Ron's World On the Political Scene

Ralph Nader says Occupy Congress

2012-01-18T18:53:00.000-05:00

We The People

2012-01-18T18:33:00.000-05:00

NationofChange Interviews Sgt. Shamar Thomas at Occupy Congress

2012-01-18T18:04:00.000-05:00

Newt Tells Mitt To Drop The Phony Baloney

2012-01-11T20:19:00.000-05:00

Politics Today

2012-01-11T16:49:00.002-05:00

Winning Our Future | King of Bain "When Mitt Romney Came To Town" [Trailer]

NOW THE POLITICAL FIGHT REALLY BEGINS ANEW. CHECK OUT THIS ADD BY APPARENT GINGRICH SUPPORTERS -- ACCORDING TO THE PRELIMINARY ARTICLE. IT'S ABOUT TO GET "HOT" UP IN HEAH!

Tucson Survivors Share their Stories One Year Later

What Next for the Occupiers?

2012-01-07T01:19:00.000-05:00

What Next for the Occupiers?
by Bill McKibben

One of the highlights of the fall for me was undertaking a kind of Occupy tourism. I was spending most of my time on the move, working to build the broad coalition that eventually won at least a temporary victory against the proposed Keystone XL pipeline from the tar sands of Alberta. In almost every city I visited, I tried to stop by the local encampment, in part because Occupiers were among our most reliable allies, and in part because it was so much fun.

I’ve gotten to speak through the human microphone in lower Manhattan and tour the D.C. campsite just a few blocks from the White House. But I’ve also gotten to sign the copies of my books in the library tent at Occupy Boston (a quiet tent, staffed by honest-to-God librarians from Boston Public Library, with everything arranged by subject). I even made it to foreign occupations—standing beneath a giant stone lion in the grand Vancouver encampment. Happiest occupation goes to San Luis Obispo, California, where I got a hug from a fellow with a huge “Free Hugs” sign. The most chic, not surprising, was Santa Fe, New Mexico, where they arranged not only a campfire for my talk, but a rising full moon in the desert sky.

There are many things they seemed to hold in common, not least an instinctive nonviolence, contrasting so sharply with the police, who so often let the logic of force drive their actions (and found out, as often in history, that the logic that works with criminals doesn’t really apply to idealists). And there was also an instinctive kindness and openness. Many of the encampments, for instance, had attracted homeless people. Since I used to run a homeless shelter in the basement of my church, and in fact lived for a period of time as a homeless man on the streets of New York, I was struck by what a good place to be homeless these camps were. They offered food, safe companionship, and also a kind of purpose, the thing most lacking in the hard and aimless life of the vagrant.

I was also struck by their refusal to simply announce a set of demands. Occupiers aren’t dumb—they’ve read and heard the many calls from the media and politicians that they simply say what they want. It would be easy enough—but in some sense it would detract from the greatest usefulness of the campaign, which has been to articulate a sense of despair bordering on rage. Because they didn’t quickly say “we want this bill passed,” commentators have had to grapple with the actual message of many Occupiers: Our economy is unfair. It gives too much power to corporations, who abuse that power for their own ends. They’ve not just cheated us financially; they’ve cheated us out of our democracy.

There’s no single bill that can address all that (though I wouldn’t be surprised to see many Occupiers start to coalesce around a drive to amend the Constitution so that corporations no longer are treated as people). It’s a mood, an analysis, a kind of citizen journalism. Hopefully it will last.

It won’t be easy—the authorities and the elements are closing down and closing in on many of the campsites. But here’s one place where those of us with a religious background may be of some small use. No good Christian confuses church with a building. Yes, we have buildings called churches that we occupy on occasion, usually Sunday morning. But church is much larger than that—it’s what we do in the world around us. Real church comes when we work together toward some broader end. I’m not suggesting Occupy is a religion; many involved would rightly rebel at the idea. But it is, at least in some sense, an outlook—a strong and necessary outlook that will thrive even in diaspora.

Bill McKibben is the Schumann Distinguished Scholar at Middlebury College in Vermont and initiator of the Tar Sands Action campaign.

The DREAM Act

2011-12-27T17:28:00.001-05:00

Watch Immigration Reform: "A Moral Imperative" on PBS. See more from Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly.

Breaking It Down: ‘The Political One Percent of the One Percent’ | | United RepublicUnited Republic

2011-12-20T21:34:00.001-05:00

Breaking It Down: ‘The Political One Percent of the One Percent’ | | United RepublicUnited Republic

Sunlight Foundation report shows how power is held by extremely few hands

Report finds only 0.01 percent of Americans make most political contributions. Credit: Shutterstock

Making waves all over the web recently was the Sunlight Foundation’s excellent analysis of political contributions, showing how a tiny portion (0.01 percent!) of Americans – mainly wealthy elites, who Sunlight dubs The One Percent of the One Percent– provided the large majority of funding for 2010 election campaigns:

In the 2010 election cycle, the average One Percent of One Percent spent $28,913, more [on campaign contributions] than the [entire] median individual income of $26,3 64.

Lots of news outlets have picked up on the analysis.

The Washington Post noted how the report found many of the richest donors supported Democrats.

NPR’s All Things Considered interviewed Lee Drutman, a data fellow with the Sunlight Foundation who provided more insight into the report.

The Nation was also surprised by the findings:

To put this in somewhat more dramatic terms, almost a quarter of the total donations from individuals to nearly every actor in the political system came from a group that’s slightly larger than the undergraduate class at a state university like Virginia Tech.

The report is reader-friendly and features endlessly interesting graphs and statistics. It’s worth a read, especially if you’re in the 99.99 percent.

The Sunlight Foundation: The Political One Percent of the One Percent

The Washington Post: The politics of the top 0.1 percent

NPR: Report: Wealthy ‘Elite Donors’ Fueling U.S. Politics

The Nation: Who Are the One Percent?

The Saving American Democracy Amendment

2011-12-17T03:25:00.000-05:00

Crossing Police Lines: US cops defect to OWS

2011-12-16T18:51:00.000-05:00

Cenk: 'NYT' article should have read, 'Republicans say voter fraud is a ...

2011-12-16T16:59:00.000-05:00

Why main street supports Occupy Wall Street: Scenes from Vanguard

2011-12-16T16:38:00.000-05:00

Chris Hedges addresses Occupy Harvard

2011-12-02T12:38:00.000-05:00

Chris Hedges, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, is a senior fellow at the Nation Institute. He writes a regular column for TruthDig every Monday. His latest book is Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle.

Occupy Wall Street is a Movement Too Big to Fail

Chris Hedges addresses Occupy Harvard November 28 2011

Why Iceland Should Be in the News, But Is Not | Truthout

2011-11-29T04:00:00.001-05:00

Why Iceland Should Be in the News, But Is Not | Truthout

by: Deena Stryker, The South Africa Civil Society Information Service | News Analysis

An Italian radio program's story about Iceland’s on-going revolution is a stunning example of how little our media tells us about the rest of the world. Americans may remember that at the start of the 2008 financial crisis, Iceland literally went bankrupt. The reasons were mentioned only in passing, and since then, this little-known member of the European Union fell back into oblivion.

As one European country after another fails or risks failing, imperiling the Euro, with repercussions for the entire world, the last thing the powers that be want is for Iceland to become an example. Here's why:

Five years of a pure neo-liberal regime had made Iceland, (population 320 thousand, no army), one of the richest countries in the world. In 2003 all the country’s banks were privatized, and in an effort to attract foreign investors, they offered on-line banking whose minimal costs allowed them to offer relatively high rates of return. The accounts, called IceSave, attracted many English and Dutch small investors. But as investments grew, so did the banks’ foreign debt. In 2003 Iceland’s debt was equal to 200 times its GNP, but in 2007, it was 900 percent. The 2008 world financial crisis was the coup de grace. The three main Icelandic banks, Landbanki, Kapthing and Glitnir, went belly up and were nationalized, while the Kroner lost 85% of its value with respect to the Euro. At the end of the year Iceland declared bankruptcy.

Contrary to what could be expected, the crisis resulted in Icelanders recovering their sovereign rights, through a process of direct participatory democracy that eventually led to a new Constitution. But only after much pain.

Geir Haarde, the Prime Minister of a Social Democratic coalition government, negotiated a two million one hundred thousand dollar loan, to which the Nordic countries added another two and a half million. But the foreign financial community pressured Iceland to impose drastic measures. The FMI and the European Union wanted to take over its debt, claiming this was the only way for the country to pay back Holland and Great Britain, who had promised to reimburse their citizens.

Protests and riots continued, eventually forcing the government to resign. Elections were brought forward to April 2009, resulting in a left-wing coalition which condemned the neoliberal economic system, but immediately gave in to its demands that Iceland pay off a total of three and a half million Euros. This required each Icelandic citizen to pay 100 Euros a month (or about $130) for fifteen years, at 5.5% interest, to pay off a debt incurred by private parties vis a vis other private parties. It was the straw that broke the reindeer’s back.

What happened next was extraordinary. The belief that citizens had to pay for the mistakes of a financial monopoly, that an entire nation must be taxed to pay off private debts was shattered, transforming the relationship between citizens and their political institutions and eventually driving Iceland’s leaders to the side of their constituents. The Head of State, Olafur Ragnar Grimsson, refused to ratify the law that would have made Iceland’s citizens responsible for its bankers’ debts, and accepted calls for a referendum.

Of course the international community only increased the pressure on Iceland. Great Britain and Holland threatened dire reprisals that would isolate the country. As Icelanders went to vote, foreign bankers threatened to block any aid from the IMF. The British government threatened to freeze Icelander savings and checking accounts. As Grimsson said: “We were told that if we refused the international community’s conditions, we would become the Cuba of the North. But if we had accepted, we would have become the Haiti of the North.” (How many times have I written that when Cubans see the dire state of their neighbor, Haiti, they count themselves lucky.)

In the March 2010 referendum, 93% voted against repayment of the debt. The IMF immediately froze its loan. But the revolution (though not televised in the United States), would not be intimidated. With the support of a furious citizenry, the government launched civil and penal investigations into those responsible for the financial crisis. Interpol put out an international arrest warrant for the ex-president of Kaupthing, Sigurdur Einarsson, as the other bankers implicated in the crash fled the country.

But Icelanders didn't stop there: they decided to draft a new constitution that would free the country from the exaggerated power of international finance and virtual money. (The one in use had been written when Iceland gained its independence from Denmark, in 1918, the only difference with the Danish constitution being that the word ‘president’ replaced the word ‘king’.)

To write the new constitution, the people of Iceland elected twenty-five citizens from among 522 adults not belonging to any political party but recommended by at least thirty citizens. This document was not the work of a handful of politicians, but was written on the internet. The constituent’s meetings are streamed on-line, and citizens can send their comments and suggestions, witnessing the document as it takes shape. The constitution that eventually emerges from this participatory democratic process will be submitted to parliament for approval after the next elections.

Some readers will remember that Iceland’s ninth century agrarian collapse was featured in Jared Diamond’s book by the same name. Today, that country is recovering from its financial collapse in ways just the opposite of those generally considered unavoidable, as confirmed yesterday by the new head of the IMF, Christine Lagarde to Fareed Zakaria. The people of Greece have been told that the privatization of their public sector is the only solution. And those of Italy, Spain and Portugal are facing the same threat.

They should look to Iceland. Refusing to bow to foreign interests, that small country stated loud and clear that the people are sovereign.

That’s why it is not in the news anymore.

The Secret of Oz - Winner, Best Docu of 2010 v.1.09.11

2011-11-28T00:52:00.002-05:00

The world economy is doomed to spiral downwards until we do 2 things

OWS: Out of Zuccotti Park and Into the Streets

2011-11-23T02:27:00.001-05:00

OWS: Out of Zuccotti Park and Into the Streets

By: Eugene Robinson | Posted: November 18, 2011

In his Washington Post column, Eugene Robinson writes that while Occupy Wall Street protesters may no longer occupy Zuccotti Park, they are still prominent in the national psyche. He says the movement has only just begun.

Demonstrators staged a “day of action” Thursday, following the eviction of their two-month-old encampment this week. The idea was, well, to occupy Wall Street in a literal sense -- to shut down the financial district, at least during the morning rush hour.

For the most part, it didn’t work. Entrances to some subway stations were blocked for a while, and traffic was more of a mess than usual. But police turned out in force, erecting barricades that kept protesters from getting anywhere near their main target, the New York Stock Exchange. Captains of commerce may have been hassled and inconvenienced, but they weren’t thwarted.

There was some pushing and shoving, resulting in a few dozen arrests. Coordinated “day of action” protests were held in other cities. They did not change the world.

A big failure? No, quite the opposite.

Read Eugene Robinson's entire column at the Washington Post.

Berkeley police yank hair of female professor and students at Occupy Cal

2011-11-22T04:27:00.000-05:00

UCB English Professor Celeste Langan (1st woman pulled) offers out her wrists and tells police they can arrest her -- they yank her out by the hair and do the same with two students. The police were intent on destroying the Occupy Cal encampment tents. Later in the video, a woman is pinned to a bush and being batoned, and a man trying to rescue her gets beaten by police.

Police pepper spraying and arresting students at UC Davis

2011-11-22T04:22:00.000-05:00

OccupySLC Winter 2011: Real Campers Interviewed

2011-11-22T04:06:00.000-05:00

Memo Spells Out Plan to Undermine Occupy Wall Street 2011

2011-11-21T12:09:00.000-05:00

How the Council on Foreign Relations Controls the Media

2011-11-16T08:42:00.000-05:00

November 15 at Occupy Wall Street: What happened today?

2011-11-16T08:35:00.000-05:00

10-14-11 1a - Showdown Postponed - Countdown with Keith Olbermann

2011-11-16T02:29:00.000-05:00

11-15-11 4 - Special Comment - Mayor Bloomberg - Countdown with Keith Ol...

2011-11-16T02:21:00.000-05:00

Celente: Washington is Wall Street, Wall Street is Washington

2011-11-16T02:10:00.000-05:00

MSNBC: Occupy Wall Street

2011-11-15T12:53:00.000-05:00

Occupy Wall Street Declares Goldman Sachs Guilty

2011-11-15T12:28:00.000-05:00

Occupy Wall Street: NYPD raid on camp in Zuccotti park

2011-11-15T12:21:00.000-05:00

Dylan Ratigan (rightfully) loses it on air

2011-11-15T11:56:00.000-05:00

Occupy Denver - Saturday, November 12, 2011

2011-11-15T11:51:00.000-05:00

Occupy Portland: Tensions rise between Portland Police and crowd

2011-11-15T11:47:00.000-05:00

Veterans March For Occupy Wall Street

2011-11-12T18:11:00.000-05:00

Veterans March For Occupy Wall Street — And It's Like Nothing You've Ever Seen Before
Linette Lopez and Robert Johnson | Nov. 2, 2011, 5:39 PM

Teachers, auto workers, nurses and more have had their chance to show their support for the ideals of the Occupy movement.
Today, veterans had their turn.
There is no perfect way to describe what it looked like, we can only say that their demonstration was serious and somber unlike any other.

This was not a party with music and cheering, their signs were not funny either, this was a true march in protest. After all, these men and women are soldiers.
As they made their way to Zuccotti Park, the feeling was tense. People who watched from their offices did not smile or laugh, they stared and whispered quietly to each other.
And then the veterans took the human microphone. Like their steps, their voices rang in perfect time. The occupiers stood in silence, only opening their mouths to repeat what the soldiers said.
When one Navy veteran addressed Zuccotti Park he put it very simply: "If you continue to assemble in peace and solidarity, justice will come to pass. We are the 99%."

The march started at the Vietnam Memorial on Water Street.
The press could not blend in during this march. The vets stayed in strict formation, moving in time through the streets without saying a word.

All types of vets were marching — A former soldier was pushing his daughter in a stroller.
The veterans stopped, faced the press and gave a speech. "We are veterans and we are the 99%. We swore to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America. We are here to support the Occupy movement."

Durham protesters speak out against Duke Energy's rate hike

2011-11-04T11:45:00.000-04:00

Durham protesters speak out against Duke Energy's rate hike
By Kosta Harlan | November 3, 2011

Durham, NC - Over 60 protesters marched on Durham City Hall here, Nov. 2, where the Public Utilities Commission was holding a hearing about Duke Energy's proposed 18% rate hike. After rallying outside, 200 people packed the two-hour hearing in City Hall to speak out against the rate hike.

The march kicked off at the newly-renamed People's Plaza, where Occupy Durham has had an encampment over the last several weeks. 40 people rallied before marching through downtown Durham, chanting "No hike, No way! Duke Energy, we won't pay!" and "Money for jobs and education, not for greedy corporations!"

Outside the Public Utilities Commission hearing, a press conference organized by North Carolina WARN (Waste Awareness & Reduction Network) brought together speakers from numerous community organizations and businesses in the area. Rafael Estrada, speaking as a member of the Occupy Durham movement at the press conference, stated, “We want to point out how obscene it is for a corporation that had record profits of $1.3 billion in 2010 to ask for a rate increase of 17% in 2011. This increase means a hard blow to all residents in the state and it would be especially harmful to those that are mostly affected by corporate greed: those below and near the poverty line, the unemployed and the undocumented."

Duke Energy claims the rate hike is necessary to "begin recovering $4.8 billion in investments made since 2009 to modernize our electric system and comply with state and federal emissions regulations." But according to their own statements, 75% of the increase would go to capital investments. This means the public is footing the bill for the foundation of future profits for Duke Energy. Duke Energy's profits went up 23% in 2010 alone, to $1.3 billion.

Alissa Ellis is an unemployed mother who is active with Occupy Durham and helped lead the rally outside the hearing. Ellis told Fight Back!, "It is important to educate people about what big greedy corporations are doing because most of the public is in the dark."

Ellis continued, "It is important for the city of Durham to show to the commission that we don't support this increase. We are a broad coalition of people, we are the 99%, and the 1% shouldn't be allowed to push us around anymore and take our money."

Duke Energy is also facing heat due to a planned merger with Progress Energy. The merger would result in the country's largest utility - an enormously powerful monopoly - valued at $65 billion.

Protect Occupy Baltimore

2011-11-01T02:22:00.000-04:00

UPDATE: CITY DEFERS OCCUPY BALTIMORE PERMIT REQUEST

OCCUPATION CALLS FOR PUBLIC SUPPORT

Occupy Baltimore has been peacefully gathering in McKeldin Square on the corner of Pratt & Light Streets since October 4th, 2011. Today marks the start of the fourth week of the encampment. Early last week, after pressure from the Baltimore City police department and the department of parks and recreation, Occupy Baltimore filed an application for a permit to continue the encampment indefinitely.

On Monday, Occupy Baltimore received word that the Department of Parks & Recreation Department has not approved their permit application, and instead suggested a compromise that would allow Occupy Baltimore to continue to occupy McKeldin Square indefinitely without a permit during the daytime hours, but limit overnight presence to a maximum of 2 people, and restrict the encampment as a whole to a smaller corner of the Square. The city has asked for an answer to the proposed deal by Wednesday Oct 26th and stated that if Occupy Baltimore agrees, they will not be removed from the park for failing to obtain a permit. Should Occupy Baltimore refuse to comply with the requests to limit the overnight presence, then the city "has the right to terminate these special accommodations," though no specific date for termination has been announced. In preparation for any possible intervention by the city, Occupy Baltimore participants are issuing a general call for all allies to join the encampment starting tonight to support and protect the group sustaining the occupation at McKeldin Square.

Over the course of the past three weeks, Occupy Baltimore has begun a directly democratic dialogue, and considering their peaceful and respectful assembly, the group requests that the city allow them to maintain this peaceful democratic space, as city government counterparts have in Philadelphia and Washington DC. Representatives of Occupy Baltimore, assisted by the Maryland chapter of the ACLU, are currently in discussion with the Department of Parks and Recreation about possible negotiations on the proposed deadline and the overnight stay limitations. These limitations present a clear concern for the Occupation, which has a complex and pre-existing infrastructure, including dedicated teams for media, food, direct action, outreach, security, and other working groups that require consultation and consideration, as well as physical space onsite.

Occupy Baltimore is committed to maintaining a vibrant, safe space in McKeldin Square as the movement continues to grow an organic infrastructure of democratic representation, arts, culture, and Political debate while still allowing the public to pass through McKeldin Square, and inviting them to join in the occupation and associated activities.

Occupy Baltimore recognizes that their requests are outside of the box for the city's existing permit system, but encourages the city to work alongside peaceful and respectful demonstrators to create a legal space where all voices can be heard.

The Occupation remains hopeful that the City of Baltimore will continue to work with the movement in the coming days and weeks to ensure the continued existence of this peaceful gathering. Participants state, however, that they are closely monitoring police presence in the area as the city's deadline approaches. They encourage supporters to maximize presence in the Square starting today, and continuing throughout the week, should the authorities decide to clear the area on or after the Wednesday, October 26 deadline.

For more information, or to schedule a time to visit the occupation movement in Baltimore, please visit www.occupybmore.org

Immunity and impunity in elite America

2011-11-01T00:57:00.000-04:00

Immunity and impunity in elite America
The top one per cent of US society is enjoying a two-tiered system of justice and politics.

As intense protests spawned by Occupy Wall Street continue to grow, it is worth asking: Why now? The answer is not obvious. After all, severe income and wealth inequality have long plagued the United States. In fact, it could reasonably be claimed that this form of inequality is part of the design of the American foundation - indeed, an integral part of it.

Income inequality has worsened over the past several years and is at its highest level since the Great Depression. This is not, however, a new trend. Income inequality has been growing at rapid rates for three decades. As journalist Tim Noah described the process: "During the late 1980s and the late 1990s, the United States experienced two unprecedentedly long periods of sustained economic growth - the ‘seven fat years’ and the ‘long boom’. Yet from 1980 to 2005, more than 80 per cent of total increase in Americans' income went to the top one per cent. Economic growth was more sluggish in the aughts [the first decade of the new century], but the decade saw productivity increase by about 20 per cent. Yet virtually none of the increase translated into wage growth at middle and lower incomes, an outcome that left many economists scratching their heads."

The 2008 financial crisis exacerbated the trend, but not radically: the top one per cent of earners in the US have been feeding ever more greedily at the trough for decades.

Inferiors and superiors

In addition, substantial wealth inequality is so embedded in US political culture that, standing alone, it would not be sufficient to trigger citizen rage of the type we are finally witnessing. The American founders were clear that they viewed inequality in wealth, power, and prestige as not merely inevitable, but desirable and, for some, even divinely ordained. Jefferson praised "the natural aristocracy" as "the most precious gift of nature" for the "government of society". John Adams concurred: "It already appears, that there must be in every society of men superiors and inferiors, because God has laid in the… course of nature the foundation of the distinction."

Not only have the overwhelming majority of those in the US long acquiesced to vast income and wealth disparities, but some of those most oppressed by these outcomes have cheered it loudly. Americans have been inculcated not only to accept, but to revere those who are the greatest beneficiaries of this inequality.

In the 1980s, this paradox - whereby even those most trampled upon come to cheer those responsible for their state - became more firmly entrenched. That's because it found a folksy, friendly face. Ronald Reagan, adept at feeding the populace a slew of Orwellian clichés that induced them to defend the interests of the wealthiest. "A rising tide," as one former US president put it, "lifts all boats". The sum of his wisdom being: It is in your interest when the rich get richer.

Implicit in this framework was the claim that inequality was justified and legitimate. The core propagandistic premise was that the rich were rich because they deserved to be. They innovated in industry, invented technologies, discovered cures, created jobs, took risks, and boldly found ways to improve our lives. In other words, they deserved to be enriched. Indeed, it was in our common interest to allow them to fly as high as possible, because that would increase their motivation to produce more, bestowing on us ever greater life-improving gifts.

Gratefulness for the leadership

We should not, so the thinking went, begrudge the multimillionaire living behind his 15-foot walls for his success; we should admire him. Corporate bosses deserved not our resentment but our gratitude. It was in our own interest not to demand more in taxes from the wealthiest but less, as their enhanced wealth - their pocket change - would trickle down in various ways to all of us.

This is the mentality that enabled massive growth in income and wealth inequality over the past several decades without much at all in the way of citizen protest. And yet something has indeed changed. It’s not that Americans suddenly woke up one day and decided that substantial income and wealth inequality are themselves unfair or intolerable. What changed was the perception of how that wealth was gotten and so of the ensuing inequality as legitimate.

Many Americans who once accepted or even cheered such inequality now see the gains of the richest as ill-gotten, as undeserved, as cheating. Most of all, the legal system that once served as the legitimising anchor for outcome inequality, the rule of law - that most basic of American ideals, that a common set of rules are equally applied to all - has now become irrevocably corrupted and is seen as such.

While the founders accepted outcome inequality, they emphasised - over and over - that its legitimacy hinged on subjecting everyone to the law’s mandates on an equal basis. Jefferson wrote that the essence of America would be that "the poorest labourer stood on equal ground with the wealthiest millionaire, and generally on a more favoured one whenever their rights seem to jar". Benjamin Franklin warned that creating a privileged legal class would produce "total separation of affections, interests, political obligations, and all manner of connections" between the rulers and those they ruled. Tom Paine repeatedly railed against "counterfeit nobles", those whose superior status was grounded not in merit but in unearned legal privilege.

Definition of tyranny

After all, one of their principal grievances against the British king was his power to exempt his cronies from legal obligations. Almost every founder repeatedly warned that a failure to apply the law equally to the politically powerful and the rich would ensure a warped and unjust society. In many ways, that was their definition of tyranny.

Americans understand this implicitly. If you watch a competition among sprinters, you can accept that whoever crosses the finish line first is the superior runner. But only if all the competitors are bound by the same rules: everyone begins at the same starting line, is penalised for invading the lane of another runner, is barred from making physical contact or using performance-enhancing substances, and so on.

If some of the runners start ahead of others and have relationships with the judges that enable them to receive dispensation for violating the rules as they wish, then viewers understand that the outcome can no longer be considered legitimate. Once the process is seen as not only unfair but utterly corrupted, once it’s obvious that a common set of rules no longer binds all the competitors, the winner will be resented, not heralded.

That catches the mood of the US in 2011. It may not explain the Occupy Wall Street movement, but it helps explain why it has spread like wildfire and why so many Americans seem instantly to accept and support it. As was not true in recent decades, the American relationship with wealth inequality is in a state of rapid transformation.

It is now clearly understood that, rather than apply the law equally to all, Wall Street tycoons have engaged in egregious criminality - acts which destroyed the economic security of millions of people around the world - without experiencing the slightest legal repercussions. Giant financial institutions were caught red-handed engaging in massive, systematic fraud to foreclose on people’s homes and the reaction of the political class, led by the Obama administration, was to shield them from meaningful consequences. Rather than submit on an equal basis to the rules, through an oligarchical, democracy-subverting control of the political process, they now control the process of writing those rules and how they are applied.

Writing laws

Today, it is glaringly obvious to a wide range of those in the US that the wealth of the top one per cent is the byproduct not of risk-taking entrepreneurship, but of corrupted control of our legal and political systems. Thanks to this control, they can write laws that have no purpose than to abolish the few limits that still constrain them, as happened during the Wall Street deregulation orgy of the 1990s. They can retroactively immunise themselves for crimes they deliberately committed for profit, as happened when the 2008 Congress shielded the nation’s telecom giants for their role in Bush’s domestic warrantless eavesdropping programme.

It is equally obvious that they are using that power not to lift the boats of ordinary Americans, but to sink them. In short, Americans are now well aware of what the second-highest-ranking Democrat in the Senate, Illinois’s Dick Durbin, blurted out in 2009 about the body in which he serves: the banks "frankly own the place".

If you were to assess the state of the union in 2011, you might sum it up this way: rather than being subjected to the rule of law, the nation’s most powerful oligarchs control the law and are so exempt from it; and increasing numbers of Americans understand that and are outraged. At exactly the same time that the nation’s elites enjoy legal immunity even for egregious crimes, ordinary Americans are being subjected to the world's largest and one of its harshest penal states, under which they are unable to secure competent legal counsel and are harshly punished with lengthy prison terms for even trivial infractions.

‘Two-tiered justice system’

In lieu of the rule of law - the equal application of rules to everyone - what we have now is a two-tiered justice system in which the powerful are immunised, while the powerless are punished with increasing mercilessness. As a guarantor of outcomes, the law has, by now, been so completely perverted that it is an incomparably potent weapon for entrenching inequality further, controlling the powerless, and ensuring corrupted outcomes.

The tide that was supposed to lift all ships has, in fact, left startling numbers of Americans underwater. In the process, we lost any sense that a common set of rules applies to everyone, and so there is no longer a legitimising anchor for the vast income and wealth inequalities that plague the nation.

That is what has changed, and a growing recognition of what it means is fuelling rising citizen anger and protest. The inequality under which so many suffer is not only vast, but illegitimate, rooted as it is in lawlessness and corruption. Obscuring that fact has long been the linchpin for inducing Americans to accept vast and growing inequalities. That fact is now too glaring to obscure any longer.

Glenn Greenwald is a former constitutional and civil rights litigator and a current contributing writer at Salon.com. He is the author of two New York Times bestselling books on the Bush administration's executive power and foreign policy abuses. His just-released book, With Liberty and Justice for Some: How the Law Is Used to Destroy Equality and Protect the Powerful (Metropolitan Books), is a scathing indictment of America's two-tiered system of justice. He is the recipient of the first annual I.F. Stone Award for Independent Journalism.

Bill Maher Defends Occupy Wall Street

2011-10-27T17:55:00.000-04:00

Occupy Atlanta

2011-10-26T11:30:00.000-04:00

Errin Haines
The Associated Press

ATLANTA—With helicopters hovering overhead, police moved into a downtown Atlanta park early Wednesday and arrested around 50 Occupy Wall Street protesters who had been camped there for about two weeks.

Like in many other cities, protesters had been camping in Woodruff Park to rally against what they see as corporate greed and a wide range of other economic issues.

Before police moved in, protesters were warned a couple times around midnight to vacate the park or risk arrest.

Inside the park, the warnings were drowned out by drumbeats and chants of "Our park!"
Organizers had instructed participants to be peaceful if arrests came, and most were. Many gathered in the centre of the park, locking arms, and sang "We Shall Overcome," until police led them out, one-by-one to waiting buses. Some were dragged out while others left on foot, handcuffed with plastic ties.
Police included SWAT teams in riot gear, dozens of officers on motorcycles and several on horseback. By about 1:30 a.m. Wednesday the park was mostly cleared of protesters.

State Sen. Vincent Fort was among those arrested and had come to the park in support of the protesters in recent days. He said the police presence was "overkill."

"He's using all these resources ... This is the most peaceful place in Georgia," Fort said, referring to Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed. "At the urging of the business community, he's moving people out. Shame on him."
Reed told reporters he had serious security concerns. They were heightened Tuesday when a man was seen in the park with an AK-47 assault rifle, the mayor said. He said authorities could not determine whether the weapon was loaded, and were unable to get additional information about it.

Occupy Atlanta organizers said the demonstrators who were arrested would go before a judge Wednesday morning. They were planning a march from the park to the jail shortly before the court hearings.

"It's real simple: This is a crisis of priorities that this small group of campers ... is the greatest threat in this city. It's outrageous," said organizer Tim Franzen.
Reed on Monday said he planned to revoke the permit allowing Occupy Atlanta protesters to live in the park, but was vague about when that might come.
Late Tuesday, police started surrounding the park at a busy intersection, and some protesters gathered up their tents, pillows, sleeping bags and other belongings, saying they didn't want to lose them. Right after the order to leave, some did, standing outside the barricades.

Hundreds of others stood on Atlanta's famous Peachtree Street, booing police. They shouted "Shame!" and "Who do you protect? Who do you serve?"
Reed said he was upset over an advertised hip-hop concert that he said drew 600 people to the park over the weekend but didn't have a permit and didn't have security guards to work the crowd, calling it irresponsible.

In Oakland, California, police shot tear gas in response to rock throwing from some of the demonstrators who had gathered there, authorities said.

Why the USA should spread the wealth

2011-10-26T09:03:00.000-04:00

Why the USA should spread the wealth
By Mark Thoma, The Fiscal Times

America sacrificed equity for the false promise of efficiency and growth, and society is now more unequal than at any time since the early part of the last century.
Many economists worry that making societies more equal through income redistribution or other means reduces economic growth.

This big trade-off between equality and efficiency, which is supported by comparisons of capitalist and socialist countries, implies that there's a limit to how much redistribution a society should pursue. At some point, the trade-off of more equality for less output -- which worsens as we push toward more and more equality -- becomes intolerable.

However, while the trade-off is quite unfavorable as we push to extremes, recent experience suggests there is a wide region where the trade-off is hard to detect. Thus, worries about this trade-off appear to be overblown.

For example, the Bush tax cuts were justified, in part, by the assertion that equity had overshadowed efficiency in tax policy. Taxes on the wealthy, and the inefficiencies that come with them, were much too high, it was argued, and lowering taxes would cause output to go up enough to lift all boats substantially.
Accordingly, the lower end of the income distribution would fare much better after income trickled down than it would under redistributive policy.

The economy did grow after the Bush tax cuts, but the rate of growth was unremarkable, especially for jobs, and there's little evidence that they caused large increases in output growth, as promised.
In fact, there's little evidence that the Bush tax cuts had any effect at all. The trade-off simply wasn't there.

And the tax cuts at the upper end of the income distribution did nothing to correct for the fact that although worker productivity was rising, wages remained flat -- a problem that began in the mid-1970s.

This was an indication that something was amiss in the mechanism that distributes income to different members of society. Workers were helping to increase the size of the pie, but income did not trickle down, and their share of the pie was no larger than before.

This is not the only way in which the distribution of income has become disconnected from productivity. While some argue that those at the top of the income distribution earn every cent they receive, and hence deserve to keep all of it, there is plenty of evidence that the compensation of financial executives, CEOs of major corporations and others at the top of the pyramid far exceeds the value of what they contribute to society.

That holds true even without the 2008-09 financial crisis, but how, exactly, can we justify the extraordinarily high income of this group when the result of their actions was to ruin the economy?

If those at the top of the income distribution receive far more than the value of what they create, and those at lower income levels receive less, then one way to correct this is to increase taxes at the upper end of the income distribution and use the proceeds to protect important social programs that benefit working-class households, programs that are currently threatened by budget deficits.

This would help to rectify the maldistribution of income that is preventing workers from realizing their share of the gains from economic growth.
And there is another reason why taxes on the wealthy should go up. Someone has to pay taxes, and the question is how to distribute the burden among taxpayers. Many believe, and I am one of them, that progressive taxes are the most equitable way to do this. In particular, the guiding principle is that the last dollar of taxes paid should cause the same amount of sacrifice for rich and poor alike.

There has been an attempt to make it appear that taxes are mostly paid by the wealthy; the deceptive claim that half of the people pay no taxes is part of this. But taxes are less progressive than before the Bush tax cuts, and when all taxes at all levels of government are taken into account, "the U.S. tax system just barely qualifies as progressive," according to a 2010 report from Citizens for Tax Justice.
We face a choice between cutting key benefits for the middle class and creating an ever more unequal society, or raising taxes on the wealthy to preserve the social programs that lower-income households rely upon.
We hear that raising taxes is unfair and that tax increases will harm economic growth. But there's nothing unfair about correcting the maldistribution of income that we've seen in recent decades, or about making sure the burden from paying taxes is more equitable than it is now.

And there's no reason to fear that economic growth will be lower if taxes are increased. Cutting taxes on the wealthy during the Bush years didn't stimulate growth, and raising taxes back to the levels we've had in the past -- when growth was quite robust -- won't have much of an effect either.

Keith Olberrmann Tavis Smiley Dr. Cornell West Occupy Wall Street

2011-10-25T20:25:00.000-04:00

"Occupy" Movement Gets Settled in NYC, DC

2011-10-25T19:46:00.000-04:00

More Awesome Drums at Malcom X Park with Occupy DC

2011-10-25T19:45:00.000-04:00

Occupy Wall Street: Inspired by rapid progress, Michael Moore calls on all Americans to participate

2011-10-24T02:25:00.000-04:00

MOVE YOUR MONEY

2011-10-22T16:52:00.000-04:00

An Open Letter to the Occupiers

2011-10-18T23:51:00.002-04:00

An Open Letter to the Occupiers from a Veteran Troublemaker

by Jim Wallis 10-13-2011 10:18 am

You have awakened the sleeping giant, too long dormant, but ever present, deep in the American democratic spirit. You have given voice and space to the unspoken feelings of countless others about something that has gone terribly wrong in our society. And you have sparked a flame from the embers of both frustration and hope that have been building, steadily, in the hearts of so many of us for quite some time.

Throughout history, often it has been left to the youth of a society to do that, and you boldly have stepped into the role of the emerging generation, which sometimes means saying and doing what others only think. You have articulated, loudly and clearly, the internal monologue of a nation.

Some of you have told me that you expected only to foment a short-lived protest and that you were as surprised by this “movement” as anyone else. Try to listen and learn from those whose feelings and participation you are evoking by encouraging more reflection than certainty.

While there are some among us who may misunderstand your motives and message, know that you are an inspiration to many more.

One of you told me in New York City last week, “This is not a protest, but a think tank.” Another of your compatriots wanted me to understand that you are trying to build something in Liberty Square that you aspire to create for our global village — a more cooperative society.

Most telling to me was the answer to the first question I asked of the first person I talked to at the Wall Street demonstrations. I inquired of one of the non-leaders who helped lead the first days of Occupation what most drew him to get involved in the demonstration and he replied, “I want to have children someday, and this is becoming a world not good for children.”

My 13- and 8-year-old boys came to mind when I heard his answer, and I felt thankful. It is precisely those deepest, most authentic feelings and motivations that should preoccupy you, rather than how best to form and communicate superficial political rhetoric.

You are raising very basic questions about an economy that has become increasingly unfair, unstable, unsustainable, and unhappy for a growing number of people. Those same questions are being asked by many others at the bottom, the middle, and even some at the top of the economic pecking order.

There are ethics to be named here, and the transition from the pseudo-ethic of endless growth to the moral ethics of sustainability is a conversation occurring even now in our nation’s business schools (if, perhaps, secreted inside the official curriculum).

Keep pressing those values questions because they will move people more than a set of demands or policy suggestions. Those can and must come later.

And try not to demonize those you view as opponents, as good people can get trapped in bad systems and we’ve seen a lot of that. Still, you are right for saying that we all must be held accountable — both systems and the individuals within them. It is imperative that we hear that message right now.

The new safe spaces you have created to ask fundamental questions, now in hundreds of locations around the country and the world, are helping to carve out fresh societal space to examine ourselves — who we are, what we value most, and where we want to go from here.

Instead of simply attacking the establishment “economists,” you can become the citizen economists, like the young economics major I met at the Wall Street occupation who discussed with me new approaches for society’s investment and innovation. We desperately need new vision like hers to come up with alternative ways of performing essential functions.

Keep asking what a just economy should look like and whom it should be for. They are noble questions. But you’d do well to avoid Utopian dreaming about things that will never happen. Look instead at how we could do things differently, more responsibly, more equitably, and yes, more democratically.

Don’t be afraid to get practical and specific about how we can and must do things better than we have in recent years. One of our best moral economists, Amartya Sen, says that “being against the market is like being against conversation. It’s a form of exchange.” You have begun such a conversation about what markets could and should be. Keep talking.

Even in forums where business and political leaders meet, they too are asking those questions and using terms like “a moral economy” as a way to interrogate our present and failed practices. I’ve been in such a gathering this week — just days apart from visiting yours — where the participants slept on featherbedding in five-star hotels rather than in pup tents on the sidewalk. And yet, surprisingly, they were asking many of the same questions you are.

Keep driving both the moral and practical questions about the economics of our local and global households, for that is what the discipline was supposed to be about in the first place.

I know you believe that the leadership on Wall Street, and Constitution and Pennsylvania Avenues have all failed you. Indeed, they have failed us all. But while you feel betrayed by both our business and political leaders, don’t give up on leadership per se.

We need innovative leadership now more than ever. And you are providing some of it.

Think of stewards rather than masters of the universe as the model for leadership.

And remember, nonviolence is not just a critical tactic but a necessary commitment to moral and civil discourse that can awaken the best in all of us. There is much to be angry about, but channeling that energy into creative, non-violent action is the only way to prevent dangerous cynicism and nihilism that also can be a human response to the injustice and marginalization many people now feel.

The anarchism of anger has never produced the change that the discipline and constructive program of non-violent movements has done again and again.

I remember what it feels like to see your movement as a lead story on the evening news every night, and the adrenaline rush that being able to muster 10,000 people in two hours’ time to march in protest against injustice and inhumanity can bring. I was in your shoes 40 years ago as a student leading demonstrations against the Vietnam War, racism, and nuclear proliferation.

I would advise you to cultivate humility more than overconfidence or self indulgence. This really is not about you. It’s about the marginalized masses, the signs of the times, and the profound yearning for lasting change. Take that larger narrative more seriously than you take yourselves.

Finally, do not let go of your hope. Popular movements are the only force that truly brings about change in society. The established order is never as secure and impervious to change as those who preside over it believe it to be.

Remember that re-action is never as powerful as re-construction. And whatever you may think of organized religion, please keep in mind that change requires spiritual as well as political resources, and that invariably any new economy will be accompanied by a new (or very old) spirituality.

So I will say, may God bless you and keep you.

May God be gracious to you and give you -– and all of us — peace.

Jim Wallis is the author of Rediscovering Values: A Guide for Economic and Moral Recovery, and CEO of Sojourners. He blogs at www.godspolitics.com. Follow Jim on Twitter @JimWallis.

I AM NOT MOVING - Short Film - Occupy Wall Street

2011-10-17T04:29:00.000-04:00

Occupy Wall Street protests spread all over US despite police brutality...

2011-10-17T03:10:00.000-04:00

DC Douglas' "Why #OccupyWallStreet? 4 Reasons."

2011-10-17T03:06:00.000-04:00

Welcome to the Poverty Thunderdome

2011-10-14T00:12:00.000-04:00

Earlier this week, professional loudhailer Bill O’Reilly welcomed — well, welcomed might be a bit generous — radio and TV host Tavis Smiley and Princeton University professor Cornel West to his FoxNewsChannel show to yell at them….I mean, to interview the pair about poverty in America and the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations.
To call it a “dust up” doesn’t quite capture the full throttle epic clash of personalities.
(Read more about what the Huffington Post called “nothing short of a cable news classic” HERE.)
Printed here below is my favorite exchange.
Frankly, the written word doesn’t do it justice, so you might consider grabbing a couple of friends for a dramatic reading:

The Poverty Thunderdome from cathleen falsani on Vimeo.

SMILEY: I’m still going to finish my point. You’re right to go after Stanley O’Neal. I know you didn’t mean to do this. I don’t want to believe you meant to do this, but Stanley O’Neal, there are four or five black CEOs in this country. You choose a guy at Merrill Lynch to make him the poster guy for all the folks on Wall Street.
O’REILLY: Oh Tavis knock it off with the black business, will you? Oh stop.
(CROSSTALK)
SMILEY: Bill, why — why Stan O’Neal as opposed to all the other guys who do this?
O’REILLY: This is one of the most egregious things that happened. We — we treat everybody the same here, Tavis.
SMILEY: But no you do not.
O’REILLY: It doesn’t matter whether they’re black or white.
SMILEY: Bill, the bottom line is what we’re talking about here is fairness. We’re talking about justice here. We’re talking about not protecting Wall Street. Not one — they’ve been arresting protesters, Bill, left and right, arresting protesters left and right. now the talk on Fox News is that it’s costing taxpayers money for police to do their job. Not one bankster, not one Bill, they can arrest hundreds of protesters but not one banker has gone to jail to pay for his crimes.
O’REILLY: Because they didn’t violate any laws, Tavis.
(CROSSTALK) OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!!!
WEST: Brother Bill, how do you know? How do you know?
O’REILLY: OK, hold it. Hold, all right, knock it off.
WEST: There’s been no investigation of all the predatory lending. (INAUDIBLE) Why would you say something like that, brother? You don’t even have the evidence. You don’t know.
Yeah.

In August, Smiley and West, who together host the radio program also called “Smiley & West,” embarked on a national “Poverty Tour,” a road trip “to highlight the plight of the poor people of all races, colors, and creeds so they will not be forgotten, ignored, or rendered invisible during this difficult and dangerous time of economic deprivation and political cowardice.”
On his PBS talk show this week, Smiley has been highlighting the issue of poverty in the United States, with guests including West, Vicki Escarra (CEO of Feed America), Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Columbia University economist Jeffrey Sachs.
Smiley will conclude his week-long focus on poverty Friday with our very own Sojourners CEO, the Rev. Jim Wallis.

Cain's 9-9-9 tax plan is simple: Most will simply pay more

2011-10-13T18:56:00.001-04:00

Cain's 9-9-9 tax plan is simple: Most will simply pay more

Cain's 9-9-9 tax plan is simple: Most will simply pay more

By John W. Schoen, Senior Producer

When it comes to Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain's proposed 9-9-9 tax plan, there’s one thing all sides agree on: it’s very simple.
If you're a corporation, own a small business or count yourself among the richest Americans, you'll simply love it. If not, you'd simply pay a lot more in taxes.
Everyone hates the current tax code. A Congressional supercommittee is attacking the mess as part of a broad proposal to balance the federal budget. President Barack Obama wants to pay for his jobs stimulus package by raising taxes on the wealthiest households. Corporations are agitating for a “tax holiday” to bring home over a $1 trillion in profits stashed overseas to avoid the IRS back home.
Now Cain, who has recently surged to the front of the pack of GOP presidential contenders, is drawing attention to a radical idea. Rather than slog through the political morass of overhauling the existing system, just scrap it entirely. No more deductions, exemptions, incentives and tax loss carry forwards
In its place, Cain wants the government to pay its bills with three sources of revenues held to single-digit rates: a 9 percent tax on all consumer purchases, a 9 percent “business” tax and a 9 percent income tax.
Cain claims the plan is already generating popular support among voters, which will make it much easier to implement in the political quagmire that has numerous tax reform proposals.

“I can be walking through the airport going through security and a TSA agent will say, ‘Hello Mr. Cain: 9-9-9,” Cain recently told CNBC. “If the public understands it, they will support it and demand it. That is going to be the difference. It is not a complicated piece of legislation.”
But the odds are much higher that, when the public understands it, the vast majority of taxpayers will be horrified to realize they face a huge tax increase. That assessment comes from Bruce Bartlett, a senior official in the Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations, who described the plan as a “distributional monstrosity.”
“The poor would pay more while the rich would have their taxes cut, with no guarantee that economic growth will increase and good reason to believe that the budget deficit will increase” Bartlett recently wrote in the New York Times. “Even allowing for the poorly thought through promises routinely made on the campaign trail, Mr. Cain’s tax plan stands out as exceptionally ill conceived.
The reason the plan would hit poor people much harder that the wealthy is also simple. The current tax code provides a series of deductions, credits and exemptions that ease the tax burden on all households, but they have a greater positive impact those at the bottom of the income ladder. As a result, some 38 percent of U.S. households pay little or no taxes. They would now suddenly be hit with what amounts to a tax bill that represents 27 percent of their income, according to USC law professor Edward Kleinbard, who published a paper this week calling the 9-9-9 plan “a terrific example of fiscal hocus pocus.”

“It is presented as a low-tax panacea, but it actually would raise the tax bills of many Americans very substantially,” he said.
Though he's gained political momentum by hammering away at the plan's simplicity, Cain has had a harder time explaining how the plan would benefit the average household. In a recent appearance on MSNBC’s The Daily Rundown with Chuck Todd, Cain explained that a family with annual income of $50,000 would come out ahead under the 9-9-9 scheme. But as my NBC News colleague Domenico Montanaro found upon closer examination, the numbers Cain offered just don't add up.
The plan would certainly benefit some households. Owners of small businesses would be among the biggest winners, said Kleinbard, because they could pay themselves with dividends (which would no longer be taxed) instead of wages. That would effectively reduce their tax rate to about 18 percent.
Kleinbard also found that the plan would have some significant unintended consequences, including what amounts to a phantom tax on existing savings. For example, if you bought a new car with money you’d stashed in a savings account, accumulated from earnings, investment gains or interest or dividends that you’ve already paid taxes on, you’d now have to pay yet another 9 percent on the new car.
That phantom tax, which would apply to any purchase made with existing wealth, “may come as a big surprise to Mr. Cain and his followers.”
Cain and advisors who have reviewed the plan insist that it would collect enough money to replace the current tax code and not add to the federal budget deficit. But until Cain presents a more detailed proposal, those estimates are all but impossible to verify.
That uncertainty has drawn fire from the political right. Many support the idea of a flatter, more regressive tax than the current system. But they worry that Cain‘s plan could make it easier for the government to raise revenues.
“The challenge is creating a (business tax) and a sales tax and keeping the income tax having three taxes all of which can grow,” Grover Norquist, head of Americans for Tax Reform, told MSNBC. “It’s like having three needles in your arm taking blood out. It’s much more dangerous than just one.”
Critics of Cain’s plan argue that he’s hoping that widespread dissatisfaction with the current system will prompt voters to overlook the plan’s numerous pitfalls.
NYU law professor Daniel Shaviro thinks part of the popular appeal of Cain’s plan is that it appears to hold tax rates to single digits – even though the cumulative tax paid by most households would amount to 27 percent. Borrowing from Cain, Shaviro offers and even simpler solution to make existing tax code much more palatable
“Replace the 35 percent annual income tax with a 3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3-3 monthly tax on annual income,” he recently wrote on his blog. “After all, who's counting if the 12 monthly taxes actually add up to 36 percent annually?”

Get Money Out

2011-10-13T16:37:00.000-04:00

Get Money Out

All About Greed: 'Corporations + Government = Fascism'

2011-10-10T04:14:00.000-04:00

Michael Moore: Occupy Wall Street will only get bigger

2011-10-10T03:10:00.000-04:00

Cornel West in Liberty Plaza Warns Protest Will Grow

2011-10-10T03:02:00.000-04:00

Why we must stop the Banks

2011-10-10T02:54:00.001-04:00

Bill Moyers Journal . This is Usury - 2008
Why we must stop the Banks

OccupyWallStreet:

2011-10-10T02:16:00.000-04:00

#OccupyWallStreet: Hand Gestures, Health Care and the Birth of a New Paradigm
by Tim King 10-07-2011 05:40 pm

NEW YORK, N.Y. – Brendan, with his shaved head, tattoos and tight black t-shirt, looks like he should be a bouncer at a night club.
Instead, he is standing at the entrance of the outdoor media center here in “Liberty Park.”

“And demand some jobs!!” the crowd chants in response as a large group of demonstrators migrates toward the cameras.
Sitting on the ground by a granite bench, a smaller group of protesters doesn’t even look up and continues its discussion. They are busy debating the best way to coordinate the flow of information through all of the various working groups, back to the General Assembly (the democratic decision making body) and then out to other “Occupy” groups across the world.
A drum circle formed at one end of the park and a blue grass trio plays to a small crowd at the other end. Every once in a while you’ll hear someone on an acoustic guitar singing a 60’s protest song. A small team hurriedly works “the kitchen” where all the food supplies are gathered. They rush to put out all of the donations they are receiving and answer questions about what food is vegan.

It can be hard to walk around in the afternoon when the crowd grows and tourists stop to take pictures and video. Throughout the day here at the #OccupyWallStreet mass demonstrations in New York’s financial district, you can find small and often somber groups meeting.
They have agendas, a facilitator, a time keeper, and someone to keep track of the “stack” — the list of people waiting to make a point or ask a question.
And they also have a system of hand gestures — a sort of gonzo sign-language adaptation of Roberts Rules of Order — designed to keep the discussion and decision-making process both democratic and efficient.
When someone agrees with a point the speaker is making, the crowd raises two hands in agreement. When the crowd disagrees, hands quickly go up, making a downward pointing motion. To call a “point of process” crowd members shape their hands into a triangle to stop discussion. Speakers who wander off topic are quickly redirected and reminded of the point being discussed in the agenda.

These working groups bring their recommendations to the #OccupyWallStreet General Assembly, which takes place once a day. A vote is taken to determine consensus before a recommendation is passed along to the G.A.
Anyone participating in the General Assembly can block a proposal by forming an X with their arms. Participants make their case and then a revised proposal is put forth. The revised proposal can then be passed with a 90/10 consensus.
Bre, a college student studying economics who has taken the semester off to participate in the protests, said that what is seen in the park is only a small example of what is occurring more broadly throughout the #OccupyWallStreet movement. When she talks about what is happening in that park and now across the world, you can tell she has started to develop here own succinct means of description but still doesn’t have practiced talking points.
“The intellectual capacity of this movement is enormous,” Bre said. “We are having city planners come down, economists and web experts all helping to build the infrastructure for a larger movement.”
Another participant said that “protest” is the wrong word for what is happening in “Liberty Park.”
“It’s really more of a ‘think tank,’” he said.
Drew, was hard to get a hold of. Our conversations were squeezed in between his busy schedule of meetings. He is in his mid-20’s and had been working freelance web design when he decided to devote himself full time to planning and executing the “Occupation.” Early planning meetings drew a good crowd of people but they never expected the demonstrations in Lower Manhattan to last more than a few days.
He uses the term “suicidal” to talk about the systems — political and economic — currently at work in the United States. “It simply doesn’t work to have an economy based on infinite growth when you life in a finite world,” Drew says. Changing the “suicidal” status quo, he says, requires a radically different way of living in and viewing the world.
The Wall Street protests in New York, while something of an ideological Eden where these new ways of living and thinking are being formed, are not without their own set of societal ills. There are a few trouble makers who don’t embrace the peaceable ethos of the majority, and a few reports of theft. (Some equipment has gone missing, for example.)
“Now, we are having to figure out the basic processes of how decisions are made,” Drew says. “We’re trying to figure out our own democracy.”
But, he says, demonstrators are trying to create systems of ersatz governance that are both realistic and a challenge to the current “paradigm” of broader U.S. culture and society.
Despite a few hiccups, by and large Drew believes the growing community of protesters — designing and building their own culture, really — is functioning well.
“This park is a microcosm of what we want to create,” Drew says, between bites of pizza — known as “occu-pies” at the demonstrations.) “Everybody has health care, enough to eat and the people own the media.”

Dr. Cornell West - We the People Have Found Our Voice

2011-10-10T02:04:00.000-04:00

Stop Oil Companies Tax Breaks

2011-05-11T17:57:00.000-04:00

Take action: Ask oil executives about their billions in tax breaks

Oil companies are living large.

While you and I pay skyrocketing prices at the gas pump, these corporations are laughing all the way to the bank. The "big five" — ExxonMobil, BP, Chevron, Shell and ConocoPhillips — made a staggering $32 billion in profit during the first quarter of the year.

The worst part? These companies get billions of dollars a year in tax breaks. So you get to give them money at the pump – and then each April when you pay your taxes.

Clearly, this isn't sound policy. Instead of helping Big Oil, we should support growing industries like clean energy, where every $1 million of investment creates roughly 16 jobs. $4 billion would create 64,000 jobs a year.

Green For All has begun to speak out on the issue. Yesterday, I wrote a piece for the Huffington Post and appeared on MSNBC to raise awareness about these handouts.

There's a way you can get involved.

Tomorrow, the heads of the "big five" companies are testifying before the U.S. Senate Finance Committee, having been called by Chairman Max Baucus of Montana.

Use the tool at our website to suggest to Sen. Baucus the questions you want these executives to answer.

Our country can't afford to hand over billions of dollars to some of the richest companies in America – companies that perpetuate a dirty energy system.

Join me in speaking out.

Sincerely,

Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins
CEO, Green For All

Stop Big Oil subsidies

2011-05-09T21:00:00.001-04:00

While the price of oil skyrockets, oil companies are pulling in massive profits and collecting tidy subsidies from American taxpayers. Something is dreadfully wrong with this picture. The Senate may soon vote on a measure to end Big Oil subsidies, which amounts to 4 billion dollars a year. Ask your Senators to vote against Big Oil subsidies.

These subsidies go to the same industry that is pushing legislation to allow offshore development without new safety requirements. The oil industry fights safety inspections, complains about environmental safeguards critical to protecting community water supplies and wildlife refuges, pressures Congress to gut environmental laws and blocks attempts to ensure that the taxpaying public gets fair value through royalties when they exploit the lands that belong to all Americans.

Take action now.

According to the federal government's Energy Information Administration, the average cost to produce a barrel of oil in the United States is approximately $30. So when oil companies sell a barrel for triple the cost — $100 or more, as they have been for months - the oil industry is pocketing at least $70, and passing the cost on to you and me.

In a budget environment where severe cuts to environmental protection programs, education and programs like Medicare are being threatened, there's no place for the oil industry giveaways that cost taxpayers $40 billion each decade.

Help us end this debacle. Take action today.

And thanks, again, for all you do to protect America’s wild places.

Sincerely,
Kathy Kilmer

Corporate Boards Getting Whiter While America Is Not

2011-05-04T00:20:00.000-04:00

Janell Ross Janell.Ross@huffingtonpost.com Become a fan of this reporter

White men's already dominant control of the boards that oversee the nation's largest corporations widened during the last six years, according to a new report issued by the Alliance for Board Diversity.

In 2004, white men held 71.2 percent of board seats associated with the nation’s Fortune 100 companies. By 2010, that figure had grown slightly to 72.9 percent. During the same period, the share of Fortune 100 board seats held by black men dropped from 7.8 percent to 4.2 percent. White men gained 32 board seats, while black men lost 42. And, the total number of Fortune 100 board seats held by all women, Latinos and Asian Pacific Islanders grew by just 45 seats.

When the alliance broadened its research from the Fortune 100 to include Fortune 500 companies, it found that there was not a single Latino female board chair of a Fortune 500 company in 2010.
"The good old boys network is continuing to work," said George Herrera, a member of Windham International, Inc.’s board and a former director of the Cendant Corp. Hererra is Latino.
Also, just 15 of the nation’s Fortune 500 boards include at least one member of each of the major ethnic groups tracked by the U.S. Census.

The pattern raises questions about corporate America's commitment to diversifying corporate boards and the efficacy of decades-long efforts by advocacy groups to reshape them.
“There are all kinds of excuses,” said Deborah M. Soon, a senior vice president of strategy and marketing who oversees the executive leadership initiative at Catalyst, a New York-based nonprofit that provides information about creating workplaces that enable women and their employers to succeed and is part of the alliance that produced the report.

“It’s too hard finding women. It takes too long,” said Soon, an Asian woman, describing the usual excuses for the lack of corporate board diversity. “But, there are cultures and norms that permeate corporate America today and continue to stand in the way of greater board diversity.”
Some companies and financial analysts have questioned the business value of board diversity. A 2007 Catalyst study examining corporate finances between 2001 and 2004 –- a period of boom and bust –- found that companies with women on their boards outperformed those without women in several key ways. Among the study’s findings: Fortune 500 companies that ranked in the top 25 percent for female board member inclusion produced on average a 53 percent better between return on equity, a 42 percent difference in profits, and a 66 percent difference in return on invested capital when compared to companies with the least gender-diverse boards.

This month, the nation’s two largest public pension plans developed a database where companies invested by the plans can find a diverse and qualified pool of potential board candidates. The two funds spent about $120,000 on the database, said Wayne Davis, a spokesman for one of the two California public employee plans. The funds expect to make their money back in subscriptions to the database.
The benefits of board diversity extend well beyond stock prices, said Arnold Donald, president and CEO of the Executive Leadership Council, a Virginia-based organization with nearly 450 mostly African American corporate senior executive members. The council is also a part of the Alliance for Board Diversity.

Companies need more diverse boards so that they can better understand the interests, concerns and experiences of their increasingly diverse clients and customers. Diverse boards are more likely to come up with ideas that expand sales and distribute corporate philanthropic dollars to address a wider variety of community needs said Donald, who is African American.
“If the lay person will think about any experience they may have had where there was a very diverse group of thinkers at the table,” said Donald. “That diversity probably brought more creative, dramatic and impactful ideas and solutions. A diverse group of people are simply going to have a different understanding of events, demands and needs.”

While working as a senior executive at Monsanto, Donald assigned a diverse team to the effort to get Environmental Protection Agency clearance for a new herbicide. A group had been working on the project for 17 years. The diverse team sought and won approval in less than a year, he said.
In the last decade, 98 percent nation’s population growth was due to increases in the black, Latino and Asian populations. Together, women, racial and ethnic minority men already comprise 66 percent of the nation’s population.

“I think what’s happened is that a lot of these companies are not in lock step with understanding the changing demographics [of the country],” said Herrera. “When there is a resignation the CEO typically looks within the board to try to get a recommendation so only about 48 to 50 percent of fortune 500 companies even use a search firm.”
Right now, there are nearly 900 Fortune 1000 companies that do not have a single Latino member of their board, said Herrera. Among Fortune 100 companies, only half have a Latino board member. Latino population growth outpaced that of any other group over the last decade.

“When you are sitting here and hearing the Census numbers,” said Herrera, “and the explosion of the Hispanic community and the size of its spending power you realize that we are driving the profits and revenues of a lot of these companies. I think we have to ask if I am good enough to buy your products in services then tell me why I am not good enough to sit in your board room.”

In the six-year period that the alliance study examined, many corporate boards became less diverse for a variety of reasons ranging from ordinary inertia, to a handful of retirements by just a few people of color serving on multiple boards, said Donald. Then, Donald said, there are the unintended consequences of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, accounting regulations instituted after the demise of Enron and WorldCom.

Sarbanes-Oxley set new standard for public company boards, management and public accounting firms making each of the groups more accountable for inaccuracies in corporate financial statements. It also requires boards to be made up of mostly independent directors and create an audit committee that includes at least one person with financial management experience. Companies that do not have such a person must explain why in proxy statements.
Donald believes that to find these people many Fortune 500 companies turned to the ranks of retired CEOs, CFOs and accounting firm executives. Because of historical hiring, recruiting and promotion patterns, these pools consist almost exclusively of older white men, Donald said.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission did not respond to a request for comment about corporate board diversity or the impact of Sarbanes-Oxley.
One of the reasons for the mixed results in the alliance’s report may be that, since Sarbanes-Oxley, many boards have been reduced in size and have recruited more independent directors from the pool of retirees that Donald describes, said Lissa L. Broome, a professor at University of North Carolina School of Law who researches the issues of diversity on boards. Another problem may be one that, for years, passed as the solution to all types of discrimination: ignore or at least avoid talking about difference.

When Broome and her research partners interviewed corporate board members around the country about the issue of diversity, many of the people interviewed expressed confidence that board diversity is valuable but were unable to articulate specific ways in which it affected decision making or shaped outcomes.
“I think part of the problem is that people are very uncomfortable talking about race and gender,” said Broome, who is white. “Talking about that is not politically correct or may not feel that way for a lot of these directors.”

In February 2010, the Securities and Exchange Commission began requiring companies to include in their proxy statements information about how diversity factored into filling board vacancies. But diversity was not defined and the statements have, thus far, been vague, Broome said. To help companies find more diverse candidates, Broome maintains a database of individuals interested in serving on corporate boards that companies can use free of charge.

Herrera doesn’t believe that Sarbanes-Oxley is the reason for the decline in certain types of board diversity. While Herrera does have business experience, he has never served as the CEO or CFO of a major corporation. But, he is a member of Windham’s audit committee.
“I think companies have to be committed and aggressive in finding people who have the skills they need,” said Herrera. “We do exist, and, let’s be honest here, they do have the capacity to find us and understand us when they want to sell their products. Companies have to bring that same aggression to the table when it’s time to search for directors.”

Another part of the problem may simply be the way that some companies opted to weather the recession. Many companies retrenched and focused on protecting capital, said W.D. “Denny” Minami, an Asian-American who is also a North Star Financial Corporation board member and former director at Ashford Hospitality Trust, Inc. These companies looked for board members with contacts that would help the businesses simply maintain rather than identify or expand into new markets.

While American companies wrestle with the issue of board composition, Norwegian companies have already complied with 2008 rules ensuring women hold 40 percent of each public company’s director seats. Companies that did not comply risked being delisted from Norway’s stock exchange. Most met the deadline. A small number went private or reincorporated in other countries, Broome said.

“My sense is that that is never going to happen in the United States,” said Broome. “But, I’d sure like to see it threatened.”

The Right-Wing Network Behind the War on Unions

2011-04-25T23:16:00.000-04:00

The Right-Wing Network Behind the War on Unions
Inspired by Ronald Reagan and funded by the right's richest donors, a web of free-market think tanks has fueled the nationwide attack on workers' rights.

— By Andy Kroll
Mon Apr. 25, 2011

From New Hampshire to Alaska, Republican lawmakers are waging war on organized labor. They're pushing bills to curb, if not eliminate, collective bargaining for public workers; make it harder for unions to collect member dues; and, in some states, allow workers to opt out of joining unions entirely but still enjoy union-won benefits. All told, it's one of the largest assaults on American unions in recent history.

Behind the onslaught is a well-funded network of conservative think tanks that you've probably never heard of. Conceived by the same conservative ideologues who helped found the Heritage Foundation, the State Policy Network (SPN) is a little-known umbrella group with deep ties to the national conservative movement. Its mission is simple: to back a constellation of state-level think tanks loosely modeled after Heritage that promote free-market principles and rail against unions, regulation, and tax increases. By blasting out policy recommendations and shaping lawmakers' positions through briefings and private meetings, these think tanks cultivate cozy relationships with GOP politicians. And there's a long tradition of revolving door relationships between SPN staffers and state governments. While they bill themselves as independent think tanks, SPN's members frequently gather to swap ideas. "We're all comrades in arms," the network's board chairman told the National Review in 2007.

Occasionally, SPN think tanks boast of their clout. Such was the case when the Tennessee Center for Policy Research bragged on its website recently that it "leads the charge against teachers' union" and "laid the groundwork" for the bills now in the Tennessee legislature to restrict, and possibly eradicate, bargaining for public school teachers. More often, though, the fingerprints of SPN's members are less apparent.

Founded in 1992 by businessman and Reagan administration insider Thomas Roe—who also served on the Heritage Foundation's board of trustees for two decades—the group has grown to include 59 "freedom centers," or affiliated think tanks, in all 50 states. SPN's board includes officials from Heritage and right-wing charities such as the Adolph Coors and Jacqueline Hume foundations. Likewise, its deep-pocketed donors include all the usual heavy-hitting conservative benefactors: the Ruth and Lovett Peters Foundation, which funds the Cato Institute and Heritage; the Castle Rock Foundation, a charity started with money from the conservative Coors Foundation; and the Bradley Foundation, a $540 million charity devoted to funding conservative causes. SPN uses their contributions to dole out annual grants to member groups, ranging from a few thousand dollars to $260,000, according to 2009 records.

According to SPN's website, Roe launched the conservative network "at the urging" of President Reagan himself as a way to shape state-level policy just as Heritage has influenced federal policy. Surveying the political landscape today, Roe's and Reagan's idea couldn't have been more prescient. More than a dozen states are currently considering legislation weakening the clout of organized labor. In many of those states, SPN think tanks have been pushing for similar prescriptions for years via "research" papers, policy recommendations, and talking points that are widely distributed to lawmakers.

In Iowa, Republican Gov. Terry Branstad cited research (flawed, it turned out) by SPN's Public Interest Institute in his January 2011 budget address to justify curbing the state's collective bargaining law for public workers. (Last month, the GOP-controlled Iowa House passed a bill limiting bargaining rights, but the measure died in the Democratic-controlled Senate.)

In Michigan, as Mother Jones previously reported, the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, an SPN member, published a list of four policy recommendations that would give unelected "emergency managers" more power to go into municipalities and wipe out union contracts and fire local elected officials, all in the name of repairing broken budgets. All four ended up in Governor Rick Snyder's "financial martial law," as one GOP lawmaker described it. The bill was signed into law in March.

The Nevada Policy Research Institute (NPRI) has for more than a decade bashed the Silver State's efforts to pass collective bargaining laws and accused unions of trying to "monopolize the public sector." In March, Nevada Republicans, citing NPRI data, introduced a bill of their own to weaken bargaining rights. There, as in other states considering similar measures, GOP lawmakers called on an SPN staffer to testify on the bill, which he did favorably.

In California, where a Republican lawmaker introduced a bill in February to repeal collective bargaining on retirement benefits for public workers, the Pacific Research Institute (PRI) has churned out a steady stream of reports and op-eds claiming that teachers unions use collective bargaining to "neuter school board authority, protect bad teachers, restrict principals, emphasize seniority over performance, and limit teacher evaluation and accountability." That is, bargaining is to blame for just about everything that's gone wrong. A 2003 PRI paper recommended that policymakers "streamline or repeal" collective bargaining for teachers.

When SPN think tanks are not providing conservative lawmakers with ammo, they're providing them with cover as they take on organized labor. In Wisconsin, as Republican Gov. Scott Walker weathered criticism and sinking approval ratings for his anti-union "repair" bill, the MacIver Institute and Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, both SPN members, rushed to his defense. MacIver lauded Walker's controversial bill as a "step in taming the behemoth" of big government caused by public-sector unions. Meanwhile, a staffer for the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute (and former Wisconsin legislative aide) defended Walker's bill in an error-riddled New York Times op-ed as "fiscally modest, but politically bold." As tens of thousands poured into the streets of Madison to oppose Walker's bill, MacIver even cut a video that dismissed the pro-labor protesters as radicalized communists and socialists.

More recently, the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs, another SPN member, urged lawmakers to "follow Wisconsin's lead" and curb collective bargaining rights for public workers, and the GOP-controlled state Senate voted to do so soon after. Republican Gov. Mary Fallin is expected to sign the repeal into law.

SPN think tanks do more than merely pepper politicians with briefings and a barrage of policy recommendations; they also serve as a farm team for the GOP. Reps. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) and Mike Pence (R-Ind.) and former Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.) all ran SPN think tanks before entering Congress. Following his election in 1994, Massachusetts Gov. William Weld, a Republican, "hired almost everybody" (PDF) out of SPN's Pioneer Institute in Massachusetts, according to an SPN official.

In Michigan, the GOP and Mackinac Center have been particularly close. Before serving as Michigan's governor, Republican John Engler helped found the center in the late 1980s, and the two-term governor would go on to implement many of Mackinac's recommendations. (Engler and the think tank did, however, disagree on a few issues.) In 1995, Engler also appointed Joseph Olson, Mackinac's long-time board chairman, to oversee Michigan's insurance commission. "The Mackinac Center has been tied at the hip with the Republican Party establishment for years," a spokesman for the Michigan Education Association says.

The SPN revolving door spins both ways. Brooke Rollins, president and CEO of the Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF), previously served as Republican Gov. Rick Perry's deputy general counsel and the head of Perry's policy division, overseeing the administration's work on everything from health care and education to criminal justice. Jeff Judson, who led the TPPF before Rollins, did stints in the offices of Sen. John Tower and Rep. Tom DeLay, as well as in the George H.W. Bush administration's Department of Energy. Forest Thigpen, president of the Mississippi Center for Public Policy, is a former aide in the DC office of Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.).

Tracie Sharp, SPN's president, told Mother Jones in an email that member think tanks "set their own policy agendas" and "have always been fiercely independent." But those on the other side of the fight see the think tanks as part of a broader effort. "This is not a grassroots movement to eliminate collective bargaining," says Al Mance, executive director of the Tennessee Education Association, the state's largest teachers union. "This is a national movement, and it's funded by all the conservative moneyed interests."

Rev. Jackson to Lead Rally for Michigan

2011-04-21T16:38:00.000-04:00

Rev. Jackson to Lead Rally for Michigan Blacks
Date: Thursday, April 21, 2011,

By: Jackie Jones, BlackAmericaWeb.com

Rev. Jesse Jackson will lead a rally at the Michigan state Capitol in Lansing at 11 a.m. Thursday. (AP)

The emergency takeover of the government of Benton Harbor, Michigan, like the suspension of collective bargaining rights for employees in Wisconsin, are all part of a greater scheme to reverse years of civil and states rights law, the Rev. Jesse Jackson said Wednesday.

Jackson, who will lead a rally at the state Capitol in Lansing at 11 a.m. Thursday with the Michigan Black Legislative Caucus, said it was time to organize residents to take back their government through mass demonstrations and legal action.

Last month, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder signed a new law expanding the powers of emergency managers appointed by the Treasury Department to take over distressed schools and communities.

The first town affected by the law was Benton Harbor, a predominantly black city in southwest Michigan. On Friday, Joseph Harris, the state-appointed emergency financial manager, suspended the decision-making powers of Benton Harbor officials.

According to The Detroit News, the order limits Benton Harbor officials to calling meetings to order, adjourning them and approving minutes of meetings.

Michigan AFL-CIO President Mark Gaffney called the move “sad news for democracy in Michigan.”

Jackson told BlackAmericaWeb.com that the law likely would be used for a broader mission, which would target collective bargaining rights for public employees, dilute voter strength – particularly for black Americans and other people of color – and limit states’ rights.

“It’s not just Benton Harbor. (Snyder has) approved 40 other emergency mandatory measures so it’s like a takeover of government that denies their workers’ rights. It’s replacing democracy with a czar in the name of fiscal emergency,” Jackson said.

Benton Harbor has long been an economically depressed community, where the median income hovers around $10,000 a year, compared to its more affluent neighbor St. Joseph, a mostly white community with a median income average of $33,000.

Jackson pointed out that while the U.S. is involved in wars on three fronts, all supposedly seeking to preserve or promote democracy, there is serious movement within the U.S. to diminish the democratic process.

“It’s wrong there, and it’s wrong here. They are attacking teachers unions, attacking collective bargaining, attacking the rights of (voter) access,” Jackson said, adding that the argument that this is an effort to deal with fiscal crises affecting struggling communities is nothing more than a cover-up for a more sinister agenda.

“This is a states’ rights agenda,” Jackson said. “It’s the ‘60s all over again, when the federal government had to intervene to protect us. We won these battles, but now the right wing is engaging in a radical backlash.”

He said urban centers with organized labor, including Milwaukee, Chicago, Detroit and Memphis, could well face similar challenges.
There have been reports that Wisconsin is considering its own emergency financial manager law.

MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow wrote in her Tuesday blog that Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker says he's no way about to repeat what Michigan has done, with a bill that imposes what critics call financial martial law. Instead, it appears that a business group in Milwaukee is pushing for stress tests for municipalities.

Jackson said it was critical to inform the black community about the insidious nature of such legal maneuvers to appeal to legislators to pay closer attention to bills that could wrest away local autonomy and organize public demonstrations against such action.

Rev. Jesse Jackson speaks to city leaders in Benton Harbor

2011-04-21T16:33:00.000-04:00

Rev. Jesse Jackson speaks to city leaders in Benton Harbor

Jackson to Lead Rally for Michigan Blacks

2011-04-21T16:30:00.000-04:00

Jackson to Lead Rally for Michigan Blacks

The cultural Kryptonite of the American Right - Opinion - Al Jazeera English

2011-04-02T15:29:00.002-04:00

The cultural Kryptonite of the American Right - Opinion - Al Jazeera English

Before US Tomahawk cruise missiles began to rain down on Muammar Gaddafi's air defences this past week, the only conversation that president Obama had to have was with his senior advisors.

They, and they alone would decide whether a country founded as a democratic republic would engage in what George Washington would have likely viewed as a "foreign entanglement" – using 21st century ordinance against a sociopath with a history of violence and a worse hat fetish than Sammy Davis Jr.

Obviously, in 200 years the United States has evolved from a rebel-with-a-cause into a world power, and additional involvement in world affairs has become part of the cost of doing business.

There is also a good argument to be made that after the terrible mistake of the Iraq invasion, the US can do some good by putting an end to the murderous Gaddafi in Libya, as part of an international coalition made up of Arab and African countries, blessed by the United Nations.

Yet, that does not change the fact that congressional support for this operation was as important as an appendix or a Newt Gingrich marriage vow.

Obama and his people simply knew they could ignore the people's representatives and safely rely upon a militarised culture primed to support an attack on an Arab nation. Particularly one the US had already thrown down with only a generation ago.

It is this fact that makes author, syndicated columnist and talk radio host David Sirota's new book, Back To Our Future, not only a fascinating read about the culture of the 1980s, but a manifestly important work in helping explain why the United States does the things it does today.

From involvement in a civil war in Libya to allowing a madman sans background check to saunter into his local arms bazaar and purchase a high-powered firearm for an attempted assassination of a congresswoman.

The latter being easier than say, finding plutonium for your DeLorean in 1955.

'Outlaw with morals'

As Sirota explains it, the 80s were the age of cross-marketing, when concepts that had a place in American history suddenly became commonplace. The anti-government language of president Ronald Reagan adorned films such asGhostbusters and E.T.

These "political messages in non-political settings indoctrinated the young, when their filter for political propaganda was turned off." As a result, these framed narratives became part of the conventional wisdom, continuing to this day.

In much the way E.T. heightened suspicions about our government, Lybian terrorists in Back To The Future and a bad-guy professional wrestling star named The Iron Sheikh helped prepare the American people for the role we've played in the Arab world over the past decade.

Meanwhile, the "outlaw with morals", or rogue who had to work against the system to get things done, was a key message that reached the masses.

The bromide of "government being the problem, not the solution", was not only contained in Reagan's philosophy, but Wall Street's ethic, the frontier mythology of many regions of the country, and films, music, and television series, but perhaps most importantly promoted using athletes by one of the most powerful marketing machines ever seen – Nike.

As Sirota offers about Nike's effect, "they took this narrative to the level of societal saturation".

This can at least partially explain the rogue individualism that can be found in the love affair certain Americans have with guns, and even more importantly, the corollary that only they can protect themselves, often from the very government they once looked upon for this service.

Of course, this cultural sea change did not just happen by itself. An array of right-wing think tanks and media organisations, born in the 1970s to lead this kind of a cultural revolution, synergistically grabbed this societal zeitgeist and hopped, skipped and jumped with it, declaring the 1960s and 1970s an illegitimate, naïve, or even dangerous social experiment.

As Sirota reminds us, in the 1980s a minister speaking at The Heritage Foundation, one of these newish (1973) and lavishly funded right-wing media and policy operations intricately tied to the Reagan administration, believed he and his ilk, were "here to turn the clock back to 1954 in this country".

'Prepubescents' in charge

Danny Goldberg, former CEO of Air America, has also recognised this cultural evolution, and the role played by well-funded conservative organs in helping spread the non-love.

As he sees it, appealing to the psyche and vision of the American people or pulling on their heartstrings, if you will, is in short supply on the Left, as "Democrats do not use imagination and culture to open minds for their agenda".

As Goldberg put it in a Nation piece, "you can count how many people click onto a web page, how long it was viewed and how many people it was forwarded to but determining how much impact it has on the minds of the readers requires educated guesses and fallible intuitive human analysis."

The Left had better begin to under this outsized role of culture, imagination and emotion in our politics soon.

Because if we are indeed operating in parameters set up by not only the politics, but the arts and letters of 1980s, reinforced by millions of dollars invested in long-term conservative projects to convince the American people this is the way it has always been, we are in for a rough decade or three.

For as Sirota says, "our world is increasingly run by the prepubescents, college kids, and young ladder-climbers who were originally indoctrinated and inculcated in the 1980s."

Therefore, if we are looking for an alternative to all-too-present strains of foreign adventurism, Wall Street me-ism and domestic militia-ism – among other challenges – we will need our own cultural rebirth to return to the values that once animated this nation.

Because, whether he comes from Krypton, Kansas City or Kazakhstan, I am not ready to start kneeling before Zod anytime soon.

Cliff Schecter is the President of Libertas, LLC, a progressive public relations firm, the author of the 2008 bestseller The Real McCain, and a regular contributor to The Huffington Post.

Follow Cliff Schecter On Twitter: @Cliffschecter

Moral bankruptcy in Libya war

2011-04-02T15:06:00.002-04:00

Foreign intervention in Libya is fuelled by ulterior motives, not goodwill.

The world community – the real world community, not the diplomatic charade code-named the UNSC – is thrown into a psychosomatic stupor and forced into a moral dilemma to choose between letting a psychotic tyrant maim and murder a nation (usually called "his own", as if he owned Libyans) or else stand still and witness the hypocritical abuse of that fact by US and its European allies in order to consolidate a military foothold into the dramatic unfolding of democratic uprisings in North Africa and beyond.
This evident dilemma, however, is a trick question, a false choice, and the answer to it, as to all others, is "none of the above". Visionary artists like Márquez have redrawn the moral map of our universe so that we do not have to make these banal choices.
Finding a military foothold
By luring the US into leading yet another war against a sovereign nation-state, Gaddafi has given the US and its allies a military foothold in the unfolding and open-ended democratic uprisings in the region and thus turned Libya into the crucible of a new meltdown of state power and national sovereignty.
In this act, and thanks to the revolutions that now sweep through two continents, we are back not to la vita nuda of Georgio Agamben but in fact to a renewed asabiyyah of Ibn Khaldun.
We are not helpless facing these tribal and postmodern acts of violence exacerbating each other; we are retrieving a collective consciousness of commitment and identity that can and will judge these atrocities – Gaddafi's and those who sold and now destroy his arms – and we will do so with historical agency, political prowess, and above all moral rectitude.
Seeing through the thicket of these events is no easy task – but we must. Leading Arab intellectuals are scrambling to strike a balance between support for the Libyan uprisings without appearing to endorse or condone the US-led invasion of Libya.
It is a difficult spot to occupy if you insist on implicating yourself onto that corner. Just shy of two years ago, if Obama as much as mentioned the name of Neda Aqa Soltan, the young woman who was cold-bloodedly murdered by the security forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran during the heydays of the Green Movement, many on the Left were quick to use the reference as an indication that the movement was in fact the handiwork of the CIA and financed by the Saudis.
Now the same folks find themselves in the rather embarrassing situation that Obama and his military might coupled with the military might of the entire EU, and now in fact extended to include NATO, are bombing Gaddafi's army in support of the democratic uprising in Libya.
The same folks were in a similarly embarrassing situation even earlier when the Egyptian army became instrumental in the success of the Egyptian revolution.
The money that the CIA had evidently allocated for regime change in the Islamic Republic was peanuts compared to the US investment in the Egyptian army to implicate and train it for its imperial projects in the region.
But do either of these two cases, the instrumental role of the Egyptian army in the Egyptian revolution or the military support of the US and its European allies for the rebellious uprising against Gaddafi's tyranny detract an iota of legitimacy from the veracity and grassroots authenticity of the Egyptian revolution or Libyan uprising? Of course not, not a scratch.
The glorious Egyptian revolution remains exemplary for the whole world to behold, and the world has unconditional support for the Libyan uprising against domestic tyranny and foreign domination alike, no matter how the US and EU imperial adventurism may want to abuse it.
The only embarrassment that remains is for what passes for "the Left" to figure out the limits of its own moral and political imagination.
To be fair, the Left is not the only block of thinkers and activists caught in the sectarian stupor – for or against the US-led invasion of Libya.
A group of mostly American scholars and think tank employees have just written an open letter to Obama urging him to "recognise, arm, and support the National Coalition Government in Libya".
No such letter was written by any one of these folks asking the US president to "recognise, arm, and support" Hamas for example, or Hezbollah, resisting the brutalities of Israel in the region.
Meanwhile, al-Qardawi's dismissal of the Bahrain democratic uprising as merely sectarian is yet another clear indication that moral and political bankruptcy is not limited to leftist or right wing sectarianism and has an equally prominent role in ageing, stale Islamism as well.
For a man of God – like al-Qardawi – to be so ungodly limited in his moral imagination must be a sign of the divine vengeance on a trapped faith that has lost trust in reality and confidence in the world.
Awakening a moral imagination
Beyond these banalities, stubborn remnants of old clichés, we need clear-headed moral rectitude to figure out what is happening in our midst and right in front of our own eyes.
Assimilating these extraordinary events backward to sectarianism of one sort or another will be a sure way to delusional confusions, of undoing in words what is happening in deeds.
If the dandy French guru, Bernard-Henri Lévy, is so in a rush to make sure the post-Gaddafi shape of Libya is Zionist-friendly that he rushes in public half naked and has somehow convinced his ego-maniacal banality that his juvenile dress code is really "cool", it is really his issue with his therapist and has no bearing on Libya and beyond.
The groovy "philosopher" (poor philosophy) knows only too well that the ultimate loser in these democratic uprisings is the settler colony of Israel, and it is just matter of time that the young generation of Israelis will want to join this block party and tear down those apartheid walls.
Meanwhile, the only way Zionists know how to handle such a (for them) "crisis" is to make a deal with corrupt politicians, for the democratic will of people frightens "the only democracy in the Middle East" out of its wits.
For all we know, Bernard-Henri Lévy has struck a deal with Moustapha Abdeljalil, a former justice minister turned rebel leader, to assume an Israeli-friendly Libya when Gaddafi finally exists.
But that possibility can not mar our reading of the Libyan uprising. They do their things (imperial designs and colonial settlements) and we do ours (we, the people).
Propaganda officers like Bernard-Henri Lévy or Muslim clerics like sheikh Yusuf al-Qardawi (who at least has the decency of buttoning up his shirt when he shows up in public) are known and predictable factors.
Our categorical denunciation of violence – whether perpetrated by Gaddafi, Sarkozy or Obama – is a moral position and not a political proposition.
The unwavering solidarity with the democratic will of a people who have put their lives on the line – from Tehran to Libya and beyond – never oscillates because of any political consideration or because American Neo-cons or French Zionists are trying their best to kidnap it.
In a famous articulation of a "categorical imperative" in his Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals (1785), Immanuel Kant proposes that we must act in such a way as if the maxim of our action were to become by our will a universal law.
This is a moral maxim, not a political dictum – a mandate by which a moral imagination can form a society of citizens and citizenship, and not the political proposition by which a polity might be formed or in its absence deformed.
States are not moral proposition, they are political machineries and as such they still function very much the same way that Max Weber defined them early in the twentieth century, as a political machinery that claims a monopoly of "legitimate" violence.
Weber always considered that "legitimacy" parenthetically – that a polity might grant or withdraw it from a state apparatus.
Investing a state – a tyranny like Libya or a democracy like the United States – with legitimacy is a political contract predicated on a moral choice; shooting your own citizens or invading another sovereign nation-sate is a political atrocity that ipso facto suspends that moral pact.
We as citizens, as "the people", must never presume to have the political prowess to order a military strike or to drop a bomb, for that would be at the heavy price of forfeiting our moral agency to invest or withdraw legitimacy from the state apparatus.
We, the people, were never consulted when millions of dollars of arms were sold to Gaddafi by the US or the UK; as we, the people, were never consulted when the UNSC resolution 1973 was ratified. So why must we be put in a position to condone or denounce the US-led invasion of Libya?
We are not, have never been, in a position to decide. But we are, and we remain, in a position to bear witness, to judge, and to act accordingly – and what we are witnessing from one continent to another is first and foremost a moral rebellion, and thus the persistence to call it for what it is, for "dignity".

Vox Populi
Holding our grounds as moral agents, for us, the people – Libyans, French, British, or Americans, etc. – the US and its European allies and Gaddafi are the losers in this game, sooner or later. Triumphant will remain the democratic will of the Libyan people that will overcome this debacle.
The question is how. Gaddafi has bloodied this democratic uprising, and that cannot be allowed to mar and maim the post-Gaddafi choices.
The Libyan people, which cannot be reduced or limited to those who have taken up arms and must be extended to the civic foregrounding of a democratic future must think of enduring institutions beyond the obscenity of a doctorate in democracy bought and paid for at the London School of Economics for Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, the man who would be king.
Cliché and outdated forms of solidarity or opposition no longer make sense. Neither blind solidarity without an eye towards the formation of enduring institutions of democracy, nor the degeneration of opposition to adventurous imperialism into suspicion of democratic uprisings will find a way into the texture and contour of this long awaited revolutionary moment.
We need to keep our eyes on the ball – which is the democratic will of people, vox populi – rising to demand and exact enduring institutions of civil liberties and social justice.
The UN is the diplomatic arm of the US and its European allies. The US lacks any moral authority to pretend to be on the side of these democratic uprisings. NATO is abusing Gaddafi's slaughter of his own people to reclaim the Mediterranean Sea and environ as its theatre of operation.
China and Russia scarcely think of anything but their lucrative business dealings. Against the collusion of all these forces have arisen the moral authority and the democratic will of people from western Africa to eastern Asia.
What ever the will to dominate and exploit might be, it will lose to the infinitely superior will to defy and reclaim peoples' destiny. Tyrannies might be as conniving as the octogenarians ruling the Islamic Republic or as reckless as Gaddafi's Libya. But they will both fold facing these rises of democratic wills.
These revolutionary uprisings are realities sui generis, legitimate by what and where they are, and they must not be reduced to losing agential autonomy, and thus finding and losing legitimacy by the hypocritical and opportunistic attempts of military powers to embrace or repress them.
What Egyptians have achieved in Tahrir Square in particular re-conceives the very notion of "democracy".

Tahrir Square is today the symbolic site of rethinking the entire gamut of a political philosophy that can, happily, overcome the meaningless catastrophe codenamed "the West" as it redefines "government" in terms much closer to popular sovereignty, even before it is re-narrated into enduring institutions of civil liberties.

The revolutionary uprising across two continents need the cultivation of a new language, the drawing of a new moral map.

"Language is not just one of man's possession in the world," says German hermeneutician Hans Georg Gadamer inTruth and Method, "but on it depends the fact that man has a world at all. For man the world exists as a world in a way that no other being in the world experiences. But this world is linguistic in nature."

It makes no difference if Gaddafi and his children rule over Libya for one more day or one more century.

The moral map and the grammatological syntax and morphology of our imagination have already changed.

The political collapse of his regime, and the hypocrisy of the US-led invasion of Libya, is exposed the minute Libyans rose against his tyranny and said enough is enough – or just echoed the voice of Egyptians: al-sha'b yurid isqat al-nizam (tr: the people want the fall of the regime).

Hamid Dabashi is Hagop Kevorkian Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature at Columbia University in New York. He is the author, most recently, of Iran, the Green Movement, and the US: The Fox and the Paradox (Zed, 2010).

Obama's critics say Arab revolutions vindicate Bush's freedom agenda, but they overestimate US influence.

2011-04-02T14:56:00.001-04:00

While many American conservatives were quicker to warm to the recent Arab revolutions than the Obama administration, they were wrong to have always assumed that American power was the essential ingredient for change in the region.

In his aptly (and mischievously) titled article, Project for a New Arab Century, Muhammad Khan alleged that the recent eruption of popular revolutions in the Middle East left conservative enthusiasts for democracy promotion "largely silent". In fact, conservatives have been very vocal as of late. In the midst of the Obama administration's waffling response to the protests, George W. Bush supporters have seized the opportunity to seek vindication for the former president's 'freedom agenda'.

Elliot Abrams, who served as Bush's deputy national security adviser for global democracy strategy, was the first out of the gates. On January 29, Abrams highlighted Bush's comments on the universality of democracy and the instability of autocracy as prescient strategic insights confirmed by unfolding events. Why, Abrams asked, could Obama not follow Bush's example and express his support for the popular protests more unequivocally?

Others have gone much further than Abrams. For Charles Krauthammer, a popular conservative columnist and one of the chief theorists of democracy promotion, the current upheavals have been all about Bush. "Everyone," Krauthammer insisted on March 4, "is a convert to George W. Bush's freedom agenda" now.

If this is true, then it behooves us to ask what Krauthammer defines as the 'freedom agenda'. It turns out that, according to Krauthammer (all that talk about 'regime change' from 2002 to 2003 notwithstanding), the chief principle of the 'freedom agenda' can be reduced á la Abrams to the rather pedestrian insight that "Arabs are no exception to the universal thirst for dignity and freedom".

But Krauthammer does not stop there and advances quickly from the banal to the absurd. Apparently, in Krauthammer's words, "the Bush Doctrine set the premise" for the current revolutions, upsetting age old structures of power in the Arab world. Really? Did the Arab public truly require Bush's imprimatur on democracy before they rose up to demand greater justice and freedom with the tools provided by democratic discourses?

More serious and substantial commentary has come from William Inboden, a former senior director for strategic planning on the National Security Council under Bush. On January 30, Inboden asked why the Obama administration did not see the Egyptian revolt coming and on February 11, he insisted that "not everyone was wrong on Egypt" - pointing to the intriguing (but marginalised) work of the bi-partisan Working Group on Egypt since 2010.

The Working Group on Egypt was perhaps the most persistent and vocal group in Washington circles warning of the decrepitude of the Mubarak regime. On April 17, 2010, Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, received a letter from the group, led by Michele Dunne and Robert Kagan, warning that Egypt was "at a critical turning point". The group cautioned that unless the US took a serious interest, Egypt risked "sliding backwards into increased authoritarianism" rather than "progressing gradually on a path of desirable reform".

Receiving little response, the group sent a second letter to Clinton on May 11 2010. Several weeks later Dunne and Kagan penned an op-ed in the Washington Post highlighting the gulf that had "opened between the government and the citizenry" in Egypt. Dunne and Kagan worried that if the US did not take action, then Egypt might be lost to radicalism.

A US-centric view

Before going any further, however, it is worth considering what exactly these critics of the Obama administration actually saw coming in the Arab world. After all, there was nothing particularly profound or prophetic about pointing out that the Egyptian people had little affection for Mubarak and his policies in 2010. If we really want to know whether American conservatives 'saw it coming', it is better to look beyond their particular assessments of the Mubarak, Ben Ali or Gaddafi regimes to their general view of the relationship between power and change in the region.

Well before Bush II came into office, the Project for a New American Century (PNAC), a 'neo-conservative' think-tank based in Washington DC, began to mount a full-on assault against the 'realist' assumptions they perceived to be governing American foreign policy. Chief amongst their targets was the allegedly narrow 'realist' construal of national interest. Far better, the PNAC contended, to expand the concept of national interest to encompass things like the promotion of democracy abroad.

After 2001, the PNAC's arguments about democracy promotion and national interest gained momentum. Along with this argument came an unchallenged assumption about the nature of political change in the Arab world.

While conservatives such as Bush spoke enthusiastically about the universality of democracy they remained convinced that beneficial change would come about in only one of two ways: Regime change or gradual internal reform. In either case, American power and support were considered the essential element. American inaction meant either the maintenance of the status quo or the spread of Islamic radicalism.

In many ways, this myopic, American-centric view of power and change continues to govern both conservative and liberal American views of the Arab world. What conservatives never saw coming, along with the majority of American foreign policy analysts, was the manner in which the Arab world has changed in recent months. It turns out America was not the essential catalyst for change that everyone assumed.

Twice in a decade now, hitherto neglected non-state actors have seemingly come from nowhere to fundamentally alter both America's perception of the Middle East and the history of the region itself. Unfortunately, Americans were too mesmerised by the spectre of their own power to see such things coming.

At this juncture, as Americans ponder their future relationship with the Arab world, they might do well to consider the ideas of an important, but neglected theorist of political power, John Howard Yoder. He offered the sound insight that state power (whether 'soft', 'smart' or 'hard') is not equivalent to real power and that he who wields the sword is not the source of agency or creativity in history.

Todd M. Thompson is an assistant professor of International Affairs at Qatar University.

The battle for Tahrir Square

2011-02-03T17:09:00.000-05:00

Media in the line of fire in Egypt
Domestic and foreign journalists have come under siege amid the turmoil in Egypt.
Al Jazeera's online producer Last Modified: 03 Feb 2011 19:35 GMT

Journalists in Egypt – domestic and foreign – are increasingly under siege, with Egyptian authorities detaining reporters and gangs of young men roaming the streets looking for anyone with camera equipment.
Some of the pressure has come from the government: Six Al Jazeera journalists were detained for several hours earlier this week, and while they were eventually released, their equipment remains with the police.

Earlier on Thursday concerns were raised as another three reporters went missing. They have now returned, safe and well, to their hotel.
Two New York Times reporters were reportedly arrested – or "taken into protective custody", as the government termed it.

'Israeli spy' rumours

Spotters stand outside many hotels, watching balconies with high-powered binoculars. When they see balconies with camera equipment or photographers, they use radios to call in the details.
Egyptian police sources say that information from those spotters has been used to conduct several raids on journalists' hotel rooms in recent days.

And the government has reportedly pressured several hotels not to extend the reservations of foreign journalists.
But most of the intimidation and violence has come from unofficial sources: Young men loiter outside the hotels where many reporters are staying, shouting at (and sometimes attacking) anyone with equipment.

Hotel lobbies are filled with journalists and camera crews wearing bandages, and many have been restricted to watching the events in Tahrir Square from their hotel balconies.
Egyptian state television has actively tried to foment the unrest by reporting that "Israeli spies" have infiltrated the city – which explains why many of the gangs who attack reporters shout "yehudi!" ("Jew!").

The area around Tahrir Square has become a virtual no-go zone for camera crews, which were assaulted on Wednesday almost as soon as they entered the area controlled by supporters of Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak.

Several of them were mistaken for Al Jazeera crews, and were chased off by young men wielding sticks and chanting, "Jazeera! Jazeera!".
CNN anchor Anderson Cooper said his crew was also assaulted on Tuesday night after being mistaken for an Al Jazeera crew.

A reporter for the Al Arabiya network was kidnapped for several hours during Wednesday’s protest.
The violence has come exclusively from the Mubarak supporters: There have been no reports of pro-democracy demonstrators attacking or intimidating the media.

Egyptian journalists, too, have been the victims of angry mobs, all of them affiliated with the pro-Mubarak crowd. Sarah El Sirgany, an editor with the Daily News Egypt, tweeted that her brother was assaulted while trying to protect a group of reporters attacked by an angry mob.
An Al Jazeera reporter was held at knifepoint by a group of young men on Thursday morning. One man’s face was still bloodied from the previous night’s fighting.
Bloggers, too, have become targets: The popular Egyptian blogger Sandmonkey has reportedly been arrested (it's unclear by who).

International condemnation

The United States and Britain have condemned what they call the intimidation of foreign journalists reporting on events in Egypt.
Robert Gibbs, White House spokesman, called for the release of any journalist who had been detained in the country and said acts to intimidate the media were "completely and totally unacceptable".
PJ Crowley, state department spokesman, added: "There is a concerted campaign to intimidate international journalists in Cairo and interfere with their reporting. We condemn such actions."

Britain's foreign minister also said the intimidation and harassment of journalists was "unacceptable and disturbing".
The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists called the attacks on journalists an attempt at "blanket censorship" by the government, and listed a number of reported assaults against Egyptian, Arabic and international media.

The battle for Tahrir Square

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aljazeeraenglish/sets/72157625966223134/show/

It was late on Wednesday as I slipped off to the Corniche road along the Nile to try to make my way inside Tahrir Square.

I had never seen a revolt up close and in real time, so it was with some trepidation that I had left the confines of our building after a full 10 hours of witnessing rock and Molotov barrages out of the window.
The street was empty but for a small army presence – a couple of armoured personnel carriers and some soldiers, most stationed near the Egyptian Museum.
To my left, 300m away, a pro-Mubarak crowd rained Molotov cocktails down on the anti-government protesters from an flyover leading from the 6th of October bridge.

In a few minutes, I had made it south down the Corniche to Kasr al-Nil bridge, which empties into central Cairo from the west and becomes a road that leads directly into Tahrir.
The anti-government protesters in Tahrir had arranged a field of debris 40m in front of their barricade, forcing anyone approaching to stop their stride and hop over.

Twenty metres beyond, they had strung a heavy electric cable about waist high from heavy metal fences on either side of the road, and 10m beyond that lay the final barricade, a stacked mix of metal barriers and spiked fences.
Two wooden boards were jammed length-wise across a side path to bar easy entrance.

I hopped down and walked through a small grassy park, approaching a small squad of men guarding a nearby path that led around the main barricade.
I held my hands up, palms out. They asked me for ID, so I showed them my US driver's license. I also told them that I came from Al Jazeera.
Unlike the pro-Mubarak people, the Tahrir protesters have a passion for our network. You tell the truth, they told me. One of the group patted me down and apologised for the inconvenience.

"It's for security," he said.
'Remember my name'
I approached the Kasr al-Nil barricade from behind, cautiously, and asked permission to take pictures.
Rocks were stacked in piles around the street, and Molotov cocktail bottles sat next to one another near a tree; a revolutionary armoury.

I was referred to the 'boss' of the checkpoint, a man with a lengthy black beard, a white, bloodstained headwrap, and a heavy grey peacoat spattered with blood.
He introduced himself as Hossam Eid al-Sharqawy and took hold of my shoulder. Time was short, I should take pictures quickly and go, he said.
He had blunt words for Egypt's 30-year president, whose two rounds of concessions and promise not to run again have failed to placate protesters. "Hosni Mubarak kills his own people," Sharqawy said.

"Remember my name," he said. "If I die here tonight, you will tell our story."
I told him I would, then photographed the barricade and continued into the square.
The chaos taking place to the north at the Egyptian museum was inaudible.

The square was peaceful but eerily empty; just 24 hours earlier, hundreds of thousands of anti-government protesters had staged what might have been the largest political demonstration in Cairo's history, a show which likely prompted Wednesday's violent response.

Men prayed on a large banner that had been laid out on the pavement.
It carried the two words that have become the slogan of anti-government protests from Tunisia to Egypt: "Game Over."
Farther into the square, small groups huddled around fires and inside tents.
The jubilance that had turned the square into a giant camp ground just a day before was gone; people now feared being overrun and killed by the surrounding pro-government mob, many of them reportedly hired thugs.

Apocalyptic scene

As I progressed toward the fighting near the museum, the square became decidedly more apocalyptic.
The roads were carpeted in broken rocks, making it hard to walk.
Men with crowbars and long metal rods – probably stolen from the construction site at the remodeling of the Ritz in the square – chipped away at curbs and at the road to make more projectiles for their comrades.
In the distance ahead, the orange glow of the street lights and the continual Molotov cocktail fire lent an air of medieval combat to the front lines of the fight.

The closer I got, the more frenetic the activity among the anti-government protesters.
Men and women hustled up huge bags of rocks. Another group dragged a metal barricade into a new backup position.
The source of the cacophony that had been echoing off Cairo's streets and through our window was revealed: protesters behind the lines were rhythmically banging on the metal pavement fences in a primal drumbeat to keep the crowd's spirits up.

One storey above us, two men crouched on a balcony and chucked rocks at the pro-Mubarak crowd.

I knelt down behind a pavement about 20m from the barricade.
Fiery Molotovs streamed down toward the pro-Mubarak crowd from above my head, as the government supporters on the 6th of October flyover above and in front of me responded with their own.
The anti-government barricades lay just out of the throwing reach of most of the Mubarak supporters, but occasionally an energetic rock barrage would slam against the metal sheets separating us from them.

Anti-government rock throwers launched their own rocks from behind the barricade, where it was impossible to see where they would land.
Other men crouched in between the sheets, in the shadows, making sure the barrier stayed up and occasionally sneaking a glance out.
What they saw was no-man's land.

War zone

An open space that had once served as a cramped artery of traffic toward Tahrir in one direction and Ramses Square – the main train station – in the other, had become a war zone, covered in rocks and dotted with the fire of petrol bombs.
An army personnel carrier sat parked 75m away, facing us, doing nothing as pro-Mubarak protesters milled about, throwing rocks and taking cover behind bridge supports.

Above, it was hard to discern spectators from rock throwers.

But onlookers eventually withdrew, leaving only dozens of men dancing about, gesturing angrily toward us and throwing rocks.
Everytime an anti-government protester managed to land a petrol bomb on the bridge above, a cheer went up from the barricades, accompanied by joyous cries of "God is great!"

Eventually, the anti-government lines began to advance; skirmishers in front of the line became braver, throwing rocks and petrol bombs with little or no cover.
Loud gunshots rang out, likely from the personnel carrier in front of us, which had been surrounded by pro-Mubarak men.

It was hard to tell exactly when, but at some point the anti-government protesters outflanked the Mubarak crowd on the overpass.
'Take the bridge'
Shouts of "take the bridge" rang out along the line. The anti-government crowd began to advance past the metal sheets, and the Mubarak supporters fled.

Men dropped their rocks and bowed their heads to the ground in prayer.

Others began to immediately scrub the pro-Mubarak graffiti off of the monuments in the area that had, for around 12 hours, been occupied by the government crowd.
On the overpass, a tank roared toward the direction of the retreating Mubarak supporters, flooding the air with fumes.

As I stepped back through the barricades to Tahrir, a group of men dragged someone inside.
I tried to take pictures but was told to walk away. It was unclear if they were detaining a pro-Mubarak supporter or bringing back one of their wounded.

Inside, men gathered in groups to assess the victory. Others walked back motorcycles that they had captured. One held a bloody Egyptian flag as he returned.
A crowd across from the Egyptian Museum pressed in around a wounded man. Doctors carried him away, leaving a puddle of blood on the concrete.
One who remained, dressed in a white coat and a cotton mask, told me that the man had been shot in the head by Mubarak supporters, but that he still had a pulse.

Behind me, a similar crowd gathered around another bloody, wounded man who looked completely unresponsive. They carried him away.

I ran into a 22-year-old man named Mohammed Hassan, a blogger, activist and self-described "revolutionary" carrying a stick.

He showed me a catapult the anti-government protesters had erected at a side entrance to the square, which he said they had used to launch flaming debris at the approaching crowd.
I watched as three men tested its tension.
Bandaged face
Further into the square, Hassan led me through a human chain and down the steps that lead into the Sadat metro station.

On the rubbish-strewn stairs, several bloody men sat nervously. The protesters told me they were captured Mubarak supporters.

One man, allegedly a former employee of the defence ministry, had his face nearly completely bandaged, but made a great effort to explain to me that he was not a lover of the government.
It was hard to watch; every few seconds, he seemed overcome by the pain and stopped to gently touch the wounds on his head.
He denied being paid or ordered to come. "It's my creed," he said in English.

As I stood in the makeshift prison, more people were dragged down the steps.
Some fought back and were shoved against the wall by several anti-government protesters.

A skinny man, almost a boy, with a bleeding head wound, pleaded with the captors and tried to convince them that he hated Mubarak.
Another young man, more calm and less wounded, was accused of using a police handgun to fire on the protesters.
The anti-government protesters could not find evidence that their captives were government employees, either police or interior ministry security, but they promised me that others were.

An official from the defence ministry checked on the condition of the alleged former ministry employee, they pulled him up the stairs to turn over to the army, though the protesters assured me the army was simply releasing those prisoners who were turned over.
Metallic drum beat

I left the prison and headed back to the Kasr al-Nil barricade, navigating a chokepoint made of turned over cars set at sharp angles.
I exchanged a few words with the men I had met on the way in; one told me what name to use if I wanted to re-enter.
Then I climbed through the wooden barricade blocking the path to the side of the wall and left.

As I approached our building, a soldier climbed down a tank and halted me. He found my camera in my pocket and demanded the film.
I had removed the SIM card and hid it, and though the soldier at first indicated that I should go with him to his commander, I finally convinced him to let me go, losing only my battery in the process.

Back inside, dawn was beginning to break over Cairo.
The protesters had reformed their barricades, in preparation for the pro-government attack which would come just hours later.

The metallic drum beat never halted. Deep in the square, the crowd remained.

Mubarak's third force terror tactic
President Mubarak unleashed his 'personal' thugs in a failed attempt to silence protestors seeking an end to his regime.

The apparently sudden and unexpected violence against Egyptian protesters that started on February 2 has an interesting historical ring to it. The date marks the unbanning of liberation movements in South Africa in 1990, and the start of political negotiations between the apartheid regime and the African National Congress. It also marks the start of the most violent period in South Africa’s turbulent political history.

The parallels with Egypt start with Mubarak’s speech to the nation on February 1, ostensibly making a significant concession to the protesters and a commitment to Egypt’s democratic future. The next day thugs, many now clearly identified as members of the security forces, rallied in central Cairo and launched attacks on hitherto peaceful demonstrators.

The tactics of deploying so-called third forces is a tried and tested method of autocratic regimes, usually utilised when the regime realises that it is on the strategic defencive politically. The focus of the regime then shifts from merely ruling as usual to extending its reign as long as possible, while at the same time sapping the material and political energy of its opponents.

In South Africa this tactic was intended to legitimise the regime as the only thing standing between an orderly transition to democracy on the one hand, and chaos on the other. At the same time it sought to drain the energy of the liberation movement by killing some of its leaders, forcing it into a defencive mode of thinking and compelling it to accept a compromise favourable to the regime. Mubarak’s statements prior to the unleashing of his ‘police-in-civilian clothing’, the inaction of the army and the apparently reasonable response of his Prime Minister after the fact that they will vigorously investigate the violence and bring the perpetrators to book, are well rehearsed elements of a ‘third force’ strategy.

Like in South Africa, the Egyptian ‘third force’ will be constituted of a variety of elements, including members of the security services operating as civilians, party loyalists and some civilians who are attracted by financial incentives. Even criminal gangs will be increasingly utilised, providing further ‘evidence’ that the violence is not perpetrated by the regime but plainly criminal. In the end the entire effort is neither spontaneous nor independent.

Any decent investigation will find that this force is organised, resourced and directed by elements within the Mubarak regime. The Tahrir Square protesters have already collected ample evidence to this effect. In South Africa it took the brave Justice Richard Goldstone (of the UN Gaza Report fame) to expose a similar and wide-ranging network of regime instruments masquerading as various independent third forces.

Unless the army intervenes on the side of the Egyptian democracy movement, this ‘third force’ will continue to strike, not only in Cairo and other cities but increasingly also in the rural parts of the country. In South Africa the third force violence lasted from 1990 to 1994. In Egypt Mubarak’s regime has until September to produce a disorganised, leaderless and desperate opposition unable to execute a proper election campaign. The lessons of South Africa are instructive in how to defeat this effort by a desperate regime.

The continued unity of South Africans, in protest, was the central element that defeated the efforts of the apartheid regime to continue governing. If the Egyptian people continue protesting, as they have for the last two weeks, any claims of legitimacy by the regime are transparently ridiculous. In South Africa the central demand of the liberation movement at the height of third force violence became one for a transitional government.

No autocratic regime can oversee its own demise, and a real election could only take place if the entire state apparatus, including its security forces, were placed under the control of an interim government. The South African Transitional Executive Council established in 1993 and acting as an interim government, ensured the holding of free and fair elections in April 1994.

Anything less than the departure of Mubarak and his key allies will mean a transition always under threat of violence by a so-called third force, and an election that might disappear amidst the violence visited upon the Egyptian resistance.

David Africa is an independent security analyst based in South Africa. He has previously worked in counter-terrorism intelligence and research, and served in the underground of the then-banned African National Congress in South Africa.

Algeria to lift emergency powers - Africa - Al Jazeera English

2011-02-03T16:19:00.000-05:00

Algeria to lift emergency powers - Africa - Al Jazeera English

The battle for Tahrir Square - Middle East - Al Jazeera English

2011-02-03T16:06:00.000-05:00

The battle for Tahrir Square - Middle East - Al Jazeera English

2011-02-02T22:24:00.001-05:00

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2011-02-02T15:52:00.001-05:00

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2011-02-02T15:34:00.000-05:00

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Understanding the Protests in Egypt

2011-01-29T22:33:00.001-05:00

Understanding the Protests in Egypt
by Bryan Farrell 01-27-2011
The massive anti-government protests that flared in Egypt yesterday, in which tens of thousands filled the streets of several Egyptian cities, was perhaps the most dramatic display of civil unrest the country has seen in decades. Most media sources have been quick to link the protests to the recent Tunisian uprising, hinting that it may be a sign of a domino effect taking place across the region. But how much of this early analysis is just misinformed anticipation? Jack Duvall, president of the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict in Washington, D.C., spoke to this concern in an interview with Waging Nonviolence yesterday:
Egypt has had what might be called the formation of an inchoate movement based on students, labor, human rights activists and traditional opposition parties—both left and right (if you can classify the Muslim Brotherhood as right). It’s been going on for several years and it would be unfair to them to say that the protests today are a function of Tunisia. Whoever called the protests today probably was expecting a response because of Tunisia, knowing there would be enthusiasm to participate. And there were a lot of people who did come out. But I don’t think one should place too much political importance just on what has been happening today and it certainly shouldn’t be attributed to what is happening in Tunisia.
Jamila Raqib, the executive director of the Albert Einstein Institution in East Boston, echoed this sentiment:

To view the events taking place in Egypt as simply inspired by Tunisia, with no attention given to an ongoing struggle for human rights and an end to Mubarak rule (that has been waged for decades) would be a mistake. What is happening has been brewing for a very long time, and what we see is a result of at least some planning. To what degree, we don’t know, and certainly the effectiveness of the struggle as it continues will depend on the degree to which planning was involved.
Rather than pinpoint the uprising in Tunisia as the catalyst, Duvall suggested more attention be paid to the recent events in Lebanon, where thousands have been protesting Hezbollah:
Lebanon needs to be looked at closely too because that could be the beginning of a long period of both traditional political instability as well as two different civilian based movements in the streets—a recrudescence of the so-called Cedar Revolution, which is based on Sunni Arabs and Christians as well as an indigenous Lebanese opposition allied with Hezbollah. Part of this is a traditional jockeying for power mirrored by supporters in the streets, but some of it is really home grown. It’s absolutely interesting because of the so-called Cedar Revolution, which forced the Syrians to get out of Lebanon and was a major accomplishment of people power. Lebanese have a fair amount of experience with people power unlike the Tunisians. So what is now beginning to happen in Lebanon may be of more importance if one is just paying attention to the history of people power than what has happened in Tunisia—not to take anything away from what the Tunisian protesters accomplished.
All potential influences and inspirations aside, the events in Egypt could not have honestly been foreseen, according to Raqib:

The events in Egypt could not have been predicted by anyone, especially in terms of how rapidly they took place. There have been predictions about a possible domino effect similar to what happened in Eastern Europe with the collapse of Communist governments, however, there were and remain too many unknown factors that prevent us from drawing any meaningful and definitive parallels.
What I am hearing and reading about is the definite spreading of a new awareness: that people are not helpless in the face of repression, that the seemingly all-powerful dictatorships in the region—against whom struggle was perceived as futile—are actually not so powerful when faced with the real power of ordinary people, and that bringing about massive change is not predicated on the use of military power by a foreign government. It can happen organically, self-reliantly, and nonviolently, and also, importantly, with less casualties than a protracted guerrilla struggle or terrorism. This change can come not only without the help of outsiders, but perhaps even in spite of their support for the opponent, or even their attempts to derail a popular movement. What an amazing realization with massive, far reaching consequences!
That awareness on its own is not enough, however. What needs to take place is a process of careful thinking and planning. One danger is that what occurred in Tunisia (while stunning) will give the impression that people, with simple protest and no real planning or strategic thinking, can produce sweeping and long-lasting, positive political change so quickly. In most cases, it is much more complex.
Even in the case of Tunisia, affecting positive political change is still complex, as Duvall explained.

There was no movement [in Tunisia] and that’s why elements of the old regime as well as traditional opposition parties began to immediately occupy a vacuum and there is now a struggle for power in Tunisia. Movements are a struggle for power, but if there is no movement and only protest, all it is is an uprising… The best distinction that can be made is between civilian based protest and organized campaigns or movements using civil resistance in order to accomplish a more decisive political change in a country. When the latter happens, as it’s happened historically, then there can be something that you could call a revolution.
So, rather than jump to conclusions about the direction of events in Egypt, perhaps the best thing we observers from afar can do is applaud the willingness of ordinary people to resist a corrupt and dictatorial regime and encourage further use of nonviolent means. The existence of that kind of bravery is the one thing we can be sure of.
[This article appears courtesy of a partnership with Waging Nonviolence.]
Bryan Farrell is a New York-based writer, covering topics that range from the environment and climate change to foreign policy and militarism. His work has appeared in The Nation, In These Times, Plenty, Earth Island Journal, Huffington Post, and Foreign Policy In Focus. Visit his website at BryanFarrell.com.

http://blog.sojo.net/2011/01/27/understanding-the-protests-in-egypt/

2011-01-29T16:04:00.003-05:00

MILITARY HOLDS BACK
Tens Of Thousands Storm Cairo Streets In Defiance Of Mubarak.. ElBaradei Speaks: 'People Will Not Go Home Until Justice Is Restored'

View more news videos at: http://www.nbcwashington.com/video.

The AP adds:

Protesters have filled the street in front of the Egyptian embassy in Washington, demanding that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak step down.
The demonstrators on Saturday also criticized the Obama administration's response to the clashes in Egypt, where thousands of protesters have thrown the country's 30-year-old regime into tumult.
Those in Washington waved Egyptian flags and held signs that read "Obama: Democracy or Hypocrisy?" and "Victory to the Egyptian People!"
Tamim Barghouti, a 32-year-old professor, said he was angered by Mubarak's choice for a vice president Saturday. He says the new vice president would simply be another puppet of America.

Today 1:53 PM Tunisia Minister Weighs In
The protestors have said that they were inspired by the successful ousting of the Tunisian president. Now Tunisia's new foreign minister has given his take on the Egypt. Reports the AP:
Tunisia's new foreign minister says his country isn't going to lecture Egyptians on what path their country should take, following this week's anti-government protests.
Ahmed Ounaies says the two Arab countries are different and must each chart their own course.

He told The Associated Press Saturday "it is up to the Egyptian people to decide their present and their future for themselves. We are not going to decide on their behalf or give them any lessons."

2011-01-29T13:50:00.003-05:00

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

CAIRO — Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak named a vice president Saturday for the first time since coming to power nearly 30 years ago — a clear step toward setting up a successor in the midst of the biggest anti-government protests of his regime.
After five days of protests, Cairo was engulfed in chaos. There was rampant looting and lawlessness was spreading fast. Egyptian security officials say at least 62 people have been killed nationwide over the last two days. The officials say an additional 2,000 people have been injured.
Residents of affluent neighborhoods were boarding up their houses against gangs of thugs roaming the streets with knives and sticks and gunfire was heard in some neighborhoods.
At least three people were killed as they stormed the Interior Ministry, Al Jazeera reported.

NBC News' Richard Engel reported dramatic scenes of tanks and armored personnel carriers fanning out across the city of 18 million, guarding key government buildings. He told msnbc there was rampant looting and protesters, many smeared in red, screaming and yelling in the streets.
The military was protecting major tourist and archaeological sites such as the Egyptian Museum, home to some of the country's most treasured antiquities, as well as the Cabinet building. The military closed the pyramids on the outskirts of Cairo — Egypt's premiere tourist site.

Egypt tense after bloody protests - Middle East - Al Jazeera English

2011-01-28T23:23:00.005-05:00

click this link for full post
Egypt tense after bloody protests - Middle East - Al Jazeera English
Protesters in the Egyptian cities of Cairo, Alexandria and Suez have defied a nighttime curfew and continued with demonstrations demanding an end to Hosni Mubarak's 30-year presidency.

Fresh protests erupt in Egypt
Army reportedly on the streets of Cairo as curfew is imposed from 6pm to 7am local time.

Protests have erupted in cities across Egypt, with demonstrators demanding an end to Hosni Mubarak's presidency.
Tens of thousands took to the streets across the country following Friday midday prayers.
State TV said a curfew will be imposed from 6pm to 7am local time.
Egyptian military vehicles were sighted on the streets of Cairo on Friday after a day of violent clashes between police and protesters demanding an end to President Hosni Mubarak's rule.

Protesters had previously chanted slogans calling for the army to support them, complaining of police violence during clashes on Friday in which security forces fired teargas and rubber bullets.

"Where is the army? Come and see what the police is doing to us. We want the army. We want the army," the protesters in one area of central Cairo shouted, shortly before police fired teargas on them.

Al Jazeera's Ayman Mohyeldin, reporting from Cairo, said protesters reacted positively when an armoured vehicle with troops showed up, possibly indicating that it belonged to the military.

"The army is a respected establishment in Egypt, and many feel they need their support against what they see as excessive force by the police and security forces," he said.
Earlier, clashes between protesters and police erupted outside a mosque in Cairo.
Protesters reportedly threw stones and dirt at the police after security forces confronted them. They held up posters saying "No to dictatorship" and stamped on posters of Mubarak.
Al Jazeera's Rawya Rageh, reporting from the Mediterranean port city of Alexandria, said protesters streamed out of mosques shortly after prayers to chant slogans against Mubarak. Police responded immediately, firing tear gas to disperse the crowd.
Alexandria is a stronghold of the Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's technically banned but largest political opposition group, but Rageh said the crowds in the city predominantly consisted of "ordinary citizens".
"This is the same mosque where protests were held against police brutality in June after a 20-year-old man was beaten to death by police," she said. "It’s very symbolic that the current protests are taking place at the same place all over again."
Protests were also reported in Suez, a port on the Red Sea east of Cairo, and in the Nile Delta cities of Mansoura and Sharqiya, witnesses said.
Friday marked the fourth consecutive day of protests in the Middle East's most populous nation coming on the heels of a social uprising in nearby Tunisia that ousted that country's president of 23 years.
Mohamed ElBaradei, the former head of the United Nations' nuclear watchdog and an opposition leader in Egypt, returned to the country on Thursday night after telling reporters he was ready to lead a "transition" if asked. On Friday, he prayed with thousands of worshippers at a mosque in Cairo and had reportedly been prevented from moving freely by security forces.
The countrywide violence has so far left seven people dead.
In response, the government has promised to crack down on demonstrations and arrest those participating in them. It has blocked internet, mobile phone and SMS services in order to disrupt the planned demonstrations.
Internet shut down
Before Egypt shut down internet access on Thursday night, activists were posting and exchanging messages using social networking services such as Facebook and Twitter, listing more than 30 mosques and churches where protesters were to organise on Friday.

"Egypt's Muslims and Christians will go out to fight against corruption, unemployment and oppression and absence of freedom," a page with more than 70,000 signatories said.

The Associated Press news agency reported that an elite special counterterrorism force had been deployed at strategic points around Cairo, and Egypt's interior ministry warned of "decisive measures".

Safwat Sherif, the secretary-general of the ruling National Democratic Party, told reporters on Thursday: "We hope that tomorrow's Friday prayers and its rituals happen in a quiet way that upholds the value of such rituals ... and that no one jeopardises the safety of citizens or subjects them to something they do not want."

Meanwhile, a lawyer for the Muslim Brotherhood said that 20 members of the officially banned group had been detained overnight.

Abdel-Moniem Abdel-Maksoud said two of the most senior movement members were detained: Essam El-Erian, its main spokesman, and Mohammed Moursi, a prominent Brotherhood leader.
Fierce clashes
On Thursday, protesters hurled petrol bombs at a fire station in Suez, setting it ablaze. They tried but failed to set fire to a local office of the ruling National Democratic Party. At another rally near Giza on the outskirts of Cairo, police used tear gas to break up hundreds of protesters late at night.

Cairo, normally vibrant on a Thursday night ahead of the weekend, was largely deserted, with shops and restaurants shut. In the city of Ismailia, hundreds of protesters clashed with police who used tear gas and batons to disperse them.
"This is a revolution," one 16-year-old protester said in Suez . "Every day we're coming back here."
"The intensity continues to increase," Al Jazeera's Jamal Elshayyal reported from Suez.
"There have been fierce clashes with rubber-coated steel bullets being fired by the riot police as well as tear gas."
Restraint urged
Human Rights Watch said Egyptian police had escalated the use of force against largely peaceful demonstrations and called it "wholly unacceptable and disproportionate".
Barack Obama, the US president, urged both the government and protesters to show restraint as they expressed their "pent-up frustrations". Hillary Clinton, the secretary of state, had earlier said that the protests offered the Mubarak government an opportunity to institute social, economic, and political reforms.
"It is very important that people have mechanisms in order to express legitimate grievances," Obam said as he answered questions from an online audience on the YouTube website.
Obama also urged Mubarak to make changes to the political system to appease the angry protesters.
"I've always said to him that making sure that they are moving forward on reform - political reform, economic reform - is absolutely critical for the long-term well-being of Egypt."

Insiders blab about Afghan war

2010-10-17T02:23:00.001-04:00

By Richard GwynColumnist

The most important aspect of American investigative journalist Bob Woodward's book, Obama's Wars, about the conflict in Afghanistan, is not the inside dope that he was able to dig out. It is rather that he so easily got many insiders to blab.

Woodward did ferret out some interesting stuff. One of the best bits is on how President Barack Obama's generals kept trying to get him to give them more troops. As soon as he'd set the number at 30,000, rather than the 40,000 they'd demanded, they immediately proposed he send in 4,500 “enablers” — that is to say, more troops under a different name.

Obama actually comes out well. He was trapped: He couldn't bug out after George W. Bush's “surge” had seemed to have worked in Iraq. But he knew the Afghan war was unwinnable in conventional terms, telling White House aides there had to be a plan “about how we're going to hand it off and get out.”

Gen. David Petraeus, now the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, also comes out well. In an interview with Woodward, Petraeus said, “I don't think you win this war . . . You have to stay after it. This is the kind of fight we're in for the rest of our lives, and probably our kids' lives.”

Both are highly intelligent men. Each has a private agenda. Obama described his by his now much-quoted comment, “I can't lose the whole Democratic party.” Republican critics have made much of this, but any president who doesn't worry about votes won't be president for long.

Petraeus's private agenda is the honour of the U.S. military. His purpose in Afghanistan is not to win — the goal all generals have sought throughout history — but not to lose, or at least not to be seen to have lost.

So why did so many White House and Pentagon insiders blab so readily to Woodward?

Because they, too, if less perceptively than Obama and Petraeus, know they are engaged in an unwinnable war.

Call it a new kind of war, a postmodern war. It has no beginning: Afghans have fought almost continuously for centuries, against outsiders but as readily against each other.

It will have no end but will eventually peter out whether the Americans are there or not. Certainly there will be no victory parades, by anyone.

It has no particular purpose. There's jihad, of course. But Afghans aren't by nature religious fanatics.

Americans, understandably, are afraid that if the Taliban win, Al Qaeda will use the country as a base.

But Al Qaeda doesn't need a physical base. It's a virtual terrorist organization, an idea, a brand name, nothing that anyone can wrap their hands around and blow up.

Al Qaeda will also peter out one day, destroying itself because its principal activity has become motivating and training Muslims to kill Muslims — that's what's now going on in Iraq no matter that the Americans have gone.

Killing has become for the terrorists a self-justifying cause. For suicide bombers it's also an immensely satisfying one since there's no clearer proof of having power — as all the teenage bombers lack completely in their own lives — than being able to decide who to kill and how many.

Those insiders broke the rules and blabbed to Woodward because they know the war in Afghanistan is insane, and know as keenly that no aspect of it is more insane than that American troops are still there because no one in Washington has yet been able to figure out how to get them out without being seen to have lost.

By this book, Woodward has done a real service to Americans. Probably without intending to — since while a good journalist, Woodward is no deep thinker — he's told them the truth.

God in America | Extended Preview | PBS

2010-10-08T12:52:00.000-04:00

WE SUPPORT OUR PRESIDENT

2010-10-01T20:38:00.000-04:00

   Subject: The Arrogance of being President while Black

  A good explanation of what seems to be happening in this Country. Even the First Lady has received unwarranted negative press.

Arrogance of being President while being Black

I don't think anyone was under some real illusion that the election of Barack Obama actually means the end of racism in America . I'm pretty sure that the president-elect knew it better than anyone. After all, he saw it every day, from the moment he announced his candidacy. To some degree, he saw it within his own party during the primaries. And he saw it in all ugliness during the general election. For half of this country, he was "That One". No matter how big and clear his victory was. No matter how smart he is. No matter how decent he is. No matter what a true patriot he is. No matter how optimistic and positive his vision for America was. All that didn't matter. Because at the end of the day, he was still black.

I'm quite old. I remember, vaguely, where my parents were on November 22, 1963. I've seen so many presidents. Some were feared, some were hated, some were adored, some popular and some not. But all of them, without exception, were treated with the highest respect deserving the office of the president of the United States .

  That is until a black man won the right to occupy this office. It's been 13 months now, and in the eyes of so many, Barack Obama is still that one. He is being disrespected and at the same time being held to the highest standard of any president I've ever seen – and not just by the Republican side! He has to perform three times better than any president in history, and even that may not be enough.

  For the media, he is many more times just "Obama" than "President Obama". They create scandals out of nothing issues. It took them at least 6 years to start giving Bush a small part of the sh-t he deserved. It took them 6 months to begin crap all over Obama because he's yet to fix the catastrophe that was left for him.

  They use condescending tones when they talk about him, and only mildly less condescending when they talk TO him. With anyone else, CNN wouldn't dare go to commercials every time the president speaks, like they did during that summit on Thursday. They wouldn't dare be counting how many minutes George Bush or Bill Clinton were talking. Chris Mathews wouldn't dare make an issue out of Ronald Reagan calling members of congress by their first name, like he is not actually the president. They fully cooperate with the Right-Wing smear machine when it comes to president Obama's national security performance – even if almost every independent and military expert actually thinks that he's a terrific Commander-in-Chief. You'll never see them on TV, and virtually no one from the Left, in congress and outside, defend the President on this matter.

  I don't care about the Far-Right. They're just crazy ignorant Neanderthals. It's the way the beltway and the mainstream treats this President that is shocking. On Thursday, almost every Republican had no trouble interrupting him in the middle of a sentence. They looked like they're going to vomit every time they had to say "Mr.President". They all had this Eric-Cantor-Smirk whenever he spoke. Then they went out and started to spit their stupid talking points, to the delight of the media. Sarah Palin, a woman who can hardly read, thinks that he was "arrogant" towards John McCain, and somehow this is an important news. Because you see, "Obama's Arrogance" is the talking point of the day.

  Oh, those talking points. He is arrogant (because he knows the facts better than all of them combined). He is an elitist (because he uses big words that they don't understand). He is weak on national security (because he actually thinks about the consequences). He divides the country (well, he did that the day he had the audacity to win the election). Worst of all, he actually thinks that he's the President. He even dared to say so on Thursday. How arrogant of him. You'd think that previous presidents didn't have any ego. Somehow it turned out that the one president who treats even his biggest opponents with the utmost respect – is the arrogant one. I wonder why?

  I expected that his winning the Presidency would bring out some ugliness, but it's been far worse than I imagined. The racism coming from the Right is obviously clear and shameless, but there's also some hidden and maybe subconscious and disturbing underline tone behind some of the things that I read here and throughout the Left blogosphere, even before the end of Obama's first year - 'He's weak, he's spineless, he's got no balls, primary him in 2012'. It'll be dishonest to deny that.

  The fact is that for millions in America , Barack Obama is this uppity black man (Not even a "real" black), who received good education only due to affirmative action, and has no right to litter the sacred Oval Office with his skin color. They just can't accept the fact that the President is a black man, who unlike his predecessor, was actually legally elected. But what's really sad is that it's not just the fringe, its deep deep in mainstream America .

  Barack Obama's ability to remain above all this slob, to keep his optimism and his strange and mostly unjustified faith in people, while continuing to gracefully deal with an endless shitstorm – is one of the most inspiring displays of human quality I have ever seen. And I can only hope that the Cosmos is on his side because God is and He never makes a mistake.

Gerald A. McIntosh (G-Mack)

WE SUPPORT OUR PRESIDENT BY GOING TO THE POLLS. HE NEEDS US TO SHOW
UP SO THAT THE HOUSE AND CONGRESS CAN SEE THAT THE PEOPLE SUPPORT HIM.

Evangelical leaders: Gulf oil spill

2010-06-29T16:50:00.002-04:00

Oil In The Gulf
Evangelical leaders: Gulf oil spill raises moral issues
The Associated Press
Leaders of a group that encourages evangelical Christians to care for the environment say the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico raises moral challenges for the country.
The Revs. Jim Ball and Mitchell Hescox, leaders of the Evangelical Environmental Network, are visiting southern Louisiana to pray with people who have lost jobs because of the spill.

Joining them is the Rev. Galen Carey of the National Association of Evangelicals.
Ball says they took a boat ride off the coast Thursday and were saddened by sights of oil-spattered marshes where birds were nesting.

He says the oil spill is a stain on the nation's stewardship of God's creation, and should inspire people of faith to embrace cleaner energy sources. Ball says how the nation responds to the disaster is a matter of values.

OIL- SHELL'S History Of Environmental Degradation

2010-06-20T05:27:00.000-04:00

Kenule "Ken" Beeson Saro Wiwa (October 10, 1941 – November 10, 1995) was a Nigerian author, television producer, environmental activist, and winner of the Goldman Environmental Prize. Saro-Wiwa was a member of the Ogoni people, an ethnic minority in Nigeria whose homeland, Ogoniland, in the Niger Delta has been targeted for crude oil extraction since the 1950s and which has suffered extreme and unremediated environmental damage from decades of indiscriminate petroleum waste dumping. Initially as spokesperson, and then as President, of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), Saro-Wiwa led a nonviolent campaign against environmental degradation of the land and waters of Ogoniland by the operations of the multinational petroleum industry, especially Shell. He was also an outspoken critic of the Nigerian government, which he viewed as reluctant to enforce environmental regulations on the foreign petroleum companies operating in the area.

At the peak of his non-violent campaign, Saro-Wiwa was arrested, hastily tried by a special military tribunal, and hanged in 1995 by the military government of General Sani Abacha, all on charges widely viewed as entirely politically motivated and completely unfounded. His execution provoked international outrage and resulted in Nigeria's suspension from the Commonwealth of Nations for over 3 years.

The Case Against Shell: 'The Hanging of Ken Saro-Wiwa Showed the True Cost of Oil'

Ken Saro-Wiwa: his last interview, part I

Ken Saro-Wiwa: his last interview, part II

http://remembersarowiwa.com/

Will BP Oil Spill Make Shell ‘Come Clean’?

By Ben Amunwa on June 16, 2010

As the US government takes BP to task over the disasterous Gulf of Mexico spill, many Nigerians are asking, ‘what about Shell?’. There is nothing clean about Shell’s operations in the Niger Delta, where daily oil spills are frequently ignored for months and where ‘clean up’ methods include dumping oil-drenched soil into pits before burning them.

So poor is Shell’s record that over the weekend, the Nigerian government had to remind the company to respect international standards when it does get around to cleaning up a fraction of over 2,400 spill sites in the Delta.

The Deepwater Horizon disaster caused headlines around the world, yet the people who live in the Niger delta have had to live with environmental catastrophes for decades

“If this Gulf accident had happened in Nigeria, neither the government nor the company would have paid much attention,” said the writer Ben Ikari, a member of the Ogoni people. “This kind of spill happens all the time in the delta.”

OIL TODAY

2010-06-16T13:54:00.000-04:00

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

New World Order Or What ?

2010-06-13T20:38:00.000-04:00

I have been hearing bits of information and suggestions about the organized workings of the very rich in this country and the world for over 40 years.
What is the truth, what is going on, why is this happening? We need to find the truth.

Chris Hedges on Corporate Totalitarianism 1/2

2010-05-11T00:27:00.000-04:00

Chris Hedges on Corporate Totalitarianism 2/2

2010-05-11T00:21:00.000-04:00

President Obama named Elena Kagan

2010-05-10T12:55:00.003-04:00

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

President Obama named Elena Kagan, the Solicitor General, as his second pick for the Supreme Court today, paving the way for the most gender-balanced court in American history.

If she is confirmed Ms Kagan, 50, would become the youngest member of the highest court in the US and the only justice with no experience as a judge. Her appointment would also radically alter the religious composition of the court: she would be the third Jewish justice, alongside six Catholics, leaving no Protestant voice on the court for the first time.

Mr Obama today introduced her as “our Solicitor General and my friend”, emphasising his decades-long personal relationship with Ms Kagan.

“I have selected a nominee who I believe embodies ... excellence, independence, integrity and passion for the law,” Mr Obama said. “Elena is widely regarded as one of the nation’s foremost legal minds. She is a trailblazing leader.”

The President said that he was proud that she would become the third woman on the court and highlighted her reputation as a “consensus builder” who had a strong working relationship with the conservative members of the court and a “habit of fair-mindedness”.

Before Mr Obama chose Sonia Sotomayor last year Democrats had waited for 15 years for the chance to select a Supreme Court judge. Justices stay on the court until their death or retirement, which means that appointments to the court are among the most significant opportunities for any administration.

George W. Bush managed to shift the court towards conservatism by appointing Samuel Alito to replace Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, a moderate.

Ms Kagan has enjoyed a stellar legal and political career. She was the first female dean of Harvard Law School and the first woman to serve as the Solicitor General, the country’s most senior legal advisor.

Her age gives her the opportunity to extend Mr Obama’s legacy for a generation, reinvigorating the court’s liberal wing by replacing the 90-year-old Justice John Paul Stevens.

2010-05-10T12:43:00.002-04:00

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Tim Wise: On White Privilege

2010-02-17T22:43:00.000-05:00

Tim Wise: On White Privilege

The Pathology of Privilege Racism, White Denial & the Costs of Inequality - 1

Tim Wise-The Pathology of White Privilege Part 2

Tim Wise-The Pathology of White Privilege Part 3

Tim Wise-The Pathology of White Privilege Part 4

Tim Wise-The Pathology of White Privilege Part 5

Tim Wise-The Pathology of White Privilege Part 6

MOVE YOUR MONEY

2010-01-07T05:06:00.000-05:00

MOVE YOUR MONEY

People all over the country are choosing to move their money out of bigger banks and into smaller, community-oriented financial institutions that generally avoided the reckless investments and schemes that helped cause the financial crisis.

Fueled by the personal initiatives of thousands, it’s a grassroots effort that has the potential to shift power in the financial system away from Wall Street and to Main Street.

Check out the video, read up on what inspired the idea, connect with others through Facebook and Twitter and then use the tools and links provided to find a community bank or credit union in your area

Move Your Money: A New Year's Resolution

Too-big-to-fail banks are profiting from bailout dollars and government guarantees, and growing bigger. Tell us which community bank you use, and why.

Last week, over a pre-Christmas dinner, the two of us, along with political strategist Alexis McGill, filmmaker/author Eugene Jarecki, and Nick Penniman of the HuffPost Investigative Fund, began talking about the huge, growing chasm between the fortunes of Wall Street banks and Main Street banks, and started discussing what concrete steps individuals could take to help create a better financial system. Before long, the conversation turned practical, and with some help from friends in the world of bank analysis, a video and website were produced devoted to a simple idea: Move Your Money.

The big banks on Wall Street, propped up by taxpayer money and government guarantees, have had a record year, making record profits while returning to the highly leveraged activities that brought our economy to the brink of disaster. In a slap in the face to taxpayers, they have also cut back on the money they are lending, even though the need to get credit flowing again was one of the main points used in selling the public the bank bailout. But since April, the Big Four banks -- JP Morgan/Chase, Citibank, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo -- all of which took billions in taxpayer money, have cut lending to businesses by $100 billion.

Meanwhile, America's Main Street community banks -- the vast majority of which avoided the banquet of greed and corruption that created the toxic economic swamp we are still fighting to get ourselves out of -- are struggling. Many of them have closed down (or been taken over by the FDIC) over the last 12 months. The government policy of protecting the Too Big and Politically Connected to Fail is badly hurting the small banks, which are having a much harder time competing in the financial marketplace. As a result, a system which was already dangerously concentrated at the top has only become more so.

We talked about the outrage of big, bailed-out banks turning around and spending millions of dollars on lobbying to gut or kill financial reform -- including "too big to fail" legislation and regulation of the derivatives that played such a huge part in the meltdown. And as we contrasted that with the efforts of local banks to show that you can both be profitable and have a positive impact on the community, an idea took hold: why don't we take our money out of these big banks and put them into community banks? And what, we asked ourselves, would happen if lots of people around America decided to do the same thing? Our money has been used to make the system worse -- what if we used it to make the system better?

Everyone around the table quickly got excited (granted we are an excitable group), and began tossing out suggestions for how to get this idea circulating.

Eugene, the filmmaker among us, remarked that the contrast between the big banks and the community banks we were talking about was very much like the story in the classic Frank Capra film It's a Wonderful Life, where community banker George Bailey helps the people of Bedford Falls escape the grip of the rapacious and predatory banker Mr. Potter.

It was a lightbulb moment. And, unlike the vast majority of dinner conversations, the excitement over this idea didn't end with dessert. It actually led to something -- thanks in great part to Eugene and his remarkable team, who got to work and, in record time, created a brilliant, powerful, and inspiring video playing off the It's a Wonderful Life concept. Watch it below.

Within a few days, the rest of the pieces fell into place, including an agreement with top financial analysts Chris Whalen and Dennis Santiago, who gave us access to their IRA (Institutional Risk Analytics) database. Using this tool, everyone will be able to plug in their zip code and quickly get a list of the small, solvent Main Street banks operating in their community.

The idea is simple: If enough people who have money in one of the big four banks move it into smaller, more local, more traditional community banks, then collectively we, the people, will have taken a big step toward re-rigging the financial system so it becomes again the productive, stable engine for growth it's meant to be. It's neither Left nor Right -- it's populism at its best. Consider it a withdrawal tax on the big banks for the negative service they provide by consistently ignoring the public interest. It's time for Americans to move their money out of these reckless behemoths. And you don't have to worry, there is zero risk: deposit insurance is just as good at small banks -- and unlike the big banks they don't provide the toxic dividend of derivatives trading in a heads-they-win, tails-we-lose fashion.

Think of the message it will send to Wall Street -- and to the White House. That we have had enough of the high-flying, no-limits-casino banking culture that continues to dominate Wall Street and Capitol Hill. That we won't wait on Washington to act, because we know that Washington has, in fact, been a part of the problem from the start. We simply can't count on Congress to fix things. We have to do it ourselves -- and the big banks are the core of the problem. We need to return to the stable, reliable, people-oriented approach of America's community banks.

So watch Eugene's amazing video, then go to www.moveyourmoney.info to learn more about how easy it is to move your money. And pass the idea on to your friends (help make this video -- and this idea -- go viral!).

JP Morgan/Chase, Citi, Wells Fargo, and Bank of America may be "too big to fail" -- but they are not too big to feel the impact of hundreds of thousands of people taking action to change a broken financial and political system. Let them gamble with their own money, not yours. Let's turn big banks into smaller banks. We'll all be better off -- and safer -- as a result.

Make it your New Year's resolution to move your money. We can't think of a better way to start 2010.

Health Insurance Reform - One More Hurdle!

2009-11-09T12:06:00.011-05:00

House Passes Health-Care Bill in Historic Vote

By JANET ADAMY and NAFTALI BENDAVID (Edited by Kitty)
WASHINGTON --
The House narrowly passed its sweeping health bill late Saturday, marking the biggest victory yet for Democrats in their drive to create near-universal health insurance.The bill passed by a 220-215 margin after fractious debate and garnered the unexpected backing of only one Republican, Rep. Joseph Cao of Louisiana. Thirty-nine Democrats voted against the measure. The narrow passage in the House, where the Democrats have a large majority, underscores the divisiveness of the legislation.

The vote was a victory for President Barack Obama and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.), and moved them toward a goal that has eluded presidents for decades. Mr. Obama came to the Capitol on Saturday morning and assured Democrats they would remember the vote as their finest moment in politics should he sign it into law. "Opportunities like this come around maybe once in a generation," he said. Its passage pushes Congress closer to the largest social safety net expansion since 1965, when the government created the Medicare insurance program for the elderly. The measure spends slightly more than $1 trillion over a decade to provide health insurance to an additional 36 million Americans and creates a new public insurance plan to compete with private insurers by 2013. It requires most Americans to carry insurance, creates a new exchange where they can shop for it and gives the lowest earners tax credits to help them pay for it.

As the vote count hit the 218 needed to secure passage, Democrats erupted in cheers. They turned to hug and kiss each other and then shouted out a countdown of the last 10 seconds before the vote closed. Republicans were silent. On the rest of the bill, Republicans offered nothing but sharp opposition. Democrats easily voted down Republicans' attempt to pass their own bill, which would have more narrowly expanded health insurance and cost $61 billion over a decade.

Democrats portrayed their legislation as a moral imperative that would achieve a goal sought by presidents since Theodore Roosevelt. They argued it would fix the worst aspects of the medical system by preventing insurers from denying coverage to the sick and protecting consumers from financial ruin caused by medical bills. "It is testimony to how we care for our fellow citizens," said John Larson (D., Conn.). "It is at the very core of all that America stands for, and why we came here to serve."

The vote was perhaps the most far-reaching consequence of the Democrats' sweeping election victories in 2006 and 2008. Democrats have felt pressure to produce results to show for those victories.The health vote also put newly elected Democrats from conservative areas in a tough political position, caught between party leaders and their election prospects in 2010.

One of the day's most dramatic scenes of the day came when lawmakers sparred over an amendment that would exclude coverage of abortion for those gaining new health insurance under the overhaul. The 240-194 vote to pass the amendment flipped the usual voting lineup, with 176 Republicans joining 64 Democrats in favor. The block of ANTI-ABORTION Democrats led by Rep. Bart Stupak (D., Mich.) refused to sign onto the legislation unless House leaders agreed to take up an amendment preventing anyone who gets a government tax credit to buy insurance from enrolling in a plan that covers abortion.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops threatened to withhold its support from the entire legislation unless House leaders took up the amendment. Anti-abortion advocates lauded the change and described it as the most significant House vote on the issue in more than a decade. They said it preserves existing abortion laws that restrict the government from funding the procedure.

Mr. Stupak argued that the bill "in no way prohibits any individual from purchasing a supplemental abortion coverage. ABORTION -RIGHTS SUPPORTERS were stunned by the change and argued it erodes existing laws that protect women's access to abortion. Those who receive an insurance subsidy and want coverage for abortion would need to buy a rider policy since private plans wouldn't include it in their coverage. "What woman would buy a plan for an unplanned pregnancy?" asked Laurie Rubiner, vice president for public policy for the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that by 2019, the bill would leave about 96% of legal residents with health insurance, up from 83% now. To pay for expanding insurance coverage, the bill calls for hundreds of billions of dollars in cuts to Medicare aimed at eliminating its wasteful spending. It levies a 5.4% tax on the wealthy that targets individuals earning more than $500,000 a year and couples earning more than $1 million a year. All employers would be required to provide insurance and pay for most of the premium, or they would face a fine of up to 8% of their payroll. The small businesses would not be required.

The focus now turns to the Senate. Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) said Saturday that he expects to get cost estimates for the Senate bill from the Congressional Budget Office in the next couple of days, and that he hopes to bring a bill to the Senate floor "as soon as possible.

Democratic leaders had aimed to deliver a bill to the president this year but have effectively acknowledged that deadline could slip into 2010. The challenges are facing Senate Democrats, who will be working with no Republican nor Democrats support to hold together a fragile coalition.

The challenge in the Senate is greater, since Mr. Reid must cobble together 60 votes out of 100 to proceed to a final vote, rather than a simple majority. (100 Senators; 58 Democrats, 40 Republicans and 2 Independence) Independent Sen. Joe Lieberman(Conn.) has already planned to oppose any legislation that includes a government-run health-insurance plan like the one in the House bill.

The health overhaul still has before it can become law, and its final passage is far from assured. The Senate must pass its own bill and meld it with the House bill before sending it to President Obama's desk. It's more difficult to pass legislation through the Senate, and despite Democrats' wide majority there, leaders are straining to bring together their fractious coalition.

Any final bill is likely to be more moderate, and possibly less ambitious, than what passed through the more liberal House. It faces a tougher fight in the Senate where Republicans and some Democrats argue that the bill is too costly and won't achieve its goals.

The abortion issue is likely to arise in the Senate as well. And because rules in the Senate give more power to individual lawmakers, the debate is likely to take weeks, rather than hours.

Information on the bill -

http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h3200/show

2009-11-02T16:24:00.001-05:00

Free the Scott Sisters. Please put the petition on your page and encourage all your friends to sign. We can make a difference when we work together. http://www.change.org/actions/view/free_the_scott_sisters_2 http://www.tagged.com/freethescottsisters Learn more here - JUSTICE FOR ALL http://www.ronsworldlife.com/

2009-10-29T12:11:00.001-04:00

African Americans for Barack Obama Digest, October 29th

Dear friends,

The Senate is closing in on a health care bill with a public health insurance option, a key ingredient of meaningful health care reform.

But conservatives and insurance companies are fighting hard against the public option, so Senate leadership has compromised by including an "opt-out" clause, which would allow individual states to choose not to participate in the program.[1]

There's a real danger here. In the stimulus fight, we saw Republican governors and legislators refuse federal dollars for political gain. The same thing could happen with health care reform, with everday people in states like Lousiana, Alabama, and South Carolina -- states with large Black, poor, and working-class populations -- left out.[2]

That's why I've joined ColorOfChange.org's campaign calling on Congress and the White House to make the public option available everywhere. Please join me:

http://www.colorofchange.org/healthcare/?id=2376-660064

I understand the need for compromise and negotiation, but I also want to make sure that no community gets negotiated away in the process.

Including "opt-out" may be the best way to get a bill through the Senate with a public option--but that won't be the end of the process, and it doesn't mean "opt-out" will be in the final bill. The House still needs to decide exactly what will be in its health care bill. And once both the House and the Senate have passed legislation, they'll have to negotiate with each other, and the White House, to reconcile the differences between the two bills.

That's why we need to make it clear that we're watching and that we will demand a public option that's available in every state. Please join me in sending this message to Congress and the White House, and ask your friends and family to do the same:

http://www.colorofchange.org/healthcare/?id=2376-660064

Thank you.

References:

1. "So what is the 'opt-out' compromise?" Talking Points Memo, 10-26-2009

http://tinyurl.com/yjffquq

2. "Public option opt out denies help to those who need it most," Fire Dog Lake, 10-8-2009

http://tinyurl.com/yks5sxz