Mage Soapbox

WORLD - President Accepts Peace Prize

2009-12-14T08:05:00.000-08:00

Wartime President Accepts Peace Prize with an 'American Speech'"

Shields and Brooks on Obama's Nobel Speech, senate Health Bill"

These are excerpts I find most meaningful.

BARACK OBAMA:

These extremists (today's) are not the first to kill in the name of God; the cruelties of the Crusades are amply recorded. But they remind us that no Holy War can ever be a just war.

Such a warped view of religion is not just incompatible with the concept of peace, but I believe it's incompatible with the very purpose of faith -- for the one rule that lies at the heart of every major religion is that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us.

For, if we lose that faith -- if we dismiss it as silly or naive; if we divorce it from the decisions that we make on issues of war and peace -- then we lose what's best about humanity. We lose our sense of possibility. We lose our moral compass.

Like generations have before us, we must reject that future. Let us reach for the world that ought to be -- that spark of the divine that still stirs within each of our souls.

POLITICS - Waaaa ..... I Don't WANT to Play

2009-12-14T08:14:00.001-08:00

"New Childish Republican Obstruction Tactic: Refusing To Use Their Assigned Cards In Order To Delay Votes" by Lee Fang, Think Progress

In September, the Orlando Sentinel reported that Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) had noticed Republicans House lawmakers intentionally forgetting or losing their voting cards in order to delay votes. Starting late in the summer, Grayson said he saw 60-70 GOP congressmen engaging in this tactic:

GRAYSON: They’d all walk to the front of the House and, laughingly and jokingly, put their arms around each other’s shoulder like it was some kind of clownish fun. And they did this over and over to make sure every vote took half an hour. That’s how low things have gotten. I could give you countless examples just like that. They’re simply obstructionists and there’s nothing you can do about it.

Yesterday at the Center for American Progress Action Fund, Majority Leader Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD) delivered an address on unprecedented minority obstruction of reform. ThinkProgress spoke to him afterwords, and the Majority Leader confirmed that even the House parliamentarian had criticized Republicans for this very tactic. Hoyer admonished what he called “such a transparent effort at solely delay”:

Hoyer on GOP's Childish Tactics

All year, Republicans have dedicated themselves to reflexively blocking progressive legislation rather than even attempting to participate in the legislative process. The examples are boundless:

In July, Minority Leader Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) forced the House clerk to read aloud a 55-page motion to recommit in order for House Republicans to attend a “2009 Boehner Beach Party” fundraiser.

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) attempted to block the veterans’ benefits bill because of unrelated concerns with the Recovery Act.

Republicans have “filibustered” committee markups by offering dozens of frivolous amendments.

Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) went so far as authoring a memo on various parliamentary maneuvers Senate Republicans can use to delay and kill health reform in the Senate.

The voting card delaying may be the least mature of all obstruction measures, however.

Like we've been saying, GOP = Party of NO!

POLITICS - The "Swiftboaters"

2009-12-14T08:11:00.000-08:00

"Fox host’s book title implies Swift Boat veterans were liars" by David Edwards & Muriel Kane, Raw Story

Conservatives have long railed against media turning 'swiftboat' into pejorative or 'hate term'

As former President George W. Bush attempts to salvage his tarnished legacy, Fox News Radio host John Gibson has eagerly joined in the effort to rehabilitate the previous administration's image.

Gibson, the author of Hating America and The War on Christmas, has a new book out titled How the Left Swiftboated America: The Liberal Media Conspiracy to Make You Think George W. Bush Was the Worst President in History.

In order to make his point, however, Gibson has to suggest that the Swift Boat Veterans, whose attacks on Democratic candidate John Kerry helped Bush win re-election in the midst of an unpopular war, were unconscionable liars.

"They were lying through their teeth and they got away with it," Gibson told the hosts of Fox & Friends on Wednesday morning -- referring not to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth but to Democrats and liberals who have portrayed Bush as incompetent and indifferent.

Lie, cheat, slander, anything to "win." What else would you expect from a GOP neo-Nazi group? NOT honest game-playing.

POLITICS - Purity for Dummies

2009-12-08T13:56:00.000-08:00

"G.O.P. Considers ‘Purity’ Resolution for Candidates" by ADAM NAGOURNEY, New York Times

The battle among Republicans over what the party should stand for — and how much it should accommodate dissenting views on important issues — is probably going to move from the states to the Republican National Committee when it holds its winter meeting this January in Honolulu.

Republican leaders are circulating a resolution listing 10 positions Republican candidates should support to demonstrate that they “espouse conservative principles and public policies” that are in opposition to “Obama’s socialist agenda.” According to the resolution, any Republican candidate who broke with the party on three or more of these issues– in votes cast, public statements made or answering a questionnaire – would be penalized by being denied party funds or the party endorsement.

The proposed resolution was signed by 10 Republican national committee members and was distributed on Monday morning. They are asking for the resolution to be debated when Republicans gather for their winter meeting.

The resolution invokes Ronald Reagan, and noted that Mr. Reagan had said the Republican Party should be devoted to conservative principles but also be open to diverse views. President Reagan believed, the resolution notes, “that someone who agreed with him 8 out of 10 times was his friend, not his opponent.”

Hence the provision calling for cutting off Republicans who agree with the party on fewer than eight of 10 items. The resolution demands that Republicans support “smaller government, smaller national deficits and lower taxes,” denial of government funding for abortion, and “victory in Iraq and Afghanistan.” It calls on candidates to oppose amnesty for illegal immigrants and repealing of the Defense of Marriage Act.

The development is going to put pressure on Michael Steele, the party chairman, as he tries to maintain a balance between those in his party who have been saying the road to victory is to include divergent views, and those who say the party needs to embrace conservative principles that have been at its core.

Mr. Steele managed, at his party’s last meeting, to steer clear of potentially contentious resolutions, including one that equated Democrats with socialists.

Gail Gitcho, a spokeswoman for the committee, said it was not clear what Mr. Steele would do.

“The deadline for submitting resolutions for the R.N.C. Winter Meeting is more than 30 days away,” she said. “At this point, we do not what resolutions will be submitted nor what the final language of any resolution ultimately submitted may be.”

Here is the resolution’s list:

We support smaller government, smaller national debt, lower deficits and lower taxes by opposing bills like Obama’s “stimulus” bill;

We support market-based health care reform and oppose Obama-style government run health care;

We support market-based energy reforms by opposing cap and trade legislation;

We support workers’ right to secret ballot by opposing card check;

We support legal immigration and assimilation into American society by opposing amnesty for illegal immigrants;

We support victory in Iraq and Afghanistan by supporting military-recommended troop surges;

We support containment of Iran and North Korea, particularly effective action to eliminate their nuclear weapons threat;

We support retention of the Defense of Marriage Act;

We support protecting the lives of vulnerable persons by opposing health care rationing and denial of health care and government funding of abortion; and

We support the right to keep and bear arms by opposing government restrictions on gun ownership.

Hummm... Sorta puts the GOP in a Straight Jacket.

Hay! They ARE crazy!

POLITICS - Change Marches On, State Politics

2009-12-07T15:07:00.000-08:00

"The Home Stretch for Martha Coakley in the MA Senate Primary" by Ani, No Quarter 12/7/2009

As the most qualified in the field, Martha Coakley has a chance to make history tomorrow, December 8th. I for one hope she does it. Massachusetts has never sent a woman to the Senate. Knowing her record, I suppose I am somewhat partial. The fact that she endorsed the right candidate for President last year and voted for Hillary on the convention floor speaks for her. As usual, it will come down to who has the best Get Out The Vote effort. The New Bedford Standard Times is one of a number of prominent publications giving AG Martha Coakley a strong endorsement for tomorrow’s MA Senate Primary:

…Attorney General Martha Coakley best exemplifies the qualities that make an effective U.S. senator.

A senator must be tough yet polished, a shrewd negotiator who is willing to compromise. Coakley strikes that balance, giving her the edge in a race against opponents who hold similar political views.

As attorney general, Martha Coakley sought to protect homeowners from abusive lending practices long before anyone coined the term “Great Recession.”

In June 2007, she announced an emergency 90-day regulation banning sham rescue schemes that took advantage of homeowners facing foreclosure. Judging the problem too dire to wait for the standard regulatory process, she boldly pressed forward to defend faltering homeowners.

Two months later, she proposed a series of new rules to fight predatory lending.

In 2008, Coakley responded to skyrocketing coastal homeowner’s insurance rates by calling on the state to fund public storm models crafted by academic scientists. SouthCoast homeowners — even those without so much as a water view — say their rates have doubled or tripled in the last few years.

This summer, Coakley filed suit against the federal government for equal marriage benefits, such as Social Security and income tax credits, for same-sex couples.

And in August, responding to growing political support for casinos, Coakley took forward-looking steps to update Massachusetts law with regard to money laundering and other crimes associated with gambling.

Coakley is a leader. She knows the law and is willing to take risks to do the right thing.

…Coakley was the first among the candidates to point out that the abortion amendment in the House health-care reform bill could actually roll back women’s access to abortion.

It does not merely block federal Medicaid funding for abortion for poor women — already the law — but in most cases prevents any government-run health plan or subsidized private insurance from covering abortion, regardless of whose money actually pays for the procedure. States could not use their own matching funds as some do now.

The result would be second-class treatment of poor women.

[snip]

Though gender should not propel an unworthy candidate forward, the gender issue matters. In all of Massachusetts’ long history, it has never sent a woman to the Senate.

It’s time to change that, but not with just anyone. The candidate must be worthy of the Senate, and Coakley is.

She is sharp and at the top of her game, ready to grow into the kind of senator Massachusetts deserves.

Her chief opponent, Rep. Capuano, was recently endorsed by Speaker Pelosi. That in itself is enough to disqualify him in my view. Not to mention his voting for the disastrous Stupak amendment in the House health care bill.

Coakley has also been endorsed by these publications:

Berkshire Eagle, MetroWest Daily News, Waltham Daily News Tribune, Milford Daily News and Dedham Transcript, Patriot Ledger (Quincy), Brockton Enterprise, Providence Journal and Springfield Republican.

Here is a link to a complete list of her endorsements by organizations, elected officials, and business and community leaders follows:

Those wishing to assist in their GOTV effort can e-mail elise@votecoakley.com for an ID to make calls at your leisure.

Coakley has shown courage and knows how to step up to the plate. Here’s hoping the voters agree and step up to the plate for her on Tuesday.

EDUCATION - Campus Rape Issue

2009-12-07T14:54:00.000-08:00

"Sexual Assault on Campus, Key Findings" Center for Public Integrity

Kathryn Russell said it happened in her on-campus apartment. For Megan Wright, the venue was a residence hall. According to a report funded by the Department of Justice, roughly one in five women who attend college will become the victim of a rape or an attempted rape by the time she graduates. But official data from the schools themselves doesn’t begin to reflect the scope of the problem. And student victims face a depressing litany of barriers that often either assure their silence or leave them feeling victimized a second time, according to a nine-month investigation by the Center for Public Integrity.

Many victims don’t report at all, because they blame themselves, or don’t identify what happened as sexual assault; one national study found that more than 95 percent of students who are sexually victimized do not report to police or campus officials. Local criminal justice authorities regularly shy away from such cases, because they are “he said, she said” disputes sometimes clouded by drugs or alcohol. That frequently leaves students to deal with campus judiciary processes so shrouded in secrecy that they can remain mysterious even to their participants.

Critics question whether faculty, staff, and students should even adjudicate what amounts to a felony crime. But these internal proceedings actually grow from two federal laws, known as Title IX and the Clery Act, which require schools to respond to allegations of sexual assault on campus and to offer key rights to victims.

Institutional barriers compound the problem of silence, and few victims in fact make it to a campus hearing. Those who do come forward can encounter secret disciplinary proceedings, closed-mouth school administrations, and off-the-record negotiations. At times, school policies and practices can lead students to drop complaints, or submit to gag orders—a practice deemed illegal. College administrators generally believe the existing processes provide a fair and effective way to deal with highly sensitive allegations, but the Center’s investigation has found that these processes have little transparency or accountability, and regularly result in little or no punishment for alleged assailants.

The Center interviewed 48 experts familiar with the college disciplinary process—student affairs administrators, conduct hearing officers, assault services directors, and victim advocates. The inquiry included a review of records in select cases, and examinations of 10 years worth of complaints filed against institutions with the federal Department of Education under Title IX and the Clery Act, as well as a survey of 152 crisis services programs and clinics on or near college campuses over the past year. The Center also interviewed 33 women who reported being raped by other students.

These are the Center’s first stories in an ongoing series that will examine the hurdles facing college students who seek accountability for allegations of rape on their campuses. Other pieces will appear in early 2010.

There are several other articles on their page as well as a Reporter's Toolkit link.

ON THE LITE SIDE - "Going Rouge" GOP Special Sale

2009-12-07T05:21:00.001-08:00

On Sale at Amazon, "Going Rogue" Collectible $45.95

BUY NOW! Before the GOP Conservative rush.

POLITICS - Obama Speech on Afghanistan 12/1/2009

2009-12-02T08:39:00.000-08:00

"Obama's Address on the New Strategy in Afghanistan and Pakistan" New York Times

Interactive video and transcript of President Obama’s speech at the United States Military Academy

(The New York Times link is the full 34min speech with the transcript synchronized with the video)

"In Afghanistan Plan, Exit Strategy Remains a Sticking Point" PBS News Hour
Evaluation by former Army and CIA officers

POLITICS - GOP Gambling Addicts

2009-12-04T10:04:00.001-08:00

"THE NO-SENSE JOBS PLAN" by Steve Benen, Washington Monthly

Arguably the single most farcical aspect of America's political discourse is listening to congressional Republicans talk about economic policy. We're talking about a group of people who've managed to be spectacularly wrong about practically every economic challenge in recent memory, but who are nevertheless convinced of their own self-righteous expertise. It's hard not to cringe.

But yet, they keep talking, blissfully unaware of their track record of uninterrupted failure. Yesterday, for example, House Minority Whip Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.) visited the conservative Heritage Foundation to unveil what he called "a no-cost jobs plan." Andrew Leonard explained, "Without adding a single dime to the deficit, the Republican's plan will ameliorate the worst unemployment crisis in 30 years. One wonders how a political party capable of such innovative thinking ever lost its hold of power."

To recap: Cut regulations. Freeze spending. Cut taxes. No new taxes. That's the plan.

I would really, really love to have access to an alternative universe in which Cantor's plan could have been applied this past year, in parallel with our world, in which the economy was injected with a massive stimulus, so we could compare the efficacy of the two approaches in real time. What would have happened if instead of spending money, the government had sat on its hands?

I think about that all the time. Republicans controlled the levers of power, and the results were nearly catastrophic for the economy. Democrats were handed the reins, and while the economy is still struggling, we're working our way out of the ditch. If we'd listened to Cantor & Co., we'd still be digging.

As for the "no-cost jobs plan," it's hard not to laugh at the stupidity. We tried it Cantor's way. We're still suffering the consequences. NBC reported on Cantor's plan, and explained, "The challenge for Cantor and Republicans is that these solutions -- low taxes, free trade, and fewer regulations -- existed during the Bush years, which saw three different economic downturns (in 2001, 2003, and 2008), and which produced the weakest eight-year span for the U.S. economy in decades."

It's not just Cantor, of course. House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) has scheduled an "economic roundtable" today, to compete with the White House's job summit. Roll Call reported, "A spokesman for Boehner said the purpose of the meeting is to give a platform for economists who have a different perspective on how Obama's agenda has affected the economy."

And who are these experts? Apparently, House Republicans have turned to "former Bush administration and McCain campaign staffers, who have advocated disastrous tax and budget policies."

So, to summarize, less than a year from the last administration, congressional Republicans believe it's time to re-embrace the Bush/Cheney agenda that didn't work, and listen to the architects of the Bush/Cheney agenda that didn't work.

Historically, after a major electoral defeat, the losing side adapts and shifts course. Congressional Republicans, for reasons that defy comprehension, are doubling down on an agenda that's already failed.

Doubling down, just like Gambling Addicts.

FINANCE - Reforms, So "It" Doesn't Happen Again

2009-12-03T09:38:00.000-08:00

"House committee OKs key financial rule changes" by Jim Puzzanghera, Los Angeles Times

The Obama administration's overhaul of financial regulations took a big step forward Wednesday as a key House committee approved legislation that would give federal officials broad new powers to downsize and dismantle large financial firms whose failure would seriously damage the economy.

The House Financial Services Committee voted 31-27 to pass the expanded ability to deal with teetering financial giants -- authority that was limited when investment banker Lehman Bros. and insurer American International Group Inc. neared bankruptcy last year.

As part of the legislation, government regulators would be able to step in when a huge firm is on the verge of collapse and take it apart in an orderly way to avoid market panic. Regulators can do that now with banks but not with more complex financial institutions.

In addition, financial firms would be required to pay into a fund to cover government costs of such takeovers.

The committee's bill goes beyond the powers requested by the Obama administration. It grants regulators additional authority to preemptively break up large financial institutions that pose a "grave threat to the financial stability or economy of the United States."

The legislation also would impose stricter congressional oversight on the Federal Reserve, authorizing the Government Accountability Office to conduct detailed audits on a variety of the central bank's activities.

The legislation is the final major piece of a package of reforms that the full House could vote on as early as next week. Other components of the overhaul include the creation of an agency to protect consumers in the financial marketplace and increased oversight of complex derivatives.

Banking and business groups strongly oppose creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, which they said would limit the ability of financial institutions to offer credit to consumers.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has been leading the opposition to the agency, sent a letter Wednesday to every member of Congress urging them to vote against it.

"While we agree that the financial crisis exposed failures in consumer protection regulation that need to be addressed, we are concerned this bill would do far more harm than good -- for consumers, for the business community, and for the overall economy," the chamber wrote.

"Rather than address the failures within existing regulatory agencies, this bill would create a new and massive government bureaucracy that would reduce consumer choice, stifle innovation and restrict access to credit just as we are beginning to see signs of an economic recovery," the letter said.

The Senate is working on its own overhaul of financial regulations, but is unlikely to comply with President Obama's appeal for action this year. Still, Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said Wednesday's vote "moves us another important step toward comprehensive financial reform that will create a more stable financial system with better protection for consumers and investors."

Bold emphasis mine

As for the opposition? Hay, these financial institutions were not responsible for almost bringing our economy to its knees, right? We should just "trust" them to always do the ~~right~~ correct thing.

POLITICS - The Winds of Change

2009-12-03T09:29:00.001-08:00

"Obama, the great disappointment? The Miracle President hasn't actually accomplished much? Wrong" by Mark Morford, San Francisco Chronicle

Excerpts

I am here to report some good news. Times have changed. Things are not what they once were. Evolution has occurred, is occurring, just now occurred while you were reading this very sentence.

Did you feel it? Are you noticing? The new has fully arrived to replace the old, and the old is going to have to take a long nap under a tree and watch what happens while the new delves in even deeper and does the best it can under the circumstances.

There is much talk, for example, of the man known as President Obama, of his effect and impact so far, his supposed lack of marked accomplishment lo these first dozen months of this most historic and revolutionary of presidencies -- a period, by the way, I am absolutely convinced we will all look back on in 10 or 20 years and go, oh my God, there. Remember that? That was a time, wasn't it? We will sigh and smile and point at the historic pictures and say, dear God, how incredible that was. It was a difficult time, there was much acrimony and resistance, but it was amazing. And it changed everything.

As Slate's Jacob Weisberg rightly points out, Obama has had a very first good year indeed, spectacular even, far better than most in major media acknowledge (but they will, they will). In fact, assuming health care passes, Obama will have accomplished more in his first year than any president in the history of the world, ever.

That might be an exaggeration. But I'm OK with that, because the basic idea is something that needs to be declared a bit more loudly. Nearly everything Bush tore down and decimated and humiliated to its very core, Obama has either restored, is in the process of restoring, or is set to restore. Even Afghanistan appears to have a coherent framework now (we shall see). And that's just the beginning.

Make no mistake, it is not all wine and roses and classy poetry slams in the East Room. Personally, I'm far from the nice swoon for Obama that I experienced when he swept to miraculous, world-altering victory, a swoon born in large part from the nearly unbearable sense of relief that Bush was finally gone. My appreciation is now tempered with harsh reality, as well it should be.

Then again, during the campaign, Obama admitted this exact fact himself, saying he was sure to make mistakes, that you would not agree with every decision, that there would be more bad news before we got back to the good. What a jerk. Oh wait.

Regardless, I had an ambitious idea, way back at the beginning of Obama's term, to keep a loose, running catalog of all his accomplishments, every announcement and policy shift, legislative act and executive order I could find that either reversed a toxic Bush agenda item or put into motion a progressive idea he'd mentioned during the campaign, everything from science to emissions, stem-cell research to women's rights. As the stories came across the wires, I'd grab the link and keep a master list. Just to see.

Ha. It didn't take long before I realized the utter futility of this plan. I simply could not keep up. There were too many, coming too quickly. What's more, many of the changes were not widely reported, were not shouted by the White House by a president seeking applause or a boost in poll numbers from a mal-educated, reactionary "base" who wouldn't be happy until every Planned Parenthood clinic was burned down and Jesus' face was on the dollar bill and the Indy 500 was declared a national holiday. For example.

The good news is, others took up this noble task, have tracked most of Obama's rather stunning, unsung achievements and policy nudges to date. And those changes are voluminous. Here's just one handy list, a quick rundown of about 90 of Obama's more noteworthy accomplishments, right off the top. Can you read it and not be impressed? Or do you get stuck on those handful that you disagree with, personal hot buttons that negate and blinder everything else? Shame.

Sure, there's still a long way to go. Yes, we're still invading Afghanistan. Wall Street is still packed with jackals and demons. DOMA still exists. All is far from perfect. But times have changed indeed. Things are most definitely not what they once were. I can think of no better news to report.

ON THE LITE SIDE (sorta) - Bush Base xoxoxo

2009-12-03T09:07:00.000-08:00

"A Conservative Love Letter To George W. Bush" by Ken Kupchik, Air America

Dear George W. Bush,

It has been too long. We miss you and we want you back.

This new guy sucks. He just decided to send 30,000 more troops into Afghanistan, but we're still not convinced that he's taking it seriously. He actually had to think about it and analyze the situation, can you believe that crap? What happened to leading with your gut, shooting from the hip? If you were still in charge we'd be building a Disneyland in Tehran by now.

And the budget? This guy spends money like he had your father's credit card during homecoming at Phillips Academy, Andover. This runaway spending is bankrupting the country. We can't explain exactly why it is bankrupting the country, because we have had a higher national debt in relation to the size of our economy before, like after WWII, but it really freaks everyone out so we'll keep saying it. (Learned that one from you and your boys.) Man, are we pining for the days when you made us feel like spending was patriotic, and a dead marsupial could get a mortgage.

I don't think you could fully understand how angry we are! This president is a radical leftist! He is imposing his agenda everywhere we look. Granted, he has drawn an economic team from the same pool of Wall Street elites as nearly all past presidents, kept your Federal Reserve chairman in place, kept your Secretary of Defense, hasn't legalized gay marriage or marijuana, closed Guantanamo Bay, repealed Don't Ask Don't Tell, or even proposed a single-payer health care system, but he is a radical leftist! We know for a fact, because Limbaugh, Hannity and Beck would never say it if it weren't true.

We are sick of people blaming all of these problems on you. I mean it's been like almost a whole eleven months, more than enough time to solve the largest financial collapse since 1929. Please come back, or at least send Sarah Palin in your place. America's problems will never solve themselves unless we allow them to solve themselves by ignoring them for another twenty years. And we miss Dick Cheney. He says the president is projecting weakness, and we know that nothing projects strength and courage like five draft deferments! We want our country back!

Love always,

Your Base xoxoxo

Couldn't resist. Got a real chuckle out of this.

ON THE LITE SIDE - A New 007

2009-12-02T13:47:00.001-08:00

"Afghanistan's James Bond: suave killer who drives a Toyota Camry" by Dion Nissenbaum, McClatchy News

The television set crackles with breaking news: Terrorists have smuggled a nuclear bomb into Kabul and are preparing to take out the Afghan capital.

There is panic and pandemonium. Facing imminent immolation, the nation's leaders turn to the only man who can save Kabul: Afghanistan's first modern day James Bond.

Hollywood may have plans to set part of the next James Bond film in Afghanistan, but Kabul already has its own 007.

His favored drink is thick Turkish coffee, not a vodka martini. He speeds across the movie screen in a Toyota Camry, not an Aston Martin. And Afghanistan's 007 has no on-screen love interest.

But "Nijat" — the Dari world for "savior" — kills with the same suave efficiency as Sean Connery, Roger Moore and Daniel Craig.

Afghanistan's 007 is the newest incarnation in the nation's scrappy, low-budget film industry still struggling to recover from years of Taliban repression. If all goes as planned, "Nijat" will debut next year as part of the fifth annual Kabul International Documentary and Short Film Festival.

"Afghanistan's film industry is coming out of the ashes," said Sonia Nassery Cole, an Afghan-American filmmaker currently in Kabul, where she is directing "Black Tulip," a motion picture about modern life in this volatile nation.

Afghanistan's movie industry was crippled by years under Taliban rules that barred films and shuttered cinemas.

Even though U.S.-led forces toppled the Taliban government in 2001, filmmakers in Afghanistan still face unenviable challenges.

The deadly blast from a suicide car bomber targeting the NATO headquarters in Kabul last month seriously damaged the nearby movie set for a biographic film about Rumi, the region's celebrated 13th century Sufi poet.

The ongoing Taliban insurgency makes it impossible to film in large parts of the country.

And the Afghanistan government, beset by corruption and nearly overwhelmed by Taliban fighters, offers little support for the country's underdeveloped film industry.

Last year, the Afghan government banned theaters from showing "The Kite Runner" because of concerns that the Hollywood movie's stark depiction of a Pashtun boy raping a Hazara boy would inflame ethnic tensions.

Filmmakers became so worried about the fallout that they delayed release of the film so they could spirit the four child stars out of Afghanistan.

"We are sandwiched between the Taliban and the government," said Latif Ahmadi, director of Afghanistan's state-run film commission, whose office windows were blown out by the October attack on the NATO headquarters across the road.

Ahmadi said he received about $50,000 from the Afghan government to make his film about Rumi. But he quickly ran out of cash and has shelved the film while he searches for more money.

Like the Rumi movie, Afghanistan's new James Bond film is decidedly low-budget.

The filmmakers used jury-rigged firecrackers and packets of red ink to simulate shootings.

Sympathetic diplomats have agreed to let the filmmakers transform their gated embassy into the headquarters of the fictional Afghanistan Secret Service.

And Afghanistan's 007 nearly crushed the movie screenwriter with his Camry when he confused the accelerator for the brake after a long day of filming.

But Nijat is something more than a short action film.

The film's star is Qaseem Elmi, a quiet, 26-year-old entrepreneur who runs a small media production company in Kabul.

As the son of a police officer who worked for the Moscow-installed government in the 1980s, Elmi fled to Pakistan with his family when the Soviet forces withdrew in 1989.

Elmi spent his first eight months as a refugee living in a tent and kissed the ground when he returned to Afghanistan in 2002 after U.S.-led forces toppled the Taliban rulers.

Elmi started a Kabul computer business, worked for Afghan President Hamid Karzai's senior economic adviser and produced Andy Warhol-style campaign posters for one of the two female candidates in the recent presidential election.

The Bond-inspired film evolved as a side-project while Elmi and his partners were waiting for the delayed arrival of fiberglass "dome homes" that they hope NATO will buy to replace chilly military tents.

Elmi doesn't want moviegoers to simply see Nijat as an action hero. He sees the Afghanistan Bond as a role model for his fractured country.

"I hope any kid or any soldier who watches this will think: 'Can I be like that?'" Elmi said while smoking one of Nijat's signature cigarettes. "'If I get a job that big, can I save my country?'"

WAR ON TERROR - From the Inside, KOLK Afghanistan

2009-12-02T13:41:00.000-08:00

"Trainers of Afghan police have work cut out for them" by Jay Price, McClatchy News

When the improvised bomb exploded in a mud-walled compound about 300 yards from a new traffic checkpoint, the six Afghan police officers at the post just looked at one another.

Another violent day on Afghanistan's Highway 1 had begun.

"Tell them to send three guys and go check it out to make sure no locals were hurt," U.S. Army 2nd Lt. Hans Beutel told a translator. "Tell them not to get too close, but go take a look."

Then Beutel, 23, and the rest of his team from the 4th Brigade of the 82nd Airborne Division drove off to a half-finished nearby base to grab a quick lunch. When they returned to the police checkpoint in the early afternoon, they found it deserted.

It was another lost afternoon in the frustrating effort to train Afghanistan's ill-paid police, who have a well-deserved reputation for stealing and extorting bribes. Staff Sgt. Tony Locklear, a 44-year-old from Robeson County, N.C., who'd spent the morning coaching the officers on running a checkpoint, cursed when he saw they were gone.

Training the Afghan national and local police, who function as a paramilitary force, is essential to the Obama administration's efforts to find an exit from Afghanistan. If the Afghan government is ever to take control of the country, it will need a less corrupt and more professional police force that can stand on its own.

Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the U.S. commander, has called for boosting the police force to 160,000 from its strength of 84,000; McChrystal also wants the Afghan army to double in size, to 240,000.

Eight years after the U.S.-led invasion, the police appear to be years away from functioning independently. American trainers say they must tell the Afghans repeatedly to do the simplest things, such as separating passengers they've searched from ones they haven't when they stop a vehicle.

The police suffer from a range of problems besides corruption, their U.S. trainers say. Illiteracy is the norm — Beutel thinks that only about 10 percent of the police officers he works with can read — and drug abuse is common.

Fuel is often in short supply. The central police headquarters in Kandahar, in southern Afghanistan, provides the district police with whom Beutel works one tank of diesel fuel a month per truck. That often means that when Beutel wants to mount a mission, he has to carry American fuel in jerrycans for the Afghan vehicles, a double frustration since the whole idea is to develop a force that can work without U.S. help.

Still, the police, manning vulnerable traffic checkpoints, routinely suffer casualties at a rate two or three times that of any other force on the coalition side, and American trainers say that many are fearless under fire.

This area along Highway 1 about 25 miles west of Kandahar illustrates the challenge the police face. Down a dusty side road about 700 yards from the police checkpoint, two white flags flapped in the breeze one recent morning.

"A few days after we started showing up here, the Taliban put up those flags," said Beutel, of Huntersville, N.C. "Pretty much everything past that is theirs."

That means the Taliban control a series of small grape-farming villages on a strip of land a mile or two wide between the highway — the main east-west artery — and the Arghandab River, a key waterway in Kandahar province.

After nearly two dozen assaults into Taliban turf in the past three months, Beutel and the soldiers he commands describe a nightmarish place in which the Taliban control the villages even in daylight, and the roads and paths are larded with bombs and mines.

Explosive booby traps are set into walls, and the insurgents have dug elaborate fighting positions with "spider holes," bunkers, camouflaged trenches and even tunnels that are reminiscent of the Vietnam War.

Beutel said he'd like to clean it all out and set up checkpoints outside the villages to prevent the Taliban from slipping back. That, however, would take perhaps twice as many police and a savvier police district commander who could persuade the village elders to build a working relationship with the police.

For now, it's all the local police and Afghan National Army units can do to try to keep the highway safe along the 12-mile stretch that Beutel's police are supposed to patrol.

"The ANA should clear (the villages) and the police should hold them, but for now they're both kind of in survival mode," Beutel said. "They have a foothold on Highway 1 and that's about it."

Beutel's soldiers work with the officers on a range of skills, from how to patrol to how to operate a checkpoint and even how to act professionally.

He talks with the police battalion commander, Bismullah Jan, almost daily, the young American officer sitting with the grizzled policeman on a rug in the district police offices on the Canadian military base where Beutel's troops live. They sip tea and discuss what went well that day and what could improve, plan missions and discuss what supplies the police need.

Before the police disappeared from the checkpoint, Beutel had been feeling good about the last 25 days. His soldiers had worked with the police to beef up several permanent checkpoints along the district's stretch of highway. The plan had been to monitor who was entering and leaving villages and to keep the Taliban away from the highway.

The operation had been a success: The number of bombs planted on the road had fallen by 70 to 80 percent, Beutel said. The mission couldn't last indefinitely, however, because it required too many police officers, and its last day would underscore the security challenges.

The explosion at the nearby compound was only the first of a series of incidents. Beutel thought an insurgent might have set off a bomb accidentally or possibly tried to lure his soldiers into an ambush.

Next, a U.S. Army truck filled with soldiers from another unit hit a mine, which blew off one wheel.

Then the attack that many had been expecting came just after Beutel's paratroopers drove off for lunch at the partly constructed U.S. base.

This time, the insurgents struck an Afghan army convoy about 1,000 yards east with rocket-propelled grenades and small arms. Beutel's troops, hearing the attack just as they were beginning to eat, jumped in their armored trucks and raced out through the gate.

They tore past the Afghan convoy and took up a position where they had a good line of sight south. Beutel got on the radio with the pilots of two U.S. helicopters overhead. The pilots fired a couple of rockets at yet another taunting white flag south of the highway, near where Beutel told them the insurgents had been seen last, but they didn't flush any.

That didn't surprise Locklear, whose men have found networks of holes and trenches near the villages.

"We've even seen them shoot at helicopters, slide down awhile when the choppers fire rockets at them, then pop up and shoot again," he said.

Later, Beutel went to find the police battalion commander for their usual evening meeting, but an assistant said Jan was off on business. A police commander named Farouk, who like many Afghans goes by a single name, walked up. U.S. paratroopers had spoken admiringly about him.

Farouk said he'd just chased a dozen Taliban away from a broken-down truck on the highway. He thought he knew where they were hiding. "Let's go kill them!" he said.

"He comes out with ideas. He'll come to us with plans for operations," Beutel said. "He's a real go-getter."

Then Hamayun, the battalion's gaunt, bearded criminal investigations officer, approached. Beutel asked through a translator why the six policemen had abandoned the checkpoint.

"Did the Taliban shoot at them?" he asked.

Hamayun drew himself up.

"We wouldn't put on these uniforms if we were afraid of the Taliban," he said. "They left because the Americans never came back."

"It sounds like they just took off because they were lazy," Beutel said, walking back to the concrete bunker where he sleeps. "If we're not around, they think it's not really like an operation."

Beutel remained philosophical, however. Most of the police are brave, and some are, if anything, too eager, he said. Others aren't much good. Regardless, making the police into a force that can counter the Taliban is going to be a long haul, and a single afternoon doesn't mean much.

"Somehow we've got to empower the locals to trust" the police, Beutel said. "Right now, though, the guys with legitimacy in those villages are the ones who can bust through your door with an AK-47."

POLITICS - More Opinion on the Narrow-Minded GOP

2009-12-01T09:10:00.000-08:00

"GOP's wrong prescription" by Doris Eutsey, Tribe Total Media

When President Roosevelt called for a program to protect America's seniors in 1935, the Republicans denounced it as socialism and claimed it was the first step toward "feeling the lash of the dictator." The Wall Street Journal said it was the beginning of the end for capitalism and would end the progress of a great nation.

Their predictions of doom and gloom were proven false, and today millions of seniors rely on Social Security to meet their basic needs.

In 1964 President Johnson called for a government program to provide health care for the nation's seniors -- Medicare. Once again, the Republicans recycled their predictions of catastrophe for our country claiming that it was a cruel hoax and the beginning of socialized medicine. Republicans gave speeches on the floor of Congress claiming that it would lead to bureaucrats making medical decisions for us and taking away our right to choose our own doctors.The Wall Street Journal wrote in 1965 that the Democrats were playing politics with the health care of our mothers and fathers.

Medicare has been a resounding success, and it would be hard to find seniors willing to give up their Medicare.

Because of its popularity, the Republicans now claim they want to protect Medicare. The very people who fought so hard against Medicare now want to claim it as their own.

When the House recently voted on the health care bill, Republicans once again reverted to theatrics. It was quite amazing to see how far they would go to prevent the bill's passage. They used the same old tactics of scare and fear mongering.

The American people want and need health care reform. Members of Congress need to stop the theatrics, sit down and write a bill that is good for our country. They need to decide if they are going to obstruct the legislation or do they want to be on the right side of history for a change.

The GOP change? Now that's an oxymoron.

POLITICS - Afghanistan Speech, Opinion

2009-12-01T14:38:00.001-08:00

"The Speech Obama Should Give Tonight" by Adam Hanft, Huffington Post 12/1/2009

(President Obama should say)

Winston Churchill was a great orator who knew the power of the simple declarative.

On June 17th, 1940, he got on the radio and said to his country: "The news from France is very bad."

And so in that spirit of directness, I stand before you tonight and say the news from Afghanistan is very bad.

The war in Afghanistan began on October 7th, 2001, and here is where we stand on the evening of December 1st, 2009:

Put in the starkest terms, we have not been able to defeat the Taliban, to eliminate the pervasive corruption and drug trade that undermine the country's very existence, to establish even the rudimentary foundations of a stable nation.

Whatever successes we've had have come because we've bribed some local militias and tribal chiefs with wads of cash. When America has to compromise its values by supporting warlords who just happen to be on our side of ancient tribal conflicts, something is very wrong.

I listened to the generals and added thousands of troops since I became president. But the Taliban insurgency is growing in strength every day. That's not because we don't have courageous troops and brilliant generals. It's because we don't have the support of the people of Afghanistan. And the truth is that no matter how many troops you have on the ground, you cannot succeed where you are not welcome.

Consider these numbers: In 2005, more than 80% of Afghanis gave the United States a rating of good or excellent; this year, the same number has plummeted to 30%.

To me, that says there is something fundamentally misguided about our efforts. We're spending billions of dollars and risking American blood and treasure on an effort to protect the Afghani people from the depredations of the Taliban, and yet the local population views us more unfavorably year after year.

We have invested billions to build a stable society, but our effort hasn't been matched by enough legitimate, dedicated efforts on their side to put Afghanistan on the path to become an honest and open nation. While there are some admirable people in the Afghan Army and police force who deserve our respect, these are fundamentally broken institutions where the right amount of money stuffed in the right pocket can buy anything you want.

For seven years Afghanis lived under the brutal thumb of the Taliban; basic human rights were violated, girls couldn't go to school and women couldn't work.

Even though we liberated that country - and I don't use that word lightly - America, as I have told you, is still largely mistrusted and often loathed. With real unemployment pushing twenty percent at home, with 20,000 people a day joining the Food Stamps program, with more than forty million people lacking health insurance, I can't justify a further investment in Afghanistan.

If I sent in 40,000 troops - the number requested by General McChrystal, I am sure we would have some short-term success. Our troops are well-trained and well-equipped. But it's not the short-term that deeply troubles me.

I believe that the presence of more American troops on the ground would make it easier for the Taliban to recruit and to grow stronger, since there is no palpable national desire for our involvement and for the positive change we can bring about. More American boots on the ground feed their mythology. We are a commercial for our enemies.

If the country of Afghanistan won't step up, we shouldn't step out. That is the hard but implacable truth.

Of course, all this would be different if there were national security issues at stake. There were clearly such issues in the balance when we launched our attack on the Taliban. They gave safe harbor to Al Qaeda. It was in Al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan where many of the perpetrators of the September 11th attacks learned their evil trade and where Osama bin Laden was permitted to set up shop.

But we have largely dismantled Al Qaeda and decimated its leadership. At the same time, their support has been dropping around the Muslim world. Polls show that the number of Muslims supporting suicide bombings in places like Indonesia and Lebanon has dropped by more than half over the last five years. In Saudi Arabia, only 10 percent of the population now has a favorable view of Al Qaeda.

The tide is naturally turning as the twisted ideology of Al Qaeda is being seen for what it is. Now I am not naïve, I know that they will continue to recruit disillusioned Muslim youth, and that we are engaged in an enduring struggle against their belief system and their concrete plans to kill Americans around the world.

If I thought that sending more troops to Afghanistan would prevent an Al Qaeda attack against American interests, I would not hesitate to take the steps - despite my frustration with the Afghan people who haven't taken their own futures in their own hands.

But I believe that increasing our troop commitment will create the illusion of progress in a war where conclusion is the only progress. We have sophisticated drones and enough troops on the ground to prevent Al Qaeda from re-establishing itself. That should be our only goal. Not nation-building, not defeating the Taliban, but simply preventing those who perpetrated the September 11th attacks to be in a position to harm a single American, anywhere in the world.

So my message tonight is a simple one. I respect my generals who are asking for more troops, but I have not been convinced that more troops are the long-term answer. In fact, more troops are a long-term disaster, because they will only create a situation from which it will be more difficult to extricate ourselves. I have seen no evidence that the sacrifices we've made to date have resulted in an Afghanistan that is more unified in its mission to create a strong, proud and just nation. So I have no reason to believe that intensified sacrifice will change this.

I am telling the Afghan government and the Afghan people that they need to get their act together, and that we will start to draw down our troops at a reasonable and prudent level starting now.

If this tough medicine galvanizes the nation into action, if I see real efforts made to eliminate corruption, to suppress the drug trade, to put tribal differences aside to begin the difficult and complex - but noble task of creating a modern nation, I will reconsider.

But until that time, and as long as - to paraphrase Churchill once again -the news from Afghanistan is very bad; I'm not authorizing a single additional brave American to be deployed there.

OUR PLANET - Jane Goodall

2009-12-01T14:18:00.000-08:00

"Preserving Planet Earth" Bill Moyers Journal

This week on the JOURNAL, Bill Moyers spoke with famed scientist Jane Goodall, best known for her groundbreaking work with Chimpanzees in Tanzania.

For the past two decades, Goodall has devoted much of her time to environmental advocacy, convincing audiences that saving the wilderness and wild creatures needs to be a priority for all of us, and that individual citizens can make a profound difference. She told Moyers:

“There have been extinctions. The dinosaurs are thought to have been [because of] a meteorite or something. And there've been gradual extinctions, because there have been fluctuations in climate that changes ecosystems and habitats. But since the industrial revolution, our human impact on the planet – our greenhouse gas emissions, our reckless damage to the natural world, the continual growth of our populations, have had a tremendously damaging effect... Wouldn't it be easy just to say, ‘Well, it's a trend and it's just happening. The pendulum is swinging. We just better sit back and let it swing. And maybe one day it'll swing back.’ If everybody stopped, [if] everybody gave up, then I wouldn't like to think of the world that my great-great-grandchildren would be born into.”

What do you think?

How are you and your community helping to preserve the environment?

WORLD VIEW - Baghdad Iraq 11/28/2009

2009-12-01T14:12:00.001-08:00

"Iraqi journalists speak out" Baghdad Observer, McClatchy News

The crowd was not large, but given the fact that a gathering of outspoken Iraqi journalists is an obvious target for violence here in Baghdad, and that the Muslim world is currently celebrating the Eid al-Adha religious festival, the crowd was large enough.

The scene was Baghdad's Firdos Square, best known to Americans as the place where Iraqis, in a televised event we later learned was stage-managed, pulled down a huge statue of dictator Saddam Hussein after U.S. troops occupied the city in April 2003.

There was nothing stage-managed about today's gathering--a demonstration in response to the near-fatal shooting five days ago of Imad Abadi, a well-known television anchor known for his criticisms of politicians and parties of every stripe, his crusades against corruption, and his aggressive defense of press freedom. Abadi, 36, was wounded in the head and neck, in what the nonprofit group Reporters Without Borders said was clearly a target shooting. He remains in intensive care at a Baghdad hospital.

Investigative journalism is a new phenomenon to Iraqis, and reporting is a dangerous profession. Hundreds of journalists have been killed since 2003. (And, of course, there was no independent media under Saddam's rule). But after talking with a few of Abadi's colleagues and admirers at Firdos Square, I felt their might be hope for the future--at least in the long-term, if not the near-term.

They were eloquent, even without pen and paper, or script and camera.

Abraheem al Khayat, spokesman for Iraq's union of writers, said Abadi had become so outspoken that friends had warned him to be careful. Khayat made an allusion to the silencer presumably on the intended assassin's weapon. "It is a silencer that is required to silence the voices of outspoken people," he said.

Asked whether Abadi was expected to survive, he said: "Maybe he will live, but he cannot work. Maybe he will live, but he will flee" the country.

I asked Muntasar Buzaid, who is affiliated with a private group that defends press freedom, whether he was optimistic or pessimistic about the future of journalism in Iraq. "I have a little of both," he replied immediately. "Now, I am writing with an alias. For me, it will be a milestone when I can write what I want to write using my own name."

Mohammed Ali, a photographer who works with Abadi, spoke for journalists the world over devoted to their craft. "This is our line of work," he said. "We have only one life. I'm a journalist. What can we do? Should I become a farmer?"

Given their bravery, I felt more than a little ashamed that I could spend only 25-20 minutes at the protest because Western reporters, due to security concerns, are advised not to linger in public places too long.

HEALTHCARE - Evidence Keeps Mounting FOR Reform

2009-12-01T08:34:00.000-08:00

"No Big Cost Rise in U.S. Premiums Is Seen in Study" by ROBERT PEAR & DAVID M. HERSZENHORN, New York Times

The Congressional Budget Office said Monday that the Senate health bill could significantly reduce costs for many people who buy health insurance on their own, and that it would not substantially change premiums for the vast numbers of Americans who receive coverage from large employers.

The eagerly awaited report, which came as the Senate began debate on the legislation, provided Democrats with ammunition against Republicans who have criticized the bill on the ground that it would raise costs for a majority of Americans.

Centrist Democrats like Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana, whose votes are vital to President Obama’s hopes of getting the bill approved, had feared that the measure would drive up costs for people with employer-sponsored coverage. After reading the budget office report, Mr. Bayh said he was reassured on that point.

Before taking account of federal subsidies to help people buy insurance on their own, the budget office said the bill would tend to drive up premiums. But as a result of the subsidies, it said, most people in the individual insurance market would see their costs decline, compared with the costs expected under current law. The subsidies, a main feature of the bill, would cost the government nearly $450 billion in the next 10 years and would cover nearly two-thirds of premiums for people who receive them.

For most people who get health insurance through employers — five-sixths of the total market — the budget office concluded that there would be little change in their premiums relative to the amounts projected under current law.

Administration officials said the report provided a lift to the bill, which embodies Mr. Obama’s top domestic priority.

“The C.B.O. has rendered a fundamental judgment that this will reduce the deficit and reduce people’s premium costs,” said Rahm Emanuel, the White House chief of staff, who huddled with Senate Democratic leaders on Capitol Hill on Monday. “All the Republican leadership will guarantee you is the status quo.”

But Republican senators like Charles E. Grassley of Iowa and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the minority leader, said the report validated their concerns. They focused on the prediction that unsubsidized premiums in the individual insurance market, less than a fifth of those with health insurance, would rise an average of 10 percent to 13 percent.

“The analysis by the Congressional Budget Office confirms our worst fears,” Mr. Grassley said. “Millions of people who are expecting lower costs as a result of health reform will end up paying more in the form of higher premiums. For large and small employers that have been struggling for years with skyrocketing health insurance premiums, C.B.O. concludes this bill will do little, if anything, to provide relief.”

The Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada, said the highly partisan floor debate that opened Monday afternoon was one of the most significant in the history of the Senate. It is expected to continue for much of December, with supporters and opponents alike offering a raft of amendments as the White House and Democratic leaders seek to put together the 60-vote coalition necessary to win passage.

Administration officials continued to reach out to lawmakers in both parties to try to build support. Senator Susan Collins, Republican of Maine, said she met Monday for 45 minutes with Nancy-Ann DeParle, director of the White House Office of Health Reform, to discuss her concerns about the legislation.

In its report, the budget office compared estimates of premiums in 2016 under the new legislation and under current law. In either case, after seven years of inflation, premiums would be substantially higher than they are today.

The budget office said the analysis of premiums was extremely complex, so the experience of individuals and families "could vary significantly from the average.”

“In general,” it said, “the proposal would tend to increase premiums for people who are young and relatively healthy, and decrease premiums for those who are older and relatively unhealthy.”

Under the legislation, it said, the average premium per person in the individual insurance market would be 10 percent to 13 percent higher than under current law. But, it said, most people in this market — 18 million of the 32 million people buying insurance on their own — would qualify for federal subsidies, which would reduce their costs well below what they would have to pay under current law.

For people receiving subsidies, the budget office said, premiums would be 56 percent to 59 percent lower than under current law.

Without subsidies, it said, premiums under the bill would average $5,800 a year for individuals and $15,200 a year for families buying coverage on their own. Under current law, the comparable figures would be $5,500 and $13,100.

“This study indicates that, for most Americans, the bill will have a modestly positive impact on their premium costs,” Mr. Bayh said. “For the remainder, more will see their costs go down than up.”

Under the bill, the budget office said, individual policies would have to provide more benefits and pay a larger share of costs than most existing policies do. In other words, it said, some people would pay more, but would also get more.

Insurers, it said, would have to cover certain services that, in many cases, are not covered by existing policies in the individual insurance market. These include maternity care, prescription drugs, mental health services and substance abuse treatment. Moreover, it said, under the legislation, insurance would cover an average of 72 percent of medical costs for people buying insurance on their own, up from 60 percent under current law.

The budget office said it foresaw “smaller effects on premiums for employment-based coverage.”

In groups with 50 or fewer employees, it said, unsubsidized premiums in 2016 would average $7,800 a year for individuals and $19,200 for families — scarcely any different from the amounts expected under current law. Of the 25 million people receiving coverage from small businesses, it said, 3 million would qualify for subsidies, which would reduce their premiums by an average of 8 percent to 11 percent.

Large employers would generally not be eligible for such assistance. Their premiums in 2016 under the bill would average $7,300 for individual coverage and $20,100 for family coverage, the report said. Under current law, the comparable figures would be $7,400 for individual coverage and $20,300 for family coverage.

The Senate bill would impose an excise tax on high-premium health plans offered by employers. People who remain in such “Cadillac health plans” would pay higher premiums, but most people would avoid the effect of the tax by enrolling in plans with lower premiums, the budget office said.

(from "New CBO Report Undermines Arguments Against Health Reform")(click for larger view)

ENVIRONMENT - The Triggers of Concern

2009-12-01T08:53:00.000-08:00

"Climate 'time bombs' stoke scientists' fears" The Independent UK 11/30/2009

Excerpt

Whatever the outcome of the UN climate summit in Copenhagen, Nature may have some extremely nasty surprises up its sleeve, say scientists.

They say Earth's biosphere has numerous "tipping points" - triggers that cause global warming and its impacts to lurch up a gear or two, rather than occur than in a smooth, incremental way.

In other words, the planet itself would become the main driver of warming, making the crisis far more difficult to manage.

Many of the tipping points have only been discovered within the last decade or so, and experts admit to many unknowns as to how and when they could occur.

Here is a summary of the main triggers, outlined by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and in studies published in peer-reviewed journals:

ARCTIC SEA ICE LOSS

GREENLAND AND WEST ANTARCTIC ICE SHEETS

PERMAFROST TIME BOMB

SAGGING SINKS (CO2 Sinks)

(See full article for details of triggers)

POLITICS - Scare Stories Hobble Government

2009-11-25T13:15:00.000-08:00

"The Phantom Menace" by PAUL KRUGMAN, New York Times 11/22/2009

A funny thing happened on the way to a new New Deal. A year ago, the only thing we had to fear was fear itself; today, the reigning doctrine in Washington appears to be “Be afraid. Be very afraid.”

What happened? To be sure, “centrists” in the Senate have hobbled efforts to rescue the economy. But the evidence suggests that in addition to facing political opposition, President Obama and his inner circle have been intimidated by scare stories from Wall Street.

Consider the contrast between what Mr. Obama’s advisers were saying on the eve of his inauguration, and what he himself is saying now.

In December 2008 Lawrence Summers, soon to become the administration’s highest-ranking economist, called for decisive action. “Many experts,” he warned, “believe that unemployment could reach 10 percent by the end of next year.” In the face of that prospect, he continued, “doing too little poses a greater threat than doing too much.”

Ten months later unemployment reached 10.2 percent, suggesting that despite his warning the administration hadn’t done enough to create jobs. You might have expected, then, a determination to do more.

But in a recent interview with Fox News, the president sounded diffident and nervous about his economic policy. He spoke vaguely about possible tax incentives for job creation. But “it is important though to recognize,” he went on, “that if we keep on adding to the debt, even in the midst of this recovery, that at some point, people could lose confidence in the U.S. economy in a way that could actually lead to a double-dip recession.”

What? Huh?

Most economists I talk to believe that the big risk to recovery comes from the inadequacy of government efforts: the stimulus was too small, and it will fade out next year, while high unemployment is undermining both consumer and business confidence.

Now, it’s politically difficult for the Obama administration to enact a full-scale second stimulus. Still, he should be trying to push through as much aid to the economy as possible. And remember, Mr. Obama has the bully pulpit; it’s his job to persuade America to do what needs to be done.

Instead, however, Mr. Obama is lending his voice to those who say that we can’t create more jobs. And a report on Politico.com suggests that deficit reduction, not job creation, will be the centerpiece of his first State of the Union address. What happened?

It took me a while to puzzle this out. But the concerns Mr. Obama expressed become comprehensible if you suppose that he’s getting his views, directly or indirectly, from Wall Street.

Ever since the Great Recession began economic analysts at some (not all) major Wall Street firms have warned that efforts to fight the slump will produce even worse economic evils. In particular, they say, never mind the current ability of the U.S. government to borrow long term at remarkably low interest rates — any day now, budget deficits will lead to a collapse in investor confidence, and rates will soar.

And it’s this latter claim that Mr. Obama echoed in that Fox News interview. Is he right to be worried?

Well, spikes in long-term interest rates have happened in the past, most famously in 1994. But in 1994 the U.S. economy was adding 300,000 jobs a month, and the Fed was steadily raising short-term rates. It’s hard to see why anything similar should happen now, with the economy still bleeding jobs and the Fed showing no desire to raise rates anytime soon.

A better model, I’d argue, is Japan in the 1990s, which ran persistent large budget deficits, but also had a persistently depressed economy — and saw long-term interest rates fall almost steadily. There’s a good chance that officials are being terrorized by a phantom menace — a threat that exists only in their minds.

And shouldn’t we consider the source? As far as I can tell, the analysts now warning about soaring interest rates tend to be the same people who insisted, months after the Great Recession began, that the biggest threat facing the economy was inflation. And let’s not forget that Wall Street — which somehow failed to recognize the biggest housing bubble in history — has a less than stellar record at predicting market behavior.

Still, let’s grant that there is some risk that doing more about double-digit unemployment would undermine confidence in the bond markets. This risk must be set against the certainty of mass suffering if we don’t do more — and the possibility, as I said, of a collapse of confidence among ordinary workers and businesses.

And Mr. Summers was right the first time: in the face of the greatest economic catastrophe since the Great Depression, it’s much riskier to do too little than it is to do too much. It’s sad, and unfortunate, that the administration appears to have lost sight of that truth.

SCIENCE - Fusion Reactor Update

2009-11-25T12:49:00.000-08:00

"ITER Fire-Up Delayed Again" by Tudor Vieru

Experts say 2018 is too soon

Scientists assessing the difficulties related to the construction of the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) facility in southern France have recently revealed that it may be unfeasible to fire up the reactor as soon as 2018, as current plans have it. The multi-billion-euro nuclear fusion test reactor was supposed to come online as fast as possible, so that experts could begin their research into the mysteries and issues surrounding this type of energy production at that point.

Representatives of the European Union met between November 18-19 in St Paul-lez-Durance, a town not far from the place where ITER is scheduled to be built. Delegates from the EU told the representatives of the other six countries involved in the project that the originally planned start date was no longer realistic, but declined to comment on the reason afterwords. European officials were, however, careful to point out that the reactor still enjoyed the full support of the Union, Nature News reports.

“Our guiding objective is to ensure a sustainable success for ITER at reasonable costs and with an acceptable level of risk,” Catherine Ray explained, quoted by Nature News. She is a spokesperson on science and research for the European Commission, based in Brussels. The stakes are terribly high in this endeavor. In addition to the large costs implied, the project could yield massive benefits for humankind, by providing us with a means of producing massive levels of energy without any of the harmful side-effects that greenhouse gases currently have on our planet.

Fusion is theoretically attainable through the merging of deuterium and tritium, which are both heavy isotopes of hydrogen. Their nuclei would merge, and an impressive amount of electricity would be produced, in addition to the useful chemical element helium. The thing is that the reaction can only take place at temperatures close to the ones inside stars, or around 150 million degrees Celsius. China, India, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States will each provide nine percent of the construction costs, with the other 45 percent coming directly from the European Union.

By the time the reactor is built, it's estimated that its costs will be more than double the originally planned ones, of US$7.4 billion. This would make ITER one of the most expensive scientific undertakings ever, and for just reasons. A success here would mean a cleaner future for us, and for our children.

Fusion is the atomic process that takes place in our Sun. Unlike Fission Reactors we use today, Fusion Power will be cleaner because there is little lasting radiation and little nuclear waste to dispose of, comparatively speaking. In addition, turning off the reaction is like turning off a gas stove (no rods).

WORLD VIEW - Global Warming

2009-11-25T09:56:00.000-08:00

"Global Warming Report Finds Time Running Out" by BILL BLAKEMORE, ABC News 11/24/2009

Excerpt

There's even less time for humanity to try to curb global warming than recently thought, according to a new in-depth scientific assessment by 26 scientists from eight countries.

Sea level rise, ocean acidification and the rapid melting of massive ice sheets are among the significantly increased effects of human-induced global warming assessed in the survey, which also examines the emissions of heat-trapping gases that are causing the climate change.

"Many indicators are currently tracking near or above the worst-case projections" made three years ago by the world's scientists, the new Copenhagen Diagnosis said.

Nor has manmade global warming slowed or paused, as some headlines have recently suggested, according to the report, which you can see here.

The scientists also calculate that the world's emissions of heat-trapping gases must peak in less than 10 years and then dive quickly to nearly zero, if warming of more than another 2 degrees Fahrenheit above the current annual global temperature is to be prevented after 2050.

Any warming of more than 2 degrees F above current temperatures has been generally agreed among governments around the world to be "dangerous," though what "dangerous" means is still debated.

This is the first comprehensive update of leading peer-reviewed climate science in the three years since the last report of the intentionally thorough and slow-paced Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was finalized.

That report is now widely recognized to be out of date in important ways.

This is because over the past three years, hundreds of new scientific field accounts of global warming's impacts, as well as improved peer-reviewed analysis of global warming itself in both the deep past and the very near future, have depicted earth's atmosphere as far more "sensitive" to the invisible CO2, methane and other human-sourced greenhouse gases than had been hoped.

"Mother nature puts a limit on how long you can dither and procrastinate," climatologist Richard Somerville, one of the study's authors, told ABC News.

'Abrupt or Irreversible Change' If It's 'Business as Usual'

"We found that several vulnerable elements in Earth's climate system -- like the Amazon and other big rain forests, like the great ice sheets that have so much sea level locked up in their ice -- could be pushed toward abrupt or irreversible change if we go on toward 2100 with our business-as-usual increase in emissions of greenhouse gases," he said.

This is just the latest. The nay-sayers have to be blind or not paying attention to the history of our planet, maybe they're too young.

The gathering evidence, including what's happening lately in Antarctica (East Antarctica, Long Stable, Is Now Losing Ice), is almost shouting for our attention. The WORLD Scientists are becoming more alarmed because if we do not take drastic actions NOW, it MAY be too late to advert the consequences.

It could be that the nay-sayers just cannot take the long view. They look at our world now and cannot see the danger, it's too long away for them. The old head-in-the-sand syndrome.

POLITICS - A Long View From the '70s

2009-11-24T08:48:00.000-08:00

"What Ever Happened to That Prosperity the Tax-Cutters Promised?" by Sam Pizzigati, Too Much

Don't expect an answer from the ranters and ravers who frequent 'Tea Parties' — or the politicians who egg them on.

You don’t have to dig particularly deep, in the United States today, to find some striking similarities between today’s virulently anti-Obama “Tea Party” crowd and the media darlings who birthed the “Tax Revolt” phenomenon back in the late 1970s.

The Tax Revolters burst onto the national scene amid an inflation-battered economy. They blamed “big government” for what ailed America, and they offered a simple remedy: cut taxes. Lower taxes, they promised, would get average Americans back on track.

The Tea Party zealots have, like the Tax Revolters, also coalesced in tough economic times. They attack “big government,” too. They even make the same promises about taxes.

But the Tea Party types, so far at least, haven’t scored any early political success. The Tax Revolters did. In 1978, in a ballot-box stunner, they passed a statewide initiative in California known as Prop 13, an unprecedented cap on property taxes.

Within a few short years, almost half America’s states had followed suit with tax cuts and caps of their own. In 1980, at the national level, this Tax Revolt surge would carry Ronald Reagan into the White House. One year later, a pliant Congress would give President Reagan the biggest across-the-board federal tax cut in U.S. history.

Tax relief had become, in the wink of an eye, America’s most potent political creed. Tax cutting and capping would go on to dominate the nation’s political discourse for the next three decades, an entire generation.

And what do we have to show for all this cutting and capping? Last week, researchers offered up two new studies that offer up a useful assessment.

The first, funded by the Social Security Administration, looks at the wealth of American families. That wealth, the Tax Revolters assured us,would start amassing again once taxpayers yanked “big government” out of our pockets.

The second new study zeroes in on state and local taxes. After years of tax revolting, this Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy report asks, who exactly is paying taxes at the state and local level? Who has benefited the most, in tax terms, from the Tax Revolt the Tea Party zealots are now so fervently seeking to extend?

The answer: The rich have benefited the most. The Tax Revolt that began back in the late 1970s has, in state after state, let the affluent off the tax hook.

In fact, notes the new Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy analysis, “nearly every state and local tax system takes a much greater share of income from middle- and low-income families than from the wealthy.”

In the entire United States, the analysis adds, “only two states require their best-off citizens to pay as much of their incomes in taxes as their very poorest taxpayers must pay, and only one state taxes its wealthiest individuals at a higher effective rate than middle-income families have to pay.”

America’s most affluent 1 percent now pay, on average, just 6.4 percent of their incomes in state and local taxes. But they actually pay even less than that, since they can deduct their state and local taxes from their federal tax bill. The state and local tax burden on America’s rich, after taking this offset into account, drops to 5.2 percent.

Middle-income families — to be precise, those families who make up the middle fifth of America’s income distribution — pay, after the federal offset, 9.4 percent of their incomes in total state and local taxes.

America’s poorest families pay even more. Tax collectors take 10.9 percent of the incomes of households in the nation’s bottom 20 percent, more than double the share they take from the incomes of the nation’s top 1 percent.

The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy paper, Who Pays? A Distributional Analysis of the Tax Systems in All 50 States, covers non-elderly households. Incredibly, the study details, some states “ask their poorest residents — those in the bottom 20 percent of the income scale — to pay up to six times as much of their income in taxes as they ask the wealthy to pay.”

Now you could argue that none of this matters. The Tax Revolters, after all, didn’t claim that their tax cutting and capping would have low- and middle-income people paying taxes at a lower rate than the rich. They claimed, instead, that massive tax cuts, taken as an amorphous whole, would help just about everybody get considerably richer.

That hasn’t happened, as Brookings Institution researchers Barry Bosworth and Rosanna Smart document in a paper just published by the Boston College Center for Retirement Research, with funding support from Social Security.

Bosworth and Smart “explore the consequences of the housing price bubble and its collapse for the wealth of older households.”

Along the way, the two investigators dive into the overall family wealth data the Federal Reserve has been collecting since the early 1980s. Tapping into another federal data set, they bring the family net worth picture up-to-date for 2009.

For low- and middle-income families, their numbers tell a depressing story.

All American households — poor, middle, and rich — have lost wealth since the subprime mortgage collapse and last fall’s financial meltdown. On average, since 2007, Americans have lost 26 percent of their total net worth.

But low- and middle-income households under age 50 haven’t just lost a big chunk of the wealth they held in 2007. These households have actually lost all the wealth they had gained since 1983, the first year with Federal Reserve family wealth data available.

Back then in 1983, the bottom third — by income — of U.S. families under age 50 had an average $24,000 in net worth to their names, as measured in year 2000 dollars. The housing bubble helped boost this bottom-third average net worth to $27,000 in 2007.

Today, in the wake of that bubble’s collapse, researchers Bosworth and Smart put average bottom-third net worth at just $17,000, in those same year 2000 dollars.

Middle-income households under age 50, meanwhile, held an average net worth of $50,000 in 1983. The current net worth of this middle third, after adjusting for inflation: $45,000.

Older households in the bottom and middle income thirds — those over age 50 — have, to be sure, seen their after-inflation net worths increase between 1983 and 2009. But these households have lost at least 22 percent of the wealth they held in 2007. As older families, Bosworth and Smart note, they now “have less time to recover.”

That recovery may take some time.

Back in the middle of the 20th century, governments in the United States routinely taxed the rich to pay for the programs that built a vibrant middle class. The Tax Revolt that began three decades ago, by demonizing taxes, gave the rich a free ride and gutted those programs.

That demonization today continues, with politicos beholden to that rich cynically fanning the Tea Party flames. They don’t care who gets burned. The rest of us should.

Isn't about time ordinary Tax Payers like us get angry? Isn't about time we STOP believing the GOP's Commandment "Lower Taxes?"

The truth is, the GOP only serves the rich.

POLITICS - A Win for New Orleans, Post Katrina

2009-11-20T15:07:00.000-08:00

"In New Orleans, Elation Over Katrina Liability Ruling" by CAMPBELL ROBERTSON, New York Times

Since the first days after Hurricane Katrina, when the streets were still under water, many residents of New Orleans and its surroundings have maintained that the flood that wrecked their lives was the government’s fault, and that the government should pay for it.

On Wednesday night came news that many had hoped for but few had believed would ever actually happen: a federal judge agreed.

“My head is spinning,” said Pam Dashiell, a co-director of the Lower Ninth Ward Sustainability Project and a 20-year resident of the neighborhood. “Maybe things are really breaking for the people.”

The sense of vindication was widespread, but the practical implications were less clear. The morning after Judge Stanwood R. Duval Jr.’s decision that the Army Corps of Engineers’ negligent maintenance of a major navigation channel led to major flooding in the Lower Ninth Ward and the adjacent St. Bernard Parish, a pleasantly startled New Orleans was still trying to decipher what it meant.

Was it an opening for tens of thousands of lawsuits, or a big class-action lawsuit, that could add up to billions of dollars in compensation for residents? Or was it leverage for negotiating a broader, regionwide settlement with the government? Some experts suggested that it was a welcome but ultimately symbolic ruling that could be overturned on appeal.

Charles S. Miller, a spokesman for the Department of Justice, said that the government was still reviewing the decision.

“We have made no decision as to what the government’s next step will be in this matter,” he said in a statement.

But given the potential of liability, legal experts are expecting the government to appeal.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in New Orleans, where the case would go, has a record of hostility to plaintiffs in environmental cases, said Oliver Houck, a law professor at Tulane University. But, he said, Judge Duval’s decision is so technical and packed with details — it came with a 33-page appendix of graphs, charts and maps — that there are only a few areas where it would be exposed to a reversal.

“For an appellate court to reverse him on the facts is unthinkable,” Professor Houck said.

In 2008, Judge Duval dismissed a lawsuit arising from drainage canal breaches that flooded much of the city, ruling that a 1928 act gave the corps immunity for damages that came from a flood protection project. But his decision was scathing nonetheless, and he insisted that the government should not be free “from posterity’s judgment concerning its failure to accomplish what was its task.”

Wednesday’s decision was about a different corps project, the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet, a navigation channel known as MR-GO (pronounced Mister Go). In the 156-page decision, the judge wrote nearly as much about complicated immunity issues as he did in determining that the corps’s negligent maintenance of the channel actually caused the flooding in two areas, including the Lower Ninth Ward.

Lawyers for the corps had raised a variety of immunity shields in addition to the Flood Control Act, and the judge knocked these down one by one. With every one, though, he created a potential opportunity for higher judges to overturn the decision on appeal.

The judge ruled that the corps was liable for damages because, he said, it should have been filing environmental impact statements as the landscape around the channel significantly changed: wetlands had disappeared, levee banks had eroded, and the channel had more than doubled in width.

This is a conclusion of law rather than of fact, experts said, and thus is open territory for appeals judges. When legal opinion is at issue, said Howard J. Bashman, a Pennsylvania lawyer specializing in appellate practice, “the court gets to make up its own mind, without any deference paid to the trial judge in how the law was applied.”

At a Thursday morning news conference, the plaintiffs’ lawyers painted the decision in superlative terms, even comparing it to the victory over the British in the Battle of New Orleans.

The lawyers said they hoped the decision, and the possibility of thousands more cases following, would compel Congress and the Obama administration to agree to some kind of larger settlement for the entire city, like the one for victims of the Sept. 11 attacks.

“It’s time that we stopped litigating and started negotiating,” said Pierce O’Donnell, one of the lead lawyers.

Mr. O’Donnell said that he and the other lawyers had scheduled meetings on Capitol Hill in the coming weeks at which they would push for damage compensation for property owners, billions of dollars to rebuild infrastructure projects, and restoration of the area’s coastal wetlands. They will also demand a widespread overhaul of the Army Corps.

For now, however, much of the city was just enjoying a rare sense of triumph. Friends who were watching the news Wednesday night grabbed for their cell phones. At a coastal planning meeting in St. Bernard Parish, people broke into applause.

Mark Madary, who was on the St. Bernard Parish Council at the time of Hurricane Katrina, had campaigned against MR-GO ever since he heard the forecasts of catastrophe at a sportsmen’s league meeting in 1978. He said he never thought the case would even make it to court, but now expects a regionwide settlement.

“Now that the corps has been thrown over and exposed, it’s their duty,” Mr. Madary said.

Others in New Orleans, a city that has become accustomed to disappointment over four long years, were not as elated.

“It is an answer to something that was obvious from the beginning, and we’re glad we finally got a federal judge to agree with us,” said Robert Green Sr., a resident of the Lower Ninth Ward, who lost his mother and granddaughter in the flooding.

But it was clear that Mr. Green was more interested in talking about a grocery store that could be coming to the neighborhood.

“The lawyers are happy and the people are happy,” Mr. Green said of the decision. “But at the same time, we waited four years. So you deal with the important issues that are right in front of you.”