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Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Democracy Now! | Headlines for August 30, 2011
'Hurricane Irene Death Toll Climbs to 40 as Widespread Flooding, Power Outages Persist
The death toll from Hurricane Irene has jumped to at least 40 people as towns in Vermont, New York and New Jersey continue to battle epic floods. Millions remain without power. Irene dumped up to 11 inches of rain on Vermont and more than 13 in parts of New York.
Michele Bachmann Says Hurricane Irene Should Be Viewed as Message from God
On the campaign trail, Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann is coming under criticism for saying Hurricane Irene should be viewed as a message from God. She made the comment on Sunday at a campaign event in Florida.
Michele Bachmann, Republican presidential candidate: "And I don’t know how much God has to do to get the attention of the politicians. We’ve had an earthquake. We’ve had a hurricane. He said, 'Are you going to start listening to me here?' Listen to the American people, because the American people are roaring right now, because they know what needs to be done. They know the government is on a morbid obesity diet. It’s got to rein in the spending. This is not a difficult problem to solve."
On Monday, Bachmann attempted to back away from her comment. A campaign spokesperson said Bachmann made the comment in jest. The Christian televangelist Pat Robertson made a similar remark last week on his television program.
Pat Robertson, Christian televangelist: "It seems to me the Washington Monument is a symbol of America’s power. It has been the symbol of our great nation. We look at that monument, and we say, 'This is one nation under God.' Now there’s a crack in it. There’s a crack in it, and it’s closed up. Is that a sign from the Lord? Is that something that has significance, or is it just a result of an earthquake? You judge, but I just want to bring that to your attention. But it seems to me symbolic."
Inspection Team Dispatched to Virginia Nuclear Power Plant Following Earthquake
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has sent a special inspection team to the North Anna nuclear power plant in Virginia after last week’s earthquake. The 5.8-magnitude quake is now believed to have shaken the nuclear plant more than it was designed to withstand. No significant damage has been identified so far, but the plant’s two reactors remain shut down.
Maryland Nuclear Power Facility Shut Down in Wake of Hurricane
In Maryland, the Calvert Cliffs nuclear power plant was shut down over the weekend after Hurricane Irene ripped a piece of aluminum siding from the plant and slammed the metal piece into an electrical transformer.
Libyan Rebels Accuse Algeria of Aggression for Accepting Gaddafi Family
The rebels in Libya have accused neighboring Algeria of an act of aggression for admitting the fleeing wife of Muammar Gaddafi and three of his children, but the whereabouts of Col. Gaddafi himself remains a mystery. Algeria’s foreign ministry said Gaddafi’s wife Safia, his daughter Aisha, and his sons Hannibal and Mohammed entered Algeria on Monday morning. Meanwhile, for the third time this month rebels are claiming they have killed Gaddafi’s son Khamis, but once again no proof of his death has been made public. In other news from Libya, Physicians for Human Rights has issued a new report accusing Gaddafi forces of targeting civilians with rape, torture and summary executions.
African Union Chief Accuses Libyan Rebels of Targeting Black Africans
African Union chief Jean Ping has accused Libya’s rebels of treating black Africans as mercenaries for Muammar Gaddafi. Ping spoke to journalists in Ethiopia.
Jean Ping, Chairman of the African Union Commission: "The TNC seems to confuse black people with mercenaries: all blacks are mercenaries. If you do that, which means one-third of the population of Libya, which is black, is also mercenaries. They are killing people, normal workers, you know, mistreating them, invading some embassies like the embassy of Kenya, some embassies in Tripoli."
Lockerbie Bomber Maintained Innocence in Private Correspondence with Libyan Officials
In other Libya news, the Wall Street Journal is reporting the Libyan convicted of bombing Pan Am Flight 103 over Scotland in 1988 has maintained his innocence, even in private correspondence with Libya officials. The newspaper has obtained a letter written by Abdel Baset al-Megrahi to Libya’s intelligence chief. In the letter, Megrahi wrote, "I am an innocent man." The Journal obtained the letter after gaining access to the former intelligence chief’s office. Megrahi served eight-and-a-half years in prison in Britain but was released in August 2009 because of his failing health. He is now in a coma in Libya. The letter is likely to spark new questions about Megrahi’s involvement in the bombing that killed 243 passengers and 16 crew members. On Monday, Scottish First Minister
Alex Salmond says Scotland does not plan to seek his extradition.
Alex Salmond, Scottish First Minister: "He’s under Scottish jurisdiction. We have not, and never have, had any intention of calling for his extradition. And it’s been made clear by the Libyan Transitional Council, who are the new duly constituted legal authority in Libya, that even if there had been, they would have no intention of agreeing to it."
August Becomes Deadliest Month for U.S. Troops in Nearly Decade-Long Afghanistan War
August has become the deadliest month for U.S. troops in the nearly 10-year-old war in Afghanistan. So far, 66 U.S. troops have died this month, eclipsing the 65 killed in July 2010. In addition, the NATO coalition suffered the loss of two British, four French, one New Zealander, one Australian, one Polish and four other troops whose nationalities have not yet been disclosed.
Afghan Government Derailed Peace Talks Between U.S. and Taliban
An investigation by the Associated Press has revealed the Afghan government intentionally helped scuttle preliminary peace talks between the United States and the Taliban. According to the report, the Afghan government leaked details of clandestine meetings between Washington officials and a personal emissary of Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar. Once details of the talks emerged, the talks imploded, and the Taliban intermediary went into hiding. The AP reports the talks were deliberately revealed by someone within Hamid Karzai’s presidential palace out of fear that any agreement Washington brokered would undermine Karzai’s authority.
Pentagon Use of No-Bid War Contracts Balloons to $140 Billion
The Pentagon’s use of no-bid contracts has tripled since the United States was attacked on 9/11, in spite of promises to reform the controversial practice. According to a new investigative report from the Center for Public Integrity, no-bid spending has ballooned from $50 billion in 2003 to $140 billion in 2011. One instance cited in the report details how the Department of Defense awarded $50 million in sole-sourced contracts to an Arizona company in order to develop a lightning-shooting device that could detonate improvised explosives from the front of a vehicle. The Marines eventually canceled the contract. It was later revealed a separate company has developed the same technology for $1.5 million. So far this year, the Pentagon has allowed competition on just 55 percent of its war contracts, the lowest rate since 9/11. In addition to the Center for Public Integrity’s findings, the independent Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan is preparing to release a report showing that one in every six contracting and grant dollars spent in Iraq and Afghanistan has been wasted, totaling some $30 billion lost.
Israeli Military Prepares to Supply Jewish Settlers with Tear Gas, Stun Grenades
The Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz reports the Israeli military is planning to give tear gas and stun grenades to Jewish settlers in the occupied West Bank ahead of the expected United Nations vote on Palestinian statehood this fall. The move comes as part of Israel’s preparations to deal with possible confrontations with Palestinians after the vote. The Israeli army is also drafting guidelines on when it would be appropriate to shoot live ammunition at the feet of Palestinian protesters.
Obama: New Economic Aide Will Focus on Jobs
Under pressure to spur job growth, President Obama announced on Monday he had chosen Princeton University labor economist Alan Krueger to become the top White House economist and that he will offer a jobs plan next week. Krueger, an expert on unemployment, would succeed Austan Goolsbee as chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisers.
President Barack Obama: "Alan brings a wealth of experience to the job. He’s one of the nation’s leading economists. For more than two decades, he has studied and developed economic policy both inside and outside of government. In the first two years of this administration, as we were dealing with the effects of a complex and fast-moving financial crisis, a crisis that threatened a second Great Depression, Alan’s counsel as chief economist at the Treasury Department proved invaluable."
Report: Half of Muslim Americans Feel Intensified Presence of U.S. Anti-Terror Policies
A new report finds more than half of Muslim Americans feel U.S. anti-terror polices have placed them under intensified surveillance or monitoring, while many have experienced increased name calling, threats and harassment by airport security, police officers and others. Despite the complaints, most American Muslims report being satisfied with the way things are going in the United States and rate their communities highly as places to live, according to data gathered by the Pew Research Center.
Alabama Judge Temporarily Blocks Controversial Immigration Law
A federal judge in Alabama has temporarily blocked Alabama’s controversial immigration law, after the measure was challenged by the Obama administration. Under the new law, contracts held by undocumented immigrants would become null, police would be required to arrest anyone they suspect of being in the country without legal status, and public schools would be required to determine the immigration status of enrolled students. The law would also make it a crime to knowingly harbor or transport an undocumented immigrant. In an editorial published Monday, the New York Times described Alabama’s measure as "the country’s cruelest, most unforgiving immigration law."
Commission Confirms 1940s U.S. Medical Experimentation in Guatemala Killed 83
A commission has found U.S. medical experimentation conducted in Guatemala during the 1940s resulted in the deaths of 83 people. The testing focused on sexually transmitted diseases and involved U.S. medical officials intentionally infecting Guatemalan sex workers, prisoners, soldiers and mental patients — without their permission — in order to study the effects of Penicillin. President Obama put together the commission to investigate the program when it was unearthed late last year. On Tuesday, the commission concluded nearly 5,500 people were subjected to diagnostic testing in Guatemala, and more than 1,300 were exposed to venereal diseases by contact or inoculations. Guatemalan President Álvaro Colom has described the experiments as a "crime against humanity" and ordered his own investigation. The Guatemala program was discovered by Wellesley College Professor Susan Reverby while she was researching the infamous Tuskegee experiments. Professor Reverby spoke to Democracy Now! last year and discussed how much U.S. officials knew about the practices the program’s architect, John Cutler, was engaged in.
Professor Susan Reverby, Wellesley College: "It’s too easy to say, 'OK, this was a period when there wasn't research norms or any of the kind of regulations we’ve had in place since the mid-'70s.' But Cutler’s bosses at the Public Health Service knew this was sort of really on the edge. And the quote that I found that just really knocked me off the chair was one from the surgeon general himself, who said — and this is secondhand, but it was in a letter to Cutler where one of his colleagues said, 'The surgeon general says, "Well, we couldn't do this in the United States."’ And that’s just a stunning, absolutely stunning, acknowledgment of what was going on."
Top NASA Climate Scientist Arrested in Ongoing White House Keystone XL Pipeline Protest
One of the nation’s leading climate scientists, James Hansen, was arrested Monday along with 60 others at a protest outside the White House against the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline. Hansen is the head of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Hansen called on President Obama to reject the pipeline, which would stretch from Canada to Texas. Since last week, 522 people have been arrested in Washington protesting the pipeline.'
Saturday, June 5, 2010
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Bob Dylan - Blind Willie McTell - I'm Not There
“And Jesus answered him, the first of all commandments is, Hear o Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord, and thou shalt love the Lord, thy God, with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength; this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely, this: thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, there is none other commandment greater than these.”
- Holy Bible
Posted via web from Joshua Oakley - Dreams Poetry Visions Imagination Beauty
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Obama, MLK, HCR, Tea Partiers, Civil Rights, & Change We Can Believe In . . . .
So this speech is amazing, not just because it is a good speech. I think it is truly transformational in the sense that it represents a profound change in the way Americans think about politics and the ability of politicians to actually help people instead of looking after themselves and special interests first . . . President Obama is certainly known for giving good speeches, but this one represents yet another turning point I feel in his presidency toward making meaningful and transformational change in American government, and by extension, the world. Perhaps if Americans are healthier, if we no longer have to worry so much about getting sick and not being able to pay for our treatment, we can be more engaged and present in the decision-making that goes on in our name. My hope is that we can say goodbye forever to the disengagement and apathy that seems to have defined the past ten to twenty years of American politics, maybe going back as far as the Reagan era, not just because of health care reform, but seeing health care reform as one more step toward a truly just and equitable society that lives up to the promise and possibility of the idealistic language used in the Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution. My hope is that we are one step closer to realizing Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s vision and dream of a free and peaceful society. Yet we have a long way to go yet, not least of which are the ongoing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that need to end as soon as possible . . . .
Which brings me to the deplorable conduct of the Tea Party activists that reminded many African American Representatives of their experiences in the Civil Rights movement and their work integrating schools . . . .
C-SPAN: "Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH) on Tea Party activists using racial epithets toward members of Congress"
Rep. Ryan decries the horrible treatment of members of Congress by the Tea Party protesters, including Rep. John Lewis, who experienced similar treatment during the Civil Rights movement of the 1960's, and Rep. Barney Frank. Democratic representatives give reasons to support the bill, measured with wishes of ways to improve health care in the future after the bill becomes law. Republican politicians follow with first a letter by the Texas Medical Association and then a long diatribe about how the American Medical Association does not truly speak for the majority of American doctors and that the Tea Party protesters were great patriots . . . and somehow that means that Democrats are demons and the representative actually uses the word Armageddon to describe the passing of comprehensive health care reform legislation, perhaps echoing the words of house minority leader Boehner during his tirade against Democrats and health care reform and support of the "Red Whatever-They-Are" astroturf Tea Party campaign financed and organized by the Republican party leaders and their friends in the health insurance industry. I never realized how much influence the health insurance lobby had in American politics until this past thirteen months of debate in the house and senate regarding health care reform. Yet now I think it is painfully obvious that the health insurance lobby has exorbitant influence in both the house and senate, and in both major political parties. The fact that the health care reform legislation is as the Democratic representatives describe as "middle of the road," illustrates just how far to the extreme right-wing conservative perspective the Republican leadership in the house and senate has become. I am not sure which caucus is more extreme, the Republican house or senate, but I do think that the house has certainly a big advantage as far as sheer numbers of unhinged opinionators and halfbaked conspiracy theories masquerading as intelligent discourse and "setting the record straight" of the "lies" of health care reform (yet the so-called "lies" really extend to whatever issue and subject that the individual extremist does not agree with, and to a greater extent the entire community of like-minded individuals within the Republican party mostly dominated by right-wing extremists such as the racist and homophobic Tea Party protesters currently).
Sounds like a madhouse with angry protesters threatening violence & hurling abuse at Democratic lawmakers . . . I wonder where the anti-reform Tea Party protesters get their wild ideas about how the government is going to "take over" their health care & turn the country into a communist / socialist / fascist state? It might have something to do with Republican / conservative lawmakers and media figures warning about those very conspiracy theories and halfbaked scaretactics championed by the likes of Beck, Hannity, and Limbaugh. Yet without other circumstances besides the conservative media figures and lawmakers such as Boehner and McConnell, I can't imagine that such a great proportion of the electorate would actually fall for such brazen lies and misinformation, except that the recession and poor economic situation has created a situation rife with possibility for unscrupulous snake oil salesmen to ply their nefarious trade & try to hold onto their own power and wealth, even though they would actually be richer literally and metaphorically if they didn't resist positive change, but participated honestly in reform for the health care system, clean energy technology, green jobs, disarmament, financial reform, peace, etc.
Peace everyone! And good luck! Let's keep working . . . Onwards toward peace, environmental sustainability and wisdom, and social justice for all the world, both human and nonhuman . . . a better world IS possible, and we are on our way . . . .
President Obama makes the case & sets up victory with humility & truth as antidote to demonization of health care reform as evil communist / socialist / fascist . . . .
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Miles Davis, Keith Jarrett, & Movement Toward Meaningful Health Care Reform: A Good Day
So it appears to be a good bet that the health care reform reconciliation package will pass the house with Rep. Kucinich's vote (however reserved his support may be :)).
Kucinich Has Just Restored My Faith In Democracy, Or Something Like That . . . .
Bravo Mr. Kucinich! I was beginning to have my doubts about your commitment to moving our country forward toward a progressive vision of the future, yet now I see that you are wiser than many, and understand the oft-quoted maxim: "Do not let perfect be the enemy of the good." Here's wishing for speedy passing of the reconciliation bill, and good luck with future efforts to make the health care system even better in the years to come! I know it will be hard going, but that doesn't mean we can't get to the compassionate world that we all seem to want! Peace, Love, Understanding, Truth, and Beauty!
Looks like Howard Fineman was right last night on KO when he said Dennis would switch his vote because Dennis Kucinich held a presser this morning and said even though it's not the bill he wanted, he'll vote for HCR.