Tuesday, March 3, 2009

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Marcia DeSanctis: Time to do away with "Best" as an Email Sign-off Top
In the hierarchy of email signoffs, by far the worst is 'Best'. Maybe it's just me, but nothing displays contempt more succinctly, or says "Leave me the hell alone from this point forward," as concisely as this most reviled of four-letter words. Here's the other encrypted message hidden in this verbal snub: Unlike you, I am too busy and important for a far more acceptable All the best. Two extra words. Would it kill you? In these troubled times, legions of the scared and unemployed are drawing upon every drop of courage to email even the most tenuous of leads. Nothing takes more confidence - increasingly in short supply - than contacting somebody cold. If and when a return email appears in the inbox (the tension of which deserves another column entirely) a little warmth would go a very long way. 'Best' with all of its chilly undertones, assumes power and conveys just enough insult to make the message of annoyance clear. Meanwhile, the barriers between the privileged and the destitute are falling. We all share the same high wire and it is a terrifying place to be. Today's most powerful could be tomorrow's most hopeless. Put more bluntly, for every person with a corner office, the pavement outside is altogether too visible. Circumstances should be forcing us to move to a higher, more cooperative plane, citizen to citizen. Which means signing off more generously. Which means banning "Best" from our e-vocabulary. Surely we can do better. It's not just prospective employers who are over-relying on this infernal sign-off. The word is everywhere, and rarely does it mean best anything. From school letters to bill collectors to perfunctory correspondence with your lawyer or accountant, our societal need for electronic shorthand is slowly stripping our humanity. Best. Best what exactly? Best wishes? Best of luck? These would impart respect or at least a little consideration. The best is yet to come? (Then give me a job interview.) More likely it appears to mean, I wish you the best in your future endeavors as long as they don't involve me. Alone with no ellipsis, "Best" lets you know where you stand: the bottom of the sign-off food chain, way below Love, xxoo, xx, xo, x, Warm regards, Sincerely yours, and the dubiously perky Cheers. Today there was an email from Howard Dean - Howard Dean! - in my inbox. I was procrastinating so I read the whole thing, which he signed, Thank you, Marcia, for all you do. I have never met Howard Dean, and realize I was one of three or so million recipients of this letter, but all the same, the sign-off was genuinely warm. It was a small gesture, but a noticeable one, and I appreciated the familiarity. Had it been signed Best, I would have felt a blast of icy air through my laptop, and had my doubts about the DFA's interpersonal skills. We are all too rushed, plugged in, ever on the grid, and have more demands on our time than most of us can bear. So when it comes to email, courtesy is easily jettisoned to make way for speed and efficiency. But we could all try to be more conscious of the emailing habits we seem to readily adopt, that keep us disconnected and even more isolated from each other. Yours is more human, Fondly is a trusty perennial which conveys affection but not devotion, and as for abbreviations, nothing beats the military's VR, short for Very Respectfully, which could do a lot towards making a job-seeker feel human and whole. Pete Best was the only Beatle not to make it past 1962, and I embrace the symbolism: my hope is that "Best," the most unsubtle, unfriendly of email cold shoulders, will have a similarly short career.
 
Brian Whitmore: The Kremlin, the Oligarch, and 'the Thaw' Top
Many Kremlin-watchers point to oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky's October 2003 arrest as the point when it became crystal-clear where Vladimir Putin's Russia was headed. Opposition leaders are now saying that Khodorkovsky's fate has again become a litmus test -- this time for President Dmitry Medvedev. In a trial that begins today, Khodorkovsky and his business partner Platon Lebedev are facing new charges of embezzling and laundering more than $20 billion. Critics say the case -- like Khodorkovsky's 2005 trial in which he was convicted of tax evasion and fraud and sentenced to eight years in prison -- is a fabricated and made-to-order affair to make sure that he stays in prison for the foreseeable future. After serving half of his eight-year sentence, Khodorkovsky is eligible to apply for early release. He has already been denied parole once, but the Kremlin apparently doesn't want to take any chances. A conviction in the new trial could lead to an additional sentence of at least 15 and as many as 27 years. In a recent interview with Vladimir Kara-Murza of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty's Russian Service, Aleksandr Osovtsov, a member of the opposition group Solidarity, said the new trial will put Medvedev's recent overtures to the liberal opposition and pledges to establish an independent justice system to the test: For Medvedev the situation is very interesting. Because while this is the second Khodorkovsky trial, it is the first one for Medvedev as president. All this is a test of all his talk about how freedom is better than the lack of freedom, and [his promises to] make courts more independent. It is a moment of truth. If there is another guilty verdict then nobody among those who hoped and counted on changes from Medvedev will have any more illusions about this. Whether Medvedev likes it or not, the Khodorkovsky and Lebedev trial has become the only factor whether or not his declarations will be trusted. Khodorkovsky's mother, Marina Khodorkovskaya , also says she is placing her hope in Medvedev: I hope that our new president -- who isn't a Petersburg bandit, but a person from a good academic family who is a lawyer by education -- will not behave in such a lawless manner like those previous comrades. According to Khodorkovsky himself -- as well as his supporters and independent observers who have followed his case closely -- the main instigator of the Kremlin's campaign against him was First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin. After Khodorkovsky's Yukos oil company was broken up, the majority of its assets were taken over by the state-run oil giant Rosneft, which Sechin chairs. Opposition politician Vladimir Ryzhkov says anybody placing their hopes in Medvedev will be severely disappointed. Speaking to Andrei Shary of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty's Russian Service, Ryzhkov said whatever Medvedev might want to do, he isn't the one calling the shots: The transfer of authority [to Medvedev] was strictly cosmetic. Vladimir Putin is still in charge. And by all appearances, the people who made the decision [to initiate a new criminal case against Khodorkovsky and Lebedev] are the same people who made the decision several years ago to destroy Yukos. Anybody who followed Russia in the 1990s knows that Khodorkovsky -- like all the oligarchs of that period -- was no angel. He used his connections in former President Boris Yeltsin's Kremlin to acquire and expand his business empire on the cheap, evade taxes, and undermine the interests of minority shareholders. But what set him apart in the early part of this decade, was that he decided to go straight. When I interviewed Khodorkovsky in March 2000 he said he planned to bring " efficiency and transparency " to his Yukos oil company's operations. At the time I was skeptical (and I wasn't alone in that assessment). But the funny thing was that Khodorkovsky made good on his promise. The company paid its delinquent taxes, posted healthy profits, and paid stockholders hefty dividends. He won plaudits in the West and became Russia's richest man. Yukos became known as one of Russia's best-run companies. And this unexpected success, combined with Khodorkovsky's desire to dabble in politics, proved to be his undoing. The last thing Putin's Kremlin wanted was to have a newly clean and politically independent entrepreneur roaming the countryside. And the very last thing the Kremlin needs now is a political martyr walking the streets as the economy tanks and the legitimacy of the regime is coming under threat. Cross-posted on RFE/RL's The Power Vertical More on Russia
 
Tom Alderman: Tennessee Woman Spends $50,000 on Audiobooks Top
Marion Bryant shelled out $50,000 dollars last year on audio books. She spends between 20 minutes and an hour-and-a-half a day listening to them in her car, or doing chores around her home in Tennessee. She favors fantasy books, The Teaching Company lecture courses, but her favorite listen last year was The Bible Experience narrated by Samuel L. Jackson, Angela Bassett, Cuba Gooding, Jr. and Blair Underwood. Marion Bryant is also a valuable resource during the recession. She is the director of the Blue Grass Regional Library in Columbia, Tennessee, which has an annual budget to buy audio books for a consortium of 200 non-metropolitan libraries around the state. She's not just stocking their shelves. Most of the titles she buys will be downloaded from branch websites to computers and MP3 players, provided listeners have a library card and a computer at home. Computers cost, the library card and the audiobooks are free. All across the country, libraries are consumers' first choice for audiobooks, accounting for 43 percent of the listening audience, according to a survey from the Audio Publishers Association , the industry's trade organization. Meanwhile, Barnes & Noble , Borders , and all retail sales, amount to 27 percent of the market, while downloads from sites such as Audible.com or Amazon account for only 9 percent of sales. Like everyone else, audio publishers are feeling the results of today's nasty economy. But there was comfort in the industry, until recently, when the audiobook sales figures numbered slightly over 1 billion. Nice. As sales figures have risen in this ear end of publishing, so have audio production values. In the early 1980s, production was often basic narration by non-professionals from independent publishers in off-the-beaten-path studios. Now, production is skillful and done in New York and Los Angeles for name-brand publishers like Macmillan , Random House , HarperCollins , and Simon & Shuster . Independent production has also blossomed in non-coastal places like Ashland, Ore., where Blackstone Audio is based, Grand Haven, Mich., home to Brilliance Audio and Old Saybrook, Conn., where you'll find Tantor . A lot of well known actors do book narrations but the majority of voice talent heard today are working actors who've become listener brand-names like Grover Gardner, Lorelei King, Barbara Rosenblat and Frederick Davidson. The reader is what often makes audiobooks more appealing than their ink-and-paper brothers. "Narration is a unique experience. It's more than just getting the words," says veteran Los Angeles audio producer, Linda Korn. "Readers can make a huge difference. A good narrator can make a mediocre book better, a good book excellent, and bad narrator can ruin a good book." With fiction, skilled actors inhabit multiple characters and have the ability to make listeners forget there's only one person doing all the male and female voices, plus narration. Listeners say they have an easier time accessing dense, non-fiction books through their ears, rather than through their eyes. Lorin Henner, a fifty-something Los Angeles writer makes use of his endless freeway time by absorbing The Teaching Company courses he gets free from the Los Angeles Central Library. Whether in Los Angeles or Tennessee, library audiobooks, and their downloads, are an increasingly popular source for entertainment and learning during these very tough times. The Los Angeles Central Library, with 71 branches serving 500 square miles, has more than 107,000 copies in their audiobook collection. Of the 4,000 available for download, listeners piped-in a whopping 3,842 of them in January alone, and the number is growing every month, according the library's Giovanna Mannino, of Information Technologies & Collections. Tennessee's Blue Grass Consortium has 7,400 books available to the 91 non-metropolitan counties they serve. An astounding 10,610 per month are now being downloaded. And that does not include the big cities of Memphis, Chattanooga, Nashville, or Knoxville, each of whom has their own audiobook collections. Awesome. Audiobooks seem to satisfy several functions - mostly all while moving: a stress reliever in daily traffic; boredom fighter on long solo drives; educational while riding public transportation; diverting while walking the dog; communal entertainment for family car trips; distraction from routine household chores; and a world of mysteries, thrillers, romance, science fiction, literature, best-sellers, histories, biographies, spiritual and self help books - all for nothing through the local library. With the cost of everything rising and the value of everything falling, it's gratifying to have Marion Bryant, her librarian counterparts across the country - and a library card.
 
Jerry Weissman: Two Franks on Form and Content Top
From his former role as the New York Times drama critic to his current role as one of their leading political columnists, Frank Rich has long impressed and even inspired me with his depth of knowledge and points of view. In his most recent column , however, he took a point of view about my field - public speaking - with which I must respectfully disagree. Writing about Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal's broadly derided speech, (please see yesterday's post on the subject) Mr. Rich said, "The morning-after conservative rationalization of Jindal's flop was that his adenoidal delivery, not his words, did him in, and that media coaching could banish his resemblance to Kenneth the Page of "30 Rock." That's denial. For Jindal no less than Obama, form followed content." Then, later in the same column, discussing Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner's similarly-criticized speech, Mr. Rich extended his form follows content point, "Like the Louisiana governor, the Treasury secretary is a weak public speaker not because he lacks brains or vocal training but because his message doesn't fly." If one accepts that point of view, then one would accept the corollary that, if Jindal's content had had more substance - say like Newt Gingrich's 1994 "Contract with America" which cost Bill Clinton his congressional majority - Jindal's delivery would have been less "smug and jejune," as Mr. Rich described it. Or that, if Geithner had come up with an economic plan that had the clarity and specificity of General Schwarzkopf's Desert Storm operation, his dour, flatline delivery would have been more like that of Barack Obama's power presentation of the same serious matter. (Please see tomorrow's post on that subject.) As evidence to the contrary, what if Sarah Palin, whose content is more often than not as specious as was Jindal's, or as snarky as she usually is, had delivered the identical text Jindal did, but did it with her trademark perky cheerleader style? Of course, any thinking adult and every Democrat would have objected just as vehemently, but odds are, the Republicans would not have had to scramble as hard to defend the criticism. The point of view here, if I may, Mr. Rich, is that form does not follow content, they are of equal weight. Bobby Jindal did sound like Kenneth the Page and that exposed and exacerbated the flaws in his message. While what you say is important, how you say it every bit as important, and both require equal diligence and skill. As another Frank, Mister Sinatra, once sang about love and marriage, "You can't have one without the other." More on Timothy Geithner
 
Ukraine: Nation On The Brink Of Bankruptcy Top
When the United States sneezed, Old Europe's banks caught a heavy cold, and New Europe's mini-tiger economies have succumbed, one by one, to a nasty bout of flu. But in the so-called neighbourhood states immediately to the east, chief among them Ukraine, pneumonia threatens - and the experts' prognosis is not good. International financiers will say, without wanting to be quoted, that Ukraine is already, for all practical purposes, bankrupt. They do not like the D-word, default, though that is clearly on their mind. Ukrainian officials like the word still less, smacking as it does of national humiliation. But the taboo was broken in recent days, when a senior IMF official, Marek Belka, director of the fund's European department, was quoted in the Ukrainian press as rejecting that idea. Which, in many Ukrainian minds, only made the prospect more real. D-day - in almost every sense - could come as early as next Saturday when Ukraine has to pay its next instalment for Russian gas deliveries under the agreement painfully negotiated in January. It is grimly forecast that Kiev will not be able to pay, so triggering a new cut-off. Even if this particular Armageddon is averted, there is still April - when the warmer days of spring will still be only on the horizon. So far, however, Ukraine's capital, Kiev, has worn impending doom lightly. High finance is not something that has impinged greatly on the average citizen - yet. Shops and restaurants may not be busy, but they are not deserted either. The city's elegant facades look better maintained than they did when I was last there a little more than two years ago, and any potential fuel problem clearly does not extend to petrol. The traffic is denser and the cars more expensive; shiny 4x4s are king. Kiev has seen small, sporadic protests but nothing reminiscent of the waves of pent-up discontent that shook the country in 2004. Nothing, either, that would seriously threaten the fractious government - no more than the warring leaders threaten it themselves. Half a dozen well-insulated tents - the temperature still plunges to -8C at night - are pitched beside the winter skating rink at the edge of Independence Square. Bathed in the floodlighting from the vast Ukraina monument, they are daubed with slogans that say "Everyone out!" A banner slung between them reads "No to corruption and abuse of power". The camp, such as it is, presents but a poor relic of the glory days four years ago. Popular anger, it would seem, has some way to go before it reaches boiling point. Kievans, unlike some of their less fortunate provincial kin, are still living off borrowed money from the good times. Borrowing, though, is where Ukraine, like so many of its near-neighbours, has come unstuck. Yet it is hard not to be just a little sympathetic. As in "new Europe", the bulk of the credits (80 per cent) were taken out not by the state, but by individuals and advanced by enthusiastic foreign banks that saw only high growth rates and low risk. And they covered themselves, as they thought, by loaning in their own money, rather than fast appreciating local currency. How the climate has changed. The exposure of Austrian banks, in particular, to what was once seen as Eastern promise, is such - some fear - as to destabilise that country's hitherto rock-solid financial sector. In Ukraine, smaller, private banks have been in little-reported trouble since last December. I was in Kiev for the third annual Europe-Ukraine Forum, which brought together officials, politicians, industrialists and others from across the region and the EU. Inevitably, the economic crisis dominated every discussion. But, as always, it was the unscripted moments that were most telling. After a succession of speakers, including the chairman of the National Bank's supervisory board, had insisted that, while dire, the banking system was absolutely stable, the deputy head of a scientific and technical centre in the Western city of Lviv - a city known for fancying itself more cultivated in every respect than Kiev - stood up to complain about frozen deposits, confiscated ATM cards and vanishing transfers at his branch of the Nadra bank, the country's sixth-largest. What had he done about it? He had petitioned local dignitaries; he had extracted undertakings from the bank; he had used his remaining cash card to make withdrawals so he could pay his staff. And, when all else failed, it transpired, a sort of barter-economy was reappearing to fill the gap. Ivan Kulchytskyy, it seems, is unusual only in his readiness to expose the dubious protestations of officials, and of having a public forum where he could do so. Ukraine's precarious financial position is compounded by its uncertain relations with the IMF. Kiev is still waiting for the second tranche of an agreed IMF credit, postponed for guarantees about how it will be used, after a significant proportion of the first tranche vanished - so it is said - in record time from the accounts where it had been deposited. Corruption at almost every level is identified as Ukraine's number one problem. It is an affliction that has grown in the four years since the pro-democracy street protests that escalated into the Orange Revolution and propelled the pro-Western and pro-market pairing of Viktor Yushchenko and Yulia Timoshenko to power. Their perpetual quarrelling is blamed by many Ukrainians for blighting their country's development - hence the "Everyone out" slogans on the tents. Television talk-shows denounce the political bickering as the slide in the grivnya against world currencies is scrolled in real-time beneath. Then the Prime Minister comes on to accuse her opponents (the President and his men) of talking down the currency to justify declaring an emergency. The Ukrainian media is among the freest in the emerging market countries - which may explain why the cameras at Ms Timoshenko's press conference homed in on her gleaming hair, cleavage, waistline, and high heels. Not everyone agrees that the government discord is terminal. A new, self-justifying myth has grown up in official circles that says Ukraine was never a country distinguished by strong leadership, still less autocracy - a snipe at Russia - and that this is to its credit. And it is true that the economy grew apace after 2000 despite successive political upheavals. Italy was sometimes cited as an encouraging example of how economic growth and unstable government could live side by side. While EU officials and politicians berate Ukraine for backsliding - on privatisation, modernising the infrastructure and, of course, corruption - the buccaneers of US business give a fine impression of remaining bullish. From Citibank to Kraft Foods via Shell, area managers took the floor at the Europe-Ukraine Forum to congratulate themselves on investment decisions that had paid off, sometimes in spectacular fashion. One company's economic hardship, they chorused, was another's opportunity; they were looking to expand. Even as they spoke, Coca-Cola was announcing the acquisition of an elderly Ukrainian plant producing kvas, a traditional beer-like drink. Could Ukraine still be Europe's "best-kept secret", or were they simply picking over the entrails of an "emerging" market about to fail? Such deep industrial and financial penetration from the West, and especially from the United States, reflects the euphoria abroad that greeted, first, Ukraine's independence, following the collapse of communism, and then the Orange revolution of 2004. If Ukraine is forced to default - a prospect that may not yet be inevitable - billions in dollars and euros will be lost, and with them many extravagant hopes for Ukraine. Before EU leaders met in Brussels at the weekend, the President of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick, issued an appeal for Europe to "come together to ensure that the achievements of the last 20 years are not lost because of an economic crisis that is rapidly turning into a human crisis". Whether the EU can, or should, reach over its borders in an effort to rescue Ukraine from a fate that partly reflects the improvidence of foreign banks, and is partly at least of its own making, can be disputed. But there can be no doubt that Ukraine is next in the crisis line of fire. Ukraine: At a glance *Population 46 million *Capital Kiev *Currency grivnya (fallen to 9.7 to US$1 from 5 in Jan 2008) *Per capita GDP US$7,800 (2008) *GDP growth rate 5.3 per cent in 2008; projected (2009) -5 to -10 per cent *Inflation rate (2008) 23 per cent *Main exports Steel, machine-tools, grain *Leaders Viktor Yushchenko (President); Yulia Timoshenko (Prime Minister) *Next presidential election Nov/Dec of this year (but could be postponed) Read more from the Independent. More on Economy
 
Ronald B. Robinson: Fox and Murdoch Use 24 to "Ape" New York Post Cartoon Top
And you thought that Rupert Murdoch might repent after his New York Post's depiction of President Obama as a "dead chimp" lost its "plausible deniability." That would be a Hell No! Murdoch's top rated Fox TV show, 24 Monday night used its power of "plausible deniability" and the public airwaves to show a group of camouflage wearing, machine gun toting, axis of evil loving, White woman President slapping, "angry Black men" from Africa, taking over the White House and threatening America and the free world in what could only be described as a Rush Limbaugh, Karl Rove, and Sean Hannity "wet dream from hell." Especially when the "Black male terrorist" slaps the White female President in the face in the White House! We all know what the historical revenge fantasy is for a Black man that offends a White woman , even for looking at her the wrong way or for "not listening" to her. Oh, and of course they had great fun lampooning the "War Crimes Act" -- you know, that favorite liberal cause celebre to cede sovereignty of the country over to rogue nations, failed states, sponsors of terror, various and sundry "colored people" the world over, and their enablers over at the UN. In other words, it was a conservative's terrorist "dream come true" in High Def if not pixilated living color. Talk about a revenge fantasy. This was a revenge fantasy "in spades" (pardon the deliberate pun) -- Murdoch and Co. taking revenge out on Blacks, liberals, spineless Republicans and independents for giving us our first Black President and our freedom from the Bush/Cheney/Rove three-headed hydra. Don't worry Rupert. We get it, and we get you. Just like we get Rush Limbaugh and the fact that he is the titular King of the Republican Party and Sarah Palin is his fantasy "NRA Chicks Gone Wild" pinup Queen, i.e., the Scylla and Charybdi s of the "conservative cause." Y'all not only want President Obama to fail, but like Jefferson Davis before you , you also want the Union to fail. "Mr." Murdoch: We hereby condemn your secessionist cravings and those of your titular King and Queen GOP Predator Pals. And we would like the good folks over at Disney, which owns ABC and broadcasts Limbaugh to 20 million loyal "ditto heads," that although they might not care if the Union fails, we do ! Can somebody spell the words, "advertisers" and "boycott," and then can the congregation give me a resounding, amen? More on ABC
 
Heidi Kingstone: sudan and the international criminal court Top
Along the stretch of highway leading to the international airport in Khartoum, there are illuminated signs of Sudan's President Omar el-Bashir alternating with those of Luis Moreno-Ocampo, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court who has indicted him. It is quite a jarring sight, and a jarring statement as the country waits to see if the ICC will issue an arrest warrant for its leader, the first for a sitting head of state, rumored to be due out tomorrow. It marks a turbulent time in a turbulent country, and illustrates how shaken the government is . There are a number of possible outcomes if an arrest warrant is issued. Bashir has already been indicted on ten counts of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide, although it is speculated that the last might be dropped. One is that a state of emergency could be declared and that a defiant government, that does not recognize the jurisdiction of the ICC, would strengthen its grip on power. Already people are being arrested. Sudanese men and women who work for NGOs have been beaten. The government believes they are providing evidence against Bashir. A nervousness invades the streets, but it's not something you can sense as a foreigner. I had made plans to travel to Kordofan with one humanitarian agency. To travel you need permission from the Humanitarian Aid Commission, a government ministry. HAC insisted both the charity and myself wrote letters agreeing that I would not publish anything negative about the government. You might think they had more serious concerns. There is an election scheduled for July 2009, and a referendum scheduled for 2011 to decide the future of the country. After Africa's longest running civil war came to an end in 2005 with the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, the semi-autonomous Government of South Sudan was established. The next step will determine whether or not the south becomes independent. The south is landlocked but has oil, the north, where the power is concentrated in Khartoum, has the know-how and access to the sea. Is it better for Sudan to stay as one country with access to the northern African countries, and a part of the Muslim world, or disintegrate into another small African country? What are the other repercussions? Another civil war? Conflict in the east? Sudanese are also perplexed that Darfur has grabbed the headlines when the numbers of dead from the north-south civil war totalled millions, and Bashir is not being indicted for crimes there. Yet everyone talks about Darfur. At a British Embassy reception I had an interesting conversation with a gay (illegal here) Sudanese man. "The Sudanese," he tells me, "are the most racist people in the world." His family comes from one of the ruling northern tribes. "If I told my father I wanted to marry a Darfurian (all ironies aside), he would kick me out." I was told that no trip to Sudan is complete without meeting the Black Pope of Terrorism, Dr Hasan Turabi, who engineered the coup d'etat in 1989 that brought Bashir, now mortal enemies, to power. He comes across as reasonable, gentle turbaned sheikh. But he oversaw an extremely gruesome period in government It is debatable how much political capital he has. Of interest is his putative link to the Justice and Equality Movement. The JEM rebel leader, who lead the attacks last year on Omdurman, on the outskirts of Khartoum, that shock the government, used to be in Turabi's party. Both claim to have no connection, but rumours persist that they are linked. Osama bin Laden used to be Turabi's neighbour in the luxurious suburb where he has his house. It was at his invitation that bin Laden came to town. Turabi says " he was a very gentle, soft-spoken and fragile man." The question often asked here is how different Sudan is from conventional western perceptions. Darfur means Sudan to the outside world, yet its three provinces - South, West and North Darfur -are the size of France in Africa's largest country. Khartoum is a bustling city where men and women mix freely. Like any capital it is not representative. In Nyala, the capital of South Darfur, there are many rebel factions operating, and I go and see a number of them. Or at least I think I do. All the headquarters look the same, all in an advanced state of decay, all wind-blown, all with men sitting around, all of them saying the same thing. It 's like being in a movie. Maybe I just entered one door, got turned around, and went back through the same door. In Kalma camp an estimated 70,000 IDPs (internally displaced people) have sought refuge since 2003. It is one of many. Darfur is desolate at the best of times, and no where more so than here where people live in shelters constructed with twigs and whatever else they can find. UNAMID, the hybrid UN and African Union peace-keeping force, spends $2 billion a year in the Darfur region. On August 25 the government entered the camp looking for weapons and shot more than 30 people, including women and children. We pass their graves as we enter. The IDPs asked for more protection and since then the UN has built a 24-hour armed boundary with barbed wire, sand bags and look-outs. No one wants the government to come back in, but this is not a failed state, it has a right to maintain law and order. There has been a spate of cattle-rustling. Many people think the thieves are plants from Khartoum, but there has been a rise in crime even in Nyala, and there are many tribal tensions inside the camps. Travel outside of the main towns has deteriorated enormously over the last few years, and the arms situation is now out of control. The massacres that took place in Darfur between 2003-2005 have stopped. The level of violence has decreased, but then the government has liquated much of its opposition. Many rebel leaders live lives of luxury in European capitals. Perhaps there are improvements along the margins, but the international community can never say what the endgame is. Meanwhile political demographics are changing, old enemies, the Sudanese People's Liberation Movement/Army, now form part of the government with the ruling National Congress Party opaque as ever. No political players in Sudan have clean hands and if Bashir goes it is likely that someone else from one of the dominant northern tribes will replace him. "Who would you put in charge," asks one savvy western diplomat? The devils who came on horseback now ride in stolen four by fours. Carjacking is a hobby in Darfur. A friend was held up, forced to lie face down in the sand as gun-totting militias threatened to kill her and her Sudanese colleagues. They didn't, finally only robbing them. So somewhere out there a janjaweed wears last year's Roberto Cavalli glasses.
 
Mikhail Khodorkovsky Trial Seen As Test For Medvedev Top
The second trial of former oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky, which kicks off with preliminary hearings Tuesday, offers a test case of President Dmitry Medvedev's promises to clean up the country's notorious judiciary, Khodorkovsky's lawyers and political analysts said. More on Russia
 
Patrick Kampert: A tale of abortion -- and the evil some men do Top
Abortion is ready to engulf the nation as a social issue - again. President Obama has restored funding to overseas abortions and is poised to tell pharmacists who object to dispensing the morning-after pill to get a new job. With even Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia telling "60 Minutes" he would not vote to overturn Roe vs. Wade, the future of abortion seems secure in the U.S. But I wonder if we can move the discussion past the intractable positions of the pro-life and pro-choice camps. I cringe every time I see a man at an anti-abortion rally - not because his body is not the one carrying the fertilized egg, but simply because if men were more willing to be equal partners in contraception and in relationships, there would be many fewer abortions to worry about. If you want to cut the number of abortions in half overnight, get men to act like men instead of self-centered little boys. These issues came to mind recently as I met with Jane, a successful white businesswoman in her mid-30s who has had five abortions. She says she told herself over and over, "You're smarter than that." She asked me, a person who claims to follow Christ: "Any judgment?" No, not here. To begin with, my Bible says so-called Christians have no business judging anyone besides themselves. Besides, the fifth chapter of Galatians puts things like envy, jealousy and selfish ambition on the same level of wrongdoing as adultery, drunkenness and homicide. Seems to me the entire human race probably has no room for self-righteousness in that passage. And, secondly, my heart went out to her for all she's been through at the hands of males. And how she has come through that mill with grit, intelligence and humor. Yeah, her mother is a piece of work too, but I'll stick to one screwed-up gender for the purposes of this column. Since Jane's body is allergic to condoms, and she was only on the pill for about four years (articles about the pill's potential health hazards scared her off it), what's done is done. The experiences, she says, have made her the person she is today. She is pro-choice and has three children. Her two youngest kids are doing very well in grade school, so much so that their teacher asked Jane what her "magic formula" was for raising terrific children. She says she does not regret the abortions. "I was stuck, and I wasn't going to be stuck." But she says she has "remorse for the lives that were never brought to be. Viewing my three and how wonderful they are, there could have been five additional bright souls in this world." Yet if you dig beneath the surface, you find that the issues in Jane's life were not always of her own making. In many ways, her life is emblematic of the problems with all too many males. And abortion is only one of those issues that have plagued us since the beginning of human history. Jane's mom had three marriages. Jane's biological father split when she was young, eventually settling somewhere out west. Jane grew up in the big city, where her first stepfather, Art, molested her for a year, from the age of 5 to 6. When Jane finally got up the courage to tell her mother 10 years later, mom claimed Jane was a promiscuous liar who should be on the pill. Even though Jane was still a virgin at the time. And was an honor-roll student despite the turmoil at home. Art also beat her mother but never struck the kids. Jane remembers climbing on his back to pull his hair to try to get him to stop the violence. Even at that young age, she says, when he summoned her to the bedroom for unspeakable things, she told herself that "if I do this for him, he won't beat her." "I did go through counseling at 15," Jane continued, "which my mother refused to go to. Well, she said she'd go - and then she ditched me." Their relationship has not gotten much better since then. A couple years later, she haltingly told four friends about the sexual abuse as they rode to school on a public bus. "Five out of five girls on that bus had the same experience," she said through tears. "Stepfather, uncle, father. I will never forget that day. Five out of five? It's more prevalent in this country than people think." Sadly, the statistics show Jane's story is all too common. Children 17 and younger are the victims of about 70 percent of all sexual assaults. The statistics also say that 25 percent of girls are sexually abused before they turn 18 (Jane's anecdote about her bus ride suggests it might be higher). And in 30 to 40 percent of the cases, the perpetrator is a family member. More evidence, I think, of the carnage men leave behind. It's a wonder women want to have anything to do with us. For me, at least, it reaffirms my faith as a follower of Jesus that we do need a Messiah to save us from ourselves - and each other. And, of course, sometimes the ones we need to be saved from are people with distorted faith. One could argue that was the case for Jane in 5th grade, when nuns at her Catholic school showed her and her female classmates photos of aborted babies. She was simply sickened and didn't know what to make of it all. She remained a virgin until her senior year in high school. Her first act of intercourse resulted in pregnancy, but not abortion. She was planning to terminate the pregnancy, but says she was put off by the fact that the clinic also provided neonatal care for women planning to deliver. And besides sitting next to women with swollen abdomens in the waiting room, her mind was changed when a clinic nurse, exasperated by her hesitancy, told Jane, "Oh, honey, we've had 10-year-olds go through this." Two years later, she had another pregnancy with her next boyfriend. Jesse wanted her to have the baby. She said no. "He was a vagabond," Jane said. "He was just a free-spirited guy who liked fun, somebody I knew I'd never have a life with." That was the first abortion. A year later, at 22, "I was dating a guy [Dave] in a purely sexual relationship," she said. She got pregnant. "And I used abortion as a form of birth control." At 23, she was still with Dave and got pregnant again. It was only then that she learned Dave already had a child with a former lover. Worse, he told Jane he planned to renew those relationships. "They kind of came out of the woodwork into our lives. And he was sure that he wanted to reconnect with her and this child," said Jane, weeping. "That was abortion number three." If Dave sounds like a loser, he probably was. "He had some issues," Jane admitted. "I would get (emotionally) attached to the men." The only stable man she'd seen in her life up that point was Chris, her mom's third husband. Perhaps too much damage had already been done by her biological father and Art the pedophile. But Chris was "a saving grace," Jane said. "He was easygoing, gentle and kind-hearted. He brought a lot of balance to the family." Jane and her stepdad would go to sporting events together, but there was some angst there as well. Even when they were doing father-child activities, he was distracted. It seems Jane's sister Beverly hated Chris, so he tried harder and harder to win Bev's approval. "I was always hurt by that. 'Why is he fighting for her attention? I'm right here.' " So, she stayed with Dave, even after two abortions with him. "And then," Jane said, "it started to get to be a volatile relationship. Physically." National statistics show that Jane isn't alone in that either. Every year, about 4.8 million women are beaten or raped by their male partners. And we haven't even talked about stalkers in these paragraphs. If Jane's relationships were a mess, her parenting was not, as alluded to earlier. Her son was gifted, so she worked long and hard to send him to a private school while she lived at home with her crazy mom, functional stepdad and reclusive sister. She also put herself through community college and bought a car. Then she made the break from Dave and moved out of her mother's home to a town she only knew as a name on a map. A better job and, she hoped, a better life awaited. But she didn't know anybody out in the 'burbs. She managed a retail store. One day, she met Russ in the shop. She was lonely. It was the week of her birthday and she felt isolated. She slept with him and began a relationship, but didn't see it as a long-term fix because Russ was an alcoholic. She got pregnant. And ended it. Number 4. Some hope would come when she met Steve, who would later become her husband. But he had no more interest in preventing pregnancy than her previous boyfriends. They were living together. By then, Jane was in a job that required travel and paid her $80,000 a year. She got pregnant, but this time she was ready for another child in her life. Unfortunately, Steve wasn't. "I just can't do this," he told Jane. "I can't have this baby." Jane felt stuck. She was 27, with a 9-year-old son, living in Steve's home, relying on him for shelter and emotional support. "This is the one time I didn't want to do it," she said, the tears spilling again. "But I did." Within a year, she was pregnant again and expressed her anger to Steve about his reluctance to become a father. She won this round. She had a second son. Steve told her she should become a stay-at-home mom. "I never thought I could have that opportunity," Jane said. "It sounded pretty good." Steve proposed to her during her pregnancy. Her intuition told her not to marry him. But she did. She got pregnant again on their honeymoon, which resulted in her third child. But the sex disappeared from the marriage, and so did the money. "He put me on an allowance," she said. Emotional abuse followed, and Jane braced herself for worse. "I was waiting for him to hit me," she said. One day, at lunch, her doorbell rang. The woman at the door had a summons. "Who could be suing me?" she wondered. It was Steve, suing for divorce. He didn't have the guts to tell her to her face. She was devastated. "I never wanted to be a woman of divorce, like my mother," Jane said. A year later, she found out Steve was gay. He didn't have the guts to tell her that either. Although they have become friends in the years since, and Steve, she says, has been a good father to their children (they share custody), Jane has bounced through several relationships since then. She recently broke off an 18-month relationship with a terrific, gentle older man because it just wasn't right for her. "I always thought you were looking for a father figure," a relative told her. The relative was right, Jane says. But now, for the first time in her life, "I'm OK with being alone," she said. Comfortable, even. An aunt took the breakup hard because she liked the boyfriend. "She just wants me to be happy," Jane said. "But I think the women in our family think it takes a man to do that. And it's the first time in my life I feel like a grownup." Jane doesn't blame the men for the abortions. They all supported her in the decision, even went to the clinic with her, where they sat amid other couples, as well as women abandoned by their less-than-equal partners. Those women were accompanied by female friends or relatives. Not all get the kind of support Jane has experienced from her partners, even if Jane's men were utterly passive about preventing pregnancy. Too many males won't lower themselves to worry about a little thing like birth control, like a friend of mine who would walk out the door if the woman he picked up at a bar pulled a Trojan out of her purse. Others walk away when the woman gets pregnant. Others insist she have an abortion even if she doesn't want one. If you want cut abortions in half, don't waste your breath picketing abortion clinics or, on the other side, passing out the pill to middle-school girls without their parents' consent. Get males to become men. That's a tall order, but we owe it to the women who put up with so much from us. Pseudonyms have been used in this article to protect identities. More on Religion
 
Craig Newmark: Obama New Media team off to a great start Top
Hey, Jose Antonio Vargas published a really good piece on the White House new media team . In TechPresident.com, Andrew Rasiej offers some additional perspective . Having served as an informal advisor to the technology and innovation and government reform group during the transition, I saw first-hand how difficult it is to quickly convert all of the federal government's communications to the 21st century. Although there are challenges, the people working on it are some of the most qualified and dedicated people Obama could have chosen. Many of us who follow the convergence of the Internet and government view what Obama's new media team is starting to do as a great first step and a sign that the Obama administration will move the federal government onto a parallel track with the rest of the world's use of technology and make our democracy more participatory. I am highly impressed by the team's efforts so far. I've also observed what's going on, and I feel Andrew has it right here. The previous Administration told us they weren't interested in feedback from Americans, and followed through. The Obama team is starting from nothing, and building a team which listens to people and will act. WhiteHouse.gov and Recovery.gov are great starts, unlike anything we've seen before Also, the genuine empowerment of the Federal Web Managers Council has unleashed a lot of people committed to better serving the public. I feel we must have high expectations of the White House team, but also realize that they've just started.
 
Cat Stuffed Into Bong To Chill Out, Owner Faces Charges Top
OMAHA, Neb. — A man who tried to cool out his hyper cat by stuffing her into a boxlike homemade bong faces cruelty charges _ and catcalls from animal lovers. Lancaster County sheriff's deputies responding to a domestic disturbance call Sunday alleged they saw 20-year-old Acea Schomaker smoking marijuana through a piece of garden hose attached to a duct-taped, plastic glass box in which the cat had been stuffed. "This cat was just dazed," Sgt. Andy Stebbing said. "She was on the front seat of the cop car, wrapped in a blanket, and never moved all the way to the humane society." Schomaker told deputies 6-month-old Shadow was hyper and he was trying to calm her down. The contraption she had been stuffed inside was 12 inches by 6 inches. Shadow was timid but in good condition Monday at the Capital Humane Society, executive director Bob Downey said. "What the human mind doesn't invent, huh?" Downey said. Schomaker, who was released from jail after paying a $400 fine on the arrest warrant, faces drug and misdemeanor animal cruelty charges. He did not immediately respond to phone messages left Monday seeking comment. More on Animals
 
"We're 100 Percent Confident" EFCA Will Pass: Union Official Top
Pushing back against reports of concern over the Employee Free Choice Act's passage, union officials insisted on Monday and Tuesday that they have enough votes to get the legislative priority through Congress and to the president's desk. A spokesperson for the AFL-CIO told the Huffington Post that the union's legislative team and whip counters are "100 percent confident" that EFCA will pass. Without giving away who the Republican targets would be -- Democrats will need at least one GOP Senator to defect for a cloture vote ending debate -- the official offered the following optimistic outlook. "We are not worried at all. The Secretary of Labor and [Vice President] Biden both are coming to our Executive Council meeting and demonstrating their commitment to working Americans and re-building an economy that works for everyone. [Labor Secretary Hilda] Solis spoke at length last night about how important the Employee Free Choice Act was to helping America's workers and rebuilding the middle class. She also made sure to remind everyone that her and Obama were co-sponsors of the Employee Free Choice Act. Right now our analysis is simple. The House will pass it, the Senate will pass it, Obama will sign it, and America's working people will benefit." The spokesperson's remarks come a day after the Huffington Post reported on concern over the possibility of moderate Democrats defecting on EFCA. Moreover, they come as elected and non-elected Republicans have begun to publicly advertise the resources and energy they will bear on this legislative fight. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich declared during his speech at CPAC that conservatives "will never forgive somebody" who votes for cloture or the passage of EFCA. Meanwhile, business groups are reportedly getting set to ramp up their lobbying efforts and target potential Democratic defectors. That said, Democratic leadership in the Senate has not backed away from its position that a vote on the Employee Free Choice Act -- which would allow unions to more easily organize -- will be held sometime in the late spring or summer. The party should, by that time, have 59 caucusing members, provided that Al Franken is seated in Minnesota. Thus, in order for the bill to pass cloture, one Republican would have to cross the aisle. The most likely candidate is Pennsylvania's Arlen Specter. How hard the Obama administration pushes for EFCA's passage could go a long way in determining the outcome of the vote. To this point, the president has given some encouraging signals to the labor community. But he has not been definitive about a preferred time frame for the bill -- choosing instead to focus his time and efforts on more pressing and complex economic matters. That may change with Labor Secretary Hilda Solis installed at her post. The California Democrat made her first public appearance on Monday in Miami before a gathering of union officials and offered an early and firm endorsement of the legislation. "If you take care of an employee, that employee will produce. Productivity by our workforce, especially union members, has increased," she said . "But we don't see the same value in terms of their wages going up. So there has to be some morality placed there."
 
UN Racism Conference: European, Muslim Nations Clash Over Israel Top
GENEVA — European Union countries Tuesday stepped up their opposition to Muslim attempts to shield Islam from criticism and attack Israel through a U.N. conference on racism. EU members were unusually outspoken in appearances before the U.N. Human Rights Council, saying they were worried about preparations for a global racism conference to be held next month because attention was being diverted from the real problems of racial discrimination. "I am deeply disturbed by the turn this event is taking," Dutch Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Verhagen said. "The thematic world conference is used by some to try to force their concept of defamation of religions and their focus on one regional conflict on all of us," Verhagen told the 47-member council. References to Israel and protection of religion in the current draft conclusion being negotiated for the so-called Durban II conference are unacceptable, Verhagen said. "We cannot accept any text, which would put religion above individuals, not condemn discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, condone anti-Semitism or single out Israel," he said. Denmark, Germany, Belgium and Italy voiced similar concerns. Islamic countries, still angry over cartoons and films attacking Muslims, have been campaigning for wording that would equate criticism of a religious faith with a violation of human rights. The informal negotiations have proven difficult with many issues that marred the first U.N. conference on racism in 2001 re-emerging _ such as criticism of Israel. The April 20-25 meeting is designed to review progress in fighting racism since the global body's first such conference eight years ago in Durban, South Africa. That 2001 meeting was dominated by clashes over the Middle East and the legacy of slavery, and particularly marred by attacks on Israel and anti-Israel demonstrations at a parallel conference of non-governmental organizations. The U.S. and Israel walked out midway through the 2001 conference over a draft resolution that singled out Israel for criticism and likened Zionism _ the movement to establish and maintain a Jewish state _ to racism. The European Union also refused to accept demands by Arab states to criticize Israel for its "racist practices." In the end, the 2001 conference dropped criticism of Israel. It urged governments to take concrete steps to fight discrimination and recognized the plight of the Palestinian people and the need for Israel to have security. Israel and Canada had already announced they would will boycott Durban II. The Obama administration said Friday the U.S. will stay away from this year's conference unless its final document is changed to drop all references to Israel and the defamation of religion. Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Monday that countries should not put conditions for the participation in the meeting. Durban II should deal with contemporary forms of racism, such as religious profiling and Islamophobia, he said. More on Israel
 
Andrea Chalupa: Red-state residents buy the most online porn Top
I wonder how pill-popping Rush Limbaugh would explain this: a new study out of Harvard Business School finds that red-staters buy more online porn than their blue state compatriots. Jason Cochran breaks down the findings for WalletPop.com: A Harvard Business School assistant professor who had access to customer receipts from dozens of adult websites found something titillating: The more conservative and religious a state is, the more likely its residents are to buy Web porn. As someone who helps big companies like Microsoft and AOL with internet fraud, Benjamin Edelman, Ph.D., had access to two years of credit card data from 2006 to 2008 that included purchase dates and each customer's ZIP code. Using that with existing demographics, he found that of the 10 states where porn is most consumed, eight of them gave their electoral votes to John McCain. Out of the 10 states with the lowest consumption, only four did. And which state buys the most online porn? Utah! ( Big Love writers, there's a storyline for you!) And which state buys the least online porn? Montana. Maybe they prefer the real thing. (I've seen Montana Senator Max Baucus in person; he's got this "I was Peter Fonder from Easy Rider in a former life" thing going on, not bad). I love how extreme-conservatives blast liberals for being morally loose when they're busy getting their keyboards all sticky. To read more, check out Cochran's post here.
 
Bil Browning: GLADly bending over or All coastal states are tops Top
The Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (GLAD) announced at a press conference today that they filed "the first concerted, multi-plaintiff lawsuit to challenge the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA)" in federal district court. New England's Bay Windows reports : GLAD plans to file suit March 3 in the Federal District Court of Massachusetts, challenging provisions in section three of DOMA that bar the federal government from granting certain protections to legally married same-sex couples. If successful the suit would overturn only those specific provisions of DOMA, not the entire statute, which prevents federal recognition of any same-sex marriage and also allows states to deny recognition of same-sex marriages performed in other states. The marriage fight has cost me dearly in Indiana. I've lost jobs. I've lost an apartment and been denied others. I've been beaten with a crowbar and gang raped by men who called me "faggot" and "queer" over and over and over to the point where I still here them in my sleep. And there's not a damned thing I can do about it because our state legislature is still focused on keeping the queers from getting married - something we neither asked nor demanded - instead of moving the ball forward on discrimination and basic human rights. So, kudos to an east coast state that already has marriage. I'll bend over now; coastal states seem to all be tops. One Step Forward and Two Steps Back It couldn't come at a worse time for Indiana. We just staved off a marriage amendment with the logic by our House Speaker that we already had a DOMA law and there's been no challenge federally. The general strategy was, "If they were challenging it nationally, it'd be a different story because then the judges would have control." The session isn't over yet and there's plenty of time next year to revisit that bit of legislation too. A person from Massachusetts commented on a mailing list I'm on, "and know one thing, Mary Bonauto rarely ever loses." That sends me over the edge. Mary Bonauto had better not make this one of those "rare" cases because it's going to knock out our "rare" win for hate crimes and employment protections. We have a chance of finally passing those now that the focus was taken off of marriage for the first time in almost 10 years but as soon as this hits the local papers we're screwed. Focus back on f--king marriage again. Even all of the work I've done with Indiana towns and cities to pass non-discrimination ordinances is honestly useless; they can't be enforced because of the state law which says that local government can't go beyond the protections offered by the state. Companies don't even have to respond to a complaint or notice by a human rights commission if it's LGBT-related. And when there's a chance of gay weddings in Indiana, why bother helping the gays and being seen as gay friendly? Remember - New England Republicans are our Democrats. Look at ENDA. What other state had a majority of Democrats - of which the majority wouldn't vote for ENDA and were behind the "dump trans people" brigade? Obama may have turned us blue for him, but not blue enough for that. "Painfully Familiar" You know what I thought when the "news" broke that Hawaii might get civil unions ? Might?!? They got us into the damned problem to start with and now they might finally get civil unions? GLAD's going after one portion? We're going for the right to life and liberty before the right to happiness. That one portion isn't without cost. My concerns on the mailing list generated a reply that read: this sounds painfully familiar. when the marriage case in MA was first being tried, everyone had a fit here. we can't do that! no no no! There's a reason why what you're hearing is familiar to you. Perhaps, someone will actually listen. Because there's consequences to GLAD's actions that they don't have to live with. We do. We pay with our blood, our money, our time, our energy, and our security. When the next kid is beat up for being too nelly and nothing happens other than a slap on the wrist? When the butch lesbian loses her job in this economy with double digit unemployment rates? I'll tell them it sounds "painfully familiar," but GLAD is going after section 3 of DOMA so sit back and enjoy the show. The Myopic Focus on Marriage As a movement we've focused on marriage quite a bit. Almost every national group helped in some sort with Prop 8. Almost every state has had folks on the ground locally trying to stop their state's amendment - without luck. Coastal states keep pushing the ball forward for marriage. But when do some of those orgs help those of us who can still get fired for being LGBT? Or denied housing? Or even public accommodations? Or hate crimes protections? All four have happened - repeatedly - here in the past year. And not a damned peep from any of the national groups on how to help us get the basic rights that a lot of the our readers take for granted every day. Where's the coastal and national groups saying, "We're not free until we're all free." and sending us some help organizing, fundraising and lobbying? Where's the millions of dollars spent to allow a small portion of one state's queer folks to get hitched? Or hell, 1/10th of that cash... Where's the planning sessions on helping out flyover country states? Where's the e-mails on those mailing lists? Where's the shout back to middle America that Harvey Milk gave? Remember, the kids he talked about in his speeches came from my area and he was there to help - and not just help us get married but to have some damned dignity and basic recognitions. This isn't help. This is hurt. And, personally? I'm glad some folks can get married. Good for them; they're lucky. I fought for them both nationally and I fought for myself locally because of them. Now someone stand up for us for once. I'm tired of us being the whipping post. More on Gay Marriage
 
William Fisher: Something Obama Can Do Top
President Obama apparently had a successful first meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Steven Harper. Obviously, their main - perhaps only - subject was the current economic meltdown. But event disappointed many of the president's supporters. These are the folks who are confused by what they see as the Administration's ambivalence about the nexus between national security and civil and human rights. In his first week in office, the president signed executive orders to shut down Guantanamo within a year, review all the cases there within 120 days, ban "enhanced interrogation" techniques, and bring a new era of openness and transparency to his government. Before his first month was out, Obama's Justice Department released some of those famous memos written by John Yoo and other Bush lawyers, justifying virtually infinite presidential power. And the CIA disclosed that it destroyed not two, but ninety-two, interrogation tapes. But while all that was going on, Obama's DOJ lawyers were in court, twice choosing to follow the same tired road so frequently traveled by George W. Bush: Invoking the so-called "state secrets privilege" to keep cases from ever getting heard in court. In one case, the government's lawyers used the "state secrets" defense to get a federal court to throw out a case against a Boeing subsidiary called Jeppesen Dataplan, in which four Guantanamo prisoners alleged that they were victims of "extraordinary rendition," and that Jeppesen provided the CIA with the logistical support for their flights into foreign torture chambers. In another case, Obama's DOJ used "state secrets" in an attempt to halt a lawsuit charging that the government's evidence was obtained through Bush's warrantless wiretapping program. Maybe most of us can accept that all governments have secrets and have to have a way to keep their secrets secret - although the two cases cited above would not seem to be particularly great candidates for that inclusion in that category. Unless these cases somehow make it to court, we'll never know. Unless someone leaks the facts to media. But there's one case the government refuses to talk about, despite that fact that all the evidence has been public for years. That, of course, is the case of Maher Arar. Arar is the Canadian citizen who was stopped by immigration authorities at Kennedy Airport in 2002, while he was in transit back to Canada. He was detained for two weeks, denied a lawyer, and then shipped off first to Jordan and then to Syria. In Syria, he was held incommunicado in a cell the size of a grave and tortured for ten months before the Syrians released him without charges. The Canadian Government formed a special commission to review their citizen's "extraordinary rendition." After an exhaustive investigation, the body admitted that what happened to Arar was a result of faulty information the Canadian Royal Mounted Police gave to U.S. authorities. The head of the RCMP was forced to resign, and Canada gave Arar an official apology and ten million dollars. This all happened on George Bush's watch. But after incessant stonewalling about the issue, all that Secretary of State Condi Rice would say was that she thought the affair was not handled very well. And Maher Arar, for reasons no one will discuss, is somehow still on the U.S. "no-fly" list. Which brings me back to Obama's meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Harper. Yes, the economic meltdown had to be top of both men's agendas. But how difficult would it have been for our new president raise the Arar issue with Harper? Or vice versa? As far as we've been told, nothing like that ever happened. And that's an Obama opportunity lost. But it's not too late. An honest statement from the Obama Administration - and an apology to Arar - could still be of enormous help in reassuring those of us who believe in the rule of law that our new president is really committed to justice and transparency.
 
Bill Maher: New Rule: Tech Offensive (VIDEO) Top
The cable news networks have to try to contain their excitement about the new touch screen technology... More on Video On HuffPost
 
$1.3 billion in 2005 tax refunds goes unclaimed Top
WASHINGTON — Time is running out for more than a million taxpayers to file for $1.3 billion in unclaimed tax refunds from 2005. The Internal Revenue Service said Tuesday that the taxpayers are still owed refunds because they never filed tax returns for 2005. The missing taxpayers have until tax day _ April 15 _ to claim their 2005 refunds, or the money becomes the property of the U.S. Treasury. "Especially in these tough economic times, people should not lose out on money that is rightfully theirs," IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman said in a statement. "People should check their records, especially if they had taxes withheld from their paychecks but were not required to file a tax return. They may be leaving money on the table, including valuable tax credits that can mean even more money in their pockets." The IRS estimates that half of those owed refunds would receive more than $581. There is no penalty for filing a late return that qualifies for a refund, the IRS said. But most taxpayers get only three years to file or they forfeit the money. Taxpayers must also have filed returns for 2006 and 2007 to receive refunds from 2005. Some taxpayers might not have filed because they made too little income to require a tax return, but they still had money withheld from their pay, the IRS said. Tax returns for 2008 are due April 15. More on Taxes
 
James Moore: I Hope Rush Succeeds Top
Never envisioned myself writing a sentence like this but I hope Rush Limbaugh succeeds. Yep, I hope he spreads his vile as far and wide as he possibly can through his EIB (Extremely Ignorant Broadcast) network. Through his outreach, even more Americans will come to know the absurdity of Limbaugh's politics and the conservatives he continues to represent on the radical right. The more people that hear Limbaugh articulate his disdain for the success of America the better will be the country's chances of rejecting his hateful ideology and getting back on the path to prosperity. As one-sided as that paragraph sounds, I think it's time to start using some of the same tools that people like entertainer Limbaugh deploy to make their points; except I'm going to avoid hypocrisy and oxycontin since every second grader knows those two combined are bad for both the soul and the body. But what if the president who just left the White House (I'm through writing his name) were to propose a financial solution for solving the financial crisis and then Keith Olbermann went on the air and said, "Mr. President, I hope you fail." Everyone knows what would happen: conservatives of all ilk and Republicans would be screaming "treason" and the FOX Ruse headlines would be, "Democrats Don't Want America to Come out of Economic Crisis." Steve Dorky on their morning show would be asking over and over, "How can we let people say this? I mean, I realize we are a free country and everything but isn't there a line that's being crossed here? Don't we all want America to succeed?" That's what I used to think. But Rush apparently wants us to fail, go right down the old crapper. He never said anything even remotely close to this when the previous president (so tired of having to even think about that guy) gave blank checks to Wall Street to save the big financial institutions from collapse. That was different. That guy was a Republican. He had the interests of the nation at heart, (and probably the interests of Rush's investment portfolio.) But the new president it seems is a socialist, even though he's doing pretty much what the previous president was doing; except he's including individual taxpayers and homeowners in the recovery package. Is that what makes it all socialist, Rush, just including the little guy? Man, I hope you succeed. And I hope your angry voice and cigar-smoking mug become the profile and the sound of the Republican Party for the next four years. Whenever anyone thinks about the GOP I hope they can't help but see your round puss with a long Montecristo Cuban sticking out of it as you stand at the tee box on your private golf course or board your private jet or waltz around the grounds of your mansion in West Palm and they realize you are the ideologue that guides conservative thinking. And every solitary time there is a person who wonders what the GOP might do differently or better, I hope all that individual hears in their ears is the sound, "I hope the president fails." The problem with guys like you Rush is that you never think anyone can see through your contradictions and your hypocrisy. When the little taxpayers' money was being used for the Wall Street bailout by the last president, there wasn't much of a protest over there on Easy Street where you live. We had to protect the economy. But as soon as the assistance started to include the little guy, you were outraged. I say stay angry, pal. Keep the outrage working. Moan and whine and wish ill on the president and his attempts to get our country out of a nosedive. Tell everyone you can what you think and why you want him to fail. The ragtag band of Republicans that the previous president (oh crap, I have to think about him for a last sentence) bequeathed the conservative movement needs a leader. You're perfect. Angry. Rich. And loud. You can steer that party anywhere you want. And, at the moment, I'd say you're leading them further into the wilderness. Here's hoping they all recognize your leadership skills and follow wherever you may go. Also at http://www.moorethink.com More on CPAC
 
Cuba Shake-Up Raises Questions About US Relations Top
HAVANA — Cuban President Raul Castro's decision to oust powerful officials close to his brother Fidel raises questions both about who will succeed him and how the biggest government shakeup since he took power a year ago will impact U.S.-Cuba relations. Monday's changes replaced some key Fidel loyalists _ including the foreign minister widely thought of as a possible successor _ with men closer to Raul. But they appeared to have little to do with hopes for closer U.S.-Cuban ties now that both countries have new presidents. "There is nothing that indicates it's a reaction to anything in the United States," Phil Peters, a Cuba specialist at the Lexington Institute near Washington, said, noting that Raul Castro has long spoken of streamlining Cuba's government. Peters said it is too early to tell whether the changes could affect relations with the new administration of President Barack Obama, whose proposals for easing U.S. restrictions on Cuba have created hopes that negotiations will resume on ending decades of hostility. The changes also seemed to cast further doubt on who could one day succeed Raul Castro. The youngest and most prominent of those replaced was Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque, 43, who had been widely mentioned as a possible future president. Cuba's current No. 2, Jose Ramon Machado Ventura, is a year older than Raul _ and no heir apparent was clear from Monday's list of new leaders. Perez Roque, who was Fidel Castro's personal secretary before becoming foreign minister almost a decade ago, delighted in blustery, Fidel-like denunciations of U.S. policy. "He was someone who was very close to Fidel Castro and built his career working directly for Fidel Castro," Peters said. Perez Roque was replaced by his own deputy, Bruno Rodriguez, who once served as Cuba's ambassador to the United Nations. Officials announced no new post for Perez Roque. Vice President Carlos Lage, 57, apparently kept his job as vice president of the Council of State _ a ruling body more powerful than the Cabinet. But he was replaced as Cabinet Secretary by Gen. Jose Amado Ricardo Guerra, who had been a top official in the military that Raul Castro ran for decades. Lage, a former Communist youth leader, was credited with helping save Cuba's economy by designing modest economic reforms after the Soviet Union collapsed. Peters said there was no sign Lage's economic role was being reduced. Another former youth leader, Otto Rivero Torres, was removed as Cabinet vice president. Rivero Torres had already been dropped from the Council of State last year when Raul Castro became president. His replacement is hardliner Ramiro Valdez Menendez, who fought alongside Fidel, Raul and Ernesto "Che" Guevara in the revolution that toppled the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista in 1959. If Cuba was trying to send a strong message with the shakeup, it did so in the subtlest of ways: The official state media reported the leadership changes at the end of the midday news, following the weather and sports. Nonetheless, it did not sit well with some Cubans, including Carmen Elizondo, 45, a housewife with three children who said she heard the announcement on the news. "Ay! It left me feeling cold," Elizondo said. "I don't understand. Why make these changes, more than anything, Felipe? I had a lot of confidence in Felipe. I don't know any of those they put in place." But retired worker Marta Jimenez, 65, was more optimistic. "People here are not used to change," she said. "But I think this was necessary and will be for the better. It's a restructuring of the country and I see that as good." Several ministries were consolidated in response to Raul Castro's calls for a "more compact and functional structure" for the often unwieldy communist bureaucracy that oversees nearly all public activity on the island. Longtime Economy Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez was replaced by Internal Commerce Minister Marino Murillo Jorge; Finance Minister Georgina Barreiro Fajardo was replaced by Lina Pedraza Rodriguez of the Communist Party's secretariat; and Labor Minister Alfredo Morales Cartaya was replaced by Vice Minister Margarita Marlene Gonzalez Fernandez. Jose Miguel Miyar Barruecos, a close Fidel Castro confidant, was removed as secretary of the Council of State but was given the vacant post of science and environment minister. Replacing him as secretary of the governing council is Homero Acosta Alvarez, who worked closely with Raul Castro during the younger Castro brother's decades as Cuba's defense minister. ___ Associated Press Writer Anne-Marie Garcia contributed to this report. More on Cuba
 
Doreen Giuliano Led Double Life To Deceive Juror From Son's Murder Trial Top
For more than a year, in Brooklyn, N.Y., Doreen Giuliano lived a lie. She created a false identity, called herself Dee Quinn, changed her appearance and rented an apartment for more than $1,000 a month. The deception was designed to get close to one person: Jason Allo, whom she believed should never have been on a jury that convicted her son of murder.
 
Michael Wolff: Why America Needs a Jade Goody Top
How come the Brits are far crazier about reality TV than we are? You would have thought we'd have had a monopoly on outsized vulgarity--but we've been so seriously trumped. Jade Goody seems to be some reverse Diana, embodying the British people's worst fears and most depressed sense of self. Our reality people, those gigantic people on the weight loss show, barely have names. Jade Goody is surely some sort of economic tailspin chic, or end-of-the-good-times bathos. She turned reality celebrity into cash, got dinged for a bit of British working class-ism (racism, as it happens), rose again, then got felled by cancer. And now has chosen to live out her fate as publicly as possible. That's pretty irresistible--and Jade Goody is clearly an original. So where are our reality stars? Hard to believe there aren't some suitable media-crazed Americans. The bleak fact is that we need such a star to save the media--at least the old media. Continue reading at newser.com More on Reality TV
 
Michael Shaw: Reading The Pictures: NY Mag Joker's On Us? Top
A few takes: 1. Far from a monster, Bernie's been turned into a clown -- making it that much harder to take him, his regulatory enablers, and all the legal gamblers who bankrupted the country more seriously. 2. Perpetuating the joke, this is quite a take-off on Grandpa Munster . 3. Is perhaps part of the move here to feminize? In the high finance/high testosterone world that powers New York, maybe NYM thinks Bernie is a wuss for getting caught? 4. The marketing game... Hey, let's put this out just before the Academy Awards and make a few dollars off Heath Ledger's suicide -- and likely Oscar. 5. And then, if you are trying to deliver a character hit with the Joker, this is a high bar. I mean, are you feeling the monster? For more visual politics, visit BAGnewsNotes.com (and more take-aways via Twitter ). (illustration: Darrow for NY Magazine. March 2, 2008 cover) More on Financial Crisis
 
Gordon Brown Faces Humiliation After Obama 'Snub' Top
Downing Street is looking to avoid potential humiliation after the White House scaled down the profile of Gordon Brown's first formal meeting with Barack Obama. While the Prime Minister is expected to hold nearly two hours of talks with the US president, the White House has categorically ruled out a traditional joint press conference before the White House media. After overnight protests from British diplomats, the White House agreed to allow journalists into the Oval Office later for a brief round of questions after the talks. Gordon Brown's officials have played down the significance of the decision and deny the Prime Minister is being snubbed. However, the move will distinctly lessen the prestige of the PM's coup of becoming the first European leader invited to Washington for talks with Obama since his inauguration in January. That Obama will find time to meet with the Boy Scouts of America later this afternoon is sure to add to the embarrassment. The trip is in marked contrast to the hospitality lavished on Tony Blair by George Bush when they met for the first time. Related article: Brown takes gift to Obama and hopes for finance pact Read more from the Independent. More on England
 
Ad Calls US "The Saudi Arabia Of Solar" (VIDEO) Top
The ad, titled "Solar," explains how harnessing the power of the sun -- as the American West is "the Saudi Arabia of solar power" -- can both drive the national movement away from dirty fossil fuels and create good-paying jobs that cannot be shipped overseas. The script of the commercial relies on studies showing that the resource potential of solar energy is so vast that a parcel of land in the Southwest, 96 miles on a side, could power America's entire electricity system. Says WE: Before a joint session of Congress last week, President Obama expressed strong support for growing our economy by repowering America, calling for American leadership and innovation in clean energy technologies and for a national energy policy that shifts emphasis away from the dirty fuels of the 20th century. More on Video On HuffPost
 
Rebecca Novick: Tibet's Unlikely Defender: A Chinese Journalist's Change of Mind Top
Photo by Lhakpa Kyizom It's standing room only in the modest hall of the Dharamsala Welfare Office. People are sitting cross-legged on the floor, so tightly they're almost in each others' laps. The over-flow has spilled out onto the street. Monks peer in through the windows. Tibetan exiles from all walks of life in this rustic mountain community have come to hear a talk by a Chinese journalist. Sitting at a table next to her Tibetan translator is a soft-spoken Chinese woman with an easy smile with the look of someone quietly sure of her truth. She begins to talk about her time spent in Tibet, her appreciation of its culture and her affection for its people. A youthful 48, Zhu Rui seems perfectly at ease before her first Tibetan audience. The expressions on the faces in the room begin to change from guarded skepticism to rapt attention as the audience hears words that none of them ever expected from a Chinese national. During the Q & A, the questions come thick and fast -- "How can we improve Tibetan-Chinese friendship?" "What do you think about China's historical claim to Tibet?" One Tibetan man asks about Zhu Rui's impressions from meeting the Dalai Lama. She describes how the room in which they met was uncomfortably cold because the air conditioner was set too high. Instead of asking his attendant, the Dalai Lama had gone over and turned it down by himself. A simple act, that to Zhu Rui, spoke volumes about him as a person and a leader. "If Hu Jintao did this instead of delegating the task to a subordinate, Chinese people would be totally shocked!" she joked, evoking an enthusiastic round of applause. Zhu Rui (pronounced too ree ) has met the Dalai Lama twice now. "He has such simplicity," she says, "which is why many Chinese leaders don't understand him. They are much too complicated." In China, the media is controlled by the government. Journalists working for Chinese media who want to visit Dharamsala in any official capacity have to apply for a permit. Rarely, if ever, is it granted. One Chinese journalist said, "I have applied many times for a permit to Dharamsala but it's always denied. They say it's for my own security." Although she had felt very at home in Tibet, Zhu Rui didn't know what to expect in Dharamsala; the stronghold of the so-called Dalai Clique. All she had heard was that there were Tibetan terrorist groups operating there, and about one of their most notorious ringleaders -- the red headband-wearing "radical" Tenzin Tsundue. But Zhu Rui found the town to be quite different from its reputation in the Chinese media. "Anybody you run into on the street immediately becomes your friend as soon as you start talking with them," she says. When she finally met Tenzin Tsundue, she admitted that she thought she might be taking her life into her hands. But instead of a terrorist, she found a poet and community organizer with a Gandhian commitment to non-violence. While the Tibetan community seems to have embraced Zhu Rui with open arms, she has been less warmly received by some of her fellow countrymen. A Canadian citizen based in Calgary, Alberta, Zhu Rui has been advised by her close friends not to return to China for her own safety. Some of the strongest reactions she has received have come in response to a letter she wrote to the Dalai Lama that she posted on her blog. The letter begins: I have to tell you that my impression of you in my childhood and youth was that you were a flayer of human skin, a demon who picked flesh from human bones. From this point alone, you have probably guessed that I am Han Chinese. Zhu Rui continues the letter with a declaration of her respect for Tibetan culture and her concern about what she views as China's colonial presence in Tibet. She speaks of a growing number of Chinese people demanding a resolution of the Tibet problem by means of respect, tolerance, consultation and dialog , and ends: From a Han who sympathizes with the suffering of the Tibetan people, and who has limitless respect for you: Zhu Rui . Some of the comments she received to this posting were so vilifying that she can't bring herself to describe them. "Traitor" is one of the milder names she's been called. Yet Zhu Rui is convinced that her detractors do not represent the majority, and that there is a growing number of Chinese who admire the Dalai Lama and are sympathetic to the aspirations of Tibetan people. In the grounds of Shungtsep Nunnery, she talks about her journey from critic of Tibetan society to one of its most passionate advocates. "I have been through such a transformation," she says, "I want to tell every one what I saw and what I heard, even if it's just to a single Chinese person." She has come to Dharamsala to complete a book called Brief Introduction to the Contribution Made by the Dalai Lama to Tibetan Culture and Humanity . The book is a response to the Chinese government's White Paper on Tibet that was published in June 2008. (China recently published another White Paper on Tibet.) In the foreword to her book, she writes that she was "astonished to see that the White Paper on Tibet was filled with hackneyed phrases, far-fetched comparisons and shrewd lies." As a young girl growing up in northeast China, Zhu Rui used to attend meetings called recalling the bitterness and thinking about the sweetness . "In the meetings, we used criticize the Dalai Lama as the symbol of serfdom and we had to eat a kind of food that we were told was eaten by the serfs in old Tibet. It tasted awfully bitter. I used to really pity those poor Tibetans." She laughs at the memory. In the late 1980s she read some books that aroused her curiosity, such as Seven Years in Tibet by Heinrich Harrer. She found herself desperately wanting to visit Tibet, and to see what it was like for herself. In 1997, she traveled there as a tourist. On her way east, she arrived at Kumbum Monastery where she saw pilgrims performing full-body prostrations on big flat wooden boards. "I was really amazed that there were still people with such devotion in this world," she recalls, "because there are no longer such things in China." Before this, Zhu Rui had never even seen a photo of the Dalai Lama. "When I saw his picture for the first time, I couldn't believe my eyes -- that this was the man who we'd criticized for the last 50 years, the man who in my imagination was a monster. It was astonishing for me to see his face, so full of kindness." While she was in Lhasa, she asked a Chinese restaurant owner for directions to the Tibetan quarter. He warned her that it was too dangerous to got there because it was "full of Tibetans". Zhu Rui didn't heed his advice, and she found herself drawn again and again to the Tibetan neighborhoods of the city. "I just felt at ease there," she says. Zhu Rui didn't know it, but she had arrived in the capital towards the end of a decade of sporadic popular unrest. One day in March, she saw a man shouting "Free Tibet!" in the street. She remembers the question rising in her mind: If the Chinese Communist Party has liberated Tibet, why is this man shouting for freedom? Many years later she would explore this question more deeply in her article published after the 2008 demonstrations in Tibet called Why Tibetans Protest . In 1999, Zhu Rui accepted an offer to work as a writer and editor for a magazine of the Tibetan Literature Association in Lhasa. She began to meet Tibetans from different backgrounds, and became especially interested in the life stories of the older generation who remembered what life was like before the Chinese takeover. At first, they were reluctant to speak with her, but she eventually began to win their trust. "When they were telling me their stories, they were very sincere and genuine," she says. "I just felt very close to them." She came to befriend a number of people who had formerly been members of the aristocracy. "It was such a great opportunity for me to listen to their stories; those Tibetans who in earlier times were criticized for being serf-owners. I had been taught that they were the exploiting class, but their personal histories were totally different from what I'd learned. It was from them that I came to understand the meaning of kindness." While Zhu Rui was vacationing at some hot springs, she met some local people and was shocked at the poverty she saw. "Their houses were near to collapse," she recalls. But what surprised her even more was what they told her about life in Tibet before the Chinese takeover in 1959. "They said that in earlier times, even ordinary farmers used to live in three-story buildings -- the kind made from stone with the top floor used as a family prayer hall, the family house on the middle floor and the ground floor for the livestock. They never ran short of food, they had plenty of yaks and sheep. They were really pretty satisfied with their lives back then. This is completely different from what we read in text-books and what we're told." Zhu Rui sees Beijing's announcement of March 28th 2008 as Serf Liberation Day , commemorating the 50th anniversary of the dissolution of the Tibetan parliament, as a provocative move. "I think that it's a well-planned scheme aimed at escalating the resentment and anger. When this resentment reaches a boiling point, then they have an excuse for responding with force." When the March 2008 demonstrations erupted in Tibet, Zhu Rui was not surprised. "I understood what it was all about--the pain in the hearts of the Tibetans. I found it so absurd when the Communist Party accused the Dalai Lama of inciting the protests." Zhu Rui believes that China's government is less robust than it appears. "People are becoming desperate under this kind of rule. They are protesting all over China, not just inside Tibet." When asked what she thinks is the biggest threat to the present leadership, Zhu Rui doesn't hesitate. "The will of the people," she says. Though not a practicing Buddhist, she wonders if she has a karmic connection with Tibet from a previous life. "As a writer, I feel that Tibet is my home. I miss it all the time. Whenever I hold a pen, it is all about Tibet. I won't write about anything else but Tibet until the end of my life." It was dark by the time Zhu Rui finished her talk at the Welfare Office hall. Her route back to the nunnery took her down a small path that winds for ten minutes through the woods. The man who made sure that she returned safely, lighting her way with his flashlight? The feared terrorist of her imaginings -- Tenzin Tsundue. Interview translation by Tenzin Losel. Rebecca Novick is a writer and the founding producer of The Tibet Connection radio program. She is currently based in Dharamsala, India . More on China
 
Domo Arigato Baby Roboto (VIDEO) Top
There are lots of awesome things about this video: 1) There is a book that plays "Mr. Roboto" when you open it. 2) There is a child who can do the dance better than "Styx." 3) There are parents who encourage this behavior and film it. WATCH: See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor . More on Funny Videos
 
Earl Ofari Hutchinson: The Limbaugh Strawman Top
First President Barack Obama stroked talk show kingpin Rush Limbaugh's ego by proclaiming him the pied piper of the GOP. Next Republican National Chair Michael Steele showed some moxie and publicly told Limbaugh that he was the shot caller in the GOP. That didn't last. In the next breath, he publicly pleaded for forgiveness from Limbaugh for his momentary pique. Then top Obama advisor Rahm Emanuel jumped in and lathered Limbaugh with praise and scorn as the boss of the GOP. Obama and Emanuel had an ulterior motive. They propped up Limbaugh as their straw man to tar the GOP as an antique, discredited, and obstructionist bunch of sore losers who will stop at nothing to derail Obama's policies. Steele is just simply running scared of Limbaugh. But in either case, they have done what Limbaugh couldn't do for himself and that's to wildly inflate his importance as the GOP kingmaker. Limbaugh got the kind of promotion that ad companies spend millions on for nothing. But it's still nothing but hot air. Limbaugh hasn't stopped one Obama staff or cabinet appointment, prevented one policy directive, executive order, or a single piece of legislation. That includes Limbaugh's favorite target Obama's economic stimulus bill. Heck, Limbaugh couldn't even stop his arch nemesis, Al Franken, from bagging the Minnesota senate seat. Franken's the guy who outrageously wolf ticketed Limbaugh as the big fat idiot, and then turned the wolfing into a best selling book. Limbaugh's rambling, long winded, rant at the Conservative Political Action Conference, complete with his confusion over what the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence say, was the topper. The crowd which was heavily white and male, lapped up every Limbaugh inanity. A stroll through the convention hall showed that the crowd's Cloud Nine divorce from political reality was almost laughable. Every anti in America--taxes, gay rights, gun control, and government, as well as touting their darling Sarah Palin--was on display there. This does a lot to further seal the GOP's lot as a party that is stepping fast toward becoming a self-marginalized, mean spirited, faded political entity. This isn't the first time that the Obama team created and then punched away at a GOP strawman target. When Republican rival John McCain plopped Sarah Palin on his ticket, a top Team Obama member reflexively hammered Palin. Obama quickly realized that it was a colossal mistake. He did the smart thing and simply congratulated her on being picked as McCain's VP candidate and then went back to talking about the issues. He knew not to make her the issue. But the lesson hasn't stuck in the case of Limbaugh. By making Limbaugh bigger than life in American politics, it gives steam to his inflammatory campaign of rumors, half truths, distortions, and flat out lies about Obama, liberals, and now Steele. Limbaugh's aim with Steele is to further cow the GOP into line; the line that forms behind him. At the start of his tenure as RNC chair, Steele had the good sense to know that kowtowing to Limbaugh was a prescription for even bigger disaster for the GOP. He resuscitated the old Bush line circa 2000, and talked about making the GOP a party of big tent diversity. Then like Bush he promptly forgot it. That's exactly what Limbaugh with his conservative white man's litmus test for the GOP wants. But that flies in the face of what Obama's election triumph showed. That is that the country's fast changing ethnic vote demographics looks nothing like it did a decade ago. Black, Hispanic, Asian and Native American voters now make up nearly a quarter of the nation's electorate. College educated whites make up more than one-third of the vote. Limbaugh's comfort zone voter demographic; white blue collar, heartland and deep South voters have shrunk to less than forty percent of the nation's voters. Immigration, higher birth rates, and the youth trends will continue to swell the numbers of minority and youth voters. The white electorate overall will continue to decline. It's not only the numbers that work against the GOP. It's also ideology. The Democrat's expanding core base of voters is more moderate, socially active, and pro government; the exact opposite of what Limbaugh rants for. Obama, Emanuel, and Steele know this. The Democrats would not have won the White House and Steele would not have beat out a pack of mostly Limbaugh fawning contenders for the RNC top spot if that hadn't been true. Still, Limbaugh has one powerful tool to bully, badger and cajole the GOP and saber rattle Obama. That's the airwaves. He'll exploit it to the hilt. But that won't make him the boss of the GOP let alone any real threat to Obama. It'll just make him an inviting and convenient strawman. Earl Ofari Hutchinson is an author and political analyst. His new book is How Obama Won (Middle Passage Press, January 2009). More on Michael Steele
 
Facebook Worm: Koobface Worm In New Form Infects Facebook, MySpace Top
Facebook and MySpace user beware: the Koobface virus is back in a new form. Huliq reports : A new strain of Koobface worm, a type of web application virus, is resurfacing in Facebook and Myspace. Security experts warn the users of the popular online social networks to be watchful and use caution when on the networks. The "Koobface" Facebook worm tricks users and hijacks accounts. This virus seems similar to the one that was affecting Gchat users not long. That worm also used false messages from friends to hijack your confidential information.
 
Justin Timberlake's John Mayer Impression On Fallon (VIDEO) Top
Justin Timberlake treated viewers to his impression of John Mayer during the premiere episode of Jimmy Fallon's late-night show. Fallon and Timberlake agreed they do impressions of people out of love, so the mocking wasn't mean spiritied. "John Mayer is like if Macy Gray and Smokey Robinson," Timberlake started, before self-correcting, "Actually, Macy Gray and Smokey the Bear, had a love child." Fallon then handed him a microphone, into which Timberlake did a few spot-on lines of Mayer's "Daughters." Timberlake then explained Mayer's face. "He has the most amazing solo face. Literally his tongue takes over." WATCH: More on Jimmy Fallon
 
City Signs $5M PR Contract Despite Budget Crunch Top
The Daley administration has signed another $5 million public relations contract -- bringing the citywide total to 11 firms and $55 million -- to augment the highly controlled message coming out of City Hall. Mayoral press secretary Jacquelyn Heard insisted last fall that not a penny would be paid to outside spin doctors until Chicago's budget crisis is over.
 
Alaska Sen. Mark Begich Discusses 3,370-Mile Commute, Shares Airport Travel Tips Top
Begich generally travels with a couple of copies of business or current affairs magazines. On this latest trip, he had an issue of BusinessWeek in tow, which, by nightfall, had been voraciously dog-eared and spattered in blue pen. A man whose hair remains kempt after a day of travel is a fastidious man, and Begich has thought out his system for traveling, down to the placement of reading materials. He keeps his magazines and papers in a blue shopping sack that he then slings over the collapsible handle of his carry-on.
 
Fern Siegel: Stage Door: Sleepwalk With Me, Lansky Top
Nathan Lane is among the producers of Sleepwalk With Me . It's his first foray into producing - and he's backed a winner. Now playing at the Bleecker Street Theater, Sleepwalk With Me stars Mike Birbiglia, who delivers a hilarious stand-up routine in just over an hour. Quiet and self-effacing, Birbiglia's style is Seinfeldian; he observes situations and relates them with a comic twist - sans Jerry's confidence. Birbiglia's gift is in the telling. His manner is seriously low-key; he's not a witty or sassy entertainer; he is an ordinary guy with an extraordinary problem: severe sleepwalking. But he copes with it, utilizing great humor and even grace. By framing the monologue as memoir, he reveals the vulnerability, crazy family dynamics and emotional tensions common to all. Birbiglia's calm speaks volumes. He charms the audience with a single prop - a chair - and a gentle demeanor that belies the pain just beneath the surface. He's a quirky character - brave enough to consider life as a comedian, yet unable to address potentially lethal problems. How he survives is as much a testament to his fantastically honed sense of humor as his uncanny ability to accept any experience with Zen detachment. Sleepwalk With Me is a terrifically funny show that proves nice guys finish first. Meyer Lansky, known as a quiet gangster who kept his wife and children away from the business, proves just the opposite. A partner of Charlie "Lucky" Luciano and Bugsy Siegel, Lansky was famous for organizing the Mob and uttering the immortal phrase: "We're bigger than U.S. Steel." Known as the "Little Man," Lansky was a numbers genius; the man who transformed bootlegging and hotel/casinos into a billion-dollar business. Fierce and determined, his story is the basis of Lansky , a one-man play written by Richard Krevolin and Joseph Bologna now at the St. Luke's Theater. Lansky (Mike Burstyn), who created a gambling empire, liked to boast he had New York, Las Vegas and Havana in his back pocket. But unlike his Italian counterparts, this first-generation American Jew shunned the spotlight. The play opens in Tel Aviv, as he petitions the Israeli High Court to grant him, "a retired businessman from Miami," citizenship. Burstyn relates Lansky's tale as apologia. We may dislike Lansky's path to wealth, but his story is unique in the annals of American Jewish history, a cross-cultural exercise in assimilation and identity. Lansky came of age on the mean streets of the Lower East Side in the early part of the 20th century. Schooled in crime by Arnold Rothstein, he was known as a brainy tough guy. The Bug and Meyer Gang was among the most violent during Prohibition, but in general, he claimed to prefer bribes to blood feuds. There were notable exceptions. When American Nazis gathered at Madison Square Garden in the 1930s, Lansky and "my boys" beat them up. When German saboteurs on the docks were sinking American ships during the war, the U.S. government asked for Lansky's help - and he eliminated the problem. What's interesting about the play is Burstyn's take: Lansky, born in Poland, where "even the dirt was anti-Semitic" will not capitulate. He wants to achieve the American Dream - and he wants to play by his own rules. At turns sympathetic, angry, intimidating and mournful, Burstyn gives us a glimpse of a smart, driven man torn between the Old World and the New. Lansky may be the most shadowy underworld figure, but in Burstyn's capable hands, he's a compelling one.
 
Clinton Doubtful That Iran Will Respond To Any Kind Of Diplomatic Engagement Top
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday expressed doubts in a private meeting with an Arab counterpart that the Obama administration's outreach to Iran would be successful. Clinton "said she is doubtful that Iran will respond to any kind of engagement and opening the hand out and reaching out to them," said a senior State Department official, who requested anonymity because he was describing a closed-door conversation. More on Iran
 
Pelosi To House GOP: Be Thankful For What You Have Top
Speaker Nancy Pelosi has a message for House Republicans who think they weren't given enough time to debate or amend the stimulus package that moved through Congress over an eight-day period earlier this session: You could have had much less. "To tell you the truth, I could have fast-tracked this much faster," Pelosi, a California Democrat, told a group of reporters and progressive writers at a breakfast gathering Tuesday. Pelosi had been asked about an anonymous White House aide's suggestion that the administration didn't approve of the speed with which the Speaker handled the package. "Let me get this straight," she said. "You're the president of the United States; you have a recovery package that you want done by the president's break; we get that done -- and we 'fast tracked it over the president's objections'? It couldn't be farther from the truth." Pelosi also denied assertions that she has instructed the White House not to talk to her members without going through her first. She said she told the administration: "Talk to the members. Talk to the chairmen. Talk to the different caucuses. They have a lot of ideas." She rejected the notion that she keeps a grudge list of folks who have crossed her, saying that every day is a new day. "They're saying I keep a list of members. It couldn't be farther from the truth. My commitment is to all of my members," she said. "I don't have any list." Republican objections that they were not included and didn't approve of the process through which the stimulus was passed, said Pelosi, only mask ideological differences that they had with the bill. "We gave them the regular order," said Pelosi. "We were not going to go backward and adopt their economic failed policies and that's what they're upset about." More on Nancy Pelosi
 
Robert J. Elisberg: Republicans Decide at CPAC to Run on Empty Top
I don't begin to have a clue what the Republicans are doing. If it's any solace, apparently neither do they. Conservatives are not merely the Republican "base," they've become the party. So, when CPAC met for the big conservative gathering last week, it was significant. It was to show America the foundation from which the Republican Party will attempt to rebuild itself, after getting crushed in the last two national elections, and losing the White House. It turns out that that foundation is papier-mâché. With the nation's economy in freefall and two wars being fought, how did the conservatives at CPAC make their case for having substance and depth? Their keynote speaker was a radio host. "Joe the Plumber" headed a panel. And they had a 13-year-old child deliver a policy address. Ladies and gentlemen, meet the new face of the Republican Party. Who the GOP hopes to convince America will lead the nation out of its George Bush-created collapse. Honest. Mind you, I understand that Rush Limbaugh is popular with his broadcast audience. But, geez, folks, so is Keith Olbermann. Just imagine if a floundering Democratic Party brought in Randi Rhodes to lead them. But it's worse than that. Rush Limbaugh's fire-breathing bombast is what helped Republicans lose their last two national elections! Why in heaven's name would a political party still want to listen to his advice??? It's like a favorite bus driver taking you over the cliff, and then asking him to drive you out after the crash bursts into flames. Forget directions, the bus is destroyed. Rush Limbaugh hates everything President Barack Obama stands for. We get it. Fine. But it's Republicans following that very hatred that helped get Barack Obama to be president!! And Republicans now make the conscious choice to have Mr. Limbaugh be their CPAC voice, their keynote, their standard bearer?? This is the political equivalent of pinning a "Kick me" sign on your own butt. Yet even that doesn't explain having Joe Wurzelbacher at CPAC. "Joe the Plumber" shouldn't have been anywhere near the convention - unless it was to fix leaking toilets. And even then it would be a bad idea, since he isn't licensed. From every public word he has spoken since elbowing into our accidental public consciousness, there is nothing about "Joe the Plumber" that is not pitiful and buffoonish - including that he's known to his admirers as "Joe the Plumber." America is facing its worst economic disaster since the Great Depression. You don't bring in clowns to lead policy. That conservatives think it's a good thing to be associated with Joe Wurzelbacher about anything speaks volumes about their grasping emptiness. The only thing that might speak louder is having 13-year-old Jonathan Krohn address the convention. Mind you, they didn't invite this preadolescent to preen adorably about the future when he's all grown up - he was there to lecture on party strategy! "Conservative Victories Across the Nation." Who cares that three years ago he was named "Atlanta's Most Talented Child"? The operative word in that title is "Child." (By the way, know how he got that exciting "title"? He was dubbed it by Deborah Norville on TV's "Inside Edition." No, honest.) Now, young master Krohn might be extremely bright for a 13-year-old kid. But the point is, if you're trying to convince America that your party's discredited philosophy should be given another chance, is that really what you want to put forward? This is a time when Republicans should be listening to party leaders with the historical stature of Dwight Eisenhower, Barry Goldwater, Nelson Rockefeller, Jacob Javits, even Ronald Reagan. Not any 13-year-old kid. The problem is that there aren't Republican leaders like that these days. So, the GOP is stuck with Rush Limbaugh, "Joe the Plumber" and a 13-year-old. "We have to return to conservative values" is what these crack experts keep insisting. Sorry, but if Republicans couldn't handle the concept of being themselves for the past eight years they were in power, why should anyone think that six weeks out of power would make a difference? But far more to the point - Conservative values are cutting takes and individual liberties without government control. That is how Republicans have been acting for the past eight years. There's nothing to "return" to. And...these conservative values are precisely what has gotten us into the mess we're in. I can understand a 13-year-old not grasping that, or "Joe the Plumber," but these other leading Republican voices know. And you know they know. They know that conservative values have failed America. That's why at CPAC, Rush Limbaugh once more explained how he hopes the President of the United States fails. It's the only flop trick he has left. Just imagine if a Democrat said this about any president. But the thing is, in the end, as much as Rush Limbaugh and Republicans think it's a winning strategy to copy how Democrats ran against George Bush, it shows the mindless futility of their papier-mâché GOP foundation - George Bush had a 23-percent approval rating. Barack Obama is at 67-percent. George Bush was tarnished with the Iraq War, collapsing economy, Hurricane Katrina, failing education, global warming, and so much more. Barack Obama was just elected in an Electoral landslide. Yet Republicans want to keep running against the man they just lost to. Want to return to the values they never left which got them voted out of office. And want to push forth as their public faces of leadership a radio host, "Joe the Plumber" and a 13-year-old child. It's pathetic. But then, it's that attitude when in power which got us in this mess in the first place.
 
Anthony Tjan: Big Company Lessons for Small Businesses Top
Dick Harrington was most recently the CEO and President of the world's largest information media company Thomson Reuters and is largely recognized for his transformation of the company from a diversified holding company to the information services juggernaut it is today. He currently serves as my Partner and Chairman at our early-stage investment firm, Cue Ball . He and I recently had a conversation about the wisdom of applying big company lessons to small ones. Here are some highlights from that conversation: After spending about a decade running a Fortune 500 - the world's largest information media company - what motivates you to now work with early stage and small businesses? Small businesses employ over half of all American private-sector employees and are responsible for most of the growth within the United States. Over the past decade, they have generated about 75 percent of new jobs annually. Most important, it is where our most creative thinking comes from. Still, most small companies fail because they have poor basic business practices. So I get excited about having the opportunity to mentor them and hopefully share some lessons. Think about it: it's a lot more exciting to get a company from 0 to $100M than getting a billion dollar company its next $100M. What is the biggest misconception people have between small and big businesses? Most small businesses think that big companies have limitless resources and tons of money, and accordingly can do whatever they want. At the same time, most large companies think that all small ones are entrepreneurial, acting quickly, and bursting with creativity. Neither of these common beliefs is true. Most big companies do not throw a lot of resources at every project, and most small companies tend to become stagnant when they are through with their initial, entrepreneurial stage. Give some examples of how you are applying big company lessons to the small firms you are investing in today. The questions we asked ourselves while I was at Thomson are the same ones that every small business has to ask itself. At the end of the day, business is business. The size of the organization doesn't matter. We all must understand our customers and the markets we serve, put the right people in the right places, and be sure the organization is aligned to deliver on our goals and objectives. What strengths shold entrepreneurs focus on? Small businesses have important competitive advantages. When founders are leading the company, they do so with an authentic passion to deliver on a vision. It's their life. They know their business and customers better than anyone else, and this knowledge can be hugely leveraged with the right operational practices. A large company may have more money for research, but the leader of a small company almost always has more direct interaction with their customers. I am a huge believer that customer-driven strategies win over the long run. What is the most significant challenge facing small businesses? The biggest issue is how well the entrepreneur can scale. It's important for entrepreneurs to realize that one person can't control everything, that they can't be VP of marketing, sales, operations, etc. That kind of mindset just won't work in the long run. How can an entrepreneur meet that challenge? It's important to let go - to trust people you hire - and to be okay with them making mistakes along the way. Even if a manager makes a decision 180 degrees in the wrong direction, it'll probably be okay. Let them learn from their own mistakes. What other lessons have you learned that would be helpful for small businesses and emerging leaders reading this? Years ago I started a plumbing supply company with some partners. We did not have a lot of capital so we sometimes had to get creative on how we filled orders. We went out of our way to ensure that every order was filled, always. Sometimes, this meant getting the parts from competitors or buying at retail to complete the order. But that was okay. What mattered was never disappointing a customer. We had "Yes, we can" years before Obama did. In addition to the customer-comes-first principle, I always had the motto that the higher you get in an organization, the harder you have to work. Success rarely happens on a nine-to five schedule. Also- dive into the important issues and from time to time "work the line" with other employees. The best way to shape people's behavior is to inspire them by doing it yourself. Finally, focus. Don't sweat the small stuff. Save the intensity and for the most important company priorities and always make sure those are done first. To help make that happen, deal at most with five things at a time, and don't put #6 on until #1 gets knocked off. You'll definitely increase your chances for success. This article first appeared on Harvard Business Publishing on February 26th, 2009. More on CEOs
 
James Boyce: If We Stop Listening To Idiots, Maybe We Won't Be So Shocked By The News Anymore. Top
The single best piece of political advice I have heard offered someone running for President was this: Put down the polls and look out the window. I thought of this yesterday as the markets fell to new lows, blah blah blah, because people were shocked that AIG had actually announced a $61.7 billion loss and that someone nameless at the Treasury Department, I love that part, decided to give $30 billion to AIG - of our money. The fact that this was shocking is well, not just shocking by pathetic. Right here at The Huffington Post on February 25th, I had written an entire post on the matter. I May Be A Complete Idiot But I've Never Lost $645 Million Every Day For An Entire Quarter. The answer I fear, for all of us, really is that I am not a complete idiot but I have a suggestion for who is - the 'economists' who are constantly quoted in newspapers and articles, especially those who are quoted as a 'survey of leading economists.' These 'experts' couldn't find their own asses with their own hands on a good day. Time and time again, over the past 24 months, we have heard rosy reports of future happiness from this oracles of error that have been proven time and time again to be laughably wrong. Think I exaggerate? Am guilty of hyperbole? I think not. For example, just this morning, Economists polled by Reuters had forecast pending home sales to fall 3.0 percent in January. 3% down? Economists plural? Well, let me tell you something. 3% seems like an awful light number given the news of the last three months, 3% is a dip. So what happened? The National Association of Realtors Pending Home Sales Index, based on contracts signed in January, plunged 7.7 percent to 80.4, the lowest since the NAR started tracking the series in 2001. Oops, seems like our calculator-laden heroes of forecasting missed it by just this much. Well, they missed it by over 100%. Pathetic. But read on in the article. "We expect similarly soft home sales in the near term, but buyers are expected to respond to much improved affordability conditions and from the $8,000 first-time buyer tax credit." Who said that? The chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, the same geniuses who, two hours ago, were predicting a slight decline in sales. We're on our own folks, let me tell you, we are own our own. Housing prices are going down another 30% to historical means and then, maybe, we'll have a floor. Until then, it's everyone for themselves and don't listen to the experts. These people are idiots. More on Economy
 
Study Links Too Much TV To Higher Asthma Risk Top
Children who watch television for more than two hours a day have twice the risk of developing asthma, British researchers reported Tuesday. Asthma affects more than 300 million people worldwide and is the most common children's chronic illness. Symptoms include wheezing, shortness of breath, coughing and chest tightness. More on Health
 
ProPublica: Tracking WhiteHouse.gov's New Iraq Page Top
by Brian Boyer , ProPublica The all-seeing eye of ChangeTracker , our handy tool that watches for changes on White House Web sites, spotted a total rewrite of the Iraq agenda over the weekend. The changes reflect the new policy presented by President Obama on Friday at Camp Lejeune, N.C. Previous to the change, the agenda page was more or less a shortened version of its predecessor at the Obama campaign Web site. Some differences we found interesting: Nearly one-fifth of the original version was devoted to "Preventing Humanitarian Crisis," promising "at least $2 billion to expand services to Iraqi refugees and ensure Iraqis inside their own country can find sanctuary." The word "humanitarian" is absent from the new version. The new version flatly states: "Iraq's future is now its own responsibility." And in the new version, the administration states outright their interest in "preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapon" and for "actively seeking a lasting peace between Israel and the Arab world." Take a look at all the changes. Hungry for more? You can sign up to be alerted -- via email, RSS, or Twitter -- as ChangeTracker spots changes. And if you're interested in tracking the changes to a website of your choice, you can create your own tracker: check out the tutorial for instructions. ProPublica is America's largest investigative newsroom. More on President Obama
 
Keli Goff: Clearly the G.O.P. Does Not Have Balls of Steel When It Comes to Limbaugh Top
I guess if you were to look up the word "naïve" in the dictionary you might see my picture. See I was one of the people who genuinely applauded Michael Steele's ascension to the head of the Republican National Committee. I had the opportunity to interview him for my book Party Crashing , about the evolving politics of African-American voters and found him to be not only gracious but incredibly forthright -- a quality that journalists (shockingly) don't always encounter in those in politics. But what I admired most about Steele was his willingness to be his own person. Whether you agree with him or not, you have to admit that it takes a strong individual to be willing to be in the ultimate minority, among minorities, and that is what someone who is both black and Republican is -- especially when they take decidedly non-conservative positions in support of affirmative action and in opposition to the death penalty. (Steele's independent streak earned him high profile black supporters, including mogul Russell Simmons and nearly 30% African-American support during his Senate run). During our conversation Steele even joked about the times when his own mother expressed loving consternation at his chosen political path. But something that she and others could be proud of was the fact that he was his own man. At least that's what I thought until yesterday. I cheered Steele on when he forcefully reclaimed the reins of the party he was elected to lead by proclaiming that he -- not Limbaugh -- was the Republican Party's rightful leader. On Sunday I expressed a similar sentiment on CNN's Reliable Sources , noting that there are plenty of Republicans who do not think that the Rush Limbaughs and Ann Coulters of the world speak for them. Limbaugh and Coulter may hog the limelight (and yes I cringe at the thought that I am giving them even more right now), and they may still sell books and line up some listeners, but they no longer command the cultural army they once did in their glory days of the Republican Revolution. (If they did then a black guy who's middle name is Hussein would not be going by the salutation "Mr. President" right now). That's the only reason they are so desperate to command even more attention, and ultimately why they are overcompensating by being even louder, more outlandish and in Rush's case larger than life -- literally -- than ever before. So I was incredibly disappointed to read that S teele had called Limbaugh to apologize, for simply telling the truth. Speaking as an Independent, but more importantly as someone who truly believes that it is in the interests of all voters, of all ages and colors, to have viable political options from a diverse array of qualified candidates from different parties each election cycle, I was hopeful that in Steele we had found someone who could help advance this cause. Clearly I was wrong. What's particularly disturbing about this story is that just weeks after Steele spoke about his party's efforts to reach out to minority voters, he became an unfortunate symbol of one of the party's most troubling historic images; the idea of a strong, black man being forced to go hat in hand to a white man, for no other reason than to keep a job that is rightfully his. Let me be clear. The purpose of this piece is not to kick Michael Steele when he is down. After all, any person who inspires David Duke to near suicidal apoplexy will hold a measure of begrudging respect in my book. I get that Steele finds himself between a rock and a hard place, but it is a rock/hard place of his choosing. He chose to take on the task of leading his party. Now it's time for him to act like the "Man of Steel" he has proclaimed to be, and stand up to Rush Limbaugh and any other voice from the right, that stands in the way of the G.O.P. becoming a party that truly represents America. www.keligoff.com More on Michael Steele
 
Jason Mesnick Talks To Kimmel About Choosing Two Women On 'The Bachelor' (VIDEO) Top
As you know by now, "The Bachelor" switched fiancees after the finale . Jason Mesnick proposed to Melissa Rycroft on the show, but six weeks later changed his mind and went back to second place Molly Malaney. Jason sat down with Jimmy Kimmel last night after the finale and reunion special aired to talk about the developments and his relationship with Molly. Kimmel asked him about all the juicy details including if he'd really slept with nine of the contestants (no) and why things didn't work out with Melissa. "You're really with [Molly]? Is there going to be a special tomorrow where we find something else weird out?" Kimmel asked. "No," Mesnick responded. WATCH: More on Jimmy Kimmel
 
Obama Touts Main Street Success As Wall Street Plunges Top
The Obama administration hosted an event at the Department of Transportation on Tuesday to mark the first case of stimulus money creating infrastructure jobs. But even as the president, vice president and secretary of the DOT were touting the 60 employees who would find work through a contract in Montgomery County, Maryland, a more ominous economic index hung over their heads. The plunging of the Dow Jones industrial average, to levels not seen since the late 1990s, has taken the air out of the room and grabbed a stranglehold on much of the news. It has also left Obama and his aides in a bit of a bind: unable to turn to the market (indeed, not willing to respond to the whims of market activity) they must find ways to show that their economic policies are working. What's ensued is a battle to redefine the frame of success: blue-collar jobs versus the Dow average, Main Street v. Wall Street. On Tuesday, the President took the stage to declare that, "already," the impact of the stimulus package "is being felt across this nation. Hard-working families can worry a little less about next month's bills because of the tax cuts ... and transportation projects once on hold are now starting up again." The White House, meanwhile, put out a fact sheet on Tuesday morning, asserting that investment in infrastructure would lead to 150,000 jobs saved or created by the end of 2010, surpassing, the president noted, the number of employees GM, Ford and Chrysler "have lost in manufacturing over the past three years combined." But for all the work created by the stimulus -- Obama said more than 200 projects would be launched across the country "over the next few weeks" -- there are those who will insist that the financial markets determine the administration's report card. Already, Republicans are using phrases like 'Obama-Bush continuity' to describe the current state of the economy, and the commentariat is practically begging the president to focus more on the markets. "I'm not saying, 'Mr. President, go stare at the Bloomberg quote machine and come to your senses,'" said CNBC's Jim Kramer. "I just want some sign that Obama realizes the market is totally falling apart. And that his agenda has a big hand in that happening." More on Barack Obama
 
Meet The Faces Of The Recession Top
On a special aired last Friday, February 27th, Oprah's Lisa Ling took an in-depth look at the faces of the recession - those ordinary individuals whose very lives and livelihoods have severely changed by the recession. Their stories show how quickly it can happen. Favor, [a 36-year-old mother], and her children, Breeanne, Noah and Hannah, have been homeless since January 2009. When Favor and her husband lost their jobs and could no longer keep up with their rising adjustable mortgage payments, she says they were forced to sell their condo and move into a rented one. Eventually, the couple ran out of money. Favor's husband moved in with friends, but Favor and their children split their time between two homeless shelters. During the day, they stay at a shelter for women and children called Loaves & Fishes. At night, they sleep at the city's homeless shelter. On weekends, when the daytime shelter is closed, the family is forced to wander the streets. Even those who saved were not spared. When the housing market crashed in 2007, [Norma and Michael's] successful mortgage business crashed with it. The bank repossessed their 2,600-square-foot home, and they were forced to move into their office space. "We expected to retire like everyone else around 62 or 65 years old," Norma says. But the most important takeaway from this is not that these stories exist, but that through their hardships, these people have managed to stay positive and find the strength to persevere. Roslyn, a 22-year-old mother of two who lost her home to foreclosure when she was laid-off from her $70,000-a-year job as a sales training manager says: If she could go back... there are two things she'd do differently--save and give more to others. "...[T]ithing and giving to others...my motto is: 'You've got to release to increase,' and there's something to be said about it." Read the whole story here... In the meantime, please share your own stories of both hardship and perseverance. How have you been affected? What lessons have you learned? And most importantly, where do you find your inspiration? Related: HuffPost Readers Pay It Forward: A Round-Up Of Random Acts Of Kindness HuffPost Readers Blog The Meltdown Blogging The Meltdown, Part 2: More HuffPost Readers Share Their Stories Blogging The Meltdown, Part 3: More Stories From HuffPost Readers Russell Bishop: Today's Economy: What Myth Are You Stuck In? More on The Recession
 
William K. Black: Americans Can Do Anything: Jindal's Lack of Faith in Democracy (Part 1) Top
This reaction to Governor Jindal's speech focuses on subjects I've taught: democratic government and public finance. His response to President Obama's State of the Union Address presented a paradox he did not recognize. His mantra is "American can do anything." Our democratic government is "the freest political system in the history of the world." He celebrates its success in response to terrible crises: slavery, world wars, depression, and terrorism." We triumph because when Americans: "pull together, there is no challenge we cannot overcome." The context of the paradox was his claim (despite macroeconomic theory and experience that proves the opposite) that nations suffering from severe recessions should respond solely with tax cuts and not stimulate demand through public expenditures. My focus is on the rationale he offers, which is that our democracy is illegitimate. When Jindal says "Americans can do anything," he actually means "except through democratic processes." But Democratic leaders in Congress rejected this approach [of making solely tax cuts]. Instead of trusting us to make wise decisions with our own money, they passed the largest government spending bill in history. We oppose the National Democrats' view that says -- the way to strengthen our country is to increase dependence on government. When Americans spend money individually we make "wise decisions" but if "government" spends money we are worse off because we become "dependen[t]" on it. The "government" spends money because it doesn't "trust us." Jindal cites the U.S. victories in the two world wars as proof that we can do anything. We won because we used public expenditures to raise, feed, train, equip, and transport armed forces to Europe and Asia. If we had cut taxes and "trust[ed]" citizens to "make wise decisions" with "our own money" we would have lost the wars. Jindal says that ending slavery was one of our greatest triumphs. Lincoln would not have saved the Union and ended slavery if he had responded to secession with tax cuts. Lincoln, the greatest Republican, dramatically expanded the federal government in order to win the Civil War, preserve the Union, and end slavery. The Confederacy, of course, wouldn't have let Jindal's parents into Louisiana. Public finance explains why governments are needed to provide a "public good" like national defense. Private markets cannot make a profit on "public goods." "Public goods" have two defining characteristics -- there is no practical manner for a private firm to exclude non-payers from the benefits and "consumption" of the good or service is "non rival." Public finance also explains why additional "collective action" problems, such as "free riders" ensure that "trusting" citizens to "make wise decisions with our own money" will never produce an effective national defense. Jindal proclaims that another triumph is that the U.S. "won the struggle for civil rights." He overstates, but government actions have brought progress. The initiative typically came from the targets of bias, but the targets' strategy nearly always centered on the enlistment of the federal government as an ally. Absent the federal government's support, the struggle for civil rights would have been lost. Public finance and political theory explain why this is true. Bigots that secure the support of local and state governments render their targets politically powerless. Such discrimination can prevail indefinitely. Private market actions cannot defeat it, and will often reinforce it. Private intimidation, often aided by local law enforcement, can make the bigotry lethal and far more effective. Federal government intervention was essential, and effective, in reducing such discrimination. Discrimination against disfavored groups causes great harm not only to the direct victims, but also "negative externalities" that harm the overall economy, society, and polity. Jindal emphasized the importance of education: To strengthen our economy, we also need to make sure every child in America gets the best possible education. Public education is the single most important reason for our nation's success. Jindal appears to understand that. Republicans led the charge for free public education. The slave states generally opposed public education. Slave states often made it illegal to educate slaves. Slave states repeatedly blocked passage of the Land Grant Colleges act. Lincoln was finally able to pass it because of secession. Education provides "positive externalities." Your child's superior education helps society. It makes her a more likely to be an informed voter and a better contributor to the economy. Better-educated kids are less likely to have children out of wedlock or enter shotgun marriages, more likely to marry, more likely to defer having children to a time when they can afford to care for them with their own resources, less likely to become criminals, and less likely to divorce (Cahn & Carbone 2009, Red Families v. Blue Families, forthcoming). The only way "to make sure every child in America gets the best possible education" is to provide free public education. Jindal also addressed "the crisis in health care." Republicans believe in a simple principle: No American should have to worry about losing their health coverage -- period. We stand for universal access to affordable health care coverage. We oppose universal government-run health care. Health care decisions should be made by doctors and patients -- not by government bureaucrats. We believe Americans can do anything -- and if we put aside partisan politics and work together, we can make our system of private medicine affordable and accessible for every one of our citizens. No one has a window to another's soul. We can only rely on how they act. Congressional Republicans do not act to ensure that "no American should have to worry about losing their health coverage -- period" or to provide "universal access to affordable health care coverage." Millions of Americans lose their coverage every year (an estimated four million since the official start of the recession). Republican Governors like Jindal and Palin have opposed efforts to prevent these losses of health care coverage. They have opposed Obama's plans to provide medical care coverage to the millions of Americans that have no coverage. The U.S. does not provide "universal access to affordable health care coverage." We went the wrong direction on access under Bush. Republican policies ensure that there will be no universal access. The system they protect makes insurance companies wealthy. Jindal's rhetoric: "health care decisions should be made by doctors and patients -- not by government bureaucrats" is doubly duplicitous. The assertion that "bureaucrats" make the health care decisions in other advanced nations is false, but his understanding of America is equally poor. Insurance company bureaucrats frequently make our health care decisions. Poor and working class Americans that have no health care coverage do not cherish their "freedom" to decide. They are forced to ask themselves: is my child so sick that I should take her to the emergency room and pray that the bills won't force me to declare bankruptcy? Jindal's jingoism ignores the reality working class Americans live. We believe Americans can do anything -- and if we put aside partisan politics and work together, we can make our system of private medicine affordable and accessible for every one of our citizens. It is strange that Jindal, in a speech emphasizing federal budgetary limitations, assumes that poorer Americans "can do anything" by ignoring their budgetary limits. Poorer Americans inherently cannot afford expensive health care or education. That is an economic fact that has nothing to do with partisanship. We can succeed, if we "work together" through government. Only government funding can make "private medicine affordable and accessible for every one of our citizens." Health care provides substantial positive externalities, so the private sector will not provide it adequately. Jindal proclaims that we have "the most powerful military." We do -- because of federal government spending, funded by taxes. Jindal, implicitly, concedes that government action is essential and has been effective in this field. Here's his key phrase again, he asserts that government services represent a failure to "trust[] us to make wise decisions with our own money." What he misses entirely are the concepts of democracy and voter competence. We are bright enough to understand the concept of "public goods", "externalities" and "collective action problems." As a result, we realize (1) that we need an effective national defense, (2) that the private sector is incapable of providing it, (3) that we can direct our democratically elected government representatives to provide for that defense, and (4) that we must fund that defense through taxes. We are making "wise decisions" -- we use government to provide useful goods and services that the private sector cannot adequately provide. We follow Jindal's advice, because when we use democratic government to: "pull together, there is no challenge we cannot overcome." It is Jindal that does not "trust" Americans and our democratic system of government. Americans can do anything if we work together. One of the essential ways in which we work together is through the government programs that produced each of the triumphs Jindal urges us to celebrate. More on President Obama
 
Jennifer Donahue: Bare Arms? Kissing Rush's A**? Folks, the Dow is in the Six-Thousands and the World Economy is Falling Apart Top
Am I dreaming, or am I really seeing what the "news" is today? RNC Chairman Michael Steele is trying to backpedal from his comments about Rush Limbaugh and Gov. Bobby Jindal. Rush Limbaugh is the titular head of the Republican party. Are we dumbing things down on purpose, because it is too hard to report on the economy? Do readers not want to hear about it? What is going on? There are 17 days left in President Obama's first 100 days. The stimulus bill got passed and is ready to be signed. The budget proposal has been put forward. Unless something dramatic happens in the next couple weeks, I'm not sure a stimulus bill that the administration and almost everyone in Congress is uncomfortable with is a slam-dunk. Now that the urgency of getting it passed is over, a week or two to read what was in it or hold hearings before it came out of Congress doesn't seem like it would have been such a bad idea. The budget is hot off the presses, so that has to be absorbed and put through the sausage maker that is Congress. Get ready, Dems. Republicans don't want the focus on their party to be Steele, Limbaugh and infighting. They're going to pick the budget proposal apart. The politics of the stimulus bill will look like kindergarten compared to this. I worked for a member of the Senate Budget Committee when President Clinton presented his first budget after being elected in 1992. For two years, Democrats held the majority in the White House, House and Senate, and it was that budget that began the development of message unity in the GOP. That message turned into the Contract with America, which helped allow the GOP to win a majority in the House and Senate in the next mid-term election. In today's market, that's called 2010. More on Michael Steele
 
Maia Szalavitz: What We Lost When We Lost Rocky-- Paper 1st Exposed Teen Torture Top
When people talk in the abstract about what we lose when we lose newspapers, it's often hard to drum up much concern. Yeah, people are losing their jobs--that's what happened to the buggy makers when the car took over. Yeah, news is important--but hey, we've got the web now. And the MSM blew it on Iraq, so who needs them anyway? We've got twitter. Just last week, Denver lost the Rocky Mountain News and before its website disappears, I wanted to share an example of just how much newspapers matter. This series-- Desperate Measures --was the first to comprehensively take on the multi-million teen abuse empire variously known as WWASP, WWASPS and Teen Help. Please take the time to read it--once you start, it's hard to turn away. (And sadly, though WWASP has lost a few rounds lately, it's still operating). Expensive to conduct, extensive, well-written and well-reported, this journalism helped inspire a generation of activists, as well as my book, Help at Any Cost: How the Troubled-Teen Industry Cons Parents and Hurts Kids, which is the first book length investigation of the billion dollar business. In the series, Pulitzer-prize winner Lou Kilzer and photographer Dennis Schroeder make abundantly clear that the programs affiliated with WWASP are harsh, abusive and wildly popular--and they get a top WWASP official to admit that their staff is untrained and its methods completely untested: "These people are basically a bunch of untrained people who work for this organization," Ken Kay told the Denver Rocky Mountain News in an interview before he rejoined Teen Help as a vice president. "So they don't have credentials of any kind. ... "We could be leading these kids to long-term problems that we don't have a clue about because we're not going about it in the proper way. ... "How in the hell can you call yourself a behavior modification program -- and that's one of the ways it's marketed -- when nobody has the expertise to determine: Is this good, is this bad?" Kilzer shows that WWASP's contract with parents allows the programs to "use handcuffs, mechanical restraints, electrical disabler, Mace or pepper spray in order to restrain the student." Parents could not sue the program for "liability or damages resulting from restraint procedures." In one of the earlier demonstrations of the power of multimedia, the series includes a haunting video of a child sobbing that he wants to come home, but insisting--as though brainwashed--that he needs to stay in WWASP's program. The series shows how--in facilities located both inside the U.S. and in countries like Jamaica, Mexico, Samoa and the Czech Republic-- WWASP staff beat, intimidated, humiliated, sexually abused and in some cases tortured teenagers. In case after case, officials and staff present sometimes bizarre excuses for what are clearly systemic abuses. One claimed a program in Mexico was shut down because the police thought it was a 'house of ill-repute '. As a result of hard-hitting journalism like this, legislation just passed the House for the first time in the new Congress last week. It bans the use of any technique "designed to degrade or humiliate" children and allows them access to a hotline to report abuses at these facilities. The bill was championed by Education and Labor Committee Chair George Miller (D-CA) and work is underway to introduce it in the Senate. Websites cannot afford to do investigations like this--bloggers are not paid and reporters are hurried to keep up with one breaking news story after another. Authors cannot investigate every incident without back-up. The loss of newspapers and the investigations they do is a tragedy and it puts us all at risk. Jefferson said he'd rather see a country without government than one without newspapers--it looks like his nightmare is coming true. Program note: My other book, The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog and Other Stories from a Child Psychiatrist's Notebook, co-written with Bruce Perry, MD, PhD, the child psychiatrist in question, is featured on Oprah today!!!
 
Law Firm McDermott Will And Emery Cuts Free Coffee Top
CHICAGO - First the Chicago law firm of McDermott Will & Emery laid off 60 associates and 89 staff members. Now the firm will no longer provide free coffee to its lawyers. McDermott's Chicago office head Quentin Heisler recently informed colleagues not only will the firm no longer provide free coffee, it also will suspend evening food services. Heisler said the firm will keep single-serve coffee machines and make beverages available for client meetings. Heisler says the cutbacks are not signs the firm is in financial trouble. He said the changes are symbolic moves made in conjunction with other budget cuts. Heisler said the firm also canceled a black-tie, 75th anniversary event at the Field Museum. The money saved will supplement severance benefits to staff employees who lost their jobs. Information from: Chicago Tribune, http://www.chicagotribune.com More on Economy
 
Jonah Goldberg: 'I Hope Obama Fails, Too' Top
If the war over Rush Limbaugh truly is "tired," then why are people like Jonah Goldberg still fighting it, in insipid little columns, like the one he's written for the L.A. Times , "The tired war on Rush Limbaugh." I mean, we get it: Limbaugh has successfully recast himself as the Great Emasculator, and he's scalping sacks left and right -- Michael Steele is the latest example. All the Democrats are doing is sitting back and enjoying the spectacle, right? Well, not exactly. Goldberg is apparently aggrieved that anyone would object to Limbaugh's oft-repeated sentiment that he "hopes Obama fails." Observe the eternal sunshine of Goldberg's spotless cranial void as it attempts to write its way to credibility: Well, given what Obama wants to do, I hope he fails too. Of course I want the financial crisis to end -- who doesn't? But Obama's agenda is much more audacious. Pretty much every major news outlet in the country has said as a matter of objective analysis that Obama wants to repeal the legacy of Ronald Reagan and remake the country as a European welfare state. And yet people are shocked that conservatives, Limbaugh included, want Obama to fail in this effort? What movie have they been watching? Because I could swear that conservatives opposing the expansion of big government is what conservatives do. It's Aesopian. The scorpion must sting the frog. The conservative must object to socialized medicine. Besides, since when did hoping for the failure of ideological agendas you disagree with become unpatriotic? Liberals were hardly treasonous when they hoped for the failure of George W. Bush's Social Security privatization scheme . Since when? Uhm...I could go on for about a thousand words on this, but happily, Sadly, No! has provided us with a picture that makes my point rather nicely:
 

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