16 Sept - RSS SnapShot

Opit's LinkFest! at My Opera 23:16 MSDT

Blacklisted News

• IBM uses DNA to make next-gen microchips

  International Business Machines Corp is looking to the building blocks of our bodies -- DNA -- to be the structure of next-generation microchips.

• Who is funding the Afghan Taliban? You don't want ...

  It is the open secret no one wants to talk about, the unwelcome truth that most prefer to hide. In Afghanistan, one of the richest sources of Taliban funding is the foreign assistance coming into the country.

• How were Social Security numbers given away?

  When Tropical Storm Chata'an struck the Federated States of Micronesia in 2002, the U.S. government sent 1,300 blankets, 4,000 disposable diapers, 30 cases of sardines — and my Social Security number.

• Gulf Arab money 'behind purchases of Israeli land'

  Vast tracts of Israeli agricultural land in north Israel's Galilee area have been bought up by Arabs with financial backing from the Gulf, Israeli public radio reported on Saturday.

• Concentration of wealth in hands of rich greatest ...

  The wealthiest 10 percent of Americans now have a larger share of total income than they ever have in records going back nearly a century — an even larger amount than during the Roaring Twenties, the last time the US saw such similar disparities in wealth.

Project Censored

• WALTER CRONKITE: THE END OF AN ERA – JULY 17, 20 ...

  WALTER CRONKITE: THE END OF AN ERA – JULY 17, 2009 The end of an era is a term too often over-used. But it is a term that is properly used when discussing the passing of Walter Cronkite. It is truly the end of an era in journalism. No other journalist could do what Walter did. He could cal ...

• You Can Now Find Our Investigative Research at the ...

  You can now find all of the investigative research that we have done over the years at our new and exciting Media Freedom International Website Please check the website often for news and updates.

• Analysis of Project Censored: Are We a Left-Leanin ...

  By Peter Phillips and Mickey Huff “Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe.” –Frederick Douglass ...

• Infotainment Society: Junk Food News and New ...

  By Mickey Huff and Frances A. Capell We can do the innuendo We can dance and sing When it’s said and done We haven’t told you a thing We all know that crap is king Give us dirty laundry! Don Henley, Dirty Laundry, 1982 The late New York University media scholar Neil Postma ...

• A Black President Doesn’t Mean Racism is gone in ...

  By Peter Phillips Racial inequality remains in the US. People of color continue to experience high rates of poverty, significant unemployment, police profiling and repressive incarceration. School segregation is a continuing concern among race scholars as well. According to a new Civil Rights re ...

Scoop - NZ

• Housing Won't Recover Until Employment Does

  Splinters of good news spurring optimism and a broad market rally over the past few months are also surrounded by various weak indications that the U.S. economy is not quite on a path of sustainable recovery-despite what is perceived by the capital markets. For example, as news across the pond poin ...

• The damage done by finance companies

  Depression, illness caused by stress, and even suicide has been brought on many people by failed finance companies. » PLIGG_Visual_RSS_OriginalNews

• DebtWatch Video: Keen's Whitlam Institute Lecture

  Last month I spoke at a seminar on the financial crisis organised by The Whitlam Institute, in reply to a speech by Professor John Quiggin. Guy Debelle, the Assistant Governor (for Financial Markets) of the Reserve Bank of Australia, was the other discussant.The Institute has put together a very pro ...

• SPLC Report: Return of the Militias

  The 1990s saw the rise and fall of the virulently antigovernment "Patriot" movement, made up of paramilitary militias, tax defiers and so-called "sovereign citizens." Sparked by a combination of anger at the federal government and the deaths of political dissenters at Ruby Ridge, Idaho, and Waco, Te ...

• Kohia te kai rangatira, ruia te taitea

  For just a moment today, perhaps set aside a little time for reflection on, or to lift a glass and toast those New Zealanders who are "one of us" and not "one of them".Ivor Lloyd Richardson, Silvia Rose Cartwright, Leonard Ramsay Castle, Witi Ihimaera-Smiler, Nigel (Sam) Neill, Vincent O'Sullivan, R ...

Independent ( London )

• Purges strike fear in new Chechnya

  A decade ago central Grozny looked like post-war Stalingrad; now it looks like somewhere in Belgium. Here, in the middle of the troubled North Caucasus region, is a city lined with new, brightly coloured buildings, and freshly-paved, tree-lined walkways. At pedestrian crossings, a digital timer tic ...

• Iran adds 25 more to mass trial

  Iran expanded its mass trial of opposition supporters yesterday, adding 25 more defendants, including a Jewish teenager, who are accused of involvement in unrest over the disputed presidential election.

• Nine out of 10 dollar bills test positive for coca ...

  Up to nine out of 10 American bank notes bear traces of cocaine, research has shown. In some large US cities evidence of "dirty money" is even stronger. Analysis of bank notes from Washington DC, home to Congress and the US Presidency, were the most contaminated, with 95 per cent of them carrying mi ...

• The families of Gaza profit from bunny business

  The shrapnel holes in the wall behind her underline why Subheya Motawe, her husband and their 15 children were forced to escape from their four-room home in this central Gaza village last January. With no time to grab most of their possessions, Mrs Motawe, 52, had the presence of mind to at least t ...

• Afghan women to miss out on vote in landmark elect ...

  Millions of Afghan women will be denied their chance to vote in presidential elections this week because there aren't enough female officials to staff the women-only polling stations.

CASMII - Campaign against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran

• Wag The Dog, Again

  Summary: It is curious that in spite of the fact that there is a consensus that Iran is not yet seeking a nuclear weapon and has no capability to accumulate sufficient weapons grade uranium to do so for some time to come, US politicians and media accept without question the Israeli argument that ...

• IRAN: Under Pressure from Hawks, Obama Tacks to th ...

  Summary: But the administration is facing a great deal of pressure to move quickly to sanctions from congressional hawks - backed by hardline organisations within the so-called "Israel lobby" - who have been pushing for a tougher line against Tehran since well before the Jun. 12 elections that t ...

• Iran: Whose War?

  Summary: Huber The logical goal of Iran’s nuclear program is not possession of nuclear bombs but a thriving nuclear energy industry. Having nukes would merely make Iran a target—both Israel and the U.S. would have justification for a massive preemptive strike. We’d know they have them beca ...

• The Ever Present Military Option

  Summary: Last week, retired Air Force Gen. Chuck Wald published an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal declaring "There Is a Military Option on Iran." It’s probably not a coincidence that Wald’s piece was hot on the heels of John Bolton’s "While Diplomats Dither, Iran Builds Nukes." source: ...

• Clinton: US Supported Iran Protesters ‘Behind th ...

  Summary: In an interview today on CNN’s GPS with Fareed Zakaria, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that while the US didn’t want to come out too publicly in favor of the protesters in the wake of Iran’s disputed June elections, the State Department was “doing a lot” behind the sc ...

The Daily Galaxy

• How Fast Can a Human Ulitimately Run? Is a 5.0 Sec ...

  Amazing as Usain Bolt's new world record 100-meter victory was, his time of 9.58 seconds is nowhere near what biostatisticians such as Peter Weyand of SMU thinks is the natural limit for the human body. Experts studying the steady progression...

• Image of the Day: Laser Strikes at Supermassive Bl ...

  It's not the sequel to War of the Worlds! Astronomers at the Very Large Telescope (VLT) site in Chile are trying to measure the distortions of Earth's ever changing atmosphere. Constant imaging of high-altitude atoms excited by the laser --...

• "Relic" Particles Discovered Spanning the Universe ...

  An ancient subatomic signature extends across the universe. It seems that some subatomic particles, invisible and untouchable effects of the very creation of reality, might exist simultaneously across all of space. We're honestly surprised people who say science is boring...

• Today's Popular Posts

  Storms of Saturn's Moon Titan - A Model of the Early Earth? Is The Digital Era Overriding Our Ability to Forget? Gary McKinnon Case: Extraditing the 'Extraterrestrial' Hacker - Yes or No? A Galaxy Poll NASA's Volcanic Robo-Spiders: Sentinels of...

• The Space Elevator Games -The Next Big Reality TV ...

  It's right out of NOVA or the scifi channel: Microsoft is sponsoring the 2009 Space Elevator Conference, a four-day long event with movies, presentations, and workshops where engineers and entrepreneurs gather to discuss the technical and logistical issues of building...

Natural News

• Why Are Smart People So Ignorant When it Comes to ...

  (NaturalNews) This is the second part of a three-part article series. To read part one (recommended), visit: http://www.naturalnews.com/026843_health_food_nutrition.html Enforcing nutritional ignorance Powerful corporations, of course, require the services of oppressive government to enforce nutriti ...

• Purple Carrots in High Demand as Natural Food Colo ...

  (NaturalNews) Producers of purple carrots are anticipating a massive surge in demand as consumers and governments become increasingly wary of artificial food colorings. For decades, food producers have used petroleum-based dyes to give their products bright colors, sometimes reminiscent of the flavo ...

• The Rumsfeld Plague: Aspartame Brings Horror (Opin ...

  (NaturalNews) The aspartame horror began in 1981 due to Donald Rumsfeld, as head of the G.D. Searle pharmaceutical company, when he used his political clout to put a known carcinogen on the market to poison a nation all in the name of money. In a Washington Post article of December 12, 2001 about Do ...

• Why Are Smart People So Ignorant When it Comes to ...

  (NaturalNews) A heart disease patient of late Had an IQ of 168. His brain was immense But it lacked common sense And it never engaged when he ate. - by the Health Ranger As an observer of human behavior, one of the most fascinating things I've ever witnessed is really smart people dying of diseases ...

• Specific Pesticide Directly Linked to Parkinson's ...

  (NaturalNews) According to the National Parkinson Foundation, about 1.5. Americans currently have Parkinson's Disease (PD) -- the motor system disorder which afflicts actor Michael J. Fox. Another 60,000 or so people in the U.S. will be diagnosed with PD in 2009. The four main symptoms of this often ...

• TheGallopingBeaver

• G.I. Jane

  THE NY TIMES has an interesting article by Lizette Alvarez, " G.I. Jane Breaks the Combat Barrier as War Evolves ". It's about the experience of women in the conflict in Iraq. In a Taliban wonderland, women cannot go to school or have a job; in Saudi, they are forbidden to drive; in Iraq, they colle ...

• He's not sayin', he's just...you know...sayin'

  Sure, he's a block away from where the president is speaking, and he's carrying a sign suggesting the need for violent revolution/assasination and bloodshed while packing heat, but it isn't a threat. He's just a patriotic American exercising his legal second amendment rights. Remember when George B ...

• Where are the mighty Martin Mars?

  As thousands of people in BC are evacuated from their homes ahead of raging forest fires, where are the mighty Martin Mars water bombers? From owners Coulson Flying Tankers in Port Alberni, BC : They can be in the air in ten minutes and, based on historical data, each can make a drop every fifteen ...

• But can they handle Godzilla?

  There a general election at the end of the month here in Japan so the parties are busy running around trying to show how on top of things they are and how they have every possible contingency covered in their little policy books. Naturally, the papers have been full of policy stuff for weeks, much o ...

• The New Know-Nothings

  I often think he's a sexist pig and frequently wish he'd just shut up already about atheism and religion, but Bill Maher is right: Americans are stupid. I don't think all Americans are stupid, but there is a vast swath of dumbness that seem to run through the population like a venereal disease. I ...

Media Matters for America

• After previously debunking "death panels," NY ...

  Reporting on the claim that a provision in the House health care bill that requires Medicare to cover voluntary end-of-life counseling sessions would "set up 'death panels' to determine care for patients who are close to dying," The New York Times portrayed the issue as a he said/she said debat ...

• Wallace revives rationing bogeyman

  On Fox News Sunday , host Chris Wallace repeatedly advanced the conservative talking point that Democrats' health care reform proposals would create a system of rationing care, omitting the fact that rationing already happens under the current system. Indeed, Wallace did not acknowledge that ...

• Tucker Carlson absurdly claims it's "absurd" to t ...

  On Fox News' Hannity , contributor Tucker Carlson called the idea that "town hall meetings are somehow being infiltrated by industry, opponents to the plan, and their shills, basically, working on behalf of trade groups" a "conspiracy theory" and "absurd," and agreed with host Sean Hannity that ...

• Fox uses falsehood, cropped video to hype unsolic ...

  Even while asserting that he wasn't suggesting anything "nefarious" on the part of the White House, Fox News' Major Garrett did just that while recounting an exchange he had with White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, in which Garrett relayed complaints from people who, according to Garrett, ...

• REPORT: The media have debunked the death panels ...

  Numerous media outlets have now debunked right-wing claims that the House health care reform bill would encourage euthanasia of the elderly, including Sarah Palin's claim -- forwarded by the conservative media -- that the bill would create a "death panel" and the related claim -- initiated by Be ...

Global Research.ca

• War? Israeli ambassador to US: Obama’s end-of-th ...

  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.

• Wealth Inequality and the New World Order

  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.

• Spy bug takes flight, wins more Pentagon money

  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.

• Italy, Germany and Japan: Former World War II Axis ...

  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.

• US Air Force Program: Marine Mammals and Other Sea ...

  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.

TPM Cafe

• Is Max Baucus the New Phil Gramm?

  Is Max Baucus about to do to America's health care system what Phil Gramm already did to the nation's banking system? Let's hope someone stops Baucus before it's too late.... Sponsored Topics: Max Baucus - United States - Senate Finance Committee - Medicare - Health care

• Addicted to The Mall Economy

  As this chart shows, almost every major country is experiencing an upturn in export volume, except the U.S.. The news yesterday that retail back-to-school sales were down spooked investors. Halfway through the back-to-school shopping season, retail professionals are predicting the... Sponsored Top ...

• Obama: Stay Home, Those People Out There Are Nuts

  Check this out from ABC News. Enough with the town meetings already. One of the best things about living in the world today is that you can communicate with the American people without risking your life. The value added from... Sponsored Topics: ABC News - United States - President - Town meeting ...

• Botanist of the Trees of Crazy

  Don't miss Rick Perlstein's WP Outlook piece, "In America, Crazy Is a Preexisting Condition / Birthers, Town Hall Hecklers and the Return of Right-Wing Rage." It's a fine supplement to Richard Hofstadter's The Paranoid Style in American Politics, published in... Sponsored Topics: Rick Perlstein - ...

• Presented By:

TruthOut

• White House Appears Ready to Drop "Public Option"

  Seniors are raising questions about health reform plans. (Photo: Chris Schneider / The Tribune) read more

• Who's Behind the Attacks on a Health Care Overhaul ...

  Washington - Much of the money and strategy behind the so-called grassroots groups organizing opposition to the Democrats' health care plans comes from conservative political consultants, professional organizers and millionaires, some of whom hold financial stakes in the outcome. If Preside ...

• "What Do Palestinians Want?" Is the Wrong Question

  What do the Palestinians really want, anyway? Are they ready to compromise and make peace with Israel? Or are they really intent on abolishing the Jewish state? Sooner or later, nearly every conversation about the Middle East conflict - whether it's here in the US, in Israel, or most anywhere el ...

• Iran Defies Condemnation, Expands Opposition Trial

  Tehran, Iran - Iran expanded a mass trial of opposition supporters on Sunday with the addition of 25 defendants - including a Jewish teenager - in defiance of international condemnation, as France said Iran agreed to release a French woman held on spying charges from prison. The defendants ...

• Actor's US 'Detention' Prompts Outrage in India

  New Delhi - Angry fans burned a US flag in protest Sunday, a Cabinet minister suggested searching visiting Americans and an actress tweeted her outrage after Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan said he was detained for questioning at a U.S. airport. Though US immigration officials denied he ...

The Heathlander

• A culture of fear

  Pankaj Mishra dissects the ‘culture of fear’ being manufactured by a recent spate of books and articles warning of an impending ‘Eurabia’: ‘Ordinary Muslims in Europe, who suffer from the demoralisation caused by living as perennial objects of suspicion and contempt, are far from thinking ...

• Fighting the fash

  Anti-fascist activists successfully confronted the BNP’s ‘Red, White and Blue’ hatefest [.pdf] (see also this Channel 4 report) in Codnor yesterday: One of the favourite chants of the day was reportedly: “We are black, white, Asian and we’re Jew / And they’re many, many more of us than ...

• Silencing civil society

  Former Israeli military commander Efran Efrati recently testified to the BBC that Palestinian children are ‘routinely ill-treated’ by Israeli soldiers: “You take the kid, you blindfold him, you handcuff him, he’s really shaking… Sometimes you cuff his legs too. Sometimes it cuts off the ci ...

• Gaza Freedom March

  For those who don’t know, Norman Finkelstein and others are organising a mass non-violent global march on Gaza to break the siege. Some updates: - Gaza Freedom March website: http://www.gazafreedommarch.org/ - YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/GazaFreedomMarch - A list of peop ...

• The latest anti-Hamas meme: “child brides”

  Last week, Hamas sponsored a mass wedding celebration in Gaza, perhaps in an attempt to reverse its flagging poll ratings: ‘Nearly a thousand Palestinians celebrated marriage on Thursday night in a ceremony organised by Hamas in the north of the Gaza Strip. Hamas dignitaries including Mahmud Zahar ...

Water - AlterNet

• Mining's Destructive Legacy on Waterways

  Scientists are now beginning to see that mining's most lasting damage may be the massive amounts of debris dumped into valley streams.

• The CA Legislature Unveiled 5 New Water Bills -- A ...

  I would urge that California's water warriors hold their opinions until they actually read and digest these bills.

• Vitaminwater's Empty Calories Are at the Heart of ...

  Vitaminwater tells its customers to "hydrate responsibly." That means not drinking 125-calorie sugar rushes like ... Vitaminwater.

• Why Corporations, Emerging Powers and Petro-States ...

  In the past six months, big players in the global economy have grabbed 50 million acres of arable land, from Africa to Southeast Asia.

• Goodbye Pools, Lawns and a Whole Lot More: Why Lif ...

  Water in the very near future will be neither cheap nor plentiful, and much of the Southwest is destined for real trouble.

TruthHugger

• Without Health Options – Where Is Your Voice? Op ...

  Who needs health care

• Republicans Have Government Insurance, Why Can’t ...

  For weeks I have been listening to all the BS Republicans have spewed about health care reform. Republicans shouted it was socialized medicine and when that didn’t work they came up with other untruths. The fact of the matter is all members of Congress use the public option plan. Republicans are w ...

• Retire Early In Self Defense Could Be A Mistake †...

  /h3> Collect Now, or Later? Timing Your Social Security Benefits With the current state of US and world economy, the alternative to jumping out a window, committing a heinous crime or planting your pup tent under an overpass, is retire early and collect your meager social security check at gene ...

• Texas Progressive Alliance – July 13, 2009

  It’s Monday and it’s time for another version of the Texas Progressive Alliance weekly highlight reel. Off the Kuff suggests that a pro-science PAC could do a lot of good, nationally and in Texas. WCNews at Eye On Williamson reminds us that despite the brouhaha over transportation during the rec ...

• Protect Us From Another Celebrity Death and Networ ...

  The world is reeling from political upheaval, economic meltdown and environmental catastrophe. What does the national media focus on for two weeks? The high drama of a controversial musical artist who has the audacity of dying. News that effects each and every person on this planet is buried un ...

Dandelion Salad - Featured Writers' Posts

• Guantánamo And The Courts (Part Two): Obama’s S ...

  by Andy Worthington Featured Writer Dandelion Salad www.andyworthington.co.uk 11 Aug. 2009 In the

• Money is God, Greed is King and Corruption Runs th ...

  By Siv O’Neall Featured Writer Dandelion Salad axisoflogic.com August 16, 2009 Never has the world

• American Economy: The Shrinking Margin of Error by ...

  by Josh Sidman Dandelion Salad Featured Writer Josh’s Blog Post August 10, 2009 One of the most p

• Barack Obama, front man for the ‘man’ By Willi ...

  By William Bowles Featured Writer Dandelion Salad Creative-i 16 August 2009 I contend that ever si

• House un-American Activities Committee Chaired by ...

  By Cindy Sheehan Featured Writer Dandelion Salad Cindy Sheehan’s Soapbox Blog Cindy Sheehan’s Soap

Unexplained Mysteries

• "Mighty" T. Rex mostly picked off youngsters ?

  A new study in to the behaviour of legendary dinosaur Tyrannosaurus rex has revealed that this fearsome predator would have been unlikely to attack ad...

• Facial expressions 'not global'

  People from different cultures read facial expressions differently a new study has suggested. People from East Asia for instance focus more on the eye...

• Skydiver survives 10,000ft fall to ground

  A skydiver has survived a 10,000ft plunge when his parachute failed to open after jumping from a plane over Shropshire, England. Paul Lewis, 40, lande...

• Mona Lisa gets animated

  A team of animators have created an exhibit of animated masterpieces at Beijing's Planning Exhibition Hall. Paintings such as the Mona Lisa can now mo...

• Massive methane storm spotted over Titan

  A huge storm the size of India has been observed over Saturn's moon Titan. Scientists are now working to try and piece together the processes that cau...

Grassroots

• Building a Movement, Haitian Style

  pigs.jpg I spent the better part of last week crisscrossing Haiti’s arid Northwest with Grassroots International’s partner the National Congress of the Peasant’s Movement of Papay (MPNKP). MPNKP is best known to our allies and friends fo ...

• Resilient Hondurans Lead The Way To Protect Democr ...

  IMG00292.jpg Today, thousands of people will fill the streets of Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras. They are students, housekeepers, children and farmers from different parts of country—many of whom walked 10-12 miles a day to get to the ...

• Yes, We Can - But Will We Join Our Neighbors to Re ...

  More than a month after the military coup in the Central American country of Honduras (for which the term “banana republic” was originally coined due to the overwhelming influence of U.S. fruit corporations in that country), the junta is still in power and shows little real sign of budging. re ...

• They Are Afraid of Us, Because We are Not Afraid o ...

  Tom Loudon from our ally the Alliance for Responsible Trade, which is a member of the Hemispheric Social Alliance (a Grassroots International grantee) is currently in Honduras as part of an international human rights monitoring delegation. Today, August 11th, the Global Day of Action for Honduras, h ...

• On the Global Day of Action for Honduras, Donate y ...

  Want to do something simple to help support Honduran democracy and keep the crisis in the public eye? Donate your status! It’s free, easy, and can make a huge impact. Right now, the corporate news media is mostly silent about what’s happening on the ground in Honduras and the role of US polic ...

Climate

• August 15-16, 2009

  China Sets Date for CO2 Cut (Financial Times) China's carbon emissions will start falling by 2050, its top climate change policymaker said, the first time the world's largest emitter has given such a time-frame. Gloomy Negotiators End Bonn Climate Talks (Greenwire) The latest round of talks ...

• August 14, 2009

  China Says Rich Up Pressure on Poor over Climate (Reuters) China has accused rich nations at UN climate talks of increasing pressure on the poor to do more to combat global warming while shirking their own responsibility to lead. India Blames Kyoto Failure for Climate Standoff (AFP) India ...

• August 13, 2009

  U.S. Court Blocks Plan to Curb Mountaintop Mining (Reuters) A federal court in Washington has blocked an attempt by the Obama administration to overturn a Bush-era rule that made it easier for coal mining companies to dump mountaintop debris into valley streams. Australian Parliament Rejects C ...

• August 12, 2009

  Oil Sands Test of Obama's Green Credentials (Financial Times) The Obama administration faces a test of its environmental credentials in deciding whether to approve a pipeline carrying greenhouse gas-intensive oil sands fuel from Canada into the US. Virginia Judge Nixes Permit for Coal Power Pla ...

• August 15-16, 2009

  China Sets Date for CO2 Cut (Financial Times) China's carbon emissions will start falling by 2050, its top climate change policymaker said, the first time the world's largest emitter has given such a time-frame. Gloomy Negotiators End Bonn Climate Talks (Greenwire) The latest round of talks ...

TomDispatch

• Tomgram: Withdrawing by Bike from Iraq

  [ Note for TomDispatch Readers: So it's sayonara for a couple of weeks. I'm taking my usual August break. TomDispatch will return sometime the week of August 24th, but will be on a limited posting schedule through Labor Day. Let me take this opportunity once again to thank those of you who hav ...

• Tomgram: Mark Engler, Protesting at Climate Groun ...

  We're so past the Roman Empire by now that it's probably time to update the phrase "fiddling while Rome burns." What about, for instance, "writing fake letters ostensibly from real non-profit groups to weaken a climate-change bill while the planet burns"? It's true. According to the New York Ti ...

• Tomgram: Jamail and Lazare, Lost in Military Limb ...

  [ Note for TomDispatch Readers: In Chalmers Johnson's recent piece, "Three Good Reasons to Liquidate Our Empire," the mission of the Service Women's Action Network (SWAN) was mischaracterized. It has now been corrected at the piece. ] It's not exactly a secret that the U.S. Army and the U.S. M ...

• Tomgram: John Feffer, Their Martyrs and Our Heroe ...

  The way you imagine someone engaged in a suicide attack depends, not surprisingly, on which end of the attack you happen to be on -- in cultural, if not literal terms. In American films and pop culture, there were few acts more inexplicable or malevolent in the years of my childhood than those of ...

• Tomgram: Frida Berrigan, 64 Years Too Late and No ...

  As another August 6th approaches, let me tell you a little story about Hiroshima and me: As a young man, I was probably not completely atypical in having the Bomb (the 1950s was a great time for capitalizing what was important) on my brain, and not just while I was ducking under my school desk ...

Smirking Chimp

• The Great Government Swine Flu Conspiracy

  More than 230,000 cases of the Swine Flu have been confirmed world wide. About 2,100 persons have died. As much as one-fourth of America's workforce may be infected by Swine Flu when it peaks in Winter, according to studies conducted by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. CDC sci ...

• John Edwards Vows to Spend More Time With His Fami ...

  Former presidential candidate John Edwards said today that he would withdraw from public life, promising "to spend more time with my families." But even as he made this vow, Mr. Edwards said he would continue to sound the themes of his presidential campaigns: "There are two Americas, and I have chil ...

• Anyone Want to Buy a Title?

  This is an article I did for the Daily Beast. It is one of the major disappointments of the Obama administration that this practice should continue unabted. But if you ever feel bad about something he has done, there are two words you can say that will make you feel better -- Sarah Palin. That will ...

• Why the Opponents of Health Care Reform Are Baby K ...

  Below is an article I did for McClatchy which was posted today. The title I chose is a little more provocative than the one below that appeared on the article. McClatchy Washington Bureau Posted on Sun, Aug. 16, 2009 Commentary: U.S. healthcare reform faces the status quo Dennis Jett | Special ...

• Please boycott Whole Foods.

  I am not the first person here on The Smirking Chimp to call for the boycott of Whole Foods after the op-ed in the Wall Street Journal that appeared under the name of Whole Foods CEO John Mackey, though it appears now that much of it was ghost written by Lanny Davis. Here is a link to Miss Marple' ...

Ten Percent

• Malalai Joya- Raising My Voice (Review Part 1)

  ‘The truth is like the sun: when it comes up nobody can block it out or hide it’ Malalai Joya is an Afghan woman, the youngest MP in the Loya Jirga and barred from it since 2007 because a woman telling the truth is still forbidden in Afghanistan. In her book Raising My Voice she attempts [.. ...

• Ezra Nawi’s Sentencing Now Scheduled For 21st Se ...

  Dear friends and supporters, Ezra’s sentencing process started this morning (Aug 16′ 2009). Ezra and the “Committee for Ezra Nawi” wish to thank and express our appreciation to all those who testified on his behalf, came to court, wrote letters or signed petitions. As part of today’s hea ...

• Help Ezra Nawi

  Ezra Nawi will be sentenced this Sunday. Over 19,000 people have already asked Israel not to jail him. We will bring their signatures to the courtroom–but we need more. His crime? Watch the video and see for yourself. Ezra tried to stop a military bulldozer from destroying the homes of Palestinia ...

• Claustrophobia

• Why Jim Webb Was In Burma

  Reagan appointee (and now conservative Dem and occasional screenwriter whose ‘Rules of Engagement’ was described as “probably the most racist film ever made against Arabs by Hollywood“) the former Marine has gotten Yettaw out, but really the US agenda is …democracy…China. He is a critic ...

Paul Krugman

• A quick note on Germany and France

  There's a dissonance between what Germany says and what it does.

• Left-wing propaganda

  Beware of Julie and Julia.

• More on deficits and interest rates (wonkish)

  A bit more detail on the reasoning behind my earlier post on deficits and interest rates.

• Perspective on the eurobounce

  Germany is growing, but only after a deep slump.

• Deficits and interest rates

  It turns out that there's a strong correlation between budget deficits and interest rates -- namely, when deficits are high, interest rates are low.

No Quarter

• Tune In Now: Larry Johnson on The John Batchelor S ...

  Tune in to John Batchelor’s West Coast show by 10:30 p.m. EDT. In case Larry joins the panel early, start listening at 10:05 p.m. via KFI 640 AM. From John Batchelor’s schedule for tonight’s show: Sunday 1035P: (735P Pacific Time): John Fund, WSJ, Diana West, Larry Johnson, No Quarter, Marga ...

• Reforming For Profits

  We must have misunderstood. We thought the whole point of reforming health care was to actually help the american people have better, more affordable health care. We thought the promise was: BARACK OBAMA’S PLAN FOR A HEALTHY AMERICA: Lowering health care costs and ensuring affordable, high-quali ...

• In 15 Minutes, Join NoQuarter Radio’s Sense on C ...

  Join me tonight on NQR’s Sense on Cents with Larry Doyle as I welcome Ronnie Sue Ambrosino, head of the Bernard Madoff Victims Coalition. Has our government ever failed us to the extent involved in the regulatory oversight connected to the Bernard Madoff Ponzi scheme? How could these failures hav ...

• The Tiny Window

  I know this isn’t much of a cartoon. But it’s the look that I needed to illustrate what I think you will find much more interesting in my story. When I was doing health care research for General Wes Clark’s team a few years ago, I gained some fascinating insights into what it would [...]

• President Clinton Responds To A “Heckler”

  At the Netroot Nations ‘09 meeting recently, there was an interaction between President Bill Clinton and a member of the audience. During Clinton’s speech, this man stood up to ask him some questions. I mean in the middle of Clinton’s speech. Major H/T to my NQ fellow writer, pm317 for the fo ...

Environmental Graffiti

• Tarantulas Aggressively Baring Their Fangs
• Ant Invaders Enslave their Kind and Subject them t ...
• Rare Photo of 1840s American Steam Locomotive
• The Incredible Terraced Chalk Ponds of Pamukkale
• Amsterdam From Above

Foreign Policy in Focus

• Lack of North American Leadership

  The three amigos met in Guadalajara and failed to usher in a new paradigm of North American cooperation.

• Learning from the British in Iraq

  History suggests that the United States won't be leaving Iraq any time soon.

• The Pursuit of True Security

  For all of the money we spend on defense, are we really all that safer?

• The Bully in Baghdad

  Politics has trumped democracy as Iraq just postponed a key vote on the status of U.S. forces in their country.

• Postcard From...Dharamsala

  Dharamsala is where Tibet 2.0 is being created.

Therapy News

• Temp Jobs Harm Mental Health - Study Suggests

  A GoodTherapy.org News Headline In the modern economic environment, many people are struggling with job loss or with the fear of losing their sources of income, and some are turning to temp jobs in an effort to stay afloat. While this may be a wise choice financially, a study conducted at McGill Uni ...

• Multi-National Study Links Many Mental Health Conc ...

  A GoodTherapy.org News Headline In the consideration of suicide, it’s a commonly held idea that those with symptoms of depression are most prone to thinking about suicide and exhibiting relevant behaviors. This may not be the case, however, as described by a recent study based on over one hundred ...

• Therapy for Smoking Cessation May Ward Off Dementi ...

  A GoodTherapy.org News Update Smoking Cessation Therapies May Ward Off Dementia Cognitive decline is a serious mental health issue affecting a large number of aging people, and tends to strike for a variety of reasons, sometimes without much of any warning. As the progress of medical science marches ...

• Annual Conference for OCD Helps Clients Cope

  A GoodTherapy.org News Headline While the effects, for both clients and their families, of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder or OCD can have far-reaching consequences that greatly impact elements of everyday life, many who grapple with the mental health concern remain untreated, even during the normal c ...

• Growing Awareness of Nutrition Sets to Foster Happ ...

  A GoodTherapy.org News Update Check into a given health-related news portal these days and you’re likely to find a wealth of material about obesity. Calling the increasing number of people who grow up overweight an “epidemic,â€� some medical professionals and reporters have represented the ...

Mountaintop Removal

• Army Corps of Engineers Approves Permit for Contro ...

  Charleston, West Virginia Today the public learned that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers issued a Clean Water Act permit last week for Consol Energy’s Peg Fork mountaintop removal coal mine in Mingo County, West Virginia.

• Arrival of windmills to N.J. may pose threat to wi ...

  National designation sought for Shawangunk-Kittatinny Ridge in the Appalachian Highlands

• The plan: Plant 125 million trees (Lexington Heral ...

  A group promoting reforestation in Appalachia is seeking more than $422 million to plant trees on mo

• Reclamation changed in 1970s (Lexington Herald-Lea ...

  Surface mining in the steep-sided hills of Appalachia stretches back generations, but the practice e

• the plan: plant 125 million trees (Lexington Heral ...

  A group promoting reforestation in Appalachia is seeking more than $422 million to plant trees on mo

Memeorandum

• Administration Official: "Sebelius Misspoke." (Mar ...

  Marc Ambinder / The Atlantic Politics Channel : Administration Official: “Sebelius Misspoke.” — An administration official said tonight that Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius “misspoke” when she told CNN this morning that a government run health insurance option â ...

• White House Appears Open to Insurance Co-ops (Jose ...

  Joseph Berger / New York Times : White House Appears Open to Insurance Co-ops — The Obama administration sent signals on Sunday that it has backed away from its once-firm vision of a government organization to provide for the nation's 50 million uninsured and is now open to using nonprofit c ...

• Row over Afghan wife-starving law (Sarah Rainsford ...

  Sarah Rainsford / BBC : Row over Afghan wife-starving law — An Afghan bill allowing a husband to starve his wife if she refuses to have sex has been published in the official gazette and become law. — The original bill caused outrage earlier this year, forcing Afghan President Hamid K ...

• Sebelius: There will be competition with private i ...

  Martina Stewart / CNN : Sebelius: There will be competition with private insurers — WASHINGTON (CNN) - A day after President Obama appeared to suggest that his administration might be open to health care reform legislation that does not include a public health insurance option, one of Obama ...

• Swimmers are told to wear burkinis (Patrick Sawer/ ...

  Patrick Sawer / Telegraph : Swimmers are told to wear burkinis — British swimming pools are imposing Muslim dress codes in a move described as divisive by Labour MPs. — Under the rules, swimmers - including non-Muslims - are barred from entering the pool in normal swimming attire.

Energy & Environment News

• A New Test for Business and Biofuel

  One of the nation’s wealthiest American Indian communities is a major investor in a start-up with the twin goals of making fuel from algae and reducing emissions.

• U.S. Says Refineries Bought Oil Smuggled From Mexi ...

  At least one American oil executive has pleaded guilty to a conspiracy that involved about $2 million in stolen Mexican oil, United States Justice Department officials said.

• Dynegy in $1.5 Billion Deal to Sell 8 Electricity ...

  Dynegy also posted a wider second-quarter loss of $345 million as lower power prices offset higher production.

• Green Inc. Column: A New Focus on Ocean Conservati ...

  Conservationists are turning their attention toward the sea as development pressures mean less land contiguously available for protection.

• Economic View: A Missed Opportunity on Climate Cha ...

  If carbon allowances are distributed free instead of auctioned, the tax offset for consumers evaporates and effective tax rates will rise.

5+ quakes - 7 days

• M 5.0, Kepulauan Mentawai region, Indonesia

  Monday, August 17, 2009 00:33:51 UTC Monday, August 17, 2009 07:33:51 AM at epicenter Depth : 35.00 km (21.75 mi)

• M 6.7, southwestern Ryukyu Islands, Japan

  Monday, August 17, 2009 00:05:47 UTC Monday, August 17, 2009 09:05:47 AM at epicenter Depth : 10.00 km (6.21 mi)

• M 6.6, Izu Islands, Japan region

  Wednesday, August 12, 2009 22:48:51 UTC Thursday, August 13, 2009 07:48:51 AM at epicenter Depth : 51.00 km (31.69 mi)

• M 5.7, Mindanao, Philippines

  Wednesday, August 12, 2009 20:04:25 UTC Thursday, August 13, 2009 04:04:25 AM at epicenter Depth : 95.00 km (59.03 mi)

• M 5.5, Catamarca, Argentina

  Wednesday, August 12, 2009 18:00:51 UTC Wednesday, August 12, 2009 03:00:51 PM at epicenter Depth : 156.10 km (97.00 mi)

China Dialogue

• Removing chemicals from our food

  Recent studies show that food safety in China still needs improvement. Organic production is the answer, argues Jiang Gaoming. Here he explains how to make the shift. Environmental group Greenpeace recently tested vegetables purchased in supermarkets and markets in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou at ...

• Beginning of the end for oil?

  Greenpeace and others see the industry approaching a tipping point, thanks to price declines, technological advances and climate policies. Controversial investments in Canadian tar sands may be doomed. David Teather reports. A long-term decline in the demand for oil could undermine the huge investme ...

• Solar futures at the foot of Everest

  Passive solar homes could help to improve people’s daily lives and protect the environment on the Tibetan plateau, finds Cai Rupeng. The summer had only just started, but village elder Yuzhen was already looking forward to winter. Standing in front of her home in Tingri , Tibet, one looks up and s ...

• Leading the swine-flu battle

  WHO director Margaret Chan announced in June that a new virus had reached pandemic proportions. She tells Aida Edemariam how H1N1 is being fought and of the personal price she pays. Although she would no doubt point out that swine flu should properly be called H1N1, there is something pleasing in th ...

• “I openly call for emissions cuts” (2)

  In the second section of a two-part interview, Liu Jianqiang and Yi Shui talk to Hu Angang about how China’s climate-change policy is formed, and how it can change. [Produced in association with Rutgers Climate and Social Policy Initiative ] chinadialogue: Many Chinese people who oppose a comm ...

Daily Censored

• Ohio police dispatcher passes along racist image o ...

  Read the full story at Think Progress The OhioDaily blog reports on a “rogue” dispatcher from the North Canton Police who recently sent out a racist e-mail from her work account. Dispatcher Anita Malachowski forwarded this message: “New “Air Force One” Tail Number and yes, please forgive ...

• They Still Think We’re Fox News

  Read the full story at News Hounds I’m taking off for the mountains for a few days and posting may be a bit lighter than usual. So I thought I’d post something a bit less heavy than the kind of alarming, incendiary, anti-Democratic commentary that has been steadily pouring forth from Fox News la ...

• They Still Think We’re Fox News

  Read the full story at News Hounds I’m taking off for the mountains for a few days and posting may be a bit lighter than usual. So I thought I’d post something a bit less heavy than the kind of alarming, incendiary, anti-Democratic commentary that has been steadily pouring forth from Fox News la ...

• Corzine on Christie: He’s ‘a lawbreaker’ who ...

  Read the full story at Think Progress For years, GOP leaders have been eyeing former U.S. attorney Chris Christie for national political office. In recent congressional testimony, Karl Rove revealed that “he had conversations with Christie about a possible run for governor while Christie was servi ...

• Rep. Meek: There are members of Congress telling h ...

  Read the full story at Think Progress In an interview with ThinkProgress yesterday, Rep. Kendrick Meek (D-FL) — who is now running for Senate — warned that special interests’ influence over Congress has impeded efforts at health care reform. Insurance companies are now promising to cover indiv ...

AlterNet's Breaking News

• Taiwan must airlift many typhoon victims: govt

• Tiger's invincible aura shattered by unheralded Ko ...

• Yang stuns Tiger to win PGA, claim Asia's first ma ...

• Groin injury troubles Gay ahead of 200m heats

• Tropical storms race toward the Caribbean

Institute for Policy Studies

• Their Martyrs and Our Heroes

  Powerful, developed countries have suicide bombers too.

• Taxing Wealth for the Common Good

  Business leaders and wealthy individuals call for a repeal of the Bush-era taxes on high incomes.

• The Destruction of the Black Middle Class

  Left out of the commentary on race and class over the Gates affair has been talk of the increasing impoverishment — or, we should say, re-impoverishment — of African Americans as a group.

• Asia's Axis of Evil?

  Burma and North Korea are the pariahs of Asia. Are these birds of a feather flocking together?

• Obama: Renegotiate NAFTA as You Promised

  Mexican, Canadian, and U.S. leaders should scrap their failed "Security and Prosperity Partnership" and begin overhauling the North American Free Trade agreement at an upcoming Guadalajara meeting.

Reuters - Most Popular Articles

• Chavez says Obama "lost in space" on Latin America

  CARACAS (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama is "lost in the Andromeda" galaxy on Latin American policy, his chief critic in the region, Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, said on Sunday, while demanding the closure of U.S. military bases.

• Public insurance plan not essential: Sebelius

  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The government-run health insurance option favored by President Barack Obama is not essential to a healthcare overhaul as long as the final measure boosts competition, a top U.S. health official said on Sunday.

• Tropical Storm Claudette threatens Gulf Coast

  MIAMI (Reuters) - Tropical Storm Claudette, the third of the Atlantic hurricane season, formed on Sunday in the Gulf of Mexico east of the heaviest concentration of U.S. energy platforms, as two other storms, Ana and Bill, raced across the Atlantic.

• Ahmadinejad plans female ministers in Iran cabinet

  TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Sunday he would propose at least three female ministers in his cabinet following the disputed election, an unprecedented move in the conservative Islamic state.

• Fox News' "Glenn Beck" loses advertisers

  NEW YORK (Nielsen Business Media) - Some of the nation's biggest advertisers are distancing themselves from Fox News host Glenn Beck after he called President Obama a racist during a July 28 broadcast.

Godspace

• Unemployment as a Spiritual Practice

  I am now back from Australia and as you can imagine the posts for my series on What is a Spiritual Practice have been mounting up while I have had limited internet access and less time to focus on such things. Â Thanks for your patience and for your prayers during this challenging season. Today’ ...

• Editing your Life: The Spiritual Discipline of Edi ...

  I am sitting in Sydney on a beautiful but crisp winter’s morning watching the rainbow lorikeets out in the trees. Â My Dad’s funeral is over and I will head back to Seattle in 2 days time. Â I have been very aware of prayer and the grace of God in the midst of this. Â Thanks to [...]

• Living in Transition as Spiritual Practice

  I am now in Sydney Australia after what has been one of the easiest long international trips I have made for a long time. Â I even slept for several hours on the flight which makes me very aware of the fact that people have been praying for me. Today’s article comes from Guy Chmieleski who is [. ...

• Recent Additions to the Spiritual Practices series

  Here’s the round-up of the most recent Spiritual Practices posts: The Spiritual Practice of Apologizing by T Freeman Love-making as a Spiritual Practice by Mark Scandrette Smoking the Glory of God by Jason Clark The Spiritual Practice of Getting Honest With Myself by Jonathan Brink Spiritual Disci ...

• Between the Sheets: Sleeping as A Spiritual Practi ...

  I will be heading out to Australia this afternoon but am hoping to continue posting while I travel. Â The submissions continue to arrive which is wonderful and I am enjoying reading them before I post them. This morning’s post is from Teri Peterson a presbyterian pastor who loves her new bed (wh ...

Equality Trust

• Shattering the myth of equality

  An article by Boris Frankel in Melbourne's newspaper 'The Age'.

• Polly Toynbee: This bold equality push is just wha ...

  Polly Toynbee writing about the new Equality Bill today's Guardian. "Harriet Harman's bill is a frank recognition of the role of class in Britain. A decade earlier, it might have had a real impact..."

• Seumas Milne: This naked display of class egotism ...

  "It's more than a week since Alistair Darling's budget, but the howls of protest haven't stopped for a day ever since. That's not been the public sector employees facing a harsh squeeze on jobs and pay who've been squealing, or the million workers expected to join the dole queues in the next year, ...

• Bob Holman on social breakdown

  Bob Holman writes in the Glasgow Herald about the evidence in The Spirit Level.

• Inequality is the root of our unhappiness

  Former director of the Institute of Education Peter Mortimore, writing in today's Education Guardian.

IntelNews

• News you may have missed #0068

  US overt aid to Pakistan revealed. Intolerance of Arabs, Muslims led to torture, says US interrogator. China drops Rio Tinto espionage charges.

• Sri Lankan forces score massive intelligence victo ...

  Not only does the Sri Lankan government appear to be scoring a massive tactical victory in its 25-year military confrontation with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), it is also well on its way to smashing the LTTE’s intelligence infrastructure.

• Ex-FBI translator alleges Turkish intelligence act ...

  A former FBI translator has alleged that agents acting at the behest of the Turkish government have bugged, blackmailed and bribed US politicians.

• News you may have missed #0067

  David Wise on CIA assassinations. These are the architects of torture in 9/11’s wake. Defector recounts torture, terrorism by Uzbek government.

• News you may have missed #0066

  US court upholds conviction of CIA contractor. US ex-Attorney General comes out against CIA probe. A rare Chinese view on the Rio Tinto spy case.

Res'Eau-WaterNet

• Too Many Canadians Without Safe Water: $5.2M to He ...

  For six million Canadians, quenching their thirst isn’t a matter of simply turning on the kitchen faucet.

• Dr. David Wilkinson appointed Director of the Clea ...

  RES'EAU-WaterNET researcher Dr. David Wilkinson was recently appointed Director of the Clean Energy Research Centre (CERC), beginning July 1, 2009.

• Walkerton Clean Water Centre Receives Ontario Mini ...

  The Walkerton Clean Water Centre (WCWC) – a RES’EAU-WaterNET partner – received the 2008 Emerald Award for innovation from the Ontario Ministry of the Environment at an awards ceremony held on March 3, 2009.

• Filling the glass

  Innovation Canada : Showcasing Research Excellence in Canada

PDA AMERICA

• A Progressive Response to Mitch Stewart & OFA

  Dear Mitch Stewart & OFA, I am glad you are still Organizing for America — we need the activated grassroots energy that swept Mr. Obama into office to keep things moving forward. But I have ...

• Progressive Democrats take a stand on health care

  From the RNN: The Real News Network Some members of Congress are going to fight for a robust public option and a single-payer amendment VIDEO CAN BE VIEWED BY CLICKING HERE An amendment introduced by representative Anthony ...

• Who Decides About War?

  WhoDecidesAboutWar.org National Conference on War Powers, Law, and Democracy October 2-3, 2009 Washington D.C. Who decides about war and peace? Congress? The President? The Courts? The People? What kind of national defense should the U.S. have? What ...

• Another Scandal Near New Orleans

  By Jayne Lyn Stahl There have been no shortage of news stories about how detainees have been treated at Guantanamo Bay, and Abu Ghraib before it. Likewise, there has been a lot of talk about so-called ...

• CDPP Report for August 2009

  CDPP report, August 2009, Mervis Reissig and Anna Givens Two of us have volunteered to continue working with the Congressional District Point Person program for PDA. As CD Point People ourselves and longtime volunteers for ...

Marler Blog

• Why the CDC has it right - It was Nestle Toll Hous ...

  In early June 2009, public health investigators noticed an increase in isolates submitted by multiple state public health laboratories to PulseNet with a two-enzyme pattern combination of EXHX01.0224 and EXHA26.0536. This is a relatively common pattern combination, appearing at least 364 times in t ...

• OK, I made a mistake - FSIS did publish Retail Rec ...

  I blew it. I look at the FSIS site daily and I missed that they had posted the below list of retail outlets that received the Salmonella Newport Beef: I am sorry. The Sterling Pacific Meat products subject to recall include: Fatburger Brand: * 20-pound packages of "8 oz. PUCK (80/20) GROUND BEEF P ...

• A week after FSIS announces a Class I Recall of Sa ...

  On August 6, 2009 Beef Packers, Inc., of Fresno, California recalled approximately 825,769 pounds of ground beef products linked to an outbreak of salmonellosis (disease that can be caused by antibiotic-resistant Salmonella Newport). This was announced on the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Sa ...

• Nestle Toll House Cookie Dough E. coli Outbreak, P ...

  There are a lot of things I love about my job, but one is the science behind linking people in dozens of states to food that they consumed that poisoned them. Once that link is scientifically determined, and the outbreak stopped, then the time comes to learn from the mistakes so the next outbreak c ...

• H.R. 2749 - Food Safety Enhancement Act of 2009 - ...

  Click on above image to see final bill passed from the House, or see my post below.

• IPS - Inter Press Services

• SOUTH-EAST ASIA: River Deal May Help Dam Debate i ...

  HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam, Aug 17 (IPS) - The Mississippi River may be on the other side of the world from the Mekong River, but Vietnamese environmentalists say they hope a new link between the agencies that look after these two river systems can lead to new thinking about ways to manage water ...

• MIDEAST: Children Have a Way With Miracles

  AMSTERDAM, Aug 16 (IPS) - Call it that choice between looking at the half-full or half-empty part of the results. And it is almost half; 55 percent of schoolchildren passed their exams in Gaza this year.

• TOURISM-COSTA RICA: Much More Than a Walk in the ...

  SAN JOSÉ, Aug 16 (Tierramérica) - Some 3,000 people make their living from rural community-based tourism in Costa Rica, according to the association of tour operators who connect visitors to the delights of rural life.

• COTE D’IVOIRE: Communities Determined to Pr ...

  ADIAKÉ, Côte d'Ivoire, Aug 15 (IPS) - When a major agribusiness company began clearing the rich reservoir of biodiversity of southeast Côte d'Ivoire's Tanoé Swamps Forest for an oil palm plantation, ecologists and local communities demonstrated in favour of preserving it.

• INDIA: Swine Flu Tests Privatised Health Care

  NEW DELHI, Aug 15 (IPS) - While the swine flu pandemic has not hit India too hard, it has sorely tested the country’s ailing health delivery system and its plans to remedy the situation through ‘private-public partnerships.’

The Intelligence Daily

• Video -- Peak Everything: Waking Up to the Century ...

• 9/11 Mind Swell

• Global Depression and Regional Wars - Part I

• Italy, Germany and Japan: Former World War II Axis ...

• Latin America: Social Movements in Times of Econom ...

My AntiWar

• Canada in Arctic Show of Strength
• Security Risks, Segregation Likely to Undermine Af ...
• US, Colombia to Sign Deal on Military Deployment W ...
• Weapons Cuts to Pay for Army Troop Increase
• Chavez Says Obama ‘Lost in Space’ on L ...

• Rogue Government.com

• Swine Flu Jab Link To Killer Nerve Disease

• Colonial BancGroup and Pennsylvania thrift shut

  Regulators on Friday shut down Colonial BancGroup Inc., a big lender in real estate development that marked the biggest U.S. bank failure this year, and a small bank in Pennsylvania.

• Send a text message to ET via Hello From Earth

  The website HelloFromEarth.net is giving people a chance to send text messages to planet Gliese 581d which is a planet outside our solar system that could support life. Messages will be compiled on the site until August 23rd and the entire message collection will be sent off to Nasa’s Jet Propul ...

• Behavior Detection Officers To Study Travellers F ...

  From the furrowed brow to the nervously tapping foot, security personnel will soon start studying air travellers' facial expressions and body movements to see if they could be criminals and terrorists.

• U.S. to Resume Training Georgian Troops

  The United States is resuming a combat training mission in the former Soviet republic of Georgia to prepare its army for counterinsurgency operations in Afghanistan, despite the risks of angering Russia , senior Defense Department officials said Thursday.

Innovation Canada

• Ocean view

  The winch at the rear of the ship slowly lowers a 13-tonne steel capsule about the size of three minivans into still water in early July. The shell, painted a garish yellow, is a trawl-resistant frame designed to deflect fishing nets. More important, once settled on the ocean floor, the capsule will ...

• Space reader

  (Article courtesy of the University of Windsor) Bill McConkey probably won’t be around to see the day when humans are finally able to travel tremendous stretches through outer space to distant planets such as Jupiter. When they do make that journey, however, they’ll owe a significant debt of gra ...

• Filling the glass

  Walkerton, Ont., North Battleford, Sask., and the Kashechewan First Nation Reserve, in Northern Ontario, have all become high-profile — and tragic — examples of what can go wrong when a community’s drinking water becomes contaminated. Surprisingly, they are not alone. At any given time, 1,700 ...

• i2eye with Bartha Maria Knoppers

  “Don’t plan your career — be curious.” That’s the credo that Bartha Maria Knoppers, the new director of the Centre of Genomics and Policy at McGill University and Génome Québec Innovation Centre, espouses — and one she lives by. Knoppers turned her love of books into a master’s in c ...

• Environmental legacy

  (Article courtesy of University of Regina) University of Regina biologist Chris Somers is fascinated by how humans and wildlife interact and how animals respond to human-modified environments. “My research often combines animal ecology in the field, environmental chemistry and genetics,” explain ...

Signs of the times

• Eric Steig Corrigendum to Antarctic Warming

  US. federal policy defines plagiarism as follows: Plagiarism is the appropriation of another person's ideas, processes, results, or words without giving appropriate credit. Here is a discussion of the topic from Penn State, where Michael Mann of Steig et al has an appointment. In an entirely ...

• Study: Babies cared for in another home become hea ...

  When infants attend day care in someone else's home, they're more likely to be heavier than average by the time they're toddlers, new research suggests. Harvard researchers report in the August issue of Pediatrics that babies aged 6 months and younger who were cared for in someone else's home, rath ...

• Police, sheriffs establishing regional intelligenc ...

  Centers nationally have been target of complaints by civil libertarians. For months, detectives from two law enforcement agencies had been on the trail of the culprits in a series of home burglaries in Southeast Austin and southern Travis County. Neither group knew the other had similar unsolved ca ...

• Scars linger from killer Montana earthquake of '59

  Gallatin National Forest - Just before midnight under the moon's gray light, the world tilted and tore off a Montana mountainside. Sliding rock buried 19 campers alive, their bodies never found, and 80 million tons of rock and trees tumbled into Madison River Canyon, leaving rubble piled more than ...

• Earthquake Magnitude 6.8 strikes off Japan

  A magnitude-6.8 earthquake hit off Japan's southern coast Monday, prompting the Meteorological Agency to issue a tsunami warning. The quake struck off the coast of Ishigaki island, near Japan's southern island of Okinawa, around 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) south of Tokyo. It struck at a depth of ...

Threat Level

• Luckless Predator Only Attracted to Undercover Cop ...

  It’s official. There’s nobody in the chat rooms but pedophiles and undercover police. On Thursday, a federal appeals court upheld the conviction of an Indiana man whose online efforts to proposition underage girls led him to not one, not two, but three undercover cops, none of whom apparently kn ...

• Hotel Error Advertises Room Rate in Italy for 1 Ce ...

  Word apparently spread quickly across the internet on Sunday night that a luxury hotel in Venice, Italy, was offering a special 1-cent-a night rate. Visitors to the online registration page of the luxury Crowne Plaza Venice East-Quarto d’Altino hotel discovered it wasn’t just a rumor and that in ...

• Firefox Plug-In Frees Court Records, Threatens Jud ...

  Access to the nation’s federal law proceedings just got a public interest hack, thanks to programmers from Princeton, Harvard and the Internet Archive, who released a Firefox plug-in designed to make millions of pages of legal documents free. Free as in beer and free as in speech. The Problem: Fe ...

• Feds Support $1.92 Million RIAA File Sharing Verdi ...

  The Obama administration told a federal judge Friday the $1.92 million jury verdict against a Minnesota woman for sharing 24 music tracks on Kazaa was constitutionally sound, despite defense claims it was unconstitutionally excessive. After the June verdict against Jammie Thomas-Rasset, defense atto ...

• Top Security Firm RSA Tries to Silence Blog

  RSA security, one of the top security firms in the country, has sent takedown notices to a blogger and his hosting company in an effort to silence his discussion of a vulnerability found on a bank web site that RSA helps monitor, according to the blogger. The firm has accused the blogger of tradema ...

PERRspectives : Blog

• Obama Falling Victim to Krugman's Law. Again.

  Following President Obama's lead, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius on Sunday announced that a public option is "not the essential element" of the administration's health insurance reform push. Sadly, that development seems to signal that, as with the...

• Right-Wing Rage: Recurring Symptom of a Preexistin ...

  There's nothing new under the sun, especially when it comes to the frothing at the mouth right-wing rage over health care reform. But thanks to the 24/7 media's transformation of politics into just another form of entertainment, delusional Birthers, deceitful...

• Health Scare: When Politics is Entertainment

  "When politics is just another form of entertainment," I lamented in a presentation on the 2008 campaign last year, "the first thing that suffers is the truth." And so it is with the incendiary health care debate and so much...

• Smoking Grassley on Health Care Reform

  After his predictable experience with unified Republican obstructionism on the stimulus bill, President Obama must be high if he thinks there's a glimmer of hope for bipartisan cooperation on health care reform. Not because Sarah Palin is doubling-down on her...

• Smoking Grassley on Health Care Reform

  After his predictable experience with unified Republican obstructionism on the stimulus bill, President Obama must be high if he thinks there's a glimmer of hope for bipartisan cooperation on health care reform. Not because Sarah Palin is doubling-down on her...

Blackspot News Feed

• White House Appears Ready to Drop "Public Option"

  Seniors are raising questions about health reform plans. (Photo: Chris Schneider / The Tribune) read more

• Who's Behind the Attacks on a Health Care Overhaul ...

  Washington - Much of the money and strategy behind the so-called grassroots groups organizing opposition to the Democrats' health care plans comes from conservative political consultants, professional organizers and millionaires, some of whom hold financial stakes in the outcome. If Presiden ...

• Iran Defies Condemnation, Expands Opposition Trial

  Tehran, Iran - Iran expanded a mass trial of opposition supporters on Sunday with the addition of 25 defendants - including a Jewish teenager - in defiance of international condemnation, as France said Iran agreed to release a French woman held on spying charges from prison. The defendants a ...

• Actor's US 'Detention' Prompts Outrage in India

  New Delhi - Angry fans burned a US flag in protest Sunday, a Cabinet minister suggested searching visiting Americans and an actress tweeted her outrage after Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan said he was detained for questioning at a U.S. airport. Though US immigration officials denied he w ...

• North Korea to Reopen Border With South: KCNA

  Seoul - North Korea, whose relations with South Korea have turned increasingly bitter, said on Monday it had agreed to reopen its border with its neighbor and allow tourism and family reunions to resume. But in a sign that tensions on the peninsula still run high, North Korea's KCNA news age ...

Consortium News

• A Gorilla Dust-up Over Health Care

  The clash over health care has become an excuse to refight unresolved U.S. political battles, writes Michael Winship. August 15, 2009

• Cheney's New Gambit

  Dick Cheney's anger at George Bush for not using his pardoning power may reflect personal self-interest, says Ray McGovern. August 14, 2009

• The Truth Will Not Out, on Its Own

  The hysterias over the Iraq War and now health-care reform suggest truth is a fragile U.S. commodity, writes Robert Parry. August 13, 2009

• Rove Implicated in Prosecutor Firings

  Political adviser Karl Rove pressed for the firing of a key U.S. Attorney who balked at prosecuting Democrats, reports Jason Leopold. August 12, 2009

• Palin's 'Death Panel' and GOP Lying

  Sarah Palin's rant about Barack Obama's "death panel" fits with a 30-year-old Republican strategy to deceive, says Robert Parry. August 11, 2009

CounterPunch

• Alexander Cockburn : Health Plans and Death Plans
• Ron Jacobs : Unconditional Negotiations, Now!
• Charles R. Larson : Egyptian Economics 101
• Poets' Basement : Reiss, Ford and Moser
• Jeffrey St. Clair : The Fall of the House of Stanf ...

Institute for Middle East Understanding

• Jew elected to Fatah governing body (Al Jazeera)

  The Fatah movement of Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas has elected an Israeli Jew to one of its governing bodies for the first time in the movement's half-century history. Uri Davis, a sociology professor ...

• Morality's chief of staff (Gideon Levy, Haaretz)

  The IDF under Ashkenazi, who demanded that the army "scour with a steel comb every platoon and squad" in response to the hazing incident, did not investigate the killing of white-flag bearers. All of a sudde ...

• New Israeli rules curb travel from West Bank (Jon ...

  Human rights groups are also concerned by the wording of new restriction, confining foreign citizens to "Palestinian Authority territories". The PA rules over only about 40 per cent of the West Bank. The gro ...

• Israeli peace activist highlights Bedouin's plight ...
• Obama's America is not delivering the goods (Gide ...

  With great sorrow and deep consternation, we hereby declare the death of the latest hope. Perhaps rumors of its death are greatly exaggerated, to paraphrase the famous quote by Mark Twain, but the fears are ...

Planetsave

• Tourist Mosquitoes Threaten the Galapagos

  If you could declare a home town of evolution it would be the Galapagos Islands. Back in 1835 a sea sick young naturalist, Charles Darwin, landed on the Galapagos to conduct a little research. That research was the genesis of Darwin’s seminal work “On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural ...

• Growing Acid in our Oceans: A Looming Threat to Se ...

  This picture is a picture of the beautiful Monterey, California coastline. This is where I grew up. It is famous for it’s beautiful sea life. Sea otters, jelly fish, sea lions, kelp forests all populate the Monterey coast. The Pacific Ocean is the largest ocean in the world. Yet, with all th ...

• Great Lakes Offshore Wind Aesthetics

  [social buttons] While public opinion remains divided about the risks and benefits of installing wind farms in the Great Lakes, several of the eight states with Great Lakes water are racing to be first to approve projects capturing energy from frequently strong offshore winds. It remains to be seen ...

• ET Text Home? Send your own Texts Into Space

  Gliese 581 d. Such a catchy name eh? You probably have never heard of it. It is 20 light years away, but in late April 2009 new observations by the original discovery team concluded that the planet is within the habitable zone where liquid water, and therefore, life, could exist. Some of you may h ...

• Australia Plans Airstrikes to Kill 650K Camels in ...

  Australia’s wild camel population is out of control. An estimated 1 million roam the outback, destroying fragile ecosystems, fouling water holes, and causing a threat to endangered wildlife. They are Australia’s largest invasive species, and the government is spending $19 million AUD to deal wi ...

Water Quality - WordPress

• Pollution Is Closing More Nearby Beaches, Report F ...

  The number of New York and New Jersey beaches that were either closed, or the subject of warnings, b

• Blake Lake Report

  Melancholy is about how I’d describe this weekends at the lake. This was our last official “family

• U.S.-China Memorandum of Understanding to Enhance ...

  US Dept. of State http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/126802.pdf This Memorandum of Understa

• Images of Proposal for Studio City Golf and Tennis ...

  Studio City River Park Proposal In October 2009, L.A. Creek Freak reported details about a proposed

• Eutrophication : Sources and Drivers of Nutrient P ...

  World Resources Institute / by Mindy Selman and Suzie Greenhalgh http://www.wri.org/publication/eutr

Public Citizen in Texas

• Grassroots vs Astroturf- the difference in citizen ...

  Most people have a good general conception of what a real grassroots movement looks like: citizens get outraged over some injustice or inequity and get organized and get active. These campaigns are built from the bottom up. And what happens when you don’t have a grassroots movement but want to ...

• Boerne Makes Move on Local Renewable Power

  I came across this article recently in the Express-News’ Northwest Daily and had to share. Boerne, population c. 9,400, located about 30 miles northwest of San Antonio, will soon establish a framework for the development of distributed generation. Under the terms of an ordinance that passed a fir ...

• Texans care about climate change too

  Being an environmentalist in Texas, sometimes it feels like the whole world is against you. Â There’s a common assumption that folks around here just don’t care as much about the environment as elsewhere, and that people don’t see climate change as all that much of a threat. Â When I tell ...

• San Antonio Mayor’s Nuclear Town Hall Tonight

  Tonight, August 10, is Mayor Castro’s Town Hall Meeting, where he wants to allow the community to tell city council and himself what they think about going the nuclear route. This is so important to attend. It will be at the City Council Chambers downtown where Flores and Commerce meet (map belo ...

• Texas Progressive Alliance Weekly Round Up

  The Congress may be in recess, but the Texas Progressive Alliance is always in session. Here’s the weekly roundup of blog highlights. Off the Kuff takes a closer look at the crimefighting plan of Houston Mayoral candidate Annise Parker. WCNews at Eye On Williamson encourages everyone to get involv ...

Press TV

• Karzai's policies under focus ahead of polls

  An Afghan female lawmaker tells Press TV that while incumbent President Hamid Karzai's rivals say that he has not been successful in promoting democracy, he has been successful in this regard.

• Mexico 'cleans up' customs force

  As part of a crackdown on corruption, Mexico has laid off over 700 customs officers serving at airports and land crossings, replacing them with newly trained agents.

• Irked by US-Colombia deal, Chavez warns of war

  Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez has again slammed US plans to increase its military presence in Colombia, echoing his earlier remarks in which he warned of an imminent war in the region.

• Karzai's rival: President's 'assessment a myth'

  Afghanistan's incumbent president, Hamid Karzai has attended a live televised election debate with two of his main rivals, ahead of Thursday's presidential poll.

• Israel 'far from' striking Iran: Envoy

  The Israeli ambassador to the United States has rejected reports of an imminent military strike on Iran, saying Tel Aviv is even 'far from' mulling the option.

Axis of Logic

• Money is God, Greed is King and Corruption Runs th ...

• Latin America: Social Movements in Times of Econom ...

• The 'Anti-Starbucks' Starbucks

• Exclusive: Kill Them All and Cover Them with Bulls ...

• One State, Two States - Resolving the Israel/Pales ...

They Gave Us a Republic

• Denying Liberalism

  Don't blame repugs, or insurance companies, or Limpballs/Pecked/O'Wrongly or even racism for the ease with which the hooligans have hijacked the health care reform debate. Blame Democrats. When you spend decades running away from the political philosophy that brought us all the things Americans most ...

• Scientists at the Creationism Play Park

  On August 7, the Secular Student Association, PZ Myers and 300 friends toured Ken Ham's Creationism World O' Superstition in Northern Kentucky. A scientist who scoffs at those who believe that men and dinosaurs cohabited the Earth rode a saddled triceratops last weekend. Paul Zachary Myers, an assoc ...

• "All things considered, I'd rather be in Philadelp ...

  But that isn't happening this time back east. That was the plan, but plans change. My traveling companion had difficulties managing to be in two places at once, and I need to get back home and sign something important in person, and I'm really not that thrilled about traveling alone anyway, and be ...

• Forty Years Ago Tonight

  I wasn't there, but I will forever regret not witnessing this. This weekend marks the 40th anniversary of Woodstock, and we're celebrating with Hendrix's rendering of the national anthem. We keep the LNMC apolitical, but I want to at least squeak a shout-out to this as clear evidence that symbols of ...

• The Wages of Assassination

  It's not a question of giving people ideas any more - the idea is widespread among the townhall hooligan racists, and manifesting itself in loaded weapons carried to presidential events. I have great faith in the Secret Service, not least because they know Barack Obama is the ultimate test for them: ...

Care 2

• Study says global warming shrinks Australian birds

  Some species of Australian birds are shrinking and the trend will likely continue because of global warming, a scientist said Sunday. Janet Gardner, an Australian National University biologist, led a team of scientists who measured museum specimens Submitted by Simone D. to Animals | Note-it! ...

• Seismic Tests Threaten Marine Protected Area and W ...

  Environmental groups have filed a lawsuit to stop seismic blasting by an American research vessel that threatens endangered whales in a Canadian marine protected area. Submitted by Cher C. to Animals | Note-it! | Add a Comment

• ACTION ALERT: Stop The Brutal Finning Of Sharks!- ...

  This slaughter needs to be stopped as soon as possible! Every year thousands upon thousands of shark species are caught and get their fins hacked off by normally rusty machetes, knives or anything sharp that is available. Submitted by Simone D. to Animals | Note-it! | Add a Comment

• Nine tiger cubs sighted in Satpura Reserve

  Nine tiger cubs have been sighted in Madhya Pradesh's Satpura Tiger Reserve, amidst reports of dwindling cat population in the state. Submitted by Cher C. to Animals | Note-it! | Add a Comment

• ACTION ALERT: Save the Taiji Dolphins!!!- Pls sign ...

  Every day hundreds of Dolphins are gathered to a secret cove and slaughtered for their meat! Japanese Fishermen shepard the Dolphins to an out of the way shallow cove by messing around with the dolphins sonar. They then Jab them with harpoons and machete Submitted by Simone D. to Animals | Note- ...

GreenBiz

• IBM Sets Its Big Green Sights on S.F. Bay Water Qu ...

  Big Blue is teaming up with San Francisco's Public Utilities Commission to monitor and reduce pollution in the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay.

• IBM Sharpens Focus on Business and Battery Efficie ...

  The company announced today the creation of the Green Sigma Coalition to integrate IBM’s Green Sigma consulting service with the products and services of several big-name partners. A second project will take aim at the development of tomorrow’s lithium-ion batteries.

• Starbucks Coffee: Green or Greenwashed?

  Starbucks is given credit by many for revolutionizing the American coffee drinking experience. The company, however, is both praised and criticized by environmentalists. Is Starbucks a leader of sustainability or a greenwasher?

• PepsiCo Opens Green Beverage Plant in China

  The company expects the plant, located in western China in the city of Chongqing, will use 22 percent less water and 23 percent less energy than other PepsiCo plants in the country.

• IBM Sets Its Big Green Sights on S.F. Bay Water Qu ...

  Big Blue is teaming up with San Francisco's Public Utilities Commission to monitor and reduce pollution in the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay.

Reuters Global

• North Korea’s “Dear Leader” open ...

  A North Korean traffic officers directs cars on the streets of Pyongyang under a new umbrella. Photo provided by North Korea's official KCNA news agency on August 13, 2009.

• Pakistan’s Enemy No.1

  An overwhelming majority of Pakistanis consider the United States to be the greatest threat to the nation, far more than traditional rival India, and the Taliban, according to a new poll.

• Who is funding the Afghan Taliban? You don’t ...

  It is the open secret no one wants to talk about. In Afghanistan, one of the richest sources of Taliban funding is the foreign assistance coming into the country. International donors, primarily the United States, are to a large extent financing their own enemy.

• Targeted killings inside Pakistan;are they working ...

  The U.S. strategy of targeted killings inside Pakistan would seem to be working if the death of Baitullah Mehsud the leader of the Pakistani Taliban turns out to be true, as seems increasingly likely. But the jury is out over whether such strikes are effective over the longer term.

• Is a moral instinct the source of our noble though ...

  A growing number of psychologists, biologists and philosophers see the brain as the base of our moral views. Noble ideas such as compassion, altruism, empathy and trust, they say, are really evolutionary adaptations that are now instinctive responses fixed in our brains.

Ezra Klein

• Tab Dump

  • The economy: Now with more gild! • The myth of management consultants. • The New York Times calls a lie a lie. • End-of-life care: Where ethics meet economics. • Arlen Specter and Chuck Grassley, both septuagenarian senators, have a spat on twitter. Rarely has America been so terrib ...

• The New Message

  Barack Obama was in Montana today for a town hall on health care. I've pasted his remarks below the fold. They're most interesting for what's not in them. The word "cost" never appears. Nor does "curve." The word "insurance" appears 36 times, as in "insurance companies will no longer be able to ca ...

• The Michael Jackson Moment

  "We're in the Michael Jackson moment for health-care reform," says Andy Stern, head of the Service Employees International Union. "These town halls are stages that have been set for a show. There's no way any congressman can think this is representative." At least, Stern hopes not. Before the town ...

• A Chat With the Head of the Health Insurance Indus ...

  Turns out the C-SPAN folks lied. The video of my interview with insurance industry poo-bah Karen Ignagni is not embeddable. But it is watchable online. You just have to go here .

• An Interview With Ezekiel Emanuel

  Before Ezekiel Emanuel joined his brother Rahm in the White House, he was director of the National Institute of Health's clinical bioethics programs and an oncologist specializing in breast cancer. Since he began advising President Obama's budget chief, Peter Orszag, on health care, however, he's be ...

Booman Tribune

• Talking Health Care Strategy

  One of the difficulties with writing about the health care debate in this country is figuring out what scale you want to use to examine it. A lot of people are looking at the art of negotiation. For example, it's pretty standard to ask for something more than what you are willing to settle for. I ...

• Open Thread

  It's a long, but beautiful, drive from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia. I have just completed the trip and will write a few pieces over the next few days about what I saw and learned at the Netroots Nation conference. I am very grateful to everyone who made my trip possible with their contributions. ...

• Sunday Morning Funnies

  Watch as Lawrence O'Donnell presses Republican Congressman Culberson on his claims that health care reform is socialist, telling him he needs to vote to repeal Social Security and Medicare too...and keeps pressing him through the whole segment. I wish more people would be asking the Republ ...

• Reflections

  I'll have more to say on this soon, but one notable thing about Netroots Nation was the split between people who are trying to get the Progressives to stand firm and torpedo any health care bill that isn't good enough and the people who are arguing that we need to get a foot in the door and pass som ...

• Don't Trust Rasmussen Polls

  I really want to urge Democrats not to believe any Rasmussen poll that can't be tested by an actual election. Every opinion poll that they put out seems unhelpful and demoralizing to Democrats, and they rarely agree with other polling (when other polling is available). It has gotten to the point t ...

European Tribune

• European Salon de News, Discussion et Klatsch - 17 ...

  A Daily Review Of International Online Media Europeans on this date in history:1686 – Nicola Porpora,...

• Sunday Open Thread

  Sunday lounge...

• European Salon de News, Discussion et Klatsch - 16 ...

  A Daily Review Of International Online Media Europeans on this date in history:1876 – Birth of...

• Lazy Saturday Open Thread

  another picture of the Cervin...

• European Salon de News, Discussion et Klatsch - 15 ...

  A Daily Review Of International Online Media Europeans on this date in history:1875 – Birth of...

Futurismic

• Scriths and legends: hidden portals a possibility

  Researchers in Hong Kong are developing technologies that could one day lead to hidden portals [1]: In the research paper, the researchers from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and Fudan University in Shanghai describe the concept of a “a gateway that can block electromagnetic wa ...

• Scriths and legends: hidden legends a possibility

  Researchers in Hong Kong are developing technologies that could one day lead to hidden portals [1]: In the research paper, the researchers from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and Fudan University in Shanghai describe the concept of a “a gateway that can block electromagnetic wa ...

• They’ve got a TV eye on you

  Much as we all bemoan the relentless increase of surveillance technologies in our countries, it appears that the cable TV companies are confident that we’ll just invite it in to our homes if there’s enough of an incentive. After all, who wouldn’t want a set-top DVR unit with a camera so it cou ...

• Universal robot operating system: well, they’re ...

  As evidenced by the number of posts we end up doing about them, robots are a real growth industry. Which is all well and good, but the folks in R&D departments everywhere have a problem. In a nutshell, it’s interoperability: each robot is developed in isolation, meaning valuable resources are exp ...

• They’ve got a TV eye on you

  Much as we all bemoan the relentless increase of surveillance technologies in our countries, it appears that the cable TV companies are confident that we’ll just invite it in to our homes if there’s enough of an incentive. After all, who wouldn’t want a set-top DVR unit with a camera so it cou ...

Yahoo! Canada News

• YahooCanadaNews: Obama's team shares winning strat ...

  YahooCanadaNews: Obama's team shares winning strategies with NDP http://tr.im/wsSV

• YahooCanadaNews: Ryan M. for Y! CA News. Volkswage ...

  YahooCanadaNews: Ryan M. for Y! CA News. Volkswagen threat 'tantamount to blackmail': Opel union leader http://tr.im/wsuW

• YahooCanadaNews: NDP name change may prove awfully ...

  YahooCanadaNews: NDP name change may prove awfully embarrassing in Quebec http://tr.im/wqGT

• YahooCanadaNews: Ryan M. for Y! CA News. Federal N ...

  YahooCanadaNews: Ryan M. for Y! CA News. Federal NDP to mull name change at N.S. convention http://tr.im/wmRD

• YahooCanadaNews: MK for Y! CA News. Small Canadian ...

  YahooCanadaNews: MK for Y! CA News. Small Canadian firm wins battle against Microsoft. http://bit.ly/FV0lE

Global Elite

• President European Commission Advocated World Gove ...

  Jurriaan Maessen. Infowars. July 24th, 2009 On September 7, 1992, two term President of the European Commission Jacques Delors gave a speech to the Royal Institute of International Affa ...

• Billions of People Expected to Die Under Current C ...

  Barbara Minton, Natural News, July 21st, 2009 Your right to eat healthy food and use supplements of your choice is rapidly vanishing, but every effort has been made to keep you in the d ...

• Bioweapons, Dangerous Vaccines, and Threats of a G ...

  Stephen Lendman, Global Research, July 7th, 2009 Although international law prohibits the use of chemical and bacteriological weapons, America has had an active biological warfare progr ...

• Today we’re all prisoners in the USA

  Papers, Please! June 2, 2009 As of today, June 1, 2009, even U.S. citizens are officially prisoners in the USA, or exiles barred from entering our own country without the government’s ...

• Biopiracy, GM Seeds and Rural India "Over 100,000 ...

  Priya Kumar, Global Research, June 2, 2009 The reality for the average Indian remains the same: agricultural cultivation and the ability to farm is the bedrock of rural living. With its historical practices, values, and communal sentiments of ...

Al Jazeera

• Japan emerges from recession

  World's second-largest economy grows at annualised 3.7 per cent in second quarter.

• Pakistan Sunni leader shot dead

  Officials say personal grudge likely behind the killing of outlawed group leader.

• Mexico replaces all border agents

  All 700 customs officers replaced and inspection team doubled to stamp out smuggling.

• Deadly blasts hit Iraq market

  Twin blasts at Baghdad market leave eight dead and 21 injured.

• Russian stunt jets collide

  One pilot killed and two others injured in Moscow air show rehearsal accident.

Green Inc. - NYT

• In Case You Missed It . . .

  The green-collar economy, the environmental challenges of solar power, and other energy and environment stories from around the globe.

• High Carbon Cost for 'Clunkers' Program

  The popular "cash for clunkers" program may be costing the government several hundred dollars for each ton of carbon dioxide that it destroys, according to conclusions reached separately by two California academics.

• Energy Leapfrogging: A View from Togo

  (Credit: Themba Hadebe/The Associated Press) Solar panels sit atop rental rooms in Johannesburg, South Africa. As renewable energy systems become more efficient and less expensive, many environmentalists hope to incorporate the technologies into development models around the world. Just as millions ...

• As Prices Slump, Solar Industry Suffers

  A run of bad earnings has dampened confidence in once-booming solar companies.

• Exxon Fined for Causing Bird Deaths

  Exxon Mobil has pleaded guilty to causing the deaths of 85 protected birds -- and agreed to pay penalties amounting to $7,000 per bird.

Dot Earth News

• Energy Frontiers: Space Solar, Hot Lots

  A closer look at potentially transformational energy ideas.

• Data Gap on Atlantic Storms and Warming

  More questions raised about recent hurricane trends.

• A Billion Teenagers, for Better or Worse

  Some of the world's poorest and most turbulent regions are witnessing explosive population growth, meaning enormous numbers of teenagers and children.

• Landslide Losses Not Inevitable

  With planning, the risks from landslides like those in Taiwan can be reduced.

• In Praise of Activism

  Human progress on a finite planet will require lots of vigilant activists.

Doug Feith : Hong Pong

• Thanks to Rose for finding my phone! Plus: I'm sta ...

  I nearly had a horrible day today, leaving my trusty old Helio phone on a bench at the University of Minnesota mall. A good samaritan named Rose picked it up and called the Boiler Room coffee shop back after I tried the phone. I got it back! Thanks a ton, Rose, you saved yet another messy situation ...

• Hat tip for Joaquin Phoenix conspiracy

  Not a bad idea! Which makes this potentially one of the greatest performances any modern actor has ever given -- or at least one of the most baldly courageous. The closest comparison would have to be Andy Kaufman's utter commitment to his obnoxious Tony Clifton persona, but Phoenix is going Kaufman ...

• Tough times south of the border

  Duly noted: Mexican TV reporter ducking stray bullets: Hat tip to the thoughtful Texas farmer Don , who knows what you ought to know about the War On Drugs. This video was recently the #1 most discussed from Mexico on YooToob... Plus, don't miss the five stages of complete social collapse! http://c ...

• Pirate Bay Trial and Kopimi: The Kopimi Manifesto

  I can't say I get it. But I like it. In these apocalyptic and bitchy times, it is high time to get some sarcastic Swedish hacker philsophy out there. Now is the time. The spectrial is apparently the place. How could we forget the Pirate Bay Spectrial?! They released a Pirate Bay Manifesto - POwr, Br ...

• Some notes from the Abyss; Fusion Centers going to ...

  We're on the brink of disaster | Salon! As people lose confidence in the ability of markets and governments to solve the global crisis, they are likely to erupt into violent protests or to assault others they deem responsible for their plight, including government officials, plant managers, landl ...

• AlterNet Top Stories

• Why the Right's 'Astroturfing' Propaganda Is Textb ...

  Faux grassroots firms are exhibiting all the tell-tale signs.

• Lou Dobbs Tours Single-Payer Systems Abroad and Re ...

  Has CNN's government-out-of-my-face bloviator actually had a change of heart when it comes to Obama's health plan?

• No Matter What Lies the Right Wing Screams, the Br ...

  Republicans and right-wing pundits in the US have tried to scare us about Britain's public health system -- because it works.

• Let The Sun Shine In: Marriage Equality Comes to B ...

  The classic protest musical, Hair, is back to tackle what many consider to be the biggest civil rights issue of our era: marriage equality.

• Put Down That Coors: Why We Should Be Boycoting Bi ...

  One reason to boycott large breweries is the union busting, right wing culture that dominates some of the biggest breweries in America.

Threat Level

• Luckless Predator Only Attracted to Undercover Cop ...

  It’s official. There’s nobody in the chat rooms but pedophiles and undercover police. On Thursday, a federal appeals court upheld the conviction of an Indiana man whose online efforts to proposition underage girls led him to not one, not two, but three undercover cops, none of whom apparently kn ...

• Hotel Error Advertises Room Rate in Italy for 1 Ce ...

  Word apparently spread quickly across the internet on Sunday night that a luxury hotel in Venice, Italy, was offering a special 1-cent-a night rate. Visitors to the online registration page of the luxury Crowne Plaza Venice East-Quarto d’Altino hotel discovered it wasn’t just a rumor and that in ...

• Firefox Plug-In Frees Court Records, Threatens Jud ...

  Access to the nation’s federal law proceedings just got a public interest hack, thanks to programmers from Princeton, Harvard and the Internet Archive, who released a Firefox plug-in designed to make millions of pages of legal documents free. Free as in beer and free as in speech. The Problem: Fe ...

• Feds Support $1.92 Million RIAA File Sharing Verdi ...

  The Obama administration told a federal judge Friday the $1.92 million jury verdict against a Minnesota woman for sharing 24 music tracks on Kazaa was constitutionally sound, despite defense claims it was unconstitutionally excessive. After the June verdict against Jammie Thomas-Rasset, defense atto ...

• Top Security Firm RSA Tries to Silence Blog

  RSA security, one of the top security firms in the country, has sent takedown notices to a blogger and his hosting company in an effort to silence his discussion of a vulnerability found on a bank web site that RSA helps monitor, according to the blogger. The firm has accused the blogger of tradema ...

Reuters - Most Popular Articles

• Chavez says Obama "lost in space" on Latin America

  CARACAS (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama is "lost in the Andromeda" galaxy on Latin American policy, his chief critic in the region, Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, said on Sunday, while demanding the closure of U.S. military bases.

• Public insurance plan not essential: Sebelius

  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The government-run health insurance option favored by President Barack Obama is not essential to a healthcare overhaul as long as the final measure boosts competition, a top U.S. health official said on Sunday.

• Tropical Storm Claudette threatens Gulf Coast

  MIAMI (Reuters) - Tropical Storm Claudette, the third of the Atlantic hurricane season, formed on Sunday in the Gulf of Mexico east of the heaviest concentration of U.S. energy platforms, as two other storms, Ana and Bill, raced across the Atlantic.

• Ahmadinejad plans female ministers in Iran cabinet

  TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Sunday he would propose at least three female ministers in his cabinet following the disputed election, an unprecedented move in the conservative Islamic state.

• Fox News' "Glenn Beck" loses advertisers

  NEW YORK (Nielsen Business Media) - Some of the nation's biggest advertisers are distancing themselves from Fox News host Glenn Beck after he called President Obama a racist during a July 28 broadcast.

Godspace

• Unemployment as a Spiritual Practice

  I am now back from Australia and as you can imagine the posts for my series on What is a Spiritual Practice have been mounting up while I have had limited internet access and less time to focus on such things. Â Thanks for your patience and for your prayers during this challenging season. Today’ ...

• Editing your Life: The Spiritual Discipline of Edi ...

  I am sitting in Sydney on a beautiful but crisp winter’s morning watching the rainbow lorikeets out in the trees. Â My Dad’s funeral is over and I will head back to Seattle in 2 days time. Â I have been very aware of prayer and the grace of God in the midst of this. Â Thanks to [...]

• Living in Transition as Spiritual Practice

  I am now in Sydney Australia after what has been one of the easiest long international trips I have made for a long time. Â I even slept for several hours on the flight which makes me very aware of the fact that people have been praying for me. Today’s article comes from Guy Chmieleski who is [. ...

• Recent Additions to the Spiritual Practices series

  Here’s the round-up of the most recent Spiritual Practices posts: The Spiritual Practice of Apologizing by T Freeman Love-making as a Spiritual Practice by Mark Scandrette Smoking the Glory of God by Jason Clark The Spiritual Practice of Getting Honest With Myself by Jonathan Brink Spiritual Disci ...

• Between the Sheets: Sleeping as A Spiritual Practi ...

  I will be heading out to Australia this afternoon but am hoping to continue posting while I travel. Â The submissions continue to arrive which is wonderful and I am enjoying reading them before I post them. This morning’s post is from Teri Peterson a presbyterian pastor who loves her new bed (wh ...

Pine River World News

• Iraqi MP demands to establish headquarters of Yeme ...

  IntelTrends - The following article is from al-Sahwa. Iraqi MP demands to establish headquarters of al-Houthi rebels in Baghdad © al-Sahwa August 16, 2009 (Sahwa Net) - Head of Iraq parliament's Foreign Committee Sheikh Hamam Hamaudi has called for establishing a headquarters for al-Houthi rebe ...

• Tribalism main obstacle to democracy in Afghanista ...

  The following article is from Today's Zaman, Istanbul. Tribalism main obstacle to democracy in Afghanistan, say Afghan intellectuals © Today's Zaman By Emine Kart August 16, 2009 ANKARA - Days ahead of Thursday's presidential election in Afghanistan, which will be the second since the Taliban re ...

• JIHAD IN NIGERIA: Boko Haram sect threatens Nigeri ...

  Pine River World News / IntelTrends August 15, 2009 If you thought that Boko Haram, the Islamic sect at the center of recent clashes in northern Nigeria, would simply go away after their leader was executed by police you may well be mistaken. Mohammed Yusuf's death certainly dealt a blow to the mov ...

• Islamic Emirate of Baytul-Maqdes declared in Gaza: ...

  IntelTrends - [ Blogmaster note : The Islamic Emirate of Baytul-Maqdes has been declared in Gaza under the leadership of Sheikh Abunnur al-Maqdesy. The Unjust Media (mujahideen and Islamic news) is carrying a declaration this date.] August 15, 2009 JUND ANSAR ALLAH: A Declaration of the ISLAMI ...

• BURMA: Junta's ploy: Push Kokang to shoot first

  IntelTrends - The following article is reprinted with permission from Shan Herald Agency for News (S.H.A.N.), Thailand. Junta's ploy: Push Kokang to shoot first © S.H.A.N. August 14, 2009 Knowing the ceasefire groups' major concern is the border closure imposed by China, Burma's military leade ...

• PsyBlog

• Consumer Psychology

  · How and why we consume and how our beliefs, ideas and senses influence consumption. Peter Drucker, the management consultant, famously argued that about 80% of all products and services fail or fall well short of targets within six months of launching. Clearly markets have little understanding ...

• Why Left to Right Punches Are More Aggressive, Pow ...

  Reading and writing from left to right is a skill so well-practised, so ingrained in language, that it's easy to ignore. Yet, according to some research, the direction in which language flows could have implications that spread into many other areas of our experience. Consider that people are often ...

• Persuasion: The Right-Ear Advantage

  If you want someone to comply with a random request for a cigarette, you should speak into their right ear, according to a new study by researchers in Italy. Marzoli & Tommasi (2009) had a female confederate visit a disco and approach 176 random people asking for a smoke. Clubbers were about twice ...

• 10 Rules That Govern Groups

  Much of our lives are spent in groups with other people: we form groups to socialise, earn money, play sport, make music, even to change the world. But although groups are diverse, many of the psychological processes involved are remarkably similar. Here are 10 insightful studies that give a flavou ...

• Are Your Initials Holding You Back?

  "What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet." ~Romeo and Juliet In these lines from Shakespeare's famous play, Juliet is trying to persuade Romeo that the bitter feud between their respective families doesn't matter, that he and his surname are easily divisib ...

After Downing Street.org

• Go Harrison Premier: Reality Check - Militarizing ...

• Why We Need Health Care Reform

  Why We Need Health Care Reform By Barack Obama | NYTimes Our nation is now engaged in a great debate about the future of health care in America. And over the past few weeks, much of the media attention has been focused on the loudest voices. What we haven’t heard are the voices of the millions up ...

• White House Appears Ready To Drop 'Public Option'

  White House appears ready to drop 'public option' By Philip Elliott, Associated Press | Yahoo! News Bowing to Republican pressure, President Barack Obama's administration signaled on Sunday it is ready to abandon the idea of giving Americans the option of government-run insurance as part of a new h ...

• Holder's George W. Bush Conflict of Interest

  By Dana Jill Simpson For months we have been trying to get down to the bottom of why Eric Holder would not really investigate the cases of Mr. Siegelman, Mr. Scrushy, Mr. Minor, the two other judges in Mississippi, and Charles Walker. Well, I finally have the answer. I got it from writing my Greg ...

• Declaration of Indictment

Grist - News

• Ruminations on the Obama era, with a side of spicy ...

• Cheap-chicken ad from KFC hides true cost of food; ...

• For a quick fix to school-lunch woes, pack an appe ...

• Stalking the wild leeks of spring

  What could improve a forest walk in early spring? Spotting a bunch of that delicious wild relative of the leek known as the ramp.

• From a zingy spring herb, a soup for sipping on th ...

  Gardeners and gastronomes fawn over sorrel—and almost everyone else ignores it. That’s a shame; it’s is a powerful addition to soups and sauces, and tasty in salads when picked young.

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renewable recycling conservation

Australia Govt Moves To Pass Renewable-Energy Bill

Wall Street Journal

- Aug 16, 2009

- 21 hours ago

The move also jeopardized plans to require that 20% of Australia's electricity be generated from renewable sources by 2020, from less than 5% now - even ...

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Ratepayer tab on renewable energy could total $2 billion

The Union Leader

- Aug 16, 2009

- 28 minutes ago

By PAULA TRACY CONCORD – The state renewable energy law that made it feasible for controversial new "wind parks'' will also cost New Hampshire consumers in ...

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clipped from Google - 8/2009

Renewables energy target debate to take all night

The Australian

- Aug 16, 2009

- 1 hour ago

THE House of Representatives is gearing up for an all-night debate on the Government's 20 per cent renewable energy target. ...

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clipped from Google - 8/2009

Treasury & DOE To Release $2B for Renewables Manufacturers

Reuters

- Aug 14, 2009

- Aug 14, 2009

By Renewable Energy World - Renewable Energy World The US Department of the Treasury and the US Department of Energy (DOE) have released guidelines for the ...

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Human Habitat

ecology water energy

Disagreement costs Superfund clean-up effort $3M

Seattle Times

- Aug 16, 2009

- 9 hours ago

The Kitsap Sun reports the EPA must return $3 million after failing to negotiate a new management contract with the state Department of Ecology. ...

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clipped from Google - 8/2009

Eastern Michigan University wins grant to help children learn ...

Examiner.com

- Aug 15, 2009

- Aug 15, 2009

The initiative's goal is to increase awareness and understanding of the ecology of the Great Lakes so that Michigan's students become active stewards of the ...

clipped from Google - 8/2009

Is Canada's China Oil Exports Worth the Ecology of the West Coast?

Pacific Free Press

- Aug 16, 2009

- 6 hours ago

by Chris Genovali A recent Canwest News report described how "China's energy buying spree is bypassing Canada's oilpatch." Depending on one's viewpoint, ...

clipped from Google - 8/2009

Anatomy of a deal: How local bidders landed former Sentinel building

San Jose Mercury News

- Aug 12, 2009

- Aug 12, 2009

A local consortium submitted the winning bid for the downtown building SANTA CRUZ -- Once a small nonprofit, Ecology Action has grown into a major force, ...

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clipped from Google - 8/2009

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Water Power

water floods pollution

Passing grade eludes Milford's water

Boston Globe

- Aug 16, 2009

- 38 minutes ago

A dog owner was among those picking up bottled water at Milford High School Saturday. The town is still under a boil-water order, despite efforts to remove ...

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clipped from Google - 8/2009

2009 Chicago Air and Water Show flies despite lurking rain

Chicago Tribune

- Aug 16, 2009

- 4 hours ago

... Force as soon as he's 18, but for the next eight years, jealously watching pilots in F-16 jets at the Chicago Air and Water Show will have to be enough. ...

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clipped from Google - 8/2009

Calif. lawmakers shift focus to water problems

San Jose Mercury News

- Aug 16, 2009

- 11 hours ago

Arnold Schwarzenegger and lawmakers of both parties want sweeping reforms that would overhaul how the state manages its water supplies. ...

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clipped from Google - 8/2009

Snake Valley water

Salt Lake Tribune

- Aug 15, 2009

- Aug 15, 2009

The conflict over the water beneath the 100-mile-long Snake Valley, which straddles the Utah-Nevada state line, stems from a water scheme by the thirsty ...

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