any scale - has its roots in the chaos that gripped Kenya at the start of the year. For weeks the sprawling, densely packed slum, home to up to a million people, was gripped by ethnic clashes and street battles between riot police and protesters demonstrating over flawed presidential elections.
Among those concerned about a looming hunger crisis was Su Kahumbu, managing director of Green Dreams, one of Kenya's pioneer organic produce companies.
Initially, she hoped to organise a mass distribution of seeds to small-scale farmers in the Rift Valley to enable them to plant before the April rains. After a lack of funding halted the plan, a friend told her about a group of young, unemployed men in Kibera who wanted to learn how to farm - inside the slum.
Link to con.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Bolivian Crisis in the New South America
The Machine Gun and the Meeting Table
By BENJAMIN DANGL
On Monday, September 15, Bolivian President Evo Morales arrived in Santiago, Chile for an emergency meeting of Latin American leaders that convened to seek a resolution to the recent conflict in Bolivia. Upon his arrival, Morales said, "I have come here to explain to the presidents of South America the civic coup d'etat by Governors in some Bolivian states in recent days. This is a coup in the past few days by the leaders of some provinces, with the takeover of some institutions, the sacking and robbery of some government institutions and attempts to assault the national police and the armed forces."
Morales was arriving from his country where the smoke was still rising from a week of right-wing government opposition violence that left the nation paralyzed, at least 30 people dead, and businesses, government and human rights buildings destroyed. During the same week, Morales declared US ambassador in Bolivia Philip Goldberg a "persona non grata" for "conspiring against democracy" and for his ties to the Bolivian opposition. The recent conflict in Bolivia and the subsequent meeting of presidents raise the questions: What led to this meltdown? Whose side is the Bolivian military on? And what does the Bolivian crisis and regional reaction tell us about the new power bloc of South American nations?
Link to con.
The Machine Gun and the Meeting Table
By BENJAMIN DANGL
On Monday, September 15, Bolivian President Evo Morales arrived in Santiago, Chile for an emergency meeting of Latin American leaders that convened to seek a resolution to the recent conflict in Bolivia. Upon his arrival, Morales said, "I have come here to explain to the presidents of South America the civic coup d'etat by Governors in some Bolivian states in recent days. This is a coup in the past few days by the leaders of some provinces, with the takeover of some institutions, the sacking and robbery of some government institutions and attempts to assault the national police and the armed forces."
Morales was arriving from his country where the smoke was still rising from a week of right-wing government opposition violence that left the nation paralyzed, at least 30 people dead, and businesses, government and human rights buildings destroyed. During the same week, Morales declared US ambassador in Bolivia Philip Goldberg a "persona non grata" for "conspiring against democracy" and for his ties to the Bolivian opposition. The recent conflict in Bolivia and the subsequent meeting of presidents raise the questions: What led to this meltdown? Whose side is the Bolivian military on? And what does the Bolivian crisis and regional reaction tell us about the new power bloc of South American nations?
Link to con.
US Federal Reserve announces $85 billion bailout of insurance giant AIG
By Bill Van Auken
Following emergency consultations between the Federal Reserve, the US Treasury and the Democratic leaders of both houses of Congress, the Federal Reserve on Tuesday night announced a bailout of the Wall Street insurance giant American International Group (AIG).According to reports posted by the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, under the emergency plan the Fed will provide the failing firm with an $85 billion loan in exchange for 80 percent of its assets.
The reported bailout is a reversal of the policy adopted by the federal government just last weekend, when it failed to intervene to stop the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the country’s fourth largest investment bank. According to the Journal, government officials believed “it would be ‘catastrophic’ to allow AIG to fail.” Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, the newspaper said, “concluded that federal assistance would be necessary to avert an AIG bankruptcy, which they feared would have disastrous repercussions throughout the financial markets.”
The bailout is one more demonstration of the systemic crisis confronting American and world capitalism. It is unprecedented and, in some respects, goes even further than the government takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac barely a week before. Unlike the two mortgage finance giants, AIG is not a government-sponsored institution and is not even directly regulated by the federal government.
Link to con.
By Bill Van Auken
Following emergency consultations between the Federal Reserve, the US Treasury and the Democratic leaders of both houses of Congress, the Federal Reserve on Tuesday night announced a bailout of the Wall Street insurance giant American International Group (AIG).According to reports posted by the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, under the emergency plan the Fed will provide the failing firm with an $85 billion loan in exchange for 80 percent of its assets.
The reported bailout is a reversal of the policy adopted by the federal government just last weekend, when it failed to intervene to stop the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the country’s fourth largest investment bank. According to the Journal, government officials believed “it would be ‘catastrophic’ to allow AIG to fail.” Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, the newspaper said, “concluded that federal assistance would be necessary to avert an AIG bankruptcy, which they feared would have disastrous repercussions throughout the financial markets.”
The bailout is one more demonstration of the systemic crisis confronting American and world capitalism. It is unprecedented and, in some respects, goes even further than the government takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac barely a week before. Unlike the two mortgage finance giants, AIG is not a government-sponsored institution and is not even directly regulated by the federal government.
Link to con.
One Heartbeat Away: Reflections on the Palin Nomination
Paul Street
COUNTRY FIRST”
John McCain’s selection of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as the Republican Vice-Presidential candidate is one of the most transparently crass and cynical moves in United States political history.“Country “First” was the white-nationalist rallying cry at the Republican Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota two weeks ago.
“WHAT WOULD SHE DO TO THE NATION?”
The slogan is coldly contradicted by McCain’s chilling proposal to put a remarkably inexperienced, arch-secretive, vindictive, petty, distant, and ignorant politician one heartbeat away from the presidency.Lyda Green is the Alaska state senate’s Republican president. She thought it was a prank when she heard that Palin had tapped for her party’s presidential ticke. “She’s not prepared to be governor. How can she be prepared to be vice president?” asked Green, who comes from Palin’s home town of Wasila. “Look at what she’s done to this state. What would she do to the nation? (Cockerham and Loy 2008).
Green’s concerns were richly validated by Palin’s recent interview with ABC news anchor Charles Gibson, where she revealed amateurish misunderstanding of basic facts of U.S. policy and economic life (ABC News/Huffington Post 2008).
“WHERE’S SARAH?”
Link to con.
Paul Street
COUNTRY FIRST”
John McCain’s selection of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as the Republican Vice-Presidential candidate is one of the most transparently crass and cynical moves in United States political history.“Country “First” was the white-nationalist rallying cry at the Republican Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota two weeks ago.
“WHAT WOULD SHE DO TO THE NATION?”
The slogan is coldly contradicted by McCain’s chilling proposal to put a remarkably inexperienced, arch-secretive, vindictive, petty, distant, and ignorant politician one heartbeat away from the presidency.Lyda Green is the Alaska state senate’s Republican president. She thought it was a prank when she heard that Palin had tapped for her party’s presidential ticke. “She’s not prepared to be governor. How can she be prepared to be vice president?” asked Green, who comes from Palin’s home town of Wasila. “Look at what she’s done to this state. What would she do to the nation? (Cockerham and Loy 2008).
Green’s concerns were richly validated by Palin’s recent interview with ABC news anchor Charles Gibson, where she revealed amateurish misunderstanding of basic facts of U.S. policy and economic life (ABC News/Huffington Post 2008).
“WHERE’S SARAH?”
Link to con.
It's Time for the Federal Government to Abandon the Drug War
By Bob Barr, Huffington Post.
As both a U.S. Attorney and Member of Congress, I defended drug prohibition. But it has become increasingly clear to me, after much study, that our current strategy has not worked and will not work. The other candidates for president prefer not to address this issue, but ignoring the failure of existing policy exhibits both a poverty of thought and an absence of political courage. The federal government must turn the decision on drug policy back to the states and the citizens themselves.
My change in perspective might shock some people, but leadership requires a willingness to assess evidence and recognize when a strategy is not working. We are paying far too high a price for today's failed policy to continue it simply because it has always been done that way.
It is obvious that, like Prohibition's effort to eradicate alcohol usage, drug prohibition has not succeeded. Despite enormous law enforcement efforts -- including the dedicated service of many thousands of professional men and women -- the government has not halted drug use. Indeed, the problem is worse today than in 1972, when Richard Nixon first coined the phrase "War on Drugs."
Link to con.
By Bob Barr, Huffington Post.
As both a U.S. Attorney and Member of Congress, I defended drug prohibition. But it has become increasingly clear to me, after much study, that our current strategy has not worked and will not work. The other candidates for president prefer not to address this issue, but ignoring the failure of existing policy exhibits both a poverty of thought and an absence of political courage. The federal government must turn the decision on drug policy back to the states and the citizens themselves.
My change in perspective might shock some people, but leadership requires a willingness to assess evidence and recognize when a strategy is not working. We are paying far too high a price for today's failed policy to continue it simply because it has always been done that way.
It is obvious that, like Prohibition's effort to eradicate alcohol usage, drug prohibition has not succeeded. Despite enormous law enforcement efforts -- including the dedicated service of many thousands of professional men and women -- the government has not halted drug use. Indeed, the problem is worse today than in 1972, when Richard Nixon first coined the phrase "War on Drugs."
Link to con.
Only a Roosevelt-Scale Counterrevolution Can Prevent Great Depression II
By Robert Kuttner, The American Prospect.
The current carnage on Wall Street, with dire spillover effects on Main Street, is the result of a failed ideology -- the idea that financial markets could regulate themselves. Serial deregulation fed on itself. Deliberate repeal of regulations became entangled with failure to carry out laws still on the books. Corruption mingled with simple incompetence. And though the ideology was largely Republican, it was abetted by Wall Street Democrats.
Why regulate?
As we have seen ever since the sub-prime market blew up in the summer of 2007, government cannot stand by when a financial crash threatens to turn into a general depression -- even a government like the Bush administration that fervently believes in free markets. But if government must act to contain wider damage when large banks fail, then it is obliged to act to prevent damage from occurring in the first place. Otherwise, the result is what economists term "moral hazard"-- an invitation to take excessive risks.
Government, under Franklin Roosevelt, got serious about regulating financial markets after the first cycle of financial bubble and economic ruin in the 1920s. Then, as now, the abuses were complex in their detail but very simple in their essence. They included the sale of complex securities packaged in deceptive and misleading ways; far too much borrowing to finance speculative investments; and gross conflicts of interest on the part of insiders who stood to profit from flim-flams. When the speculative bubble burst in 1929, sellers overwhelmed buyers, many investors were wiped out, and the system of credit contracted, choking the rest of the economy.
Link to con.
By Robert Kuttner, The American Prospect.
The current carnage on Wall Street, with dire spillover effects on Main Street, is the result of a failed ideology -- the idea that financial markets could regulate themselves. Serial deregulation fed on itself. Deliberate repeal of regulations became entangled with failure to carry out laws still on the books. Corruption mingled with simple incompetence. And though the ideology was largely Republican, it was abetted by Wall Street Democrats.
Why regulate?
As we have seen ever since the sub-prime market blew up in the summer of 2007, government cannot stand by when a financial crash threatens to turn into a general depression -- even a government like the Bush administration that fervently believes in free markets. But if government must act to contain wider damage when large banks fail, then it is obliged to act to prevent damage from occurring in the first place. Otherwise, the result is what economists term "moral hazard"-- an invitation to take excessive risks.
Government, under Franklin Roosevelt, got serious about regulating financial markets after the first cycle of financial bubble and economic ruin in the 1920s. Then, as now, the abuses were complex in their detail but very simple in their essence. They included the sale of complex securities packaged in deceptive and misleading ways; far too much borrowing to finance speculative investments; and gross conflicts of interest on the part of insiders who stood to profit from flim-flams. When the speculative bubble burst in 1929, sellers overwhelmed buyers, many investors were wiped out, and the system of credit contracted, choking the rest of the economy.
Link to con.
In hard times, tent cities rise across the country
Since foreclosure mess, homeless advocates report rise in encampments
A few tents cropped up hard by the railroad tracks, pitched by men left with nowhere to go once the emergency winter shelter closed for the summer.Then others appeared — people who had lost their jobs to the ailing economy, or newcomers who had moved to Reno for work and discovered no one was hiring.
Within weeks, more than 150 people were living in tents big and small, barely a foot apart in a patch of dirt slated to be a parking lot for a campus of shelters Reno is building for its homeless population. Like many other cities, Reno has found itself with a "tent city" — an encampment of people who had nowhere else to go. From Seattle to Athens, Ga., homeless advocacy groups and city agencies are reporting the most visible rise in homeless encampments in a generation.
Nearly 61 percent of local and state homeless coalitions say they've experienced a rise in homelessness since the foreclosure crisis began in 2007, according to a report by the National Coalition for the Homeless. The group says the problem has worsened since the report's release in April, with foreclosures mounting, gas and food prices rising and the job market tightening.
Link to con.
Since foreclosure mess, homeless advocates report rise in encampments
A few tents cropped up hard by the railroad tracks, pitched by men left with nowhere to go once the emergency winter shelter closed for the summer.Then others appeared — people who had lost their jobs to the ailing economy, or newcomers who had moved to Reno for work and discovered no one was hiring.
Within weeks, more than 150 people were living in tents big and small, barely a foot apart in a patch of dirt slated to be a parking lot for a campus of shelters Reno is building for its homeless population. Like many other cities, Reno has found itself with a "tent city" — an encampment of people who had nowhere else to go. From Seattle to Athens, Ga., homeless advocacy groups and city agencies are reporting the most visible rise in homeless encampments in a generation.
Nearly 61 percent of local and state homeless coalitions say they've experienced a rise in homelessness since the foreclosure crisis began in 2007, according to a report by the National Coalition for the Homeless. The group says the problem has worsened since the report's release in April, with foreclosures mounting, gas and food prices rising and the job market tightening.
Link to con.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Bolivia Versus the Empire
Morales Sí, Secession No
By Patrick Irelan
Evo Morales is a patient man. After he was elected president of Bolivia in 2005, he set about in a peaceful and democratic way to liberate his country’s oppressed majority. That majority includes indigenous South American Indians, who make up over 55 percent of the population, plus a large proportion of the country’s mestizos, who constitute a total of 30 percent of the population. Morales himself is an Aymara Indian, the first indigenous president in the history of Bolivia. The remaining 15 percent of the population is as white as the faces you recently saw at the Republican National Convention. (Ethnic statistics courtesy of the CIA’s World Factbook.)
During the campaign, Morales and his Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) promised to distribute the country’s oil and natural gas revenue in a manner that would help the impoverished majority without sending the white minority into the poorhouse. He also wanted to institute land reform for the benefit of the landless peasantry. In a manner reminiscent of the Spanish latifundia, 5 percent of the producers owned 89 percent of the arable land. The poorest 80 percent owned a mere 3 percent of the land (Nidia Diaz, Granma, 12/7/2006).
In Bolivia, it’s quite common for a wealthy family to own 30,000 acres or more. In the departments of Santa Cruz and Beni, a mere 14 families own three million hectares of farmland (Diaz). One hectare equals 2.47 acres. You do the arithmetic. The mainstream press in the United States sometimes calls these people “farmers,” which I assume is meant as a joke. Anyone with that much land isn’t a farmer. He’s a landlord or a land baron or the lord of the manor. This type of land ownership is medieval. If I owned 30,000 acres of Illinois farmland, I’d sell it and buy Los Angeles.
Link to con.
Morales Sí, Secession No
By Patrick Irelan
Evo Morales is a patient man. After he was elected president of Bolivia in 2005, he set about in a peaceful and democratic way to liberate his country’s oppressed majority. That majority includes indigenous South American Indians, who make up over 55 percent of the population, plus a large proportion of the country’s mestizos, who constitute a total of 30 percent of the population. Morales himself is an Aymara Indian, the first indigenous president in the history of Bolivia. The remaining 15 percent of the population is as white as the faces you recently saw at the Republican National Convention. (Ethnic statistics courtesy of the CIA’s World Factbook.)
During the campaign, Morales and his Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) promised to distribute the country’s oil and natural gas revenue in a manner that would help the impoverished majority without sending the white minority into the poorhouse. He also wanted to institute land reform for the benefit of the landless peasantry. In a manner reminiscent of the Spanish latifundia, 5 percent of the producers owned 89 percent of the arable land. The poorest 80 percent owned a mere 3 percent of the land (Nidia Diaz, Granma, 12/7/2006).
In Bolivia, it’s quite common for a wealthy family to own 30,000 acres or more. In the departments of Santa Cruz and Beni, a mere 14 families own three million hectares of farmland (Diaz). One hectare equals 2.47 acres. You do the arithmetic. The mainstream press in the United States sometimes calls these people “farmers,” which I assume is meant as a joke. Anyone with that much land isn’t a farmer. He’s a landlord or a land baron or the lord of the manor. This type of land ownership is medieval. If I owned 30,000 acres of Illinois farmland, I’d sell it and buy Los Angeles.
Link to con.
The Paramilitary Massacre in Bolivia
Reactionary Rampage
By FORREST HYLTON
Bolivian President Evo Morales’ expulsion of US Ambassador Phillip Goldberg on September 10 for alleged coup plotting sparked the latest diplomatic crisis in the Americas. But the diplomatic fallout has overshadowed the internal dynamics that led to the massacre of some 30 campesinos with perhaps as many as 40 more disappeared in El Porvenir, Pando, near Bolivia’s northeastern border with Brazil. The massacre coincided with the 35th anniversary of the violent overthrow of socialist president Salvador Allende in Chile.
The massacre in El Porvenir was the worst in Bolivia since right-wing President Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada presided over the slaughter of more than 70 unarmed protestors in October 2003. This time, however, the violence was not orchestrated by the central government, but by regional officials: departmental prefects in league with civic committees. Administratively organized similar to France, Bolivia is divided into nine departments, each run by a prefect, while civic committees are made up of a handful of unelected, local, commercial-landed elites who preside over one of the most unequal distributions of land and wealth in the world. These public- and private-sector authorities, in turn, are allied with cypto-fascist paramilitary youth gangs armed with baseball bats, clubs, chains, guns, and in the case of the massacre at El Porvenir, official vehicles. These groups have made Bolivia’s eastern lowlands ungovernable for the Morales administration.
It may be helpful for U.S. readers to consider Bolivia’s eastern lowlands as analogous to Dixie. In the 1950s and 60s, working with governors and mayors of states and localities, white supremacist paramilitary groups terrorized African Americans. The campaign of terror was intended to preserve a status quo that benefited a tiny class of wealthy white landowners, against which the federal government—under Eisenhower and Kennedy—hesitated to act.
Link to con.
Reactionary Rampage
By FORREST HYLTON
Bolivian President Evo Morales’ expulsion of US Ambassador Phillip Goldberg on September 10 for alleged coup plotting sparked the latest diplomatic crisis in the Americas. But the diplomatic fallout has overshadowed the internal dynamics that led to the massacre of some 30 campesinos with perhaps as many as 40 more disappeared in El Porvenir, Pando, near Bolivia’s northeastern border with Brazil. The massacre coincided with the 35th anniversary of the violent overthrow of socialist president Salvador Allende in Chile.
The massacre in El Porvenir was the worst in Bolivia since right-wing President Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada presided over the slaughter of more than 70 unarmed protestors in October 2003. This time, however, the violence was not orchestrated by the central government, but by regional officials: departmental prefects in league with civic committees. Administratively organized similar to France, Bolivia is divided into nine departments, each run by a prefect, while civic committees are made up of a handful of unelected, local, commercial-landed elites who preside over one of the most unequal distributions of land and wealth in the world. These public- and private-sector authorities, in turn, are allied with cypto-fascist paramilitary youth gangs armed with baseball bats, clubs, chains, guns, and in the case of the massacre at El Porvenir, official vehicles. These groups have made Bolivia’s eastern lowlands ungovernable for the Morales administration.
It may be helpful for U.S. readers to consider Bolivia’s eastern lowlands as analogous to Dixie. In the 1950s and 60s, working with governors and mayors of states and localities, white supremacist paramilitary groups terrorized African Americans. The campaign of terror was intended to preserve a status quo that benefited a tiny class of wealthy white landowners, against which the federal government—under Eisenhower and Kennedy—hesitated to act.
Link to con.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
The Campaign of Lies and Smears Against Kucinich
Dear Friend,
Immigration and Healthcare are serious matters. That's why the Republican smear machine is going into overdrive to misrepresent the facts and mislead voters about Congressman Dennis Kucinich’s record. Read this and know why this election is important for Ohio and America, and arm yourself with the facts to expose Republican falsehoods and fiction which are being circulated in printed literature in Ohio’s 10th Congressional District.
FICTION: Republicans say "Kucinich voted against Children's Health Insurance Program (S-Chip) because it did not cover children of illegal immigrants."
FACT: Dennis stood up for the children of LEGAL immigrants. Dennis voted against one version of the S-CHIP bill specifically because it did not cover the children of LEGAL immigrants. He stood up and spoke out strongly to protect the health care of more than 400,000 children in America who were ignored and excluded from coverage in the bill. Dennis comes from Ohio's 10th District, a community of many immigrant peoples.
FICTION: Republicans say "Kucinich voted against prescription drugs benefits for seniors."
FACT: Dennis took on Big Pharma. Dennis voted against the notorious Medicare Part D which passed by a single vote and took cost controls off the big drug companies. He voted against giving them multi-billion dollar windfall profits.
FACT: Dennis Takes on the Insurance Companies. Dennis is the author of the MEDS Act which would provide senior citizens with a full prescription drug benefit, cost-free under Medicare. Dennis is also the co-author and the driving force nationally for HR 676, Medicare for All. It is a single-payer system that covers all medically necessary services for all Americans.
Currently, $2.4 trillion is spent each year for "health care." But 1 out of every 3 dollars ($800 billion annually) goes for the activities of the private insurance 'industry' such as corporate profits, stock options, executive salaries, advertising, marketing, cost of paperwork, etc.), rather than actual health care services. Dennis' bill, drafted with Congressman John Conyers, reallocates that wasted $800 billion to pay for medical care and services for people who need them.
These lies against Dennis on immigration and health care are coming from the very same person who, as chairman of the GOP in Ohio's largest county, collaborated with Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell to suppress the Democratic vote in 2004, which enabled George Bush to win Ohio and the election! Now he is trying to suppress votes for Dennis by manipulating voters with a campaign of lies and smears.
Dear Friend,
Immigration and Healthcare are serious matters. That's why the Republican smear machine is going into overdrive to misrepresent the facts and mislead voters about Congressman Dennis Kucinich’s record. Read this and know why this election is important for Ohio and America, and arm yourself with the facts to expose Republican falsehoods and fiction which are being circulated in printed literature in Ohio’s 10th Congressional District.
FICTION: Republicans say "Kucinich voted against Children's Health Insurance Program (S-Chip) because it did not cover children of illegal immigrants."
FACT: Dennis stood up for the children of LEGAL immigrants. Dennis voted against one version of the S-CHIP bill specifically because it did not cover the children of LEGAL immigrants. He stood up and spoke out strongly to protect the health care of more than 400,000 children in America who were ignored and excluded from coverage in the bill. Dennis comes from Ohio's 10th District, a community of many immigrant peoples.
FICTION: Republicans say "Kucinich voted against prescription drugs benefits for seniors."
FACT: Dennis took on Big Pharma. Dennis voted against the notorious Medicare Part D which passed by a single vote and took cost controls off the big drug companies. He voted against giving them multi-billion dollar windfall profits.
FACT: Dennis Takes on the Insurance Companies. Dennis is the author of the MEDS Act which would provide senior citizens with a full prescription drug benefit, cost-free under Medicare. Dennis is also the co-author and the driving force nationally for HR 676, Medicare for All. It is a single-payer system that covers all medically necessary services for all Americans.
Currently, $2.4 trillion is spent each year for "health care." But 1 out of every 3 dollars ($800 billion annually) goes for the activities of the private insurance 'industry' such as corporate profits, stock options, executive salaries, advertising, marketing, cost of paperwork, etc.), rather than actual health care services. Dennis' bill, drafted with Congressman John Conyers, reallocates that wasted $800 billion to pay for medical care and services for people who need them.
These lies against Dennis on immigration and health care are coming from the very same person who, as chairman of the GOP in Ohio's largest county, collaborated with Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell to suppress the Democratic vote in 2004, which enabled George Bush to win Ohio and the election! Now he is trying to suppress votes for Dennis by manipulating voters with a campaign of lies and smears.
Monday, September 15, 2008
Can we really have a presidential election in which one side does nothing but lie? (Apparently so.)
Am I the only one in a state of stupefaction over the course the presidential election has taken? Oh, we saw it coming, but now that it's here, is it any less shocking?
We have a campaign in which essentially every word out of every mouth on one side is a lie.
Oh, we've seen the the extremified Right heading this way, rejecting all obligation to, even minimal respect for, the concept of truth, instead applying the word to what Stephen Colbert has conveniently dubbed "truthiness," which can be either (a) what one thinks ought to be true or (b) what one wishes were true. These are actually very different things, but functionally they have in common that they represent an abandonment of the basic standard of truth.
It's an astonishing thing to watch, and unlike so many progressive commentators, who can tell you exactly how a battle against it should be fought, I'm for the most part struck dumb. I don't see anything the least "postpartisan" about our time, but I see all too clearly that it's "posttrue." And once the public has lost all interest in actual truth, and yet in screeching, almost murderous, hysteria proclaims its lies to be truer than truth, what is there left to discuss?
The Sarah Palin phenomenon is part of the package. In saner times, she would be dismissed by all but the hard-core delusionals as an irrelevant ignoramus, and the McCranky campaign would get the old Gong Show hook and never be heard from again, having admitted that in terms of having anything to say of any relevance to the governance of the country it is 0 for the campaign. Instead, this person of absolutely no qualifications for any public office, let alone the vice presidency of the U.S., is breaking the rule that in presidential elections people don't vote for the VP candidate. It appears that large numbers of voters are prepared to vote for McCranky the empty suit because of the appallingly ignorant Palin and her random snatches of ultra-wacko extremist ideology.
Link to con.
Am I the only one in a state of stupefaction over the course the presidential election has taken? Oh, we saw it coming, but now that it's here, is it any less shocking?
We have a campaign in which essentially every word out of every mouth on one side is a lie.
Oh, we've seen the the extremified Right heading this way, rejecting all obligation to, even minimal respect for, the concept of truth, instead applying the word to what Stephen Colbert has conveniently dubbed "truthiness," which can be either (a) what one thinks ought to be true or (b) what one wishes were true. These are actually very different things, but functionally they have in common that they represent an abandonment of the basic standard of truth.
It's an astonishing thing to watch, and unlike so many progressive commentators, who can tell you exactly how a battle against it should be fought, I'm for the most part struck dumb. I don't see anything the least "postpartisan" about our time, but I see all too clearly that it's "posttrue." And once the public has lost all interest in actual truth, and yet in screeching, almost murderous, hysteria proclaims its lies to be truer than truth, what is there left to discuss?
The Sarah Palin phenomenon is part of the package. In saner times, she would be dismissed by all but the hard-core delusionals as an irrelevant ignoramus, and the McCranky campaign would get the old Gong Show hook and never be heard from again, having admitted that in terms of having anything to say of any relevance to the governance of the country it is 0 for the campaign. Instead, this person of absolutely no qualifications for any public office, let alone the vice presidency of the U.S., is breaking the rule that in presidential elections people don't vote for the VP candidate. It appears that large numbers of voters are prepared to vote for McCranky the empty suit because of the appallingly ignorant Palin and her random snatches of ultra-wacko extremist ideology.
Link to con.
Count the Lies
John McCain may be trying to sell himself as a "maverick" and a "straight talker" who will tell the truth no matter the consequences, but independent, non-partisan watchdog groups aren't buying it. But, since he wrapped up his party's nomination, John McCain has offered more of the same false attacks and smears. To date, independent, nonpartisan fact checkers have published more than 50 fact checks debunking John McCain's lies and distortions.
To hold John McCain accountable to his own standard, the Democratic National Committee will count and chronicle the lies here on the McCainPedia's "Count the Lies" page.
Link to 52 Fact Checks
John McCain may be trying to sell himself as a "maverick" and a "straight talker" who will tell the truth no matter the consequences, but independent, non-partisan watchdog groups aren't buying it. But, since he wrapped up his party's nomination, John McCain has offered more of the same false attacks and smears. To date, independent, nonpartisan fact checkers have published more than 50 fact checks debunking John McCain's lies and distortions.
To hold John McCain accountable to his own standard, the Democratic National Committee will count and chronicle the lies here on the McCainPedia's "Count the Lies" page.
Link to 52 Fact Checks
Death Becomes Her: Let’s Make Her Our President
Jason Miller
Savage animal slaughterer that she is, it’s apt that Sarah Palin has now brutally plunged a razor-sharp knife into the very heart of the seemingly invincible doubts concerning her capacity to be Vice-President of the United States. Wielding her chutzpah with the awe-inspiring deftness with which she employs her gun or rifle when hunting defenseless wolves or moose, she appeared on 20/20 and left our skepticism writhing on the ground in agony, immersed in its own blood and gasping its last.
Given her virtuoso performance with Charlie Rose a few nights ago, John McCain might as well croak now and get it over with. She’s ready for the presidency. All the cynics who dared to question her qualifications to become VP now have about as much credibility as card-carrying members of the Flat Earth Society.
Sarah Palin is the person we need (and deserve) to lead us on our incessant quest for global hegemony and in our ongoing orgiastic gang rape of the Earth. A former beauty pageant contestant noted for her fierce competitiveness who would easily qualify as an actress in the B-grade movies and who takes great pride in her capacity to stick her head up her behind and go for it instead of “blinking,” this “lipstick pitbull” embodies nearly all that we worship in a nation fueled principally by narcissism, arrogance, willful ignorance, and belligerence. She may lack the obscene wealth that also triggers our reflexive genuflection, but she will acquire that in time.
Link to con.
Jason Miller
Savage animal slaughterer that she is, it’s apt that Sarah Palin has now brutally plunged a razor-sharp knife into the very heart of the seemingly invincible doubts concerning her capacity to be Vice-President of the United States. Wielding her chutzpah with the awe-inspiring deftness with which she employs her gun or rifle when hunting defenseless wolves or moose, she appeared on 20/20 and left our skepticism writhing on the ground in agony, immersed in its own blood and gasping its last.
Given her virtuoso performance with Charlie Rose a few nights ago, John McCain might as well croak now and get it over with. She’s ready for the presidency. All the cynics who dared to question her qualifications to become VP now have about as much credibility as card-carrying members of the Flat Earth Society.
Sarah Palin is the person we need (and deserve) to lead us on our incessant quest for global hegemony and in our ongoing orgiastic gang rape of the Earth. A former beauty pageant contestant noted for her fierce competitiveness who would easily qualify as an actress in the B-grade movies and who takes great pride in her capacity to stick her head up her behind and go for it instead of “blinking,” this “lipstick pitbull” embodies nearly all that we worship in a nation fueled principally by narcissism, arrogance, willful ignorance, and belligerence. She may lack the obscene wealth that also triggers our reflexive genuflection, but she will acquire that in time.
Link to con.
A Matter of Morals, Not Morales: Respect Bolivia's Democracy!
By Olivia Burlingame Goumbri, AlterNet.
As an American and an expert on US-Venezuela relations, the events unfolding in Bolivia are simply too familiar to escape my notice. The tactics used by opponents of President Chavez during Venezuela's short-lived coup in 2002 are currently being replicated in a "civic coup" in neighboring Bolivia that is designed to undermine the democratic government of Evo Morales. That nation, though different from Venezuela in so many ways, seems to be travelling down a strikingly similar road, not least in terms of the role of the media in encouraging right-wing, anti-democratic opposition groups and the active support of that process by US officials.
Just over a month ago, on August 10th, Morales won a recall referendum with over 67% of the popular vote. This successful electoral process served as a check on his mandate, and was a powerful reaffirmation of the legitimacy of his democratic administration. Bolivians turned out at the polls in even higher numbers for that referendum than during the last presidential race in 2005, when Morales won 53% of votes.
Nine days after the peaceful referendum, opposition governors in the eastern states of Tarija, Bani, Pando, and Santa Cruz mobilized protests around their secessionist agenda and desire to exert total control over local natural gas reserves. With those disturbances barely in the past, a new bout of violence is again threatening national unity. Two days of mayhem and violence have wracked the city of Santa Cruz, spurred on by calls broadcast over the national media to join in "civil disobedience" against the government. Journalists considered sympathetic to the government were also harassed and injured.
Link to con.
By Olivia Burlingame Goumbri, AlterNet.
As an American and an expert on US-Venezuela relations, the events unfolding in Bolivia are simply too familiar to escape my notice. The tactics used by opponents of President Chavez during Venezuela's short-lived coup in 2002 are currently being replicated in a "civic coup" in neighboring Bolivia that is designed to undermine the democratic government of Evo Morales. That nation, though different from Venezuela in so many ways, seems to be travelling down a strikingly similar road, not least in terms of the role of the media in encouraging right-wing, anti-democratic opposition groups and the active support of that process by US officials.
Just over a month ago, on August 10th, Morales won a recall referendum with over 67% of the popular vote. This successful electoral process served as a check on his mandate, and was a powerful reaffirmation of the legitimacy of his democratic administration. Bolivians turned out at the polls in even higher numbers for that referendum than during the last presidential race in 2005, when Morales won 53% of votes.
Nine days after the peaceful referendum, opposition governors in the eastern states of Tarija, Bani, Pando, and Santa Cruz mobilized protests around their secessionist agenda and desire to exert total control over local natural gas reserves. With those disturbances barely in the past, a new bout of violence is again threatening national unity. Two days of mayhem and violence have wracked the city of Santa Cruz, spurred on by calls broadcast over the national media to join in "civil disobedience" against the government. Journalists considered sympathetic to the government were also harassed and injured.
Link to con.
U.S. Arms Sales Climbing Rapidly
By ERIC LIPTON, NY TIMES
The Bush administration is pushing through a broad array of foreign weapons deals as it seeks to rearm Iraq and Afghanistan, contain North Korea and Iran, and solidify ties with onetime Russian allies. From tanks, helicopters and fighter jets to missiles, remotely piloted aircraft and even warships, the Department of Defense has agreed so far this fiscal year to sell or transfer more than $32 billion in weapons and other military equipment to foreign governments, compared with $12 billion in 2005.
The trend, which started in 2006, is most pronounced in the Middle East, but it reaches into northern Africa, Asia, Latin America, Europe and even Canada, through dozens of deals that senior Bush administration officials say they are confident will both tighten military alliances and combat terrorism.
“This is not about being gunrunners,” said Bruce S. Lemkin, the Air Force deputy under secretary who is helping to coordinate many of the biggest sales. “This is about building a more secure world.”
Link to con.
By ERIC LIPTON, NY TIMES
The Bush administration is pushing through a broad array of foreign weapons deals as it seeks to rearm Iraq and Afghanistan, contain North Korea and Iran, and solidify ties with onetime Russian allies. From tanks, helicopters and fighter jets to missiles, remotely piloted aircraft and even warships, the Department of Defense has agreed so far this fiscal year to sell or transfer more than $32 billion in weapons and other military equipment to foreign governments, compared with $12 billion in 2005.
The trend, which started in 2006, is most pronounced in the Middle East, but it reaches into northern Africa, Asia, Latin America, Europe and even Canada, through dozens of deals that senior Bush administration officials say they are confident will both tighten military alliances and combat terrorism.
“This is not about being gunrunners,” said Bruce S. Lemkin, the Air Force deputy under secretary who is helping to coordinate many of the biggest sales. “This is about building a more secure world.”
Link to con.
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Friday, September 12, 2008
Naomi Klein Strikes Back at Critics of Her 'Shock Doctrine' Book
By Naomi Klein, NaomiKlein.com.
One year ago, I set off on a book tour to promote The Shock Doctrine. The plan was for it to last three months, quite long by publishing standards. Twelve months later, it is still going. But this has been no ordinary book tour. Everywhere I have traveled- from Calgary, Alberta to Cochabamba, Bolivia -- I have heard more stories about how shock strategies have been used to impose unwanted pro-corporate policies. I have also been part of stimulating debates and discussions about how the current round of crises -- oil, food, financial markets, heavy weather -- can be transformed into opportunities for progressive change.
And there have been other kinds of responses too. The Shock Doctrine is a direct attack on the intellectuals and institutions that have disseminated corporatist ideology around the world. When I wrote the book, I fully expected to get hit back. Yet for eight months following publication, there was an eerie silence from the "free-market" ideologues. Sure, a few dismissive reviews appeared in the business press. But not a word from the Washington think tanks that I name in the book. Nothing from the University of Chicago economics department. Even The Economist magazine, which used to attack me gleefully and with great regularity, never mentioned the book in print. An American television producer, who was trying to find an opponent to debate me on-air, confided that she had never been turned down so consistently. "They seem to think if they ignore you, you'll go away."
LINK TO CON.
By Naomi Klein, NaomiKlein.com.
One year ago, I set off on a book tour to promote The Shock Doctrine. The plan was for it to last three months, quite long by publishing standards. Twelve months later, it is still going. But this has been no ordinary book tour. Everywhere I have traveled- from Calgary, Alberta to Cochabamba, Bolivia -- I have heard more stories about how shock strategies have been used to impose unwanted pro-corporate policies. I have also been part of stimulating debates and discussions about how the current round of crises -- oil, food, financial markets, heavy weather -- can be transformed into opportunities for progressive change.
And there have been other kinds of responses too. The Shock Doctrine is a direct attack on the intellectuals and institutions that have disseminated corporatist ideology around the world. When I wrote the book, I fully expected to get hit back. Yet for eight months following publication, there was an eerie silence from the "free-market" ideologues. Sure, a few dismissive reviews appeared in the business press. But not a word from the Washington think tanks that I name in the book. Nothing from the University of Chicago economics department. Even The Economist magazine, which used to attack me gleefully and with great regularity, never mentioned the book in print. An American television producer, who was trying to find an opponent to debate me on-air, confided that she had never been turned down so consistently. "They seem to think if they ignore you, you'll go away."
LINK TO CON.
Marijuana Could Be a Gusher of Cash If We Treated It Like a Crop, Not a Crime
By Steven Wishnia, AlterNet.
If marijuana were legal but taxed like alcohol and tobacco, how much money could it bring in to cash-strapped state governments?
One 2006 study called cannabis the top cash crop in the nation, worth more than corn and wheat combined. It was the leading crop in 12 states, outstripping grapes in California and tobacco in North Carolina, and one of the top three in 18 others, coming in just behind apples in Washington and cotton in Georgia. So with states facing massive deficits, could reefer revenues help?
The answer is unclear, but it could be lucrative for governments, especially when combined with the savings from ending prohibition. As the U.S. marijuana market is illegal, there are no sales figures. Estimates of its size range from $10.5 billion a year to $113 billion. But three studies done by economists and policy analysts say ganja taxes could bring in anywhere from $2.4 billion to $31.1 billion in revenue, depending on how big the sales really are. About one-third of that would go to the states.
"There's not enough really good data on it, so it's probably best to look at it in ballpark figures," says Jon Gettman, a Virginia policy analyst who has worked with the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws and the Marijuana Policy Project. "But there's a consensus that there's an awful lot of marijuana out there and that it's very valuable."
LINK TO CON.
By Steven Wishnia, AlterNet.
If marijuana were legal but taxed like alcohol and tobacco, how much money could it bring in to cash-strapped state governments?
One 2006 study called cannabis the top cash crop in the nation, worth more than corn and wheat combined. It was the leading crop in 12 states, outstripping grapes in California and tobacco in North Carolina, and one of the top three in 18 others, coming in just behind apples in Washington and cotton in Georgia. So with states facing massive deficits, could reefer revenues help?
The answer is unclear, but it could be lucrative for governments, especially when combined with the savings from ending prohibition. As the U.S. marijuana market is illegal, there are no sales figures. Estimates of its size range from $10.5 billion a year to $113 billion. But three studies done by economists and policy analysts say ganja taxes could bring in anywhere from $2.4 billion to $31.1 billion in revenue, depending on how big the sales really are. About one-third of that would go to the states.
"There's not enough really good data on it, so it's probably best to look at it in ballpark figures," says Jon Gettman, a Virginia policy analyst who has worked with the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws and the Marijuana Policy Project. "But there's a consensus that there's an awful lot of marijuana out there and that it's very valuable."
LINK TO CON.
Howard Zinn: American Empire Is 'Crumbling'
Al Jazeera.
Where is the United States heading in terms of world power and influence?
Zinn: America has been heading -- for some time, and is heading right now -- toward less and less world power, less and less influence. Obviously, since the war in Iraq, the rest of the world has fallen away from the United States, and if American foreign policy continues in the way it has been -- that is aggressive and violent and uncaring about the feelings and thoughts of other people -- then the influence of the United States is going to decline more and more.
This is an empire which is on the one hand the most powerful empire that ever existed; on the other hand an empire that is crumbling -- an empire that has no future because the rest of the world is alienated and simply because this empire is top-heavy with military commitments, with bases around the world, with the exhaustion of its own resources at home.
[This is] leading to more and more discontent and home, so I think the American empire will go the way of other empires and I think it is on its way now.
LINK TO CON.
Al Jazeera.
Where is the United States heading in terms of world power and influence?
Zinn: America has been heading -- for some time, and is heading right now -- toward less and less world power, less and less influence. Obviously, since the war in Iraq, the rest of the world has fallen away from the United States, and if American foreign policy continues in the way it has been -- that is aggressive and violent and uncaring about the feelings and thoughts of other people -- then the influence of the United States is going to decline more and more.
This is an empire which is on the one hand the most powerful empire that ever existed; on the other hand an empire that is crumbling -- an empire that has no future because the rest of the world is alienated and simply because this empire is top-heavy with military commitments, with bases around the world, with the exhaustion of its own resources at home.
[This is] leading to more and more discontent and home, so I think the American empire will go the way of other empires and I think it is on its way now.
LINK TO CON.
Blizzard of Lies
By PAUL KRUGMAN, NY TIMES
Did you hear about how Barack Obama wants to have sex education in kindergarten, and called Sarah Palin a pig? Did you hear about how Ms. Palin told Congress, “Thanks, but no thanks” when it wanted to buy Alaska a Bridge to Nowhere? These stories have two things in common: they’re all claims recently made by the McCain campaign — and they’re all out-and-out lies.
Dishonesty is nothing new in politics. I spent much of 2000 — my first year at The Times — trying to alert readers to the blatant dishonesty of the Bush campaign’s claims about taxes, spending and Social Security.
But I can’t think of any precedent, at least in America, for the blizzard of lies since the Republican convention. The Bush campaign’s lies in 2000 were artful — you needed some grasp of arithmetic to realize that you were being conned. This year, however, the McCain campaign keeps making assertions that anyone with an Internet connection can disprove in a minute, and repeating these assertions over and over again.
Link to con.
By PAUL KRUGMAN, NY TIMES
Did you hear about how Barack Obama wants to have sex education in kindergarten, and called Sarah Palin a pig? Did you hear about how Ms. Palin told Congress, “Thanks, but no thanks” when it wanted to buy Alaska a Bridge to Nowhere? These stories have two things in common: they’re all claims recently made by the McCain campaign — and they’re all out-and-out lies.
Dishonesty is nothing new in politics. I spent much of 2000 — my first year at The Times — trying to alert readers to the blatant dishonesty of the Bush campaign’s claims about taxes, spending and Social Security.
But I can’t think of any precedent, at least in America, for the blizzard of lies since the Republican convention. The Bush campaign’s lies in 2000 were artful — you needed some grasp of arithmetic to realize that you were being conned. This year, however, the McCain campaign keeps making assertions that anyone with an Internet connection can disprove in a minute, and repeating these assertions over and over again.
Link to con.
A Chicken in Every Garage
By EDUARDO PORTER, NY TIMES
From afar, the rise and fall of the sport utility vehicle might look like the clear-cut story of two gas prices. With unleaded gas dropping below $1 a gallon in the years following the 1980 oil crisis, Detroit successfully made the pitch that trucks conceived for life on a farm were a good way to move the family around in suburbia. Today, with gas reluctantly receding to $3.50 a gallon, the idea makes no sense at all.
But the Ford F-Series pickup did not rule the roost as the nation’s best-selling vehicle, on an annual basis, from 1981 to last year just because gas was cheap. Its ascent required a helping hand from Uncle Sam. As Washington scrambles for a policy to achieve the incompatible goals of making fuel cheaper and making Americans use less of it, it might consider the twisted tale of how four-wheel-drive gas hogs became Detroit’s best sellers.
It started in 1961 with chicken. Trying to stop a surge of chicken imports into Germany, the European Common Market bowed to the European poultry lobby and almost tripled the tariff on frozen chicken from the United States. Washington, of course, struck back. In 1963, it raised tariffs on a range of European products: brandy to hit the French; dextrine, a food and glue component, to hit the Dutch.
Link to con.
By EDUARDO PORTER, NY TIMES
From afar, the rise and fall of the sport utility vehicle might look like the clear-cut story of two gas prices. With unleaded gas dropping below $1 a gallon in the years following the 1980 oil crisis, Detroit successfully made the pitch that trucks conceived for life on a farm were a good way to move the family around in suburbia. Today, with gas reluctantly receding to $3.50 a gallon, the idea makes no sense at all.
But the Ford F-Series pickup did not rule the roost as the nation’s best-selling vehicle, on an annual basis, from 1981 to last year just because gas was cheap. Its ascent required a helping hand from Uncle Sam. As Washington scrambles for a policy to achieve the incompatible goals of making fuel cheaper and making Americans use less of it, it might consider the twisted tale of how four-wheel-drive gas hogs became Detroit’s best sellers.
It started in 1961 with chicken. Trying to stop a surge of chicken imports into Germany, the European Common Market bowed to the European poultry lobby and almost tripled the tariff on frozen chicken from the United States. Washington, of course, struck back. In 1963, it raised tariffs on a range of European products: brandy to hit the French; dextrine, a food and glue component, to hit the Dutch.
Link to con.
Sarah Palin & the Christian Fascists [Lesser-Known Alaskan Rock Band]
The reality is that Palin’s speech was a piece of ultra-right demagogy delivered to an audience assembled by what is unquestionably the most reactionary party on the face of the planet, committed to the unrelenting defense of wealth and privilege against the interests of the vast majority of the American people and all of humanity. Assembled in the hall were the foulest elements of American society. The lily-white crowd—the number of black delegates had fallen from 150 in 2004 to 36 in 2008, barely 1.5 percent of the total—included a collection of religious fanatics, racists, anti-Semites and militant defenders of torture, militarism and inequality.
Only such a party could even conceive of someone like Sarah Palin as a candidate for vice president. Palin cast herself as the small-town “hockey mom” determined to go clean up Washington, and as an innocent victim of media disparagement. One would never guess that she was a politician with intimate ties to movements best described as theocratic fascist, who has campaigned for the outlawing of abortion and the teaching of creationism.
Palin's speech had the smug, bullying tone of an episode of the O’Reilly Factor on Fox - lashing out at the “cosmopolitans,” the “Hollywood liberals,” those who are concerned about whether detainees get “read their rights.” When Adolf Hitler rallied the angry “volk”—the “common people” in Germany—against the “cosmopolitans”— which in Germany, at that time, took extreme concentration in his attacks on the Jews —it was called fascism. What do you call it in the USA?
LINK TO CON.
The reality is that Palin’s speech was a piece of ultra-right demagogy delivered to an audience assembled by what is unquestionably the most reactionary party on the face of the planet, committed to the unrelenting defense of wealth and privilege against the interests of the vast majority of the American people and all of humanity. Assembled in the hall were the foulest elements of American society. The lily-white crowd—the number of black delegates had fallen from 150 in 2004 to 36 in 2008, barely 1.5 percent of the total—included a collection of religious fanatics, racists, anti-Semites and militant defenders of torture, militarism and inequality.
Only such a party could even conceive of someone like Sarah Palin as a candidate for vice president. Palin cast herself as the small-town “hockey mom” determined to go clean up Washington, and as an innocent victim of media disparagement. One would never guess that she was a politician with intimate ties to movements best described as theocratic fascist, who has campaigned for the outlawing of abortion and the teaching of creationism.
Palin's speech had the smug, bullying tone of an episode of the O’Reilly Factor on Fox - lashing out at the “cosmopolitans,” the “Hollywood liberals,” those who are concerned about whether detainees get “read their rights.” When Adolf Hitler rallied the angry “volk”—the “common people” in Germany—against the “cosmopolitans”— which in Germany, at that time, took extreme concentration in his attacks on the Jews —it was called fascism. What do you call it in the USA?
LINK TO CON.
Republicans, stop calling Obama elitist
Because the real reason you don't like him is that he's smarter than you.
By Bill Maher
New Rule: Republicans need to stop saying Barack Obama is an elitist, or looks down on rural people, and just admit you don't like him because of something he can't help, something that's a result of the way he was born. Admit it, you're not voting for him because he's smarter than you.
In her acceptance speech, Gov. Sarah Palin accused Obama of using his run for the White House as a "journey of personal discovery" -- this from the lady who just spent 10 minutes of her speech introducing her family -- Track, Trig, Bristol, Piper -- for a minute there I thought she was calling in an airstrike.
Karl Rove described Obama as "the guy at the country club with the beautiful date, holding a martini, and making snide comments about everyone who passes by." Unlike George Bush, who's the guy at the country club who makes snide comments, and then passes out. Now this characterization, of course, was something Mr. Rove just completely pulled out of his bulbous, gelatinous ass, but remember this is America, a land where people believe anything they hear. One of McCain's ads casts Obama as "the one," implying he thinks he's the Messiah. Good, maybe he can raise McCain from the dead.
LINK TO CON.
Congressman Lynn Westmoreland Calls Barack Obama "Uppity"
joseph-a-palermo
I'm sure you've heard by now that Congressman Lynn Westmoreland, who represents Georgia's 3rd district, when asked to comment on John McCain's pick of Sarah Palin for vice president and contrast her with Michelle Obama said: "Just from what little I've seen of her and Mr. Obama, Senator Obama, they're a member of an elitist-class individual that thinks that they're uppity." [sic] When the reporter asked if "uppity" was really the word he wished to use, Westmoreland said: "Uppity, yeah."
Last year, Westmoreland was one of only two members of Congress (422-2) to vote against a bill named after the slain 14-year-old African-American boy, Emmett Till, which would provide funds to the FBI to investigate killings during the civil rights era. He sponsored a bill to post the Ten Commandments in the House and the Senate but can't even name all ten of them by memory. He recently held vigil in the House with other Republican dead-enders demanding that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi call the chamber into session to appease their "Drill here, Drill now!" demands. Said Westmoreland: "This is about Nancy Pelosi versus the people of the United States. She's elected by the San Francisco mentality." Westmoreland apparently considers Californians "uppity" too because we don't want to sacrifice a $6 billion-a-year tourist industry that employs 2 million people so that oil conglomerates can rake in more record profits and good ol' boys in Westmoreland's district can pump gas into their trucks and hummers that is a few pennies cheaper in 10 years (while the planet continues to heat up).
LINK TO CON.
Because the real reason you don't like him is that he's smarter than you.
By Bill Maher
New Rule: Republicans need to stop saying Barack Obama is an elitist, or looks down on rural people, and just admit you don't like him because of something he can't help, something that's a result of the way he was born. Admit it, you're not voting for him because he's smarter than you.
In her acceptance speech, Gov. Sarah Palin accused Obama of using his run for the White House as a "journey of personal discovery" -- this from the lady who just spent 10 minutes of her speech introducing her family -- Track, Trig, Bristol, Piper -- for a minute there I thought she was calling in an airstrike.
Karl Rove described Obama as "the guy at the country club with the beautiful date, holding a martini, and making snide comments about everyone who passes by." Unlike George Bush, who's the guy at the country club who makes snide comments, and then passes out. Now this characterization, of course, was something Mr. Rove just completely pulled out of his bulbous, gelatinous ass, but remember this is America, a land where people believe anything they hear. One of McCain's ads casts Obama as "the one," implying he thinks he's the Messiah. Good, maybe he can raise McCain from the dead.
LINK TO CON.
Congressman Lynn Westmoreland Calls Barack Obama "Uppity"
joseph-a-palermo
I'm sure you've heard by now that Congressman Lynn Westmoreland, who represents Georgia's 3rd district, when asked to comment on John McCain's pick of Sarah Palin for vice president and contrast her with Michelle Obama said: "Just from what little I've seen of her and Mr. Obama, Senator Obama, they're a member of an elitist-class individual that thinks that they're uppity." [sic] When the reporter asked if "uppity" was really the word he wished to use, Westmoreland said: "Uppity, yeah."
Last year, Westmoreland was one of only two members of Congress (422-2) to vote against a bill named after the slain 14-year-old African-American boy, Emmett Till, which would provide funds to the FBI to investigate killings during the civil rights era. He sponsored a bill to post the Ten Commandments in the House and the Senate but can't even name all ten of them by memory. He recently held vigil in the House with other Republican dead-enders demanding that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi call the chamber into session to appease their "Drill here, Drill now!" demands. Said Westmoreland: "This is about Nancy Pelosi versus the people of the United States. She's elected by the San Francisco mentality." Westmoreland apparently considers Californians "uppity" too because we don't want to sacrifice a $6 billion-a-year tourist industry that employs 2 million people so that oil conglomerates can rake in more record profits and good ol' boys in Westmoreland's district can pump gas into their trucks and hummers that is a few pennies cheaper in 10 years (while the planet continues to heat up).
LINK TO CON.
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Remembering 9/11 and Moving Towards a Re-United States of America
Dennis J Kucinich
We suffer in our remembrance of 9/11, because of the terrible loss of innocent lives on that grim day. We also suffer because 9/11 was seized as an opportunity to run a political agenda... It is not simply 9/11 that needs to be remembered. We also need to remember the politicization of 9/11 and the polarizing narrative which followed... As we were all victims of 9/11, so we have become victims of the interpretation of 9/11.
9/11 Op-Ed article by Dennis Kucinich:
America must move from the errant, retributive justice of 9/11 to a healing, restorative process of truth and reconciliation.
Before the Congress adjourns, I will bring forth a new proposal for the establishment of a National Commission on Truth and Reconciliation, which will have the power to compel testimony and gather official documents to reveal to the American people not only the underlying deception which has divided us, but in that process of truth seeking set our nation on a path of reconciliation.
We suffer in our remembrance of 9/11, because of the terrible loss of innocent lives on that grim day. We also suffer because 9/11 was seized as an opportunity to run a political agenda, which has set America on a course of the destruction of another nation and the destruction of our own Constitution. And we have become less secure as a result of the warped practice of pursing peace through the exercise of pre-emptive military strength.
It is not simply 9/11 that needs to be remembered. We also need to remember the politicization of 9/11 and the polarizing narrative which followed, locking us into endless conflict, a war on terror which has wrought further terror worldwide and which has severely damaged our standing worldwide as an honorable, compassionate nation. As we were all victims of 9/11, so we have become victims of the interpretation of 9/11.
LINK TO CON.
Dennis J Kucinich
We suffer in our remembrance of 9/11, because of the terrible loss of innocent lives on that grim day. We also suffer because 9/11 was seized as an opportunity to run a political agenda... It is not simply 9/11 that needs to be remembered. We also need to remember the politicization of 9/11 and the polarizing narrative which followed... As we were all victims of 9/11, so we have become victims of the interpretation of 9/11.
9/11 Op-Ed article by Dennis Kucinich:
America must move from the errant, retributive justice of 9/11 to a healing, restorative process of truth and reconciliation.
Before the Congress adjourns, I will bring forth a new proposal for the establishment of a National Commission on Truth and Reconciliation, which will have the power to compel testimony and gather official documents to reveal to the American people not only the underlying deception which has divided us, but in that process of truth seeking set our nation on a path of reconciliation.
We suffer in our remembrance of 9/11, because of the terrible loss of innocent lives on that grim day. We also suffer because 9/11 was seized as an opportunity to run a political agenda, which has set America on a course of the destruction of another nation and the destruction of our own Constitution. And we have become less secure as a result of the warped practice of pursing peace through the exercise of pre-emptive military strength.
It is not simply 9/11 that needs to be remembered. We also need to remember the politicization of 9/11 and the polarizing narrative which followed, locking us into endless conflict, a war on terror which has wrought further terror worldwide and which has severely damaged our standing worldwide as an honorable, compassionate nation. As we were all victims of 9/11, so we have become victims of the interpretation of 9/11.
LINK TO CON.
Tuesday, September 09, 2008
What I hear when creationists speak
PZ Myers
I like it. This is a perfect analogy to creationist argument.
The theory of childhood, also known as child origin, is a damnable, loathsome and indefensible lie. How can any thinking person suppose all humans used to be babies once? There is no development path from babies to adults, no transitional forms between these two species. Show me even one baby with the head of a grown man on his body. Can you? No? Not even a bearded toddler? No adults with unfused skullbones, outside unfortunate disorders? Not even a tiny little newborn girl suddenly sprouting a respectable bosom? You can't find them, because they don't exist. There isn't a single transitional form between children and adults, and you will never find one because the theory simply is an unscientific lie.
The development of children has been well-researched in our six-month study following a sample of one thousand children and adults of various ages. We have conclusively proven that while there are minor changes in features like height and body fat, and replacement of deciduous teeth with permanent teeth, incontravertibly still every creature in the study that started out as a child had only slightly more adult features at the end of the observation period than at its beginning. Children and adults are separate kinds and there will never be sufficient changes to change one into the other. We reject any evidence from longer-term studies as we believe the laws of physics have changed within the last year
LINK TO CON.
PZ Myers
I like it. This is a perfect analogy to creationist argument.
The theory of childhood, also known as child origin, is a damnable, loathsome and indefensible lie. How can any thinking person suppose all humans used to be babies once? There is no development path from babies to adults, no transitional forms between these two species. Show me even one baby with the head of a grown man on his body. Can you? No? Not even a bearded toddler? No adults with unfused skullbones, outside unfortunate disorders? Not even a tiny little newborn girl suddenly sprouting a respectable bosom? You can't find them, because they don't exist. There isn't a single transitional form between children and adults, and you will never find one because the theory simply is an unscientific lie.
The development of children has been well-researched in our six-month study following a sample of one thousand children and adults of various ages. We have conclusively proven that while there are minor changes in features like height and body fat, and replacement of deciduous teeth with permanent teeth, incontravertibly still every creature in the study that started out as a child had only slightly more adult features at the end of the observation period than at its beginning. Children and adults are separate kinds and there will never be sufficient changes to change one into the other. We reject any evidence from longer-term studies as we believe the laws of physics have changed within the last year
LINK TO CON.
(Lets fill are prisons with some more petty drug dealers/users....stupid stupid. I think California has the best plan...just limit sales to minors!!)
Hallucinogen’s Popularity May Thwart Medical Use
By KEVIN SACK and BRENT McDONALD, NY TIMES
With a friend videotaping, 27-year-old Christopher Lenzini of Dallas took a hit of Salvia divinorum, regarded as the world’s most potent hallucinogenic herb, and soon began to imagine, he said, that he was in a boat with little green men. Mr. Lenzini quickly collapsed to the floor and dissolved into convulsive laughter. When he posted the video on YouTube this summer, friends could not get enough. “It’s just funny to see a friend act like a total idiot,” he said, “so everybody loved it.”
Until a decade ago, the use of salvia was largely limited to those seeking revelation under the tutelage of Mazatec shamans in its native Oaxaca, Mexico. Today, this mind-altering member of the mint family is broadly available for lawful sale online and in head shops across the United States. Though older Americans typically have never heard of salvia, the psychoactive sage has become something of a phenomenon among this country’s thrill-seeking youth.
LINK TO CON.
Hallucinogen’s Popularity May Thwart Medical Use
By KEVIN SACK and BRENT McDONALD, NY TIMES
With a friend videotaping, 27-year-old Christopher Lenzini of Dallas took a hit of Salvia divinorum, regarded as the world’s most potent hallucinogenic herb, and soon began to imagine, he said, that he was in a boat with little green men. Mr. Lenzini quickly collapsed to the floor and dissolved into convulsive laughter. When he posted the video on YouTube this summer, friends could not get enough. “It’s just funny to see a friend act like a total idiot,” he said, “so everybody loved it.”
Until a decade ago, the use of salvia was largely limited to those seeking revelation under the tutelage of Mazatec shamans in its native Oaxaca, Mexico. Today, this mind-altering member of the mint family is broadly available for lawful sale online and in head shops across the United States. Though older Americans typically have never heard of salvia, the psychoactive sage has become something of a phenomenon among this country’s thrill-seeking youth.
LINK TO CON.
Country Last
By David Michael Green
Did you also know that he was a POW, and that he was a POW?
Now that I've recapped seventy percent of the Republican Convention last week, let me fill in the remaining 30 percent: hypocrisy, arrogance, lies and bullshit.
What an unbelievable ride the last week has been, though that will be the fundamental question of this election: Will it be believable? Can Republicans use the old magic successfully one more time? Has the American public, even an angry American public, been dumbed down sufficiently in recent decades to vote against its own interests, yet one more time, even under conditions like those of 2008?
Really, nothing less than American democracy lies in the balance, and the fact that so many folks are still susceptible to this horror show is dispiriting in the extreme. Watching the Rovoclones at the RNC in action was such a scary sight. Orwell had it so right. Of course we're at war with Eurasia. We've always been at war with Eurasia. If you can fool people under these conditions with patriotic peacocks and über-elite fake outrage over ‘liberal elitism', you can basically fool them anytime.
McCain began the week with an act that, in any healthy democracy, would have instantly disqualified him to be the city dogcatcher in Wasilla, Alaska, let alone leader of the free world. He has been telling us for years that the fight against Islamofascism is the transcendental struggle of our time. He has been telling us the most important job of the Vice President is be qualified to run the country at a moment's notice (not least because this particular dude is a seventy-two year-old four-time cancer survivor). He's been telling us over and over that Iraq is the central front in the war against terrorism. Then he chooses someone who has admitted that she doesn't really know anything about Iraq, ‘cause she's been focused on Alaska state government. Given that the war has been the premier foreign policy issue for America for half a decade now, we also can safely assume, I'm sure, that she knows even less about the rest of the world.
This definitely demonstrates two things about John McCain. First, that his judgement is deeply impaired. We know, for example, that he had hardly vetted Sarah Palin at all, other than within the last couple of days before the announcement. We know, from Alaskan Republicans no less, that no one from the McCain campaign was up there asking questions prior to the choice (but they are now!). We know that McCain had met her all of once before making the choice. Americans really need to ask themselves, do we truly want another four years of a president who goes on gut hunches and politicizes every decision?
LINK TO CON.
By David Michael Green
Did you also know that he was a POW, and that he was a POW?
Now that I've recapped seventy percent of the Republican Convention last week, let me fill in the remaining 30 percent: hypocrisy, arrogance, lies and bullshit.
What an unbelievable ride the last week has been, though that will be the fundamental question of this election: Will it be believable? Can Republicans use the old magic successfully one more time? Has the American public, even an angry American public, been dumbed down sufficiently in recent decades to vote against its own interests, yet one more time, even under conditions like those of 2008?
Really, nothing less than American democracy lies in the balance, and the fact that so many folks are still susceptible to this horror show is dispiriting in the extreme. Watching the Rovoclones at the RNC in action was such a scary sight. Orwell had it so right. Of course we're at war with Eurasia. We've always been at war with Eurasia. If you can fool people under these conditions with patriotic peacocks and über-elite fake outrage over ‘liberal elitism', you can basically fool them anytime.
McCain began the week with an act that, in any healthy democracy, would have instantly disqualified him to be the city dogcatcher in Wasilla, Alaska, let alone leader of the free world. He has been telling us for years that the fight against Islamofascism is the transcendental struggle of our time. He has been telling us the most important job of the Vice President is be qualified to run the country at a moment's notice (not least because this particular dude is a seventy-two year-old four-time cancer survivor). He's been telling us over and over that Iraq is the central front in the war against terrorism. Then he chooses someone who has admitted that she doesn't really know anything about Iraq, ‘cause she's been focused on Alaska state government. Given that the war has been the premier foreign policy issue for America for half a decade now, we also can safely assume, I'm sure, that she knows even less about the rest of the world.
This definitely demonstrates two things about John McCain. First, that his judgement is deeply impaired. We know, for example, that he had hardly vetted Sarah Palin at all, other than within the last couple of days before the announcement. We know, from Alaskan Republicans no less, that no one from the McCain campaign was up there asking questions prior to the choice (but they are now!). We know that McCain had met her all of once before making the choice. Americans really need to ask themselves, do we truly want another four years of a president who goes on gut hunches and politicizes every decision?
LINK TO CON.
Palin's Churches and the Third Wave
The 10 minute video documentary "Sarah Palin's Churches and The New Wave" (currently also titled as "Sarah Palin's Demon Haunted Churches)
By Bruce Wilson
Along with her entire family, Sarah Palin was re-baptized at twelve at the Wasilla Assembly of God in Wasilla, Alaska and she attended the church from the time she was ten until 2002: over two and 1/2 decades. Sarah Palin's extensive pattern of association with the Wasilla Assembly of God has continued nearly up to the day she was picked by Senator John McCain as a vice-presidential running mate. Palin's dedication to the Wasilla church is indicated by a Saturday, September 7, 2008, McClatchy news service story detailing possibly improper use of state travel funds by Palin for a trip she made to Wasilla, Alaska to attend, on June 8, 2008, both a Wasilla Assembly of God "Masters Commission" graduation ceremony and also a multi-church Wasilla area event known as "One Lord Sunday." At the latter event, Palin and Alaska LT Governor Scott Parnell were publicly blessed, onstage before an estimated crowd of 6,000, through the "laying on of hands" by Wasilla Assembly of God's Head Pastor Ed Kalnins whose sermons espouse such theological concepts as the possession of geographic territories by demonic spirits and the inter-generational transmission of family "curses". Palin has also been blessed, or "anointed," by an African cleric, prominent in the Third Wave movement, who has repeatedly visited the Wasilla Assembly of God and claims to have effected positive, dramatic social change in a Kenyan town by driving out a "spirit of witchcraft."
The Wasilla Assembly of God church is deeply involved with both Third Wave activities and theology. Their Master's Commission program is part of an three year post-high school international training program with studies in prophecy, intercessory prayer, Biblical exegesis, authority and leadership. The pastor, Ed Kalnins, and Masters Commission students have traveled to South Carolina to participate in a "prophetic conference" at Morningstar Ministries, one of the major ministries of the Third Wave movement. Becky Fischer was a pastor at Morningstar prior to being featured in the movie "Jesus Camp." The head of prophecy at Morningstar, Steve Thompson, is currently scheduled to do a prophecy seminar at the Wasilla Assembly of God. Other major leaders in the movement have also traveled to Wasilla to visit and speak at the church.
LINK to con. and to video
The 10 minute video documentary "Sarah Palin's Churches and The New Wave" (currently also titled as "Sarah Palin's Demon Haunted Churches)
By Bruce Wilson
Along with her entire family, Sarah Palin was re-baptized at twelve at the Wasilla Assembly of God in Wasilla, Alaska and she attended the church from the time she was ten until 2002: over two and 1/2 decades. Sarah Palin's extensive pattern of association with the Wasilla Assembly of God has continued nearly up to the day she was picked by Senator John McCain as a vice-presidential running mate. Palin's dedication to the Wasilla church is indicated by a Saturday, September 7, 2008, McClatchy news service story detailing possibly improper use of state travel funds by Palin for a trip she made to Wasilla, Alaska to attend, on June 8, 2008, both a Wasilla Assembly of God "Masters Commission" graduation ceremony and also a multi-church Wasilla area event known as "One Lord Sunday." At the latter event, Palin and Alaska LT Governor Scott Parnell were publicly blessed, onstage before an estimated crowd of 6,000, through the "laying on of hands" by Wasilla Assembly of God's Head Pastor Ed Kalnins whose sermons espouse such theological concepts as the possession of geographic territories by demonic spirits and the inter-generational transmission of family "curses". Palin has also been blessed, or "anointed," by an African cleric, prominent in the Third Wave movement, who has repeatedly visited the Wasilla Assembly of God and claims to have effected positive, dramatic social change in a Kenyan town by driving out a "spirit of witchcraft."
The Wasilla Assembly of God church is deeply involved with both Third Wave activities and theology. Their Master's Commission program is part of an three year post-high school international training program with studies in prophecy, intercessory prayer, Biblical exegesis, authority and leadership. The pastor, Ed Kalnins, and Masters Commission students have traveled to South Carolina to participate in a "prophetic conference" at Morningstar Ministries, one of the major ministries of the Third Wave movement. Becky Fischer was a pastor at Morningstar prior to being featured in the movie "Jesus Camp." The head of prophecy at Morningstar, Steve Thompson, is currently scheduled to do a prophecy seminar at the Wasilla Assembly of God. Other major leaders in the movement have also traveled to Wasilla to visit and speak at the church.
LINK to con. and to video
Sunday, September 07, 2008
That Dam Senator
A River Ran Through Him
By JEFFREY ST. CLAIR
“The dam is a con.”
-- Jake Gittes, Chinatown
As any fan of the movie Chinatown knows, in the American West one commodity reigns supreme. Not oil or timber, not gold or silicon chips, but water which flows its glistening way through the body politic, providing nourishment for corruption.
The latest politician caught in a crooked water grab is Colorado’s Ben Nighthorse Campbell, the Harley-riding former Democrat who jumped the divide to the Republicans in the wake of the 1994 elections. The move didn’t surprise observers who had followed Campbell’s career. The senator had modeled himself after Wayne Aspinall, an anti-environmental congressman from western Colorado who orchestrated the spasm of dam-building, mining, and logging in the West in the late 1950s and 1960s. Campbell shared Aspinall’s vision, but he’s never exhibited his grandiose malignity. Campbell’s politics have rarely risen above the petty and the personal.
In the summer of 1998, Campbell concocted a bill to transfer the federally-owned Vallecitos reservoir and dam, located in southern Colorado near Durango, to the privately-owned Pine River Irrigation District. As originally devised, the legislation would have sold the federal property to the ranching and development group for only $492,000, far below its market value. But by the time the bill had moved out of Campbell’s committee, even that small sum had been excised and both the reservoir and the dam were offered on behalf of we-the-people to the Pine River organization for free. In a speech on the Senate floor, Campbell said the transfer was needed in order to give citizens “local control” over their water supplies. The bill flew through the Senate unanimously on a voice vote on October 8, 1998, but stalled when the Congress adjourned before the House could take up the legislation.
LINK TO CON.
A River Ran Through Him
By JEFFREY ST. CLAIR
“The dam is a con.”
-- Jake Gittes, Chinatown
As any fan of the movie Chinatown knows, in the American West one commodity reigns supreme. Not oil or timber, not gold or silicon chips, but water which flows its glistening way through the body politic, providing nourishment for corruption.
The latest politician caught in a crooked water grab is Colorado’s Ben Nighthorse Campbell, the Harley-riding former Democrat who jumped the divide to the Republicans in the wake of the 1994 elections. The move didn’t surprise observers who had followed Campbell’s career. The senator had modeled himself after Wayne Aspinall, an anti-environmental congressman from western Colorado who orchestrated the spasm of dam-building, mining, and logging in the West in the late 1950s and 1960s. Campbell shared Aspinall’s vision, but he’s never exhibited his grandiose malignity. Campbell’s politics have rarely risen above the petty and the personal.
In the summer of 1998, Campbell concocted a bill to transfer the federally-owned Vallecitos reservoir and dam, located in southern Colorado near Durango, to the privately-owned Pine River Irrigation District. As originally devised, the legislation would have sold the federal property to the ranching and development group for only $492,000, far below its market value. But by the time the bill had moved out of Campbell’s committee, even that small sum had been excised and both the reservoir and the dam were offered on behalf of we-the-people to the Pine River organization for free. In a speech on the Senate floor, Campbell said the transfer was needed in order to give citizens “local control” over their water supplies. The bill flew through the Senate unanimously on a voice vote on October 8, 1998, but stalled when the Congress adjourned before the House could take up the legislation.
LINK TO CON.
Colleges take on drinking age
A call to examine the age-21 threshold has sparked heated debate on campuses.
By Stacy Teicher Khadaroo
Would lowering the drinking age make alcohol problems more or less prevalent on campus? In a bold challenge to the decades-old status quo, 129 college presidents have signed a statement calling on elected officials "to support an informed and dispassionate public debate over the effects of the 21-year-old drinking age."
Known as the Amethyst Initiative, it has stirred discussions on campuses and editorial pages across the United States. It's also drawn stinging criticism from groups such as Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), which defends the age limit as a key factor in reducing traffic fatalities.
"We agree there are terrible problems with binge and underage drinking. We just don't agree on their proposed solution, that being lowering the drinking age," says MADD president Laura Dean-Mooney in a phone interview. In the group's press release in mid-August, she urged parents to "think twice before sending their teens to these colleges or any others that have waved the white flag on underage and binge-drinking policies."
LINK TO CON.
A call to examine the age-21 threshold has sparked heated debate on campuses.
By Stacy Teicher Khadaroo
Would lowering the drinking age make alcohol problems more or less prevalent on campus? In a bold challenge to the decades-old status quo, 129 college presidents have signed a statement calling on elected officials "to support an informed and dispassionate public debate over the effects of the 21-year-old drinking age."
Known as the Amethyst Initiative, it has stirred discussions on campuses and editorial pages across the United States. It's also drawn stinging criticism from groups such as Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD), which defends the age limit as a key factor in reducing traffic fatalities.
"We agree there are terrible problems with binge and underage drinking. We just don't agree on their proposed solution, that being lowering the drinking age," says MADD president Laura Dean-Mooney in a phone interview. In the group's press release in mid-August, she urged parents to "think twice before sending their teens to these colleges or any others that have waved the white flag on underage and binge-drinking policies."
LINK TO CON.
“It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. … Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust.
A man’s ethical behaviour should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death.”
-Albert Einstein
A man’s ethical behaviour should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death.”
-Albert Einstein
Africa Becoming a Biofuel Battleground
By Horand Knaup
Western companies are pushing to acquire vast stretches of African land to meet the world's biofuel needs. Local farmers and governments are being showered with promises. But is this just another form of economic colonialism?
Everything will turn out alright. Correction: everything is going to get better. There will be new roads, a new school, a pharmacy, even a proper water supply. Most of all, there will be jobs -- 5,000, at the very least. "If there are jobs for us, then it's a good thing," says Juma Njagu, 26, who hopes to be able to leave his meager existence as a planter and charburner behind soon.
Njagu lives in Mtamba, a village of about 1,100 souls in Tanzania's Kisarawe district, about 70 kilometers (43 miles) south-west of Dar es Salaam, the capital and largest city. Mtamba, accessible by dirt road, is a place where people scrape by on a bit of farming, a bit of fishing and the production of charcoal. There isn't much else in Mtamba.
That could change if the British firm Sun Biofuels goes ahead with plans to produce biodiesel fuel from "Jatropha curcas," an energy plant with a high oil content, which it hopes to plant on Kisarawe's farmland.
LINK TO CON.
By Horand Knaup
Western companies are pushing to acquire vast stretches of African land to meet the world's biofuel needs. Local farmers and governments are being showered with promises. But is this just another form of economic colonialism?
Everything will turn out alright. Correction: everything is going to get better. There will be new roads, a new school, a pharmacy, even a proper water supply. Most of all, there will be jobs -- 5,000, at the very least. "If there are jobs for us, then it's a good thing," says Juma Njagu, 26, who hopes to be able to leave his meager existence as a planter and charburner behind soon.
Njagu lives in Mtamba, a village of about 1,100 souls in Tanzania's Kisarawe district, about 70 kilometers (43 miles) south-west of Dar es Salaam, the capital and largest city. Mtamba, accessible by dirt road, is a place where people scrape by on a bit of farming, a bit of fishing and the production of charcoal. There isn't much else in Mtamba.
That could change if the British firm Sun Biofuels goes ahead with plans to produce biodiesel fuel from "Jatropha curcas," an energy plant with a high oil content, which it hopes to plant on Kisarawe's farmland.
LINK TO CON.
Running From Reality
By BOB HERBERT, NY TIMES
If there was one pre-eminent characteristic of the Republican convention this week, it was the quality of deception. Words completely lost their meaning. Reality was turned upside down. From the faux populist gibberish mouthed by speaker after speaker, you would never have known that the Republicans have been in power over the past several years and used that titanic power to lead the country to its present sorry state.
In his acceptance speech on Thursday night, Senator John McCain did his best Sam Cooke imitation (“A Change is Gonna Come”) and vowed to put the country “back on the road to prosperity and peace.”
Mr. McCain spoke at the end of a day in which stock market indexes plunged. The next morning the Labor Department gave us the grim news that another 84,000 jobs had been lost in August, and that the official unemployment rate had climbed to 6.1 percent — the highest in five years.
If there were any good ideas at this convention of mostly rich and mostly right-wing delegates about how to haul the country out of this mess that the G.O.P. has gotten it into, they were kept well hidden. Perhaps they were tucked away behind the more prominently displayed creationism and “just-say-no to global warming” documents.
Link to continue
By BOB HERBERT, NY TIMES
If there was one pre-eminent characteristic of the Republican convention this week, it was the quality of deception. Words completely lost their meaning. Reality was turned upside down. From the faux populist gibberish mouthed by speaker after speaker, you would never have known that the Republicans have been in power over the past several years and used that titanic power to lead the country to its present sorry state.
In his acceptance speech on Thursday night, Senator John McCain did his best Sam Cooke imitation (“A Change is Gonna Come”) and vowed to put the country “back on the road to prosperity and peace.”
Mr. McCain spoke at the end of a day in which stock market indexes plunged. The next morning the Labor Department gave us the grim news that another 84,000 jobs had been lost in August, and that the official unemployment rate had climbed to 6.1 percent — the highest in five years.
If there were any good ideas at this convention of mostly rich and mostly right-wing delegates about how to haul the country out of this mess that the G.O.P. has gotten it into, they were kept well hidden. Perhaps they were tucked away behind the more prominently displayed creationism and “just-say-no to global warming” documents.
Link to continue
Palin: the real scandal
By Leonard Doyle
Seen from the air, Sarah Palin's state is an environmental wonderland. From Anchorage to the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, there is a vast landscape of snow-capped peaks, fjords, crystal glaciers, coastal lagoons, wide river deltas and tundra. The guardian of this wilderness – and Governor of Alaska – has, this week, become one of the most recognisable faces in the world. But behind her beaming smile and wholesome family values is a woman aligned with the big oil and coal firms that are racing to exploit Alaska's vast energy reserves. In the short term, that has bought her popularity at home.
"I love the woman," the pilot on our flight shouts over the noise of the engine, "especially what she wants to do with oil, we just have to drill more, there is no alternative. What's the point of leaving it all in the ground?"
It is a stance that guaranteed John McCain's new running mate a rapturous reception at the Republican convention this week where the response to the coming energy crisis was a chant of "drill, baby, drill".
Link to con.
By Leonard Doyle
Seen from the air, Sarah Palin's state is an environmental wonderland. From Anchorage to the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, there is a vast landscape of snow-capped peaks, fjords, crystal glaciers, coastal lagoons, wide river deltas and tundra. The guardian of this wilderness – and Governor of Alaska – has, this week, become one of the most recognisable faces in the world. But behind her beaming smile and wholesome family values is a woman aligned with the big oil and coal firms that are racing to exploit Alaska's vast energy reserves. In the short term, that has bought her popularity at home.
"I love the woman," the pilot on our flight shouts over the noise of the engine, "especially what she wants to do with oil, we just have to drill more, there is no alternative. What's the point of leaving it all in the ground?"
It is a stance that guaranteed John McCain's new running mate a rapturous reception at the Republican convention this week where the response to the coming energy crisis was a chant of "drill, baby, drill".
Link to con.
Palin, with her meat loaf and rifles, reminds us that there are two hopelessly incompatible Americas
By Linda Grant
A Photoshopped picture of Sarah Palin has been doing the rounds for the past few days; it shows her in a stars and stripes bikini toting a rifle - patriotism, hunting and cheesecake all combined in one image. Two minutes of Googling reveals that the rifle has been identified by gun nuts in Republican chatrooms as a Crossman pump pellet gun. Soft porn for rednecks. Expect to see it pinned to the wall in every gas station in Texas and tacked to the dashboard of every long-haul truck. But this cartoon-like depiction of her smothers what we need to understand about why Palin appeals to American voters and why American elections have been so deadlocked for the past decade, as if there were two Americas, doomed to lived on the same landmass under the same government, like hopelessly incompatible spouses.
A new novel, American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld, published in the US this week, tells a fictionalised and thinly veiled story of Laura Bush, from small-town girl in the 1950s midwest to school librarian to Republican bride to President's wife. What you learn from the novel is that, like it or not, the American heartland is not so much a political ideology but an actual place with people living in it. Small-town Americans have values and a lot of those values are good ones: neighbourliness, family life, a knowledge of the land and what grows in it. The other America they see on TV seems without ethics - crime, violence, drug addiction, pornography and prostitution - and they don't want any part of it.
Link to con.
By Linda Grant
A Photoshopped picture of Sarah Palin has been doing the rounds for the past few days; it shows her in a stars and stripes bikini toting a rifle - patriotism, hunting and cheesecake all combined in one image. Two minutes of Googling reveals that the rifle has been identified by gun nuts in Republican chatrooms as a Crossman pump pellet gun. Soft porn for rednecks. Expect to see it pinned to the wall in every gas station in Texas and tacked to the dashboard of every long-haul truck. But this cartoon-like depiction of her smothers what we need to understand about why Palin appeals to American voters and why American elections have been so deadlocked for the past decade, as if there were two Americas, doomed to lived on the same landmass under the same government, like hopelessly incompatible spouses.
A new novel, American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld, published in the US this week, tells a fictionalised and thinly veiled story of Laura Bush, from small-town girl in the 1950s midwest to school librarian to Republican bride to President's wife. What you learn from the novel is that, like it or not, the American heartland is not so much a political ideology but an actual place with people living in it. Small-town Americans have values and a lot of those values are good ones: neighbourliness, family life, a knowledge of the land and what grows in it. The other America they see on TV seems without ethics - crime, violence, drug addiction, pornography and prostitution - and they don't want any part of it.
Link to con.
Friday, September 05, 2008
The Resentment Strategy
By PAUL KRUGMAN, NY TIMES
Can the super-rich former governor of Massachusetts — the son of a Fortune 500 C.E.O. who made a vast fortune in the leveraged-buyout business — really keep a straight face while denouncing “Eastern elites”?
Can the former mayor of New York City, a man who, as USA Today put it, “marched in gay pride parades, dressed up in drag and lived temporarily with a gay couple and their Shih Tzu” — that was between his second and third marriages — really get away with saying that Barack Obama doesn’t think small towns are sufficiently “cosmopolitan”?
Can the vice-presidential candidate of a party that has controlled the White House, Congress or both for 26 of the past 28 years, a party that, Borg-like, assimilated much of the D.C. lobbying industry into itself — until Congress changed hands, high-paying lobbying jobs were reserved for loyal Republicans — really portray herself as running against the “Washington elite”?
Yes, they can.
LINK TO CON.
By PAUL KRUGMAN, NY TIMES
Can the super-rich former governor of Massachusetts — the son of a Fortune 500 C.E.O. who made a vast fortune in the leveraged-buyout business — really keep a straight face while denouncing “Eastern elites”?
Can the former mayor of New York City, a man who, as USA Today put it, “marched in gay pride parades, dressed up in drag and lived temporarily with a gay couple and their Shih Tzu” — that was between his second and third marriages — really get away with saying that Barack Obama doesn’t think small towns are sufficiently “cosmopolitan”?
Can the vice-presidential candidate of a party that has controlled the White House, Congress or both for 26 of the past 28 years, a party that, Borg-like, assimilated much of the D.C. lobbying industry into itself — until Congress changed hands, high-paying lobbying jobs were reserved for loyal Republicans — really portray herself as running against the “Washington elite”?
Yes, they can.
LINK TO CON.
Robert Christgau on America’s Secret Fundamentalists
By Robert Christgau
Any believer in American democracy is obliged to come to terms with a wing of the citizenry few secular humanists have the wherewithal to think about—Christians. Not mainline modernists, so useful for validating progressive pieties when we godless need moral ballast, but the 75 million Americans whose Christianity takes such modifiers as the respectable evangelical, the unapologetic fundamentalist, the doctrinal Bible-believing, the thoughtful convinced and the emotional born-again. Especially the white ones, of course—even black churches that oppose abortion and homosexuality are aligned with the social gospel, while Latino Pentecostals and Korean Presbyterians generally gather in their own congregations. Anyway, secular humanists are inclined to cut African-Americans and immigrants some slack. White Middle Americans they have a problem with.
These generalizations are crude, obviously. For one thing, there are plenty of secular humanists in Middle America, where proximity mitigates incomprehension a little. But in New York, my eternal home, folks are less sophisticated. As someone whose atheism proceeds directly from his demographically unlikely childhood in a fundamentalist church in Queens, and whose brother has spent his life ministering to conservative churches in various distant suburbs, I got on this problem back when my colleagues at The Village Voice dismissed Jimmy Carter out of hand because he was a Southern Baptist. I argued back then that the specifics of Carter’s religious history suggested levels of honesty and compassion unusual in a politician, which turned out to be true—in 2000, Carter quit the by then explicitly right-wing Southern Baptist Convention after a fruitless struggle to moderate it. Other politically prominent Southern Baptists include Pat Robertson, who founded the Christian Broadcasting Network in 1960, and Jerry Falwell, who founded the Moral Majority in 1979. They do not include famed born-againer George W. Bush—or the most devout Christian currently running for president, Barack Obama. Generalizations are often crude.
LINK TO CON.
By Robert Christgau
Any believer in American democracy is obliged to come to terms with a wing of the citizenry few secular humanists have the wherewithal to think about—Christians. Not mainline modernists, so useful for validating progressive pieties when we godless need moral ballast, but the 75 million Americans whose Christianity takes such modifiers as the respectable evangelical, the unapologetic fundamentalist, the doctrinal Bible-believing, the thoughtful convinced and the emotional born-again. Especially the white ones, of course—even black churches that oppose abortion and homosexuality are aligned with the social gospel, while Latino Pentecostals and Korean Presbyterians generally gather in their own congregations. Anyway, secular humanists are inclined to cut African-Americans and immigrants some slack. White Middle Americans they have a problem with.
These generalizations are crude, obviously. For one thing, there are plenty of secular humanists in Middle America, where proximity mitigates incomprehension a little. But in New York, my eternal home, folks are less sophisticated. As someone whose atheism proceeds directly from his demographically unlikely childhood in a fundamentalist church in Queens, and whose brother has spent his life ministering to conservative churches in various distant suburbs, I got on this problem back when my colleagues at The Village Voice dismissed Jimmy Carter out of hand because he was a Southern Baptist. I argued back then that the specifics of Carter’s religious history suggested levels of honesty and compassion unusual in a politician, which turned out to be true—in 2000, Carter quit the by then explicitly right-wing Southern Baptist Convention after a fruitless struggle to moderate it. Other politically prominent Southern Baptists include Pat Robertson, who founded the Christian Broadcasting Network in 1960, and Jerry Falwell, who founded the Moral Majority in 1979. They do not include famed born-againer George W. Bush—or the most devout Christian currently running for president, Barack Obama. Generalizations are often crude.
LINK TO CON.
Thursday, September 04, 2008
Palin: wrong woman, wrong message
Sarah Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Hillary Clinton. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.
By Gloria Steinem
Here's the good news: Women have become so politically powerful that even the anti-feminist right wing -- the folks with a headlock on the Republican Party -- are trying to appease the gender gap with a first-ever female vice president. We owe this to women -- and to many men too -- who have picketed, gone on hunger strikes or confronted violence at the polls so women can vote. We owe it to Shirley Chisholm, who first took the "white-male-only" sign off the White House, and to Hillary Rodham Clinton, who hung in there through ridicule and misogyny to win 18 million votes.
But here is even better news: It won't work. This isn't the first time a boss has picked an unqualified woman just because she agrees with him and opposes everything most other women want and need. Feminism has never been about getting a job for one woman. It's about making life more fair for women everywhere. It's not about a piece of the existing pie; there are too many of us for that. It's about baking a new pie.
LINK TO CON.
Sarah Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Hillary Clinton. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.
By Gloria Steinem
Here's the good news: Women have become so politically powerful that even the anti-feminist right wing -- the folks with a headlock on the Republican Party -- are trying to appease the gender gap with a first-ever female vice president. We owe this to women -- and to many men too -- who have picketed, gone on hunger strikes or confronted violence at the polls so women can vote. We owe it to Shirley Chisholm, who first took the "white-male-only" sign off the White House, and to Hillary Rodham Clinton, who hung in there through ridicule and misogyny to win 18 million votes.
But here is even better news: It won't work. This isn't the first time a boss has picked an unqualified woman just because she agrees with him and opposes everything most other women want and need. Feminism has never been about getting a job for one woman. It's about making life more fair for women everywhere. It's not about a piece of the existing pie; there are too many of us for that. It's about baking a new pie.
LINK TO CON.
As Republicans unveil VP candidate
Democrats silent on threat from religious right
By Bill Van Auken
The Republican National Convention entered its third day Wednesday with the acceptance speech of the party’s vice presidential candidate, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, as the main event.
Palin’s candidacy, which was announced to general surprise if not outright incredulity last week, has been rolled out in a peculiar political atmosphere. The Republican leadership has kept her completely under wraps, canceling all of her public events and denying any access by the media.
The only report of any political activity by Palin at the convention before her Wednesday night speech, which was drafted by a former speechwriter for George W. Bush, came from AIPAC, the Zionist lobbying group. AIPAC said that she had met with its members in private, promising to “work to expand and deepen the strategic partnership between the US and Israel.”
Meanwhile, Republican operatives have been dispatched to Alaska, where they have instructed Palin’s friends and family members not to speak to the media.
For their part, the Democrats have largely maintained a discrete silence on the candidate and her political views. The Democratic Party has avoided any political confrontation with the Republicans during the latter’s convention in Minneapolis.
LINK TO CON.
Democrats silent on threat from religious right
By Bill Van Auken
The Republican National Convention entered its third day Wednesday with the acceptance speech of the party’s vice presidential candidate, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, as the main event.
Palin’s candidacy, which was announced to general surprise if not outright incredulity last week, has been rolled out in a peculiar political atmosphere. The Republican leadership has kept her completely under wraps, canceling all of her public events and denying any access by the media.
The only report of any political activity by Palin at the convention before her Wednesday night speech, which was drafted by a former speechwriter for George W. Bush, came from AIPAC, the Zionist lobbying group. AIPAC said that she had met with its members in private, promising to “work to expand and deepen the strategic partnership between the US and Israel.”
Meanwhile, Republican operatives have been dispatched to Alaska, where they have instructed Palin’s friends and family members not to speak to the media.
For their part, the Democrats have largely maintained a discrete silence on the candidate and her political views. The Democratic Party has avoided any political confrontation with the Republicans during the latter’s convention in Minneapolis.
LINK TO CON.
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Tuesday, September 02, 2008
Can Mexico's Calderón stop the killings?
Tens of thousands protested drug violence this weekend. Many blame the president.
By Sara Miller Llana
In August alone, the teenage son of a Mexican businessman was found dead in the trunk of a car, after being kidnapped at a fake police checkpoint; a dozen decapitated bodies were discovered in the southern state of Yucatán; and in northern Chihuahua state, gunmen fired on a dance hall, killing 13 people, including a baby.
Mexicans have long been fed up with the escalating violence. But 20 months after conservative President Felipe Calderón launched a massive military effort against drug violence, the bloodshed has only gotten worse.
Mr. Calderón has scrambled to assuage public outrage, signing a national pact this month with the country's leaders to improve anticorruption measures for cops and form new antikidnapping squads. But the pressure is on.
Over the weekend, tens of thousands of Mexicans participated in peace marches across Mexico, voicing mounting frustration over the insecurity and impunity that they say is reigning. Calderón responded by meeting Sunday with 14 civic leaders who staged the protests, saying he'd set up citizens' panels to monitor government progress, recruit better police, and equip officers with more powerful weapons. Yet if violence is not reduced, it could backfire for the president who has made security a cornerstone of his leadership.
LINK TO CON.
Tens of thousands protested drug violence this weekend. Many blame the president.
By Sara Miller Llana
In August alone, the teenage son of a Mexican businessman was found dead in the trunk of a car, after being kidnapped at a fake police checkpoint; a dozen decapitated bodies were discovered in the southern state of Yucatán; and in northern Chihuahua state, gunmen fired on a dance hall, killing 13 people, including a baby.
Mexicans have long been fed up with the escalating violence. But 20 months after conservative President Felipe Calderón launched a massive military effort against drug violence, the bloodshed has only gotten worse.
Mr. Calderón has scrambled to assuage public outrage, signing a national pact this month with the country's leaders to improve anticorruption measures for cops and form new antikidnapping squads. But the pressure is on.
Over the weekend, tens of thousands of Mexicans participated in peace marches across Mexico, voicing mounting frustration over the insecurity and impunity that they say is reigning. Calderón responded by meeting Sunday with 14 civic leaders who staged the protests, saying he'd set up citizens' panels to monitor government progress, recruit better police, and equip officers with more powerful weapons. Yet if violence is not reduced, it could backfire for the president who has made security a cornerstone of his leadership.
LINK TO CON.
Is Perpetual War Our Future?
Learning the Wrong Lessons from the Bush Era
By Andrew Bacevich
To appreciate the full extent of the military crisis into which the United States has been plunged requires understanding what the Iraq War and, to a lesser extent, the Afghan War have to teach. These two conflicts, along with the attacks of September 11, 2001, will form the centerpiece of George W. Bush’s legacy. Their lessons ought to constitute the basis of a new, more realistic military policy.
In some respects, the effort to divine those lessons is well under way, spurred by critics of President Bush’s policies on the left and the right as well as by reform-minded members of the officer corps. Broadly speaking, this effort has thus far yielded three distinct conclusions. Whether taken singly or together, they invert the post-Cold War military illusions that provided the foundation for the president’s Global War on Terror. In exchange for these received illusions, they propound new ones, which are equally misguided. Thus far, that is, the lessons drawn from America’s post-9/11 military experience are the wrong ones.
According to the first lesson, the armed services — and above all the Army — need to recognize that the challenges posed by Iraq and Afghanistan define not only the military’s present but also its future, the “next war,” as enthusiasts like to say. Rooting out insurgents, nation-building, training and advising “host nation” forces, population security and control, winning hearts and minds — these promise to be ongoing priorities, preoccupying U.S. troops for decades to come, all across the Islamic world.
LINK TO CON.
Learning the Wrong Lessons from the Bush Era
By Andrew Bacevich
To appreciate the full extent of the military crisis into which the United States has been plunged requires understanding what the Iraq War and, to a lesser extent, the Afghan War have to teach. These two conflicts, along with the attacks of September 11, 2001, will form the centerpiece of George W. Bush’s legacy. Their lessons ought to constitute the basis of a new, more realistic military policy.
In some respects, the effort to divine those lessons is well under way, spurred by critics of President Bush’s policies on the left and the right as well as by reform-minded members of the officer corps. Broadly speaking, this effort has thus far yielded three distinct conclusions. Whether taken singly or together, they invert the post-Cold War military illusions that provided the foundation for the president’s Global War on Terror. In exchange for these received illusions, they propound new ones, which are equally misguided. Thus far, that is, the lessons drawn from America’s post-9/11 military experience are the wrong ones.
According to the first lesson, the armed services — and above all the Army — need to recognize that the challenges posed by Iraq and Afghanistan define not only the military’s present but also its future, the “next war,” as enthusiasts like to say. Rooting out insurgents, nation-building, training and advising “host nation” forces, population security and control, winning hearts and minds — these promise to be ongoing priorities, preoccupying U.S. troops for decades to come, all across the Islamic world.
LINK TO CON.
Global Famine. Is It A Conspiracy?
By Eric Walberg
Food protests and riots have swept more than 20 countries in the past few months. On 2 April, World Bank President Robert Zoellick told a meeting in Washington that there are 33 countries where price hikes could cause widespread social unrest. The UN World Food Programme called the crisis the silent tsunami, with wheat prices almost doubling in the past year alone, and stocks falling to the lowest level since the perilous post-World War II days.
One billion people live on less than $1 a day. Some 850 million are starving. Meanwhile, world food production increased a mere 1 per cent in 2006, and with increasing amounts of output going to biofuels, per capita consumption is declining. The most commonly stated reasons include rising fuel costs, global warming, deterioration of soils, and increased demand in China and India. So is it all just a case of hard luck and poor planning?
There is just too much of a pattern, and too many elements all pointing in the same direction. Anyone following the news will have heard of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) which first met in 1921 and the group that represents the inner circle within the inner circle, the Bilderberg Club, which first met in 1954.
LINK TO CON.
By Eric Walberg
Food protests and riots have swept more than 20 countries in the past few months. On 2 April, World Bank President Robert Zoellick told a meeting in Washington that there are 33 countries where price hikes could cause widespread social unrest. The UN World Food Programme called the crisis the silent tsunami, with wheat prices almost doubling in the past year alone, and stocks falling to the lowest level since the perilous post-World War II days.
One billion people live on less than $1 a day. Some 850 million are starving. Meanwhile, world food production increased a mere 1 per cent in 2006, and with increasing amounts of output going to biofuels, per capita consumption is declining. The most commonly stated reasons include rising fuel costs, global warming, deterioration of soils, and increased demand in China and India. So is it all just a case of hard luck and poor planning?
There is just too much of a pattern, and too many elements all pointing in the same direction. Anyone following the news will have heard of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) which first met in 1921 and the group that represents the inner circle within the inner circle, the Bilderberg Club, which first met in 1954.
LINK TO CON.
Top Ten Most Disturbing Facts and Impressions of Sarah Palin
By AlterNet Staff, AlterNet.
Sarah Palin was named John McCain's vice presidential nominee just three days ago, yet it seems that weeks have passed in terms of the mountains of controversy it has stirred up. An overwhelming amount of negative publicity and sometimes shocking information has come out about her and her relatively short political career.
Choosing Palin has been called alternately a brilliant stroke that reinforces McCain's maverick image and a desperate, irresponsible "Hail Mary" pass in the face of an almost sure defeat in November. The fundamental question being raised: Why Palin? True, her personal narrative has lots of color: former fisherman, NRA hunter, mother of five, small-town mayor, short-term governor of a state with a small population, etc. But that does not qualify her to be a heartbeat away from the presidency.
Anathema to Moderates, Liberals and Progressives
George Lakoff, in an accompanying article, lists some of the issues swirling around Palin:
LINK TO CON.
By AlterNet Staff, AlterNet.
Sarah Palin was named John McCain's vice presidential nominee just three days ago, yet it seems that weeks have passed in terms of the mountains of controversy it has stirred up. An overwhelming amount of negative publicity and sometimes shocking information has come out about her and her relatively short political career.
Choosing Palin has been called alternately a brilliant stroke that reinforces McCain's maverick image and a desperate, irresponsible "Hail Mary" pass in the face of an almost sure defeat in November. The fundamental question being raised: Why Palin? True, her personal narrative has lots of color: former fisherman, NRA hunter, mother of five, small-town mayor, short-term governor of a state with a small population, etc. But that does not qualify her to be a heartbeat away from the presidency.
Anathema to Moderates, Liberals and Progressives
George Lakoff, in an accompanying article, lists some of the issues swirling around Palin:
LINK TO CON.
John McCain and the Telecoms
Making a Killing in Iraq
By NIKOLAS KOZLOFF
It’s no secret that John McCain has been a longtime friend of the telecom industry. Indeed, the Arizona Senator has had important historic ties to big corporations like AT&T, MCI and Qualcomm. In return for their financial contributions, McCain, who partly oversees the telecommunication industry in the Senate, has acted to protect and look out for the political and economic interests of the telecoms on Capitol Hill.
Such connections are well known, yet few have paused to consider how Iraq fits into the wider jigsaw puzzle. Prior to the war in Iraq, McCain was one of the biggest boosters of the invasion. While it’s unclear whether the telecoms actually lobbied McCain on this score, they certainly benefited under the subsequent occupation.
To get a sense of the sheer scope of McCain’s incestuous relationship with the telecoms, one need only log on to the Web site of the Center for Responsive Politics. In the 1998 electoral cycle, AT&T gave $34,000 to McCain. In the 2000 cycle, the telecom giant provided $69,000, in 2002 $61,000, in 2004 $39,000, in 2006 $29,000 and in 2008 $187,000. Over the course of his career, AT&T has been McCain’s second largest corporate backer.
LINK TO CON.
Making a Killing in Iraq
By NIKOLAS KOZLOFF
It’s no secret that John McCain has been a longtime friend of the telecom industry. Indeed, the Arizona Senator has had important historic ties to big corporations like AT&T, MCI and Qualcomm. In return for their financial contributions, McCain, who partly oversees the telecommunication industry in the Senate, has acted to protect and look out for the political and economic interests of the telecoms on Capitol Hill.
Such connections are well known, yet few have paused to consider how Iraq fits into the wider jigsaw puzzle. Prior to the war in Iraq, McCain was one of the biggest boosters of the invasion. While it’s unclear whether the telecoms actually lobbied McCain on this score, they certainly benefited under the subsequent occupation.
To get a sense of the sheer scope of McCain’s incestuous relationship with the telecoms, one need only log on to the Web site of the Center for Responsive Politics. In the 1998 electoral cycle, AT&T gave $34,000 to McCain. In the 2000 cycle, the telecom giant provided $69,000, in 2002 $61,000, in 2004 $39,000, in 2006 $29,000 and in 2008 $187,000. Over the course of his career, AT&T has been McCain’s second largest corporate backer.
LINK TO CON.
Unintelligence in Federal Intelligence Agencies
Contractors Cost Taxpayers Billions of Dollars Unnecessarily
By Joel Hirschhorn
The Bush administration has found yet another way to waste taxpayer money while providing huge sums to private contractors. According to a survey of activities in 2007 by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, about a third of the federal professional intelligence workforce now consists of contractors, mostly in the Washington, DC area.
Out of a total workforce of about 100,000 people some 37,000 are private employees that cost the government (we taxpayers) about $207,000 annually, compared with about $125,000 for civilian federal employee's salaries and benefits.
Contractors have lured people with important skills with higher salaries and benefits and have also siphoned off federal employees. With this outsourcing, taxpayers are the losers.
What does this $82,000 worker cost gap amount to yearly? About $3 billion annually is being provided to private contractor businesses that could be avoided by hiring government employees. This is incredible Bush administration fiscal insanity, but totally consistent with how Republicans changed their views on the federal government.
LINK TO CON.
Contractors Cost Taxpayers Billions of Dollars Unnecessarily
By Joel Hirschhorn
The Bush administration has found yet another way to waste taxpayer money while providing huge sums to private contractors. According to a survey of activities in 2007 by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, about a third of the federal professional intelligence workforce now consists of contractors, mostly in the Washington, DC area.
Out of a total workforce of about 100,000 people some 37,000 are private employees that cost the government (we taxpayers) about $207,000 annually, compared with about $125,000 for civilian federal employee's salaries and benefits.
Contractors have lured people with important skills with higher salaries and benefits and have also siphoned off federal employees. With this outsourcing, taxpayers are the losers.
What does this $82,000 worker cost gap amount to yearly? About $3 billion annually is being provided to private contractor businesses that could be avoided by hiring government employees. This is incredible Bush administration fiscal insanity, but totally consistent with how Republicans changed their views on the federal government.
LINK TO CON.
Monday, September 01, 2008
There Is an Alternative to Corporate Rule
By Mark Engler, Nation Books.
One of the remarkable features of modern political life is how consistently global elites deny that viable alternatives to the current global order exist, even as the terrain of international politics rapidly shifts. The "imperial globalists" that rose to power in the Bush years contend that without U.S. military strength decisively projected abroad, the forces of evil will sweep the globe. Meanwhile, "corporate globalists" of Wall Street persist in their belief that, in the post-Cold War world, we have no choice but to embrace the continual advance of the "free" market.
Neither idea is credible. The disastrous war in Iraq has firmly contradicted the neocons' argument that preemptive war can create security. Meanwhile, mainstream pundits continue to proclaim neoliberalism -- the radical free market doctrine that has defined the "Washington Consensus" in international economics in recent decades -- to be inevitable and irreplaceable. Yet as that ideology falls into disrepute across the globe, their contention is revealed as ever more deeply disingenuous. Today, there exist scores of books and hundreds of reports that offer new directions for the global order -- plus innumerable initiatives at local, national, and international levels to create political and economic systems that uphold human rights and defend the environment.
In truth, a lack of viable ideas is hardly the problem for those who reject both corporate and imperial models of globalization. Whether they are part of boisterous national uprisings or quiet, persistent community efforts to fuel a truly democratic globalization -- a globalization from below -- members of grassroots networks are now engaged in a debate about the proper balance of vision, program, political strategy, and tactics needed to move forward.
LINK TO CON.
By Mark Engler, Nation Books.
One of the remarkable features of modern political life is how consistently global elites deny that viable alternatives to the current global order exist, even as the terrain of international politics rapidly shifts. The "imperial globalists" that rose to power in the Bush years contend that without U.S. military strength decisively projected abroad, the forces of evil will sweep the globe. Meanwhile, "corporate globalists" of Wall Street persist in their belief that, in the post-Cold War world, we have no choice but to embrace the continual advance of the "free" market.
Neither idea is credible. The disastrous war in Iraq has firmly contradicted the neocons' argument that preemptive war can create security. Meanwhile, mainstream pundits continue to proclaim neoliberalism -- the radical free market doctrine that has defined the "Washington Consensus" in international economics in recent decades -- to be inevitable and irreplaceable. Yet as that ideology falls into disrepute across the globe, their contention is revealed as ever more deeply disingenuous. Today, there exist scores of books and hundreds of reports that offer new directions for the global order -- plus innumerable initiatives at local, national, and international levels to create political and economic systems that uphold human rights and defend the environment.
In truth, a lack of viable ideas is hardly the problem for those who reject both corporate and imperial models of globalization. Whether they are part of boisterous national uprisings or quiet, persistent community efforts to fuel a truly democratic globalization -- a globalization from below -- members of grassroots networks are now engaged in a debate about the proper balance of vision, program, political strategy, and tactics needed to move forward.
LINK TO CON.
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