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While election day is June 3, voters will begin receiving their absentee ballots and will begin voting on Proposition 98 - the Landlords' Scheme – and Prop. 99 – the Homeowners Protection Act this week. Because of the deceptive nature of Prop. 98, it is unlikely your friends and family will understand Prop. 98's devastating impacts to seniors, renters, the environment and our communities unless you tell them early and often through June 3rd. Start today by sending an e-mail to everyone you know! 
Donna Matthews, 83, lives in Plantation on the Lake mobile home park in Calimesa, Riverside County and is facing an eviction threat over a disputed trash bill. Under protest Donna paid the fee, but her landlord is still trying to evict her through the court process. Right now, Donna is protected by strong mobile home tenant protection laws which protect against unfair evictions. But if Prop. 98 passes, those protections are threatened, and the landlord will likely try to evict Donna again so he can raise the rent. Donna refuses to be intimidated by her landlord. She is working to inform the mobile home park residents of Calimesa to vote No on Prop. 98 in June.
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
No on 98, Yes on 99
43,000 deployed (to Iraq) unfit for combat
By Bob Kendall
That was the shocking headline in USA Today on May 8.
Gregg Zaroya wrote the story from Washington, D.C. It read:
"More than 43,000 U.S. troops listed as medically unfit for combat in the week before their scheduled deployment to Iraq as Afghanistan since 2003 were sent anyway, Pentagon records show."
Zaroya continued, "The reliance of troops found medically non-deployable is another sign of stress placed on a military that has sent 1.6 million servicemen to the war zones."
Bobby Muller, Veterans for America President, has declared, "They are repeatedly exposed to high intensity combat with insufficient time at home to rest and heal before redeploying."
From start to finish, thus far the Iraq War was based on a series of lies.
To plunge U.S. service personnel into the thousands of years old Middle East religious conflict is unforgivable. The difference in the Middle East cause for fighting with such tremendously intensity, must be stated simply and bluntly. The Middle East religions are fighting to maintain their thousands of year's old, historical religious convictions.
These fighters are fighting for their belief in their view of God and their desire to maintain this historic life style. Not even the great Roman Empire, which lasted 600 years, could conquer Baghdad. The Romans tried, but failed and raced back to Rome, defeated in their grand designs.
Fools rush in where angels fear to tread! The U.S. has a vice president who had suffered multiple heart attacks. Dick Cheney had worked for oil companies. Cheney still is receiving payments on his long term deals made before becoming vice president. Is this a conflict of interest?
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best buddy film ever
In 2004, in a marketing/advertising campaign made exclusive for the web, American Express orchestrated the best buddy film ever. Directed by Barry Levinson, Jerry Seinfeld and Superman teamed up to discuss costumes and hindsight, talk about nothing, and show off the benefits of Amex's theft and damage, 90-day warranty and roadside assistance.
Stop the Towers Hootenanny
FOR THE CALIFORNIA DESERT COALITION'S BENEFIT EVENT
Stop the Towers Hootenanny
The California Desert Coalition (CDC) will be holding a benefit dinner and silent auction at historic
Pappy & Harriets Palace in Pioneertown on
June 14, 2008, from 4:00 to 8:00 p.m.
Stop the Towers Hootenanny will feature a buffet dinner, great music, no host bar and the opportunity to bid on silent auction items. This festive evening of fun and camaraderie promises to be a real "hoot" and will offer us all the opportunity to hear about the latest progress being made to stop the proposed 500kV power corridor through the Morongo Basin and surrounding communities, including Pioneertown within sight of Pappy & Harriets Palace .
Valuable items from local businesses, artists and individuals have been pledged, and more are needed for the auction. Any items big or small are very welcome and all tax-deductible donations will be acknowledged at the party. Please call Fundraising Committee member Pam Anderson (760-228-9676) if you have a service, object or artwork to contribute to the event and this important cause or if you would like more information about the event.
Bev Doolittle, famous native Californian artist and local resident, has pledged an original piece to help raise monies to increase the education and legal fund, so you can expect to see almost anything up for auction at the Stop the Towers Hootenanny.
See the below positions, and please call Judy Ruggles at 760-364-4839 or 714-797-4807 to volunteer your help.
Greeters/Check-In Table
Duties : Greeting arriving guests; checking names on reservation sheets; directing guests to party area.
Skills: Happy personalities; ability to maintain poise under pressure; ability to find names on sheets quickly and check in. 5 volunteers needed
Silent Auction Hosts
Duties: Maintain presence near silent auction tables; help generate excitement as bidding processes get underway; ensure auction items are picked up by winning bidders at close of auction.
Skills: Ability to stand for extended periods of time; ability to socialize; assertive enough to request that guests not handle items, if need be. 6-8 volunteers needed
Cashiers
Duties: Process monies paid by winning bidders.
Skills: Ability to process checks, cash and credit cards quickly & accurately; ability to total out banks and report totals to Cash Manager. 5 volunteers needed
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How to Get Universal Health Care
Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama say they believe in giving Americans universal health care. I don't believe them. Anyone who takes the time to understand universal health care should conclude that only a simple single payer system will reform the current outrageous system that benefits the insurance and pharmaceutical industries.
The contorted plans from Clinton and Obama are not sufficient reforms. And what John McCain has proposed is sheer nonsense and by itself should cause any conscious American to avoid voting for him.
Fights for health care system reform are centered in Congress, as if legislators will do what they have never done before: achieve true, major and systemic reforms that only serve the public interest, not lobbyists and campaign contributors from business sectors.
Both Clinton and Obama believe that Americans have a moral right to universal health care. If this is correct and if this is what you believe, then achieving universal health care that covers absolutely everyone by making health care affordable to absolutely everyone, as it is in many other nations, requires a different kind of government action. What exactly?
We must expand the Bill of Rights as embodied in the US Constitution to include the right to affordable universal health care. The time has come for the public to conclude that the right to universal health care is as important and necessary as the right to free speech and all the other beloved constitutional rights. Common sense says that health care is a right, not a privilege.
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Voter ID Battle Shifts to Proof of Citizenship
By IAN URBINA
Lillie Lewis, 78, with a letter from Mississippi saying it had no record of her birth. "That's downright wrong," she said.
The battle over voting rights will expand this week as lawmakers in Missouri are expected to support a proposed constitutional amendment to enable election officials to require proof of citizenship from anyone registering to vote.
The measure would allow far more rigorous demands than the voter ID requirement recently upheld by the Supreme Court, in which voters had to prove their identity with a government-issued card.
Sponsors of the amendment — which requires the approval of voters to go into effect, possibly in an August referendum — say it is part of an effort to prevent illegal immigrants from affecting the political process. Critics say the measure could lead to the disenfranchisement of tens of thousands of legal residents who would find it difficult to prove their citizenship.
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Flame Warriors
These Are the Good Old Days
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My Mother
"They used to break bottles on a fence and follow me home. Look where they got me." Mom's story of her scars terrified me.
"They?" Who were "they"--and could they find us here at my grandmother's bungalow in Echo Park? (Which was often filled with people who had been exiled from many places--Socialists and Communists, violin soloists, and lesbians who had fled Castro's Cuba.)
I tell people that my family absorbed lesbians during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Those lesbians were a big part of my childhood, arriving midday wearing military gear and sporting masculine pompadour haircuts. They'd show up with hot bread in thin bags and produce sticks of sweet guava paste while my grandmother poured strong coffee.
Then, the merengue music would begin, and the lesbians would start to dance like Desi Arnaz, taking turns whirling mom around. She would giggle, the flan would jiggle, and for a Proustian moment all was right in the world.
When I remind my mother about this, she laments, "Why don't you remember the skiing and the leather jacket we got you? It's always the lesbians with you!"
Mom was not a butchie; she was boy crazy. During World War II, she worked in a factory that manufactured medals of honor for soldiers. She sat for twelve hours a day attaching the medals to gold braids and ribbons. Then she would place them in blue velvet boxes to be sent overseas. What no one in the factory or the federal government knew was that my mother was writing her name and address on pieces of paper and sticking them into every box. I asked her if she ever met anyone that way, to which she sheepishly replied, "Yes." The topic was dropped.
Our family business was operating batting cages. The pitching machine spit out the balls at lightning speed. Don Drysdale, Sandy Koufax. Whitey Ford. 50 cents for 12 pitches. Of course my mother ran the place, and I was her slave: selling candy, hosing down the street, and the most dreaded of all jobs, feeding the pitching machine with balls. I call it my black and blue period.
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The Oil Nonbubble
By PAUL KRUGMAN
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Ten months later, oil was selling for $70 a barrel. "It's a huge bubble," declared Steve Forbes, the publisher, who warned that the coming crash in oil prices would make the popping of the technology bubble "look like a picnic."
All through oil's five-year price surge, which has taken it from $25 a barrel to last week's close above $125, there have been many voices declaring that it's all a bubble, unsupported by the fundamentals of supply and demand.
So here are two questions: Are speculators mainly, or even largely, responsible for high oil prices? And if they aren't, why have so many commentators insisted, year after year, that there's an oil bubble?
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Things younger than Republican Presidential candidate (oh, and did I forget to mention “war hero”?) John McCain
Oil is younger than John McCain.
(Thanks to Michelle, Hana, Kenneth, Colleen, Eliot, and others for the tip!)
The Chocolate Chip Cookie.
The Chocolate Chip Cookie is younger than John McCain.
OK, this is an odd one. Apparently, the chocolate chip cookie has not been around since the dawn of time. It did not evolve from anything, nor was it hanging down from the forbidden tree (or whatever it's called) in the Garden of Eden. It was, in fact, invented in 1937 by Ruth Graves Wakefield of Whitman, Massachusetts, who ran the Toll House Restaurant.
So this classic staple and friend of milk lovers everywhere is actually younger than John McCain.
(Thanks to Sean J. for the tip!)
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US Terrorism Report: Selective Data, Wrong Lessons
By Ramzy Baroud
The data provided in the US State Department's annual terrorism report for 2007 points to some interesting if puzzling conclusions. The much publicised document, made available 30 April via the State Department's website, makes no secret of the fact that Al-Qaeda is back, strong as ever. It also suggests that violence worldwide is nowhere near subsiding, despite President Bush's repeated assurances regarding the success of his "war on terror".
Will the report inspire serious reflection on the
Let's look at some of the data. To start with, take
Then there's
There have also been many other violent incidents around the world, including but not limited to North Africa, the terrorist bombings in
But this is barely half the story -- or 40 per cent of it, if we want to be as specific as the terrorism report.
Considering the fact that the horrifying violence currently witnessed in
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Oh my
by Brad
Jonah, are you sure you want to ask this?
The Bush Legacy [Jonah Goldberg]
About a month ago, I called Ramesh in a panic because I'd forgotten that I was slated to do a Close-Up Foundation interview on the Bush legacy and I hadn't thought too much about it. Fortunately, not only did Ramesh have some great thoughts, but I was wrong about the date — by a month (I'd entered it into my PDA wrong). Anyway, I'm doing the interview this Thursday and while I have my thoughts far better organized, I thought it'd be interesting to know what NRO readers think Bush's legacy will be. Please send thoughts — hopefully constructive — to JonahResearch@AOL.com.
(Via.)
I highly encourage you all to send Jonah your thoughts on this matter, be they constructive or otherwise.
For my part, I think pictures speak more than a trillion-kabillion words, so I'll let them speak for me. Ladies and gentlemen, the Bush Legacy:
To sum up: Bush has been a smarmy, destructive asshole for the past eight years and he has left the next president with an extremely large pile of shit to deal with. And you, Jonah, dutifully enabled the stupid SOB for years until you realized that he was starting to cost the GOP votes. Lest we forget:
From tax cuts (and deficits, alas), to his personal conviction on abortion, to aligning America with the historical tide of liberty in the world, George W. Bush has proved that he's a Reaganite, not a "Bushie." He may not be a natural heir to Reagan, but that's the point. The party is all Reaganite now. What better sign that this is now truly and totally the Gipper's Party than the obvious conversion of George Bush's own son?
Why should anybody ask for your opinion on anything, dude? You have less credibility than a 9/11 Truther. Because say what you will about the Truthers, but at least they don't abandon their crazy and insane delusions just because they suddenly become politically inconvenient.
What a pathetic fraud.
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Domestic spying far outpaces terrorism prosecutions
As more Americans are watched, fewer cases are made. The trend concerns civil liberties groups as well as some lawmakers and legal experts.
WASHINGTON -- The number of Americans being secretly wiretapped or having their financial and other records reviewed by the government has continued to increase as officials aggressively use powers approved after the Sept. 11 attacks. But the number of terrorism prosecutions ending up in court -- one measure of the effectiveness of such sleuthing -- has continued to decline, in some cases precipitously.
The trends, visible in new government data and a private analysis of Justice Department records, are worrisome to civil liberties groups and some legal scholars. They say it is further evidence that the government has compromised the privacy rights of ordinary citizens without much to show for it.
The emphasis on spy programs also is starting to give pause to some members of Congress who fear the government is investing too much in anti-terrorism programs at the expense of traditional crime-fighting. Other lawmakers are raising questions about how well the FBI is performing its counter-terrorism mission.
The Senate Intelligence Committee last week concluded that the bureau was far behind in making internal changes to keep the nation safe from terrorist threats. Lawmakers urged that the FBI set specific benchmarks to measure its progress and make more regular reports to Congress.
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Ron Paul's forces quietly plot GOP convention revolt against McCain
by Andrew Malcolm
Virtually all the nation's political attention in recent weeks has focused on the compelling state-by-state presidential nomination struggle between two Democrats and the potential for party-splitting strife over there.
But in the m
Paul's presidential candidacy has been correctly dismissed all along in terms of winning the nomination. He was even excluded as irrelevant by Fox News from a nationally-televised GOP debate in New Hampshire.
But what's been largely overlooked is Paul's candidacy as a reflection of a powerful lingering dissatisfaction with the Arizona senator among the party's most conservative conservatives. As anticipated in late March in The Ticket, that situation could be exacerbated by today's expected announcement from former Republican Rep. Bob Barr of Georgia for the Libertarian Party's presidential nod, a slot held by Paul in 1988.
Never mind Ralph Nader, Republican and Democratic parties both face potentially damaging internal splits that could cripple their chances for victory in a narrow vote on Nov. 4.
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War dead cremated at facility for pets
The facility, in an industrial park near Dover Air Force Base, has cremated about 200 service members, manager David Bose said Friday night. It uses separate crematories a few feet apart to cremate humans and animals, he added.
Pentagon officials said they do not think any humans were cremated in the pet crematory. "We have absolutely no evidence whatsoever at this point that any human remains were at all ever mistreated," Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell said late Friday.
Despite Bose's estimate, officials said they do not know the number of service members cremated at the Kent County facility, identified on a billboard as Friends Forever Pet Cremation Service.
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Inspection- On Lying and Big/Tiny Wins
by Ken Carman
This edition of Inspection has been updated since the first draft to include my observations regarding North Carolina and Indiana.
I've been pondering a region; a gulf; a canyon so deep; so wide, that the Grand Canyon would be a skunk's footprint in comparison. How fitting to use a skunk: because this same divide is far more odiferous and seems set on permanent spray mode. I, of course, am referring to the Obama/Clinton divide that still lingers despite cries of, "It's over..." which have been spouted practically since the first caucus.
At least they're a little more reality-based right now. Well, a lot more.
I know, its all BillHillaryGeraldinesWrightsBaracksupportersBlacksWhites fault. If you wish, take whatever simplistic slice you want out of that non-word and go ahead... cast your slimier than fish bait blame. Then leave me alone, because I find simple answers only satisfy simpletons with big egos and empty peanut shell minds. Truth is usually far more complex than this "evil vs. good" meme' which seems to thrive inside the human cortex.
Do I really mean, "Go away?" No, not really. Some wonder why I go on debate sites and engage those I deeply disagree with; or even defend those who I am not that fond of. Why? Because I believe it's the right thing to do. I enjoy it, I really do. Kind of like being on the receiving end of an old fashioned bully beating... only to be able to spin around and slam my toes into some far less than "intellectual" ranter's exposed crotch.
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David Byrne to make music with NYC building
State officials say Byrne will create a temporary installation in the Great Hall of the Battery Maritime Building, which is next to the Whitehall Ferry Terminal.
The "Playing the Building" installation will include devices attached to ceiling beams, plumbing, electrical conduits and other parts of the structure. Sound will be produced through vibration, making the building function as an instrument.
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Bill O'Reilly Is A Nutcase
Here is angry, crazy Bill O'Reilly, back when he had hair. OMFG he is so mad about the teleprompter. Those of you who are still upset about the existence of Bill O'Reilly will surely enjoy this video clip, which has already been removed by YouTube but which has been rescued by our friends at Gawker.
Drug war horror stories to boil your blood
The New Yorker's "Drug War Bulletins" are sure to boil your blood: a man who died for want of a liver transplant because the hospital insisted he needed "drug treatment" for his medical marijuana use; a suburban San Diego housewife who will spend the next 20 years in jail because she was peripherally involved in a heroin deal while she was in college in 1975; and a pulmonologist who'd been favored by the drug warriors until his giant, well-funded, unreproachable study concluded that pot didn't give you lung cancer, and who is now a pariah whose research conclusions have been boycotted by the press.
The War on Some Drugs is as unwinnable and destructive as all the other wars on abstract nouns. Who needs terrorists to rip America apart when you've got drug warriors killing off, imprisoning and shunning its innocents?
.In Seattle, a fifty-six-year old man died last Thursday after being refused a liver transplant because he had followed his doctor's recommendation to use marijuana to ease the symptoms of hepatitis C. From the Associated Press story:
His death came a week after a doctor told him a University of Washington Medical Center committee had again denied him a spot on the liver transplant list. The team had previously told him it would not consider placing him on the list until he completed a 60-day drug-treatment class…
The Virginia-based United Network for Organ Sharing, which oversees the nation's transplant system, leaves it to individual hospitals to develop criteria for transplant candidates.
At some, people who use "illicit substances"—including medical marijuana, even in the dozen states that allow it—are automatically rejected. At others, patients are given a chance to reapply if they stay clean for six months.
The cruelty and stupidity of this beggars belief. This patient did not need "drug treatment." He was already undergoing drug treatment. Nor did he need to get "clean." He was already clean. It's the drug war that's dirty. (H/t: John Leone.)
Link (via Making Light)
Why a Spiritual Advisor to President Bush Supports Obama
The Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell explains his bond with Bush, his donations to Obama, and his defense of Jeremiah Wright.
Interview by Dan Gilgoff
When you called President Bush to say you were endorsing Senator Barack Obama, how did he respond?
He had shared his thoughts with me about Senator Obama months before I called and told him I was going to endorse. And he says he likes him as a person. He told me that early on, before the Senator even announced he was running for president. He has a tremendous amount of respect for him.
While the differences between President Bush and Senator Obama are very, very clear, allow me to share with you what their commonalities are. One, they have deep, resolute loyalty to their country, to their families, and to their God. They are both Christians. They both love their wives intensely. They're both very good dads.
They are also strong believers in rebuilding the family and rebuilding the infrastructure of our communities… Now, obviously, they have two entirely different approaches as to how to achieve that common good.
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Stuart Kauffman: Call the universe God
Complexity theory pioneer Stuart Kauffman, author of the fantastic At Home In The Universe, has a new book out called Reinventing The Sacred: A New View of Science, Reason, and Religion. According to Kauffman, who is also a theoretical biologist, the universe is so beautifully complex, incredible, and full of wonder, that we might consider thinking of it as "God." He summarizes his argument in the current New Scientist. From Kauffman's essay:
...The unfolding of the universe - biotic, and perhaps abiotic too - appears to be partially beyond natural law. In its place is a ceaseless creativity, with no supernatural creator. If, as a result of this creativity, we cannot know what will happen, then reason, the Enlightenment's highest human virtue, is an insufficient guide to living our lives. We must use reason, emotion, intuition, all that our evolution has brought us. But that means understanding our full humanity: we need Einstein and Shakespeare in the same room.
Shall we use the "God" word? We do not have to, yet it is still our most powerful invented symbol. Our sense of God has evolved from Yahweh in the desert some 4500 years ago, a jealous, law-giving warrior God, to the God of love that Jesus taught. How many versions have people worshipped in the past 100,000 years?
Yet what is more awesome: to believe that God created everything in six days, or to believe that the biosphere came into being on its own, with no creator, and partially lawlessly? I find the latter proposition so stunning, so worthy of awe and respect, that I am happy to accept this natural creativity in the universe as a reinvention of "God".
Link to New Scientist, Link to buy Reinventing The Sacred, Link to Kauffman's 2006 Edge essay "Beyond Reductionism"
Space scientist says texting is four times more expensive than receiving scientific data from space
A University of Leicester space scientist has worked out that sending texts via mobile phones works out to be far more expensive than downloading data from the Hubble Space Telescope.
Dr Nigel Bannister's calculations were used for the Channel 4 Dispatches programme "The Mobile Phone Rip-Off".
He worked out the cost of obtaining a megabyte of data from Hubble – and compared that with the 5p cost of sending a text.
He said: "The bottom line is texting is at least 4 times more expensive than transmitting data from Hubble, and is likely to be substantially more than that.
"The maximum size for a text message is 160 characters, which takes 140 bytes because there are only 7 bits per character in the text messaging system, and we assume the average price for a text message is 5p. There are 1,048,576 bytes in a megabyte, so that's 1 million/140 = 7490 text messages to transmit one megabyte. At 5p each, that's £374.49 per MB - or about 4.4 times more expensive than the 'most pessimistic' estimate for Hubble Space Telescope transmission costs."
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Manbabies
Man Babies is a bizarre blog that has nothing but photos of dads whose heads have been swapped with their kids' .
GET MORE AT ManBabies.com!
A 'restaurant' for the destitute on Kolkata's rail tracks
By Sreya Basu
Kolkata, May 11 : One chapatti for 50 paisa, a plate of rice for Re.1, a bowlful of curry for Re.1...So reads the menu card of a "restaurant" on railway tracks that has been running here for the last 51 years. In times of high inflation, it is a godsend for the poor.
She took over the business from her mother Nur Banu at the age of 11.
Fatima told IANS: "I work as a part-time maid at various households and a few hotels. I collect the extra food, the leftovers or even slightly stale food at the end of the day from these places. The next morning I sell it to my customers."
Her hotel on the tracks opens at 8 a.m. and shuts down at noon. And it has a faithful clientele of beggars, pickpockets, platform dwellers, porters and drug addicts, who troop in for an inexpensive bite.
"I have over 200 regular customers apart from the flying ones. The number of customers is increasing with such rapidity that I have employed my two daughters and two sons as household helps and hotel bearers. They too bring excess food from their workplace to meet the demand," Fatima said.
Fatima and her clients sit under an open sky, sometimes putting up plastic sheets on bamboo poles as makeshift shelter from the hot sun or rain.
It goes without saying that the reason behind the humongous success of this "hotel" is the compromise between hunger and poverty.
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The Symbols on My Flag (And What They Mean)
by Jack Handey
The bra and panties stand for women's rights.
Davy Crockett shaking hands with Daniel Boone symbolizes how we need to put aside our differences.
The skull and crossbones, in the lower right corner, stands for pirates, and all that they have given us.
The angel holding the sword represents how guns are nice but swords are more of a "heavenly" thing.
The plow with the four-leaf clover symbolizes the luck of the farmer.
The quicksand represents the travails of life. The hand sticking out of it is so you know it's quicksand and not just a dirty spot on the flag.
The bat stands for eternal life, through our lord Dracula.
The sheaf of wheat symbolizes the bounty of the land, and the hope that soon more things will come in sheaves.
The parrot represents the need to communicate, even if it's only squawks.
The tin of paprika stands for paprika, a spice I hope to learn more about.
The triskelion indicates that I know what a triskelion is.
The sun on the horizon makes you wonder, Is it rising or setting? And is it our sun or a weird invader sun? The five rays coming out of the sun symbolize the five times that I have had sex.
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Monday, May 12, 2008
17 Stunning Auditoriums & Theatres From The Ancient World
Some of the most fascinating man-made structures on earth are the massive auditoriums that were once used for theatrical performances, music shows, as well for more sinister purposes such as violent wild animal shows and gladiatorial contests. These awesome theatres have a historical stigma attached to them, and in some cases, history is still being made because some are still being used today.
It's hard to believe that some of these theatres are close to 3,000 years old, and it's amazing that they're even still standing. The amount of engineering knowledge that our ancient ancestors had developed is just as mesmerizing especially when some of these auditoria rival present-day outdoor theatres in terms of acoustic properties. That's amazing for a 2,000 year old theatre that is large enough to seat 25,000 people or more!
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The ultimate ethical meal: a grey squirrel
It tastes sweet, like a cross between lamb and duck. And it's selling as fast as butchers can get it
by Caroline Davies
The grey squirrel, the American cousin of Britain's endangered red variety, is flying off the shelves faster than hunters can shoot them, with game butchers struggling to keep up with demand. 'We put it on the shelf and it sells. It can be a dozen squirrels a day - and they all go,' said David Simpson, the director of Kingsley Village shopping centre in Fraddon, Cornwall, whose game counter began selling grey squirrel meat two months ago.
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How Food Riots, Pricey Gas and Home Foreclosures Point to a Better Future
By Marjorie Kelly and Paul Raskin
Can anybody make sense of what the heck is going on today? A lead story in the news covers the rioting in Haiti and a half-dozen other nations as food prices soar. Another front-page column reports that the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis is seizing up credit markets worldwide and contributing to housing woes -- possibly even economic destabilization -- in Ireland, Spain, Britain and elsewhere. Other news reports the discovery of a huge fracture in Antarctica's vast Wilkins ice shelf, drawing attention to the slow-motion crisis of climate change. And there are ongoing reports about water shortages in Africa and Asia, droughts in Australia, sky-rocketing oil costs, the razing of the Amazon and images of war and terror.
Is the conjunction of these various crises simply a coincidence? The answer is no. From a historical perspective it is possible to see an overall pattern that connects the dots. What is unfolding today is a systemic crisis, heralding the beginning of a large-scale shift at the deepest levels of cultural organization. We are in transition -- for the first time in history -- to a tightly interconnected global system. We have entered the planetary phase of civilization, in a passage that may prove as significant as the advent of agriculture or the Industrial Revolution.
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Environmental deal sets aside L.A.-sized tract
LEBEC, California (AP) -- A group of environmentalists and the owners of a large stretch of wilderness have reached a deal that would set aside the largest parcel of land for conservation in California history.
A deal between developers and conservationists preserves most of Tejon Ranch, a habitat for condors.
After years of legal tussles, conservationists including the Sierra Club have agreed not to challenge proposed development on the sprawling Tejon Ranch north of Los Angeles in exchange for close to 240,000 acres, in a deal to be announced Thursday.
At 375 square miles, the preserve of desert, woodlands and grasslands would be eight times the size of San Francisco and nearly the size of Los Angeles, said Bill Corcoran, the Sierra Club's senior regional representative.
"There is, in my opinion, no other place like it in California. It's unrivaled in the diversity of native wildlife and plants," said Corcoran, who helped negotiate the deal. "Tejon is key to us because it's the only place where the Sierra Nevadas, the coastal range and Mojave Desert and Central Valley all meet."
Tejon Ranch sits atop the Tehachapi Mountains, 60 miles north of Los Angeles, and is home to elk, wild turkeys, coyotes, bears and eagles, as well as a critical habitat for condors.
The Tejon Ranch Co. has been trying for years to develop three projects, or 10 percent of the 270,000-acre ranch, while appeasing environmentalists.
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Leader of GOP convention quits after Myanmar ties reported
Coordinator of GOP convention quits after Newsweek report on his firm's ties to Myanmar junta
The man picked by the John McCain campaign to run the 2008 Republican National Convention resigned Saturday after a report that his lobbying firm used to represent the military regime in Myanmar.
Doug Goodyear resigned as convention coordinator and issued a two sentence statement:
"Today I offered the convention my resignation so as not to become a distraction in this campaign. I continue to strongly support John McCain for president, and wish him the best of luck in this campaign."
Goodyear, chief executive of lobbying firm DCI Group, resigned a few hours after Newsweek posted a story posted online that the company was paid $348,000 in 2002 and 2003 to represent Myanmar's junta.
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Iraq: Will We Ever Get Out?
There is a working assumption among the American people that a new president enters the White House free of responsibility for the errors of the past, free to set a new course in any program or policy, and therefore free—at the very least in constitutional theory, and perhaps even really and truly free—to call off a war begun by a predecessor. No one would expect something so dramatic on the first day of a new administration but it remains a fact that the president is the commander in chief of the armed forces, and the power that allowed one president to invade Iraq would allow another to bring the troops home.
Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton in the current presidential campaign have promised to do just that—not precipitously, not recklessly, not without care to give the shaky government in Baghdad time and the wherewithal to pick up the slack. But Obama and Clinton have both promised that the course would be changed on the first day; ending the American involvement in the Iraqi fighting would be the new goal, troop numbers would be down significantly by the middle of the first year, and within a reasonable time (not long) the residual American force would be so diminished in size that any fair observer might say the war was over, for the Americans at least, and the troops had been brought home.
The presumptive Republican candidate, John McCain, has pledged to do exactly the opposite—to "win" the war, whatever that means, and whatever that takes. Politicians often differ by shades of nuance. Not this time. The contrast of McCain and his opponents on this question is stark, and if they can be taken at their word, Americans must expect either continuing war for an indefinite period with McCain or the anxieties and open questions of turning the war over to the Iraqi government for better or worse with Obama or Clinton. Which is it going to be?
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Surging Into Chaos: Iraq After Basra
By ASHLEY SMITH
The trumpeted success of the Bush administration's surge was built on flimsy foundations. They were, principally, the employing of the Sunni resistance to fight al-Qaeda, effectively bribing a large section of the Sunni resistance to stop attacking the U.S.; Muqtada al-Sadr's unilateral cease-fire, which temporarily silenced the Mahdi Army; and the fact that a great many areas formerly prone to sectarian violence had already been cleared of Sunnis or Shia. All of these conditions were provisional. Seemingly unaware of the Iraqi prime minister's tenuous position, Bush supported Nouri al-Maliki's disastrous attack on Sadr's Madhi Army in Basra at the end of March.
Bush celebrated the siege of Basra as "a defining moment in the history of a free Iraq" that would bring "America closer to a key strategic victory in the war against the extremists and radicals." Just as with previous proclamations like "Mission Accomplished," this new "defining moment" turned out to be precisely the opposite of what the U.S. and its puppet Iraqi government intended. Sadr withstood the attack, and it took Iran, the U.S. archenemy in the Middle East, to save the Iraqi government by brokering a cease-fire.
At the very moment General Petraeus, Ambassador Crocker, and Republican presidential candidate John "one hundred years of war" McCain were hailing the success of the surge before Congress, the assault heightened political and military conflicts between and among Iraq's three main communities—Shia, Sunnis, and Kurds.
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Bill McKibben, The Defining Moment for Climate Change
by Tom Engelhardt
A report from the Bureau of Meteorology in Australia makes clear that, despite recent heavy rains in the eastern Australian breadbasket, years of above normal rainfall would be needed "to remove the very long-term [water] deficits" in the region. The report then adds this ominous note: "The combination of record heat and widespread drought during the past five to 10 years over large parts of southern and eastern Australia is without historical precedent and is, at least partly, a result of climate change."
Think a bit about that phrase -- "without historical precedent." Except when it comes to technological invention, it hasn't been much part of our lives these last many centuries. Without historical precedent. Brace yourselves, it's about to become a commonplace in our vocabulary. The southeastern United States, for instance, was, for the last couple of years, locked in a drought -- which is finally easing -- "without historical precedent." In other words, there was nothing (repeat, nothing) in the historical record that provided a guide to what might happen next.
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Candidates differ on Gitmo future
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US Presidential candidates Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John McCain hold differing views on the future of Guantanamo Bay prison.
The Guantanamo Bay detention camp is a US prison operated by Joint Task Force Guantanamo since 2002 in Guantanamo Bay Base, Cuba, which holds detainees labeled by the US as 'enemy combatants'.
Although all three candidates believe that the Guantanamo Bay has to close, they have different point of views about the future of the detainees.
Republican nominee John McCain wants to bring the detainees to prisons inside the US, where their treatment and adjudication can be more closely monitored but contrary to his Democratic opponents, Obama and Clinton, wants to continue the military commissions that have already been set for the roughly 80 detainees against whom the military says it holds enough evidence to prosecute.
Democratic candidate Barack Obama says that if he is elected president, he would stop the military commissions and try the remaining Guantanamo Bay detainees in military courts-martial or in federal courts, which have successfully tried some terrorist cases.
His plan has sparked criticism from those who believe it would lead to the release of dangerous people, since the US military could not gather the same caliber of evidence against the detainees as would be required in a US court.
Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton has said that if elected president; she would ask the Justice Department to evaluate the cases of the detainees and decide whether they should be tried in federal courts or courts-martial.
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REMINISCING TARIQ AZIZ
By Malcolm Lagauche interviewing Ibrahim Ebeid
If you remember, the judge who sentenced Saddam Hussein to hang, Abdel-Rahman, quickly left Iraq shortly after the murder of the president and claimed asylum in Great Britain. Since then, little or nothing has been heard about him. But, mysteriously he returned to Iraq and will be the judge in Tariq Aziz' case.
The first time I saw Tariq Aziz on U.S. television was in the aftermath of Desert Storm. His voice was the only one that made sense of the political scene at the time. For once, I heard the truth about many items that had been twisted beyond recognition by the U.S. administration and media.
Aziz' eloquence in the English language intrigued me. Most U.S. government spokespeople could have used an elementary school refresher course in English, yet there was an Iraqi who, like Baghdad Bob, spoke better English than the president of the United States.
The last time I saw Tariq Aziz on U.S. television was a few months before the illegal March 2003 invasion. At the time, the U.S. was calling the Iraqi government a supporter of global terrorism and also began to mention the Iraq/Al-Qaida link. The accusations were believed by the U.S. public. To this day, many Americans believe Saddam was in cahoots with Bin-Laden in bringing down the U.S. trade center.
Tariq Aziz gave an extraordinary explanation of the difference between terrorism and revolution. He added that terrorism was the enemy of revolutionary movements. The TV program appeared at 3:00 a.m., so few people watched it. And, if more viewed the presentation, most would not have understood Aziz' eloquent offering.
Shortly before the 2003 invasion, many U.S. pundits said that the Iraqi people would welcome the U.S. soldiers with flowers and candy. Aziz took another view. He stated, "We will welcome the Americans in Baghdad. However, we have run out of candy and will have to substitute bullets." His assessment was far more accurate than those of the myriad retired generals who painted a rosy picture of the impending military action.
There is much information about his savage treatment in prison after he turned himself in to U.S. authorities, so I will not delve into the issue here. I would like to publish an interview with a former comrade and friend of Tariq Aziz. He is Ibrahim Ebeid, a Palestinian-American activist.
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How About Those Ron Paul Presidential Odds
by Christopher Costigan
Say what? Wasn't Ron Paul dead in the water?
Well, this is no ordinary political race and it shouldn't surprise too many people that someone who is still getting 8 percent of the vote in recent state primaries (16 percent in Pennsylvania) would suddenly be taken serious again.
An AOL poll conducted last month showed that much of the Northwestern states were in favor of Ron Paul over John McCain.
From the Salt Lake City Tribune:
As they have done in Nevada, Minnesota and elsewhere, a number of Utah Ron Paul backers are trying to get elected today as delegates to the Republican National Convention where, under a proposed rule change, they could be free to vote for whomever they want.
Under existing party rules, the 36 Utah delegates to the convention are obligated to vote for Mitt Romney, who won the state GOP primary with 90 percent of the vote.
the state party will consider changing its rules to release the delegates and let them vote for whom they see fit.
The proposed bylaws change comes in response to a request from Romney, after he dropped out of the race, to release his bound delegates.
That could free the delegates to support whomever they want at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul in September - a point not lost on Paul supporters.
On blogs and in e-mails, Paul backers have spread a strategy aimed at getting Paul supporters elected as delegates in order to keep Sen. John McCain from getting enough delegate support to clinch the nomination. That could force a convention fight, they argue, and give Paul a path - albeit a contorted one - to win the nomination.
"We will try to force a brokered convention - there is no way around it," writes Steve Parent on "The Daily Paul" blog.
But something else interesting happened on the way to the Convention that has helped build momentum Ron Paul's way. His new book - "The Revolution: A Manifesto" - is number one on the New York Times Best Seller list.
Upon its official release on April 30th, "The Revolution: A Manifesto" was the number one bestseller on Amazon.com and remains the number one bestseller in political books.
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New Earth Rising: Hope for a New Global Dream
by Dr. Glen Barry
Sufficient and workable individual and social solutions exist for the wide range of ecological, economic, social and personal ills facing the biosphere and humanity; and together they could herald in a new era of global ecological sustainability
Humanity has met and surpassed ecological limits. Failure to develop and implement profound personal and social change, adequate to respond to global ecosystems in mid-collapse, will have profound negative consequences for vast numbers of global citizens who are unable to meet basic needs including food, water, housing, education and health care. The task of our and all time is to find and implement sufficient solutions for the wide range of ills facing the biosphere and humanity. Ongoing arguments whether personal virtue or social enlightenment are the best strategies to promote are mute as frankly things are dire and we need lots of both.
Defining, personally embracing, and gaining social acceptance for a new global dream will require huge amounts of both personal and social change. Yet there is much to build upon, for even as the fateful hour of global ecological collapse nears, the Earth is blooming with responses to each of the symptomatic crises. From relocalized economies to community gardens, from having fewer children to better educating those we have, from driving less while living more richly where we find ourselves, by finding meaning in experience, knowledge and truth rather than competitive consumption, by rejecting ancient superstitions for an understanding that the Earth is alive and sacred -- a slowly awakening public is showing where there is knowledge and will there is hope. I see a new Earth rising.
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Do the Presidential Candidates Believe that Presidents Are Above the Law?
Regarding whether President Bush and officials in his Administration committed any crimes, Senator Barack Obama told Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Daily News that he would have his new "Attorney General immediately review the information that's already there" and if that information showed that "crimes have been committed, they should be investigated" because nobody is "above the law." Bunch in his article stated that many Americans wondered whether an Obama Administration would seek to prosecute Bush officials for crimes that they may have committed. Senator Obama stated that at the present time "I can't prejudge [whether Bush officials committed any crimes] because we don't have access to all the material right now." The other presidential candidates would probably say the same thing.
However, the public record already has sufficient information that shows that President Bush and his officials committed various crimes and the presidential candidates can make judgments on these matters now.
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Sitting In to Stop War Funding: Try This at Home
LONG NIGHT SITTING-IN
By Bruce K. Gagnon, http://www.space4peace.org
It was a 17 and 1/2 hour office occupation that began just after the lunch hour yesterday in Portland, Maine. We gathered outside the office of our Rep. Tom Allen's office at around 11am and began handing out leaflets and holding signs calling for an end to funding of the Iraq occupation. Just as we were ready to enter Allen's office to sit-in we learned that he had decided to vote against any more funding for the occupation unless there was a "withdrawal goal timeline" in the bill. Even though this was not exactly what we wanted, these timelines are non-binding, it was still progress and we decided to move on to the next target. The vote was supposed to happen yesterday but has been delayed because the Democrats' coalition is dissolving.
So we marched our way a few blocks to the office of Sen. Susan Collins, the Republican who has of course also voted over and again for the occupation funding. We entered the office with 20 people and jammed into her outer office waiting room. After a bit the staff of the senator invited us into their conference meeting room further inside the office. Two of her staff then asked us all to introduce ourselves and to state why we came. The statements made by the group were strong and moving and after we finished the staff promised they'd pass on the remarks to the senator and then invited us to leave. We said we needed to know how she planned to vote. The staff reluctantly replied that the senator would be "supporting the troops." We said we were not going to leave until the senator agreed to vote against anymore funding. The impass began.
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Shoot, Kill, Lie, Repeat: America's New Moral Universe
by Chris Floyd
Tell me that this doesn't sound like something out of a history of Nazi tactics in World War II:
The rules [of engagement]t explicitly allowed the killing of unarmed Iraqis under certain circumstances...Specifically, the snipers were allowed to shoot unarmed people running away from explosions or firefights....Of course, it's not unusual for innocent people to run from explosions.
Didier, who has since been promoted to captain, said that "if that individual makes contact with you and then breaks contact of their own accord and disarms themselves while they are breaking contact, they are still an engageable target because they are not wounded, nor did they surrender." He explained, "They are only breaking contact so that they can engage coalition forces at a later time." In court, Sgt. Anthony Murphy, one of the snipers who was responsible for a questionable kill, testified that he interpreted this order about breaking contact so they can engage at a later time as: "Engage fleeing local nationals without weapons."
In other words, if an innocent, unarmed Iraqi runs away to seek safety from a suicide bombing, a missile attack or a gunfight -- which any human being would instinctively do -- then he is fair game to be killed by an American sniper.
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Brass Brain was the equal of 100 mathematicians, weighted a mere 2500 lbs
Imagine the fearful gnashings of mathematicians in November, 1928 upon reading this account of the USGS's new "brass brain," which could "do the work of 100 trained mathematicians" in calculating tides:
The machine weighs 2,500 pounds. It is 11 feet long, 2 feet wide, and 6 feet high. Its whirring cogs are enclosed in a housing of mahogany and glass.Earthquakes, fresh-water floods, and strong winds that cannot be predicted affect the accuracy of the Brass Brain to a degree. Nevertheless 70% of the predicted tides agree within five minutes of the observed tide. The Coast and Geodetic Survey issues an annual bulletin in which it lists the forthcoming tides in 84 ports of the world. The report contains upwards of a million figures, all compiled by the Brass Brain. It has been estimated that the Brass Brain saves the government $125,000 each year in salaries of mathematicians who would be required to take its place.
Why are Christianity, Islam and Judaism all so patriarchal?
I was thinking about Mother's Day recently, and the next thing I knew, I was wondering what would explain why three major religious traditions--Judaism, Christianity and Islam--were all started by men. I know, I know; there are volumes written about the patriarchal nature of the three, and how, starting with Judaism, they stripped the ancients of a healthy belief in female deities, etc., etc., blah, blah.
But I kept thinking there had to be more to the story than what the academics would have us believe. Then it dawned on me: It's all about mothers. Both Moses and Muhammad, hereinafter referred to as M&M, suffered the absence of a nurturing mom in their formative years. (We'll get to the Christian anomaly later.)
Centuries before he was portrayed by the recently departed Charlton Heston, the Moses of mythologized history is said to have spent his earliest days bobbing down the Nile River before being conveniently rescued by an Egyptian royal family, or pharaoh's daughter, depending on which version of the story you accept. Moses (whose name in Hebrew is the more mellifluous Moshe) was dumped in the river in a baby-sized basket by his mom after a pharaoh issued an order requiring the death of all newborn Hebrew boys.
Now this is all very confounding. Why would an Egyptian Pooh-Bah, who depended on the slave labor of Hebrew tribes to build those imposing pointy structures, want to whack future workers? But I digress.
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People Can Handle the Truth About War
by Helen Thomas
Some readers resented The Washington Post for publishing an Associated Press photograph of a critically wounded Iraqi child being lifted from the rubble of his home in Baghdad's Sadr City "after a U.S. airstrike."
Two-year-old Ali Hussein later died in a hospital.
As the saying goes, the picture was worth a thousand words because it showed the true horrors of this war.
Neither side is immune from killing Iraqi civilians. But Americans should be aware of their own responsibility for inflicting death and pain on the innocent.
The Post's ombudsman, Deborah Howell, said about 20 readers complained about the photo, while a few readers praised The Post for publishing the stark picture on Page 1.
Some mothers said they were offended that their children might see the picture, though one wonders whether their youngsters watch television and play with violent videos in a pretend world.
From the start of the unprovoked U.S. "shock and awe" invasion of Iraq in March 2003, the government tried to bar the news media from photographing flag-draped coffins of American soldiers returning from Iraq. A Freedom of Information lawsuit forced the government to release pictures of returning coffins.
Howell said some readers felt the photo of the Iraqi boy was "an anti-war statement; some thought it was in poor taste." Well, so is war.
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CORPORATE GREED STRANGLES HEALTH CARE
by Jim Hightower
The essential idea behind the establishment of an insurance industry was not to maximize the profits of a few corporate giants, but to create a social good for all of us – specifically to spread the costs of medical care across our whole society. If everyone pays into the system, no one has to be crushed by the cost of care when they fall sick. The notion is that we're all in this together.
But a pernicious ethic of greed has erupted within America's corporatized system, putting an unbearable cost burden on some of us who are already burdened with the worst illnesses. Drug manufacturers have been given monopolies over medicines to treat such deadly diseases as cancers and multiple sclerosis, even though these drugs were developed with government funding. In turn, the monopolists are charging exorbitant prices for these life-saving drugs.
Enter the insurance profiteers, which have now created a special "Tier Four" pricing system that forces very ill people into co-payments that can cost them more than a thousand dollars for a month's worth of crucial pills. The price can be more than folks pay for their mortgages or even more than their monthly incomes. Pay up… or do without. Which is to say: die.
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ORWELL ROLLS IN HIS GRAVE
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