Open

*??*

...Thanks, Sam!

Human Health Effects

Ick.

Thanks for this article, Alice.

Good to know.

Australian report (Nature Conservancy and Pew Environment [?!] Group) says killing millions of wild animals will control carbon problem? (But no discussion of human health destroying, grain consuming, over-grazing, water polluting, water wasting, methane producing billions of cattle and factory farmed animals? Oh, no. The Corporatists PROFIT off those 'gassy' animals, so no way humans should protect their personal health by eating less meat!)

Can the profiteers get any more sick and insane and horrible than this?!

Evidently there is no way to profiteer off wild animals any other way, so the predatory Ruling Profiteering Class is going in for the kill on the phony pretext that carbon trading/credits etcetera will help this Earth.

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/07/killing-millions-of-gassy-animal...

[excerpt]

If you hate carbon emissions, the Australian Outback may seem like a paradise, unless you're a bit gassy, that is. According to a new study, the vast, sparsely populated Outback stores an incredible amount of carbon within its forests and grasslands, a whopping 9.7 billion tons of the stuff, in fact. As impressive as that is, researchers say the region could hold much, much more if certain measures were to be implemented, but there's a catch -- one calls for the culling of millions of feral animals just because they fart and burp.

The study, undertaken by the Nature Conservancy and the Pew Environment Group, found that while nearly 10 billion tons of carbon are stored in the Outback ecosystem, it can actually hold around 1.3 billion more by 2050. To put that into perspective, the potential carbon storage is roughly the equivalent to taking 300 million cars off the road during that same period, reports News.com.au.

In order to tap into that storage capacity, the study suggests improving land management, reducing wildfires, regrowing cleared vegetation -- and killing off millions gassy animals, like feral pigs and camels.

Turns out, farting and burping critters are quite a problem. Barry Traill, a spokesman for Pews, explains:

When feral animals belch they release methane, a particularly noxious greenhouse gas, and every single camel or water buffalo releases the equivalent of around one ton of carbon dioxide each year.
When you've got hundreds of thousands, in some cases millions, of these feral animals, it's a very large amount of pollution each year.

While the report's findings seem to present a bit of a Catch-22 for environmentalists -- curb emissions at the cost of countless animal's lives -- Australia's Greens party seems up for the big kill. Senator Christine Milne sites an urgency "to make the changes needed to tap the huge potential that is there [in the Outback]."

Judging from policies in the past, Australians aren't too queasy when it comes to culling wildlife, namely when it comes to the continent's invasive species. Just last February, for example, it was announced that officials would begin dealing with a pesky camel overpopulation problem by feeding the feral animals to hungry crocodiles.

If Australia opts to consider the techniques suggested by this recent study to expand the Outback's carbon storage capacity, it will be interesting to see whether folks side with less emissions or if they'll decide that millions of farting and burping animals really aren't that bad. If the latter wins out, I imagine an entire generation of unruly children will take notice.

[end excerpt]

A homeless area bounded by a high school and a part of Pearl Harbor -- 50 acres for the inevitable victims of the Wall Street Scams and bailouts...

http://www.staradvertiser.com/news/20100627_Huge_tent_city_takes_root.ht...

===============

AND--

http://www.kitv.com/news/24250289/detail.html

[excerpt]

HONOLULU --
The homeless still commandeer a section of Kapiolani Park beachfront. They get around Oahu's "no tent" law by sleeping under umbrellas or in open sided beach pavilions.

State Rep Tom Brower (D), and a group of other lawmakers hope to remove homeless from Kapiolani Park and other popular beach parks by offering them homeless safe zones.

The lawmakers said Tuesday they are hoping for donations of state, city or private land for the homeless safe zones.

Brower would like the first safe zone to be in the former industrial area of Kakaako close to downtown Honolulu.

Homeless safe zones would be tent cities offering the homeless bathroom facilities, lockers and security.

Brower said,"We cant allow homeless to be everywhere. That's what we have now. I am suggesting these safe zones so we could better manage homelessness and give them the proper treatment they need."
...

[end excerpt]

http://blog.al.com/live/2010/07/bp_federal_government_propose.html

[excerpt]

BP, federal government propose different plans for well cap
Published: Sunday, July 18, 2010, 12:03 PM

Officials with BP PLC and the government may be at odds over how long to keep a cap on the company's gushing oil well sealed shut.

Retired U.S. Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, the national incident commander said yesterday that closing the cap was a "temporary" test of the well's integrity that would be "eventually stopped" in favor of returning to siphoning the leaking oil.

At a news conference this morning, BP Chief Operating Officer Doug Suttles said the company hoped to keep the well capped until the permanent solution, a relief well, is finished and the leak is ended.

Allen said in a statement that the plan for the cap he detailed Saturday was still in place.

"Per my conversation with BP executive Bob Dudley as recently as 11 a.m. EST today, nothing has changed about the joint agreement announced yesterday between BP and the US government," Allen's written statement said.

The statement added that the current testing period, which ends at 3 p.m., might be extended in 24-hour increments.

"While we are pleased that no oil is currently being released into the Gulf of Mexico and want to take all appropriate action to keep it that way, it is important that all decisions are driven by the science," Allen said. "Ultimately, we must insure no irreversible damage is done which could cause uncontrolled leakage from numerous points on the sea floor."

Suttles said this morning that if the cap is opened, oil will have to be released into the Gulf for three days to relieve pressure, before officials can resume siphoning it from the broken well.

"No one associated with this whole activity ... wants to see any more oil flow into the Gulf of Mexico," Suttles said. "Right now we don't have a target to return the well to flow."

[end excerpt]

Replay in about an hour:

8 PM CDT, 9pm EDT, 7pm MDT, 6pm PDT

http://www.themic921.com/mediaplayer/

_ _ _ _ _ _
|

Here are two examples of the above - two articles either so unbelievably stupid in their analysis of Obamatime or purposefully written to hoodwink and bamboozle again the citizenry during Obamatime. And the Clintons are still to be blamed. These people never stop that particular Kabuki dance either. How often has A. Cockburn lamented in his writings that badbadbad Hillary Clinton didn't manage to bring Health insurance to the US immediately in BC's first term.

"The reality is that there can be no “good” American president," writes Cockburn.

Spare Me.

So Obama is the goodest American president one can imagine, he has the loyal and strong support of every single mainstream servant press in writing and on TV and radio, and he rules the Unites States with the loyal servant help of the powerful Dem Congress.

But Obama is just too good to get anything "progressive" done in today's time and day. It is not his fault. So Lets all crawl together into the corner and have a good cry.

Or One could laugh about all this nonsense these people come up with were the consequences of Obamatime (you know all the stuff he is actually doing) not so truly dire ... a fact they ignore.

----
The Fall of Obama

By ALEXANDER COCKBURN

The man who seized the White House by fomenting a mood of irrational expectation is now facing the bitter price exacted by reality. The reality is that there can be no “good” American president. It’s an impossible hand to play. Obama is close to being finished.

The nation’s first black president promised change at the precise moment when no single man, even if endowed with the communicative powers of Franklin Roosevelt, the politic mastery of Lyndon Johnson, the brazen agility of Bill Clinton, could turn the tide that has been carrying America to disaster for 30 years.

read here
http://www.counterpunch.com/

====

Kabuki Democrcy: Why a Progressive Presidency is Impossible, for Now

Eric Alterman

published in The Nation.

This second article is unbelievably pathetic - but it has a word in the title I gladly borrowed - Kabuki which Biden made famous - because it clearly helped explain these nonsense articles by these typical "progressives" who absolutely refuse to see the truth when it comes to President Obama.

After 19 months of Obamarule (let me spell it out: n i n e t e e n m o n t h s) they are still thinking and hoping: maybe Obama will get it or get closer to or show signs of .... tomorrow or maybe in the second semester.

Can they really be that stupid? Or are these kind of articles the usual stuff: written for job security and what they really believe is anyone's guess or guilt for letting themselves get blissfully fooled and for hoodwinking the voters with tons of kool Aid.

----
Kabuki Democrcy: Why a Progressive Presidency is Impossible, for Now
Eric Alterman

(the title alone couldn't be more stupid. Obama progressive?
No wonder this nonsense comes from the pen of Alterman)

Why hasn't it been sampled and identified by BP?

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gIXWYBTpLtSayJtg41LKXp...

Official: Seep found near BP's blown out oil well
By COLLEEN LONG and HARRY R. WEBER (AP) – 2 hours ago

NEW ORLEANS — A federal official says scientists are concerned about a seep and possible methane near BP's busted oil well in the Gulf of Mexico

Both could be signs there are leaks in the well that's been capped off for three days.

The official spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity Sunday because an announcement about the next steps had not been made yet.

The official is familiar with the spill oversight but would not clarify what is seeping near the well. The official says BP is not complying with the government's demand for more monitoring.

...

[end excerpt]

Clinton raises pressure on Pakistan to fight militants

Hillary Clinton is on her second visit to Islamabad as secretary of state

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton worries all the time about the possibility that an attack against the US could emanate from Pakistan and has called on Islamabad to take further, specific actions against militant networks.

Without entering into the details, she seemed to indicate in a BBC interview that the US wanted Pakistan to do more to tackle the Haqqani network, a branch of the Afghan Taliban which operates in Pakistan and is widely suspected of having close ties to Pakistan's intelligence agency, the ISI.

During the interview at the US embassy compound in Islamabad, Mrs Clinton also said the state department was looking into the possibility of listing the Haqqani network as a terrorist organisation.

read more
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-10679383

Vice President Biden Says Democrats Won't Lose House or Senate

"'We're Going to Shock the Heck Out of Everybody,' Biden Says on 'This Week'"

Vice President Joe Biden had a warning for Republicans who say they got "their groove back" heading into the November election. On ABC's "This Week" Biden admitted Democrats will lose seats but added, "It won't be that bad."
Biden on the November midterms.

"I think we're going to shock the heck out of everybody," the vice president said in an exclusive interview . "We're going to win the House and we're going to win the Senate. We're not going to lose either one of those bodies."

That bold prediction came exactly a week after White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs admitted that enough seats are in play this fall that Democrats could lose control of the House of Representatives.

read here
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/vice-president-biden-democrats-lose-congress/st...

Is this a freak incident or a trend?

Can't find this reported anywhere else...

http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=300147

[excerpt]

AP, DPA, Reuters journalists targeted by Israeli forces
Published Saturday 17/07/2010 (updated) 18/07/2010 10:12

Hebron – Ma'an – Israeli forces fired percussion grenades directly at two journalists on Saturday, hitting them in the face and back during a Beit Ummar protest against continued land confiscations by a nearby Israeli settlement.

A third photojournalist was physically assaulted by armed Israeli personnel, and was taken to hospital for treatment by Red Crescent Paramedics.

Medics said Reuters photojournalist Abed Khweisa was treated checked for facial bone fractures after a sound bomb hit him in the cheek, while DPA photographer Abdul-Hafidh Hashlamoun was treated for bruises on his back after being struck by a second canister shot from a high-velocity launcher.

Hazim Badr, medics said, was beaten by soldiers and treated for bruises. All three said they were covering the protest when they were targeted.

One protester was reported injured, identified as 43-year-old Ahmad Khalil Abu Hashim, secretary-general of the local anti-land confiscation committee.
...
[end excerpt]

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=20153

Tel Aviv Government Refuses to Implement Israeli Supreme Court Ruling
Palestinians suffer as courts’ authority hits all-time low

[excerpt]

The Israeli government is facing legal action for contempt over its refusal to implement a Supreme Court ruling that it end a policy of awarding preferential budgets to Jewish communities, including settlements, rather than much poorer Palestinian Arab towns and villages inside Israel.

The contempt case on behalf of Israel’s Palestinian minority comes in the wake of growing criticism of the government for ignoring court decisions it does not like -- a trend that has been noted by the Supreme Court justices themselves.

Yehudit Karp, a former deputy attorney general, compiled a list of 12 recent court rulings the government has refused to implement, but legal groups believe there are more examples. Many of the disregarded judgements confer benefits on Palestinians, either in the occupied territories or inside Israel, or penalise the settlers.

Critics have accused the government of violating the rule of law and warned that the defiance has been possible chiefly because right-wing politicians and religious groups have severely eroded the Supreme Court’s authority over the past few years.

[end excerpt]

"But here’s the thing. The press office in Houston is not run by the Unified Command. The people at the office there answer the phone with the phrase: “BP Press.” They do this because they are BP employees, and the office is in BP headquarters."

-----
BP's Latest Risky Top-Down Scheme

Cap and Blow?

By DAVE LINDORFF

What the hell are they thinking in Washington, and down at the “Unified Command” in New Orleans, letting BP try to close off the oil volcano spewing out the top of the damaged Blowout Preventer (BOP) stack?

And what the hell is the mainstream press doing not asking about the clear evidence of oil or gas spewing out under pressure from cracks in the seafloor around the base of the BOP? (See the image of oil spewing from the sea floor.)

Sure the initial partial closing of the valves is working, but they haven’t built up much pressure yet--just to 6000 lbs/square inch, which isn’t much above the 5000 lbs/square inch at that depth of the ocean--and a lot could go wrong. seriously wrong, and good reason to think it will.

I made a call to the media office of the Unified Command, the office set up to respond to public and media inquiries about the disaster, which is supposedly composed of people from the US Coast Guard, other federal agencies, and BP. When I mentioned the videos taken by BP’s own remote operating vehicles (ROVs) of the oil and/or gas spewing from cracks in the sea floor, I was told I had to call the press office in Houston, “because you’re asking us a question about the sub-surface well.”

But here’s the thing. The press office in Houston is not run by the Unified Command. The people at the office there answer the phone with the phrase: “BP Press.” They do this because they are BP employees, and the office is in BP headquarters.

This means if you want to know anything about the structural integrity of the well below the BOP, you have to get that information from BP, not from the government. That’s the same BP that told government regulators that they could handle any emergency. The same BP that assured us when the well blew that the spill was just leaking 1000 barrels of oil a day--a figure that appears to have been knowingly understated by a factor of 50 to 100.

Now, when I called BP I got a PR guy with a Brit accent named Toby Odone, who claimed he was “not aware of any oil leaking around the well itself.”

He also said, “We’re pretty certain that there is no oil leaking around the well that shouldn’t be there.”

read here

http://www.counterpunch.com/lindorff07162010.html

"It is the season of grovelling."
-------

They're All Grovelling and You Can Guess the Reason

By Robert Fisk

July 17, 2010 "The Independent" -- It is the season of grovelling.

Only a week after CNN's Octavia Nasr and the British ambassador to Beirut, Frances Guy, dared to suggest that Sayyed Hassan Fadlallah of Lebanon was a nice old chap rather than the super-terrorist the Americans have always claimed him to be, the grovelling began. First Ms Nasr, already fired by the grovelling CNN for her effrontery in calling Fadlallah a "giant", grovelled herself. Rather than tell the world what a cowardly outfit she had been working for, she announced that hers was "a simplistic comment and I'm sorry because it conveyed that I supported Fadlallah's life's work. That's not the case at all".

What is this garbage? Nasr never gave the impression that she supported "Fadlallah's life's work". She merely expressed her regret that the old boy was dead, adding - inaccurately - that he had been part of Hizbollah. I don't know what her pompous (and, of course, equally grovelling) "senior vice president" said to her when she was given her marching orders. But like victims of the Spanish Inquisition, Nasr actually ended up apologizing for sins she had never even been accused of. Then within hours, British ambassador Guy began her own self-flagellation, expressing her regrets that she may have offended anyone (and we all know what that means) by her "personal attempt to offer some reflections of a figure who, while controversial, was also highly influential in Lebanon's history and who offered spiritual guidance to many Muslims in need".

I loved the "controversial" bit - the usual "fuck you" word for anyone you want to praise without incurring the wrath of, well, you know who. The Foreign Office itself took down poor Ms Guy's blogapop on old Fadlallah, thus proving - as Arab journalists leapt to point out this week - that while Britain proclaims the virtues of democracy and the free press to the grovelling newspaper owners and grotty emirs of the Middle East, it is the first to grovel when anything might offend you know who.

For that was the collective sin of Misses Nasr and Guy. What they said might have made Israel's supporters angry. And that will never do. The reality is that CNN should have told Israel's lobbyists to get lost, and the Foreign Office - which was indeed upbraided by the Israeli foreign ministry - should have asked the Israeli government when it is going to stop thieving Arab land. But as my old mate Rami Khoury put it in the Jordanian press this week, "We in the Middle East are used to this sort of racist intellectual terrorism. American and British citizens who occasionally dare to speak accurately about the Middle East and its people are still learning about the full price of the truth when Israeli interests are in the room."

read here

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25956.htm

v. imp. article IMO -

I know people with excellent education and job experience who have lost their jobs and then can't find a new job w. same salary -we heard from friends that companies are looking for young employees who are expected to have all this job experience (like the older ones who lost their jobs) but will work for much less pay. It really is shocking. Times are really changing. V. scary.

And so many people have lost their homes -
-----

The U.S. Middle Class Is Being Wiped Out

Here's the Stats to Prove It

By Michael Snyder

July 16, 2010 "The Business Insider" -- The 22 statistics detailed here prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the middle class is being systematically wiped out of existence in America.

The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer at a staggering rate. Once upon a time, the United States had the largest and most prosperous middle class in the history of the world, but now that is changing at a blinding pace.

So why are we witnessing such fundamental changes? Well, the globalism and "free trade" that our politicians and business leaders insisted would be so good for us have had some rather nasty side effects. It turns out that they didn't tell us that the "global economy" would mean that middle class American workers would eventually have to directly compete for jobs with people on the other side of the world where there is no minimum wage and very few regulations. The big global corporations have greatly benefited by exploiting third world labor pools over the last several decades, but middle class American workers have increasingly found things to be very tough.

Giant Sucking Sound

The reality is that no matter how smart, how strong, how educated or how hard working American workers are, they just cannot compete with people who are desperate to put in 10 to 12 hour days at less than a dollar an hour on the other side of the world. After all, what corporation in their right mind is going to pay an American worker 10 times more (plus benefits) to do the same job? The world is fundamentally changing. Wealth and power are rapidly becoming concentrated at the top and the big global corporations are making massive amounts of money. Meanwhile, the American middle class is being systematically wiped out of existence as U.S. workers are slowly being merged into the new "global" labor pool.

What do most Americans have to offer in the marketplace other than their labor? Not much. The truth is that most Americans are absolutely dependent on someone else giving them a job. But today, U.S. workers are "less attractive" than ever. Compared to the rest of the world, American workers are extremely expensive, and the government keeps passing more rules and regulations seemingly on a monthly basis that makes it even more difficult to conduct business in the United States.

So corporations are moving operations out of the U.S. at breathtaking speed. Since the U.S. government does not penalize them for doing so, there really is no incentive for them to stay.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25953.htm

this time - not when we deal with something this important

and this goes for the rest who lost themselves in the romance of focusing 100 percent of their political time, money and energies on making this man America's forty-fourth president (as Alterman wants to see it).

Nice excuse.
But Please, Spare Me.

All the signs were there early on that the totally inexperienced Obama was not a "progressive". Almost instantly after walking into the White House it was clear that Obama was selected to carry on the policies of Bush II AND THEN SOME.

(excerpt)
"And the chance to replace George W. Bush with Barack Hussein Obama—both for symbolic and in many respects, pragmatic reasons in 2008—appeared so enticing (and exciting) that I think we can all be forgiven for losing ourselves in the romance of focusing 100 percent of our political time, money and energies on making this man America's forty-fourth president."

read here

http://www.thenation.com/article/37165/kabuki-democracy-why-progressive-...

I'm listening to you now, Sam, on Sunday/7-18-10/evening as I search thou government reg's to see if I qualify for "grandfathered health insurance." Yuck! :) :) But, you're good!! Always terrific to hear your voice and views, which brings memories of regret of AAR and what it could have been.

Hope you and your family are doing well.

Takecare, :) :) :) :) .... Peace

Deborah from Kansas

and also THANKS {and thanks ;}!

v. interesting interview, pics, and info

check out building 6
----------

Kurt Sonnenfeld : Exclusive interview
9/11 FEMA videographer at Ground Zero goes public

As official videographer for the U.S. government, Kurt Sonnenfeld was detailed to Ground Zero on September 11, 2001, where he spent an entire month filming: "What I saw at certain moments and in certain places ... is very disturbing!" He never handed his 29 tapes over to the authorities and has been persecuted ever since. Kurt Sonnenfeld lives in exile in Argentina, where he wrote "El Perseguido" (the persecuted). His recently-published book tells the story of his unending nightmare and drives another nail into the coffin of the government’s account of the 9/11 events. Below is an exclusive interview by The Voltaire Network.

read here

http://www.voltairenet.org/article160636.html

the hero from 9/11

we were wondering what was happening to him

I found this website

http://www.william911.com/

Hosted by George Knapp.

First Hour: Animal activist Laura Leigh talks about the recent wild horse round-up in Nevada, and the lawsuit she filed to stop it.

I'm going to take a look now...

Following the videos at william911 I came across this one which analyzes the video of the first plane crashing into WTC, and there appears th be an explosion in the building BEFORE the plane impacts.

Have you seen this yet?:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_pb3o8nxdI&feature=related

{Gotta Brew SomeMore :} ;)

THX regarding C2C and The Wild Horses info!

Posted on Jul 19, 2010

The human species during its brief time on Earth has exhibited a remarkable capacity to kill itself off. The Cro-Magnons dispatched the gentler Neanderthals. The conquistadors, with the help of smallpox, decimated the native populations in the Americas. Modern industrial warfare in the 20th century took at least 100 million lives, most of them civilians. And now we sit passive and dumb as corporations and the leaders of industrialized nations ensure that climate change will accelerate to levels that could mean the extinction of our species. Homo sapiens, as the biologist Tim Flannery points out, are the “future-eaters.”

In the past when civilizations went belly up through greed, mismanagement and the exhaustion of natural resources, human beings migrated somewhere else to pillage anew. But this time the game is over. There is nowhere else to go. The industrialized nations spent the last century seizing half the planet and dominating most of the other half. We giddily exhausted our natural capital, especially fossil fuel, to engage in an orgy of consumption and waste that poisoned the Earth and attacked the ecosystem on which human life depends. It was quite a party if you were a member of the industrialized elite. But it was pretty stupid.

Collapse this time around will be global. We will disintegrate together. And there is no way out. The 10,000-year experiment of settled life is about to come to a crashing halt. And humankind, which thought it was given dominion over the Earth and all living things, will be taught a painful lesson in the necessity of balance, restraint and humility. There is no human monument or city ruin that is more than 5,000 years old. Civilization, Ronald Wright notes in “A Short History of Progress,” “occupies a mere 0.2 percent of the two and a half million years since our first ancestor sharpened a stone.” Bye-bye, Paris. Bye-bye, New York. Bye-bye, Tokyo. Welcome to the new experience of human existence, in which rooting around for grubs on islands in northern latitudes is the prerequisite for survival.

We view ourselves as rational creatures. But is it rational to wait like sheep in a pen as oil and natural gas companies, coal companies, chemical industries, plastics manufacturers, the automotive industry, arms manufacturers and the leaders of the industrial world, as they did in Copenhagen, take us to mass extinction? It is too late to prevent profound climate change. But why add fuel to the fire? Why allow our ruling elite, driven by the lust for profits, to accelerate the death spiral? Why continue to obey the laws and dictates of our executioners?

more article
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/calling_all_future-eaters_20100719/

Reuters) - Halliburton Co (HAL.N) reported a better-than-expected 83 percent jump in quarterly profit on Monday, helped by strong U.S. onshore drilling, but a ban on deepwater activity in the Gulf of Mexico is expected to hurt full-year results.

Shares of the world's second-largest oilfield services company rose 4.6 percent in premarket trading.

Revenue jumped across all regions, with market share gains internationally and North American operations getting a boost from increased natural gas drilling.

Halliburton's operating margin jumped to 17 percent.

Simmons Co analyst Bill Herbert said it was an "incandescent" quarter for the company, especially given the strength overseas in the face of tepid rig count growth.

Halliburton, based in Houston and Dubai, expects a ban on deepwater drilling in the United States to trim 2010 earnings by 5 cents to 8 cents per share.

Analysts expect the company to earn $1.44 per share this year. In 2009 the company earned $1.27 per share.

"The tragic incident that occurred in the Gulf of Mexico and the subsequent suspension of deepwater drilling, we believe, will usher in a new regulatory climate and will have a profound impact on how deepwater drilling is performed," the company said in a statement.

more
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE66I28J20100719

by Juli Weiner
The Tea Party Federation has renounced the Tea Party Express following an uncouth satire from the latter’s leader

http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2010/07/post-22.html

snip

for example, previously he’s called Manhattan borough president Scott Stringer a “Jewish Uncle Tom who would have turned rat on Anne Frank” in response to Stringer’s support for the construction of a mosque in close proximity to Ground Zero.

-----I wanted to add that Scott Springer has been very active and speaking ou for we the people. He makes most of the other dems in NY look complacent and blue dog ish IMO. The machine is up and attacking an honorable local politican. He is a threat to the status quo.

For what it is worth he answers the phone alot. he also will engage with you on the street .

A top Democratic money man for Hillary Clinton's failed presidential run was tossed in jail for 12 years for bank fraud.

Hassan Nemazee, 60, the finance chair for Clinton's campaign, pleaded guilty in March to a $292 million Ponzi swindle.

The investment banker faced more than 19 years in jail but Manhattan Federal Judge Sidney Stein cut him a break.

more
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2010/07/16/2010-07-16_exdem_don...

Female students wearing a full face veil will be barred from Syrian university campuses, the country's minister of higher education has said.

Ghiyath Barakat was reported to have said that the practice ran counter to the academic values and traditions of Syrian universities.

His ruling, published on the All4Syria website, was said to be in response to requests from students and parents.

The issue of full face veils has caused controversy in other countries.

In 2009, Egypt's then foremost Muslim cleric, Sheikh Mohammed Sayed Tantawi, barred female students from wearing the full-face veil at the al-Azhar University, Sunni Islam's centre of learning and scholarship.

He also upset other Muslim scholars by saying French Muslims should obey any law that France might enact banning the veil.

Earlier this month, France's lower house of parliament overwhelmingly approved a bill that would ban wearing the Islamic full veil in public.

It must be ratified by the Senate in September to become law.

Belgium's lower house of parliament has also passed a bill to ban clothing that hides a person's identity in public places, although it does not specifically refer to full-face Islamic veils.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-10684359

MONDAY, July 19 (HealthDay News) -- A small study suggests that the illicit "club drug" Ecstasy may have one positive use: making psychotherapy more effective for people with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

The drug, also known by its chemical acronym MDMA, appears to benefit patients for whom standard treatments have failed. But experts stressed that the study is preliminary and safety issues must be resolved before any recommendations can be made.

"PTSD treatment involves revisiting the trauma in a therapeutic setting, but many patients become overwhelmed by anxiety or numb themselves emotionally, and so they can't really successfully engage," said study lead researcher Dr. Michael Mithoefer, a psychiatrist in private practice in Charleston, S.C. "But what we found is that the MDMA seemed to temporarily decrease fear without blunting emotions, and so it helped patients better process their grief."
\!/

http://health.usnews.com/health-news/family-health/brain-and-behavior/ar...

...once you know about it, is it secret any more?
...how many people need to know about or care about it before it isn't a secret any more?, and,
...if it is publicly televised with the public invited to participate, can it be a "secret"?

A hidden world, growing beyond control
By Dana Priest and William M. Arkin
Monday, July 19, 2010; 1:53 AM

The top-secret world the government created in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has become so large, so unwieldy and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, how many programs exist within it or exactly how many agencies do the same work.

These are some of the findings of a two-year investigation by The Washington Post that discovered what amounts to an alternative geography of the United States, a Top Secret America hidden from public view and lacking in thorough oversight. After nine years of unprecedented spending and growth, the result is that the system put in place to keep the United States safe is so massive that its effectiveness is impossible to determine.

The investigation's other findings include:

* Some 1,271 government organizations and 1,931 private companies work on programs related to counterterrorism, homeland security and intelligence in about 10,000 locations across the United States.

* An estimated 854,000 people, nearly 1.5 times as many people as live in Washington, D.C., hold top-secret security clearances.

* In Washington and the surrounding area, 33 building complexes for top-secret intelligence work are under construction or have been built since September 2001. Together they occupy the equivalent of almost three Pentagons or 22 U.S. Capitol buildings - about 17 million square feet of space.

* Many security and intelligence agencies do the same work, creating redundancy and waste. For example, 51 federal organizations and military commands, operating in 15 U.S. cities, track the flow of money to and from terrorist networks.

* Analysts who make sense of documents and conversations obtained by foreign and domestic spying share their judgment by publishing 50,000 intelligence reports each year - a volume so large that many are routinely ignored.

These are not academic issues; lack of focus, not lack of resources, was at the heart of the Fort Hood shooting that left 13 dead, as well as the Christmas Day bomb attempt thwarted not by the thousands of analysts employed to find lone terrorists but by an alert airline passenger who saw smoke coming from his seatmate.

They are also issues that greatly concern some of the people in charge of the nation's security.

"There has been so much growth since 9/11 that getting your arms around that - not just for the DNI [Director of National Intelligence], but for any individual, for the director of the CIA, for the secretary of defense - is a challenge," Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said in an interview with The Post last week.

In the Department of Defense, where more than two-thirds of the intelligence programs reside, only a handful of senior officials - called Super Users - have the ability to even know about all the department's activities. But as two of the Super Users indicated in interviews, there is simply no way they can keep up with the nation's most sensitive work.

"I'm not going to live long enough to be briefed on everything" was how one Super User put it. The other recounted that for his initial briefing, he was escorted into a tiny, dark room, seated at a small table and told he couldn't take notes. Program after program began flashing on a screen, he said, until he yelled ''Stop!" in frustration.

"I wasn't remembering any of it," he said.
Continue reading here...
http://projects.washingtonpost.com/top-secret-america/articles/a-hidden-world-growing-beyond-control/?om_rid=NFw2$z&om_mid=_BMRERdB8O5mxrD&

reminds me of a story from Alvin Toffler's "Third Wave" published in the 70's.

He was part of a top level scientific inquiry into washington to determine who was really in control.

after two years of poking around they determined that no individual or group in our goverment was.

1970 - 2010. 40 years of clusterfuck waste and confusion feeding blind arrogance.

Lily Tomlin said it best. "No matter how cynical I get, I just can't keep up."

http://www.gregpalast.com/shoot-bp-the-amazon-to-arctic-investigation/#m...

"At Tatitlek Village, Alaska Native Henry Makarka told me, "If I had a machine gun I'd shoot every one of them white sons of bitches."

Makarka was talking about the executives who came to him and his tribe 40 years ago to purchase their land at Valdez. They were from the companies now known as Exxon and BP.

The Tatitlek were paid the handsome price of $1 for Valdez, which the companies knew was worth billions."

The Killing Fields of Multi-National Corporations Pesticides,
Pollution and the Economies of Genocide

http://www.asianage.com/opinion/killing-fields-mncsthe-killing-fields-mn...

by Vandana Shiva
www.navdanya.org/

Vandana Shiva is an Indian feminist and environmental activist. She
is the founder/director of Navdanya Research Foundation for Science,
Technology, and Ecology.

snip
Lawrence Summers, who was the World Bank's chief economist and is now
chief economic adviser to the Obama government, in a memo dated
December 12, 1991, to senior World Bank staff, wrote, "Just between
you and me, shouldn't the World Bank be encouraging more migration of
the dirty industries to the less developed countries?"

http://www.navdanya.org/images/stories/bija55.jpg

http://www.i-sis.org.uk/Bt_Brinjal_Unfit.php
+++++++++++++++++++++++
_________________________
+++++++++++++++++++++++
http://foodfreedom.wordpress.com/2010/07/17/land-grabs-geoengineering-an...

some video from Rady about Vadana Shiva

By Democracy Now!

Ed. Note: I love this woman; Vandana Shiva is one of the most brilliant activists fighting for the best solutions to many of our problems today. Originally a theoretical physicist, she now campaigns the world for heirloom seeds, organic farming and local food systems instead of the chemical- and oil-intensive large scale industrial farms that destroy the environment, increase global warming and wreck local economies. She also supports Hands off Mother Earth, a citizen-based organization that resists geoengineering. ~

http://www.healthfreedomusa.org/?m=201006

the more we learn about poisons in our environment the more necessary is the Glutathione replacement . google glutathione and see how much work has been done on it. Dr Alan Pressman has been explaining how it works for years..

http://glutathione-gsh.org/glutathione/what-is-glutathione/

Food Dye Ban Implemented Or Considered By Some Health Authorities After Cancer And Hyperactivity Link Found

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/195118.php

snip
After new scientific evidence revealed a possible link between food dyes and childhood cancer and hyperactivity, Australian food authorities are reported to be considering banning food colorings from breakfast cereals and confectionary items. The research was carried out by CSPI (Center for Science in the Public Interest), USA.

According to CSPI, food dyes are used in everything, from M&Ms to Kraft salad dressings, and they pose risks of childhood cancer, hyperactivity and allergies.

The three most commonly and widely used dyes are contaminated with known carcinogens, says CSPI; they are:
Red 40
Yellow 5
Yellow 6
Red 3, another dye, has been acknowledged by the US FDA (Food and Drug Administration) as a carcinogen. But it is still in the food supply, informs CSPI.

Manufacturers in the USA use approximately 15 million pounds of 8 synthetic dyes in foods. Since 1995 each American's consumption of dyes has increased five-fold. Unfortunately, a significant proportion of these dyes are used in brightly colored cereals, drinks and candies - products aimed mainly at children.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/195118.php

Progressives are urging President Obama to nominate Troubled Asset Relief Program watchdog Elizabeth Warren to head the new consumer agency created by financial reform legislation.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/109219-progressives-sid...

Dems plan benefits vote minutes after new senator is sworn in
By Michael O'Brien - 07/19/10 02:23 PM ET
Democrats are preparing a vote to extend lapsed unemployment benefits just moments after Democratic appointee Carte Goodwin is sworn in as senator.

Goodwin, who was appointed by West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin (D) to fill the Senate seat of the late Sen. Robert Byrd (D), will be sworn in at 2:15 p.m. on Tuesday.

At 2:30 p.m., Democrats will hold a cloture vote on legislation to extend unemployment benefits.

The legislation has been stalled for weeks since expiring June 4, with Senate Republicans demanding the new spending be offset with spending cuts elsewhere.

Two Republicans, Maine Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe, have crossed the aisle to support the measure, but Byrd's death has left Democrats one vote shy of having the 60 senators necessary to approve the extension.

While Goodwin is expected to back the extension, making its passage Tuesday a fait accompli, Democrats have wasted no time attacking the GOP over the impasse. Senate Republicans, for their part, have pointed to reservations by senior Democrats and President Obama over the endless extension of benefits without being offset in the budget.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/109581-dems-plan-benefi...

Hopes and Prospects, By Noam Chomsky

Reviewed by Johann Hari

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25963.htm

http://projects.washingtonpost.com/top-secret-america/articles/a-hidden-...

===========================

Really, I'm curious why the Washington Post is doing this series. That paper does not appear independent to me [I'm referring to the use of the WaPo during Watergate to ditch Nixon as described/surmised in the book "Family of Secrets"], so they got an okay to do this series for a reason, imo. But what reason.

Is the USA supposed to be so untrustworthy (proven by the illegal-everything Bush years and now the uncontrolled money-sucking power displayed since 9/11) that it should be dissolved? That is, dissolved and replaced by Global Governance/Government?

Not normal readings, but the public is being allowed to use beaches without warnings.

Video is about half down the page...

http://theintelhub.com/2010/07/17/water-tested-toxic-levels-of-oil-sampl...

http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/07/19/hiv.gel.protection/

from the BBC
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-10691353

(CNN) -- Wildlife researchers in Sri Lanka have photographed one of the world's most reclusive primates for the first time.
Sightings of the Horton Plains slender loris -- a small nocturnal primate with extremely thin arms and legs and huge round eyes -- are so rare that the creature has only been seen four times since 1937.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/07/19/sri.lanka.slender.loris/inde...

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0710/39900.html

[excerpt]

The wide-open whip race could create a furious battle for a job that may not be on most voters’ radars but has launched careers for people like DeLay, Tip O’Neill and Tom Foley.

“There may be 400 people running for that,” said Rep. Lee Terry (R-Neb.), who mentioned McCarthy and Sessions as candidates for the majority whip job in the event of a GOP victory this fall.

[end excerpt]

http://www.imemc.org/article/59143

U.S. To Grant Israel 2.775 Billion In Security Aid
Saturday July 17, 2010 06:03 by Saed Bannoura - IMEMC & Agencies

U.S.. Assistant Secretary of State, Andrew Shapiro, stated Friday that the US government intends to grant Israel the amount of 2.775 Billion U.S. Dollars in what was described as the largest single military-security aid grant to Israel.

[more at link]

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/19/vendors-thumb-nose-at-city-...

As a lawyer and artist, I am horrified by this attempt by the mayor to prevent artists’ free expression in parks. The parks are the only place we as a society congregate, and the best place artists have to paint, or sell their finished products. Having to get a permit, try to reserve a space, hope one gets one, all makes it very hard to be an artist. In these hard economic times, this is especially cruel, as this is artists’ only way to make a living. Really, though, this is about freedom of expression. I should be allowed to set up a canvas, paint, and sell it if I can. The constitution guarantees that, but does allow reasonable restrictions. The city has submitted no proof of blocking people because there is none. He should let artists express themselves and make a living, as most are really starving artists!

— Frederic C. Schultz, Esq.

http://www.haaretz.com/magazine/week-s-end/twilight-zone-gestures-to-the...

[excerpt]

...

This week, Dafna Banai, an activist from Machsom Watch, described the most recent expulsions: 15 families were expelled from their encampments on July 1; the week before, another 16 families received demolition and evacuation orders. For more than a year, the entire valley has been strewn with dozens of cement blocks preventing entry and warning of "firing zones" wherever Palestinians live. Israel already has enclosed all the territory west of Highway 90 with impassable ditches, and residents can exit only twice a week, when Israel opens the locked gates on the roads.

Israel declares huge amounts of private Palestinian land as firing zones and expels the residents under the false and self-righteous guise of concern for their welfare, lest they be harmed by the military training; but these firing zones are always to be found solely on Palestinian land, and never on settlement land. Have you ever heard of any settlers being expelled from their homes because their settlement was declared part of a firing zone? But against these wretched shepherds in the Jordan Valley, anything goes. This is Israeli justice, this is equality as practiced by the Israel Defense Forces.

Perhaps the explanation for this appalling expulsion policy can be found in comments by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicized last Friday on Channel 10. During a condolence visit to the home of a settler family in 2001, Netanyahu divulged his dastardly plan: He told his hosts he would proclaim the entire Jordan Valley a "designated military site."

This is how the prime minister thought to mock the Americans at the time, so they would let Israel do as it pleases in the Jordan Valley. Now he is prime minister again, and his trick is working splendidly. A Jordan Valley cleansed of Palestinians will one day be more easily annexed to Israel.

[more at link]

t doesn't have to be this way. This is a book woven through with hope and awe at all the people who slip beyond imperial control and establish real democracy. Chomsky's strongest model – and the world's – is Bolivia's experiment with radical democracy. After 30 years of having neoliberalism forced on them by the West, including the cost of water pushed beyond their grasp, the Bolivian people elected the first indigenous leader since the European conquests. Since then, it has had the fastest fall in poverty and the most rapid growth in Latin America.
======
Chomsky brought this up in the talk I heard in the fall. We have to change things structurally in order for this sort of thing to happen here. He said efforts by workers, aligned with community, to take control of factories should be supported. Simple and easy to understand. Is this happening anywhere?

I believe Geithner sees the appointment of Elizabeth Warren as a threat to the very scheme he has utilized to date to hide bank losses, thus keeping the banks solvent and out of bankruptcy court and their existing management teams employed and well-paid.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-r-talbott/the-real-reason-geithner_b_...

Vendors Thumb Nose at City Restriction
Submitted by taozen on Mon, 07/19/2010 - 6:44pm.
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/19/vendors-thumb-nose-at-city-...

As a lawyer and artist, I am horrified by this attempt by the mayor to prevent artists’ free expression in parks. The parks are the only place we as a society congregate, and the best place artists have to paint, or sell their finished products. Having to get a permit, try to reserve a space, hope one gets one, all makes it very hard to be an artist. In these hard economic times, this is especially cruel, as this is artists’ only way to make a living. Really, though, this is about freedom of expression. I should be allowed to set up a canvas, paint, and sell it if I can. The constitution guarantees that, but does allow reasonable restrictions. The city has submitted no proof of blocking people because there is none. He should let artists express themselves and make a living, as most are really starving artists!

— Frederic C. Schultz, Esq.
=================================

Corporatists see all profits as their profits, and if they see a street person making a dollah on something, then that's one less dollah not in the pocket of a Corporation. Plus Corporatists do not want individuals using their art to affect the Culture; Corporatists reveal their position that they prefer the Corporation be the source of all Cultural direction. The Corporatist sees no other acceptable source of motivation in The People than Corporate Advertising.

No street artists? Just what the Corporatists would prefer, imo.

http://www.peoplesworld.org/pro-choice-groups-assail-white-house-anti-ab...

[excerpt]

Pro-choice groups assail White House anti-abortion move

...
The Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan is a transitional program to provide coverage between now and 2014 to people who have been denied health insurance because of pre-existing health conditions. In 2014 new insurance exchanges will open that will bar such coverage denials.

But those who are in need of this special plan are the very ones most vulnerable to high-risk pregnancies where abortion is indicated, women's advocates say.

"The high-risk pools were designed as temporary coverage through 2014 for individuals who cannot afford insurance due to serious health problems," Northrup said in a statement today. "Now, women who join the high-risk pools will not be able to access abortion coverage, even when a pregnancy puts their health at further risk. Yet women in these pools are far more likely to have high-risk pregnancies."

Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards pointed out that "the very women who need to purchase private health insurance in the new high-risk pools are likely to be more vulnerable to medically complicated pregnancies." The new policy, she said in a statement, "flies in the face of the intent of the high-risk pools that were meant to meet the medical needs of some of the most vulnerable women in this country."

The proposed restrictions are not required by any law, including the recently enacted health reform law, Richards and Northrup said. The action "adds insult to injury by imposing restrictions that reach beyond those agreed upon by lawmakers," Northrup said. "Excluding abortion coverage from the high-risk insurance pools was not part of the negotiations during health care reform, and nothing in the bill compels this result."

Planned Parenthood sent out an e-mail alert calling the proposed restriction a "Stupak-like ruling." That is a reference to the amendment introduced by Reps. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., and Joe Pitts, R-Pa., that would have barred coverage of abortion even where women paid with their own money. The compromise included in the final health reform bill imposes complicated restrictions but does allow women to purchase abortion coverage if they pay for that separately.
[more at link]

"That could come as a surprise to many who remember the repeated assurances from President Obama and other officials that consumers would retain a variety of health-care choice"

As the Obama administration begins to enact the new national health care law, the country’s biggest insurers are promoting affordable plans with reduced premiums that require participants to use a narrower selection of doctors or hospitals.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/18/business/18choice.html?th&emc=th

http://www.handsoffmotherearth.org/

Hands Off Mother Earth (H.O.M.E) is a global campaign to defend our one precious home, planet earth, against the threat of geoengineering experiments.

Join with us to send a clear message to the geoengineers and to governments worldwide that our home is not a laboratory

http://www.handsoffmotherearth.org/category/people/

Naomi Klein

Bridge, at that link
Submitted by nora on Mon, 07/19/2010 - 2:11am.
---

Have you seen this yet?:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_pb3o8nxdI&feature=related

====
Nora, I have seen this several times but I think it is best shown and explained in this clip, i.e. the film 911: In Plane Site (72 Min).
I watched it just a month or so ago on Nexflix where it was streaming - but not anymore. But you can see this film on Youtube. I checked it out.

I recognized the host of this docu immediately and he did a good job thruout. I thought they did really well with discussing and showing in close-up the planes flying into both towers and also the Pentagon pictures in this film I had never seen before. I recommend.

Did you read the Sonnenfeld article? Someone had posted the link and I came across my bookmark and decided to read it again.
9/11 FEMA videographer at Ground Zero goes public
Submitted by bridge on Sun, 07/18/2010 - 11:51pm.
----

The FEMA info and what he saw in building 6 where the CIA kept their stuff - something I have never seen discussed in any of the many other films.

I haven't checked out his book yet (maybe it isn't translated in English, don't know).

I was also wondering why we never see Rodriguez speaking out about his 9/11 experience anymore like many of the scientists and architects do (e.g. Griffin).

btw. I watched the two films you recommended last time and found some additional v. interesting docus. Will let you know the ones I saw. But I have to say, I got phys. sick more than once when "truth and reality" hit me. The fact that everybody and everything was turned into dust. The fact that people were told to go back up into the elevator before the second plane hit. One witness described this moment of his life when he decided not to go up with his friends from work and they teased him calling him a chicken or so. Then the building came down and he survived yet thousands were killed. I still can't get over this and I Had to take a break from watching 9/11 films.

btw. did they ever show on TV how huge the area of destruction was? How many houses destroyed? The New Yorkers knew it but I don't think I have ever seen it on TV. The picture w. building 6 in the Sonnenfeld article shows how it looked: like the bombed out German cities in WWII.

Published on Monday, July 19, 2010 by The Asian Age
The Killing Fields of Multi-National Corporations
Pesticides, Pollution and the Economies of Genocide
by Vandana Shiva

The Bhopal gas tragedy was the worst industrial disaster in human history. Twenty-five thousand people died, 500,000 were injured, and the injustice done to the victims of Bhopal over the past 25 years will go down as the worst case of jurisprudence ever.

The gas leak in Bhopal in December 1984 was from the Union Carbide pesticide plant which manufactured "carabaryl" (trade name "sevin") - a pesticide used mostly in cotton plants. It was, in fact, because of the Bhopal gas tragedy and the tragedy of extremist violence in Punjab that I woke up to the fact that agriculture had become a war zone. Pesticides are war chemicals that kill - every year 220,000 people are killed by pesticides worldwide.

After research I realised that we do not need toxic pesticides that kill humans and other species which maintain the web of life. Pesticides do not control pests, they create pests by killing beneficial species. We have safer, non-violent alternatives such as neem. That is why at the time of the Bhopal disaster I started the campaign "No more Bhopals, plant a neem". The neem campaign led to challenging the biopiracy of neem in 1994 when I found that a US multinational, W.R. Grace, had patented neem for use as pesticide and fungicide and was setting up a neem oil extraction plant in Tumkur, Karnataka. We fought the biopiracy case for 11 years and were eventually successful in striking down the biopiracy patent.

Meanwhile, the old pesticide industry was mutating into the biotechnology and genetic engineering industry. While genetic engineering was promoted as an alternative to pesticides, Bt cotton was introduced to end pesticide use. But Bt cotton has failed to control the bollworm and has instead created major new pests, leading to an increase in pesticide use.

The high costs of genetically-modified (GM) seeds and pesticides are pushing farmers into debt, and indebted farmers are committing suicide. If one adds the 200,000 farmer suicides in India to the 25,000 killed in Bhopal, we are witnessing a massive corporate genocide - the killing of people for super profits. To maintain these super profits, lies are told about how, without pesticides and genetically-modified organisms (GMOs), there will be no food. In fact, the conclusions of International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development, undertaken by the United Nations, shows that ecologically organic agriculture produces more food and better food at lower cost than either chemical agriculture or GMOs.

The agrochemical industry and its new avatar, the biotechnology industry, do not merely distort and manipulate knowledge, science and public policy. They also manipulate the law and the justice system. The reason justice has been denied to the victims of Bhopal is because corporations want to escape liability. Freedom from liability is, in fact, the real meaning of "free trade". The tragedy of Bhopal is dual.
Interestingly, the Bhopal disaster happened precisely when corporations were seeking deregulation and freedom from liability through the instruments of "free trade", "trade liberalisation" and "globalisation", both through bilateral pressure and through the Uruguay Round of General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) which led to the creation of the World Trade Organisation...

Injustice for Bhopal has been used to tell corporations that they can get away with murder. This is what senior politicians communicated to Dow Chemical. This is what the US-India Commission for Environmental Cooperation forum stated on June 11, 2010, in the context of the call from across India for justice for Bhopal victims. As one newspaper commented, Bhopal is being seen as a "road block and impediment to trade... the recommendations include removing road blocks to commercial trade by (India), and adoption of a nuclear liability regime"...

Lawrence Summers, who was the World Bank's chief economist and is now chief economic adviser to the Obama government, in a memo dated December 12, 1991, to senior World Bank staff, wrote, "Just between you and me, shouldn't the World Bank be encouraging more migration of the dirty industries to the less developed countries?"

Since wages are low in the Third World, economic costs of pollution arising from increased illness and death are least in the poorest countries. According to Mr Summers, the logic "of relocation of pollutants in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that".

All this and Bhopal must teach us to reclaim our universal and common humanity and build an Earth Democracy in which all are equal, and corporations are not allowed to get away with crimes against people and the planet.
Read in its entirety...
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/07/19-5

While looking for the 911: In Plane Site I came across several Youtubes where two guys I did not know discussed all sorts of interesting news. They also talked about Mel Gibson and it was their opinion that this whole Mel Gibson thing may be a shake-down. They said that the tapes are fake and that the woman is asking for a huge amount of money AND that this could be payback for his film Conspiracy Theory (gov. agents tried to silence him, screwed w. his mind, etc. et. and he tried to get help from the Julia Roberts character who worked at the Dept. of Justice). Def. a Must See film.

Then they discussed his latest film, Edge of Darkness, which deals w. similar stuff, whistleblowers, black project info, WMD given to terrorists) etc. Btw. these two films are not directed by MG but he is absolutely brilliant in CTheory and no doubt excellent in EofDarkness as well (read a few Netflix comments). I Just ordered the film.

They also mentioned that his ex-wife spoke out in his defense and said that in 27 years or so he always was a loving father and never violent. Others have defended him as well.

Okay. Today I googled and found endless links with "Mel Gibson tapes" being professionally made or tempered with. It may not even be Mel's voice, etc. etc. I had never heard anything so far and decided to listen to a clip. Right away, No doubt in my mind, there is something seriously wrong w. these tapes.

For example, Mel starts out breathing v. hard (allegedly) ... v. phony IMO. Also, the voice of the woman on the tape sounds v. odd, as if she is reading the script, cool as can be while the male voice is yelling. There are also v. obvious gaps in the tape. They had a forensic audio expert explain the make-up of the tapes.

Remember The bin laden tapes which were all either tempered with or completely fake? On the later ones published before the 2004 and 06 elections it wasn't even bin laden on the tape. The first one was incorrectly translated. Yet none of these tapes were ever questioned at the time AFAIR.

The weird thing about the whole Mel Gibson affair is the fact that for over twnety years he was as popular as can be. Since Mad Max which put him on the map he was considered a great actor, dedicated husband and father, totally dedicatd to his family and he loved to be on his ranch at home in Australia. Also, all those years I never heard about a single affair or even seen a picture w. Mel and another woman. All Our local channels used to come from LA so you would think I would have heard something. Nothing.

Then he made The Passion of the Christ (2004) and all of a sudden he was a racist and anti-semite. The servant press jumped into action in a big way. The people who appreciated this film and turned it into blockbuster were v. often ridiculed, too. V. odd. So IMO this whole thing was a conspiracy theory in itself.

Then he made Apocalypto and he had the hardest time to get it produced AFAIR. Same happened w. Passion. So what is it "they" didn't like about these two films. Apocalypto was ridiculed before anyone even saw a single scene. IMHO It was the film that should have won the Oscar but it was completely ignored. Another conspiracy theory?

Anyone seen "Edge Of Darkness?"

---
btw. what was wrong w. the film "The Road" w. Viggo Mortensen. This film was also absolutely brilliant yet completely ignored for an Oscar this year. The Road and Viggo Mortensen were not even nominated.

(Che and Benicio del Toro also not nominated but it is not difficult to figure out the reasons for it).

Yet the v. ordinary film The Blind Side" was nominated and the v. ordinary Sandra Bullock in that film (sp) even got the Academy Award. A total joke. But Nobody seemed to have problem with this when earlier she wasn't even a consideration AFAIR.

Ok, I could go on and on but IMO the whole Mel Gibson affair is a Conspiracy theory in itself. It also serves to keep the mind of the little people off the scary stuff that is really going on.

http://foodfreedom.wordpress.com/2010/07/17/land-grabs-geoengineering-an...

By Democracy Now!

Ed. Note: I love this woman; Vandana Shiva is one of the most brilliant activists fighting for the best solutions to many of our problems today. Originally a theoretical physicist, she now campaigns the world for heirloom seeds, organic farming and local food systems instead of the chemical- and oil-intensive large scale industrial farms that destroy the environment, increase global warming and wreck local economies. She also supports Hands off Mother Earth, a citizen-based organization that resists geoengineering. ~

Hi, Bridge. I did read that last year, but it was interesting to review it again.

night folks

)

;) Sleep Sweet

eBooks 180 compared to Hard Cover 100 sold ... eek
:):(

Sold is for weenies...You can get both electronic and hard copy books @your local library...

Speaking of...please "like" my library

Is legally partly responsible for poisoning my dad to death...

"6 times more effective than studying in your shower..."

:)

Fuck

http://www.thekittyliberationfront.org/

;)

-W.R. Grace-
Submitted by Alice on Tue, 07/20/2010 - 11:23am.
Is legally partly responsible for poisoning my dad to death...

...but frankly these mega industries/corporations and their parasitic small businesses are poisoning us all. It's the prominent reason why they don't want single payer health care for US. It would lead to having actual documentation and forensic data on their cause and effect on our population and humanity in general, and would also show the hazards far outweight the benefits.

My son and the community he lives in are fighting a businessman who wants to put in a truck stop next door to the residential property(and down the street from high, middle and elementary schools)that would use more water than is available and the land is zoned for. The community relies on water wells so not only would it take a disproportionate share of the water, it would probably poison the wells with its runoff.

So far we've been able to fend off this assault, and, if the Gulf crisis has had any silver linings, it has brought about a renewed awareness at least in my son's city/county (a more liberal/progressive leaning area) to be even more focused on green and clean energy.

But it is in Virginia where reThugs use and abuse with their usual lies, fear mongering, etc.

... anyone wanted to talk about BOOKS they might put further. {It was 4 AM for me :} I heard and seen in news, but nothing at that time on my different e-news. :} ... btw it was, I think, based on an AMAZON report. ;} {Now e-books v HARD COPIES SELLING on Amazon should be reported all about now.
:} {poof but will check back ;}
Alice on Tue, 07/20/2010 - 11:25am. tis true & Super Kewl ;}

To members of Thomas Paine's Corner

Jason Miller July 15 at 9:27am
Our fatal flaw, both systemically and individually, is our hubris. Our species reeks of arrogance as we presume that the universe revolves around us. We may no longer be geocentric in our beliefs, but we are most certainly humancentric. When our vanity, pleasure, convenience, and desires “necessitate” the holocaust of over 50 billion nonhuman animals each year, moral primitivism is the order of the day. No confession, penance, or reparations can ever absolve us of the gross obscenity of enslaving, torturing, and murdering billions upon billions of other sentients that we might eat of their rotting flesh, wear their skin, hunt them for sport, perform excruciating experiments upon them, and force them to perform for us in humiliating and painful ways. Our hands drip crimson, immersed in the blood of our innocent victims. In the court of Higher Law, humanity has been found guilty of mass murder and torture, hopefully sentenced by Karma to a fate worse than death. Yet as a collective, we clamor for more slaughter, skinning, surgeries without consent, forced addictions, bow hunts, circuses, rodeos, and more.....

http://thomaspainescorner.wordpress.com/2010/07/15/our-species-reeks-of-...

Possessed by this mode of being: we languish in a zoo of our own making where we gaze, without comprehension, at the confines of our enclosure, chew our paws, pace the cage, and are restless for mealtime. Like an animal in a cage, we are no longer what we were meant to be … we have forgotten what it is to be alive. With the exception of superficial form, we begin to lose our affinity to what makes us recognizable as a human being and as an animal — for we have become simply a sad thing that waits for lunch. And I defy any caged clock-watcher in a cubicle to defy that point.....

http://thomaspainescorner.wordpress.com/2010/07/13/a-heap-of-broken-imag...

The head of North Carolina's NAACP chapter was arrested Tuesday as advocates prepared to confront a county school board that voted to eliminate a busing policy focused on diversity.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/9182266

Food Co-Op in Rachel Corrie's Hometown Boycotts Israeli Goods
The Olympia Food Co-op announced last week that no more Israeli products will be sold at its two grocery stores.

...Last week, the board of directors of the Olympia Food Co-op in Washington state decided that no more Israeli products will be sold at its two grocery stores in the city.

"We met last Thursday for the board members meeting and a pretty large group - about 40 people - presented the boycott project and answered our questions," Rob Richards, a board member, told Haaretz. "A couple of board members were concerned about what will be the financial effect on the organization, but it's minimal. For me personally there is a moral imperative that goes beyond any financial concern...

...It is probably no coincidence that Olympia is the hometown of the International Solidarity Movement activist Rachel Corrie who was killed seven years ago in Gaza - a Caterpillar bulldozer ran over her as she tried to prevent demolition of a Palestinian house. Last month, the student body of Evergreen State College in Olympia, where she studied, passed two resolutions which called for the college foundation "to divest from companies that profit from Israel's illegal occupation of Palestine," and the second one called to ban the Caterpillar company equipment from campus.

"The fact that it is the home town of Rachel Corrie's parents and that it is represented by Rep Brian Baird (who has been to Gaza and is outspoken against Israel) makes this ripe for issues," said Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi of The Israel Project, a pro-Israel organization. "So does the fact that it does not have a very organized pro-Israel community. This went under the radar screen at a time when most groups were focused on Iran sanctions and other macro issues. It is clear that the people who voted on this did not hear both sides of the issues. What is needed is education on facts."
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/07/20-1

Since the NAACP had the audacity to ask Tea Partiers to renounce racists within their ranks, they've gotten a slew of death threats. They posted audio of one particularly chilling message on their blog. Again, the dilemma: Publicize it to condemn it, or ignore it and hope it goes away? Either way, scary stuff.

"You want a race war? You got one." – an uncalm caller to the NAACP
http://www.commondreams.org/further/2010/07/20-2

"The fact that it is the home town of Rachel Corrie's parents and that it is represented by Rep Brian Baird (who has been to Gaza and is outspoken against Israel) makes this ripe for issues," said Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi of The Israel Project, a pro-Israel organization.

"So does the fact that it {Olympia] does not have a very organized pro-Israel community. [.."]

Absolute BULLSHIT! They are very organized. I would bet that the local newspaper gave them much space to condemn the action of the CO-OP. And the editorials are very much against the boycotts. It is just that, through years and years of educating and organizing, the community is well informed of what is going on in Palestine. And supports peace within the framework of the international consensus. I went to Evergreen in the late '80s and early '90s. I remember in 1988, at the Washington State Democrat Convention, I was with a group that pushed through a plank that called for the PLO to be the political representatives of the Palestinians, and for Israel to negotiate for peace within the confines of international law. The Corries are a part of a very large activist community.

This went under the radar screen at a time when most groups were focused on Iran sanctions and other macro issues. It is clear that the people who voted on this did not hear both sides of the issues. What is needed is education on facts."
--
Good sound bite, Mizrahi. Won't work in Olympia; the people already have the facts.

From Ghettodefenders post about the arrested NAACP protestor:

>>George Ramsay, a white former student body president of Enloe High School, said it was necessary to keep the diversity policy in place to prepare students for an increasingly connected world.

"It is shortsighted to ignore the way students like me have been enriched by diversity," Ramsay said.<<

=============

Perhaps what this student points out is the very factor of that troubles the bigots who are voting for resegregation -- because I sense these bigots don't want to see their children enriched by exposure to diveristy. Are the bigots fearing their children growing up and not adopting their parents' bigotry? Do bigots fear that if their children grow up and forget seeing the world through the eyes of bigotry, then the number of bigots will decrease? Do these bigots fear a decrease in the numbers of bigots will weaken their bigotted impact on society?

you should point this out on in comments section of the article. (you have to register, though.)

"Are the bigots fearing their children growing up and not adopting their parents' bigotry?"

The economic meltdown, and this administrations determined efforts to resist the mildest of socialistic reforms, has allowed white supremacy to seize the political initiative of the country. Whether it's 1070, attacks on ethic studies (the horror of cultural history), or the latest capitulation of Obama, the bigots are winning:

USDA worker pressured to resign over race comments

The Obama administration is standing by its quick decision to oust a black Agriculture Department employee over racially tinged remarks at an NAACP banquet in Georgia, despite evidence that her remarks were misconstrued and growing calls for USDA to reconsider.

Shirley Sherrod, who until Tuesday was the Agriculture Department's director of rural development in Georgia, says the administration caved to political pressure by pushing her to resign for saying that she didn't give a white farmer as much help as she could have 24 years ago, when she worked for a nonprofit group.

Sherrod says her remarks, delivered in March at a local NAACP banquet in Georgia, were part of a story about racial reconciliation, not racism. The white farming family that was the subject of the story stood by Sherrod and said she should keep her job.

"We probably wouldn't have (our farm) today if it hadn't been for her leading us in the right direction," said Eloise Spooner, the wife of farmer Roger Spooner of Iron City, Ga. "I wish she could get her job back because she was good to us, I tell you."

The NAACP, which initially condemned Sherrod's remarks and supported Sherrod's ouster, joined the calls for her to keep her job. The civil rights group said it and millions of others were duped by the conservative website that posted partial video of her speech on Monday.

"We have come to the conclusion we were snookered ... into believing she had harmed white farmers because of racial bias," said the statement from NAACP President Benjamin Todd Jealous.

The website, biggovernment.com, gained fame last year after airing video of workers at the community group ACORN counseling actors posing as a prostitute and her boyfriend. It posted the Sherrod video as evidence that the NAACP, which recently passed a resolution condemning what it calls racist elements of the Tea Party, condones racism of its own.

Sherrod said she was on the road Monday when USDA deputy undersecretary Cheryl Cook called her and told her the White House wanted her to resign because her comments were generating a cable news controversy.

"They called me twice," she told The Associated Press in an interview. "The last time they asked me to pull over to the side of the road and submit my resignation on my Blackberry, and that's what I did."

Sherrod said administration officials weren't interested in hearing her explanation. "It hurts me that they didn't even try to attempt to see what is happening here, they didn't care," she said. "I'm not a racist ... Anyone who knows me knows that I'm for fairness."

The administration gave a different version of events.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack — not the White House — made the decision to ask Sherrod to resign, said USDA spokeswoman Chris Mather. She said Sherrod willingly resigned when asked.

In a statement, Vilsack said the controversy surrounding Sherrod's comments could, rightly or wrongly, cause people to question her decisions as a federal employee and lead to lingering doubts about civil rights at the agency, which has a troubled history of discrimination.

"There is zero tolerance for discrimination at USDA," Vilsack said. "We have a duty to ensure that when we provide services to the American people we do so in an equitable manner."

The administration is sensitive to the issue because the Agriculture Department has for decades faced charges of discrimination against black farmers who said they could not get aid that routinely went to whites. The department agreed to a final $1.25 billion settlement earlier this year in a class-action suit that has been pending for more than a decade. The payout of that settlement is pending in Congress, and Vilsack has made fixing past wrongs over civil rights a top priority.

The current controversy began Monday when biggovernment.com posted a two-minute, 38-second video clip in which Sherrod describes the first time a white farmer came to her for help. It was 1986, and she worked for a nonprofit rural farm aid group. She said the farmer came in acting "superior" to her and that she debated how much help to give him.

"I was struggling with the fact that so many black people had lost their farmland, and here I was faced with helping a white person save their land," Sherrod said.

Initially, she said, "I didn't give him the full force of what I could do" and only gave him enough help to keep his case progressing. Eventually, she said, his situation "opened my eyes" that whites were struggling just like blacks, and helping farmers wasn't so much about race but was "about the poor versus those who have."

Sherrod said Tuesday the incomplete video appears to intentionally twist her message. She says she became close friends with the farmer and helped him for two years.

"She's always been nice and polite and considerate. She was just a good person," Eloise Spooner said. "She did everything she could trying to help."

Locals said the controversy was unwelcome.

"This is a shame," said Olivia Pearson, a local commissioner for rural Douglas, Ga., who attended the event. "I can assure you that what Mrs. Sherrod said was not a racial statement. She was just trying to tell them about life."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/9182460

Fear of a Black Planet.
new
Submitted by ghettodefender on Tue, 07/20/2010 - 7:52pm.

...

"There is zero tolerance for discrimination at USDA," Vilsack said. "We have a duty to ensure that when we provide services to the American people we do so in an equitable manner."

...

----------------------

Ag Secty. Vilsack is disgusting. It includes Sherrod and so much more. He's discriminating against The Public and environment when he favors the Corporate desires for unhindered moneystreams for the Corporations from factory farming, overgrazing, water degradation, GMOs, etcetera. Nothing but harming discrimination coming from Obama's cabinet. More discrimination when BP gets favored over the The People (and Constitutional principles like Free Speech) coming from the Interior/Energy Departments, etc. Harming discrimination in all its forms is unbridled, and Vilsack misleads when he pretends his decisions are unprejudiced.

Zero tolerance for courage or integrity.
There was no discrimination. The ACORN haters came out with a trumped up case, and immediately the administration caves thus validating their dishonest argument.

On. :-)
http://streamer.whiterosesociety.org:8000/truthseeker (winamp)

Requiem for the Antiwar Movement

By Cindy Sheehan

“When you vote for war, don't be surprised when you get it.” Cindy Sheehan

“I will send at least two additional combat brigades to Afghanistan.” Presidential Candidate Barack Obama

“This war (Iraq) prevents us from tackling every serious threat that we face, from a resurgent al-Qaeda in Afghanistan to a hostile Iranian regime intent on possessing nuclear weapons.” Candidate Barack Obama

“And if we have actionable intelligence about high-level al-Qaeda targets (in Pakistan), we must act if Pakistan will or cannot.” Candidate Barack Obama

July 19, 2010 "Information Clearing House" -- This article and these observations are going to piss some people off—but oh well. You will be angry with me, even though I am not the one who is ordering more war, paying for more war, torturing people and imprisoning them without due process, destroying the economy and the environment, blah, blah, blah. I have developed an incredibly thick skin and if I rankle, it’s because I think time is running out to halt the disastrous trajectory this planet (via the US Military Corporate Complex) is on. I promise that I am not writing this because I am holding protests and no one is coming—these thoughts have been percolating in me for months now. (Note: Remember that old saying: “What if they gave a war and nobody came?” Well, here in DC I am living the opposite: “What if they gave an antiwar protest and nobody came?”)

My grandbabies and other people’s grandbabies WILL NOT live in a world where war for profit is so normal that state-sanctioned violence is rarely even questioned—and if it is, then the person questioning is the “looney tunes,” the “mama moonbat,” the “radical.” That is one seriously messed-up world. You know it is and we are the only ones who have the key to unmessing it.

Last week, the Democratically controlled House of Representatives voted to give Barack Obama 33 billion more dollars to prosecute two idiotic and ill-advised wars. Of course they did—it wasn’t the first time since 2007 that a Democratic Congress voted to fund wars, and it won’t be the last—do you all know why? BECAUSE THE DEMOCRATS DON’T WANT PEACE—THEY ARE JUST ONE-HALF OF THE “WAR PARTY.”

Why else did the Democrats vote for more war, more death and more destruction? If you are a Democrat and voted for one of these scum—did you vote for them hoping that you would get more war? Did you vote for Obama hoping that he would dig this country into a deeper hole, and do you still believe that fucking things up even more is the way to solve problems?

Do you all know what else? The wars that were begun in the Bush presidency and fully funded and increased during the Obama regime belong to everyone who voted for Obama, too. If you listened to what Obama said, and not just how he said it, then you would have heard him promise you that he was going to SEND MORE TROOPS TO AFGHANISTAN. You would have heard him say that nothing was “off the table” for dealing with Iran.

read here
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25970.htm

Haze writes:
You really have to wonder about people like Howard Zinn when he encouraged the gullible liberal left to vote for Obama. Just as it was clear to us long before the 2008 vote that Obama was pro war and bought off by BP oil and Wallstreet, it must have been clear to him. Enough of this!

The Ministry of Truth

Obama's War on the Internet

By Philip Giraldi

July 20, 2010 "Campaign for Liberty " -- The Ministry of Truth was how George Orwell described the mechanism used by government to control information in his seminal novel 1984. A recent trip to Europe has convinced me that the governments of the world have been rocked by the power of the internet and are seeking to gain control of it so that they will have a virtual monopoly on information that the public is able to access. In Italy, Germany, and Britain the anonymous internet that most Americans are still familiar with is slowly being modified. If one goes into an internet café it is now legally required in most countries in the European Union to present a government issued form of identification. When I used an internet connection at a Venice hotel, my passport was demanded as a precondition and the inner page, containing all my personal information, was scanned and a copy made for the Ministry of the Interior -- which controls the police force. The copy is retained and linked to the transaction. For home computers, the IP address of the service used is similarly recorded for identification purposes. All records of each and every internet usage, to include credit information and keystrokes that register everything that is written or sent, is accessible to the government authorities on demand, not through the action of a court or an independent authority. That means that there is de facto no right to privacy and a government bureaucrat decides what can and cannot be "reviewed" by the authorities. Currently, the records are maintained for a period of six months but there is a drive to make the retention period even longer.

The excuses being given for the increasing government intervention into the internet are essentially two: first, that the anonymity of the internet has permitted criminal behavior, fraud, pornography, and libel. Second is the security argument, that managing the internet is an integral part of the "global war on terror" in that it is used by terrorists to plan their attacks requiring governments to control those who use it. The United States government takes the latter argument one step farther, claiming that the internet itself is a vulnerable "natural asset" that could be seized or damaged by terrorists and must be protected, making the case for a massive $100 billion program of cyberwarfare. Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-CT) argues that "violent Islamist extremists" rely on the internet to communicate and recruit and he has introduced a bill in the Senate that will empower the president to "kill" the internet in case of a national emergency.

read here

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25975.htm

Top Secret America
A hidden world, growing beyond control

By Dana Priest and William M. Arkin

July 19, 2010 "Washington Post" -- The top-secret world the government created in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has become so large, so unwieldy and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, how many programs exist within it or exactly how many agencies do the same work.

V I D E O

These are some of the findings of a two-year investigation by The Washington Post that discovered what amounts to an alternative geography of the United States, a Top Secret America hidden from public view and lacking in thorough oversight. After nine years of unprecedented spending and growth, the result is that the system put in place to keep the United States safe is so massive that its effectiveness is impossible to determine.

The investigation's other findings include:

* Some 1,271 government organizations and 1,931 private companies work on programs related to counterterrorism, homeland security and intelligence in about 10,000 locations across the United States.

* An estimated 854,000 people, nearly 1.5 times as many people as live in Washington, D.C., hold top-secret security clearances.

* In Washington and the surrounding area, 33 building complexes for top-secret intelligence work are under construction or have been built since September 2001. Together they occupy the equivalent of almost three Pentagons or 22 U.S. Capitol buildings - about 17 million square feet of space.

* Many security and intelligence agencies do the same work, creating redundancy and waste. For example, 51 federal organizations and military commands, operating in 15 U.S. cities, track the flow of money to and from terrorist networks.

* Analysts who make sense of documents and conversations obtained by foreign and domestic spying share their judgment by publishing 50,000 intelligence reports each year - a volume so large that many are routinely ignored.

These are not academic issues; lack of focus, not lack of resources, was at the heart of the Fort Hood shooting that left 13 dead, as well as the Christmas Day bomb attempt thwarted not by the thousands of analysts employed to find lone terrorists but by an alert airline passenger who saw smoke coming from his seatmate.

They are also issues that greatly concern some of the people in charge of the nation's security.

"There has been so much growth since 9/11 that getting your arms around that - not just for the DNI [Director of National Intelligence], but for any individual, for the director of the CIA, for the secretary of defense - is a challenge," Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said in an interview with The Post last week.

read here
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25960.htm

The Disappearing Intellectual in the Age of Economic Darwinism
By Henry A. Giroux

Source: t r u t h o u tTuesday, July 20, 2010
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We live at a time that might be appropriately called the age of the disappearing intellectual, a disappearance that marks with disgrace a particularly dangerous period in American history. While there are plenty of talking heads spewing lies, insults and nonsense in the various media, it would be wrong to suggest that these right-wing populist are intellectuals. They are neither knowledgeable nor self-reflective, but largely ideological hacks catering to the worst impulses in American society. Some obvious examples would include John Stossel calling for the repeal of that "section of the 1964 Civil Rights Act that bans discrimination in public places."[1] And, of course, there are the more famous corporate-owned talking heads such as Glenn Beck, Charles Krauthammer, Bill O'Reilly and Rush Limbaugh, all of whom trade in reactionary world views, ignorance, ideological travesties and outlandish misrepresentations - all the while wrapping themselves in the populist creed of speaking for everyday Americans.

In a media scape and public sphere that view criticism, dialog and thoughtfulness as a liability, such anti-intellectuals abound, providing commentaries that are nativist, racist, reactionary and morally repugnant. But the premium put on ignorance and the disdain for critical intellectuals is not monopolized by the dominant media, it appears to have become one of the few criteria left for largely wealthy individuals to qualify for public office. One typical example is Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, who throws out inanities such as labeling the Obama administration a "gangster government."[2] Bachmann refuses to take critical questions from the press because she claims that they unfairly focus on her language. She has a point. After all, it might be difficult to support statements such as the claim that "the US government used the census information to round up the Japanese [Americans] and put them in concentration camps."[3] Another typical example can be found in Congressman Joe Barton's apology to BP for having to pay for damages to the government stemming from its disastrous oil spill.

This "upscaling of ignorance"[4] gets worse. Richard Cohen, writing in The Washington Post about Sen. Michael Bennett, was shocked to discover that he was actually well-educated and smart but had to hide his qualifications in his primary campaign so as to not undermine his chance of being re-elected. Cohen concludes that in politics, "We have come to value ignorance."[5] He further argues that the notion that a politician should actually know something about domestic and foreign affairs is now considered a liability. He writes:

[W]e now have politicians who lack a child's knowledge of government. In Nevada, Sharron Angle has won the GOP Senate nomination espousing phasing out Social Security and repealing the income tax as well as abolishing that durable conservative target, the Education Department. Similarly, in Connecticut, Linda McMahon, a former pro wrestling tycoon, is running commercials so adamantly anti-Washington you would think she's an anarchist. In Arizona Andy Goss, a Republican congressional candidate, suggests requiring all members of Congress to live in a barracks. This might be tough on wives, children and the odd cocker spaniel, but what the hell. Nowadays, all ideas are equal.[6]
http://www.zcommunications.org/the-disappearing-intellectual-in-the-age-...