Public Option DOA

Obama's Rejection Speech

By David Swanson

That was not a peace prize acceptance speech. That was an infomercial for war. President Obama took the peace prize home with him, but left behind in Oslo his praise for war, his claims for war, and his view of an alternative and more peaceful approach to the world consisting of murderous economic sanctions.

Some highlights:

"There are the men and women around the world who have been jailed and beaten in the pursuit of justice; those who toil in humanitarian organizations to relieve suffering; the unrecognized millions whose quiet acts of courage and compassion inspire even the most hardened of cynics. I cannot argue with those who find these men and women — some known, some obscure to all but those they help — to be far more deserving of this honor than I."

Yet, you did argue. You argued by accepting the prize " and then making a false case for war:

"War, in one form or another, appeared with the first man. At the dawn of history, its morality was not questioned; it was simply a fact, like drought or disease — the manner in which tribes and then civilizations sought power and settled their differences."

This is simply not true of all tribes and civilizations, unless we include war making as a criterion for being considered civilized.

"The concept of a 'just war' emerged, suggesting that war is justified only when it meets certain preconditions: if it is waged as a last resort or in self-defense; if the forced used is proportional; and if, whenever possible, civilians are spared from violence."

How dare someone responsible for illegal occupations and air strikes and the use of unmanned drones say these words? (Responsible, that is, given the failure of Congress and of we the people to stop him.)

"America led the world in constructing an architecture to keep the peace: a Marshall Plan and a United Nations, mechanisms to govern the waging of war, treaties to protect human rights, prevent genocide and restrict the most dangerous weapons."

How dare a president refusing to support a treaty on land mines speak in these terms? Are we supposed to not see the actions and just hear the words?

"I make this statement mindful of what Martin Luther King said in this same ceremony years ago: 'Violence never brings permanent peace. It solves no social problem: It merely creates new and more complicated ones.'"

Very wise. Very true. And completely violated by Barack Obama's actions and the better part of the words in this speech. Are we supposed to hear these words in a different part of our brains from the rest of the speech and its advocacy of war?

 

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Obama-s-Rejection-Speech-by-David-Swanson-091210-254.html

Refusing to sign the landmines agreement yet again...

GIVE A HOOT, BUT WE'RE STILL DOOMED

The Empty Gesture of Copenhagen

by Ted Rall

NEW YORK--Our parents and grandparents fell down on the job.

"The politicians in Copenhagen have the power to shape history's judgment on this generation: one that saw a challenge and rose to it, or one so stupid that we saw calamity coming but did nothing to avert it." A concise summary of how the world sees this week's U.N. climate change conference, courtesy of the editorial board of the U.K. newspaper The Guardian.

The paper continued: "In scientific journals the question is no longer whether humans are to blame, but how little time we have got left to limit the damage," wrote the Guardian's editors. The implication is that time is short. And that there's still time.

Only two sides of the climate debate get covered by the media: corporate-backed pseudo-scientists who deny the greenhouse effect or claim that it's inconsequential, and liberal environmentalists pushing for the United States and other major air polluters to act to reduce carbon emissions.

Both sides of the "debate" are liars.

The energy company-financed stooges are barely worthy of contempt, much less serious rebuttal. Their claims have been addressed and thoroughly debunked, over and over, for decades. Cut from the same toxic cloth as those who collected paychecks from tobacco companies to testify that smoking was safe, they are to be pitied, reviled and, with a little luck, imprisoned after the revolution.

More problematic--and embodied by the Guardian quote above--is the Big Lie of climate change: the implication that there's still time to stave off environmental disaster.

http://www.uexpress.com/tedrall/

I live in a van down by Duke University

How do I afford grad school without going into debt? A '94 Econoline, bulk food and creative civil disobedience

 

By Ken Ilgunas

 

Photo by Ken Ilgunas

I was lying on the floor of my van where the middle pilot chairs used to be, trying to hide from view. This is it, I thought. They know. I'm going to get kicked out of Duke.

Moments before, I had been cooking a pot of spaghetti stew on top of a plastic, three-drawer storage container, which held all my food and my few meager possessions. I figured the campus security guard had parked next to me because he spotted the blue flame from my propane stove through the van's tinted windows and shades.

I held my breath as he shut off the engine and opened his door. I was in my boxer shorts, splayed across my stain-speckled carpet like a scarecrow toppled by the wind.

As I listened to what sounded like a pair of Gestapo jackboots approach the driver-side door, I thought about how I'd almost gotten away with it. For two whole months, I had been secretly living in my van on campus.

http://www.salon.com/life/pinched/story/index.html?story=/news/pinched/2009/12/06/living_in_a_van

I'm Keeping Kosher for Christmas

For the feds, some Wall Street firms are too big — to punish

By Chris Adams | McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — Forget too big to fail. In the eyes of federal regulators, many Wall Street firms are too big to punish.

During the past three years, some of the nation's largest financial firms have been accused by the government of cheating or misleading clients and ripping off tens of thousands of consumers of their investments.

Despite these findings, these financial giants got, sometimes repeatedly, special exemptions from the Securities and Exchange Commission that have saved them from a regulatory death penalty that could have decimated their lucrative mutual fund businesses.

Among the more than a dozen firms that have gotten these SEC get-out-of-jail cards since January 2007 are some of Wall Street's biggest, including Bank of America, Citigroup and American International Group.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/227/story/80277.html?0

Just a hoax

Palestinian files $110M libel suit over 'Bruno'

By BRETT ZONGKER

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A Palestinian shopkeeper and father portrayed as a terrorist in the movie "Bruno" is suing film star Sacha Baron Cohen, David Letterman and others for libel and slander.

The lawsuit filed last week by Ayman Abu Aita in District of Columbia federal court seeks $110 million in damages.

In the movie, Baron Cohen plays a gay Austrian fashion journalist trying to make it big in the United States. To achieve worldwide fame, Bruno travels to the Middle East to make peace. He interviews Abu Aita, and a caption labels the Bethlehem shopkeeper as a member of the militant Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade.

Abu Aita is suing CBS and Letterman's company Worldwide Pants over an interview before the film's release where the Late Show host and Baron Cohen discussed Bruno's encounter with a "terrorist."

In the interview, Baron Cohen, 37, said he set up the meeting in the West Bank with the help of a CIA agent. Baron Cohen said he feared for his safety and interviewed the "terrorist" at a secret location chosen by Abu Aita. A clip was then played on "The Late Show with David Letterman."...

Hatem Abu Ahmad, Abu Aita's Arab-Israeli lawyer, said Baron Cohen made millions "on the back of my client."

The film drew disdain from the Israelis and Palestinians portrayed in a place Bruno calls "Middle Earth."

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_BRUNO_LAWSUIT?SITE=1010WINS&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

A Bouncer's Worst Nightmare

Louisiana Gal

The climate denial industry is out to dupe the public. And it's working

Think environmentalists are stooges? You're the unwitting recruit of a hugely powerful oil lobby – I've got the proof

by George Monbiot

When you survey the trail of wreckage left by the climate emails crisis, three things become clear. The first is the tendency of those who claim to be the champions of climate science to minimize their importance. Those who have most to lose if the science is wrong have perversely sought to justify the secretive and chummy ethos that some of the emails reveal. If science is not transparent and accountable, it's not science.

I believe that all supporting data, codes and programmes should be made available as soon as an article is published in a peer-reviewed journal. That anyone should have to lodge a freedom of information request to obtain them is wrong. That the request should be turned down is worse. That a scientist suggests deleting material that might be covered by that request is unjustifiable. Everyone who values the scientific process should demand complete transparency, across all branches of science.

The second observation is the tendency of those who don't give a fig about science to maximise their importance. The denial industry, which has no interest in establishing the truth about global warming, insists that these emails, which concern three or four scientists and just one or two lines of evidence, destroy the entire canon of climate science.

Even if you were to exclude every line of evidence that could possibly be disputed – the proxy records, the computer models, the complex science of clouds and ocean currents – the evidence for man-made global warming would still be unequivocal.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cif-green/2009/dec/07/climate-change-denial-industry

Lawyer Files Suit Against All Those Homeless People Near His Office

 

By Mike Giglio 

 

​Clients at the Beacon, a downtown day center for the homeless, received a strange visit during this afternoon's free lunch: attorney Andy Vickery, who held a press conference to announce that he and other lawyers will be representing both them and the Beacon.

Christ Church Cathedral, which runs the Beacon, was recently sued by a neighbor who alleges that the "derelicts" it assists have become a public nuisance, destroying the value of his business and property in the process. So the church has taken the unusual step of hiring a lawyer and public-relations firm to defend itself in and out of court.

"It's unique that a homeless organization would be sued. Especially during the season of giving and compassion," says the church's new PR man Jay Hickman.

Personal injury attorney Harry C. Arthur, who filed the suit, runs his practice and owns offices in the Marine Building across the street. He claims the 400 or so clients the Beacon attracts daily from Friday through Monday are scaring away tenants and clients.

"If this was Skid Row like in New York City, or Skid Row like in Los Angeles and you come down and feed these people, that's one thing. But this isn't where people normally stay and sleep. And the thing that attracts them is the church," Arthur tells Hair Balls.

 

http://blogs.houstonpress.com/hairballs/2009/12/homeless_beacon_law_suit_harry.php

Iraqi cab driver was source for Iraq WMD claim, British MP says

By John Byrne

A British parliamentarian claimed in a report published Tuesday that an Iraqi cab driver was the source of an infamous claim made by Prime Minister Tony Blair that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.

The member of Parliament, a member of the conservative British Tory Party, claims that he was told by a British intelligence official that the claim actually came from an Iraqi taxi driver, and that it was considered highly unreliable but was tacitly backed by Blair's government in public statements anyway.

According to the report, the taxi driver worked near Iraq's border with Jordan. The cab driver is said to have made the comments while transporting two British intelligence officers.

"Under pressure from Downing Street to find anything to back up the WMD case, [British intelligence services] were squeezing their agents in Iraq for anything at all," MP Adam Holloway wrote in his report, leaked to the British Daily Mail. "One agent did come up with something - the [claim that chemical weapons could be launched on British forces in Cyprus in] '45 minutes,' allegedly discussed in a high-level Iraqi political meeting."

British intelligence officers "were running a senior Iraqi army officer who had a source of his own, a cab driver on the Iraqi-Jordanian border. He apparently overheard two Iraqi army officers two years before who had spoken about weapons with the range to hit targets elsewhere in the Middle East."

http://rawstory.com/2009/12/iraqi-cab-driver-source-iraq-wmd-claim-british-mp/

More Americans believe in angels than humans’ role in global warming

By John Byrne

More Americans believe in guardian angels than humans' role in global warming, according to recent polls.

A Pew poll released late last month found that just 36 percent of Americans believe humans are responsible for accelerating global climate change, which scientists say mushroomed after the industrial revolution due to humans' dependence on carbon-based fuels.

Carbon dioxide, which is produced by the combustion of oil, coal and other fuels, was ruled a "dangerous" threat to public health by the Environmental Protection Agency Monday. It increases the propensity of the earth's atmosphere to retain heat.

But a near-consensus from scientists doesn't have Americans convinced. The Pew poll found that while 57 percent believe that the earth's climate is changing, just 36 percent believe that humans are responsible. 77 percent believed that global warming existed in Pew's poll conducted in 2007.

The 36 percent who believe in human-caused climate change is fewer than the number of Americans who apparently believe they're protected by guardian angels, some 55 percent, according to a poll published in 2008.

http://rawstory.com/2009/12/americans-angels-humancaused-global-warming/

The end of the Wash. Times and Rev. Moon's right-wing charity

 

You'd think that somebody with a direct line to the Almighty, and tapped by Jesus to save mankind on Earth, would be able to come up with a better business plan for running a daily newspaper. But, alas, after nearly three decades of unrelenting financial losses, the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, a federal tax cheat, accused cult leader, and founder of the Unification Church, has decided to pull out. Actually, according to news reports, it's more like Moon's U.S. college-educated sons, as part of an internal family power struggle, have decided to finally cut off the endless stream of Asian church cash that's kept The Washington Times afloat.

With the announcement that 40 percent of the Times' staff is getting pink-slipped, and that the daily's no longer even going to bother with traditional who/what/where/when/why reporting, instead publishing an opinion-heavy publication that will be free of charge at a diminished number of local outlets, Times owners look like they're angling to be a Weekly Standard wannabe, churning out lots of predictable GOP Noise Machine opinion prattle. (Paging Andrew Breitbart!) What is clear is that the daily's days as a functioning newspaper are now over.

R.I.P. The Washington Times.

http://mediamatters.org/columns/200912080004

GOP bounceback plan

NASA cooks up ingredients for life

Experiment attempts to understand how life takes hold in vacuum of space

By Irene Klotz

In a laboratory set up to simulate conditions in space, NASA scientists were able to produce a key component of RNA, which is found in the genetic makeup of all living organisms on Earth.

The experiment is part of a larger initiative to try to understand how the building blocks for life might have formed in space.

"We know they exist somehow in space, but we don't know how or where they form," said Stefanie Milam, an astrochemist at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif.

The team started with a sample of ice laced with pyrimidine, a ring-shaped molecule made of carbon and nitrogen. Pyrimidine is the basis of three nucleic acids, including uracil, which is found in ribonucleic acid, or RNA.

The ice sample was kept in space-like conditions, including extreme cold — about minus-340 degrees Fahrenheit — high radiation and a near vacuum.

The sample was then exposed to ultraviolet radiation, similar to what might happen when a dense molecular cloud is pierced by a cosmic ray or a beam of light from a passing star.

As the ice warmed, scientists found new materials formed, including uracil.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34327899/ns/technology_and_science-science/

The Irrefutable Stupidity of Sarah Palin

 

by Cenk Uygur

From time to time, I'll get into a debate with a right-winger about whether Sarah Palin is actually stupid or if liberals are just hopelessly biased against her. They claim this bias comes from the fact that liberals are scared of her electability, her charm, her looks, her femininity, her Christianity, her ability connect to the common man and her overall wonderfulness. So, the theory is that we have all collectively decided that she is the best Republican candidate in some secret liberal meeting and are conspiring against her because we are afraid of how brilliant and electable she really is.

Now, there are a couple of problems with this theory. There are no opinion leaders on the left with Rush Limbaugh-like authority who can command all other progressives to think the same thing and use the same arguments against one person. In other words, we all think she is stupid because she is in fact stupid, not because some liberal cabal told us to think that.

How come we don't call Newt Gingrich stupid? Or Dick Cheney or Kay Bailey Hutchinson or Elizabeth Dole or Dennis Hastert? And the list goes on and on of heinous and deplorable right-wingers who are not stupid. We don't make those charges against those people, because as much as we might not agree with them or like them, we know that they are not dullards. They're all clever in their own way. Mitt Romney is greasy, Michael Steele is a clown and Tom DeLay is dirty, but we don't go after their mental acuity like we do with Sarah Palin because they're not as dumb as her (not even Steele).

So, finally we get to the evidence. I thought I'd just do it here and be done with it. Then I can just point people to this post from now on and end this senseless argument.

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/25363

What Now?!! Job Summit Cafe