HHS Makes $75 Million Available to States to Expand Health Insurance Coverage HHS today announced the availability of $75 million to help states expand health insurance access to the uninsured. "With these funds, states can look at the most effective ways to provide affordable health insurance to their uninsured residents," said HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius. "Many states have had great success in recent years instituting health reforms and these awards will make it possible for more states to extend coverage to more people." Grants will be made in two categories. Target grants of $2 million to $4 million will be awarded to states with plans to target specific groups of uninsured, such as children, small businesses, or uninsured seniors. Comprehensive grants of $7 million to $10 million will be awarded to states for extensive insurance coverage initiatives. The application deadline is June 15 and all applications must have the support of the state's governor. The grants will be made over a five-year period and require a 20 percent match unless a state demonstrates a financial hardship. In addition, states must demonstrate their ability to sustain the program after Federal funding has expired. The impact and results of state projects will be reported to Congress at the end of the five-year grant period. This new program will be overseen by HHS's Health Resources and Services Administration and is an outgrowth of the agency's State Planning Grant program that operated from 2000-2007. The previous effort enabled many states to develop innovative plans that increased health insurance coverage for their uninsured residents. Visit HRSA's State Health Access for more information about this funding opportunity. From the Federation of American Scientists: When it comes to solving the nation's energy crisis utility bills hardly seem like much of a big deal. But improving access to the information in the billing records of the nation's gas and electric utilities could provide powerful tools to increase the efficiency of energy use in the US. This is particularly true in residential and commercial buildings that consume 70% of US electricity and are responsible for 40% of all US greenhouse gas emissions. Unfortunately, utility bill information is stored in a huge number of idiosyncratic formats and is not accessible to individuals and organizations that could use it. This complex, un-standardized landscape means that anyone interested in comparing their energy use with national averages, or understanding how their building is performing in terms of energy consumption, has to do an enormous amount of work sorting through confusing bill information. The small investment it would take to get these billing records into standardized formats, and making them easily available to anyone with permission to use them, would pay large dividends, for example by helping individual consumers make better decisions when they are purchasing and operating buildings, and by helping officials managing public programs designed to encourage building energy efficiency make better management decisions. In the future, detailed information about patterns of consumption may make sense when there's widespread use of "smart meters" that keep track of energy use minute by minute, and possibly appliance by appliance. But major gains are possible simply by reporting energy use for each month. Here are some examples: * Legislation could require that billing records and benchmarking data be disclosed to potential buyers at time of sale. Labels providing data on a building's energy use have been developed in Europe and are being considered in California and other parts of the US. Most labels being considered include both calculated energy demand (called "asset rating") and measured energy consumption (called an "operational rating"). The US Environmental Protection Agency has developed a tool called a portfolio manager that lets building owners compare the energy performance of their buildings with the performance of similar buildings in similar climates. At present nothing similar is available for residential buildings. The burden on the user would be greatly reduced if billing data can be uploaded automatically, using standardized formats. * If billing records for a building are available online with suitable permissions, a utility, or a third party like Google could provide a service where a consumer could go on line, identify themselves with an appropriate password, and get access to the building's history of energy use by month – preferably several years of data. This could then be automatically compared with energy use from similar structures in similar climates, and estimates of the reductions likely to result from cost-effective retrofits. Consumers might well be motivated to take action. Benchmarking tools for this purpose have already been developed by the Environmental Protection Agency. * Good building energy audits involve entering data about a structure into a computer model that estimates a building's energy use and also computes the savings that would result from different retrofit measures that could be taken (adding insulation, replacing windows, etc.) Unfortunately these models are often wrong since the outcome depends on the skill and experience of the person using them. Accuracy can be improved if the models include an analysis of the actual energy consumption of the structure. Monthly consumption data, made available to building auditors by permission of the building owner, can be used to track the sources of inaccuracy in the data input and, and algorithms could be developed over time that would suggest corrections to the user. Improved models will lead directly to retrofits that show better performance and are more cost-effective. The cost of doing this would be greatly reduced if auditors could access consumption data directly over the internet using appropriate network security tools. In the future most auditors are likely to be using wireless, handheld units at the building site to collect data and perform the energy use estimates. These could also have direct access to the data. The software for these tools would need to be adjusted for each utility if each company keeps data in a different format - at a significant increase in cost. * Utility data available online could also be used to strengthen project management for retrofit programs. The performance of individual auditing and contractor teams could be continuously measured and compared based on the actual impact their work had on energy use in the buildings they serviced. The persistence of savings could be measured over a period of years and the actual performance of different approaches to retrofits compared in ways that could lead to continuous improvement of the programs. This, of course, would require collecting and maintaining data on the kinds of measures undertaken and the cost of the installations in a standardized format. * Energy use data collected in a consistent form would also permit continuous analysis of progress, or lack of progress, of city, state, and national programs to improve energy efficiency. It could be used, for example, to compare programs in different cities, and track the impact of different policy interventions in considerable detail. While care would need to be taken to ensure that identifiable personal information is not released, statistical agencies have considerable experience in analyzing data scheduled for publication to ensure that this doesn't happen – and they have a good track record of success. The novelty in this new system, of course, would be that the data would be gathered online. Careful design of network security would needed. * The introduction of "smart grid" technology will open more opportunities for collecting detailed information about building performance. The new systems will let building owners and utilities adjust consumption to avoid system peaks and provide information useful for understanding the consumption of specific equipment in the buildings that can, among other things, be used to understand the impact of any retrofit measures undertaken in the building — with statistically significant samples. The smart grid will require standardized approaches to measuring and reporting consumption data. Taken together, the benefits of a consistent national format for the energy consumption of individual utility customers would be considerable. The benefits would include much improved management and accountability for retrofit program funds, and more energy savings per dollar invested. While some utilities may complain about the cost of converting existing data formats to a new format, the overall costs would be small compared with the savings that could be achieved. Who owns the Rain? Apparently Colorado believes only certain people own it. Environmentalists and others like to gather it in containers for use in drier times. But state law says it belongs to those who bought the rights to waterways. By Nicholas Riccardi March 18, 2009 Reporting from Denver — Every time it rains here, Kris Holstrom knowingly breaks the law. Holstrom's violation is the fancifully painted 55-gallon buckets underneath the gutters of her farmhouse on a mesa 15 miles from the resort town of Telluride. The barrels catch rain and snowmelt, which Holstrom uses to irrigate the small vegetable garden she and her husband maintain. But according to the state of Colorado, the rain that falls on Holstrom's property is not hers to keep. It should be allowed to fall to the ground and flow unimpeded into surrounding creeks and streams, the law states, to become the property of farmers, ranchers, developers and water agencies that have bought the rights to those waterways. What Holstrom does is called rainwater harvesting. It's a practice that dates back to the dawn of civilization, and is increasingly in vogue among environmentalists and others who pursue sustainable lifestyles. They collect varying amounts of water, depending on the rainfall and the vessels they collect it in. The only risk involved is losing it to evaporation. Or running afoul of Western states' water laws. Those laws, some of them more than a century old, have governed the development of the region since pioneer days. "If you try to collect rainwater, well, that water really belongs to someone else," said Doug Kemper, executive director of the Colorado Water Congress. "We get into a very detailed accounting on every little drop." Frank Jaeger of the Parker Water and Sanitation District, on the arid foothills south of Denver, sees water harvesting as an insidious attempt to take water from entities that have paid dearly for the resource. "Every drop of water that comes down keeps the ground wet and helps the flow of the river," Jaeger said. He scoffs at arguments that harvesters like Holstrom only take a few drops from rivers. "Everything always starts with one little bite at a time." Increasingly, however, states are trying to make the practice more welcome. Bills in Colorado and Utah, two states that have limited harvesting over the years, would adjust their laws to allow it in certain scenarios, over the protest of people like Jaeger. Organic farmers and urban dreamers aren't the only people pushing to legalize water harvesting. Developer Harold Smethills wants to build more than 10,000 homes southwest of Denver that would be supplied by giant cisterns that capture the rain that falls on the 3,200-acre subdivision. He supports the change in Colorado law. "We believe there is something to rainwater harvesting," Smethills said. "We believe it makes economic sense." Collected rainwater is generally considered "gray water," or water that is not reliably pure enough to drink but can be used to water yards, flush toilets and power heaters. In some states, developers try to include a network of cisterns and catchment pools in every subdivision, but in others, those who catch the rain tend to do so covertly. In Colorado, rights to bodies of water are held by entities who get preference based on the dates of their claims. Like many other Western states, Colorado has more claims than available water, and even those who hold rights dating back to the late 19th century sometimes find they do not get all of the water they should. "If I decide to [take rainwater] in 2009, somewhere, maybe 100 miles downstream, there's a water right that outdates me by 100 years" that's losing water, said Kevin Rein, assistant state engineer. State Sen. Chris Romer found out about this facet of state water policy when he built his ecological dream house in Denver, entirely powered by solar energy. He wanted to install a system to catch rainwater, but the state said it couldn't be permitted. "It was stunning to me that this common-sense thing couldn't be done," said Romer, a Democrat. He sponsored a bill last year to allow water harvesting, but it did not pass. "Welcome to water politics in Colorado," Romer said. "You don't touch my gun, you don't touch my whiskey, and you don't touch my water." Romer and Republican state Rep. Marsha Looper introduced bills this year to allow harvesting in certain circumstances. Armed with a study that shows that 97% of rainwater that falls on the soil never makes it to streams, they propose to allow harvesting in 11 pilot projects in urban areas, and for rural users like Kris Holstrom whose wells are depleted by drought. In contrast to the high-stakes maneuvering in the capital, Holstrom looks upon the state's regulation of rainwater with exasperated amusement. Holstrom, director of sustainability for Telluride, and her husband, John, have lived on their farm since 1988. During the severe drought at the start of this decade, their well began drying up. Placing rain barrels under the gutters was the natural thing to do, said Holstrom, 51. "Rain out here comes occasionally, and can come really hard," she said. "To be able to store it for when you need it is really great." Holstrom had a vague awareness of state regulations. She decided to test it last summer when she was teaching a class on water harvesting. She called the state water department, which told her it was technically illegal, though it was unlikely that she would be cited. Holstrom is known in southwestern Colorado for a lifestyle and causes that many deem quixotic. The land she and her husband own holds a yurt and tepees to house "interns" who help on their organic farm in the summers. It boasts a greenhouse, which even on a recent snowy day held an oasis of rosemary, artichokes, salad greens and a fig tree. She plucked a bit of greens from one plant and munched on it as goldfish swam in a small, algae-filled pond that helps heat the enclosure. "This has been my passion for a long time -- trying to live the best way I know how," she said. nicholas.riccardi@latimes.com MYSTERIOUS FUNGUS Kills About 90 Percent Of Connecticut's Bats By RINKER BUCK |The Hartford Courant March 18, 2009 White-nose syndrome, the mysterious plague that is decimating the Northeast's bats, killed off about 90 percent of Connecticut's bats over the winter and is now galloping across the country so quickly that it threatens the nation's - and probably the world's - largest bat populations in the American South...more US lawmakers vote for bonus tax

US lawmakers in the House of Representatives have voted in favour of a bill to levy a 90% tax on big bonuses from firms bailed out by taxpayers. The move follows outrage over the decision by AIG to award its employees $165m in bonuses after taking $170bn in aid from the government.

'Nanoball' batteries could recharge car in minutes

from New Scientist - Climate Change

US researchers have revealed an experimental battery that charges about 100 times as fast as normal lithium ion batteries – the breakthrough could be a boost for green transport

Let them eat cake! says the financial Industry

The American people are bleeding to death, and "in the midst of an economic debacle, it is the rich who are being bailed out."

Of the 418 employees who received bonuses, 298 got more than $100,000, according to the New York attorney general, Andrew M. Cuomo. The highest bonus was $6.4 million, and 6 other employees received more than $4 million. Fifteen other people received bonuses of more than $2 million and 51 received $1 million to $2 million.

[Taxpayers have already put up $173 billion, or more than a thousand times the amount of these bonuses, to fund the government's AIG "rescue." Since September 16, AIG has sent $120 billion in cash, collateral and other payouts to banks, municipal governments and other derivative counterparties around the world. This includes at least $20 billion to European banks. - "The Real AIG Outrage", WSJ, March 17, 2009.]

AIG, received more than $170 billion in emergency federal aid, has become the chief exhibit for both sides of the bailout debate.

The Weatherization Assistance Program can Jump Start Economy:

In an interview with CBS's Katie Couric on Wednesday, President Obama was asked about spending measures in the House version of the stimulus package that have been criticized by Sen. Mitch McConnell and others, including $6.2 Billion for the Weatherization Assistance Program. President Obama makes the case for the weatherization program as a means to jump start the economy by creating jobs immediately, saying "We''re going to weatherize homes, that immediately puts people back to work and we're going to train people who are out of work, including young people, to do the weatherization. As a consequence of weatherization, our energy bills go down and we reduce our dependence on foreign oil. What would be a more effective stimulus package than that?"

The President is correct.

As a paper by the Federation of American Scientists demonstrates, the Weatherization Program is the longest running, and perhaps the most successful US Energy Efficiency Program. The program, which underwrites a portion of the cost for improving the energy efficiency of low-income homes, reduces heating costs by an average of 31 percent, resulting in significantly lower energy bills that are so important in trying economic times like these. The program also creates roughly 52 jobs for every $1 million of federal investment. The stimulus package's investment of $6.2 Billion into the Weatherization program will result in roughly 300,000 jobs created.

The program carries a great potential to alleviate both the economic and energy woes our country currently faces. Investing in weatherization through the stimulus bill also provides the opportunity to create a more modern, streamlined and effective system for improving residential energy efficiency in the future. To do so, and to ensure the best use of stimulus funds, the weatherization program needs to improve the software tool that weatherization centers use to determine which retrofits are cost-effective, upgrade and standardize the training for energy auditors and weatherization crews, and start collecting data from the field about the real energy savings and costs of different weatherization measures to continuously improve the program.

FAS and Voice of Freedom applauds President Obama and the members of congress for recognizing the potential of the Weatherization Program, and we look forward to seeing this potential realized.

Obama's first days:

Two years after launching the most technologically savvy presidential campaign in history, Obama officials ran smack into the constraints of the federal bureaucracy yesterday, encountering a jumble of disconnected phone lines, old computer software, and security regulations forbidding outside e-mail accounts.

What does that mean in 21st-century terms? No Facebook to communicate with supporters. No outside e-mail log-ins. No instant messaging. Hard adjustments for a staff that helped sweep Obama to power through, among other things, relentless online social networking.

"It is kind of like going from an Xbox to an Atari," Obama spokesman Bill Burton said of his new digs.

...team members, accustomed to working on Macintoshes, found computers outfitted with six-year-old versions of Microsoft software.

But, All is not lost and the change begins Now!

WASHINGTON - In a first-day flurry of activity, President Barack Obama on Wednesday set up shop in the Oval Office, summoned advisers to begin dealing with war and recession and ordered new lobbying rules for  'a clean break from business as usual."

He also froze salaries for top White House staff members, placed phone calls to Mideast leaders and had aides circulate a draft executive order that would close the detention center at Guantanamo Bay within a year...

...Unveiling ethics rules that he portrayed as the fulfillment of a major campaign promise, Obama said that  "the way to make government responsible is to hold it accountable." The rules are needed, he added, "to help restore faith in government, without which we cannot deliver the changes that we were sent here to make."

The pay freeze affects the roughly 100 White House employees who make more than $100,000 a year. "Families are tightening their belts, and so should Washington," Obama said...

...In an attempt to deliver on pledges of a transparent government, Obama said he would change the way the federal government interprets the Freedom of Information Act. He said he was directing agencies that vet requests for information to err on the side of making information public — not to look for reasons to legally withhold it — an alteration to the traditional standard of evaluation.

Just because a government agency has the legal power to keep information private does not mean that it should, Obama said.

Change is coming, and Obama appears to be keeping promises with his first days in office.

via

Time 4 IL Black leaders to Distance themselves from Blag.

Pointblank -For weeks I considered Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich (Blag) to be a fool, last weekend I thought Roland Burris was an old fool for willing to be used by Blag.(What, Alan Keyes was too busy?). It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see the reasons Blag is fronting this guy. Its got nothing to do with how qualified he is to hold the post, it's got everything to do with distraction and fear. People from the IL probably haven't seen this kind of arrogance since Al Capone. Like the depression era gangster, Blag is not really in fear of being exposed. He is quite open about his corruption...more

Worried About Antibiotics In Your Beef? Vegetables May Be No Better

New studies show vegetables like lettuce and potatoes--even organic ones--carry antibiotics

By Matthew Cimitile

Obama's First test?

Community Car Wash
November 29, 2008
@   Preferred Physicians Group Parking Lot & Pit Bulls Gym
2802 W. Waters Ave, Tampa Fla. 33614
(Corner of Waters & Habana)

All proceed will be donated to Children With a Vision, Inc for the upcoming event on December 14, 2008 Toys 4 Tot drive.

The mission is to provide 5 organizations children wish list, or come close to their wish. Below is the front of the flyer, and One of the organizations wish list.

If you want to be a sponsor. Please contact Mrs. Tonya M. Lewis @ 813-235-5656

There will be over 2,000 to 3,000 motor cycle Rider from all over the state, on December 14, 2008 @ Hip Hop Soda Shop, 1241 E. Fowler Ave, Tampa Fla 33612. To drop off a toy or Toys.

Click the link below, to come aboard and help the families in need. Thank you for taking out your busy schedule.
www.childrenwithavisioninc.com
Mrs. Tonya M. Lewis
Children With A Vision,Inc.-Mrs. Tonya M. Lewis, Founder

Keith Olberman on Gay Marriage

This is about the... human heart, and if that sounds corny, so be it.

If you voted for this Proposition or support those who did or the sentiment they expressed, I have some questions, because, truly, I do not... understand. Why does this matter to you? What is it to you? In a time of impermanence and fly-by-night relationships, these people over here want the same chance at permanence and happiness that is your option. They don't want to deny you yours. They don't want to take anything away from you. They want what you want -- a chance to be a little less alone in the world.

Only now you are saying to them -- no. You can't have it on these terms. Maybe something similar. If they behave. If they don't cause too much trouble. You'll even give them all the same legal rights -- even as you're taking away the legal right, which they already had. A world around them, still anchored in love and marriage, and you are saying, no, you can't marry. What if somebody passed a law that said you couldn't marry?

I keep hearing this term "re-defining" marriage.

If this country hadn't re-defined marriage, black people still couldn't marry white people. Sixteen states had laws on the books which made that illegal... in 1967. 1967.

The parents of the President-Elect of the United States couldn't have married in nearly one third of the states of the country their son grew up to lead. But it's worse than that. If this country had not "re-defined" marriage, some black people still couldn't marry...black people. It is one of the most overlooked and cruelest parts of our sad story of slavery. Marriages were not legally recognized, if the people were slaves. Since slaves were property, they could not legally be husband and wife, or mother and child. Their marriage vows were different: not "Until Death, Do You Part," but "Until Death or Distance, Do You Part." Marriages among slaves were not legally recognized.

You know, just like marriages today in California are not legally recognized, if the people are... gay.

And uncountable in our history are the number of men and women, forced by society into marrying the opposite sex, in sham marriages, or marriages of convenience, or just marriages of not knowing -- centuries of men and women who have lived their lives in shame and unhappiness, and who have, through a lie to themselves or others, broken countless other lives, of spouses and children... All because we said a man couldn't marry another man, or a woman couldn't marry another woman. The sanctity of marriage. How many marriages like that have there been and how on earth do they increase the "sanctity" of marriage rather than render the term, meaningless?

What is this, to you? Nobody is asking you to embrace their expression of love. But don't you, as human beings, have to embrace... that love? The world is barren enough.

It is stacked against love, and against hope, and against those very few and precious emotions that enable us to go forward. Your marriage only stands a 50-50 chance of lasting, no matter how much you feel and how hard you work.

And here are people overjoyed at the prospect of just that chance, and that work, just for the hope of having that feeling. With so much hate in the world, with so much meaningless division, and people pitted against people for no good reason, this is what your religion tells you to do? With your experience of life and this world and all its sadnesses, this is what your conscience tells you to do?

With your knowledge that life, with endless vigor, seems to tilt the playing field on which we all live, in favor of unhappiness and hate... this is what your heart tells you to do? You want to sanctify marriage? You want to honor your God and the universal love you believe he represents? Then Spread happiness -- this tiny, symbolic, semantical grain of happiness -- share it with all those who seek it. Quote me anything from your religious leader or book of choice telling you to stand against this. And then tell me how you can believe both that statement and another statement, another one which reads only "do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

---

You are asked now, by your country, and perhaps by your creator, to stand on one side or another. You are asked now to stand, not on a question of politics, not on a question of religion, not on a question of gay or straight. You are asked now to stand, on a question of...love. All you need do is stand, and let the tiny ember of love meet its own fate. You don't have to help it, you don't have it applaud it, you don't have to fight for it. Just don't put it out. Just don't extinguish it. Because while it may at first look like that love is between two people you don't know and you don't understand and maybe you don't even want to know...It is, in fact, the ember of your love, for your fellow **person...

Just because this is the only world we have. And the other guy counts, too.

This is the second time in ten days I find myself concluding by turning to, of all things, the closing plea for mercy by Clarence Darrow in a murder trial.

But what he said, fits what is really at the heart of this:

"I was reading last night of the aspiration of the old Persian poet, Omar-Khayyam," he told the judge.

"It appealed to me as the highest that I can vision. I wish it was in my heart, and I wish it was in the hearts of all:

"So I be written in the Book of Love;

"I do not care about that Book above.

"Erase my name, or write it as you will,

"So I be written in the Book of Love."

---

Good night, and good luck.

The Ruler (from Malcolm to Barack) by Fly Gypsy *   

McCain/Palin call Obama's Economic Plan "Socialism"

Republican John McCain used the phrase "that's not America" yesterday to describe Democrat Barack Obama's plans for a middle-class tax cut, and Obama said McCain is "throwing everything he's got at us, hoping something will stick'"

McCain may not know it, being that a lot of christians simply do not know what their own bible says, but we think Jesus was "for" socialism.  What Obama is offering however is not.  Click now and find out what Joe Redner thinks about socialism.

McCain/Palin finally reap the rewards of their constituency

Threatening Letter Causes Evacuation At Obama Campaign Office

PHILADELPHIA (CBS 3) ― A threatening letter containing a suspicious powder forced evacuations at a Barack Obama campaign office in South Philadelphia Tuesday afternoon.

According to police, a letter with a suspicious powder was sent to an Obama-Biden field office in the 1500 block of Christian Street. The letter was apparently opened by a volunteer at the office.

"The letter was somewhat threatening in nature and it contained a substance that we believe to be a hazmat," Captain Mike Gillespie said shortly after the incident.

Police, fire and hazmat crews responded to the scene shortly after a 911 call was placed. As a precaution, 15 people inside the building were evacuated.

Investigators said initial field tests on the powder came back negative and it was determined to be sugar.

"We want to look over the letter through the plastic bag that we have it in to see what's actually being stated in the letter to the best of our knowledge and then determine the source," Captain Gillespie explained.

Sources said the letter did not reference the substance, but the envelope contained enough sugar that it appeared to be intentionally added to the threatening note to scare or disrupt Obama supporters.

Philadelphia Police and Postal Inspection Police were joined by the FBI and Secret Service in the investigation. The investigators will attempt to determine if the threatening note was directed at the volunteers or the candidates.

Everything Palin has said, everything McCain has talked about regarding Obama has whipped their base to a frenzy and now we have the threats to life and limb beginning.    Is this republicans at their finest?  Can anyone doubt the "change" wrought by the GOP?

The change needed in this country is not the actions of the party of fear, the party of hate, the party of violence.   We need hope.  Hope and trust in our leaders.   Obama has shown that hope and that fairness in his campaign.  

Palin/McCain's campaigns have shown the country again...that hate and fear is indeed part of what the republican party stands for.   I say this because if you don't like Obama, then don't vote for him.   You don't send threatening letters to his supporters.  Surely that is not the idea that McCain had when he and his soul mate were whipping up the fringes.  Surely?

Let us hope that McCain/Palin can smooth the hate and fear of its supporters so that there is not another attack, perhaps a more dangerous one.   I will not hold my breath on that however, since McCain is sure to bring up the Ayers issue at the next debate and it will be once again a pot stirrer with the fringe of the GOP.

Do Something, Call Your News Stations, your representatives, your Governors, let them know we don't need these kinds of leaders. 

The video leaves out the Senator's town hall last Friday, where he corrected two audience members who expressed concerns about Obama. But the spot is effective in reinforcing the notion that McCain-Palin is the ticket of at best, fear and at worse, xenophobia and bigotry.

Color for Change accompanied the release by sending members an open letter to McCain; part of which reads:

"In the last few weeks, Senator McCain and Governor Palin, rhetoric at your campaign events has taken an increasingly dangerous tone that seems to ignore the precarious state of our progress when it comes to race and ethnicity...

... For the most part, you have stood by in silence. In addition, you have also repeatedly made statements that somehow connect Senator Obama with terrorism; surrogates of yours have emphasized his middle name. This is problematic and dangerous, and I believe helps create the conditions that have given rise to these incidents of violent rhetoric from some of your supporters."

I am embarrassed and frightened for Florida, for the republicans and for America.  I can see why the world thinks badly of us at this point.  Chilling?  You Betcha!

Voters Beware

The story is all over Progressive Talk Radio today about the McCain campaign sending absentee ballot applications to registered democrats or people that have donated to Obama's campaign in the swing states.

These ballots are deliberately misleading and have postage paid return addresses that are for an election clerk that is outside of your city or town. What this will end up doing is either having your vote not counted, or if you return one of these, they will cite you for election fraud, saying that you already voted absentee.

The Columbus Dispatch reported the McCain campaign sent out a million of the applications statewide. Already, more than 740 ballots in Hamilton County have been invalidated because of the mistake.

Voter caging in 2000 and 2004 was a long-recognized, controversial Republican voter suppression tactic whereby a political party or campaign sends mail that can't be forwarded to a targeted group of registered voters. A "caging list" of those whose mail is returned "undelivered" is then used as the basis for getting them taken off the voter rolls, on the grounds that the voter does not live at the address where he or she is registered.

http://www.pbs.org/now/election-2008/question2.html

A photo of what the McCain mailing looks like and a listing of states that this has been reported to have occurred is at:   http://michiganmessenger.com/4282/rove-rove-rove-the-vote

Just as I suspected....it's Palin/McCain not McCain/Palin

A Stick in the Eye of the Press:  How the McCain Campaign Repeats Lies Even After They Are Debunked

 As the Associated Press wrote recently, “Politicians usually modify or drop claims when a string of newspaper and TV news accounts concludes they are untrue or greatly exaggerated.” But this campaign is seeing something different: A campaign that tells a falsehood, sees that falsehood corrected in the press, and continues to repeat the falsehood.

In recent days, John McCain's campaign has continued to make claims in ads and stump speeches that have been widely discredited. While much of the back-and-forth of campaigns consists of the contenders arguing about what is true and what isn't, the claims cited here are not open to interpretation. The statements are clearly and objectively false.

This poses a direct challenge to the press. If they are to be the referees of the claims made by the two campaigns, they must impose some sort of cost on a campaign when it persists in spreading falsehoods. This document details some of the McCain campaign's recent falsehoods, where and when they were debunked, and how the campaign has continued to repeat them nonetheless. 

• The Bridge to Nowhere. Almost every time Sarah Palin has appeared in public since becoming John McCain's running mate, she has claimed that she “told Congress, ‘Thanks, but no thanks' on that Bridge to Nowhere.” Even after admitting to ABC's Charlie Gibson that the claim was false, she returned to the stump and began repeating the claim again. 

• “Obama voted to raise taxes on people making just 42,000 dollars.” Barack Obama cast no such vote, and his tax plan lowers taxes on anyone making under $200,000. This claim has appeared in a McCain ad and has been repeated by McCain surrogates and spokespeople many times since it was debunked. 

• Obama would raise taxes on 100 million Americans. This claim is based on two false assertions: that 401(k) holders would pay more taxes if the capital gains tax were increased, and that Obama's proposal to increase capital gains taxes affects all taxpayers and not just wealthy taxpayers. Though it was debunked, McCain and his surrogates have continued to repeat it. 

• Obama's health-care plan would “force families into a government-run health-care system.” Obama's health-care plan is centered on private health insurance and forces no one into any government plan. McCain continues to repeat this falsehood, even after it was debunked by journalists and independent fact-checkers back when he was making the claim about both Obama's and Hillary Clinton's health-care plans. 

• Obama wants kindergartners “learning about sex before learning to read.” The legislation Obama voted for actually provides for teaching young children to avoid sexual predators. McCain's campaign continues to defend the ad in which this claim appears, despite the fact that it has been widely condemned. 

• Palin “championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress.” McCain, Palin, and their campaign have repeatedly made this claim, despite the fact that Palin requested hundreds of millions of dollars in federal earmarks for Alaska.

Details and the proof

Christian Right Voter Summit Sells Racist 'Obama Waffles'
By Adele Stan, Media Consortium

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- At the annual Washington gathering of the Christian right sponsored by the political arm of the Family Research Council, the Republican Party's top emissaries have come in past years to bow before some 2000 right-wing foot-soldiers and the leaders who command them. However, this year's Value Voter Summit, a bit light on GOP dignitaries, made less news in its speaker line-up than it did for the sale of a particular brand of breakfast food: Obama Waffles.

In the far corner of the exhibit hall at the Values Voter Summit two gonzo entrepreneurs hawked a product they described as "political satire": a box of waffle mix emblazoned with a cartoon image of a bug-eyed, toothy, dark-lipped Barack Obama eyeing a plate of waffles. A pat of butter on the waffles is stamped "2008". On the top flap, the Obama carton appears in a turban, next to an arrow printed with the text: "Point box toward Mecca for tastier waffles." The box of mix is a crude send-up of Aunt Jemima's Pancake Mix, which once featured stereotyped image of a round-faced, turbaned black woman as its trademark.

Although FRC Action claimed in a statement to have demanded that the exhibitors dismantle their display "when the content of the materials was brought to the attention of FRC Action senior officials" on Saturday, the truth is that by the time Obama Waffles creators W. Mark Whitlock and Bob DeMoss began breaking down their display, the conference was winding down and most exhibitors in the hall had already pulled out of Dodge.

I made my way through a row of un staffed and abandoned booths on Saturday afternoon, arriving just as Whitlock was packing up unsold product. Although, according to the FRC Action statement, Whitlock and DeMoss had already received the equivalent of cease-and-desist orders from conference organizers, Whitlock, dressed in a cook's apron and hat, was happy to take my $10 and fork over a box.

Taking FRC Action at the word of its executive director, David Nammo, a trusting reader may accept that the organization's leaders were unaware of what Whitlock and DeMoss were hawking for two and a half days before the exhibit was shut down. But Whitlock and DeMoss are hardly strangers to leaders of the religious right, and links to racists (and, indeed, the use of dog-whistle references for racists) are hardly new for Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, a spin-off of James Dobson's Focus on the Family empire.

According to a general letter of reference written by DeMoss on behalf of Whitlock (posted by nisperos, a savvy reader at the Denver Post's Web site), the two men met when both met while working at Focus on the Family, which Whitlock's resume dates at "1991 - 1992", when he served as a producer on Dobson's "Focus on the Family" daily radio program.

The two worked together again, some years later, at FamilyLife Publishers, an endeavor of the Campus Crusade for Christ -- one of the very first religious-right organizations. Whitlock's resume shows him having worked for FamilyLIfe from 1992 - 2004. During that time he served one year on the event team putting together the religious right's Congress on the Urban Family, which perhaps explains where the author developed an apparent affection for hip-hop music, as evidenced by the bonus "recipe rap" that appears on the side of the Obama's Waffles box:

Barry's Bling Bling Waffle Ring

Yo, B-rock here droppin' waffle knowledge Spellin' it out, 'cause a graduated college Some say I waffle so fast, Barry's causin' whiplash Just doin' my part, made wafflin' a fine art For a waffle wit style, like Chicago's Magnificent Mile Spray whipped crem around the edge Shake it first like Sister Sledge

The say wit me, I can be as waffly as I wanna be! (That goes out to my Ludacris posse)

Whitlock recently wrote a study guide to accompany the movie "Nim's Island," a production of FoxFaith, a division of Rupert Murdoch's 20th Century Fox. (Hat tip: FireDogLake's Julia.)

DeMoss, Whitlock's partner in the OW venture, also has some friends in high places, having served as the co-author of four books with Tim LaHaye, best known at the multi-million-selling author of the Left Behind series of novels.

With LaHaye, DeMoss penned four novels targeted at young adults that include a cautionary tale about an evil abortion doctor that centers on a teen gone missing, his absence noticed only after days after he has vanished because his household is headed by a single mom who spends long hours at work.

LaHaye, DeMoss' co-author, is one of the top leaders of the religious right, having co-founded the Council for National Policy, the super-secret umbrella groups that reportedly vetted GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin on the eve of the Republican National Convention. LaHaye's wife, Beverly, is the founder of the influential Concerned Women for America, which was an early proponent of "gay recovery" therapy designed to make heterosexuals out of LGBT people.

It is perhaps not surprising that material as racist as that peddled by Whitlock and DeMoss at the Values Voter Summit failed to set off alarm bells among Family Research Council and FRC Action leaders until reporters began inquiring about the Obama Waffles stand.

FRC President Tony Perkins spoke as recently as 2001 before the Council of Conservative Citizens, a well-documented white supremacist group, and directed the 1996 Louisiana congressional campaign of former Congressman Woody Jenkins from the campaign lists of former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke. Perkins paid Duke $82,000 for the lists. Jenkins served as the first executive director of the Council for National Policy, 1982-1985, and again in 1987.

More recently, while reporting for Church & State magazine, I saw Perkins address a crowd of hard-core Christian right believers in 2007 at the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church of the late Rev. D. James Kennedy. In his speech before those assembled in the church sanctuary at the "Reclaiming America for Christ" conference, Perkins blew the white supremacist dog whistle known as the biblical story of Phineas. (In this instance, Perkins used the Phineas story to make the case against Muslims, urging the assembled Christians to "take action" in the way of Phineas.)

"I am here advocating for Christian citizenship," Perkins said.

Lest any of the assembled miss the point, Perkins offered up the story of Phineas, grandson of Moses' brother Aaron, from Numbers 25. Phineas was rewarded by God with an "everlasting priesthood" for killing an Israelite and his Midian lover because God had forbidden the mixing of the men of Israel with the women of that tribe.

"We read that Phineas arose and he took action," Perkins said.

"Not only is prayer required?," Perkins continued. "I warn you that if you begin to pray for our nation that, at some point in time, you're gonna be prayin' and you're gonna feel a tap on your shoulder and hear, 'Son, daughter, I've heard your prayer; now I want you to do something about it.'"

Just in case his message should be misconstrued, however, Perkins offered this caveat: "Now, let me be clear, in case the media's here," he said, "I'm not advocating you go home and get a pitchfork out of your storage shed and run into your neighbor?s house." Phineas, the Bible tells us, used a javelin.'

So maybe the FRC people, as their statement suggests, did simply get sloppy and miss the fact that a product to which they say they object for its "coarseness and bias" sat, essentially, on the shelves of the conference store, for a couple of days. Maybe the co-author of one of the religious right's top honchos went unnoticed by FRC folks, mistaken for just another yahoo hawking an amateur attempt at humor. Maybe the leaders of the Values Voter Summit have a race problem anyway.

Adele M. Stan is executive editor for The Media Consortium, a network of progressive media organizations, including AlterNet.

Governor Sarah Palin: A Champion for Brutal Aerial Hunting

As Governor, Sarah Palin has championed aerial hunting of wolves and bears. Please watch our new video, learn more about Palin's record and help us spread the word about her awful record...

* Learn more about Governor Palin's record on protecting wildlife and the environment...

* Read the statement by Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund president Rodger Schlickeisen...

Sarah Palin says aerial hunting of wolves and bears is need to feed poor Alaskans.

If that's true then:  Why are the major special interest groups in Alaska pushing this program sport hunter groups and not advocates for the poor? Why, in most of the areas where aerial hunting is done, are most of the moose and caribou taken by urban hunters and not true  subsistence hunters?

Why does she oppose what is called "rural preference" which would give true rural subsistence hunters priority access over sport hunters to the areas where aerial hunting is conducted?

Under Alaska law, every citizen is a subsistence user, even if they don't hunt and even if they do, but live next to the local grocery store and don't rely on what they kill to survive.

Can we say McCain, Liar Liar Pants on Fire!

I would like to remind everyone at this time, before you read the article below, that John McCains campaign manager said flatly that this election isn't about the issues. So, what he means is that this election isn't about America. Thats the point. Republicans just want to win. They don't care about the issues.  They damn sure don't care about you and me.

If all the politicians and pundits are going to talk about fluff, if all they are going to do is keep lying, and if all the media is going to do is scratch their heads and go along, then I say the lipstick fits and pigs are pigs no matter how you dress them up!  

Some American's are suffering from a vile rot infecting their moral fiber. The very people that claim "values" on a platform are the very people that are most infected. Where are those values they love so much to claim. The ones like truth, honesty, fairness and civility?

Is American doomed to repeat another Bush-like administration?   

Altercation, by Eric Alterman

On Keith Olbermann's Countdown last night, Barack Obama noted the media's lack of aggressiveness when came to claims that John McCain's campaign has been making, specifically at the Republican National Convention. (He didn't specify, but let's just pick one at random: Obama is a tax-raiser. Numerous outlets have been allowing the McCain campaign to keep saying that without challenge; in fact, Obama has proposed cutting taxes for low- and middle-income families and raising them only on households earning more than $250,000 per year. That's as major point). Anyway, Obama used the phrase "working the refs" -- that's the point we want to make here.

It's not exactly difficult to discern. We all can see it. The McCain people surely know they're doing it. So why can't these journalistic referees see it? Matt Yglesias catches an interesting self-justification from political reporter Marc Ambinder, who writes:

[T]he ad claims that Palin "stopped the Bridge to Nowhere," which is technically true but functionally false. No blowback, though: the electorate doesn't seem to penalize campaigns for deliberately distorting the record of their candidate and their opponent. It's probably an artifact of twenty years' worth of campaign advertisements and has something to do with the way consumers process news.

Yglesias makes the excellent point that Ambinder must not remember the year 2000, when the electorate indeed did penalize a campaign for what it perceived to be deliberate distortions. Exit polls showed that among the 24 percent of voters who said it was very important to have an "honest and trustworthy" president, 80 percent went for George W. Bush, due in part, we can assume, to the barrage of media coverage that Gore was somehow prone to stretching the truth, from Love Canal to the invention of the Internet. Forget "the way consumers process news" -- of course the elite political media, of which Ambinder is a member, has the ability to create narratives about, for example, the veracity of a particular candidate. They have just been worked by aggressive conservatives, in 2000, and again now.

George Zornick writes: You may have heard that Obama suffered a "verbal slip" on Sunday, referring to "my Muslim faith" in an interview with ABC's George Stephanopoulos on This Week. Naturally Drudge featured it, linking to The Washington Times, which seems to have been the first to write a mainstream story. But then so did Joel Thorton at The Dallas Morning News, as did Fox News, and the Chicago Sun-Times, and UPI too.

Of course the "slip-up" was even more widely disseminated by people on the Internet who are completely loony tunes. The more responsible (relatively speaking) mainstream accounts of this gaffe simply couched the story in terms of the fuel it provided the Internet crazies, although of course Fox News wondered "whether Obama's misstatement will continue to fuel rumors of his faith, allegiances or patriotism."

Why all the coverage of what seems to be a simple misstatement -- nobody actually thinks Obama just revealed he was Muslim, and yes, there are outlandish people on the Internet. So why take up valuable newshole with this? These questions are made even better by the fact that Obama didn't even make a verbal gaffe. He was incorrectly corrected by Stephanopoulos, and then subsequently taken out of context by these reports.

Obama was suggesting that Fox News and others "closely allied" with Republicans were pushing the idea that he is a Muslim. Then he said: "Let's not play games. What I was suggesting -- you're absolutely right that John McCain has not talked about my Muslim faith. And you're absolutely right that that has not come ..."

Stephanopoulos broke in and inexplicably "corrected" Obama, interjecting: "your Christian faith." Obama momentarily agreed, but then explained "well, what I'm saying is that he hasn't suggested that I'm a Muslim." (The video is here, and it makes this whole exchange even more clear).

So, in the course of an interview, Obama strings together the three words "my Muslim faith," gets a knee-jerk correction from the interviewer, has the clip edited down and circulated all over the Internet, and then has numerous mainstream outlets write about it. How are we supposed to conduct democracy like this?

(Media Matters story, reprinted here because this should be passed around infinitely for all, so the more the merrier.  Please copy and send to all your friends.)

Ed Koch Endorses Barrack Obama     Letter from Anne Kilkenny, I know Palin!

What's Good for the Goose…

A few doofus republicans (I think they're women, I'm not sure) have banded together to call critics of Alaska Governor Sarah Louis Heath-Palin “sexists.” I almost choked on my grits one evening upon hearing the inflammatory accusation (yeah that's right I eat grits, what about it?)...more

Pointblanks' take on VP, Who?

McCain picks Palin - leaves dems and repubs scratching their head, wondering why.

Republicans cry about Obama's experience and then McCain picks Palin as a running mate.   It boggles the mind.    Obama has been to Iraq, Afghanistan, and Chad to visit refugees from Darfur. He's met with foreign leaders. He has years of experience. Biden has more foreign policy experience than almost anyone else in the federal government. 

Up to and including 2007, Governor Palin had no official position on Iraq. That is how much John McCain thinks of national security. Palin has not stated a formal position on Iraq, immigration, Social Security or Medicare, says spokeswoman Meghan Stapleton.

I only mention this because McCain says Palin is in step with him, and will carry out his agenda if he is unable to.   Palin as his running mate undermines everything his campaign has been trying to say Obama lacks.  Which of course is good for the democrats.

What an example for Bill Clinton's assertion that the first Presidential decision is the choice of a running mate, and that Obama "hit it out of the park."  The contrast of Obama's selection of Biden and McCain's selection of Palin is enormous.

"Palin a first-term governor of a state with more reindeer than people, will have to put on a few pounds just to be a lightweight. Her personal story is impressive: former fisherman, mother of five. Life time member of the NRA. There is alledged pressure from her and her office to have her ex-brother-in-law (Trooper Wooten) fired from the State Troopers office.  But that hardly qualifies her to be a heartbeat away from the presidency.

She is suing our federal government over the indangered polar bear lawsuit because it hampers Alaska's ability to hunt for oil. (think ANWR) Oh, her husband works for an oil company.

For a man who is 72 years old and has had four bouts with cancer to have chosen someone so completely unqualified to become president is shockingly irresponsible. Suddenly, McCain's age and health become central issues in the campaign, as does his judgment."

blogger:

"This is an important point. Rove, Rumsfeld, and the entire Republican machine can continue their existing policies, as Palin won't get in the way at all. With Palin in, it will truly be Bush's third term. Corporations will continue to reign supreme over White House policy.

Republicans don't want a woman who will get in their way. They want a nice quiet Miss Congenial cheerleader type.

Kay Hutchinson, being the fierce Texas fire cracker that she is, would not fit the bill there. Linda Lingle, also comes to mind, as a tough Republican who can win in a very blue state like Hawaii (and she has six times the executive experience of Palin, but I guess experience doesn't matter now!)."

Senator McCaskill spoke at the Democratic Convention and asserted:

For eight years we have watched our government take care of the powerful, the few and the extremely wealthy. We have seen our dream put at risk by George Bush's Washington. John McCain is running for four more years of the same old politics and exact same failed policies that we had under George Bush. They did tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, they're doing everything Big Oil asks for, and look where we are.

Come on, America. Let's call on our common sense and stay focused on what's important. We cannot choose that path again. That's a risk the American people cannot afford to take. I have seen Barack Obama in the Senate, and I've been by his side on the campaign trail. I know he will bring the change we need in Washington.

I saw him take on both parties to help pass the farthest-reaching ethics reform since Watergate. That's the change we need. I saw him run a campaign that hasn't taken a dime from federal lobbyists and PACs. That's the change we need. I know that this son of a single mom will stand up for the dreams of our daughters. And I know that John McCain won't.

There is only one candidate in this race who has fought for equal pay for equal work by America's women. That candidate is Barack Obama. There is only one candidate offering real tax relief for the middle class, health care that is affordable and accessible and protection of Social Security today, tomorrow and forever. That candidate is Barack Obama.

It all depends on how clearly you see America -- how clearly you see the best of America. John McCain has been in Washington for almost 30 years. Maybe that's why he has a campaign run by Washington lobbyists and thinks the fundamentals of the economy are strong. In Missouri we have a ringside seat to the real America, and I can assure you it looks much different.

Watch Obama's latest Television ad, here

Anthrax Attack: Revelations of 2001

Source: The New York Times [edited] <http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/10/opinion/10andrews.html?ref=opinion>

8-12-08  On Wednesday [6 Aug 2008], the United States Justice Department revealed its evidence that Dr. Bruce E. Ivins, on his own, committed the worst act of bioterrorism in the country's history. This 18-year veteran scientist of the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick in Frederick, Md., is accused of killing 5 people and sickening 17 others in the fall of 2001. Dr. Ivins died on 29 Jul 2008 of an apparent suicide without a chance to give his side of the story.

After reading the affidavits and listening to the Justice Department briefing, I was both disheartened and perplexed by the lack of physical evidence supporting a conviction...read more of this revealing story

It's Never Too Late to Impeach Bush

"A moment I've been dreading. George (Bush Sr.) brought his ne're-do-well son around this morning and asked me to find the kid a job. Not the political one who lives in Florida: the one who hangs around here all the time looking shiftless. This so-called kid is already almost 40 and has never had a real job. Maybe I'll call Kinsley over at The New Republic and see if they'll hire him as a contributing editor or something. That looks like easy work."
-- Ronald Reagan in his recently published diaries , written May 17, 1986

8-12-08 It's good to know there are still at least some politicians who are trying to oust the president. Dennis Kucinich gave notice on 6/9/08 that he intended to introduce 35 Articles of Impeachment to the House of Representatives (Congress). The next day he was joined by Robert Wexler. Reports say the House chamber was almost empty when he introduced this resolution. In order to get an impeachment of the President, the House must agree to pass a resolution that Bush is a traitor or guilty of other high crimes...more

Constitutional Seminar is coming to Florida!  Learn what knowing the U.S. Constitution can do for you.   
Citizen's Against Legal and Moral Abuse
Jack and Margy Flynn Saturday & Sunday, September 6th & 7th

John McCain's Chilling Project for America

What Brain Science Tells Us About Religious Belief

Pew Forum Faith Angle Conference, Key West, Florida
June 4, 2008

What does brain science add to age-old debates about the existence of God and the value of religion? Can political parties and religious groups use scientific insights to influence the beliefs of others? Are scientists as a group becoming more open to ideas of religion and spirituality? Recent advances in neuroscience and brain-imaging technology have offered researchers a look into the physiology of religious experiences. In observing Buddhist monks as they meditate, Franciscan nuns as they pray and Pentecostals as they speak in tongues, Dr. Andrew Newberg, a radiologist at the University of Pennsylvania, has found that measurable brain activity matches up with the religious experiences described by worshippers. The social, political and religious implications of these and other findings are just beginning to permeate the broader culture, according to New York Times columnist David Brooks, who has been tracking new developments in the field.

Speakers:
David Brooks, Columnist, The New York Times
Andrew Newberg, Assistant Professor, Department of Radiology, University of Pennsylvania

Moderator:
Michael Cromartie, Vice President, Ethics and Public Policy Center; Senior Advisor, Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life

In the following excerpted transcript, ellipses have been omitted to improve readability.

Andrew Newberg, Michael Cromartie and David Brooks

Andrew Newberg: How does the brain tell us when we are free? What goes on within us that the brain says to us "Yes, you're okay, you can do whatever you want to do," or "No, this is not okay?" How does our brain actually change or transform? This is a critical issue if we're going to change the views of a voter, if we're going to change a person's religion. If one of these things happens to a person, something's got to be changing in the brain as well. How do we understand what the brain can do?

I wrote, with my colleague, a paper on forgiveness and revenge several years ago, about what would be the neuropsychological correlates of that. It becomes very interesting: how we think about ourselves, how we have a construction of ourselves, and how that self relates to other individuals, and how we reconcile when somebody has injured or harmed us. This is part of how I can tie in some of the topics I'll be covering with some of the topics that have been more broadly discussed here at Key West.

Liberal and conservative brains

There have been some studies that have looked at political perspectives, trying to understand what happens in the brain of people who are Republicans and the brains of people who are Democrats. We talked about some of this, and I'd just highlight a couple of interesting studies. One was an fMRI study, which is a magnetic resonance imaging that looks at blood flow and activity in the brain, and it showed that people who scored higher on liberalism tended to be associated with stronger what they called conflict-related anterior cingulate activity. Now, what that means is, you have a part of your brain called the anterior cingulate, which helps you mediate when things are in conflict with the way you already believe.

The researchers then interpreted this, and we can go into all the questions about how should we interpret these studies. People who had greater liberalism seemed to do better or were more sensitive to altering some habitual response pattern, implying that they were more open to change, more open to other ideas, more open to conflict, than people who scored lower on liberalism. Does that mean something about people who consider themselves to be liberals versus conservatives, Republicans versus Democrats?

Of course all people, regardless of what their particular perspectives are, when they're viewing their own candidate, that has a different effect in their brain than when they are viewing a candidate from the opposite party. When you're looking at somebody from the opposite party, or thinking about them, it tends to activate the amygdala, the limbic areas, again, that tend to trigger more of an emotional response, whereas when you're looking at people who are concordant with your views and beliefs, that tends to activate some of the areas of the frontal lobe and also that anterior cingulate that helps you mediate your conflict-resolution powers.

To me, one of the most interesting aspects of this whole area is more philosophical, more theological, and thinking about what does this mean in terms of how we believe in religion, and the religious beliefs that people hold. Does this tell us something about those beliefs and experiences? When somebody has the experience of being in God's presence, and we can get a brain scan of that, what does that mean, what does that say, and how can we interpret that either for religion, against religion, or in some other alternative perspective of simply just trying to understand it better?

Now, beliefs themselves have a tremendous power over us, and I look at this all the time in the context of the placebo effect. Unfortunately, I think the healthcare system severely overlooks how beliefs have power over what happens to somebody. I'm sure probably all of you know somebody who's dealt with a severe medical problem, maybe cancer or heart disease. We have always noted, at least anecdotally, that when people have that spirit and drive to get better, they seem to have a much higher likelihood of doing that, whereas those who are ready to give up tend not to do that well. That also goes to the importance of how beliefs affect our whole body, not just the brain itself.

Of course, we can also look at religious and spiritual beliefs, which is what I will try to focus my talk on throughout the day here. I always try to come at this from a philosophical perspective. Why do we believe anything at all? It is an infinite universe for all intents and purposes. We are able to be subjected to only a very, very small amount of that information [and] an even smaller amount of that information is ultimately put into your consciousness. If you talk to somebody for 45 minutes, they are going to remember maybe three or four things. So our brain is trying to put together a construction of our reality, a perspective on that reality, which we rely on heavily for our survival, for figuring out how to behave and how to act and how to vote.

So what are beliefs? Again, I apologize, but I always come at this from a scientific perspective. I am defining beliefs biologically and psychologically as any perception, cognition, emotion, or memory that a person consciously or unconsciously assumes to be true. The reasons I define beliefs in this way are several-fold. One is that we can begin to look at the various components that make up our beliefs. We can talk about our perceptions. We can talk about our cognitive processes. We can talk about how our emotions affect our beliefs. And we can also look at how they ultimately affect us. Are we aware of the beliefs we hold? Or are they unconscious? And which ones are unconscious and which ones are conscious?

Several interesting studies have shown that when you show faces of a person of a different race to people, it activates the amygdala, the area that lights up when something of motivational importance happens to us. But if you show pictures of people of a different race that are people they know, and maybe it is a famous person or a friend, then the amygdala doesn't light up. So they tend to have this ability to culturally, cognitively overcome what might be their initial response.

We can look at all these different forces on our beliefs. We can look at our perceptual processes, our cognitive processes, the emotions we have, the social interactions we have, to see how beliefs are so heavily influenced. One of the take-home points I always hope to get across is that as much as we hold onto our own beliefs very strongly -- and I think it is appropriate for us to do so -- we also have to keep in mind they are far more tenuous than we often like to believe.

Let me go through some of these processes in a bit more detail. Let's talk about our perceptions. The brain is out there trying to take in a huge amount of information and make some coherent picture of the world for us. But, unfortunately, the brain makes lots of mistakes along the way. The most important problem with that is it doesn't bother to tell us when it does make a mistake.

If we are listening to a speech, if we are thinking about an idea, if a friend is telling us something, how well are we really doing at gathering that information out there? How easy is it for us to be manipulated in terms of the beliefs we hold?

Now we move over to the cognitive functions of the brain. We talk about the parietal lobe, which is very involved in abstract reasoning and quantization. Parts of the parietal lobe are involved in helping us orient our self in the world and establishing a relationship between our self and the rest of the world. The temporal lobe, which is along the side of the brain; the cortex areas help us to understand language; and the inner parts of the temporal lobe are where our limbic system is -- I'll talk about that in just a second -- that helps us with understanding our emotional responses to whatever stimuli are out there in the world.

The frontal lobe helps us with our behaviors and executive functions, the functions of deciding what we need to do: what we're going to do tomorrow, keeping our schedule, keeping our checkbook, and so forth, while also mediating our emotional responses. There is a push-pull between our frontal lobe and limbic system that can get out of whack sometimes. If we get overly emotional, our frontal lobes shut down, and if we become over-logical, our emotional areas shut down. There is a lot of push and pull that goes on in these different parts of the brain.

Emotions are also important for placing value on beliefs. So it's not just that we feel we should do something for the environment, it's not just that we feel we should be a Republican or a Democrat, but we start to imbue those choices with emotions. We feel strongly about the ways in which we believe, and of course this can help us form beliefs. The downside of our emotions can be in how they help us defend our beliefs. There has been a lot of research looking at when people start to feel combative and antagonistic toward people who disagree with them. This can be how we start to see religious conflicts occur throughout the world: It is not just that people disagree with each other, but that they get emotional about it. They start to feel hatred.

The emotional areas of the brain are in part of the brain called the limbic system, which is embedded in the more interior parts of the brain. Here is that amygdala, which tends to light up whenever something of motivational importance happens to us. The hippocampus, which is right behind that, helps to regulate our beliefs, but also helps to regulate our emotions and write into our memories the ideas that come about from emotionally salient events. That is why we all remember exactly what was happening to us on September 11, 2001.

As we were talking earlier today, the social milieu we are in becomes very important in influencing our beliefs. We are continuously influenced by those around us. This goes all the way back to when we are a child and the influence of our parents helps us form our initial beliefs, which write into our brain at a very early age the beliefs we carry with us throughout our lives. That is why it is difficult to change your religious beliefs. It is difficult to even change your political beliefs as time goes on. If you look at the large population, very few people ultimately do change their beliefs in any very dramatic way because those are written very deeply into our brain at very early ages. But ultimately, as we do grow up, we can be influenced, and we can change those beliefs, and that is part of what we have to look at: exactly how and why this happens.

The physiology of beliefs

So how do these beliefs form physiologically, and what does this tell us about religious and spiritual ideas, and why religion and spirituality are so ingrained in so many individuals and have been in every culture and every time? There are a couple of statements I like to use. One is that neurons that fire together, wire together. There is physiological support for that, that the more you use a particular pathway of neurons, the more strongly they become connected to each other. We prune back a lot of the neural connections we have as a child, so we ultimately go forward in our lives with a set of parameters through which we look at the world.

The other idea about neurons is the old use-it-or-lose-it concept, that when you stop thinking about certain things, when you stop focusing on something, then those connections go away. We all probably took courses in college we remembered a lot of at the time, but if we are not doing it anymore, then we don't remember it anymore.

How do we begin to invoke that? The practices and rituals that exist within both religious and non-religious groups become a strong and powerful way to write these ideas into our brain. The more you focus on a particular idea, whether it is political or religious or athletic, the more that gets written down into your brain and the more that becomes your reality. So that is why when you go to a church or a synagogue or a mosque, and they repeat the same stories, and you celebrate the same holidays that reinforce that, you do the prayers, and you say these things over and over again, those are the neural connections that get stimulated and strengthened. That is a strong part of why religion and spirituality make use of various practices valuable for writing those beliefs strongly into who you are.

Brains in meditation, prayer and worship

We have looked at a number of different religious and spiritual practices over the last decade or so. [These] SPECT (Single Photon Emission Computed Tomography) look at blood flow in the brain. We capture a picture of a person's brain when they are at rest or when they are in some kind of comparison state, and then when they are engaged in the practice, a practice like meditation, for example.

This is actually a slice through the brain. You are slicing through the brain, popping the top of the head off, and looking at what areas of the brain are the most active. The red areas are more active than what you see in the yellow, and then ultimately in the purple and the black areas. In this part of the brain called the frontal lobes, which I have labeled as an "attention area," because it helps focus our attention, we see a lot more of this red activity while the person is actively engaged in meditation than when the person is in the baseline state.

In the normal waking state, which was the baseline state, there is still a fair amount of activity in the frontal lobes because you have to be ready to attend to whatever is going on around you. But it is activated that much more when the person does this particular practice. I mentioned earlier the parietal lobe, which often functions as the orienting part of the brain. We have argued in some of our hypotheses that when people engage in these practices in a very deep way, they do two things. First, you are focusing on something, usually it is a sacred object or an image or something like that, but, second, you also screen out irrelevant information. As you do this, more and more information that normally goes to the orienting parts of your brain doesn't go there. So it keeps trying to give you a sense of yourself, an orientation of that self in the world, but it no longer has the information upon which to do that.

And if you look at the orientation area, it goes dramatically down in its activity during the meditation practice. It is mostly yellow and just a little bit of red, compared to what you see in the normal waking state. So this area of the brain becomes much less active. We think this is part of what is associated with somebody losing that sense of self. They feel at one with God, at one with their spiritual mantra, whatever it is they are looking at. This was a group of Tibetan Buddhist meditators.

We also looked Franciscan nuns in prayer. We saw some interesting similarities and differences. The nuns were doing a prayer called centering prayer, which is kind of meditation. They were focusing on a particular phrase or prayer. It is much more verbally based, I guess, than the meditation of the Tibetans. Again, one of the similarities we saw was a fair amount of increase in this red activity in the frontal lobes. So they activated their frontal lobes as they were

focusing on this particular prayer or phrase from the Bible.

They also activated the IPL or parietal lobe area. There is a much bigger glob of red in the prayer scan than what you see in the baseline scan. This is part of that verbal conceptual area in the temporal lobes, in the parietal lobes, that helps us think about abstract ideas and language. We didn't see this in the Buddhist meditators, who had a more visual practice. But we did see a similarity of decreases of activity in this orienting part of the brain; again, it's all more yellow with just a little bit of red, compared to what we saw in the original baseline state.

One of the more recent studies we did, which was very interesting, was a study of Pentecostals speaking in tongues. This was a much more exciting study for me because when you're looking at people who are meditating or in deep prayer, they're just sitting there and all the exciting stuff is going on inside, whereas when people are speaking in tongues all the exciting part is on the outside.

We had to come up with a different baseline because obviously if I showed you a person's scan while he or she was simply resting quietly, versus up and about and dancing and singing in tongues, of course you would see all kinds of changes in the brain. So the comparison state here was doing gospel-singing worship. They were up and about, dancing around, singing in English, compared to up and about, dancing around, singing but singing in tongues. One of the most interesting findings we saw in this particular study --these are four slices of the brain while they were singing, so these are just different levels through the brain.

The next slide is going to be the same person, now speaking in tongues. If you look in the frontal lobe area, where the arrows are pointing, as I toggle back and forth, you can see there's a lot less activity in the frontal lobes when the person is speaking in tongues. So when they started to speak in tongues, and we see this in all the people we studied, their frontal lobe activity goes down.

This actually makes a lot of sense because in contrast to the meditators and nuns, who are focusing on doing something, the way the Pentecostals describe speaking in tongues is they are not focusing on doing it; they let it happen. They just let their own will go away and allow this whole thing to take place. They don't feel like they're in control of this process. And the findings on the scan at least support the phenomenological experience they have.

I'm sure we'll get into a lot of interesting philosophical discussions on, "What is the reality here?" Obviously, for the Pentecostals speaking in tongues, they say this is God or the Holy Spirit who is speaking through them. What one might argue in that context is, "Your brain shuts down so you can allow the Holy Spirit to speak through you; this is how it works." On the other hand, if you don't believe speaking in tongues is really a spiritual event, then you might say, "Perhaps there's some other part of the brain that is taking over, that is causing this thing to happen. It's not the normal parts of the brain doing it, but it's some other part of the brain."

At this point we don't have that answer and this is, again, the big epistemological question about how we understand what reality is, how we begin to think about our beliefs about reality and what we can say, ultimately, about what these scans mean in the context of what's really going on. But I think there's still some very valuable information in at least understanding what's going on inside the person who is having this particular experience.

So if we're talking about religion as affecting our brain and our beliefs, we have to acknowledge that it must have some pretty profound effect on our brain if it is going to be something that has such a profound effect on us as people.

I have argued in the past that the brain's role in our overall life is to help us make some sense out of the world, and in so doing, to help maintain us. That's how it helps us to survive. We have to know not to cross the street when there's a red light, and what's okay to eat, and what's not okay to eat. It helps to make sure we do all the right things in the world.

It also helps us transcend ourselves, and by that I don't necessarily mean a religious transcendence, although that may be the ultimate expression of this, but we always grow and develop over time. There is this continual struggle, if you will, between wanting to maintain the status quo within ourselves and also knowing that we need to adapt and change as we go through our life, and our brain is capable of doing both. It holds onto beliefs very strongly to helps us figure out what we need to do in our world, but it can also change over time. All of us are still the same person we were when we were three years old, but we've learned a lot, and we've changed a lot over time. As we've gone through our lives, our brain has changed with us to adapt and help us survive.

Let me pause for a second and ask what we talk about when we're talking about people who are not religious. There is some evidence to suggest there are differences. Some of you may have read a book called The God Gene. It was an interesting study that showed there was a significant, although relatively mild, correlation between a gene that coded for what's called the VMAT-2 receptor, which has to do with serotonin and dopamine, two very important neurotransmitters in the brain, and feelings of self-transcendence. The fact that there's a correlation between the neurotransmitters and some feeling that's related to spirituality is interesting. Maybe there is something physiologically to this.

In our studies, we found -- going back to the thalamus that we talked about earlier -- that people who were long-term practitioners and meditators tended to have a lot more asymmetry: One side of their thalamus was much more active than the other, compared to the normal population of people who are not long-term meditators. I don't know what that means per se, but it seems to suggest that the ways in which we process information about the world might be fundamentally different.

One of the questions we have to ask is, if you are a non-believer or an atheist, is that the result of a lack of having such experiences, or are you having these experiences and then ultimately rejecting them? One of the examples we talked about in our last book was a woman who had a near-death experience. She described it as the full-blown near-death experience, with the light and all this kind of stuff, but said, "That was my brain dying." That was her interpretation of it, whereas other people have that experience, and they say, "That was me transcending into the next realm; that was my spiritual experience, and it was transformative; it changed who I was."

Here are a couple of websites if any of you are interested. We have a Center for Spirituality and the Mind [http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/radiology/csm/] that we've started at Penn, which is helping us consolidate a lot of the research. If any of you are interested in that survey I was mentioning you can go to the website, neurotheology.net. https://somapps.med.upenn.edu/neuro_t/

Read the full transcript and see the full set of slides at pewforum.org.

DeLauro Presses Defense Department Inspector General for Answers on Propaganda Program

Washington , D.C. – To hold the Pentagon accountable for its propaganda program, Congresswoman Rosa L. DeLauro (CT-3), a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, lead a coalition of 40 Members in sending a letter to the Department of Defense Inspector General Claude M. Kicklighter to press for answers about the program. Specifically, the Members are seeking information, including whether the IG investigated the program or senior officials involved in the program, believes the program to be illegal, or feels that military contracting waste and fraud and abuse occurred.

"This extensive propaganda program should have been revealed, not by a newspaper, but long-ago by the DoD Office of the Inspector General, which is responsible for eliminating waste, fraud and abuse at the department, as well as promoting integrity and serving the public interest," said DeLauro. "Now that the program has been halted, we must take the next steps to determine how high-ranking officials within the Pentagon were allowed to operate a program aimed at deceiving the American people.

"Not only must the Inspector General now account for what it did and did not know about this state-sponsored propaganda effort, but they must also explain why if they knew about the propaganda campaign it was allowed to proceed. Additionally, we are calling for the Inspector General to launch an investigation to ensure no detail surrounding this program remains hidden."

"When the Department of Defense misleads the American people by having them believe that they are listening to the views of objective military analysts when in fact these individuals are simply replaying DoD talking points, the department is clearly betraying the public trust," the letter concludes.

May 2, 2008

The Honorable Claude M. Kicklighter
Inspector General
U.S. Department of Defense
The Pentagon
Washington , DC 20301

Dear Inspector General Kicklighter:

We write to express our deep concern over an extremely troubling report recently published in The New York Times detailing a high-level, well thought out and extensive program within the Department of Defense to use military analysts to generate positive news coverage of the war in Iraq, conditions at the Guantánamo Bay detention center and other activities associated with the Global War on Terror. We believe that this unethical, and potentially illegal, propaganda campaign aimed at deliberately misleading the American public should have been disclosed long ago by your office, and not by a newspaper that needed to resort to suing the DoD for the information.

According to the report, in the earliest days of the Bush Administration, former Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs Torie Clarke began to build a network of "key influentials" that could generate support for then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's priorities and achieve what she called "information dominance." In 2002, Ms. Clarke allegedly made a decision to make these "key influentials," former military officers often with impressive military backgrounds, the main focus of the department's public relations push to make the case to go to war. Responding to an interest from the White House, Ms. Clarke's staff wrote summaries describing these analysts' backgrounds, business affiliations and positions on the war.

At it's peak, the Times reports that this behind the scenes network included more than 75 retired military analysts who were being briefed, often by high-level officials in a "powerfully seductive environment" (analysts reportedly met 18 times with Mr. Rumsfeld). The analysts then parroted the administration's talking points on major television news programs and 24-hour cable news outlets, as well as over the radio and through op-ed articles or quotes in magazines, websites and newspapers. According to the article, internal Pentagon documents describe these military analysts as "message force multipliers" or "surrogates" who could be counted on to deliver administration "themes and messages" to millions of Americans "in the form of their own opinions." Along with making the case for invading Iraq, these "themes and messages" included repudiating claims that U.S. troops were dying because of inadequate body armor, pushing back on reports of detainee mistreatment at the Guantánamo Bay prison facility and, according to Lawrence Di Rita, a former top aide to Mr. Rumsfeld, counteracting "the increasingly negative view of the war" that came with the rise of the insurgency. The DoD is even reported to have hired a private contractor to monitor and track the public comments of their military analyst surrogates. As one of them put it, this was "psyops on steroids."

While we are deeply disturbed by the Pentagon's taxpayer funded propaganda campaign, we find it equally troubling that the Pentagon used high-level access to DoD contracting officials as an enticement for these analysts to report the Bush Administration's talking points on the war in Iraq . The military analysts involved in the Pentagon network reportedly represent more than 150 military contractors competing for the hundreds of billions of dollars made available by the Global War on Terror. These analysts were granted special access to the high ranking civilian and military leaders directly involved in determining how war funding should be spent. Such access gave the companies they represent a clear competitive advantage and may have created a culture in which analysts felt they needed to serve as the mouthpiece for the administration in order to gain military contracts for the companies they represent.

Your office is directly responsible for eliminating waste, fraud and abuse at the Department of Defense. Moreover, your mission includes promoting integrity and serving the public interest. This appears to be a high-level, well orchestrated program that was put in place that we presume your office is aware of. We therefore request your response to the following questions:

1) When did your office first become aware of this program and did you investigate the matter? If you did open an investigation please provide us with your report. If not, please explain why?

2) In every fiscal year since this program's inception, Section 8001 of the yearly Defense Appropriations bills signed into law has made clear that "No part of any appropriation contained in this Act shall be used for publicity or propaganda purposes not authorized by the Congress." Do you believe that the activities conducted through this program are in violation of that law or any other? If not, given that this program certainly cost money and was not authorized by Congress, please explain.

3) Do you believe that a situation in which individuals representing military contractors obtain unrivaled access to key senior officials and carry out the wishes of those officials creates an environment that is ripe for waste, fraud and abuse?

4) Your office includes a unit specifically charged with investigating senior officials. Along with Mr. Rumsfeld and Ms. Clarke, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Peter Pace and then Director of Operations for the Joint Chiefs James T. Conway were allegedly involved in the program. High-level officials outside of DoD were also reportedly involved, including Vice President Dick Cheney, and perhaps others inside the DoD as well. Has your office investigated any senior level DoD officials? If so, please provide your findings? If not, please explain why?

5) Has your office investigated whether any contract awards were compromised or tainted as a result of the special access granted to the military analysts?

6) We understand that in the aftermath of The New York Times story and facing criticism from Congress, Robert Hastings, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs determined the program should be suspended indefinitely pending an internal review. Can you please confirm whether your office is conducting this internal review and if so whether you believe the program should be permanently terminated and whether any similar programs in the future should be banned?

When the Department of Defense misleads the American people by having them believe that they are listening to the views of objective military analysts when in fact these individuals are simply replaying DoD talking points, the department is clearly betraying the public trust. Moreover, when these analysts are simultaneously representing defense contractors, the apparent conflict of interest can easily lead to fraud and abuse. We find this deeply troubling, and expect you will share our deep concern.

We thank you in advance for your prompt attention to this matter.

Sincerely,

The oil industry low-balls profits and the press goes along
COMMENTARY | May 12, 2008

One more time: in a free market system, profits are return on dollars invested, not return on sales or revenue. Is that too complicated, Mr. Will?

By Henry Banta

This is not another piece about oil prices. It is about how the media cover the oil industry and its political machinations. Over the past year, and with increasing intensity lately, the oil industry has engaged in a massive propaganda offensive claiming that its profits are no higher than many other industries. It makes this claim by comparing its return on sales with those of other industries. This is intentionally misleading and deceptive.

The very fact that a major industry is devoting massive resources to what is nothing more than an outrageous lie should be major news. Suppose Clinton, Obama, or McCain set out on a campaign of conspicuous lying? Wouldn't it be news? Why should an industry with hundreds of billions of dollars in resources and a political agenda be immune? Why does it get a pass?

To understand why this is such an outrage and not just a dust-up over an arcane accounting issue requires a small – actually very small – bit of reflection of what profit means in a free market system. In the most basic sense it is the reward that the entrepreneurs get for taking the risks and putting up the money.  Profit is what the investors get back for putting up money. Profit is not the return on sales or revenue; it is the return on the dollars invested. It is this return on capital that enables the market to direct investment where it will make the most money, and be used most efficiently. It is at the heart of why we consider our economic system efficient. It is why we call it "capitalism."  Comparing the return on sales for firms in different industries is meaningless.  It tells you nothing to know that Microsoft earned a 27 percent return on revenue while Verizon earned only 6.6 percent on its sales. 

By using a return on sales to make comparisons between industries, the oil industry is engaging in a gross deception. It is simply lying. No other word works. And the oil firms know better. They certainly do not talk that way to investors or the financial community.  As Peter Ashton pointed out on Nieman Watchdog last year (June 15, 2007), ExxonMobil got it right in its annual Financial and Operating Review for 2006. The quote is worth repeating:

The corporation's total ROCE [return on capital employed] is net income excluding the after-tax cost of financing, divided by total corporate average capital employed. The corporation has consistently applied its ROCE definition for many years and views it as the best measure of historical capital productivity in our capital-intensive, long-term industry, both to evaluate management's performance and to demonstrate to shareholders that capital has been used wisely over the long term.

[And also see this by Morton Mintz in Nieman Watchdog on how to report profits.]

The oil industry's massive effort to divert the public's attention has an obvious purpose. Why the major media don't confront the issue is less obvious.  Last year Tim Russert, Washington bureau chief of NBC News, treated us to an interview with a CEO of a major oil company. One would have thought this would have presented a sitting duck for his brand of gotcha journalism. Alas, the subject never came up. Do his producers think that an issue so important to the industry has no real significance? Do they not read annual reports or financial statements? Do they need a refresher in Econ 101?

In fairness, one must admit that Mr. Russert has never pretended to have much interest in economic issues. George Will, on the other hand, would admit to no such limitation. Moreover, it is one thing to ignore the issue; it is another to join in the deception. In a Newsweek column (April 26, 2008) Mr. Will propounded questions for Senator Obama including this incantation of the industry line:

ExxonMobil's profit of $40.6 billion annoys you. Do you know that its profit, relative to its revenue, was smaller that Microsoft's and many other corporations'?

Coming from an intrepid defender of the free market this is no minor gaffe. He might be forgiven if he had noted that the nation's largest corporation last year only earned a modest 3.4 percent on revenue. Of course, that would have exposed how silly his question was and how inappropriate his comparison.

I'd be remiss if I failed to mention an article that got it right – really right. Marianne Lavelle writing in U.S. News & World Report (February 1, 2008) observed that "There's no business on the planet that gushes forth more profit than selling oil—nothing even close." Making a comparison that should make Mr. Will blush, she notes that "If Exxon Mobil were a country, its 2007 profit would exceed the gross domestic product of nearly of nearly two thirds of the 183 nations in the World Bank's economic rankings." She goes on to explain the difference between return on sales and return on equity in language that even the laziest journalist could understand. She understands the significance of the fact that the oil industry as a whole earned a 27 percent return on equity and that this was 10 points higher than all other industries.

There are other issues raised by the industry's propaganda offensive, like the amounts being reinvested. While these numbers in absolute terms seem large, over the last several years the actual rate of reinvestment has not been particularly high. In fact, the major companies have spent considerable sums buying back their own stock. For example, ExxonMobil's capital and exploration expenditures in 2007 were $20.9 billion. But it spent $31.8 billion buying back its own stock, which certainly did nothing for meeting anyone's energy needs.

What does all this matter anyhow? Doesn't everyone expect the oil industry to lie? A long time ago, while working at the FTC on advertising issues, I had occasion to visit a considerable number of advertising agencies where, as a matter professional curiosity, I asked if one could sell a product with a claim that the consumer knew was untrue. Universally, the question provoked a laugh; of course they could. They all cited what they had learned from the world of political propaganda.

"End the denial of one, a few or many, all of the time; give all men and women a fair share for sustenance only; and goodness will mobilize. It does not take a village, nor its privateer corporation; it takes a good man, a good woman and, yes, freedom to trade. Inequity, interfering government and its surrogates are the problem, the unnecessary costs and producers of nothing, except human misery."

Prison and Tax Relief: A New Mind Set/The New Way

by R.O.Wirengard

Dear Governor,

It is hard for government to forsake the prison investor, who gave amply to campaigns; and the fundamentalist believing in an angry, full of vengeance and wrathful god, who votes for that government, so as to pre-empt and choke out any notion of the loving and forgiving god, of Jesus.

But even our dark age, brutal hangings of children in public squares, for stealing bread, did not solve the problem of hunger, and other children continued stealing bread, or they would die, regardless. Succeeding as thieves, however, it became a way of life for them and continues so today, where jobs and income are not available or insufficient to live on. The permanence of poverty and its vicious circle of denying some bread, all of the time, causing the theft of bread to recur, all of the time, they - a permanent miscarriage of Justice and its illegal but rational reaction for survival - are what needs to be broken.

I have heard it said that at least ninety-five percent of prisoners are not violent, and the remainder, I believe, belong in maximum security hospital wings; but it is for one, a few or many of the none-violent ones that I petition you, as follows.

Whereas our Florida spends an average of seventeen thousand dollars per year, per prisoner, this approaching a two billion dollar industry; therefor, let us free none-violent prisoner(s), pay each one a thousand dollars per month to access food and shelter, and place the remaining five thousand dollars into a healthcare pool, from which each will be dispensed/vouchered at the going rates of healthcare incidents, as need arises; provided that:

(1) Each will agree to forego, under our Florida Right to Work law, and we will exempt employers from minimum wage laws (in accordance with U.S. Constitution, Section 10, that no state shall make a law impairing contracts), and

(2) All agree that such employers pay seventy percent above agreed to wages into the fund that is costing us taxpayers seventeen thousand dollars per year, per prisoner.

In the long run, this simple, yet robust, program becomes self-sustaining, because, at the start, jobs become available easily, as freed prisoners can afford to work as apprentices, for nothing, or at low wages of a dollar an hour, because they have a living income, so as to improve skills and command higher and higher wages, in the longer run. They and we overcome our vicious, impoverishing processes - hunger - and private employers become allowed to employ - not reform, but overcome the cost of training people - for the ultimately higher paying , skilled job, from which everyone else also benefits.

I hereby petition you to release my none-violent nephew, Alfonso Antonio Gonzales, considered a career criminal, though he did not steal when he lived with me and my wife for free, for two years, tried desperately to work legitimately, but now is, for prior crimes and ineffective counsel, a prisoner, number 506332, A2-108L, at Apalachee Correctional Institution, in Sneads, Florida, to be released to me, under the above provisions, and a few other none-violent prisoners, who also are agreeable to the provisions.

We, with the help of a few others, perhaps Pastor Clark, will prove the new way; and Dr. Blass, if not your own staff, can set forth the computer program and hardware, to serve, track, and report results instantly of this, the new way of a new mind set.

It is a new way to reduce our prisons, which are not corrective anyway - crime goes up when our economy goes down, because we have more hunger and fewer jobs - meaning also that our freed prisoners, foregoing minimum wage barriers to work, can get jobs and will improve our economy; and reverse the tilt for crime to decline; and for tax relief also to be mobilized, which desperately is needed for our citizens, not just to balance budgets, but also to lower prices and eliminate costs of none-productive institutions

Sincerely submitted, petitioned and prayed for, R.O.Wirengard

"from a military point of view, the penalty, 2,400 (4,000+ in 2008) brave Americans whom we lost, 3,000 in an hour and 15 minutes, is relative." said Pentagon Military Analyst.

Behind Military Analysts, the Pentagon's Hidden Hand

The effort, which began with the buildup to the Iraq war and continues to this day, has sought to exploit ideological and military allegiances, and also a powerful financial dynamic: Most of the analysts have ties to military contractors vested in the very war policies they are asked to assess on air.

Those business relationships are hardly ever disclosed to the viewers, and sometimes not even to the networks themselves. But collectively, the men on the plane and several dozen other military analysts represent more than 150 military contractors either as lobbyists, senior executives, board members or consultants. The companies include defense heavyweights, but also scores of smaller companies, all part of a vast assemblage of contractors scrambling for hundreds of billions in military business generated by the administration's war on terror. It is a furious competition, one in which inside information and easy access to senior officials are highly prized……….John C. Garrett is a retired Army colonel and unpaid analyst for Fox News TV and radio. He is also a lobbyist at Patton Boggs who helps firms win Pentagon contracts, including in Iraq. In promotional materials, he states that as a military analyst he "is privy to weekly access and briefings with the secretary of defense, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other high level policy makers in the administration." One client told 

Federal agencies, for example, have paid columnists to write favorably about the administration. They have distributed to local TV stations hundreds of fake news segments with fawning accounts of administration accomplishments Mr. Garrett's special access and decades of experience helped him "to know in advance — and in detail — how best to meet the needs" of the Defense Department and other agencies.

In interviews Mr. Garrett said there was an inevitable overlap between his dual roles. He said he had gotten "information you just otherwise would not get," from the briefings and three Pentagon-sponsored trips to Iraq. He also acknowledged using this access and information to identify opportunities for clients. "You can't help but look for that," he said, adding, "If you know a capability that would fill a niche or need, you try to fill it. "That's good for everybody."

There was little discussion about the actual criticism pouring forth from Mr. Rumsfeld's former generals. Analysts argued that opposition to the war was rooted in perceptions fed by the news media, not reality. The administration's overall war strategy, they counseled, was "brilliant" and "very successful."

CNN, however, said it did not know the nature of McNeil's military business or what General Marks did for the company. If he was bidding on Pentagon contracts, CNN said, that should have disqualified him from being a military analyst for the network. But in the summer and fall of 2006, even as he was regularly asked to comment on conditions in Iraq, General Marks was working intensively on bidding for a $4.6 billion contract to provide thousands of translators to United States forces in Iraq. In fact, General Marks was made president of the McNeil spin-off that won the huge contract in December 2006.

General Marks said his work on the contract did not affect his commentary on CNN. "I've got zero challenge separating myself from a business interest," he said.

But CNN said it had no idea about his role in the contract until July 2007, when it reviewed his most recent disclosure form, submitted months earlier, and finally made inquiries about his new job.

"We saw the extent of his dealings and determined at that time we should end our relationship with him," CNN said.

Full article at NY Times

*************************************

In My Own Words by Mauricio Rosas:

It is self-evident the GW Bush administration is corrupt to its core. Contracts are awarded to select corporations without or little oversight by Congress, brazenly ignoring the bidding process.   Without shame they bask in the glory of their collective gains from those alliances, some of which are teetering on the edge of being enemies of the United States.  

What started out as retaliation against a nation and its government (Afghanistan and the Taliban) who conscripted by Osama Bin Laden's Al Qaeda or acting on its own in the deliberate attack on 9/11 was a not the true objective of the Bush administration. It turns out those who advised and aligned with GW Bush to retaliate did so but with an ulterior motive, to attack Iraq.  Our soldiers were winning the war against Afghanistan and its government. American troops were within reach of capturing Osama Bin Laden, destroying the Al Qaeda network and the surrender of the Taliban. But that never happened. Instead those aligned to GW Bush diminished and practically stopped the pursuit of Osama Bin Laden, the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan in order to orchestrate their grand scheme for a "New American Century."  Unbeknownst to the American people, the invasion of Iraq had been forethought.  The corporate aristocracy of the Bush administration invaded Iraq under false pretenses. They knew it would be a "Long War."  A war reaping huge profits for corporate military contractors and the oil industry.  They are a threat because their allegiance to greed, money and power far supersedes their allegiance to the Constitution of the United States.  

Abraham Lincoln foretold of such an enemy:

"I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. Corporations have been enthroned, an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until the wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed" 

I am a firm believer in the Democratic process and the peaceful transition of power.  However, to maintain order and a government of the people, by the people and for the people, the people must step-up to the plate. Each and every American citizen of legal age must use their ultimate weapon against those who corrupt, coerce and exploit our form of government. The weapon? To cast one's ballot.

If the people do nothing?  

Corporations will tell us what to do.

Studies point to new understanding of phantom noises in the ear
By Kate Murphy
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
International Herald Tribune

Modern life is loud. The jolting buzz of an alarm clock awakens the ears to a daily din of trucks idling, sirens blaring, televisions droning, computers pinging and phones ringing - not to mention refrigerators humming and air-conditioners thrumming. But for the millions who suffer from severe tinnitus, the phantom tones inside their head are louder than anything else.

Often caused by prolonged or sudden exposure to loud noises, tinnitus is becoming an increasingly common complaint, particularly among soldiers returning from combat, users of portable music players, and aging baby boomers reared on rock 'n' roll. Other causes include stress, some kinds of chemotherapy, head and neck trauma, sinus infections, and multiple sclerosis.

Although there is no cure, researchers say they have never had a better understanding of the cascade of physiological and psychological mechanisms responsible for tinnitus. As a result, new treatments under investigation show promise in helping patients manage the ringing, pinging and hissing that otherwise drives them to distraction.

The most promising therapies, experts say, are based on discoveries made in the last five years about the brain activity of people with tinnitus. With brain-scanning equipment like functional magnetic resonance imaging, researchers in the United States and Europe have independently discovered that the brain areas responsible for interpreting sound and producing fearful emotions are exceptionally active in people who complain of tinnitus.

"We've discovered that tinnitus is not so much ringing in the ears as ringing in the brain," said Thomas Brozoski, a tinnitus researcher at Southern Illinois University School of Medicine, in Springfield.

Indeed, tinnitus can be intense in people with hearing loss and even those whose auditory nerves have been completely severed. In the absence of normal auditory stimulation, the brain is like a driver trying to tune in to a radio station that is out of range. It turns up the volume trying but gets only annoying static. Richard Salvi, director of the Center for Hearing and Deafness at the State University of New York at Buffalo, said the static could be "neural noise" - the sound of nerves firing. Or, he said, it could be a leftover sound memory.

Adam Edwards, 34, co-owner of a wheel repair shop in Dallas, said he developed tinnitus four years ago after target-shooting with a pistol. "I had all the risk factors," he said. "I grew up hunting, I played drums in a band, I went to loud concerts, I have a loud work environment - everything but living next to a missile launch site." His tinnitus, which he described as a "computer beeping" sound, was so intense and persistent that he needed sedatives to sleep at night.

Edwards says he has gotten relief from a device developed by an Australian audiologist. Manufactured by Neuromonics, of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, it looks like an MP3 player and delivers sound spanning the full auditory spectrum, digitally embedded in soothing music.

Similar to white noise, the broadband sound, tailored to each patient's hearing ability, masks the tinnitus. (The music is intended to ease the anxiety that often accompanies the disorder.) Patients wear the $5,000 device for a minimum of two hours a day for six months. Since completing the treatment regimen last year, Edwards said his tinnitus had "become sort of like Muzak at a department store - you hear it if you think about it, but otherwise you don't really notice."

A small, company-financed study in the journal Ear & Hearing in April 2007 indicated that the Neuromonics method was 90 percent successful at reducing tinnitus. A larger study is under way to determine its long-term effectiveness.

Anne Howell, an audiologist at the Callier Center for Communication Disorders at the University of Texas at Dallas, said the Neuromonics device was a big improvement over older sound therapies that required wearing something that looked like a hearing aid all the time and took 18 to 24 months.

Other treatments showing promise include surgically implanted electrodes and noninvasive magnetic stimulation, both intended to disrupt and possibly reset the faulty brain signals responsible for tinnitus. Using functional MRI to guide them, neurosurgeons in Belgium have performed the implant procedure on several patients in the last year and say it has suppressed tinnitus entirely.

But the treatment is controversial.

The magnetic therapy, similar to treatments used for depression and chronic pain, involves holding a magnet in the shape of an 8 over the skull. Clinicians use functional MRI to aim the magnetic pulses so they reach regions of the brain responsible for interpreting sound.

Patients receive a pulse every second for about 20 minutes. "It works for some people but not for others," said Anthony Cacace, professor of communication science and nerve disorders at Wayne State University, in Detroit.

Researchers in Brazil have published a study indicating that a treatment called cranial-sacral trigger-point therapy can relieve tinnitus in some head and neck trauma cases by releasing muscles that constrict hearing and neural pathways.

And drugs intended to treat alcoholism, epilepsy, Alzheimer's and depression that alter levels of various neurotransmitters in the brain like serotonin, dopamine and gamma-aminobutyric acid have quieted tinnitus in some published animal and human studies.

Medical Errors Costing U.S. Billions

Tuesday, April 8, 2008; 12:00 AM

TUESDAY, April 8 (HealthDay News) -- From 2004 through 2006, patient safety errors resulted in 238,337 potentially preventable deaths of U.S. Medicare patients and cost the Medicare program $8.8 billion, according to the fifth annual Patient Safety in American Hospitals Study.

This analysis of 41 million Medicare patient records, released April 8 by HealthGrades, a health care ratings organization, found that patients treated at top-performing hospitals were, on average, 43 percent less likely to experience one or more medical errors than patients at the poorest-performing hospitals.

The overall medical error rate was about 3 percent for all Medicare patients, which works out to about 1.1 million patient safety incidents during the three years included in the analysis.

Among the other findings:

Patients who experienced a patient safety incident had a 20 percent chance of dying as a result of the incident.The overall death rate among patients who experienced one or more patient safety incidents fell by almost 5 percent between 2004 and 2006.However, over that time, there were increases in post-operative respiratory failure, post-operative pulmonary embolism or deep vein thrombosis, post-operative sepsis (blood infection), and post-operative abdominal wound separation/splitting.The most common types of medical errors were bed sores, failure to rescue, and post-operative respiratory failure. Together, they accounted for 63.4 percent of incidents. Failure to rescue improved 11.1 percent from 2004 to 2006, while both bed sores and post-operative respiratory failure worsened during that time.Of the 270,491 deaths that occurred among patients who experienced one or more patient safety incidents, 238,337 were potentially preventable, the researchers said.If all hospitals performed at the level of the top-ranked hospitals, about 220,106 patient safety incidents and 37,214 patient deaths could have been avoided, and about $2 billion could have been saved.

"While many U.S. hospitals have taken extensive action to prevent medical errors, the prevalence of likely preventable patient safety incidents is taking a costly toll on our health care systems -- in both lives and dollars," Dr. Samantha Collier, HealthGrades' chief medical officer and primary author of the study, said in a prepared statement.

"HealthGrades has documented in numerous studies the significant and largely unchanging gap between top-performing and poor-performing hospitals. It is imperative that hospitals recognize the benchmarks set by the Distinguished Hospitals for Patient Safety are achievable and associated with higher safety and markedly lower cost," Collier said.

Starting Oct. 1, the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will stop reimbursing hospitals for the treatment of eight major preventable errors, including objects left in the body after surgery and certain kinds of post-surgical infections.

More information

The American Academy of Family Physicians outlines how patients can prevent medical errors. http://familydoctor.org/online/famdocen/home/healthy/safety/safety/736.printerview.html

SOURCE: HealthGrades, news release, April 8, 200

Giant Underwater Volcano Discovered in Iceland

Volcanologist Ármann Höskuldsson from the University of Iceland and a team of scientists recently discovered a more than 50-square-kilometer volcano off Reykjanes peninsula, southwest Iceland, and expect it to erupt at any time.

In the center of the volcano there is a caldera measuring ten kilometers in diameter.

"People shouldn't be surprised if there would be an extensive volcanic eruption underwater there soon. Nothing has happened for hundreds of years and it is in fact only a matter of time before there will be an eruption," Höskuldsson told DV.

Since the volcano is at a depth of 1,500 meters eruptions would not have any effect on Iceland, except perhaps causing earthquakes.

The volcano's discovery is considered significant because geographers believed it couldn't exist in that area. "Such large volcanoes are not located on oceanic ridges. They are always drifting apart and that prevents a volcano from being created. This is why the volcano's existence came as a surprise," Höskuldsson said.

In summer, Höskuldsson and his team will present the conclusions of their studies at the annual conference of the International Association of Volcanologists, which will be held in Iceland. Nine hundred people have already registered for the conference.

In summer 2009 they plan use a small submarine to undertake more detailed research of the underwater volcano.

Merck, Schering Call on Doctors to Boost Vytorin Use (Update1)

By Michelle Fay Cortez and Shannon Pettypiece

March 27 (Bloomberg) -- Merck & Co. and Schering-Plough Corp. are telling physicians to ignore research showing their jointly marketed cholesterol-drug Vytorin failed to halt progression of artery disease. It's unlikely they will listen.

Preliminary findings of the study, called Enhance and released in January, drove Vytorin prescriptions down 18 percent and slashed $49 billion from the drugmakers' market value. In an effort to retain the pill's $2.8 billion in annual sales, Merck and Schering-Plough are doing the unprecedented: discrediting research they funded and helped design.

The trial, intended to show Vytorin can reduce artery clogging, was created to help the drug compete against Pfizer Inc.'s Lipitor for a share of the $35 billion worldwide cholesterol market. The failure of Vytorin to outperform an older drug means doctors have little reason to use it. The final report, to be presented Sunday at the American College of Cardiology meeting in Chicago, won't help, researchers say.

``The study results aren't going to influence practice much,'' said Randy Thomas, a cardiologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. ``The question we're asking is does it lower heart attack risk. We won't know that from Enhance.''

Sekar Kathiresan, director of preventive cardiology at Boston's Massachusetts General Hospital, says research may eventually show that Vytorin and Zetia, one of the two medicines that make up Vytorin, will prevent heart attacks, strokes and death. Until studies prove that, he plans to rely on older so- called statins like Lipitor and simvastatin, a generic version of Merck's Zocor, the other component in Vytorin.

To comment on this story, click here. Merck & Co. and Schering-Plough Corp. are telling physicians to ignore research

The full story behind Rev. Jeremiah Wright's 9/11 sermon

What are the candidates thinking?  Here is a quick look to Iraq.

Here are the core elements of Barack Obama's strategy to address our critical national security challenges in the 21st century:

• End the war in Iraq, removing our troops at a pace of 1 to 2 combat brigades per month;
• Finally finish the fight against the Taliban, root out al Qaeda and invest in the people of Afghanistan and Pakistan, while making aid to the Pakistani government conditional;
• Act aggressively to stop nuclear proliferation and to secure all loose nuclear materials around the world;
• Double our foreign assistance to cut extreme poverty in half;
• Invest in a clean energy future to wean the U.S. off of foreign oil and to lead the world against the threat of global climate change;
• Rebuild our military capability by increasing the number of soldiers, marines, and special forces troops, and insist on adequate training and time off between deployments;
• Renew American diplomacy by talking to our adversaries as well as our friends; increasing the size of the Foreign Service and the Peace Corps; and creating an America's Voice Corps.

Here are the core elements of Hillary Clinton's strategy to address issue's in Iraq:

• Starting Phased Redeployment within Hillary's First Days in Office
  he most important part of Hillary's plan is the first: to end our military engagement in Iraq's civil war and immediately start bringing our troops home.
• Securing Stability in Iraq as we Bring our Troops Home
  Hillary would focus American aid efforts during our redeployment on stabilizing Iraq, not propping up the Iraqi government. She would direct aid to the entities -- whether governmental or non-governmental -- most likely to get it into the hands of the Iraqi people.
• A New Intensive Diplomatic Initiative in the Region
  Hillary would convene a regional stabilization group composed of key allies, other global powers, and all of the states bordering Iraq.
    Non-interference. Working with the U.N. representative, the group would work to convince Iraq's neighbors to refrain from getting involved in the civil war.
    Mediation. The group would attempt to mediate among the different sectarian groups in Iraq with the goal of attaining compromises on fundamental points of disputes.
    Reconstruction funding. The members of the group would hold themselves and other countries to their past pledges to provide funding to Iraq and will encourage additional contributions to meet Iraq's extensive needs.

John McCain's Strategy for Victory in Iraq:

Strengthen the Iraqi Armed Forces and Police

Create the security necessary for political progress and stability

Accelerate political and economic reconstruction in a secure   environment

Keep Senior Officers in Place

Call for International Pressure on Syria and Iran

Win the Homefront

Beware News Of Superdelegates, Done Deals and Orange Alerts (and just vote for Obama).

By Chris Stevenson
Feb. 25, 2008

Plans to discourage you from voting for he whom will eventually become the Democratic Party nominee; Barack Obama are already being drawn. No I can't swear by that but trust my paranoid intuition (which rarely fails if ever). It seems to me the more voters go to the polls, the less credit is given to them nowadays for ushering in a winner. A couple weeks back CNN (and according to a friend of mine ABC) only highlighted Hillary's and McCain's voter count during the primaries, basically censoring Obama's results in order to give you the impression that Hil was dominating. On Super Tuesday CNN only acknowledged 2 or 3 states that Obama won while Ms. Clinton was ahead by at least 3 or 4 states.

I went to bed that night only to wake up hearing on the radio (on a right wing talk station at that) that Obama had won decisively 13 states to 9 for Clinton. The fix was on I thought to myself, the big networks were trying to manipulate the election updates pretty much the same way they left off with the 2000 general election. Desperate measures were being used to hide the true ongoing Tally's by making the loser look important. But it didn't work on Super Tuesday and it shouldn't work today. Historically in this nation nothing was more feared than the black vote, lives were lost just on the suspicion of a black contemplating a trip to the booth. Couple that with the majority of the nation's blacks voting for a black candidate and you got a nightmare that even the most poker-faced white network power broker can't endure.

Not only are blacks voting for Obama, whites males, youths who ordinarily would not have registered this soon; including college students, and the same white females Hil's "cry me a river" tears won over in New Hampshire, are starting to desert her in other states. This isn't good news for Hil because according to a recent Economist women make up 60% of the democratic vote. Another element to throw off your enthusiasm for voting for Obama is the sidebar discussion of this years campaign buzz-term "Super delegates."

These mysterious powerful democrats are being touted as the final decision makers as to whether or not that candidate receives the democratic party nomination. In 2000 the word "delegate" was taken out the deep freeze and mentioned around the nation. This time around, the implication is, you need Super delegates to stop the tide of a super candidate or perhaps black candidate with super national appeal. Super delegates wield considerable power, they comprise almost 800 of the 4,049 delegates at a convention (20%) and are made up of ex-presidents, senators, congressmen and high ranking shot callers. Reportedly one of them is worth 10,000 votes. As powerful as they are however, they have one kryptonite, you. The more the nation leans towards a candidate, the more likely voters influence the delegates and the least likely the Super delegate will vote against the tide.

Super delegates don't call themselves Super delegates nor are they a new phenomenon. They really like to be known as un pledged party members and they have been around officially since 1980 in order to give a greater role to active politicians. Your vote can still beat out the ruling of a Super delegate, Howard Dean was way ahead in the delegate count back in '04 but still lost due to caucus votes. This role of these un pledged decision makers could become a major factor this fall if Obama and Clinton still aren't able to get the needed delegates to win the democratic nomination. If this is the case then a scenario known as the brokered convention enters the picture. This is when a nomination is decided by a smoking room decision by a select few with little regard for the public. Ironically enough, one of y'all's previous black presidents was selected in this manner in Obama's home town of Chicago. Only this was back in 1920 when republican senators selected Warren G. Harding as their next President.

I tossed in the threat of an Orange Alert as a possible last resort scare tactic in case Obama wins the nomination and someone decides the only way to get white guy back into the Oval Office is to raise news of a terror-threat and hope Americans respond by voting republican (even though our last 2 domestic hits were planned during republican administrations). In the meantime don't be swayed away from the caucuses by too much news of election outcomes by any other factors than you the voter. This is a historic time and you don't want to be on the sidelines giving your voting power away to rumors and haters.

Nothing is a "Done Deal" unless you done decided not to Get out and Vote.

First our Bees, now our Bats - Another Mystery Disease

You Will Think about this next time you eat Beef

Art or Obscenity? Unusual Case Draws Controversy

Child Rape Fiction Case Tests if Writers Can Be Punished Under Federal Obscenity Law
By SCOTT MICHELS

Jan 31 2008 For about the last eight years, Karen Fletcher has rarely left her run-down house outside Pittsburgh, she says. Described by her lawyers as timid and reclusive, Fletcher recently began posting short stories on the Internet that describe, in graphic detail, the sexual abuse and torture of young children  in order, she says, to cope with her own history of abuse.

But amid the ubiquitous pornography available on the Internet, those stories, read by about 29 paying subscribers, have made Fletcher one of the few people facing federal criminal charges for obscenity.

Once relatively common, federal obscenity cases in the last 15 years have become something of a rarity, law professors and former prosecutors say. Though child pornography prosecutions are increasing, adult obscenity laws are unevenly enforced across the country, taking a back seat to high-profile areas like terrorism cases and drug enforcement.

"A straight adult obscenity case is fairly far down in the pecking order" of priorities for prosecutors, said Teree Bowers, who was the U.S. Attorney in Los Angeles from 1992 to 1994.

Fletcher's case has generated even more attention because, unlike the vast majority of material thought to be obscene, Fletcher's stories have no accompanying photographs or images. In the 35 years since the Supreme Court's seminal case defining obscenity, it appears that not a single successful federal obscenity prosecution has been based solely on the written word.

"We haven't seen anything like that since the '60's," said Tim Wu, a Columbia University law professor who has written about obscenity law. He called Fletcher's case "astonishing."

Under the Supreme Court's 1973 decision in Miller v. California, pornography can be prosecuted as obscene if, taken as a whole, it lacks artistic, literary or scientific merit; depicts certain sexual conduct in an offensive way; and is prurient as measured by contemporary community standards. In a separate case decided that year, the court held that written descriptions alone, without pictures, can be obscene.

Fletcher's stories, prosecutors say, go so far beyond what is acceptable even in today's permissive culture that they warrant criminal charges. She faces up to 30 years in prison if convicted on all counts.

"The U.S. Attorney's office and I felt that the stories involved here are extremely graphic, depicting the torture and rape of children, and thought they were worthy of prosecution," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Kaufman, who is prosecuting the case.

Mary Beth Buchanan, the US Attorney in Pittsburgh, who has a reputation as one of the federal prosecutors to aggressively pursue obscenity cases, was unavailable for comment. Kaufman said, "[Former] Attorney General [John] Ashcroft made obscenity prosecutions a priority and [Buchanan] took it seriously."

Now 56 and living off of disability payments, Fletcher claims in an affidavit that she ran away from home at age 14 after being physically and sexually abused as a child. The stories, and the online communication among some of her 29 paid subscribers, were therapeutic and helped her cope with her own abuse, she said.

The Web site, Red Rose, which has since been taken down, was intended to be "a safe place for cathartic writing  for people to express themselves and use their own imagery & not to have pictures to potentially excite or be suggestive to readers," Fletcher said in the affidavit. Through her lawyers, she declined to be interviewed for this story.

"If she hadn't been writing these stories, she probably wouldn't be alive today," said Jerome Mooney, one of Fletcher's attorneys. Mooney and Fletcher's affidavit say she is a recluse who is afraid of other people and rarely leaves the house. She has avoided going to court for hearings.

"I don't think she's even in posture where she can imagine what it would be like" to go to prison, Mooney said. "She has difficulty leaving her own home. I can't imagine what would happen if she ended up in prison. I suspect it would be devastating. I don't think she'd survive it."

Her case began when the FBI received a complaint of suspicious activity from PayPal, according to a search warrant. Fletcher admitted to the FBI that she had about 29 subscribers, who paid $10 a month for access to the site.

In court papers, the government argued that the fact that Fletcher charged for access to the site made it illegal. Mooney said Fletcher charged subscribers to pay for the cost of running the site and to keep children from accessing it. This week, a judge refused to suppress Fletcher's statements to the FBI. She is expected to go to trial later this year.

Much pornography may meet the technical definition of obscenity. But many prosecutors, faced with the immensity of potentially obscene material on the Internet, tend to focus on child pornography and abuse, said Bowers and Joseph DeMarco, a former federal prosecutor in New York. Those cases are more likely to lead to other charges; pornography that features torture or rape is often made in the third world and may involve sexual slavery, DeMarco said.

In 2006, there were about 2,500 federal child pornography prosecutions, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Though both former attorneys general John Ashcroft and Alberto Gonzales said they planned to make obscenity a priority, there have been comparatively few obscenity cases brought separately from allegations of child pornography or sexual abuse.

"The idea that you can arrest someone for looking at dirty pictures seems antiquated today," Wu said. "It's close to being a dead law."

Cases attacking words alone have not fared well in the appellate courts. State obscenity charges against the rap group 2 Live Crew for their explicit lyrics were thrown out. An Ohio man pleaded guilty to state obscenity charges in 2005 for diary entries that described fantasies of sexually abusing children but was granted a new trial after a court ruled that his lawyers were ineffective because they advised him not to pursue a first amendment defense.

Though Fletcher's lawyers argue that it should never be constitutional to prosecute text-only cases, her trial will probably focus on whether her stories have literary or scientific merit. Her lawyers cite episodes of the television show South Park and Norman Mailer's novel The Castle and the Forest, which describes sex between a teenage boy and an older man, as examples of socially acceptable explicit content.

Speech isn't enough

01-21-08 When politicians are having difficulty getting themselves out of a controversial situation, pundits like Chris Matthews are quick to offer a diagnosis: The politician, they tell us, should immediately come clean, take responsibility and, if necessary, apologize. Get it over quickly; don't let it drag out -- and don't make it worse with evasive answers or half-hearted explanations.

Chris Matthews and MSNBC should have followed that advice...more

Former Republican US congressmancharged in terror case

Published: Thursday 17 January 2008 10:43 UTC
Last updated: Thursday 17 January 2008 15:02 UTC

Washington - A federal grand jury in the Western District of Missouri has returned a superseding indictment that charges the Islamic American Relief Agency (IARA) and several of its former officers with eight new counts of engaging in prohibited financial transactions for the benefit of U.S.-designated terrorist Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. The indictment also charges former Republican U.S. Congressman (Mi) Mark Deli Siljander with money laundering, conspiracy and obstruction of justice in the case.

Funds raised by the IARA reportedly went to the radical rebel leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who is hiding in the Pakistan-Afghanistan border region. The indictment against Mr Siljander says the IARA hired Mr Siljander in 2004 to lobby Congress to remove the group from a list of non-profit organisations suspected of supporting international terrorism. He is also accused of engaging in money laundering and obstruction of a federal investigation...more

Who Do We Vote For This Time Around?
A Letter from Michael Moore

01.02.08
Friends,

A new year has begun. And before we've had a chance to break our New Year's resolutions, we find ourselves with a little more than 24 hours before the good people of Iowa tell us whom they would like to replace the man who now occupies three countries and a white house.

Twice before, we have begun the process to stop this man, and twice we have failed. Eight years of our lives as Americans will have been lost, the world left in upheaval against us... and yet now, today, we hope against hope that our moment has finally arrived, that the amazingly powerful force of the Republican Party will somehow be halted. But we know that the Democrats are experts at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, and if there's a way to blow this election, they will find it and do it with gusto.

Do you feel the same as me? That the Democratic front-runners are a less-than-stellar group of candidates, and that none of them are the "slam dunk" we wish they were? Of course, there are wonderful things about each of them. Any one of them would be infinitely better than what we have now. Personally, Congressman Kucinich, more than any other candidate, shares the same positions that I have on the issues (although the UFO that picked ME up would only take me as far as Kalamazoo). But let's not waste time talking about Dennis. Even he is resigned to losing, with statements like the one he made yesterday to his supporters in Iowa to throw their support to Senator Obama as their "second choice."

So, it's Hillary, Obama, Edwards -- now what do we do?

Two months ago, Rolling Stone magazine asked me to do a cover story where I would ask the hard questions that no one was asking in one-on-one interviews with Senators Clinton, Obama and Edwards. "The Top Democrats Face Off with Michael Moore." The deal was that all three candidates had to agree to let me interview them or there was no story. Obama and Edwards agreed. Mrs. Clinton said no, and the cover story was thus killed.

Why would the love of my life, Hillary Clinton, not sit down to talk with me? What was she afraid of?

Those of you who are longtime readers of mine may remember that 11 years ago I wrote a chapter (in my first book) entitled, "My Forbidden Love for Hillary." I was fed up with the treatment she was getting, most of it boringly sexist, and I thought somebody should stand up for her. I later met her and she thanked me for referring to her as "one hot s***kicking feminist babe." I supported and contributed to her run for the U.S. Senate. I think she is a decent and smart person who loves this country, cares deeply about kids, and has put up with more crap than anyone I know of (other than me) from the Crazy Right. Her inauguration would be a thrilling sight, ending 218 years of white male rule in a country where 51% of its citizens are female and 64% are either female or people of color.

And yet, I am sad to say, nothing has disappointed me more than the disastrous, premeditated vote by Senator Hillary Clinton to send us to war in Iraq. I'm not only talking about her first vote that gave Mr. Bush his "authorization" to invade -- I'm talking about every single OTHER vote she then cast for the next four years, backing and funding Bush's illegal war, and doing so with verve. She never met a request from the White House for war authorization that she didn't like. Unlike the Kerrys and the Bidens who initially voted for authorization but later came to realize the folly of their decision, Mrs. Clinton continued to cast numerous votes for the war until last March -- four long years of pro-war votes, even after 70% of the American public had turned against the war. She has steadfastly refused to say that she was wrong about any of this, and she will not apologize for her culpability in America's worst-ever foreign policy disaster. All she can bring herself to say is that she was "misled" by "faulty intelligence."

Let's assume that's true. Do you want a President who is so easily misled? I wasn't "misled," and millions of others who took to the streets in February of 2003 weren't "misled" either. It was simply amazing that we knew the war was wrong when none of us had been briefed by the CIA, none of us were national security experts, and none of us had gone on a weapons inspection tour of Iraq. And yet... we knew we were being lied to! Let me ask those of you reading this letter: Were YOU "misled" -- or did you figure it out sometime between October of 2002 and March of 2007 that George W. Bush was up to something rotten? Twenty-three other senators were smart enough to figure it out and vote against the war from the get-go. Why wasn't Senator Clinton?

I have a theory: Hillary knows the sexist country we still live in and that one of the reasons the public, in the past, would never consider a woman as president is because she would also be commander in chief. The majority of Americans were concerned that a woman would not be as likely to go to war as a man (horror of horrors!). So, in order to placate that mindset, perhaps she believed she had to be as "tough" as a man, she had to be willing to push The Button if necessary, and give the generals whatever they wanted. If this is, in fact, what has motivated her pro-war votes, then this would truly make her a scary first-term president. If the U.S. is faced with some unforeseen threat in her first years, she knows that in order to get re-elected she'd better be ready to go all Maggie Thatcher on whoever sneezes in our direction. Do we want to risk this, hoping the world makes it in one piece to her second term?

I have not even touched on her other numerous -- and horrendous -- votes in the Senate, especially those that have made the middle class suffer even more (she voted for Bush's first bankruptcy bill, and she is now the leading recipient of payoff money -- I mean campaign contributions -- from the health care industry). I know a lot of you want to see her elected, and there is a very good chance that will happen. There will be plenty of time to vote for her in the general election if all the pollsters are correct. But in the primaries and caucuses, isn't this the time to vote for the person who most reflects the values and politics you hold dear? Can you, in good conscience, vote for someone who so energetically voted over and over and over again for the war in Iraq? Please give this serious consideration.

Now, on to the two candidates who did agree to do the interview with me...

Barack Obama is a good and inspiring man. What a breath of fresh air! There's no doubting his sincerity or his commitment to trying to straighten things out in this country. But who is he? I mean, other than a guy who gives a great speech? How much do any of us really know about him? I know he was against the war. How do I know that? He gave a speech before the war started. But since he joined the senate, he has voted for the funds for the war, while at the same time saying we should get out. He says he's for the little guy, but then he votes for a corporate-backed bill to make it harder for the little guy to file a class action suit when his kid swallows lead paint from a Chinese-made toy. In fact, Obama doesn't think Wall Street is a bad place. He wants the insurance companies to help us develop a new health care plan -- the same companies who have created the mess in the first place. He's such a feel-good kinda guy, I get the sense that, if elected, the Republicans will eat him for breakfast. He won't even have time to make a good speech about it.

But this may be a bit harsh. Senator Obama has a big heart, and that heart is in the right place. Is he electable? Will more than 50% of America vote for him? We'd like to believe they would. We'd like to believe America has changed, wouldn't we? Obama lets us feel better about ourselves -- and as we look out the window at the guy snowplowing his driveway across the street, we want to believe he's changed, too. But are we dreaming?

And then there's John Edwards.

It's hard to get past the hair, isn't it? But once you do -- and recently I have chosen to try -- you find a man who is out to take on the wealthy and powerful who have made life so miserable for so many. A candidate who says things like this: "I absolutely believe to my soul that this corporate greed and corporate power has an ironclad hold on our democracy." Whoa. We haven't heard anyone talk like that in a while, at least not anyone who is near the top of the polls. I suspect this is why Edwards is doing so well in Iowa, even though he has nowhere near the stash of cash the other two have. He won't take the big checks from the corporate PACs, and he is alone among the top three candidates in agreeing to limit his spending and be publicly funded. He has said, point-blank, that he's going after the drug companies and the oil companies and anyone else who is messing with the American worker. The media clearly find him to be a threat, probably because he will go after their monopolistic power, too. This is Roosevelt/Truman kind of talk. That's why it's resonating with people in Iowa, even though he doesn't get the attention Obama and Hillary get -- and that lack of coverage may cost him the first place spot tomorrow night. After all, he is one of those white guys who's been running things for far too long.

And he voted for the war. But unlike Senator Clinton, he has stated quite forcefully that he was wrong. And he has remorse. Should he be forgiven? Did he learn his lesson? Like Hillary and Obama, he refused to promise in a September debate that there will be no U.S. troops in Iraq by the end of his first term in 2013. But this week in Iowa, he changed his mind. He went further than Clinton and Obama and said he'd have all the troops home in less than a year.

Edwards is the only one of the three front-runners who has a universal health care plan that will lead to the single-payer kind all other civilized countries have. His plan doesn't go as fast as I would like, but he is the only one who has correctly pointed out that the health insurance companies are the enemy and should not have a seat at the table.

I am not endorsing anyone at this point. This is simply how I feel in the first week of the process to replace George W. Bush. For months I've been wanting to ask the question, "Where are you, Al Gore?" You can only polish that Oscar for so long. And the Nobel was decided by Scandinavians! I don't blame you for not wanting to enter the viper pit again after you already won. But getting us to change out our incandescent light bulbs for some irritating fluorescent ones isn't going to save the world. All it's going to do is make us more agitated and jumpy and feeling like once we get home we haven't really left the office.

On second thought, would you even be willing to utter the words, "I absolutely believe to my soul that this corporate greed and corporate power has an ironclad hold on our democracy?" 'Cause the candidate who understands that, and who sees it as the root of all evil -- including the root of global warming -- is the President who may lead us to a place of sanity, justice and peace.

Yours,

Michael Moore (not an Iowa voter, but appreciative of any state that has a town named after a sofa)
MMFlint@aol.com
MichaelMoore.com

Ringing in the New Year with New Laws

New laws target text messaging, light bulbs, smoking, civil unions and bus safety.

DENVER - A host of new laws on topics ranging from allowing civil unions in New Hampshire to prohibiting text messaging while driving in Washington state become effective Jan. 1, 2008. The National Conference of State Legislatures found a host of state laws in 31 states ranging from controversial to clever that will become law on New Year's Day.

New Hampshire and Oregon will have new provisions regarding same sex couples. In Illinois, there will be a new law prohibiting smoking in public places while in California, smoking will not be allowed in a car when a minor is present.

Washington and Oregon will prohibit typing messages while driving. In Minnesota, bus cushions must meet new depths. Three states will issue license plates to veterans or family members of military personnel killed in combat. Illinois will allow pets to be included in protection orders. If you sell American flags in Minnesota, they will have to be made in the United States.
 
The minimum wage will rise in New Mexico, and homeowners in Illinois will have new protections to avert foreclosures. Airline passengers will have a bill of rights in New York state. And bad news if you are an old light bulb in Illinois or mercury in Minnesota, you will see new restrictions. Parents of a newborn in South Carolina will have to watch a video on the dangers of shaking a baby.
 
Below is a compilation of selected legislation, organized by issue, scheduled to go into effect on Jan. 1, 2008.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE

• Ohio will revise certain penalties in its Sex Offender Registration and Notification Law in order to meet recently enacted federal requirements of the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006. States have until mid-2009 to comply with the federal act. If not, they face a 10 percent reduction in federal crime funds. (Ohio 127th General Assembly, SB 10)
• Illinois will amend its Domestic Violence Act of 1986 to protect pets. Under the provision, the court can grant a petitioner exclusive care and custody of a pet or animal. (Illinois 95th General Assembly, HB 9)
• If a child is at risk of being abused in Oregon, the state Department of Human Services will not have to gain written permission from the alleged abuser in order to run a criminal background check. (Oregon 207th Legislative Assembly, HB 2179)

DRIVER'S LICENSES

• Alaska's driver's licenses and identification cards will be marked if a person is restricted from consuming alcoholic beverages as a result of a conviction or condition of probation or parole.  (Alaska 25th Legislature, HB 90)
• In an effort to reduce youth access to alcohol, drivers under the age of 21 in New Hampshire will have a driver's license that is vertical, compared to the horizontal version for those of the legal drinking age. (New Hampshire 94th General Court, HB 1581) 
  

PRIMARY ELECTIONS

• Come Jan. 1, California and Florida will be two additional states to host their primary or caucus on or before February 5, 2007. Click here for a complete list of states. (California Legislature, SB 513; Florida Legislature, HB 537)

ENVIRONMENT

• In order to reduce energy consumption, all buildings owned or leased by the state of Illinois that are larger than 1,000 square feet must use Energy Star-labeled light bulbs. Historic buildings that are listed on the Illinois Register of Historic Places are exempt from this requirement. (Illinois 95th General Assembly, HB 1460)

• Several products sold in Minnesota must be mercury free. This includes stoves, barometers, cooking thermometers, over-the-counter pharmaceutical products, cosmetics, toiletries and fragrances. (Minnesota 85th Legislature, HB 1316) 

ETHICS

• Oregon has a sweeping government ethics bill that will limit officials to $50 gifts, provide stable funding for the Ethics Commission, increase penalties for ethics violations,

  and make financial disclosure forms filed by officials more accessible to the public and easier to understand. (Oregon 207th Legislative Assembly, SB 10)  

HEALTH

• In South Carolina, hospitals must show new parents a video on the dangers of shaking infants and the importance of child CPR. This video must also be made available to all child care facilities and child care providers so they can include the video presentation in the training of the facility's caregivers. (South Carolina 117th General Assembly, SB 518)
• Insurance companies will have to include coverage for contraceptives if they provide benefits for other drugs in Oregon. (Oregon 207th Legislative Assembly, HB 2700)

• The Uniform Child Abduction Prevention Act in Utah sets guidelines for judges to use when children of immigrants, who legal status has changed, are at risk of abduction. Three other states (Colo., Kan., LA.) have enacted similar measures. (Utah Legislature, SB 35)

LABOR

• In Kentucky, a new law will allow spouses of miners who are killed in mine accidents, injured miners and miners who are otherwise affected by possible safety violations full intervention rights in disciplinary actions before the state Mine Safety Review Commission. (Kentucky 82nd General Assembly, HB 207)
• New Mexico will have a minimum wage increases in two phases.  Employers must pay $6.50 an hour with an increase to $7.50 an hour on Jan. 1, 2009. (New Mexico 48th Legislature, First Regular Session SB 324)
• American flags sold in Minnesota must be manufactured in the United States. (Minnesota 85th Regular Session, HB 122)

REAL ESTATE

• California and Colorado will require state-regulated banks and mortgage brokers to follow federal lending guidelines of non-traditional mortgages. Banks and lenders will have to evaluate a borrower's repayment ability and make sure the borrower understands the loan terms and risks before they are issued. (Colorado 66th General Assembly, SB 216 ; California Legislature, SB 385)
• A homeowner in Illinois will have the right to keep living in a mortgaged property during foreclosure, with exceptions. Renters also will be allowed to stay in a home that is being foreclosed for the length of the rental agreement or for 120 days as long as the tenant continues to pay rent. (Illinois 95th General Assembly, SB 258)
• A home seller in Texas must disclose whether the home was used in the manufacture of methamphetamine. (Texas 80th Legislature, HB 271)

SAME SEX MARRIAGES

• In New Hampshire, same sex couples may enter civil unions and have the same rights, responsibilities and obligations as married couples. (New Hampshire 94th General Court, HB 437)
• Oregon has new procedures for domestic partnership agreements among same-sex couples. (Oregon 207th Legislative Assembly, HB 2007)

SMOKING

• Illinois will prohibit smoking in public places, places of employment, and governmental vehicles. "No Smoking" signs will also have to be posted in each public space and place of employment where smoking is prohibited. (Illinois 95th General Assembly, SB 500)
• In California, no one can smoke a pipe, cigar or cigarette in a car, whether in motion or at rest, if there is a minor inside. (California Legislature, SB 7)

STATE GOVERNMENT / REGULATION

• Each year, amusement rides in Minnesota will have to be inspected by a certified inspector. Additionally, ride owners and operators will make daily inspections of the rides and may enforce safety rules regarding the riders' behaviors. (Minnesota 85th Legislature, HB 1824)

TRANSPORTATION

• A New York state law will penalize airlines failing to provide adequate services to passengers trapped on the tarmac for more than three hours. (New York Legislature, SB 5050C)

• In Oregon, youth under the age of 18 will be banned from talking on a cell phone while driving. (Oregon 207th Legislative Assembly, HB 2872)

• In Minnesota, school bus seating must have a minimum cushion depth of 15 inches and a seat back height of at least 20 inches. (Minnesota 85th Regular Session, HB 2245)

• Drivers will not be allowed to read, write or send electronic messages while operating a motor vehicle in Washington state. (Washington's 60th First Regular Session, HG 1214)

VETERANS

• Montana will issue special military or veteran license plates for military personnel, veterans, or spouses. (Montana 60th Legislature, HB 274)
• Illinois and Iowa will issue a Gold Star license plates for residents who are the surviving widow, widower or parent of a person who served in the Armed Forces and was killed in combat. (Illinois 95th General Assembly, HB 167; Iowa 81st General Assembly, SB 586)

VOTING

• Colorado and Washington are among a number of states trying to streamline the voting process for American citizens and military personnel living overseas. (Colorado 66th General Assembly, SB 234; Washington 60th Legislature, HB 1528)
• Florida legislation includes a second wave of major election reform, including expanded absentee voting and paper audit trail of all electronic voting machines.  (Florida Legislature, HB 537)

The California Nurses Association cheering Michael Moore at a single-payer rally in Sacramento in June 2007. (AP photo)

International data have long been easily available; they show Americans spending more but slipping in rankings for life expectancy and other key health issues. But few news organizations pay attention—not even to our nearest neighbor—and commentators deluge the public with false, misleading punditry.

By Morton Mintz
mintzm@earthlink.net

Substantial mainstream reporting on single-payer health insurance should have been triggered—or so one might think—by a succession of studies over the years that establish that Canada's health-care system saves or improves large numbers of lives while not wasting money on administrative expenses and fat executive-pay packages. Almost without fail, Canada gets higher ratings than the U.S.

In 2000, for example, the World Health Organization examined and rated the health systems of 191 nations. The United States ranked 37th. Canada scored significantly better although it was not outstanding—it placed 30^th. But this study was only one of many that had Canada topping the U.S. (Click here and go to pages 152 to 155 in a PDF file for the rankings of all 191 countries.)

Between November 2002 and March 2003, the official statistics agencies of the United States and Canada did their first-ever joint survey of the health status, rates of illness, behavioral risk factors, use of health care, and access to health care. The survey included 3,505 Canadians and 5,183 U.S. residents. The results were analyzed by two associate professors of medicine at Harvard Medical School......more

ENVIRONMENT: Planetary Check-Up Starts With the Oceans
By Stephen Leahy

BROOKLIN, Canada, Nov 27 (IPS) - If continents are the Earth's sturdy bones and the atmosphere its thin skin, then the oceans are its heart, circulatory system and blood. And despite the crucial role played by the oceans in the health of the planet, and to our own health and well-being, there is little monitoring of ocean health.

Once the oceans were too big and too deep to probe, measure and observe, but between satellites, undersea robots, electronically tagged fish and deep sea sensors, scientists now have the tools.

On Tuesday, high-level officials began meeting in Cape Town, South Africa to see if governments have the will to create a Partnership for Observation of the Global Oceans (POGO) -- a 10-year project to create a comprehensive monitoring system of what has been described as the last frontier.

"We have pathetically few measurements of the oceans relative to their importance to life on Earth and the extent to which we rely on them for energy, weather, food and recreation," said D. James Baker, former administrator of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Humans are creatures of the land and do not fully understand that the seas create the conditions that make life possible. Seawater covers 71 percent of the planet, and we often think of oceans only in terms of beaches and fish, said Howard Roe, director emeritus of the National Oceanography Centre in Southampton, England, and past POGO chair.

"The oceans control the global climate and our weather," Roe told IPS.

Direct ocean temperature measurements from an array of 3,000 free-drifting "Argo buoys" provides crucial information that enables weather forecasters to make long range predictions, he said.

"Every successful El Nino prediction saves at least a billion dollars by allowing people to react in time," he noted.

Advance warnings of the Indian Ocean tsunami of December 2004 would have saved thousands of lives and billions of dollars. A new system of 32 additional Deep Ocean Assessment and Reporting of Tsunami stations are to be deployed in the Indian, Caribbean and Atlantic Oceans and would be part of POGO.

"A system for ocean observing and forecasting that covers the world's oceans and their major uses can reduce growing risks, protect human interests and monitor the health of our precious oceans," said Tony Haymet, director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California in San Diego and chair of POGO's executive committee.

It would cost an estimated two to three billion dollars to create a stable network of satellites surveying vast extents of the surface of the oceans, along with fixed stations taking continuous measurements on the seafloor or as floats and buoys moored in the water column and at the surface. To supplement this, POGO would employ a fleet of small robot submarine ocean monitors and marine animals outfitted with tiny electronic tags that capture and transmit data about the environments they visit.

This marine data would be analysed and integrated with observations from the atmosphere and other sources, and then used in models to produce forecasts useful to the public and policy makers.

Over-fishing, pollution and climate change have spurred major scientific efforts to study oceans and marine life, resulting in enormous amounts of data from hundreds of different research centres. Even though there are clear connections, the fisheries experts aren't always talking to each other, let alone with the climate experts, said Jesse Ausubel, director of the Census of Marine Life Programme at the Sloan Foundation in New York.

"It's time for integrated ocean management," Ausubel said in an interview.

POGO doesn't require a new international institution, it can be a network of institutions that United Nations agencies coordinate, he said.

However, it will require long-term government financial support.

The proposed system is akin to monitoring equipment in the atmosphere that allowed the detection of the thinning ozone layer and the build-up of carbon dioxide. When complete, POGO will authoritatively diagnose and anticipate changing global ocean conditions.

"A continuous, integrated ocean observing system will return the investment many times over in safer maritime operations, storm damage mitigation, and conservation of living marine resources, as well as collecting the vital signs of the ocean that are needed to monitor climate change," said Haymet.

POGO is a major component of a 10-year effort by 71 nations in the intergovernmental Group on Earth Observations to create a ground-based, ocean-drifting, air-borne and space-based Global Earth Observation System of Systems to monitor all of Earth's environmental conditions.

"Government ministers can really make a difference in Cape Town by supporting POGO," said Ausubel.

There are massive changes happening in the oceans from the effects of over-fishing and climate change. And these have and will continue to have impacts on the land.

"A global ocean observing system with timely reports and forecasts can help us be prepared and adapt to these changes," he said.

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Share on Facebook Want to comment? Click here for our blog. VOTER SUPPRESSION BILLS FAST-TRACKED IN TALLAHASSEE MYSTERIOUS FUNGUS Kills About 90 Percent Of Connecticut' Bats Let them eat cake! says the financial industry PRESS RELEASE: ONE MORE DAY UNTIL JOE REDNER DOCUMENTARY HITS TAMPA!!! By the Authority vested in me... Sections of Tennessee's Emory River Contaminated by Billion-Gallon Toxic Sludge Spill!  Obama's Changes in the first days Check the New Cafe Store for your Cornerstone Pub T-Shirts and Beer Steins!! "All hands on Deck!" The Despicable Executives of the Bailout-- er...'Rescue' Palin was against Darfur before she was for it. It's Happening all over America! The Wall comes tumbingdown... "Yes, I think I will see Jesus come back to earth in my lifetime" Palin Proof Positive, Media Mouthpieces for Republicans Are the American people smart..or not so smart? Fake Soldiers Used In RNC Video Detection of infectious prions in urine Public outcry brings proposed change to the rules for the slaughter of food. Tax Breaks for the Average American, Obama v. McCain The Obama Nation, abomination! Corsi the swiftboater! Comment on Anthrax Revelations by clicking on the following link   Anthrax Attack: Revelations of 2001 So, when did you hear about this, and is anything going to be done about it? Just minutes ago: House Judiciary Committe voted to hold Rove in Contempt Angry Parents Protest Radio Host Michael Savage for Calling Autistic Children 'Brats,' 'Morons' No state power is more fearsome than the power to imprison: Habeas corpus - McCain wants it gone! The observations of the judicious Blackstone . . . are well worthy of recital: 'To bereave a man of life. . . or by violence to confiscate his estate, without accusation or trial, would be so gross and notorious an act of despotism as must at once convey the alarm of tyranny throughout the whole nation; but confinement of the person, by secretly hurrying him to jail, where his sufferings are unknown or forgotten, is a less public, a less striking, and therefore a more dangerous engine of arbitrary government.'" This one really isn't VOF blog, but was so good I had to include it here:  Why Didn't They Build It On The Sun? Hurricanes could mean $6 gas, sez the Rich Oil Analysts A MUST READ - Energy Doesn't Grow on Trees How do we decide whether to walk or run? The Future of News - Live Broadcast It would be a dangerous thing for the American people to lose trust Gasoline prices: despite rising prices and growing demand, refineries are again cutting back their capacity-building plans. Hiroshima, reason Iran should not have bombs? People should be allowed to sell their kidneys? Will our table food be any safer now? Do you McCain? Do you Believe in Hagee? Life in Jail for Food Poisoning the Public Media's Worst Debate Questions EVER UPDATE 4/8/08: Murder Plot at Center Elementary in Georgia: 3rd Graders The full story behind Rev. Jeremiah Wright's 9/11 sermon Sentinels or Toxic Environment? What do the Anti-Christ, and CNN Headline News have to do with America's Presidential Elections? Republican Indicted, Surprize! First our Bees, now our Bats - Another Mystery Disease Democrats accused FEMA of manipulating scientific research A religious problem for religious people AND for American Politics Excuse me, but you are too FAT. Miss. Law Would Ban Serving Obese Diners Warning, You WILL think about this next time you Beef! Recently, the U.S. Air Force loosed 100,000 pounds of explosives in bout 10 days on Arab Jabour, a small Sunni farming region just south of Baghdad. Looks like Ron Paul is the only Sane Repub Running… Eight questions reporters should ask Huckabee Media Matters Issues Open Letter to NBC News President Steve Capus We have sunk to the “SYMPATHY” voting now! Jan. 11, 2008 Miami Herald Shipping American Jobs to India FAIR? WISE? You be the judge. Having doubts on Huckabee?  Please read on….about the “Dark Side of Huckabee” Global warming: How much is too much for the White House? Florida Hometown Democracy is a story of how Florida politics works Sign the Petition Silent Attack Was there even a NY Before Rudy? A Tisket a Tasket a pocket full of …. Pray for Rain...or a less greedy government... Bush Cronyism May be sticking it to reservists, National Guard and Citizens AGAIN. Florida Hometown Democracy, help save Florida from Politicians, Businessmen and Corporate Rape! Glenn Beck says California Fire burns people that hate America Contact Major Media Outlets - Email and Snail Mail WATCH REUTERS TOP NEWS Video's Now on Voice of Freedom Not talking about sex or the Mons Venus or XXX videos, Joe Redner, owner of Redner Enterprises, recently sold an original investment in the financial comedy website Wallstrip.com -- an irreverent video news site that's generating big buzz on Wall Street with its wit -- to the interactive arm of CBS Corp. Tampa Bay's Media Talk hosts: Janet Sherer & Rob Tiisler. Economics - What's That? Myths and Falsehoods: Congressional war spending bills Watch Olberman's "The Beginning of the End of America Joe Redner the Movie This independent documentary explores the life of Tampa, Florida local legend, Joe Redner. With interviews from family members, friends, and foes, this documentary explores the many facets of the enigma Joe Redner, not just what you see in the newspapers and television news stories. Whether you love him or hate him you will want to watch him!! This documentary will be complete this Summer 2007. For more info, please contact: Shelby Mcintyre, Director ------------------------ Quotes "My country, right or wrong" is a thing no patriot would ever think of saying except in a desperate case. It is like saying "My mother, drunk or sober." - G.K. Chesterton "The notion that a radical is one who hates his country is naive and usually idiotic. He is, more likely, one who likes his country more than the rest of us, and is thus more disturbed than the rest of us when he sees it debauched. He is not a bad citizen turning to crime; he is a good citizen driven to despair." - H.L. Mencken "Each man must for himself alone decide what is right and what is wrong, which course is patriotic and which isn't. You cannot shirk this and be a man. To decide against your conviction is to be an unqualified and excusable traitor, both to yourself and to your country, let me label you as they may." - Mark Twain "When a whole nation is roaring Patriotism at the top of its voice, I am fain to explore the cleanness of its hands and the purity of its heart." - Ralph Waldo Emerson "To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public." - Theodore Roosevelt and finally - a quote that has shown up on these pages many times..... "Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country." - Rumsfeld? No. Herman Goering Search Voice of Freedom powered by FreeFind

Cornell president condemns intelligent design

What's in Ronda's Closet? A 98Rock Interview with Joe Redner (MP3 File here) Local Ronda Storm, now one of Florida's Senators....watch this one.

"Words are sacred. They deserve respect. If you get the right ones, in the right order, you can nudge the world a little."—Tom Stoppard (1937- )

Freedom Riders on Film

Jeff Marks and Adam Eland
Fighting for Life in the Death-Belt

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Consult the formerly secret publication National Attack Scenarios, recently left available for public scrutiny by a careless admin working with the Hawaii state government.

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