Founded as the Greek colony of Ευεσπεριδεσ, or Euesperides, around 525 B.C.E., the city has been under the control of a number of empires since, including the Romans and the Ottomans. At one point, the greek colony was saved by chance while under attack by Libyan tribes in 414 B.C.E. A fleet from Sparta had been en route to Sicily to fight a battle against an Athenian colony there during the Peloponnesian War, but it was blown off course by strong winds. The Spartans helped to drive back the Libyan tribes, rescuing the city.
Today, the city is known as Benghazi is a stronghold for a democratic uprising against Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi and it is now under attack by the dictator. The UN Security Council has agreed to the institution of a no-fly zone over the country, primarily led by France. Will it be too little, too late? Good luck to everyone fighting for democracy everywhere.
Republican Congressman Peter King (Manuel Balce Ceneta, AP)
Cracks in the Façade
Since President George W. Bush (not Congress!) declared America’s Global War on Terror during the tragic fall of 2001, its armed forces have been engaged in conflicts around the world. American engagements in Iraq and Afghanistan have received the lion’s share of the press coverage, owing as much to the intensity of the action as well as to the falsity of the claims that led to the Iraqi action, though the U.S. is still active in both countries, along with Yemen and now Pakistan. Support for all of these wars has been spurred by the meme: The threat of violent Islam.
Louie Gohmert (R-TX) even decried terror babies that were being born and bred to infiltrate the United States. That is right, terrorists are born that way even if gays are not! Regardless of the “financial advantage that terrorists gain” Gohmert claims by living in the United States, do we not have confidence that terrorists might come to peace with their new standard of living?
Louie Gohmert and Anderson Cooper on 'terror babies'
We are told that everything that one need concern themselves about the wars are encapsulated in that phrase. The threat of violent Islam. It tells us Islam is violent by nature. We are threatened by it. In our fear, we react (ironically, violently) in order to protect ourselves – because they do not know peace. Presidents Bush and Obama both promised to attack this extremism wherever it can be found, lest the threat ever reach our shores.
But worldwide conflicts require military equipment and the fighting have been incredibly lucrative for American defense contractors. The profit-driven media conglomerates that derive their revenue by selling ad spots for these defense companies have found a honey pot in hard times. Hence there should be no surprise that the main stream media have been complicit in beginning wars under false pretenses as well as promoting the meme: The threat of violent Islam. “They hate us because of who we are!” “They want to destroy America!” They must be stopped!
The attacks on reason and the coercions are broadly based. All while we hear the slogans and calls for action on TV, salon monkeys such as David Brooks – a politically active commentator for the New York Times – goes on the writers circuit touting his book while encouraging people to make spontaneous and emotionally charged decisions, as if he were working in a vacuum.
Yet the spreading peaceful demonstrations against dictatorships that had been supported by the American military industrial complex (remember Made in the U.S.A. in Tahrir Square?) has placed a crimp in both the popularity in supporting puppet dictators as well as a realization that there is another route to peace: Peace itself. Peace, solidarity and human rights are now the considerations of Americans when they look to the Middle East as the labor and democracy movements there inspire the growing labor and democracy movement at home. Many Americans no longer see Islam as violent by nature, but they do see Muslims, Christians and Secular Arabs working together in order to ensure a better life for themselves. They are beginning to realize that democratically-elected leaders who prop up dictators have no respect for the democracy that they protect.
The defense industry and the media have an advertising problem because people are now becoming aware of the misinformation that they have spread for the sake of corporate profits and lowering wages at home. Most of all, when Americans look to the Middle East, they are increasingly seeing themselves.
As a result, people who see an alternative have been flocking away from the mainstream media and toward NPR and PBS, whose coverage of international affairs has been very good in stark contrast to the corporate media. Listeners to NPR routinely rank higher than Fox, CNN and Network news in terms of their knowledge about current events. And the situation is even more stark in radio: Right wing radio is being eviscerated at a time when NPR ratings are on the rise. People can now tell the difference between information and propaganda.
That NPR, a non-profit organization, is now directly competing with profit-driven organizations like Fox and CNN makes NPR very dangerous indeed. It means that the profit-driven news model, already teetering on collapse, faces new pressures from an organization that does not need to pay dividends to stockholders. For the political class, the quality of NPR’s reporting it means that listeners are increasingly hearing dissenting points of view and that makes them less likely to listen to the propaganda – including the propaganda that capitalism is the best economic model always. (Just ignore that NPR is a non-profit. Look over here! A muslim radical! And he is a SOCIALIST!) People will be less likely to support wars in distant places, now understanding the true costs involved. That will affect profit margins in defense, the news and politics alike.
In the world of American politics as infected with aggressive mendacity as it is, whither the news organization at the head of the class?
Coordinated attack?
Last Thursday was yet another highly ironic day in Washington D.C. Two days after the major media widely promoted the sting operation on NPR by James O’Keefe that supposedly led to NPR CEO Vivian Schiller and executive Ron Schiller (no relation) to step down. NPR denies it, though many corporate news organizations argued it was because of their biased views of the Tea Party being a racist and xenophobic organization, Tea Party Republican Congressman Peter King opened his hearings on Muslim Extremism in the United States.
The recent activity revolving around Islam seems to be a coordinated distract, divide and confuse operation by the right. It would be a way to divide the NPR audience, to place the attention of the news cycle on militant Islam once again, to distract from the pro-democracy movements and to cause people to think emotionally again – going against the grain of NPR programming.
The plan to hold hearings on Muslim extremists had been known long in advance. Here is a link to a Talking Points Memo article regarding the hearings, dated 17 December, 2011. There would have been plenty of time for James O’Keefe to coordinate the February 22nd meeting with Ron Schiller of NPR, and there would have been time to release the hidden video tape prior to the hearings on March 9th – just in time to distract attention from Peter King’s hearings, which in addition to a more complete conversation regarding violent extremism in the U.S. as a whole, had already received well-balanced treatment by NPR in January.
The January NPR piece discussed violent extremism in its widest sense, primarily in the wake of Gabriel Giffords shooting earlier that month. In addition to discussing radical Islam, its conversation included comments about right-wing extremists such as Timothy McVeigh and other individuals such as Ted Kaczynski and Jared Loughner. The piece brought in voices as various as the heads of the Tea Party Express and the Southern Poverty Law Center, but this was not the type of attention that Peter King was seeking for his high-profile hearings.
The Players
Last year, Andrew Breitbart attacked the US Department of Agriculture for its handling of legal settlements for African American farmers who have faced discrimination from the USDA. Breitbart alleged fraud and discrimination against whites in claims that continued from an earlier scandal during the case of Shirley Sherrod during the spring of 2010. Sherrod has since sued Breitbart for defamation of the case, and she is certain to win it due to the fact that Andrew Breitbart publicized a snippet of her comments in the exact opposite context in which they were intended. (Here is the Breitbart video. And here is the whole thing.) The entire issue had been reported heavily by NPR.
Andrew Breitbart is the same person who brought James O’Keefe to fame in the now infamous case where O’Keefe dressed as a (rather unconvincing) pimp and spliced video together to falsely claim that the community action group Acorn was supporting prostitution for public funds. Acorn won a lawsuit over defamation, but still lost public funding due to the wild political connotations that were now associated with its reputation. Breitbart was instrumental in having the segment aired on Fox and Friends.
Since that time, O’Keefe’s other “journalistic” adventures include trying to lure CNN’s Abbie Boudreau into a “den of sin”. He had planned to essentially sexually harass her while she was supposed to interview him in an effort to discredit CNN, but she found out and exposed the plot.
“NPR has disgraced itself by caving into CAIR [Council on American-Islamic Relations] and by firing Juan Williams for exercising his right of free speech. This is political correctness carried to its extreme form. Congress should move to defund NPR because of its indefensible bias.”
This led to a row between Fox News and NPR regarding the supposedly “politically-motivated” firing of a conservative journalist. Actually, Juan Williams was fired for his bigoted comments on the O’Reilly Factor. With Fox losing viewership to NPR, there could be a concern that Fox was merely working with leftovers from NPR. So what does one do? What Fox was designed to do: Make relentlessly repeated petty political attacks until people begin to memorize the slogans. In fact, Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. is giving millions of dollars to Fox News to support its war on NPR. And most ironically of all, Fox News is complaining about bias!
King rather infamously took part in a television show just prior to the hearings. The show was produced for a group called Act! for America, a conservative group that is against the spread of radical Islam. The tactics of this group, however, leave much to be desired. In her book, Because They Hate: A Survivor of Islamic Terror Warns America, founder Brigitte Gabriel claims that she says “what many in America are thinking but afraid to say out loud, for fear of being labeled a racist, bigot, Islamophobic, or intolerant.” Yet Representative King decided to participate in a rather one-sided show for the group anyway. See for yourself:
The ACT for America Show (Act! for America, via Youtube)
Remember, those were Muslim rockets! This group clearly has an axe to grind, yet Peter King resisted complaints that suggested that he was enacting the hearings for political gamesmanship and he refused to discuss the notion of violent extremism on the whole.
Act! for America has cooperated with the Chino Tea Party (the branch of the Tea Party based in Chino, CA) to support demonstrations against Muslims and Muslim groups. A screenshot of an announcement for a February Act! America/Tea Party demonstration against a fundraising event for the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) is shown here:
Chino Tea Party/Act! America Announcement of anti-muslim protest (Chino Tea Party)
Given the tone of the rhetoric in such an announcement, one may be curious about the nature of that protest. Here is video of the protest:
Chino Tea Party/Act! America anti-muslim protest, Yorba Linda, CA, 2/13/2011 (George M. Collins, via RealityDictates on YouTube)
The cheers after the death threats in the above video are typically reserved in mainstream media for “Islamic militants”, though you clearly heard that from caucasian citizens of Orange County, CA. The demonstrated ignorance with the assumption of a difference between “God” and “Allah” was an added bonus around 4:17. Why would Peter King associate himself with this group just prior to holding hearings in which to inform himself on the issue of violent extremism?
Rep. King opening comments to Homeland Security Committee Hearing on radical Islam (House Committee on Homeland Security, via YouTube)
Not only is radical Islam a problem, but so too are the forces of political correctness! But Neo-nazis are apparently not a problem for Rep. King.
“There is no equivalency of threat between al Qaeda and Neo-Nazis, environmental extremists, or other isolated mad men. Only al-Qaeda and Islamist affiliates in this country are a part of an international threat to our nation.”
With a start like that, how did the hearings go? As Talking Points Memo states it: Peter King Hearing Focuses On Whether Peter King Hearing Was A Good Idea. Rep. Charlie Dingell (D-MI) cautioned against the McCarthyite atmosphere around the hearings. But some of the most emphatic testimony from the hearings was from Representative Keith Ellison (D-MN), the lone Muslim in Congress, shown here.
Rep. Ellison comments to Homeland Security Committee Hearing on radical Islam (House C-Span 3, via YouTube)
One interesting comment by Ellison: The best protection against violent extremism is social and economic inclusion. That is not the type of statement that supports the militarization of the planet.
But what of the threat of violent Islam? It is certainly true there are violent Islamic extremists. One, supported by the U.S. since the end of the Bush Administration, is currently attacking his own citizens in Libya. They had the temerity to stand up and demand democracy. Another extremist is a dictator in Yemen, who is currently supported by the U.S. military as it enacts drone strikes on Al Qaeda cells in that country – acts that have led to the uprising for democracy that are taking place there. Osama bin Laden is still at large, likely in the mountains of western Pakistan, and he himself was supported by the U.S. while he and the Taliban were part of the Mujahadeen during the war between the Soviet Union and Afghanistan. Everywhere that one finds violent Islamic organizations, one finds dealings the U.S. military and the dictator de jour who is supported to keep the oil spigots running. Perhaps we should listen to Keith Ellison. Unfortunately, each of the major cable news networks, Fox New, MSNBC and CNN, showed Rep. King’s statements, but they cut away before the Democrats Bennie Thompson and Keith Ellison spoke! There is a reason why the Keith Ellison clip above was from C-Span 3.
Schiller’s comments
Let us consider who is right in the argument regarding NPR. Here is what Schiller said:
Ron Schiller discusses the Tea Party with a fake muslim group (AP, via Youtube)
While it might be disconcerting to hear a news executive give his own personal opinions on politics, what part of what he said was wrong? It would be incorrect to claim that all Tea Partiers are racist and that all of them are fundamentalist Christians, but Schiller does not specifically make that claim. It is certainly true that the Tea Party is connected to racist groups. That case has been made in this article, and in addition, a white supremacist played an important role in writing the Arizona immigration law last year. Which group is currently supporting elimination of restrictions on firearms? Which one is enacting anti-immigration laws all over the country? It is the Tea Party in each case. NPR should not have repudiated Schiller’s statements.
Despite all of the posturing over radical Muslims, the fact remains that the dominant form of extremism in the United States is right-wing extremism. One case of right-wing extremism came to light Friday when Francis “Schaeffer” Cox and four accomplices, all “sovereign citizens” who believe they are subject to no governmental authority, were arrested for plotting to kill a federal judge and a number of Alaska State Troopers.
UPDATE
The Atlantic is now reporting that NPR has released a couple of internal emails. They show that NPR was not duped by the fake muslim organization and they also demonstrate strict adherence to the law when it regards donations. In short, James O’Keefe’s dishonesty managed to show just how great a public organization NPR truly is. On the other hand, aren’t there laws against entrapment?
Indiana Democratic House Members are still in Illinois, preventing a vote on anti-union legislation there. As protests in Indiana continue, Indiana’s newly elected Republican Secretary of State Charlie White is probably going to jail. He has ben indicted on three counts of felony voter fraud for registering to vote in places where he did not live. One would think that a State Secretary of State, who is in charge of elections within the state, would understand the rules here – that is unless that was the reason for his choice to run. Keep in mind that White has supported the voter ID requirement in Indiana, ostensibly to prevent people from voting illegally as he has done. There are a lot more interesting details in this article
from the Brad Blog.
Space Shuttle Discovery lifts off for the last time (Michael Berigan/Reuters)
Space
The Space Shuttle Discovery launched into orbit for the last time Thursday, carrying a new crew to the International Space Station. There will be two more flights before the end of the Space Shuttle program. The shuttle Endeavour is scheduled to make one more trip to space in April, followed by the last shuttle flight by Atlantis in June. The shuttle program was to be superseded by the Constellation program, a series of manned and unmanned missions that were aimed toward bringing the United States back to low earth orbit, then the Moon and ultimately Mars. Citing current private companies such as SpaceX that are developing manned orbital systems, president Obama cancelled the Constellation program. At the moment, it appears United States will not be the first country to Mars.
Julian Assange has lost his trial for extradition to Sweden. This was expected as most extraditions within the EU are granted. Assange has promised to appeal the ruling and has seven days to do so or else he will be extradited within 10 days.
Kamal Abbas, the General Coordinator of the Centre for Trade Unions and Workers Services (via ThinkProgress)
The labor movement in Egypt has spoken in full support of state employees in Wisconsin. According to ThinkProgress, Kamal Abbas, the General Coordinator of the Centre for Trade Unions and Workers Services states:
I am speaking to you from a place very close to Tahrir Square in Cairo, “Liberation Square”, which was the heart of the Revolution in Egypt. This is the place were many of our youth paid with their lives and blood in the struggle for our just rights. From this place, I want you to know that we stand with you as you stood with us.
No one believed that our revolution could succeed against the strongest dictatorship in the region. But in 18 days the revolution achieved the victory of the people. When the working class of Egypt joined the revolution on 9 and 10 February, the dictatorship was doomed and the victory of the people became inevitable. We want you to know that we stand on your side. Stand firm and don’t waiver. Don’t give up on your rights. Victory always belongs to the people who stand firm and demand their just rights.
In other news…
Statistician extraordinaire Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight discusses why the recent Rasmussen poll that showed 48 – 38 support for Governor Walker across the country may be biased. First, Rasmussen polls have historically overestimated Republican voters by about 4% due to the fact that they do not poll individuals with cell phones, among other reasons. Second, the wording of the questions did lean in a particular direction. In fact Nate goes on to mention another poll by We Ask America with a similar methodology to Rasmussen showed that a majority of respondents actually disapprove of Governor Walker’s budget plan, though only Wisconsinites were asked. In the final comment, Silver suggests:
Because of the problems with question design, my advice would be simply to disregard the Rasmussen Reports poll, and to view their work with extreme skepticism going forward.
Artist depiction of Michele Bachmann's inner thoughts (yo2boy)
US Federal Budget
Fear not! Michele Bachmann know’s who to turn to to solve the Federal Budget Deficit! Sure, we all know that the Tax Code is a Weapon of Mass Destruction, but who better to handle WMDs than Glenn Beck? Do not get all of the apocalypse porn get to you and do not let the fact that he can not tell the difference between a socialist and a fascist bother you, but he is full of … it.
A number of people are dead after a shallow 6.3-magnitude earthquake strikes Christchurch, New Zealand. The earthquake was followed by magnitude 5.5 and 5.6 aftershocks as well.
In Pakistan, an American arrested for murder in Lahore is a CIA covert agent. Relations with Pakistan are already tense due to numerous civilian deaths after a large number of American drone attacks on its supposed ally. This also comes just a day after American airstrikes in Afghanistan kill 64 civilians, according to the Kunar provicial governor.
Little Rock, Arkansas
Phoenix, Arizona
Palmdale, California
Sacramento, California
Denver, Colorado
Des Moines, Iowa
Annapolis, Maryland
Boston, Massachusetts
Springfield, Massachusetts
Saint Paul, Minnesota
Santa Fe, New Mexico
New York, New York
Columbus, Ohio
Providence, Rhode Island
Montpelier, Vermont
Madison, Wisconsin
Ohio state employees pack the Statehouse, Feb. 17 (AP Photo/Terry Gilliam)
Pro-labor protests
Huge rallies, vigils and protests are scheduled across the United States this week as the movement to support the middle class continues to grow. See the bottom of this post for locations and check here for details on the events. Show your support because the Republicans have a national strategy to repeal workers rights state by state. In Wisconsin, Governor Walker threatens dissenting Democratic Senators that the Republicans may pass non-spending bills in their absence. In response, the Dems say they will stay away until Walker decides to negotiate. Protests Sunday were smaller than the roughly 70,000 that showed up Saturday due to a blizzard, but protests will continue through next week. Tea Party counter-protests were outnumbered 35-1 Saturday. One anti-Walker protestor says “Thank you” for bringing back the labor movement.
Where the national discussion is not on worker cutbacks, it is on privatization. This includes concerns about the privatization of libraries across the country in which patrons find the standard privatization scenario: Fewer services for a higher price. Check Privatization Watch for more information on corporate attempts to take over public infrastructure near you.
Federal Budget
Robert Reich explains why there is not anything wrong with Social Security and why it should not be cut to help the federal budget deficit. (Cutting Social Security would actually increase the deficit.) The truth is that Republicans have been creating big budget deficits to shrink social programs for years. They want control and they want government to fund corporations, not people (and yes, they are different). Meanwhile, the Republicans are aiming to shut down the Federal Government which will give companies a while to work regulation-free. The House Republicans are looking for draconian cuts to social programs while leaving the military out of the fray while Obama wishes to “out-educate, out-innovate and out-build” the rest of the world. This brings about the prospect of a default on American debt which would usher in a Great-er Depression, according to Timothy Geithner, who also believes the Republicans are pyromaniacs playing with fire on the issue.
Protests and Demonstrations Monday 21 February – Saturday 26 February.(Sites listed in order by state.)
Show your support, even if you are not in Wisconsin so that the Tea Partiers do not come looking for your benefits too! We’re all in this together!
Monday
Chicago, IL
Indianapolis, IN
South Bend, IN
Helena, MT
Raliegh, NC
Carson City, NV
Las Vegas, NV
Salem, OR
San Juan, PR
Austin, TX
Olympia, WA
Charleston, WV
Madison, WI
Tuesday
Juneau, AK
Phoenix, AZ
Palmdale, CA
Sacramento, CA
San Diego, CA
Denver, CO
Des Moines, IA
Boston, MA
Springfield, MA
Annapolis, MD
Lansing, MI
Saint Paul, MN
Santa Fe, NM
Canton, OH
Cleveland, OH
Columbus, OH
Providence, RI
Salt Lake City, UT
Montepelier, VT
Madison, WI
Wednesday
Little Rock, AR
Hartford, CT
Atlanta, GA
Scranton, PA
Madison, WI
Thursday
Trenton, NJ
Pittsburgh, PA
Statewide, PA
Madison, WI
Walker is now planning to sell a state-owned power plant used by the University of Wisconsin. The University would still need to use the plant, but they would be forced to pay for the profit margin of the company that would take it over, costing the state more money in the long term.
Around the Country…
Teacher’s collective bargaining rights are on the chopping block in Tennessee now, too, as Tea Partiers in that state continue the Koch’s national campaign against workers rights. Koch Industries has no union workers, so why are they attacking unions? The progressive advocacy group, Common Cause, is calling for an investigation into Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, whose wife is the leader of a Koch-funded organization, and who helped craft the Citizens United decision that slavishly undoes 150 years of campaign finance law allowing corporations to spend unlimited money on the campaigns.
Several years ago, orange signs lined the streets of wealthy homes in Minneapolis and Saint Paul, calling for higher taxes to preserve state programs, but Republican Governor Pawlenty refused. Instead he borrowed from the schools and now the schools are hurting.
In another tale of two parties, the Republicans in Congress have said “So be it” if federal budget cuts cost the 1 million jobs projected by the Center for American Progress. On the other hand, Democrats are proposing investment in schools, infrastructure and R&D to “Out-educate, out-innovate and out-build the rest of the world” while scaling back more tax loopholes and corporate subsidies. But a Pelosi aide says that a government shutdown is likely.
Hatshepsut, Pharaoh of Egypt 1508-1458BCE (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Hatshepsut
was a female Pharaoh of Egypt during the prosperous 18th Dynasty. She was the daughter of the powerful Thumosis II, though she was not the first female rule of Egypt (that was likely Sobekneferu, of the 12th Dynasty, a bit more than 300 years earlier), but she was one of its greatest rulers. As Pharaoh, Hatshepsut reopened trade routes that had been idle since the conquest of Egypt by the Hyksos. She also extended trade networks to distant areas, including a huge expedition to the distant land of Punt (in modern Ethiopia). At home, she engaged in a building program without compare in Egyptian history while investing heavily in the arts. Her reign was primarily peaceful, though she did continue her father’s military exploits early on. This was not a boom or bust deal – her successor, Thutmosis III built on her accomplishments and expanded Egypt’s boundaries to their largest extent yet and her social and economic investment at home helped to strengthen Egypt’s longest-ruling dynasty, the eighteenth.
SB 222 – This act modifies the child labor laws. It eliminates the prohibition on employment of children under age fourteen. Restrictions on the number of hours and restrictions on when a child may work during the day are also removed. It also repeals the requirement that a child ages fourteen or fifteen obtain a work certificate or work permit in order to be employed. Children under sixteen will also be allowed to work in any capacity in a motel, resort or hotel where sleeping accommodations are furnished. It also removes the authority of the director of the Division of Labor Standards to inspect employers who employ children and to require them to keep certain records for children they employ. It also repeals the presumption that the presence of a child in a workplace is evidence of employment.
That’s right, underage children can work in hotels and motels – and they can be asked to work hours as late and long as the management deems fit – sounds like a great idea, right? Hey, when push comes to shove these are Republican family values. This kind of hypocrisy is not new. Find out how Republicans Tom Delay and Jack Abramoff supported the sex trade in the Northern Marianas Islands on NPR and at Tom Paine.com.
In Washington, the GOP is planning to limit the new Federal Consumer Protection Agency that is intended to protect people against predation by credit card companies, bad mortgages and other types of corporate fraud. Now why would anyone want to prevent the prevention of fraud? Meanwhile, the Center for American Progress estimates that Republican spending cuts will cost about 1 million jobs in 2011. “So be it,” says John Boehner. And Jon Stewart catches Republican Jeff Sessions in a little bit of budgetary hypocriscy.
There is a political war on labor and public and regulatory institutions in the country. It is being financed by the Koch Brothers, who own Koch Industries. The Koch Brothers fund the Tea Party and they run astroturf campaigns to repeal the Clean Air Act, ending labor rights, and being rather heavy polluters, they are aiming to defund the EPA. They are a big reason why we have politicians like Michele Bachmann, who is currently at war with Michele Obama over breastfeeding. The Koch Brothers also make the claims of socialistic fascism through people like Glenn Beck. Are you a Commie-Nazi? And it is all possible because the Republicans already live rich fantasy lives.
By contrast: In Minnesota, Democratic Governor Mark Dayton, a rather wealthy individual, has decided to balance the state budget by taxing wealthy Minnesotans. He is also planning to increase funding for K-12 education and to repay the loans the state took from schools under Republican Governor Pawlenty. Mark Dayton is also increasing the state’s Medicaid program by tapping federal money that Republican Pawlenty rejected. This will allow the state to save some money in health and human services.
In health news, bad food makes you dumber according to a new study in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health. Ancient Britons, hailing from an island not always renowned for its food, may have drunk from human skulls.
Protests have begun in Libya as the wave of disquiet continues to spread through the Middle East. This includes a march on government offices. More protests are scheduled across the country today (Thursday). Two protestors were shot and killed during continued unrest in Yemen as protestors step up their demonstrations against the government. Authorities in Bahrain have sneak-attacked sleeping protestors in the capital Manama’s Pearl Square. The Bahraini king is not yet ready to deliver the Constitutional Monarchy that has been proposed by the protestors, who continue to demonstrate after rejecting a $3,000 per family bribe to be paid by the government. In Iran, thousands attend the funeral of a man killed during protests earlier this week.
Few Americans know very much about the drone strikes in different countries, but it turns out they may not care. Many Americans, including a majority of Republican primary voters are preoccupied with whether Barack Obama is an American citizen. (He is.) Despite the falsity of the claim, House Speaker John Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor do not believe it is their job to correct their constituents. This comes even as Republicans plan to attack the 14th Amendment which argues that anyone born on American soil is a US citizen. This seemingly innocuous guarantee prompted an outcry from Representative Louie Gohmert (R-Tx) last summer. On the other hand, they are not very helpful on the economy either. After the Republicans campaigned on jobs, jobs, jobs, John Boehner says that if the proposed draconian cuts to the federal budget cost jobs, “so be it.” The loss of more jobs, would of course limit future federal revenue, creating more budgetary problems in the future.
Despite several costly provisions, the House succeeded on its third attempt in one week to extend several provisions of the PATRIOT Act. 27 Republicans voted against it and 65 Democrats voted for the extension which includes “roving wiretap” court orders and allows authorities to seize “any tangible things” in a search. See how your Representative voted here.
In other portions of the US Government, Supreme Court Justices Scalia and Thomas are taking heat for failing to recuse themselves from apparent conflicts of interest revolving around their involvement with the Koch Brothers prior to the Citizens United ruling last year, in which the two justices argued slavishly in favor of corporate interests such as those of the ultra-libertarian Koch brothers. Clarence Thomas’ wife is also head of a Tea Party group. While many Tea Party groups are financed in part by the billionaire Koch brothers, Clarence Thomas has failed to report income from his wife’s political activities for more than a decade now, prompting the Supreme Court Justice to uncomfortably claim that he did not understand the corresponding tax law when the news became public. Oops.
In Space, the probe NExT (formerly Stardust) makes history as it flies past its second comet, Tempel 1. It was first launched toward Comet Wild 2 12 years ago and has very limited fuel remaining onboard.
President Obama released his federal budget proposal Monday. The proposal includes an 11% increase for education, but also possessed a large number of cuts across the board – including caps on funding for the war in Afghanistan. The Republican response from the one they tout as their budget guru designee, Paul Ryan, was a bit too quick not to involve posturing. During the next few weeks, Congress with hash the details with the Administration, but some noted economists are up in arms over federal fiscal policy this recession. The EPA gets big cuts in either case, while the security state is alive and well. Though Obama does criticize the Republicans for not investing in infrastructure and education, school superintendents in the state of Texas are about to face the largest cuts to education since World War II. The Republican cuts are so targeted and so draconian that some wonder whether this is all part of a Republican ploy to ensure that Obama fails? On a side note, other nations such as France and Germany, who spent a good deal on investment in infrastructure to get out of the recession, left the recession in 2009. We will discuss the corresponding lack of stimulus and investment in the US in a piece coming out later this week.
There are new protests across the Middle East today, in a “day of rage” in Bahrain, the fourth day of protests in Yemen, and crowds were dispersed with tear gas and possibly hired thugs in Iran. In Egypt, rifts begin to form as the military asks workers and students now protesting for higher wages and the right to unionize to disperse while Hosni Mubarak now faces the challenge to pocket his cash and run before European banks are able to freeze his assets for repatriation to Egypt. What is a dictator to do? The Middle East is not alone as thousands of Italians, especially women, protest Premier Silvio Berlusconi after a sordid sex scandal, involving a 17-year-old girl.
