Tuesday, May 5, 2009

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Jonathan Richards: Empathy Top
Obama tries to slip a code word past the GOP, but they nail it. More on Supreme Court
 
Matthew Filipowicz: How Joe The Plumber Will Keep The "Queers" Away Top
As you may have heard, Samuel Wurzelbacher, aka Joe the Plumber, was giving an interview to Christianity Today , where as usual, he displayed some of his now famous Wurzelbacher wit. When asked about gay marriage, Mr. the Plumber said : People don't understand the dictionary--it's called queer. Queer means strange and unusual. It's not like a slur, like you would call a white person a honky or something like that. You know, God is pretty explicit in what we're supposed to do--what man and woman are for. Now, at the same time, we're supposed to love everybody and accept people, and preach against the sins. I've had some friends that are actually homosexual. And, I mean, they know where I stand, and they know that I wouldn't have them anywhere near my children. Classy. But, Joe's not only someone who can "articulate conservatism" as Rush Limbaugh said . He is a man with a plan. A plan to keep the "strange and unusual" homosexuals away from his children. Take a look. Alright, I'm going to be honest with you. I'm not sure Joe the Plumber actually has kids. I searched the web for about 10 minutes, then got bored and stopped. I know he's divorced . And if he does have kids, he may not literally place them in a crate to keep them away from gay people. Maybe it'd be in a closet, or perhaps the basement. But really, this is all the Republicans have left. Embrace the bigoted. The racist. The sexist. Box themselves in more and more until they're crushed by their own hatred. And if they want to box themselves in, I say fine. It leaves more room for the rest of us. More on Satire
 
Andy Borowitz: CNN Warns Swine Flu Could Continue Through Sweeps Top
CNN reported today that its reporting of the swine flu story could spread significantly in the days and weeks ahead and might continue throughout the all-important May sweeps rating period. CNN said that its early reporting of the swine flu story had been contained to one or two hours a day but had recently increased to all twenty-four hours. "This is an alarming spread in the reporting of this story," said Carol Foyler, a CNN spokesperson. "We have seen swine flu spread from primetime to all the other day parts." Ms. Foyler said that in recent days CNN had identified several cases of "increasingly scary graphics and fonts" about swine flu during its news programs. "These scary graphics are popping up everywhere in greater and greater numbers," she said. "These are signs that the swine flu coverage is growing more intense and virulent." The CNN spokesperson said that news host Lou Dobbs had even taken time out from fear-mongering about immigration to fear-monger about swine flu: "This is an unprecedented development." Even as CNN reported that its broadcasting of the swine flu story was on the rise, there was evidence that intense cases of swine flu reporting had spread from CNN to MSNBC. "We have also seen several cases of panic-inducing graphics and terrifying fonts," said MSNBC spokesman Terry McTate. "I don't want to frighten people, but we haven't seen a story this scary since Y2K." More on Swine Flu
 
Roger Warner: The Underperformers: How Key U.S. Officials Are Making a Tribal Crisis Worse Top
[Part 4 in a series: The Strange New Life of an Old Secret War ] A little over a year ago, I was walking down a hallway in the U.S. embassy in Bangkok, Thailand, with a retired C.I.A. operative, Bill Lair. Back in the Vietnam war era, Lair started and ran a covert war in Thailand's Southeast Asian neighbor, Laos, where he worked closely with a Laotian hilltribe, the Hmong. Now he and I were in Thailand to try to get to the bottom of a contemporary mystery - namely, why wasn't the U.S. government solving the peculiar problem of the Hmong today? And what a complicated mess it is! In three countries, no less! A perfect trifecta of unnecessary misery! To sum up: 1. In Laos itself, a few Hmong resistance bands were still holding out against the neo-communist government, a third of a century after Lair's C.I.A. program had folded. The resistance had a few rusty rifles and a lot of women and children who spent their days foraging in the jungles for roots to eat. The time had come for the resistance to end - peacefully, with safety guarantees. But nobody was trying to end it. 2. Across the Mekong River in Thailand, a human rights crisis had erupted, out of sight of Western journalists. Both real and fake Laotian Hmong refugees were under intense Thai pressure to "voluntarily" agree to be repatriated to Laos, a country that has no system of justice. 3. In the United States, which does have a justice system - a weirdly imperfect one - prosecutors had launched a misguided terrorism court case against Hmong-American exiles. Though Hmong-Americans had given grassroots support to the beaten-down resistance in Laos, the Justice Department had hyped their capabilities. A U.S. undercover agent had helped concoct a enormous plot to overthrow Laos with heavy weapons and mercenaries that had little or no relation to reality. It was, indeed, one helluva mess. As far as Lair and I could tell, all three parts of the tribal crisis were connected, by history, by failed policies, and by the Hmong themselves. We also thought solving any one of the three branches of the Hmong dilemma might make it a little easier to solve the others. So we had come to Thailand to work the issue of Hmong refugees - not because we were convinced we would succeed, but because it seemed worth a shot. We walked down the embassy hallway, lined with portraits of all the past U.S. ambassadors to Thailand, many of whom Bill Lair had known. Capable men, for the most part (no women had served in that post) - and a few genuinely great diplomats. Men of substance, of character, of ingenuity, of principle, who had served their country well and who had solved problems for Thailand and for refugees from neighboring countries, too. Boy, were we ever in for disappointment. We were shown into a corner office whose ceiling must have been twenty-five feet high. And there we met the tall, clean-shaven official - for now, let's just call him that, an official - who was supposed to be able to answer our questions. He said he was glad to speak with us about the Hmong dilemma - meaning, in his case, that dilemma of Hmong refugees in Thailand. He said it was important to him, both personally and professionally. In fact, when he'd had his Senate confirmation hearings, more than two thirds of the questions he'd received had been about refugees in Thailand. That's how important it was. We briefed him. Lair and I had gone to the Thai city of Nong Khai, and met with some celebrated "jungle' Hmong leaders who were being held in detention, under threat of forced repatriation. They were still packed in the detention center, in such close confinement, under such oppressive conditions, that some of them were going crazy. Thousands more Hmong from Laos were also being held in oppressive conditions in another location. Hoping to influence the Thai government's refugee policies, Lair had visited his brother-in-law, the former foreign minister of Thailand, to see about getting an audience with Thailand's king, the country's moral conscience. But the king's health was failing, and Lair couldn't get in to see him. And Lair didn't have much better luck with the retired Thai generals he knew. Long ago, they'd all been partners with the Hmong in the Laos war, but they couldn't be bothered to help the tribespeople now. The political chaos in Thailand - the demonstrations, the threats of coups - made our mission even harder. Our last hope, as we explained to the embassy official, was a certain Thai military officer, a Gen. Niphat, who was in charge of the repatriation efforts, and who kept his job even when governments in Bangkok changed. We had never met Gen. Niphat, but he had done some of his training in the U.S. with the U.S. Army. Wasn't there a way to talk with him and enlist his cooperation? At the very least, maybe Niphat could open the door to international screening, to help determine which Hmong could go back to Laos in safety and which were genuine refugees who deserved protection and resettlement in the west. The American embassy official said he knew Gen. Niphat. Oh, really? Great! How? We asked. From riding around in a helicopter with him for a few days after the big tsunami that hit Thailand and Burma, the official said. We spent a few days together. Did you ask him about the Hmong repatriation issue? No, said the official calmly. Why not, we asked. "He isn't at my level," replied the official serenely, as though that explained everything. We left the embassy's air conditioning for the muggy polluted air of Bangkok's Wireless Road, and ducked into a nearby coffee shop to try to make sense of what we'd heard. Not at my level? We were stunned. A diplomat working for a democracy - you know, where all men are created equal - who wouldn't talk to the key Thai general because of differences in rank? Lair said sadly that the most effective ambassadors he worked with in Thailand and Laos had the common touch. "They could talk with prime ministers and kings. But they would also sit down on a curb and talk with taxi drivers, if there was a reason. They talked with whoever they needed to get the job done." We went back to the U.S. - mission unaccomplished. In the year that has passed since then, I have often tried to figure out what to make of this pompous and underperforming U.S. embassy official. On one hand, the problem was bigger than the man. The Laotian and Thai governments, the Hmong and Hmong-Americans were all involved, and had been for decades. Changing a dynamic like that was not easy. On the other hand, U.S. Ambassador to Thailand Eric John - oops! Did I just mention his real name? - seems to have exaggerated his commitment to refugees, in his Senate hearings before he took up his Bangkok posting. Whether or not he lied, he still owed the senators, and the refugees, an explanation. Because he hadn't really tried making a breakthrough with the Thais on their policies toward refugees. He'd just been going through the motions. As it turns out, underperformance and doublespeak are par for the course among U.S. officials involved in the three-nation Hmong crisis. To my mind, the U.S. ambassador to Laos, Ravic Huso, is the same kind of obstacle to progress as his colleague in Thailand. If Ambassador Huso has done anything to bring the tattered Hmong resistance to a close, peacefully, for everyone's benefit, I've certainly never heard of it. He has, however, made a breakthrough by newly exchanging military attachés with the Lao People's Democratic Republic. This means the U.S. military will be giving assistance and training to the Laotian military ... which is hunting down the last of the C.I.A.-trained resistance fighters. Go figure. In the U.S., the single most signficant underperformer is probably McGregor Scott, until recently the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of California. As U.S. Attorney, he had the responsibility for vetting - for checking and signing off on - the flawed Hmong terrorism case in Sacramento before the indictments were made. If you read his press clippings, you'll find out he knew better, because he'd prosecuted a very similar case, the so-called Lodi case, and regretted it, or parts of it, even before he went after the Hmong. But he went ahead and did it anyway. The Lodi and Hmong cases were part of a controversial strategy, called pre-emptive terror arrests, devised by the Bush administration under John Ashcroft, and continued under Alberto Gonzalez. The theory was that the best way to prevent terrorist attacks was to arrest likely terrorists before they ever acted. In practice, sometimes this meant arresting members of immigrant groups who hadn't even thought of committing illegal acts until U.S. undercover agents persuaded them to do so. Take a look at this New York Times story from October, 2006 about pre-emptive terrorism arrests and prosecutions in the post-9/11 era. It was published eight months before the Hmong were arrested, and it profiles the Lodi case, and quotes McGregor Scott. The pattern was the same: In Lodi, California, an undercover agent - a convenience store clerk who was paid $200,000 - ordered a young Pakistani-American named Hamid Hayat to go to a terrorism training camp in Pakistan. Hayat, a confused and not very bright kid who was trying to please everyone, obediently went off, and when he came back he was busted. There was a big press conference, and law enforcement officials, of whom McGregor Scott was one, triumphantly announced they had uncovered a California cell of al Qaeda. But no connection to al Qaeda was ever proved, and over time it turned out that some of the charges against the defendants were grossly exaggerated and others were false. An FBI veteran was so upset by the low investigative standards he saw that he worked for the defense lawyers for free. As Scott admitted to the Times reporters, "One of the biggest mistakes that we can make is to overhype these cases on the front end. And if it is a widely held perception out there that we did that in this case, then I regret that, because that was never our intent." But hyping was his intent. As one of the Times' sources explained, "Cases are good for getting resources, good for publicity and good for morale." In other words, law enforcement teams that make anti-terror busts get high fives from their peers, and they got appropriations the next year. That's what these cases are really about - the in-house congratulations, and the departmental budgets getting approved - more than preventing terror attacks, or winning court convictions. I've written about the oddities of the Hmong case in an earlier posting . Suffice it to say, it followed the same blueprint as the Lodi case. A government undercover agent co-created a plot to overthrow the government of Laos that the Hmong-American defendants were interested in, to varying extents, but never would have come up with on their own. After the arrests, there was a triumphant news conference. "This investigation reads like a movie script, but turned out to be reality," declared one of McGregor Scott's colleagues. In fact, the written coup plan reads like a really bad adventure movie script - according to Bill Lair and other CIA veterans of the real Laos war, who have read it and declared it unworkable, a delusional fantasy. As the case has steadily progressed through preliminary filings and hearings, more and more of the undercover agent's assertions have turned out to be riddled with mistakes and exaggerations. The defendants never bought any weapons, nor had they raised more than a fraction of the money needed for the coup. And yet for this crime that never happened the defendants could be sentenced to more than a lifetime in prison - if the case went the way the prosecution hoped. Not that this seems particularly likely. On Monday, May 11, 2009, a hearing will be held in the Hmong "terrorism" court case in the federal court house in Sacramento, California. The defense lawyers have filed a motion to dismiss the case on grounds known as Outrageous Government Conduct. The prosecution lawyers, in their opposing motion, admit their undercover agent made mistakes and helped plan the plot for which the defendants were arrested ... but argue that encouraging suspects to commit criminal acts "is constitutionally permissible, so long as the Government has not manufactured a crime from start to finish." I've never been able to find the part of the Constitution that permits this, though I agree that the prosecution has raised a sticky point: In a criminal case, how much of the planning for a crime do defendants have to think up themselves and still get convicted, if the government plans the rest? Do citizens have to think up the majority of the conspiracy, say, 51% ? What if citizens plan just plan 1% of the crime and an undercover agent plans 99%? Can the citizens still be found guilty? Does the Constitution say anything about that? And so on. The defense lawyers are playing offense, and the prosecution lawyers have gotten themselves in an awkward position, because the case wasn't solid to begin with. Outside the Sacramento courthouse, in the plaza, a rally will take place, before and after the hearing. Thousands of Hmong-Americans will be there. There will be speeches. Among others, Bill Lair, the founder of the CIA's war that brought the Hmong to America, is expected to poke holes, gently and sardonically, in the prosecution's case. I shot some video at the previous Hmong rally in this case, and expect the May 11th rally to be the same kind of spectacle. All the Hmong-Americans will be wearing white shirts, to symbolize their collective innocence. They will wave American flags, and the old Laotian royalist flag, and they will sing the Star-Spangled Banner. Over and over. Joyfully. Without irony. They will be cheerful and polite. And when the rally is over, if the past is any guide, the Hmong-Americans will sweep up their own trash and haul it away, and the courthouse plaza will be cleaner than it was when they got there. And these are the people our Justice Department is calling "terrorists," and our State Department is refusing to help. In a future episode : How a coordinated, tri-national approach by the State and Justice Departments could partly, or even totally, resolve the Hmong crisis. Previously-published episodes in this series: Part 1: The Weirdest Terrorism Case in America Part 2: The C.I.A. Man Returns Part 3: The C.I.A.'s Tribe in Danger Videos accompanying this series to date: The Strange New Life of an Old Secret War An overview of a federal terrorism case and its link to an old C.I.A. operation (duration 7:15) A Tribal Resistance on the Brink A C.I.A. returns to the vestiges of a tribal force he raised, and finds it in crisis (duration 2:30) All contents copyright 2009 by Roger Warner More on Thailand
 
Obama Notre Dame Speech: Anti-Abortion Activist Challenges Cardinal George To Speak Out Top
A national anti-abortion activist is pressuring Cardinal George to call for Notre Dame to rescind it's invitation to President Obama to speak at the school's upcoming commencement, WBBM Newsradio reports . Randall Terry, founder of Kansas-based Operation Rescue , challenged George, the Archbishop of Chicago, from the steps of Archdiocese headquarters Tuesday. "The Cardinal needs to stand in front of the cameras and say, 'I was wrong. You can disinvite the president, and you should.'" George said in late March that Obama's planned appearance at the storied Catholic university caused "extreme embarrassment" for Catholics but he did not urge the school to revoke the invitation. George's comments sparked heated discussion among American Catholics about the extent to which church doctrine, especially on right to life issues , should influence Notre Dame's selection of a commencement speaker. A Tribune report on American Catholic's reaction to Obama's planned speech found 54 percent supported Notre Dame, while 38 percent opposed the invitation. More on Barack Obama
 
Johann Hari: Thirty Years After Her Victory, Thatcherism Is Bankrupt Top
The celebrations of the thirtieth anniversary of Margaret Thatcher's ascent to power have had a surreal quality. The moist panegyrics from David Cameron and Boris Johnson - followed by an army of cheering commentators, and a distant, shameful echo from Gordon Brown - have been filled with statements that are the opposite of the truth. Yet there they stand, unchallenged, as the road-map for our future. The defences of Margaret Thatcher invariably have three prongs. She made it possible for ordinary British people to "get ahead", and "aspire" once more. She expanded freedom. And her strip-down-the-state economic model saved Britain - and spread prosperity across the world. Each of these is simply asserted, as if these claims can't be measured objectively. Just shut up and rejoice! But your ability to "get ahead" - to rise up the social ladder - isn't simply a matter of hunches; it can be tested scientifically. And every study has found one thing: social mobility collapsed under Margaret Thatcher. As a massive recent London School of Economics study showed once again, in the 1980s and 1990s we became a country where if you were born rich, you stayed rich, and if you were born poor, you stayed poor. This shouldn't have been a surprise. Every country that adopts a low-tax, low-investment model sees the same. The evidence shows only countries that tax the wealthy and use the cash to lift up the rest - like Sweden - consistently achieve the dream of allowing anyone with talent to make it. So thanks to her policies, a whole generation of poor and lower middle class children remained stuck, unable to achieve their potential. Look at the new generation of rising Tory candidates and MPs and you see this failure of social mobility writ large. They are overwhelmingly the children of the wealthy, educated at the most expensive schools. Everybody else is stuck, unable to get up and out. While you are entitled to your own opinions, you are not entitled to your own facts. To claim Thatcher boosted aspiration is false - unless you mean merely the aspiration of the rich to become super-rich. How about Thatcher's support for freedom? This is a leader who called Nelson Mandela a "terrorist" and vandalised all attempts to place sanctions on Apartheid South Africa, while her husband cheerfully referred to black Africans as "coons." This is a leader who called the self-described "fascist" General August Pinochet "a great man", after he toppled an elected leader in a violent coup and rounded up thousands of dissidents to torture to death. This is a leader who upheld a system of Protestant supremacism in Northern Ireland, while the police force there conspired with criminal gangs to murder Catholics. This is a leader who at the height of the AIDS crisis criminalized any mention of homosexuality in our schools. Freedom? What about the idea that her economic model "saved" us? Thatcher wanted to build a "night watchman state", where the government stopped anyone invading the country or your home, but otherwise stood inert and passive. She saw regulation as "red tape", and boasted of building a "bonfire" of it. And what happened? Her apostles took this to its logical conclusion, building a "shadow" banking system free of all government interference. If she had been right, it would now be the self-regulating engine of the global economy, pulling us all to a better world. It didn't quite turn out that way. As John Campbell, her best biographer, has written, the tragedy of Margaret Thatcher is that she sincerely believed rolling back the state would create a generation like her father, a moral, self-reliant grocer. Instead, it created a wave of businessmen like her son, a parasitic amoral crook. Yet David Cameron's election song could be the old Honeybus hit "I Can't Let Maggie Go." He cheered the ugliest of Thatcher's policies while they were happening: he even accepted a free holiday jaunt to Apartheid South Africa paid for by one of the most depraved corporations backing the whites-only regime. Today, he says she will be his inspiration in power, as his claims to moderation burn away under the pressure of recession. But oddly, the party that has found it hardest to get out of Thatcher's shadow is Labour. They drank so deeply of Thatcherism after the collective trauma of 1992 that they have become tarred with its worst failings. As Labour now collapses into a mess of fratricidal sound-bites, it would do well to pause and remember a slap-in-the-face fact. Contrary to the ahistorical waffle pumped out over the past week, Margaret Thatcher never won over a majority of the British people. At every single election where she was leader, 56 percent of the British people voted for parties committed to higher taxes and higher public spending. She won because the centre-left majority was divided and at war with itself - and because of our lousy electoral system. Over the past year, there have been small hints of what a de-Thatcherized Labour Party could look like - and it's a world away from both Toryism and the old, hellish Scargillite closed shops. It is simple Scandinavian-style social democracy that marries thriving markets to an interventionist state. It would tax the rich more, both to reduce inequality and to pay for public services. Despite the out-of-touch press shrieking, some 68 percent of us supported the new 50 percent top rate of tax on the richest 1 percent of Brits. It would argue for a Keynesian stimulus directed at transforming Britain into a low carbon economy - the only sane response to a depression and an unravelling climate. And it would put at the forefront of its agenda moves like Harriet Harman's excellent Equality Bill, which will require local authorities to spend most on the poorest areas, and to put greater equality at the heart of all decisions. The logic of this legislation fits with the egalitarian, European mindset of the silent liberal majority of British people. If we leave it to the market Thatcher-style, it will take eighty years before women are paid the same wages as men for the same work - and we will all be dead. Who wants to defend that? Who wants to say companies shouldn't even have to publish their gender gap, as the Bill demands? A long queue has been forming outside TV studios of Tory MPs saying just that. But a recession is the time when we can least afford to waste talent and promote mediocrities just because they are men. We need the best talents in the best positions now. Yet all this comes far too little, and far too late in the day. Brown's "Green New Deal" is pitifully small, and his ability to sell any policy is limited by his own lousy communication skills and his refusal to decisively cast off the shroud of Thatcher. Even the 50 percent tax rate was introduced with a nervous, quaking commitment to reverse it once the recession ends. Who will point out that during America's largest boom - the 1950s - it had a 92 percent top rate of tax under a Republican President? And so the window to a better, more social democratic Britain seems to be creaking shut. Gordon Brown stands frozen as his Blearsy-eyed colleagues hiss and snap all around him, protesting at even the tiniest nudges to the left. Why won't Labour let the Iron Lady rust? Johann Hari is a writer for the Independent newspaper. To read more of his articles, click here or here .
 
Mike Pence Descends Into Gibberish After Evolution Questions From Chris Matthews (VIDEO) Top
The conversation started off with a rather simple question. "Do you believe in evolution, sir?" Chris Matthews asked Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.), a leading House conservative. "Um... I, do I believe in evolution? Ah, I, I, ah... I embrace the, uh -- the, uh -- the view, ah, that God created the heavens and the earth, the seas and all that's in them..." Matthews interrupted. "Right, but do you believe in evolution as a means to get there?" The sparring continued for the next several minutes, as Matthews demanded the Republican congressman own up to his party's continued skepticism over theories and facts that have broad support from the scientific community, such as evolution and climate change. At one point, Matthews had Pence confirm for the record that he "accepts the scientific method." Pence said he did, but argued that the mainstream media was ignoring alleged growing skepticism among scientists over global warming. Asked about teaching evolution, Pence suggested schools should cover "all these controversial areas" and let the children decide. Matthews concluded, "I think you believe in evolution, but you're afraid to say so because your conservative constituency might find that offensive." Get HuffPost Politics On Facebook and Twitter! More on Chris Matthews
 
Heather Robinson: Report from the AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington D.C. Top
The mood at this year's American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) policy conference - the yearly gathering that draws thousands of Israel-supporters to be briefed on issues related to the U.S.-Israel relationship and to lobby their members of Congress - was cautiously optimistic. On the whole, most speakers seemed to voice trust in President Obama's leadership, and the theme of the conference, emblazoned on signs that decorated the main banquet hall and hallways of the Washington Convention Center, was "Relationships Matter." (This was a stark departure from the mood of urgency about Iran's march towards nuclear capability that dominated other recent AIPAC policy conferences. In the words of one attendee, "Look around. It's gone from High Noon to Kumbaya.") Of course, AIPAC works with whomever is in office in Washington and Jerusalem and is generally very effective at doing so. Now that President Obama is at the helm, the emphasis seems heavy on cooperation with other countries to put the squeeze on Iran's leadership via sanctions. Among attendees, percolating just beneath the surface one sensed the question, will the relationship between President Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu be fruitful in helping to halt Iran's march toward nuclear capability, and should it become necessary as a last resort, will President Obama support Israel in its self-defense and defense of the region? The other major theme at the conference was that the Arab states around Israel are getting nervous about Iran, too, and that this may make them open to possibilities--including acceptance of Israel--on which they have never previously budged. In other words, they are also scared of Iran and as a result might perhaps reconsider their refusal to accept Israel, because they may need Israel to protect the region. Several speakers, including Israeli President Shimon Peres, talked about the Saudi Peace Initiative to carve a Palestinian state out of parts of Israel, with a capital in East Jerusalem, and achieve what the Saudis characterize as a "just solution" to the Palestinian refugee problem in exchange for acceptance, by the other countries of the middle east, of Israel's right to exist with a complete withdrawal to the pre-1967 borders. Peres spoke of the Saudi Peace Initiative as marking a "serious U-turn" in relations between Israel and other countries in the region. He continued, "Israel wasn't a partner to the wording of their initiative. Therefore it doesn't have to agree to every word. Well, nevertheless, Israel respects the profound change. Israel hopes it will be translated in real action, the sooner the better. "Dear friends, let me make it clear. We trust the leadership of President Obama. We trust he may make a way to open both a regional agreement and meaningful bilateral negotiations. It can be done, both, together, right away. It is a real change in the situation..." Wise to keep in mind that Peres, who went on to rhapsodize that "peace is not necessarily the result of detailed negotiations with many lawyers --my god --with many map designers, my god. I know that peace bears from the soil, like a geyser. It is beautiful to behold. It is impossible to contain," was a prime architect of the unsuccessful Oslo Peace Accords. On the other hand, with the specter of a nuclear Iran looming on the horizon, no one knows what the future holds. And at AIPAC this year, along with some pretty tasty sweet potatoes and chocolate covered strawberries, all options were on the table. More on Barack Obama
 
Elizabeth Gregory: Remember Mama? Top
Motherhood changed utterly on the day after Mother's Day 1960. That's when the FDA approved the birth control pill for general use, and women at long last could become mothers by choice rather than by default. Immediately the birth rate fell, down by 44% within 15 years, where it's basically stayed ever since.* Voting with their wombs, women had fewer kids, started their families later than their mothers did, or went "childfree." Released from the old biological constraints, women flooded universities and the workforce, developing their skills, expanding their incomes, and doubling our national talent pool. Most women still want to be moms -- on the new terms that allow them to participate in civic life as well. But while they now hold a majority of middle management jobs, 49 years later women still haven't done more than trickle up into policy-making roles. Currently women (51% of the population) hold 17% of Congressional seats (a new high). In the business world, where women now hold 50.6% of professional and management positions, they comprise only 15.2% of boards of directors and 3% of Fortune 500 CEOs. What's the holdup? Well, basically, men -- particularly of the legislative and business-heading types. While our male leaders and representatives might have facilitated change on behalf of their female constituents and workers, with few exceptions they've failed to do so, leaving the old and actively family- un friendly business model in place. Like John Adams, whose wife Abigail famously enjoined him to "remember the ladies" as he developed the constitution, most somehow forgot. Even though women can now time their births, our nation's lack of a family-support infrastructure holds them back -- and mothers especially -- with a dirty laundry list of inequities: unfair pay, job ghettos, inadequate childcare, no sick leave, limited career tracks, and more. Increasingly access to birth control and abortion have been limited as well, especially for the poor. We've heard this list so often, it's come to seem insurmountable. But the stress and struggles women workers and their families undergo while trying to do their jobs are not only a national disgrace -- they're completely unnecessary. Two examples: Our military runs a strong childcare system, with trained, well-paid workers; a similar system could work for the rest of us and create hundreds of thousands of good jobs. Pay equity may frighten employers who've depended on cheap female labor, much of it in unexportable care work, but if women were paid more, they'd spend more -- revenue neutral for the economy but an important corrective to the current gender power-imbalance. Women with money could contribute to the campaigns of women candidates, and women with good childcare could stay in their jobs and climb the ladders to leadership roles in business. Things would change -- for the better. Circularly, because the support infrastructure hasn't changed, women haven't been able to move in sufficient numbers into positions where they could change it. The rationale we're given for this mistreatment holds choice against moms: It was their choice to have kids, so any consequences are their problem . But mothers' work produces not just the happiness of their families; the kids they bear and raise are essential to the operation of commerce and of the nation, which demand citizens, workers and consumers for their continuation -- and good ones at that. It's in our national interest to ensure that all families can do well and women workers do not suffer because they choose to raise the next generation while also contributing to the wider economy and civic life. Our business model is outdated in not providing circumstances in which women can contribute to the fullest, and earn a fair wage. When women's insights into how to make our systems better meet our nation's needs, including but not limited to the needs of women and families, are not taken seriously at the levels where they might be implemented, every one loses. Part of the problem is systemic. As legal scholar Lani Guinier explains: "Whoever designs the game or defines the rules predicts the outcome...[Then] the winners tell...the losers that it is futile to resist." This is true for all biases, not just gender. As we've seen, the narrative we're handed justifies the status quo. In this case, as in others, the game was established in a very different landscape, and the rules no longer makes sense for any of us. Men as well as women will be better off when we even up the playing field here. In fact, things have been improving incrementally, and we may now be approaching the critical mass needed for a game-changing jump. Women have trickled up to the point where even our incredibly low version of a Congressional high has had visible effect. The Speaker of the House is now a woman, and she and her ilk have put pay equity and paid sick leave on the agenda. Not the same as passing, but progress. Big sister is helping mom. The Obama administration has already signaled its woman-friendliness through a number of bills already passed and through its creation of a White House Council on Women and Girls to scrutinize the gender-effects of legislation. Michelle Obama, self-styled Mom-in-Chief with an impressive employment history and a new full-time job as first lady, exemplifies in her daily life the importance of support for both dimensions of women's work. She and Vice President Biden's Middle Class Task Force have committed to advancing America's work/life balance. But mama needs more , including the Commission on Women proposed by Congresswoman Jackie Speier, to take a big-picture look at the circumstances that hold women back economically and socially, and to recommend specific actions to rectify those. (Perhaps the threat of a diversity quota on boards of directors could get industry moving.) Here in Houston we recall a conference with a similar charge, held in 1977, which came up with 25 policy recommendations. Those were then overwhelmingly ignored by the same Carter administration that had called the conference. Back then, there were no women in the Senate and few Congresswomen. This time, there'll be follow-through. To guarantee it and to promote further positive change, we need ongoing active citizen support for the pro-equality legislation proposed by current office holders, male and female. Successes or even near successes in these battles can invigorate women and increase the stream of female candidates. (Women's candidacies in the last election have already led 30,000 girls to apply for a training workshop on political leadership for which fewer than 300 applied last year.) Female candidates won't all agree on everything, but their presence in the race will change the discussion in ways that will make what used to seem impossible suddenly look do-able. The recent collapse of the finance markets makes this a particularly auspicious time to consider alternative models for doing the nation's business. The culture of greed has failed. Who better than mothers to turn to for wisdom on how to build a culture of care -- one that assumes, for starters, that everyone in the national family deserves respect, fair wages, and a solid education. One that recognizes that we are our common wealth. Time for legislators to remember the ladies, and the mamas, at last. It becomes harder to forget them when they're there in the same room, voting for themselves . Since nobody else is going to do it for them. Elizabeth Gregory teaches at the University of Houston and is the author of Ready: Why Women Are Embracing the New Later Motherhood (Basic Books). *The annual US birthrate fell from 118 births per 1000 fertile women in 1960 to 65 in 1976 (the low in that period). It's bounced around in that vicinity ever since, reaching an all-time low in 2002 at 64.8, and a recent high in 2007 at 69.5. While the Pill was developed to assist women (at the behest of and with funds supplied by women), it also arrived at a point when the world needed fewer babies. Infant survival rates were up, health gains meant people lived longer, technology innovations meant farms needed fewer workers, and the globe was getting crowded. More on Barack Obama
 
Tom Cruise, Katie Holmes Set To Attend White House Correspondents Dinner After Party Top
How do you throw the most coveted after-party in town following the annual White House Correspondents' Association Dinner in this, the era of the Great Recession? Just ask Bloomberg News columnist and partyer-in-chief Margaret Carlson, who's planning Bloomberg's most exclusive soiree ever.
 
Kenneth C. Davis: GOP - DOA? Top
Are the reports of the death of the GOP, to paraphrase Mark Twain, "Greatly exaggerated?" Or are we seeing the inexorable demise of a doomed beast -- like seeing the last wooly mammoth go down in tar pits of La Brea? The defeats suffered in the 2006 mid-term and 2008 Presidential elections, combined with the recent defection of Senator Arlen Specter to the Democratic Party, certainly left a whiff of lingering death in the air. Was Specter's decision a mandatory 10-count that will allow the Republicans to get off the mat and fight on? Or was it the final knockout roundhouse? Time will tell. But history, of course, is instructive. In recent years, there have been times when both major parties have lingered on political life support, declared on the edge of political death, only to rise phoenix-like -- or vampire-like, depending on which metaphor you prefer and for which party. In the New Deal days of FDR, Republicans certainly had a near-death experience. There was another deathwatch for the Republicans following Watergate, Nixon's demise and the Ford Presidency. Then, during the "Reagan Revolution," the obituaries for the Democrats were being prepared, as the party of FDR, JFK and LBJ seemed DOA. In modern times, then, both parties have survived these "going into the light" experiences, usually when the other party does something incredibly stupid, arrogant or both. But there is no constitutional guarantee of a two-party system. After all, the Framers of the Constitution didn't even like parties, or "factions" as they called them in Washington's day. But history also tells another story: Political parties do occasionally die. And I'm not talking about the once-significant, now-obscure third parties like the Anti-Masons, Know-Nothings, Ross Perot's Reform Party, or Ralph Nader's Greens. Get out your history books, children. Remember the Federalists? The Whigs? The Federalists were one of America's first parties and early in the republic's history, its most significant. George Washington never declared himself a member of the party, but his sympathies certainly seemed to lie there. Both John Adams, Washington's successor, and his first Treasury Secretary, Alexander Hamilton, were staunch Federalists. But the Federalists eventually withered in the face of Andrew Jackson and the growing power of the Democratic Party. The heirs of those Federalists, along with some folks who just plain despised Jackson, later coalesced into the Whigs, America's other most important extinct party. The Whigs were the first political home of Abraham Lincoln. Looking back at the rise and fall of the Federalists and Whigs, it is plain what kills parties. Personalities and issues -- or the lack thereof -- make and break political parties. After their demise, the former Whigs rallied around opposition to slavery's extension and some other key organizing principles to create the Republican Party in the 1850s. New parties are born out of some old party's bones. So political parties do die -- sometimes with a bang but more often with a whimper. But history also shows that even in death, they can leave a powerful wake. In the case of John Adams, he had a single Presidential term and his Federalist Party did not survive very long. But it was Adams's appointments to the Supreme Court that truly mattered, especially his elevation of Chief Justice John Marshall in January 1801. The towering figure in 19th century legal history, Marshall shaped the court and the country for more than 30 years, until his death in 1835. His decisions, such as Marbury v Madison, not only cemented the Supreme Court's power but shaped the future of the country. That means even in the unlikely case that the Republican Party slips these mortal coils, the Republican legacy may live on for years to come. Like the Federalist legacy of John Adams, the Republican influence may remain on the Supreme Court for decades. Leaving aside 89-year-old Justice Stevens -- appointed by Republican Gerald Ford in 1975 but generally voting with the Court's liberal bloc -- there remains a solid gang of four of Republican-appointed Justices: Roberts (age 54); Scalia (age 73); Thomas (60); and Alito (59). Though considered the key "swing vote," the other Republican appointee, Justice Kennedy (72), often votes with these four, creating a solid conservative Republican majority. So bury the GOP, if you dare. But just as Chief Justice Marshall kept Federalism alive in the 19th century, well after the Federalist Party was gone, this bloc may have an impact on the nation long after the last shovel of dirt is thrown on the GOP's remains. More on Arlen Specter
 
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand: More Than Breakfast In Bed: A Legislative Agenda for Moms Top
I love celebrating Mother's Day. Since I was a kid, it was a special day to tell my Mother and Grandmother how much I love them. Now that I'm a Mom, it is a special day to spend with my children. In our busy lives, these special days are so important. But this year, with the difficult economy posing challenges for all families, our mothers need more than just attention on Mother's Day. They need a legislative agenda that enables them to thrive - creating economic opportunities for women, protecting the health and safety of mothers and children, and supporting the work women do to build strong, successful families. First, because of bad Bush policies, single moms and dads who receive child support will be forced to pay a financial penalty to pay the overhead for receiving child support. This is the wrong approach. We should not be balancing the budget on the backs of single mothers. That's why the first legislation I authored in the Senate was to eliminate the tax levied against single moms and dads on their child support checks. This measure would immediately put extra money in the pockets of at least 170,000 New York families. Second, all parents deserve to know that the products they use for their children are safe. When I read a recent report about trace amounts of probable human carcinogens and irritants being found in baby shampoos, lotions, and other products, like many parents, I immediately began to worry. I have some of these same products in my bathroom at home, and I've used them on my children their entire lives. No mother should have to worry if the baby shampoo she uses on her children is safe. That is why I've authored the Safe Baby Products Act, which will require the FDA to investigate the safety of these products, publicly report the findings, and establish manufacturing practices that will reduce or eliminating any harmful chemicals. Third, every minute of every day, a woman somewhere in the world dies in childbirth or from complications arising from pregnancy or childbirth. Every year, a million children are left motherless because of maternal mortality. You might be tempted to believe that maternal mortality exists almost exclusively in developing nations. But on the contrary, the measured U.S. maternal mortality ratio is one of the highest among industrialized nations and the Centers for Disease Control estimates that the actual level of maternal deaths in the U.S. is 1.3 to 3 times higher than the reported rate. As a Mom and a lawmaker, I believe it is outrageous that so many of these deaths could easily have been prevented. In the coming weeks, I will be introducing new legislation with my friend and colleague Congresswoman Lois Capps, to invest in prevention and emergency care to protect the health and safety of millions of new mothers here at home and around the world. Lastly, I'm hopeful that in the face of the worst economy of our lives, Congress moves immediately to ensure equal economic opportunity for women by passing the Paycheck Fairness Act. The average woman makes just 78 cents for every dollar a man earns. The disparity is even greater for women of color, with African-American women making just 62 cents and Hispanic women making just 53 cents for every dollar a man makes. Women and families deserve more. When mothers earn their fair share, young children have greater access to quality health care, educational opportunities, and safe communities. By ending the wage gap, we will help ensure that every child can achieve his or her God-given potential. Mothers around the country and around the world deserve all the special attention this weekend, but they also deserve action in Washington on a legislative agenda that will help them succeed. More on Taxes
 
Penny Herscher: How to Identify Leaders in Your Company Top
Challenge is the crucible of leadership and there is no time like the present to look for the leaders in your organization. So what should you look for - and how can you create the environment to bring out the leaders? There are many books which have been written about leadership in companies - probably thousands - and they run the gamut of styles: developing leaders through process (a favorite with HR teams), mentoring, motivational etc. But in a small company the hunt for leadership is a very practical one. You need people who can step out of the group to make a difference. All the books and papers on leadership can be boiled down into a handful of critical behaviors to watch for when you challenge your organization: - Embracing risk. Future leaders have an appetite for risk (see my post on leadership and risk ) and see it as an opportunity. An opportunity to make change happen, to have an impact, to make something new happen. The risk can be personal (looking a fool, failing) or it can be for the company (losing a stretch deal, developing a risky product that never works) but it is the risk itself that will stretch the team and the emerging leader is often the person most comfortable with the level of risk. Conservatives need not apply. - Having followers. The phrase is old and corny - "the definition of a leader is someone other people are following" - but it's so true in a company. Making new and significant change happen, especially in technology, rarely happens through authority. It happens because someone has an idea and motivates with the idea so others follow. When I am looking into my organization for leadership I look for whose ideas are carrying the day, and how is that person communicating and nurturing the ideas to have other people follow them. - Lead by doing and succeeding. People want to be successful and they will often follow someone who they can observe being successful, someone who gets things done. The motivation is to learn, to be around a winner, to have the fun of being on a winning team. It's almost impossible to be effective as a leader if you are not effective as an individual and many leaders emerge because they are good at what they do and other people want to work with them and for them to learn themselves (although sadly this is not always the case of who gets promoted ...). - Putting the company first. This is one I often see ambitious people early in their career forget. Especially in politicized companies or organizations where there is a great deal of personal wealth to be made (think company headed into an IPO or an aggressive bank). But as a CEO my interest is always 100% company first. It's the only way to measure success. So when I see someone posture or behave in a political way for their own gain I don't care how good they are, I can't see them as a leader. One of the five values at FirstRain is "Take ownership for the company's success" and I look for which employees have taken on the company's success as their own. I don't prescribe to any one style of leadership being better than any other. Society often remembers leaders from the Great Man or Hero theory of leadership - like President Obama today - who use intelligence and charisma to lead. But in a company you need more than great men (or women) because you need to find the ability to lead different skills sets and personalities who will respond to different styles of leadership. But if you are the leader of a company or a team, whether they work for you or they are a team you are leading across your community, you can find your anchors, the people who you can count on to help you get the job done, by looking for these four simple characteristics: embracing risk, having followers, succeeding and putting the company (or your shared goal) first. More on CEOs
 
Stress Test Leaks: What's The Deal? Top
The results of the government's stress tests of 19 large financial institutions are supposed to be a secret until Thursday. The banks have been given a " harsh gag rule " forbidding them to disclose any details in advance. Nevertheless, details are leaking like Edward Scissorhands' waterbed. Almost every day brings a new anonymously-sourced revelation about the tests. To wit: On Tuesday, April 28, the Wall Street Journal reported that Bank of America and Citigroup would need to raise capital, "according to people familiar with the situation." Bloomberg reported the next day that at least six of the banks will need capital, according to "people briefed on the matter." On Thursday Reuters had it that the government was leaning toward announcing the test results for individual banks instead of just summary results, according to "a source familiar with administration talks." "The source, speaking anonymously because talks are ongoing, also said officials will likely release the capital requirements of the 19 firms at their holding company level, not just the needs of their banking units," Reuters reported. Then, in classic Fishy Friday fashion, it was announced that the stress test results wouldn't be released as planned on Monday the 4th, but rather Thursday the 7th. A "government official" told the Associated Press that negotiations between the banks and the administration had pushed the results back. A Treasury spokeswoman referred the Huffington Post to the Fed for comment. The Fed did not respond. On Sunday, May 3, the Financial Times returned to the original two deficient banks, reporting that Bank of America and Citigroup are "working on plans to raise more than $10bn each in fresh capital, even as they launch last-ditch attempts to convince the US government they do not need to bolster their balance sheets" -- according to "[p]eople close to the situation." Two days later on May 5, the Wall Street Journal followed up with word that Bank of America and Citigroup aren't the only bad eggs -- 10 of 19 banks will need more capital, "according to several people familiar with the matter." Who are these people and what's with these leaks? Economist Paul Krugman wrote on Monday that the leaks seem like trial balloons, "as if the report's contents may also be dictated by what, based on the response to leaks, the informed public is willing to swallow." James Galbraith, an economist with the University of Texas, said he's skeptical that the Fed has that kind of message control. "That's giving them more credit for wizardry than we have any reason to expect they've got," Galbraith told the Huffington Post. The focus, Galbraith said, should be on whether the stress tests are sufficiently thorough. "To what extent do these stress tests evaluate the underlying loan quality and to what extent do they take the bank's own story?" Galbraith asked. "If there's been a searching examination of the documentation behind the loans I would like to know what that examination showed." On Tuesday Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) said the test results should be kept entirely under wraps . James Kwak noted that the banks don't need to do any actual leaking to send a message: Goldman Sachs, for instance, made a show of raising private capital, issuing new debt without a government guarantee, and offering to repay its TARP money. Jamie Dimon of J.P. Morgan Chase also announced that he could repay his company's TARP money. In both cases, this is code for "We're going to pass those stress tests with flying colors," and the goal is to sow doubt about competitors. The Federal Reserve said on April 24 that most banks "currently have capital levels well in excess of the amounts required to be well capitalized," though large banks should "hold additional capital to provide a buffer against higher losses than generally expected." Get HuffPost Politics On Facebook and Twitter!
 
First Swine Flu Death Of US Resident Confirmed By Texas Top
McALLEN, Texas — Texas health officials have confirmed the first death of a United States resident with swine flu. Few details were immediately released. But health officials say the patient who died earlier this week was a woman in her 30s who lived in Cameron County, along the U.S.-Mexico border. Carrie Williams, spokeswoman with the Texas Department of State Health Services, said Tuesday the woman had other, chronic health problems, but didn't offer specifics. Last week, a boy from Mexico City died at a Houston hospital, marking the first swine flu death in the United States. More on Swine Flu
 
Arnold: Time To Talk About Legalizing Pot Top
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger called on Tuesday for an open debate on legalizing and taxing marijuana. A recent Field Poll showed that 56 percent of Californians support taxing and regulating marijuana as a way to address the state's fiscal crisis. Schwarzenegger was asked at a press conference if it was finally time to legalize marijuana. "No, I think that it's not time for that, but I think it's time for a debate," he said, according to a transcript provided by Schwarzenegger's office. "And I think that we ought to study very carefully what other countries are doing that have legalized marijuana and other drugs, what affect it had on those countries, and are they happy with that decision." The Mexican ambassador to the United States, Arturo Sarukhan, recently called for the United States to hold such a debate to address cartel-related violence. Mexico has decriminalized possession of marijuana but doesn't tax it. James P. Gray, a retired Orange County Superior Court judge, applauded Schwarzenegger's openness. "Once people allow themselves to discuss the issue of treating marijuana like alcohol, the result is pre-ordained. Today marijuana is fully available for anyone that wants it -- expressly including our children -- so why not regulate and control it, and tax it as well? That will reduce the violence in its distribution, and bring in needed revenue for government," Gray, now a member of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, told the Huffington Post. Schwarzenegger referenced his native country of Austria, which has recently loosened penalties on marijuana. "I've heard that they are unhappy with that and they want to roll back some of the decisions that were made in European countries. I've had dialogue with experts over there where I was born. So I think that one ought to look at all that. And it could very well be that everyone is happy with that decision and then we can look at that. And if not, we shouldn't do it," he said. The movement to legalize pot has picked up steam in recent months as budget deficits have plagued both state and federal coffers. But for Arnold, the decision to legalize should be made on its own merits, not merely as a way to raise money. "But just because of raising revenues, we have to be very careful not to make mistakes at the same time," he said. Ryan Grim is the author of the forthcoming book This Is Your Country On Drugs: The Secret History of Getting High in America
 
Mike Alvear: Is Effeminacy a Choice? Top
There's an undeniable pansy vortex in gay life. You fall into it with baggy jeans and climb out of it with spandex up the crack of your ass. How else can you explain my ex-boyfriend "Larry"? Closeted when I met him, he was popular, gorgeous, smart and athletic. He was the "be" to everyone's bop. Then he came out. Everybody he hung out with liked to do drag and camp it up. Suddenly, Larry started shaving his legs, wearing tight shorts and calling everyone "girl." He ripened into a fruit before my very eyes. One day he made me close my eyes and sit at the foot of his bed for a surprise. He pulled out a long black wig and a slinky Bob Mackie knockoff. And that was the end of that. Now, was Larry born with the desire to dress like Cher or did he just adapt to a culture that demanded it? I'm not the only one who has lost boyfriends to the culture's pansy vortex. My friend Gary dated this really cool guy who spoke four languages. He got sucked into the vortex and never came out. Now he lisps in four languages. So, what fuels the gay flame? On the one hand, there really are guys who come out of the womb complaining about the backlighting. But my feeling is that just as many learn to complain. I've always maintained that effeminacy is like obesity. Sometimes it's glandular, but mostly it's cultural. Whether you run in more masculine circles (the leather community, for example) or simply play team sports, there's no denying that effeminacy is a big part of the gay sensibility. You can't swing a cat in a bar without hitting a wig-wompin' drag queen, or hearing guys call each other girls. In gay life, camp is considered an art form and bitchy humor its paint. How much of this sensibility is driven by the naturally nelly versus the nurtured nelly is anyone's guess. If effeminacy were completely a function of nature, wouldn't all gay men need a wrist-bone implant? And if it were completely a matter of cultural re-education (falling into the pansy vortex) then why are there so many masculine gay guys? The question is especially important if you're an effeminate guy who wants to be more masculine. Click here to see how effeminate guys can make themselves more masculine. Why would nelly gay guys write asking my advice on butching it up? Because the culture that celebrates effeminacy as a social ideal ridicules it as a sexual ideal. Even screaming queens don't want to torch their beds with the flames of other queens. Most effeminate guys are attracted to masculine guys (click here for proof). And that sets up an enormous dilemma because most masculine gay guys are NOT sexually attracted to them. Is it possible to become more masculine without compromising who you are? It depends on your view of effeminacy. Is it a choice?
 
Krugman Won't Comment On Off-The-Record Dinner With Obama Top
Nobel-Prize-winning economists Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz have been persistent critics of the bailout, serving as thorns in the side of President Obama and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner. Obama, who has been criticized for stacking his economic team with proteges of Robert Rubin, the former Clinton Treasury Secretary and former Citigroup chairman considered by many to be partially responsible for fueling Wall Street's obsession with risky investments, even joked about it during a recent New York Times magazine interview. When columnist David Leonhardt noted that Obama has a "spectrum of Democrats" within his economic policy team, Obama laughed: "But I don't have Paul Krugman or Joseph Stiglitz." Later, the president expressed his "enormous respect" for Stiglitz, adding that "I actually am looking forward to having these folks in for ongoing discussion." On April 27, Obama invited Krugman and Stiglitz to the White House for a roast-beef dinner and to get their input on the financial crisis, reports Newsweek: Mindful of his predecessor, Barack Obama seems to be trying harder to make sure he hears all sides. On the night of April 27, for instance, the president invited to the White House some of his administration's sharpest critics on the economy, including New York Times columnist Paul Krugman and Columbia University economist Joseph Stiglitz. Over a roast-beef dinner, Obama listened and questioned while Krugman and Stiglitz, both Nobel Prize winners, pushed for more aggressive government intervention in the banking system." Oh, to be a fly on the wall at that dinner! Ever since, some economic bloggers have been wondering what was actually discussed that night. Salon's Andrew Leonard wrote : Not even a whisper of this momentous news made it into Paul Krugman's blog, which seems to me to represent a misuse of the medium. I'm sure the conversation was designated off-the-record, which makes it understandable why we have no blow-by-blow from Krugman, but still: I promise all HTWW readers that if I ever have dinner with the president, I will at least mention it in this blog. What else are blogs for if not to tell people about your cool dinner dates? Today, Krugman replied with a simple response : None of your business. Andrew Leonard and Calculated Risk want to know why I didn't blog about dinner at the White House. Um, because the conversation was off the record. [emphasis added] More on Paul Krugman
 
Michealene Cristini Risley: Wanted Dead or Alive: Robert Mugabe, President of Zimbabwe Top
There are days when I wish we were back in the 'Wild Wild West". THEME MUSIC PLEASE My boots scuff on the plank sidewalk as I move toward the "Last Chance Saloon." With one arm I push the swinging doors open and saunter into the saloon. There is a ruckus going on so I slide right up to the bar unnoticed. I could see someone approach me out of the corner of my eye, and stand at the farther end and wait. I slam the gold coins on the top of the bar, scraping them across beer droppings and mug rings to stop at this strangers' hands. Eye contact, head nod, and I move past him out to my horse. "Don't need to know no details, it just needs to be done." Of course, that fantasy doesn't make me much better than Mugabe himself. Unfortunately, I have long stopped thinking of that man as human in any form. Perhaps that is part of why the 'Old West has always intrigued me. At least in the movies, the bad guys always ate rope. The problem with Mugabe and Zimbabwe is that this movie, keeps going and the bad guys always win. This kind of powerlessness is so hard for me to live with--imagine the poor people in the center of this story. Unless Zimbabwe gets the attention of National and International leaders--a focused effort--we are powerless in the fight to get Mugabe out of office....dead or alive. Awhile back in a Huffington Post blog I wrote about the story of Jestina Mukoko: >http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michealene-cristini-risley/a-christmas-carol-in-zimb_b_152882.html . Last winter, a pajama clad Jestina is taken out of her home in the middle of the night by the Central Intelligence Organization or a.k.a. "THUGS". Her son, 15 at the time, runs out screaming to stop them. He is as powerless as any Zimbabwean has been for the last 30 years. The men who carried her out beat her with police issued rubber sticks and made her kneel in gravel. For kicks, sometimes the "Guards" would force her prone to lift her feet off the ground (like doing a sit up) while they punched her in the stomach. All the while sipping on their Zambezi beer and laughing. What a riot! The current Magistrate Catherine Chimanda has refused to entertain an application by defense council to oppose Jestina and the other 18 human rights people from going back to prison. Ms. Chimanda has long been knows as a "plant" or foot-soldier for Mugabe. She does what she is told, or else. How the President continues to keep hold of this almost-demolished land of inhumanity is by planting people in positions of power. It will take outside intervention and orchestrated effort to thwart his command. On March 3rd of this year, when I found out that Jestina had been released, I was ecstatic. I even twittered on it: Justina Mukako released from Zim prison! http://tinyurl.com/bknd5q I am back in the Saloon now, mulling over the situation as I sip a beer. Having seen Mugabe's torture chambers up-close, I still see the iron chains and feel the thousand screams from those hollowed rooms. I am fearful that additional screams will be added by Jestina and the other 15. I am twittering again: "Yep, an eye for an eye never looked so good."
 

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