Wednesday, May 20, 2009

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Steve Parker: Obama - MPG up; vehicle hydrogen fuel cells killed Top
He giveth, and he taketh away. President Barack Obama has rightfully received positive reviews for his proposal this past week to raise vehicle mile per gallon standards for cars to 39 mpg and light trucks to 30 mpg by 2016, for a combined "corporate average fuel economy," or CAFÉ, of 35 miles per gallon. Harmful emissions will also be lowered dramatically by the rise in fuel mileage. But his administration also just gutted $100 million worth of federal research into hydrogen fuel cell EV technology for cars and trucks. Is there a White House technology double-standard, is it more Obama-ish realism or are oil companies lobbying as they must to keep their black gold from turning into clean, abundant hydrogen? People get instructed on how to fill 'er up when their Honda FCX Clarity hydrogen-fueled fuel cell sedan (there's a mouthful) needs a pit stop; the gas station is a Shell facility in West Los Angeles, CA, fitted in 2008 with hydrogen fueling equipment Some of the people gathered at the White House with Obama to cheer the mpg increase are angry that hydrogen is not only apparently taking a back seat to plug-in EVs and hybrids, clean diesels and conventional gasoline engines as far as Washington is concerned, but is now practically off the table, without the important implied endorsement of the US government which comes from the research project. Why can't we do it all? This is for our planet's future, after all. What's $100 million these days for such a promising - and proven - technology? Now, rather than spend $168 million in ongoing automotive hydrogen fuel cell research in 2010, new Secretary of Energy Steven Chu cut $100 million from that total and said the remainder would be spent on development of stationary fuel cells, not for cars, but which are used as backup power systems in factories and as primary electricity providers in remote areas where traditional energy sources might not be the best solution (large industrial fuel cells are already fairly common in Asia and Europe, and they're being developed for home use, too). Volkswagen's 2009 Jetta TDI clean diesel is a remarkable auto which manages over 40mpg from its twin-turbo, 140-horsepower diesel four-banger; it's the 235 foot pounds of torque which make it fun to drive! But why not continue government R&D funding into hydrogen fuel cell EVs which could eventually replace most internal combustion engines of all types? Chu has a background in biofuels and has received heavy criticism for this move. Detractors say he hasn't had enough hands-on experience with hydrogen fuel cells to make an informed decision. The concept of fuel cells has existed for almost 200 years; they were first put into practical use for the US space program, beginning with the first manned Mercury space shots in the 1960s. To this day, fuel cells are used onboard space ships and satellites to help provide power, oxygen and water. Fuel cells use an electrolytic process to strip hydrogen from whatever is being used as a fuel and remake that hydrogen into electricity and pure water. In fuel cell-powered cars, apart from electricity, the only other product is H2O. Hydrogen is the most common element in the universe, so using it as a fuel for fuel cell EV cars and trucks makes a lot of sense; we won't run out of hydrogen anytime soon. Or, scientists say, anytime. But the technology has a host of long-term and expensive problems. Just delivering hydrogen to filling stations and storing it safely on-board a car or truck is a big challenge. Also, many say that no matter how much electricity a fuel cell may make, the entire process requires more energy than the result to produce it. General Motors' Equinox (shown) led to their Segue, a hydrogen fuel cell EV, 100's of which are being run daily on US roads; killing government hydrogen fuel cell car research casts a pall over the whole industry Ask most people "in the know" about hydrogen fuel cell automotive technology and they'll usually say, "It's 20 years down the road." But they've been saying that for 20 years. In the meantime, Honda and General Motors have put hundreds of their Segue and FCX Clarity hydrogen fuel cell vehicles into the hands of real drivers and they're on American roadways every day, racking up miles and real-world experience. Those companies have spent hundreds of millions on these projects, while seeing that Washington was supportive, and have budgeted for more; they're not happy with Energy Secretary Chu's decision (I'll be driving Honda's FCX Clarity next week and the Chevy Volt and BMW's Mini E plug-in electric car two weeks after that and will report on those experiences in this space). A fuel cell EV motorcycle being built and marketed by a company called ENV; fuel cell technology can allow hydrogen to power everything from the smallest to largest vehicles Overseas, the Japanese government leases fuel cell cars from some of their domestic car-makers for the astounding sum of $7,000 a month to encourage research into the technology; "priming the pump" of their manufacturing industry and protecting car-makers from unforeseen losses. And several companies and governments in Europe are involved in similar programs. While "20 years to viability" might be true, why cut this $100 million now, when the rest of the world looks to the US for leadership in this technology? It only moves mass-production of these cars back more and more. The move puts a chill on hydrogen fuel cell research worldwide; if car-makers think they won't be able to sell a product in America, if the hydrogen delivery infrastructure is not built here for another 20, 50 or 100 years, they won't spend the time, money and brain-power in creating these pure, non-polluting, non-plug-in and off-the-grid EVs of the future. More on Barack Obama
 
Jaime Pozuelo-Monfort: We Need More Tax Justice Top
We need more tax justice. This assertion would have seemed faulty, inaccurate, perhaps outrageous thirty years ago. It no longer is. The abundance of techniques to launder money across borders and the existence of tax havens throughout the world has enabled that much of the profits from world trade end up in offshore centers. As much as sixty percent of world trade occurs between subsidiaries of a same multinational corporation. Much of this remains away from the radar of the tax authority. This is the world the baby boomers have built. This is a world that has enabled North America and Europe to continue building up their welfare states, a world that has undermined the ability of developing nations to build up their healthcare and education infrastructure, and last but not least, a world that is making it increasingly difficult to maintain the welfare standards in the Western world. What does more tax justice mean? It means appropriately taxing corporate profits, it means taxing appropriately the income and dividends, the intellectual rights of pharmaceutical companies, and the profits of hedge funds and private equity funds. Why do we need more tax justice? In order to start the new era of global public goods. Global public goods were a history of science fiction fifty years ago. They no longer are. It is possible today to build on the experience accumulated from sixty years of international institutions and cooperation to devise new horizons that propose innovative, creative policymaking. In 1992 Francis Fukuyama wrote The End of History . The fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War left democracy and capitalism as the de facto approach the West would aim at spreading. The faulty foreign policy of George W. Bush and the ongoing economic and financial crisis have turned the environment around. The Washington consensus is over, what remains? "It remains for us now, if we do not wish to perish, to set aside the ancient prejudices and build the Earth". These words, by Pierre Theilhard de Chardin, summarize the window of opportunity we face as a global society. It is our generation's duty to lead a change, to think of a better world and future and step forward to implement it. We must dare. There was no end of history. There will not be an end of history. Society will always continue to mature. Are there catalysts that could accelerate the stage of evolution of global understanding? How long will it take to implement global public goods? We demand more tax justice, when will our political and economic elites react to the reality of an unfair economic and financial architecture dominated by the loopholes the lawyers and private bankers know real well? It is time to acknowledge the reality of our unequal world. It is time to say why not instead of why. It is time, finally, to fight the pirates of heartless capitalism and eradicate extreme poverty. More on Taxes
 
Waxman Gives GOP One More Day To Stall On Climate Change Top
Henry Waxman has had just about enough. The House Energy and Commerce Committee's climate-change bill has been besieged by hundreds of (mostly Republican) amendments all week. Waxman, the committee's chairman, is giving them until the end of Thursday to keep playing around, he told the Huffington Post on Wednesday afternoon. "They're offering a lot of amendments," Waxman said of committee Republicans, who primarily sought to add giveaways for the coal, hydro and nuclear power industries Wednesday morning. "Some are to try to make political points. They've developed certain themes and they're trying to advance these political themes with many of the amendments they're offering." House Republicans, for example, called for the word "source" to be replaced with "emission point," going a little gentler on coal plants. Fine, said Democrats. The House GOP is fixated on China and India's climate change policy, and has been trying all week to write them into the bill somehow. On Wednesday, they got their way. The EPA chief will be required to brief members of Congress on China and India's policy once a year. "I mean, their plan is to try and shut down the process, but I think the signal they're sending is that they're not interested in tackling the nation's energy challenges," said Chris Van Hollen, a member of House leadership who authored a separate climate-change bill. Still, Waxman (D-Calif.) and Van Hollen (D-Md.) said Democrats will adhere to procedural rules and debate as many amendments as possible. "We may just kind of wait for fatigue to set in," Van Hollen said. Though many of the amendments have passed with a simple voice vote, the committee spent more than an hour and a half debating the first amendment on its agenda Wednesday: a proposal by Florida Republican Cliff Stearns that sought to allow states to count energy from new nuclear plants toward their renewable energy quotas. In the wake of a bitterly contentious 14-hour marathon session that ran late into Tuesday night, committee members voiced a desire to keep things more civil during Wednesday's markup meeting. That didn't quite happen. Much of the early debate was built on compromise, but charges of "socialism" and "political games" were flying freely from the right side of the aisle well before the committee's midday voting recess. Illinois Republican John Shimkus dusted off Lloyd Bentsen's "Jack Kennedy" line, substituting Exelon Corp. CEO John Rowe, to a smattering of groans. Toward the end of debate on his amendment, Stearns mockingly implored committee Democrats to break with their party on nuclear power. When Pennsylvania Democrat Mike Doyle replied that he could count on one finger the number of times Stearns had broken with Republican leadership, the room erupted momentarily into a chorus of shouts, broken by laughter when someone quipped, "Which finger?" Missouri Republican Roy Blunt suggested that a prime motivation for amendments like Stearns' was that his party had essentially been shut out of discussion regarding the bill, and argued that hydro and nuclear power in particular should be considered renewable forms of energy. "Whereas nuclear and hydro are very clean, and very efficient, and very efficacious, they are not new," Washington Democrat Jay Inslee countered. Waxman said Democrats worked out figures and compromises with emergent-industry representatives rather than the opposition party. Shortly before putting the Stearns Amendment to a vote, Ranking Committee Member Joe Barton (R-Texas) lauded the tone of the debate as an improvement over Tuesday's session. "That finger thing will probably get on YouTube," he said. But it was Stearns himself who best summed up the ongoing process -- if inadvertently. "You know," he said, "sometimes in debate you can talk too much, but let me just make three points ..." Reporting contributed by Ryan Grim. Get HuffPost Politics On Facebook and Twitter! More on Climate Change
 
Daniel Hauser: Police look for mom, son who fled to avoid chemo Top
SLEEPY EYE, Minn. — A courtroom clash between medicine and faith took a criminal turn, with police around the country on the lookout Wednesday for a Minnesota mother who fled with her cancer-stricken 13-year-old son rather than consent to chemotherapy. A court-ordered X-ray on Monday showed a tumor growing in Daniel Hauser's chest, and doctors said it will probably kill him without conventional medical treatment. Before she took off, Colleen Hauser told a judge that she wished to treat her son's cancer with natural healing methods advocated by an American Indian religious group known as the Nemenhah Band. But even that group's founder said Hauser made a mistake by running from the law. Authorities in Minnesota said they were following a number of leads on the whereabouts of mother and son, but gave no details. "I just wish we could get to Colleen and tell her to come in. This is not going to go away. It's a court order," Brown County Sheriff Rich Hoffmann said. He said Hauser's husband was cooperating with investigators. Daniel has Hodgkins lymphoma, a highly curable form of cancer when treated with chemo and radiation. But the teen and his parents rejected chemo after a single treatment, with the boy's mother saying that putting toxic substances in the body violates the family's religious convictions. Colleen Hauser said she had been treating the boy's cancer instead with herbal supplements, vitamins, ionized water and other natural alternatives _ a regimen based mostly on information she found on the Internet. The Hauser family had been ordered to appear before a judge Tuesday for a hearing to consider chemo. But mother and son failed to show, and a warrant was issued for the mother's arrest. Daniel's father, Anthony Hauser, said in an interview Wednesday at the family's farm near Sleepy Eye, a town of 3,500 people about 80 miles from Minneapolis, that his wife and son left without telling him their plans, and that he hadn't heard from them. He said he hopes his wife is either getting their son treatment for his illness or will bring him home. "If he's being cared for, and it's going to help him, I think it's going to be a good thing," Anthony Hauser said. James Olson, the attorney representing social service authorities in Minnesota, originally asked the judge to cite the father for contempt of court, but later backed off and said he believed Hauser didn't know the whereabouts of his wife and son. An alert issued to police departments around the country said mother and son might be traveling with a California lawyer named Susan Daya. The alert said they might also be with a Massachusetts man named Billy Best, who as a teenager in 1994 ran away from home to escape chemotherapy for cancer similar to Daniel's. Best, who says he was cured by natural remedies, had appeared at a news conference in Minnesota recently to support the Hausers. Daya and Best did not immediately return telephone messages Wednesday. The Nemenhah Band, based in Weaubleau, Mo., advocates healing methods tied to American Indian practices. The Hausers are not American Indian. Phillip Cloudpiler Landis founded Nemenhah about a decade ago and calls himself its principal medicine chief. He said it was prompted by his own bout with cancer, which he claims to have cured through diet, visits to a sweat lodge and other natural remedies. Landis served several months in prison in Idaho for fraud tied to the sale of natural remedies. Nemenhah members are asked to pay $250 to join and a monthly $100 fee. On Tuesday, Landis said Hauser should not have run, adding: "You don't solve anything by disregarding the order of the judge." There have been at least five instances in the U.S. in recent years in which parents fled with a sick child to avoid medical treatments. They include the celebrated case of Parker Jensen, who was 12 when his family fled from Utah to Idaho in 2003 to avoid court-ordered chemo after doctors removed a small cancerous tumor under his tongue. Daren and Barbara Jensen pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor in a deal that brought no jail time or fines, and went on to lobby for legislation to strengthen the rights of parents. Parker survived without chemotherapy. In Minnesota, District Judge John Rodenberg ruled last week that the Hausers were neglecting their son, and ordered them to consult doctors. He cited a state law requiring parents to provide necessary medical care for a child. Most states have similar laws. A few have exemptions allowing parents to refuse treatment on religious grounds, and Minnesota was one of them. But Arthur Caplan, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania, said he helped push a bill through the Legislature to remove it two decades ago. He said the impetus was a case involving Christian Scientist parents who refused insulin for a diabetic child in the mid-1980s. Caplan, one of the nation's foremost medical ethicists, said religious exceptions are bad public policy because effective medical treatment for a child shouldn't be sacrificed for a parent's beliefs. ___ Condon reported from Minneapolis. Associated Press Writer Steve Karnowski also contributed to this report from Minneapolis. More on Health
 
Chris Weigant: Exclusive Interview With Geoffrey Nunberg, On The Years Of Talking Dangerously Top
Some writers love words and language more than others. At one end of this continuum are writers who use language much the way a carpenter uses tools, and don't think about the tools much (would a carpenter say he "loves" his hammer or saw?). At the other end of the scale are writers such as Geoffrey Nunberg , whose love of language is a core part of not just their writing, but their whole being. For instance, his impressive "day job" is researching linguistics at Berkeley's School of Information, meaning that even when he isn't writing, he is still thinking about language. His previous book's full title proves this point, with what has to be an all-time champion subtitle -- Talking Right: How Conservatives Turned Liberalism into a Tax-Raising, Latte-Drinking, Sushi-Eating, Volvo-Driving, New York Times-Reading, Body-Piercing, Hollywood-Loving, Left-Wing Freak Show . The book lives up to this jaw-breaker of a title, and is one of the best things ever written about the problems liberals have had for years in competing with conservative phrasing and issue-framing. Now Nunberg is back with a new book, written about the use of language in recent days, both in the political sphere and in everyday life. The book, The Years of Talking Dangerously , is a compilation of recent essays, op-ed columns, and commentary from appearances on NPR's Fresh Air . In his introduction, Nunberg calls them "snapshots of language during the final years of the Bush era." Reading The Years of Talking Dangerously was a delight, because the book covers so much ground, and does it so well. I got the chance recently to interview Nunberg, which follows this mini-review of his new book. As to be expected in any book about language, some of the terms Nunberg throws around are brand-spanking new -- from "omnigooglization" to the "phonetosphere." Some are well-known, but what is new is how the author traces their usage back to their origins -- such as being thrown "under the bus" (a fairly recent addition to the lexicon). Nunberg also traces the lineage of the term "non-apology" back to J. Edgar Hoover in the early 1970s, who had to issue one (which was then christened, for the first time in print, a "non-apology"), for making the following statement: "You never have to bother about a president being shot by Puerto Ricans or Mexicans. They don't shoot very straight, but if they come at you with a knife, beware." Bu the most interesting of these to me was an essay on the long history of "Joe..." characters in American political history: from the original Joe Blow (who first appeared in the 1920s); through the lesser-known Joe Bloggs (Joe blogs? Who knew?) and Joe Zilch; to the more-familiar Joe Schmo (from Kokomo), Joe Palooka, Joe Lunchpail, Joe Sixpack, and Joe Camel; ending, of course, with Sam Wurzelbacher (who shall forevermore be known as "Joe The Plumber"). There's a whole essay devoted to the word (if it can be called that) "um." And another on the plight of poor Pluto ("planet" or "dwarf planet"?). But although the book at times is hilarious (such as his "Hiawatha" parody on email spam -- "In my in-box, every morning, / Scads of offers sent by spammers..."), it also covers a great deal of very serious ground as well -- such as what Nunberg writes about the language struggles during Hurricane Katrina's aftermath: Evacuees, victims, displaced, refugees, survivors -- as with the question of what to use in place of looting of food and water, there's no ideal solution here. But that's as it should be. If you weren't struggling to find the right language to describe what you were seeing over the last two weeks, you probably weren't paying close enough attention. The whole work is very accessible reading, almost a collection of blog posts (lots of very short chapters, an ideal book to pick up and read from at random). You'd expect to need a dictionary handy to read a book written by a linguist, but I only had to look a single word up while reading ("reify: to convert into or regard as a concrete thing"). Nunberg, talking about libraries, says: "Most scholars will tell you that a lot of the most interesting books they've read are ones they happened on when they were looking for something else." The Years of Talking Dangerously is exactly that type of book. [ Full Disclosure: I was provided with a promotional copy of The Years of Talking Dangerously by the publisher, but received no other compensation or consideration for writing this article. ]   What was the American Dialect Society's 2008 word of the year? "Bailout." Unimpeachable, but not very inspired, and probably not memorable, the way the news cycle moves these days. Twenty years from now, if you ask people when "bailout" was the word of the year, they're apt to scratch their heads.   In your Introduction to your book, you mention that the 2009 word of the year may wind up being something like "shovel-ready" or "workout" (of your mortgage). Two that have caught my eye recently are the Bush "torture memos" and "dog whistle" (what used to be "code words" in political speech), but I'm not sure either one has staying power. What recent terms do you think may qualify for this year's word of the year? "Torture memos" is a newsworthy subject but not a particularly interesting phrase -- if that were the area, I'd go with "enhanced interrogation methods," not an expression that anybody will soon forget. "Dog whistle politics" is evocative -- my guess is that both the phrase and the thing will be with us for a long time. As for what will be the 2009 word of the year -- well, it's too early to know, but if the election were held tomorrow it would have to be something wonky like "legacy assets," though if the gay marriage bandwagon keeps gathering steam it could wind up being "spouse."   Republicans are attempting (once again) to use the label "socialism" as a fear word. But since a huge slice of American voters grew up after the Cold War era, is the term socialism losing its power to smear? Don't younger voters tend to see socialism as something out of the pages of their history books, rather than something to worry about in modern American politics? The Harvard School of Public Health did a survey last year asking people whether they thought "socialized medicine" would help or hurt the health care system in America. A majority of the people who responded said it would help -- and the approval ran two-to-one among younger people. So it isn't likely that the word is going to work its old magic in scaring people away from the Democrats, the way it could when the Republicans evoked it to denounce every Democratic program from child labor laws to Social Security. (Back in 1952, Harry Truman said that when Republicans criticized a Democratic program by saying "Down with Socialism!" they really meant "Down with progress!") This is rump language -- the language a party starts to use when it folds in on itself to lick its wounds, as its members try to persuade themselves they're more pure than the pure. That happens to most parties after a big setback. The only difference is that now there's a business model that thrives on political isolation. The Limbaughs and Hannitys flourish when their peeps feel embattled and beleaguered -- it isn't as if Limbaugh is going to try to grow his audience by moderating his language to appeal to centrist voters. Epithets like "socialist" and "fascist" enable people on the right to bond with each other and -- though they may not acknowledge it -- to alienate everybody else. Linguistically, it may be a long winter for the right.   In your essay on the terms "progressive" and "liberal" you end with: "The difference between progressives and liberals is that progressives believe there is one." Do you think that the term "liberal" has been so demonized by conservative opponents (best example: Ronald Reagan calling it "the L-word") that the term is approaching meaninglessness in terms of how Americans define themselves politically? Or do you think in the era of Obama the word can be "reclaimed" by the left as something to be proud of again? I honestly don't know, though clearly Obama isn't going to lead this charge. But so long as "progressive" is touched with a slight disdain for old-fashioned middle-class liberals, it isn't going to be as an unapologetic rallying cry for a broad sector of Americans. Pacifica stations can call themselves progressive: MSNBC and the like will do better with the L-word. The shift of attention from cultural to economic issues may help revive the word; this isn't about what you drive or what color cheese you buy anymore.   What do you think Barack Obama's best "framing" of an issue has been so far (since he was sworn in)? What was his worst framing job? Linguistically speaking, it's early days yet for the Obama administration -- this may be a great time for business and economics writers, but it has been a slow season for linguists. We haven't heard too many catchphrases that can compete with the inventions of the Bush years. Using "recovery" for "stimulus" isn't in the same league as "the ownership society" or "healthy forests." But the administration is starting to spread its rhetorical wings -- "the New Foundation" has an ambitious ring. It may rank someday with "the New Deal" and "Morning in America," or it may crash and burn like "The Ownership Society." In the end these expressions don't retain their glow once people perceive that there's nothing behind them.   Your essay on the word "elite" ("Where The Elites Meet") traces the changing nature of how the word is used politically, from a traditional meaning of "the rich and powerful" to the way conservatives use it now as "snobs who think they're better than the rest of us." In it, you write: "That broadened meaning of elite is apt to create some confusion for liberals who haven't cottoned to it. They're apt to get indignant when they hear elite pronounced with a sneer by people who would indisputably qualify for the label under the old definition." But you failed to address the term "elitist" at all. So how would you define "elitist" today, from both a righty perspective (elite = "cultural elite") and a lefty outlook (elite = "financial/power elite")? An elitist used to be a person who believed in rule by the best and brightest -- initially, it wasn't necessarily a pejorative word. Now it has become a term for people who think they're superior to everyone else. That new meaning is more appropriate for the right than for the left, since the right is trying to make this a question of attitude than actual power, wealth, and influence. So we were treated last year to the remarkable spectacle of the multimillionaire Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild explaining on CNN that she was supporting John McCain because Barack Obama was an elitist who couldn't connect with ordinary Americans. Granted, almost everybody found that one ludicrous (well, except Lady L., which only made it funnier), but really she's only a notch up from Ivy-educated lawyers from privileged backgrounds like Ingraham and Coulter ranting about "the elites" who "hate us," as Ingraham puts it, making free use of the first-person plural. There's a condescension in that that insults the intelligence and dignity of American working people. In fact, "elitism" has become a self-diagnostic term these days: when you hear somebody using the word, it's a pretty good bet they're guilty of it.   In the political labeling arena, there seems to be one term that both sides occasionally try to claim for their own. Unlike other political monikers, "populism" seems to be a tough term to define. How would you describe the concept of "populism" in America today, and how can it apply to both Barack Obama and the tea party demonstrators? Populism is a technique and a language, not a policy or ideology -- it's not a question of what you're trying to get from people, but how you're hit on them. That's why we don't use "populist" the way we use "liberal" and "conservative" -- there are no "populist voters" or "populist constituencies," just "populist politicians," who try to play on a public's sense of aggrievement and indignation at the rich and the powerful (or sometimes, just at the people we perceive as snooty). In recent decades "populist" has been a watered-down term for anything that has down-home or down-to-earth appeal -- you see it used to refer to everything from Steven Spielberg to Oscar de la Renta's downmarket fashion line. So it may be regaining some of its original force as a term anchored in a sense of economic injury.   Do you think bloggers are aiding in the downfall of proper English, or do you see them as a revitalizing force which is updating English usage? How about the commenters to blogs (the "language police" or "grammar police") who keep the bloggers on the straight and narrow by, for instance, pointing out the difference between "loath" and "loathe" when we bloggers misuse such terms? Or how about the Twitter phenomenon, where all communication is reduced to a 140-character limit? There's a kind of observer effect here -- it isn't that the state of English has gotten any worse, but that we're seeing a broader slice of it. People are always pointing out that beauty of the Internet is that anyone can set down his or her thoughts and reach a vast potential audience, so it shouldn't be surprising that a great number of the participants in the new electronic discourse are people whose grasp of English orthography and grammar was always a little shaky. Take a word that's tough to spell, like accommodate . In the press, it's misspelled a bit more than one percent of the time; in the Google newsgroups it's misspelled over 60 percent of the time. But that error rate on accommodate has probably always been about right for the mass of people who write without benefit of a copy editor -- the only difference is that before now, their spelling errors were visible only on the notes they left on their refrigerator doors. Still, it provides grist for the language police -- really we should call them the minutemen, the sorts of people whose sense of self-worth rests on having mastered the rules for using the apostrophe in seventh grade. And you can blame the Internet for making them more visible, too.   In your essay "Branding the Phonetosphere," you talk about brand names becoming a true international "lingua branda," and how brand names such as moxie, dry ice, and zipper have become common (uncapitalized) words over time. [Full disclosure: I should note that I still use "TelePrompTer," just because it's fun to type that way.] But what about the reverse process? When do common names and titles deserve capitalization? When do you go from calling him "Joe the plumber" to the more formal "Joe The Plumber," in other words? Is there some sort of secret meeting of linguists and semanticists that decides who and what is truly worthy of uppercase letters, or does everyone just start capitalizing such a term at the same time independently? The philosopher P. F. Strawson once talked about phrases that "grow capital letters," like "The Bronx Bombers." The question is, when do these go from being a description to a name? There's a fair amount of variation in the press, even in dictionaries, and sometimes it's politically interesting. For example, since 1989 the press has been capitalizing the word "communism" much more than it did -- the implication is that the word is no
 
David Collins: None Dare Call Him Poor Top
Some lawsuits make perfect sense to me. Remember Max Mosely? He's the upper-crust Brit, the international head of Formula One racing, who was photographed last year at what the News of the World termed a Nazi-themed sadomasochistic orgy. Mosely sued for invasion of privacy. He didn't deny maintaining a bondage den in central London or hiring tall blonde prostitutes to humiliate and spank him. But he took umbrage at the Nazi thing. His father, Sir Oswald Mosley, had been a leading British fascist in the 1930s; Mosley fils didn't want to be seen as taking appeasement to a whole new level. He pressed his case, and won, and I say good for him. You got rights, Max! Other lawsuits make far less sense to me. Some, in fact, seem to have no certain outcome except to make the plaintiff look extremely silly. Consider the current defamation suit being brought by Donald Trump against Timothy O'Brien, an editor at the New York Times and author of the 2005 book TrumpNation: The Art of Being the Donald --a volume that most likely would have sunk from sight long ere now, if Trump hadn't made a stink about it. The nature of O'Brien's alleged defamation? He accuses Trump of being poor. Not poor poor, but of having a net worth in the range of $250 million rather than the 5 billion that Trump claims. Doing the math, that means he values Trump at five cents on the dollar. Ouch! Even in this age of toxic assets and vertiginous markdowns, that's quite a haircut. But still, it's just one guy's set of numbers as against another guy's set of numbers. Is it anything to sue about? No one has ever accused Trump of being a slave to dignity, but this public quibbling over the size of his bank account raises the bar on gaucherie. Could you imagine someone who was really rich--Warren Buffett, the Sultan of Brunei--stooping to this sort of thing? Not only is the lawsuit undignified; it promises to become hilarious. It will force Trump to explain how he himself values his assets, and this will likely entail breathtaking flights of fancy, spectacular bursts of bluster, and a naked logic-defying salesmanship that casts P.T. Barnum in the shade. Thanks to an article in the Wall Street Journal ["Trump on Trump: Testimony Offers Glimpse of How He Values His Empire," May 18] we've had a preview of the kind of howlers we might look forward to when and if the case gets past preliminary hearings and comes to trial. Citing a sworn 2007 deposition, the article reported that, when asked if he ever exaggerated the value and success of his projects, Trump replied, "Would you like me to say, oh, gee, the building is not doing well, blah, blah, blah..." When asked why he claimed to own 50% of the Manhattan rail yards project when in fact his stake was 30%, he replied that "in my own mind, I've always equated that 30% to 50%...more than 50%." When asked why he said, "The building is largely owned by me," in connection with a Hawaiian hotel-condo in which his sole interest was a licensing agreement, he said, "I'd rather have this than own the building." When asked if he did financial analyses of the downside risk to some of his projects, he replied that he did "mental projections" that generally showed things turning out fine. These "mental projections" apparently did not foresee the recent bankruptcy of Trump Entertainment Resorts, or the piling up of lawsuits in regard to stalled projects in Florida and Chicago, or the ongoing headaches with his planned but still unbuilt golf community on the foggy, shifting dunes of Scotland. All things considered, this would seem like an excellent time for Donald Trump to keep his head down and take care of business. But that kind of restraint seems beyond him. Like, say, Rod Blagojevich or Roger Clemens, he only knows how to play offense. Still, this defamation suit makes no sense at all. It can only invite further systematic scrutiny of Trump's finances--under oath, no less. If it turns out he really has the five billion that he claims, what has he gained? If it turns out that he's bluffing--that his "mental projections" far outstrip his actual resources--that could do serious damage to an empire built, first and foremost, on confidence, swagger, and looking like a winner. David Collins is the author of Maxxed Out , a novel about a real estate mogul going broke. He may be reached at dcmaxxedout@gmail.com .
 
Abe Silk: Clash of the Food Titans Top
On May 14, 2009 Anthony Bourdain of No Reservations fame, Duff Goldman of Ace of Cakes , and food activist Alice Waters participated in an informative, insightful, and humorous panel discussion at The Connecticut Forum in Hartford on food and food politics. Whereas Alice advocated heavily for local and sustainable food, Tony felt that taste mattered most, and the Ace of Cakes fell somewhere in between. The following exchange was especially interesting: More on Food
 
Morley Safer Suspicious Of Blogs Top
NEW YORK — CBS News veteran Morley Safer says he trusts citizen journalism as much as he would trust citizen surgery. The "60 Minutes" correspondent was honored by Quinnipiac University Wednesday with an award named for one of Safer's old bosses, Fred Friendly. He accepted it with a warning that the business problems of newspapers threaten all of journalism, and the public's precarious right to know. Safer said good journalism needs structure and responsibility. He considers the blogosphere no alternative, saying it is crammed with the ravings and manipulations of every nut with a keyboard. Safer is 77 now and works part time. He says he has no intention of giving up what he considers the best job in the world.
 
Glenn Beck Sub Holds Sane Discussion On Gitmo With Ron Paul (VIDEO) Top
Well, you have to give credit where credit is due. Glenn Beck takes time off from his eponymous Fox News show, no doubt to nurse the scars he received on The View , and guest host Judge Andrew Napolitano and Congressman Ron Paul come on the show and hold what may be the only non-demented discussion of the closure of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility you're likely to see on the non-Jon Stewart side of the teevee. Seriously! Where else on cable news have you seen a discussion on this issue transpire that ends in the unanimous opinion that these detainees are flat-out being denied their legal rights and it's wrong? Kudos to both men, who honestly have decoded this B.S. correctly. [WATCH] NAPOLITANO: Should Guantanamo Bay be closed as a prison camp for detainees? PAUL: Yes. NAPOLITANO: Why? PAUL: Sure it should be closed. We don't need it. It was unnecessary the way these prisoners were captured were very questionable. They haven't had really due process, so the real thugs that need to be tried, they ought to be tried, but they have deleted the funding mainly because the Republicans have won the argument because they turned this into, you know, if you don't support the continuation of these military tribunals and you don't support Guantanamo, maybe you support sending them into your district and they will be your neighbors, and the Democrats were convinced of that. They won the P.R. fight, and so therefore, they all became squeamish, and even the President backed down, so that's why there's no funding for closing Guantanamo, and I guess it will be open for an an indefinite future. NAPOLITANO: I visited Guantanamo about three years ago. As a physical plant, it is extraordinary. It is better than many prisons...in the United States of America, but the issue is not the physical plant . The issue is not the three square meals a day. The issue is why are these people there, and how can we keep them without proving that they have done something wrong and some legitimate, recognized court of law? PAUL: I think that's the key to it , and so far, they don't have an answer, because they're not allowing them to be tried in a legitimate court of law. I think a good example was set with the individuals that were involved with the bombing of the towers in 1993 . I mean, we even went into Pakistan, arrested them, brought them over here and tried them in our court system, and they're not our neighbors. They are in a federal prison and nobody feels threatened by them . I'm not sure why they are so determined not to pursue the law. Anyway, it has been politicized enough and it looks like the politicians are going to win this argument and the rule of law will not win. More on Guantánamo Bay
 
John Paxson Turns Over Bulls GM Job To Gar Forman Top
CHICAGO — Gar Forman has been promoted to general manager of the Chicago Bulls, replacing John Paxson, who will remain with the team as executive vice president of basketball operations. The Bulls announced the move Wednesday in a release promoting a Thursday news conference. Forman has been director of player personnel the past five years. Paxson had served as GM since April 2003, when he was officially hired as executive vice president of basketball operations. Forman joined the organization as a scout in 1998 and became the team's director of player personnel in January 2004. The move comes after a season in which the Boston Celtics eliminated the Bulls from the playoffs in seven games. More on Sports
 
Specter's Supreme Court Recommendations: Four Women Who Are Not Judges Top
Sen. Arlen Specter has given his list to President Barack Obama. The former chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee said today that Obama had asked him to name some possible successors to Justice David Souter on the Supreme Court. And Specter (D-Pa.) said he has complied, though in speaking with reporters he would only hint at the people he suggested. More on Arlen Specter
 
Derrick K. Baker: GOP's Kryptonite Dulls The Man of Steele Top
More than a few Republicans who believed they were supporting a stroke of genius in standing behind Michael Steele to become chairman of their party are now staving off an actual stroke. Who could argue with the cold, cunning and calculated political strategy that was the GOP's decision to put an African American face on the party whose most recent convention presented fewer faces of color than a Lion's Club meeting in Boise, Idaho? What happened to the Big Tent that Republicans once talked about housing a plethora of ideas and opinions and people from sea to shining sea? Perhaps an electoral tsunami ripped it to shreds and consequently, there, too, went the party's hope for one of their own forever residing in the White House. The stroke that is constricting Republicans' circulation and their inability to connect with voters beyond a shrinking base is in play because their new Man of Steele -- the African American man who pledged to "bring this party to every corner, to every boardroom, to every neighborhood, to every community" -- now is an albatross around the party's already bowed neck. And therein rests a contradiction and conundrum that has saddled political parties' plans and sandbagged politicians' plans to avoid partisanship on their way to victory: The extent to which race can and will trump political affiliations in a nation that still has trouble with dealing with the polarizing issue head on and on a national scale. This is not to say that Michael Steele is having problems with his brethren these days exclusively because he's black. Not at all. That's an off-the-wall proposition. Let's get real here, people. It's just that Steele (who earlier this year said, "We want to convey that the modern-day GOP looks like the conservative party that stands on principles. But we want to apply them to urban-suburban hip-hop settings.") was hoodwinked and bamboozled into believing that the real Republican National Committee decision-makers actually ever intended to give full control of the party's future and budget to a man who ostensibly espouses conservative principles but who mistakenly believes that the party's far right faction really agrees with him that even "one-armed midgets" have a place in his party. At some point, didn't the camera-friendly, eloquent former lieutenant governor of Maryland remember the lessons to be learned when this party faithful fooled the quixotic conservative-perennial political candidate Alan Keyes into running against Barack Obama for the U.S. Senate seat to represent Illinois? Steele is a bright man, one who made a national name for himself during his four-year run as second in charge in Maryland. So did he not take home any lessons from that fateful day on August 8, 2004, when Keyes was sacrificed, rather drafted, to challenge the nation's next president? A means to an end. A commitment to die hard under the guise of fighting for your principles. Blinded and hardened by personal beliefs. Come up with your own phrase of an explanation, but both Keyes and Steele were played like a violin by GOPers who are searching for ways to remain relevant in voters' eyes without alienating the far right who navigate their ship's rudder. (And when did Rush Limbaugh become a maritime expert anyway?) Go back to his January election as chairman of the Republican National Committee, when Steele said he was committed to bringing "this party to every corner, to every boardroom, to every neighborhood, to every community;" when he said his public relations campaign was going to be "off the hook;" and when he said his party was about to undergo an extreme makeover. Here's just how much Republicans want this man at this point in time to change their makeup and hairstyle: Greater controls over how money will be spent have been foisted on Steele. When the RNC convenes its special session this week, there's a chance they will agree to start calling Democrats the "Democrat Socialist Party," a move Steele disagrees with. And finally, holding a special session in and of itself before the RNC's regular meeting in July is being viewed as a slap at the Man of Steele, who misinterpreted the memo to believe he was actually at the top of the food chain. Michael Steele refuses to believe that he's an interloper in his own home, and that's too bad for him. Entrenched, fanatical and partisan politics have converged -- on top of any implications of race -- to cut him off at the knees before the 100-yard dash even starts. However, to quote the great author and humorist Mark Twain, once Steele is politically buried, while I won't attend his figurative funeral, I'll send a nice letter saying I approved of it ... but only because he dug the hole and jumped in. More on GOP
 
GOP Votes To Condemn Democrats' "March To Socialism" Top
WASHINGTON — Republicans on Wednesday abandoned an effort to label their opponents the "Democrat Socialist Party," ending a fight within the GOP ranks that reflected the divide between those who want a more centrist message and those seeking a more aggressive, conservative voice. Two Republican National Committee members who backed a resolution to ask the Democratic Party to change its name said supporters agreed to changing the measure's language to urge Americans to oppose what the GOP is calling the Democrats' "socialist" agenda. The name-changing resolution supported by Jim Bopp of Indiana and David Norcross of New Jersey had drawn criticism from GOP Chairman Michael Steele. Other party leaders called the move "stupid" and "absurd," saying it made Republicans look petty during a troubling time for the nation. The Democratic National Committee said the proposal reflected a political party so devoid of ideas that it was resorting to "name calling" and "petty politics." Bopp and Norcross dismissed the criticism Wednesday and said the publicity generated by the proposal was good for the GOP. "It has generated the debate we had hoped for," Bopp said. "It was an effort to educate the American people, and it was successful." Norcross said it was a bid to raise awareness of the Democratic agenda so that Americans can be "properly fearful." Republicans were slated to vote on the "socialist" resolution and other measures late Wednesday afternoon. At one point during informal discussions of the name change, those attending the meeting of state party leaders and other party officials said the proposed name might be "Nationalist Socialist Democrat Party." However, including the word "Nationalist" was not formally proposed. Republicans are trying to chart a new course after election losses in 2006 and 2008 that left them out of power in the White House, Congress and statehouses across the country. Without a successor to former President George W. Bush, the party is in the midst of an intense debate over its identity and facing an emboldened Democratic Party that's grown larger and stronger under President Barack Obama's leadership. More on Michael Steele
 
AKMuckraker: Captain Sig Hansen Speaks Out About Alaska's Deadliest Match Top
Captain Sig Hansen, well known for his featured status on the cable show Deadliest Catch has used his political capital, as it were, to speak out against Alaska's Deadliest Match; fish and the proposed Pebble Mine Project. It's unusual for a "Deadliest Catch" crew member to take a hard stance in a big Alaska resource battle like Pebble. Hansen, who lives in Seattle, said he usually shies away from requests to get involved in anything political. Because Hansen exploits crab stocks and other Alaska fisheries, he said, he can't be opposed to all resource development. "I'm not your typical greenie," Hansen said. [snip] He's persuaded that Pebble can't be done safely. If a development has "the potential to destroy a resource as delicate as the salmon, you've got to draw the line somewhere," he said in a recent interview. The ad campaign will feature TV and print ads, one of which has a picture of Hansen and crew, and states: "We don't mind crab fishing in the dead of winter in the Bering Sea, but there's no way we'd take the risk of developing Pebble Mine" Brilliant. And it expresses what many Alaskans think. It's not uncommon to see cars and trucks driving around Anchorage with the eye-catching "No Pebble Mine" stickers on them. For whatever reason, nature has gifted Bristol Bay with the greatest salmon fishery in the world. Pebble Mine, would sit on a fault zone, and at the confluence of two rivers that empty into these rich fishing waters. And the track record of environmental pollution from this type of mine is not good. There's a reason Hansen thinks the development of the largest gold and copper mine of its kind can't be done safely. Meanwhile, the folks at Anglo-American, who want to develop the mine tell us over and over again that they won't develop a mine that would endanger the fishery. They tell us what great stewards they are and how they'll do it right. Last month, Sir Mark Moody-Stuart, chairperson of Anglo American made the following comments at their Annual General Meeting: "The project has been controversial," Moody-Stuart told the AGM. He found the project close to three streams located in the headwaters of the extensive Bristol Bay watershed, which was well known for its rich salmon fishery. "I understand the fears and passions which have been stirred and recognise the cultural and commercial importance of the salmon, but I believe that many of these fears are based on the false assumption that this is a choice between mining and fishing. "I am confident that the two can coexist. We have made it clear that the project will work on the basis of world-class scientific and engineering skills and that we will use inclusive and innovative stakeholder engagement. "Our bottom line is that, if the project cannot be built in a way that avoids damage to Alaska's fisheries and wildlife or to the livelihoods of Alaskan communities, it should not be built. "It is on that basis that we will continue to evaluate the project in compliance with the prescribed regulatory processes in Alaska. But, we will do so with a mindset that goes well beyond compliance," he promised. Fishing boats in Dillingham, Alaska Moody-Stewart's last gig before joining Anglo American, just so we have a little context was as the Chair of the Committee for Managing Directors of Shell Oil, where he had worked since 1966. Shell likes to portray itself as an environmentally sensitive organization, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. This is a process that has come to be known as "greenwashing," and Shell has been forced to remove certain ads in the U.K. because of it. Next week, on May 26,the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York will hear the case of Wiwa v. Shell , despite Shell's attempts to have it thrown out of court. The trial centers around environmental devastation and human rights abuses in the Niger Delta at the hands of the company. The environmental devastation the oil company has caused to Ogoni lands in the Niger Delta was a primary reason for the Ogoni movement against Shell. In 2006, the Niger Delta Natural Resource Damage Assessment and Restoration Project (an independent team of scientists from Nigeria, the U.K. and the U.S.) characterized the Niger Delta as "one of the world's most severely petroleum-impacted ecosystems." Their report noted that the Delta is "one of the 10 most important wetlands and marine ecosystems in the world.Millions of people depend upon the Delta's natural resources for survival, including the poor in many other West African countries who rely on the migratory fish from the Delta." Of the nearly 27 million people living in the Niger Delta, an estimated 75 percent rely on the environment for their livelihood, often farming and fishing for market or subsistence living. Shell's operations in the Delta have led to the deep impoverishment of the Ogoni people and surrounding communities in the Delta. Why would they do this? Because they can get away with it. What will large resource development projects do in Alaska? They will do what they can get away with. This is not to say that we should never develop Alaska's resources. But we need to pick and choose, and we need to weigh the cost. Even Sir Moody-Stuart of Anglo American says if it can't be built in a way that avoids damage to the fishery, then it shouldn't be built. And yet, they try to tell us that we have nothing to worry about. How are they doing this? By telling us that they care. They love Alaska too. Moody-Stewart and the crew would never want to do anything to harm our fisheries, or our wildlife, or the people of the coastal communities that depend on these things. Really. They promise. It's who they are. Shell in Nigeria. Photo credit George Osodi/AP And what happens if Anglo American and their partner Northern Dynasty Minerals screw up? What happens if they have a terrible accident, or miscalculation and they contaminate this fishery? Just ask Exxon. If the Exxon Valdez oil spill is any indication, they'll make some sort of a cleanup effort, stall litigation in court for 20 years and end up paying less than half a day's profit twenty years later, after almost a quarter of the litigants are dead, and a corporation-friendly ruling comes down from a Republican appointed Supreme Court. Not much of a deterrent when you stand to make billions. Good for Sig Hansen for taking a stand. He is right when he says you have to draw a line somewhere, even if you're not a "typical greenie."
 
Trip Van Noppen: An Arctic Agenda for Secretary Salazar Top
The Beaufort Sea, off Alaska's northernmost shores, and the Chukchi Sea, which separates Alaska from Russia, are home to one in five of the world's remaining polar bears. These icy waters are crucial feeding and migration zones for bowhead, beluga and other whales, seals, walruses and migratory birds; for thousands of years they have also sustained a vibrant Native culture. But the Bush administration treated America's Arctic as just another place to be exploited, relentlessly pushing oil and gas drilling without regard for the consequences. Now a new President and his Interior Secretary, Ken Salazar, have pledged to restore science to the forefront of decisions about energy and the environment. They have no better opportunity to fulfill that pledge than in the coming weeks, as they face key decisions on oil and gas activity in the Beaufort, Chukchi and Bering Seas - decisions that will determine the future of the region, its people and its creatures. The Arctic has been called the least understood region on Earth. We do know it is already where climate change has hit hardest, as warmer temperatures threaten ecosystems, fish, wildlife and the people whose way of life depend on them. That's all the more reason the Arctic must be treated carefully, to minimize the risk of further and irreparable injury. Here's what the President and Sec. Salazar can do to make a decisive break from the "drill here, drill now" policies of the Bush administration and show Americans a new day has dawned in the Arctic: • Salazar must decide the fate of Shell Oil's plan for exploratory drilling next year in the Beaufort Sea, just off the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Shell proposed to drill directly in the endangered bowhead whale's migratory path. Noise and potential oil spills could not only harm the whales, but polar bears and Alaska Native hunting and fishing. This plan must not proceed without a rigorous review of potential impacts. • Salazar is reviewing a court ruling that the Bush administration's five-year plan for offshore Arctic drilling did not comply with the law. A controversial lease sale in the Chukchi Sea was held under this plan in 2008, and more lease sales in the Beaufort, Chukchi and Bering seas are planned. The administration should cancel the upcoming lease sales and void the illegal Chukchi leases. • Salazar has yet to take a position on a separate legal challenge to the Chukchi lease sale, which took place without adequate review of the potential environmental damage or any real plan to deal with oil spills. The administration should not defend this illegal sale. The bottom line: we need to call a time out on all offshore oil and gas activity in the Arctic until we fully understand what's at stake and how to protect it. That means putting in place a comprehensive conservation and energy plan that protects the Arctic and its people. The Obama administration has made commendable promises to change the way it does business, put science and the public interest first, and take a new direction in the Arctic. Now it's time for action. More on Climate Change
 
Stephen H. Dinan: Spreading Peace on Twitter Top
Twitter's name makes it sound like it circulates only inconsequential gossip. However, its ability to propagate ideas more rapidly than any medium in history means that it can also be used for profoundly evolutionary purposes. On Tuesday, May 19th, Deepak Chopra ( @Deepak_chopra ) offered a simple 88 character tweet on Twitter "Please take the vow of non-violence with me today: http://www.itakethevow.com Please RT!" What followed offered a fascinating experiment in this medium's capacity to be a catalyst for something quite noble -- the spreading of peace on earth. Within one hour, there had been one hundred retweets of his post and by the end of the day, over two hundred. Each retweeter offered their encouragement to followers to join them in the vow of non-violence in thought, words, and actions. Hundreds did so. Many more watched the inspiring music video and the story of the origin of the global movement, which has resulted in close to 20,000 people taking the vow since it began in November of 2008. This vow is not casual or easy; it is a permanent commitment to leave behind violence as an acceptable way of engaging others, even in our minds and in our words. Frankly, it took some serious reflection on my part as to whether I was ready. The vow also includes a commitment to encourage two others to join you in taking the vow. It's thus designed as a simple viral strategy to create peace on earth, with a goal of eventually having 100 million people take the vow. That sounds audacious until we look at the current rate of growth. From 450 people who took the vow in November to nearly 20,000 who have done so six months later, the spread has been rapid, with close to a doubling of signatories each month. If the current rate of growth continues at the same pace, I Take the Vow would reach 100 million signatories by mid-June of 2010. I believe this can be a powerful demonstration experiment of the deepest spiritual purpose of Twitter: for us to evolve our culture rapidly and to create major change on the planet with ease. Taking and then spreading a powerful vow that can truly lead to peace on earth takes only personal willingness, a few minutes and a few dozen words. If each of us took the vow ourselves and Twittered something as simple as the following tweet every month, the end result will be a very real contribution to reaching 100 million people on planet earth committed to peace. I took the vow of non-violence with @Deepak_chopra ! Join me at http://www.itakethevow.com Please RT! Join me in a simple strategy for planetary change that can also unleash the highest potential of Twitter as a medium to empower the best in us. As we demonstrate what is possible with peace, the same approach can be applied to sustainability, health, poverty alleviation, and more. You can find me @stephendinan on Twitter. More on Twitter
 
Mark Weisbrot: Big Business Gearing Up to Defend Protectionism Against UN Climate Negotiators Top
The battle over "intellectual property rights" is likely to be one of the most important of this century. It has enormous economic, social, and political implications in a wide range of areas, from medicine to the arts and culture - anything where the public interest in the widespread dissemination of knowledge runs up against those whose income derives from monopolizing it. Now it appears that international efforts to slow the pace of worldwide climate disruption could also run up against powerful interests who advocate a "fundamentalist" conception of intellectual property According to Inside U.S. Trade, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is gearing up for a fight to limit the access of developing countries to Environmentally Sound Technologies (ESTs). They fear that international climate change negotiations, taking place under the auspices of the United Nations, will erode the position of corporations holding patents on existing and future technologies. Developing countries such as Brazil, India, and China have indicated that if - as expected in the next few years - they are going to have to make sacrifices to reduce carbon emissions, they should be able to license some of the most efficient available technologies for doing so. Big business is worried about this, because they prefer that patent rights have absolute supremacy. They want to make sure that climate change talks don't erode the power that they have gained through the World Trade Organization (WTO). The WTO is widely misunderstood and misrepresented as an organization designed to promote "free trade." In fact, some of its most economically important rules promote the opposite: the costliest forms of protectionism in the world. The WTO's rules on intellectual property (Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property, or TRIPS) are the most glaring example. These are designed to extend and enforce U.S.-style patent and copyright law throughout the world. Patents are monopolies, a restriction on trade that creates inefficiency in exactly the same way that tariffs, quotas, or other trade barriers do. The economic argument for relaxing patent rules is therefore the same as that for removing trade barriers, only times 50 or 100, or even 1000 -- since the average tariff on manufactured or agricultural goods is quite small compared to the amount by which patent monopolies raise the price of a pharmaceutical drug. These restrictions cost U.S. consumers an estimated $220 billion a year compared to competitive pricing; many times the gains from trade liberalization that we could even hope to get from a successful completion of the current round of negotiations in the WTO. (This round of talks began in 2001 in Qatar and is called the Doha round). It took years of struggle by non-governmental organizations to loosen the big pharmaceutical companies' stranglehold on the WTO, to the point where the organization's 2001 "Declaration on TRIPS and Public Health" reaffirmed the rights of member countries to produce generic versions of patented drugs in order to promote public health. But this was just a first step, and seven years later these rights have been applied almost exclusively to anti-retroviral drugs for the treatment of AIDS, in just a handful of developing countries. The power of the pharmaceutical companies, with their governments in the United States and Europe as advocates, still keeps life-saving medicines priced out of reach for hundreds of millions of the world's poor. The legal procedure that has been used - although very infrequently - to allow for the production of generic drugs for the treatment of AIDS is called a compulsory license. This means that a government can legally authorize the production of a generic version of a drug that is currently under patent, provided that this is done for public health purposes. A royalty is paid to the patent holder, but this is generally not very expensive. Developing countries such as Brazil, India, and China want to make sure that such possibilities are open for new Environmentally Sound Technologies, e.g. in the areas of renewable energy, that might enable them to meet future targets for reducing carbon emissions. A Brazilian official noted that his country had only issued one compulsory license, for the anti-AIDS drug Efavirenz, produced by Merck. But big business doesn't want to take any chances. On May 20, they are scheduled to launch a new coalition called Innovation, Development and Employment Alliance (IDEA). (You've got to love the Orwellian touch of those marketing consultants). Members include General Electric, Microsoft, and Sunrise Solar; they will reportedly also be concerned with intellectual property claims in the areas of health care and renewable energy. For the intellectual property fundamentalists, the income claims of patent holders are "property rights," seen as analogous to a homeowner's right to her house. But the framers of the U.S. Constitution (Article I, Section 8) didn't it see that way, and neither, for the most part, have U.S. courts. Our legal system has long taken into account that protection for patent and copyright monopolies must reflect an important tradeoff: between rewarding innovation and creativity, on the one hand, and allowing for the dissemination of knowledge and the development of new technologies. The WTO rules, driven by the protectionist interests of powerful corporations, have gone far to advance the fundamentalist view of intellectual property, at the expense of the world's economy and public health. Now our corporations fear that negotiators at the United Nations, under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, might not share these fundamentalist views, especially when the future of the planet is at stake. Ten years ago environmentalists played a major role in exposing the built-in prejudice of WTO rules, which tend to strengthen commercial interests against environmental regulation. A tipping point was reached when they helped organize large-scale protests that shut down the WTO negotiations in Seattle in 1999, raising alarm bells and building opposition worldwide. Environmental awareness and a sense of urgency with regard to climate change are much more broadly shared today. The Obama administration should take note of this and place itself squarely on the side of promoting the spread of environmentally sound technologies. This column was published by The Guardian Unlimited on May 20, 2009. More on Climate Change
 
Birmingham Police Beating: 5 Police Officers Fired For Beating Caught On Tape Top
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Five Birmingham police officers were fired Wednesday for beating an apparently unconscious suspect after a roadway chase, an attack caught on a patrol car videotape that didn't surface publicly for a year. Police Chief A.C. Roper said the officers, who were not identified, were seasoned veterans but acted in a "shameful" manner. The video shows police pursuing Anthony Warren's van on Jan. 23, 2008. One officer on foot was injured when the van swerved through traffic. The van overturned on a ramp, ejecting Warren, who lay motionless as officers ran toward him. The video shows them beating him with fists, feet and a billy club. Roper said the department had "terminated 50 years of combined service due to 10 seconds of injustice." The officers can appeal. Authorities believe numerous Birmingham officers and as many as a half-dozen supervisors saw the video over the past year, but none reported it. "In addition to these terminations, we're also reviewing our supervisor's actions, reporting mechanisms and policies," Roper said. He said disciplinary action may be taken against supervisors. The Alabama Bureau of Investigation will review possible criminal charges. District Attorney Brandon Falls said Wednesday the tape of the beating surfaced unexpectedly as prosecutors were preparing to try Warren for assault in connection with the chase. He said prosecutors had a video of the chase "but the beating was not on the copy we had." Falls said the prosecutor wanted to play the video for the jury but, for technical reasons, she needed another copy and asked for the original. "We got the original the week before the trial ... and that's where she saw the rest of the tape," he said. He said they contacted the defense, the Alabama Bureau of Investigation and the Birmingham police chief. Warren, who had been held under $1 million bond after the chase, pleaded guilty in March 2009 to first-degree assault and was sentenced to 20 years in prison. Because of his plea, no trial was held.
 
Caption This Photo, Vote For Wednesday's Best, See Tuesday's Winner! Top
Original Caption: Keeper Petra Schroeder takes one of the triplet jaguar cubs out of a basket for weighing, at the Tierpark Zoo in Berlin, Tuesday, May 19, 2009. The three cubs were born on April 16 and named Atiero, Jumanes and Valdivia. WEDNESDAY'S FAVORITES: TUESDAY'S WINNER: Believe it or not, there's actually a fifth cigarette we can't show. By benMazal. More on Caption Contest
 
Karin Badt: Ken Loach's "Looking for Eric" Premieres at Cannes: A "Crowd-Pleaser" with Eric Cantona Top
The story of a depressed postman who finds encouragement from a phantom Eric Cantona (for those not in the know, a famous French soccer player) who visits him in private to buoy up his spirits, Ken Loach's new film is a "crowd-pleaser". While I myself -- preferring more intense dramas -- found it a bit too fluffy, I very much appreciated the scenes when Eric the postman bonds with his fellow postmen, who also cheers him on. My favorite scene: the postmen gather round in a den to do "cognitive therapy", a session especially valuable for poor Eric who has screwed up his domestic life, abandoning the woman he loves. "Okay, guys, look in the mirror and imagine someone who really loves you," the ringleader barks out, wielding a mirror. Really loves you unconditionally . Look at the mirror and see how this person loves you! Come on, now! Come on!" "Does it have to be someone real? " says one of the men -- eager, yet dumbfounded. The cockney accent and cognitive therapy combination is a riot. Another great scene is the kitschy ending, where all the men team up with Eric Cantona masks and... (no plot spoiler to follow). I asked Ken Loach -- cheerfully smiling on the terrace of the Martinez Hotel -- what he would like audience members to take away from his new film. "That you have to believe in your friends, your teammates. No I don't believe in a God, I believe in the collectivity of people: that you are stronger as a group. I chose to make Eric a postman because I wanted a working class job for him, but I also wanted to emphasize the collective power of a team. Football is a team too. Listen to what Cantona says: "the pass is more important than the goal. The goal is an individual act, but the pass is to a colleague." Loach continued with passion: "Thatcher tried to destroy it. She wanted us to be antagonistic towards each other: competitive. Everything became privatized, so we can screw each other. Now, we are faced with the destruction of the planet, and it is clear her way does not work. Collective thinking is what is going to help us." As our own group of journalists disbanded, I asked Loach if he personally felt part of a group, besides his film crew. "Of course," he said with a smile. "I am politically engaged."
 
Obama: Plame Lawsuit Should Not Be Reconsidered By Supreme Court Top
CREW learned today that the Obama administration is opposing our request that the Supreme Court reconsider the dismissal of the lawsuit, Wilson v. Libby, et al. In that case, the district court had dismissed the claims of Joe and Valerie Wilson against former Vice President Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, Scooter Libby and Richard Armitage for their gross violations of the Wilsons' constitutional rights. Agreeing with the Bush administration, the Obama Justice Department argues the Wilsons have no legitimate grounds to sue. It is surprising that the first time the Obama administration has been required to take a public position on this matter, the administration is so closely aligning itself with the Bush administration's views.
 
A. Lee Fritschler: Liberating the Postal Service Top
Government bailouts of high-profile private corporations have obscured the fact that one of the largest government enterprises, the U.S. Postal Service, is also in dire financial straits. In the case of the Postal Service, however, the fundamental problem is not money or credit, but its "business model" -- that is, the basic organization and purpose of the Postal Service. In essence, what the Postal Service needs is to be free of congressional interventions and allowed to operate as a regulated corporation in a competitive delivery services industry. Ever since 1970, when it was created by Congress to succeed the old Post Office Department, Congress had said that it wants the Service to operate like a business. Yet ever since 1970, whenever attempts are made to respond to that mandate, some old congressional hobby horses ride forth and interfere. Postmaster General Jack Potter has asked Congress to accept the fact that we might not need the mail delivered six days a week to every address in the nation -- the universal service level as it is currently defined. Potter asked for nothing more than flexibility for the future, yet several members of Congress immediately cried "Foul!" and insisted on retaining such service. However, six-day postal delivery was not invented by the Founding Fathers as many today seem to suppose. Until the Civil War, almost all Americans had to come to the post office to collect their mail. Not until the last third of the nineteenth century was postal delivery gradually extended to the main cities. Postal delivery in rural America (where most Americans still lived in 1900) was introduced in the first third of the twentieth century. Even so, as late as 1950, one in six Americans still collected his or her mail from the local post office. In the late 1970s, the country hit a rough economic patch. Inflation surged, and the federal budget turned red. To save money, Congress decided to renege on its promise to cover the costs of the Postal Service's unprofitable services. Worried that this might force the Postal Service to cut back on Saturday delivery, Congress "fixed" the problem through an appropriations rider that ordered the Postal Service to maintain six-day service without public funds. Presto, something for nothing! The problem is that almost 30 years later, the same temporary fix is still attached to the postal appropriations bill. After the first couple of years, Congress did not even bother to update it. The provision still requires that the Postal Service maintain delivery frequency at 1983 levels even though no one in Congress, and no one in the Postal Service, can say what the service levels in 1983 were. Furthermore, about 75% of those commercial mailers and households surveyed in the George Mason University study done for the Postal Regulatory Commission said they would be happy with five day delivery. The Postmaster General had a good understanding of what the public wanted. The annual postal appropriations rider has become a bad habit. It is time to stop the rider and give the Postal Service freedom to adjust delivery frequencies to the actual levels of mail and the real needs of addressees. Not unlimited freedom, but flexibility subject to oversight by the independent Postal Regulatory Commission and, of course, ultimately by Congress. Yet this only illustrates one facet of a much larger problem: how to equip the Postal Service to meet the needs of the twenty-first century. The base problem confronting the contemporary Postal Service is that the environment in which it operates has changed drastically. It is less and less a conduit for exchanging first class letters and more and more a broadcast medium, primarily for the distribution of advertisements, periodicals, and parcels. None of these classes of mail is covered by the monopoly on first class mail, a monopoly adopted by Congress in 1872! Today, the reasons for establishing the Postal Service as a government monopoly are fast disappearing. We need to think seriously about transforming the Service from a government monopoly into a regulated, competitive enterprise. There are numerous examples from abroad on how the transition might be made. The European Union has ordered the end of virtually all national postal monopolies by the end of the year 2010. And there are ample precedents and lessons to be learned from regulatory reform in other industries in this country. A restructured postal system would give the Postal Regulatory Commission, an independent and impartial body of experts, the authority to define the truly public interests which must be protected. For example, the Commission might require delivery of individual first class letters to, say, 98 percent of all addresses in the U.S. within three business days at a maximum rate of 50 cents for the next five years. It would be up to the Postal Service to figure out how to do that. If the Postal Service cannot do the job at a profit, the Commission might contract with a private carrier to provide the necessary service. Meanwhile, the Postal Service might find it commercially sensible to reduce rates for some types of letters -- for example, local utility bills. If it can offer lower rates in some places or to some mailers (without unfair price discrimination) it should do so. And if mailers want enhanced service, they should be able to get it and be willing to pay for it. We need to get away from the idea that the same level of service should be provided to all mailers everywhere. The true public interest lies in a guarantee of a reliable nationwide delivery service at an affordable maximum price. Public policy towards the Postal Service has grown unwise by not changing with changing times. We now have a system in which Congress feels obliged to oversee the execution of a public monopoly granted in the nineteenth century, while the Postal Service is struggling to adapt to life in the twenty-first century. This mismatch between policy and reality endangers the future of the Postal Service. It is time to allow the Postal Service to manage itself subject to clearly stated and impartially implemented rules that protect -- and where necessary pay for -- the essential minimum level of nationwide postal services required by the people. A. Lee Fritschler, Professor, School of Public Policy, George Mason University, was Chairman of the U.S. Postal Regulatory Commission. With colleagues James I. Campbell Jr., Robert H. Cohen, and Christine Pommerening, Professor Fritschler recently completed a study on the development and future of universal postal service for the Commission.
 
Laura Kiss: Mr. Berlusconi, Why You Don't Answer the Press? Top
There is a topic in Italy which is beginning to interest the rest of the world: the President of the Council of Minister's proclivity to lie to the public. Furthermore, when he is asked about uncomfortable truths, he not only continues to lie or refuses to answer, but also vehemently counterattacks the press who dared to ask him certain questions. This confrontation is currently underway with La Repubblica, the second major Italian daily newspaper property of Gruppo Espresso. Its only fault is to assume that the chief of government is accountable and coherent. It does not matter if the president is a womanizer, or even worse if he humiliates his wife: what counts is that our president speaks the truth in front of the nation. «Communists», is the adjective full of disdain with which Berlusconi reacts. So, today Italians should protest, a little further, the scandal that came out a couple of weeks ago regarding the prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, involved with a teenager. This is the scandal that has caused his wife to seek a divorce. La Repubblica, instead, has risen as a strong voice on the case, and after a couple of weeks since the scandal began, addressed Berlusconi with ten questions that have, as of yet, gone unanswered. These are the questions from La Repubblica: 1) When and how did Berlusconi meet Elio Letizia, the father of the 18 year-old Naomi? 2) How many times did he meet Mr. Letizia? Where, and for what occasion? (Berlusconi said that has been a friend of Letizia for many years. At the beginning of the scandal, however, he indicated him as the driver of former prime minister Bettino Craxi. This assertion was immediately denied by Craxi's son). 3) How can he describe the reasons of his friendship with Elio Letizia? 4) A few days following the scandal, Berlusconi tried to justify himself during a TV show, saying that he met the girl's father to discuss the candidates for the next European and administrative elections. Yet, he had always affirmed before that he was not having anything to do with the names of the future candidates. How is it that he was discussing these political matters with the girl's father? Elio Letizia, is not inscribed in any political party or unions, nor is he influential in the Southern Italy society. 5) When did Berlusconi meet Noemi Letizia for the first time? (the scandal started when he arrived at Noemi's 18th birthday party and she declared to the Press that she and "Papi" (Daddy), were seeing each other for at least two years in Rome and Milano). In other words, they were seeing each other while she was a minor. After these public comments, Berlusconi's wife, Veronica Lario, asked for divorce and declared that "she cannot live anymore married to a man who goes out with minors.") 6) How many times did Berlusconi and Noemi Letizia meet and where? 7) Does Berlusconi take care of the education, life and future of Noemi? Does he give financial support to her family? 8) If it is true, as Noemi has declared, that Berlusconi had made her understand that he could help her in a career as actress or as politician? This instrumental use of the woman's body does not impoverish the quality of democracy of a country, as other members of his own coalition have declared? 9) Veronica Lario reported that her husband "goes out with minors". Are there other minors whom the prime minister meets? 10) Veronica Lario has also declared "I have tried to help my husband, I have begged the people who is surrounding him to do the same, as one does with a sick person. It was all to no avail." How is the premier's health? Italians are genius in the art of surviving, but even better in the art of pretending. Since the Roman times, we have been unique in many different disciplines, some quite world renown. We were clever also in conquering other countries and populations, and in distant times we have produced political heavyweights such as Machiavelli and subsequent politicians of value. But today, in a world where communication has no borders, how can a Prime Minister of a Western country not publicly answer to the Press ? America, please help! Laura Kiss lkiss@inwind.it More on Italy
 
Huff TV: HuffPost's Dave Burdick On Wind Turbines, Obama's Fuel Rules, And Peeing In Old Faithful Top
Huffington Post Green Editor Dave Burdick weighed in on this week's green winners and losers over on Current.com . Topics included bird-friendly wind turbines, Obama's new fuel rules, and the recent firing of two Yellowstone employees who were fired after they were caught peeing into the Old Faithful geyser. Watch the full video below: HuffPost Green on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Huffington-Post-Green/56915268945 My Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/daveburdick Who's up and who's down this week in green? WINNERS: Wind Turbines Save Birds: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/15/study-think-wind-turbines_n_203908.html Obama's New Fuel Rules: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/19/obama-automakers-announce_n_205033.html Lisa Jackson on Fuel Rules: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/19/lisa-jackson-says-everyon_n_205464.html LOSERS: Old Faithful Micturaters : http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/14/2-yellowstone-workers-fir_n_203770.html
 
Swine Flu Reaction: Infomercials And Conspiracy Theories (VIDEO) Top
A couple of videos coming out of Iraq and Iran reveal a troubling reaction in the Middle East to the global H1N1 influenza epidemic, including anti-Western infomercials and conspiracy theories ( Via The Hill ) This first video is an Iranian commercial that peddles a conspiracy theory that the virus was spread by a Jewish drug company and Donald Rumsfeld for profit. [WATCH:] The second video (un-embeddable) is a rather goofy Iraqi government infomercial centered on the message, "Dear citizen, you must take precautions to protect yourself from this disease." It then lists very basic preventative techniques such as covering one's face when coughing or avoiding hand shakes. View the video here at MEMRI. Get HuffPost World On Facebook and Twitter! More on Swine Flu
 
Josh Sugarmann: Congress Says Yes to Guns in National Parks Top
If the champagne being quaffed by consumer groups and others in the wake of House passage of a bill aimed at limiting deceptive and abusive credit card practices has a slightly bitter aftertaste, it's probably because they're sharing a magnum with the National Rifle Association. In its ongoing efforts to open up every possible space in America to gun toting, the NRA succeeded in attaching to the credit card bill legislation allowing loaded guns in National Parks and Wildlife Refuges (legislation passed on the Senate side contained similar language). College presidents. Business owners. City mayors. Now you can add park rangers and other national park employees as the latest additions to the list of those whose knowledge and expertise have been trampled in the wake of the NRA's bullying efforts to remake America in its own image. After all, as the NRA's Wayne LaPierre says, and a majority of Congress seems to agree, " the guys with the guns make the rules ." This dangerous provision will put park park rangers, visitors, and wildlife at extreme risk. Don't believe me? Listen to the people who actually work every day to protect our nation's parks and their visitors. John Waterman, president, U.S. Park Rangers Lodge, Fraternal Order of Police : "One should ask, what do guns have to do with credit cards? We are disappointed that congress chose to disregard the safety of U.S. Park Rangers, the most assaulted federal officer, and forgo the environmental process set up by them to assure the protection of our national parks. If signed by Obama, this will clearly be a change in the president's rhetoric towards taking better care of our environment and protecting federal employees." Theresa Pierno, executive vice president, National Parks Conservation Association : "We are disappointed in the members of the House and Senate who allowed this amendment to pass, as well as President Obama. By not taking a stand to prevent this change, they have sacrificed public safety and national park resources, in favor of the political agenda of the National Rifle Association. This amendment had no hearing or review, and will increase the risk of poaching, vandalism of historic park treasures, and threats to park visitors and staff." Bill Wade, chair, executive council, Coalition of National Park Service Retirees : "Passage of this legislation that would allow firearms of all kinds in national parks is an absolute travesty. There is simply no need for it, given the extremely low risks that visitors face in national parks compared with everywhere else. Legislators who voted for this Amendment now have to live with the fact that they have, in fact, increased the risk to visitors and employees, as well as the risk to wildlife and some cultural resources. Moreover,they've just contributed to diminishing the specialness of this country's National Park System. We hope the American people register their disappointment in the actions of these legislators." Sorry guys. You didn't get the memo. The guys with the guns make the rules.
 
Douglas Rediker: Support the IMF Top
I suspect that the number of issues on which Condi Rice, Henry Kissinger, Bob Rubin, Paul Volcker, Tony Lake and James Baker all agree is small. But earlier this week, they and eight others of similar stature signed a letter to congressional leaders urging support for additional US funding for the International Monetary Fund. These former leaders from State, Treasury, the Federal Reserve and the National Security Council argued that the severe impact of the global financial crisis on developing countries has endangered America's own hopes for an end to the recession and that a "stronger and more responsive IMF is essential to the restoration of confidence in the global economy and financial system and thus to our own economic recovery." And yet, in spite of this unambiguous, high profile, bipartisan support, congressional approval remains uncertain. Those who oppose increased IMF funding argue that it costs too much, it unfairly benefits other countries on the back of the US taxpayer and the funding process is opaque. Others simply hate the IMF. It is important to understand the nature of the funding being sought, how it is being accounted for and the crucial role that the IMF plays in today's fragile global economy -- a role that benefits not only recipient countries to which the IMF provides financing, but also to the US. First, in spite of arguments about how much IMF participation costs the US, in fact, we make money from our stake in the fund. According to the US Treasury, over the past five years, the direct financial benefit of US participation in the IMF to the US taxpayer has exceeded $1.5 billion. That's because the IMF is a monetary agency -- not a special interest, charity or even a development bank. As such, the US benefits directly from both the payment of interest and from increases in the valuation of its share of IMF reserve assets. The current request before Congress calls for $108 billion in additional funding for the IMF, but this is actually misleading. Given the fact that, as noted above, these funds have proven to be more like profitable investments than traditional budgetary outlays, there is a credible argument that they should not be counted as anything more than an exchange of assets with one of the most creditworthy entities in the world. The majority of the current funding request is for what is known as the IMF's "New Arrangements to Borrow," or the NAB. The NAB acts as an emergency contingency fund and is only tapped when all other IMF resources are exhausted. If the increased US commitment to the NAB is actually utilized, the US would receive an IMF issued interest bearing security in return. That's why the current request for over $100 billion in authorization is being ascribed a "score" of $5 billion in the budget. While critics howl that allocating $100 billion while accounting for it as only $5 billion is financial trickery and obfuscation, the reality is that even this number is probably too conservative. For the US to actually lose money on the funding, the IMF would need to default. I can't imagine a scenario where the global financial system had been so decimated that even the IMF, backed by virtually every sovereign around the globe, could not repay its biggest lenders. Far more important than the outright profit the US makes from the IMF or the way Congress and the OMB decide to account for it, is the very necessary role that the IMF plays in providing a safety net for developing countries. Not only does that provide security benefits to the US by lessening the risk of creating failed states, but it also provides enormous economic benefits, primarily by creating more demand for US goods. It also provides surplus countries an alternative to hoarding vast amounts of precautionary reserves. A sustainable economic recovery depends on greater demand for US exports. The US Treasury estimates that for every one percent increase in foreign output, US GDP grows by between 0.25 and 0.35%. Exports accounted for almost 70% of US economic growth in 2008, but as demand from the emerging world fell last autumn and the dollar strengthened, American exports have fallen steadily. First quarter real exports this year were 23% lower than the year earlier. If exports were to remain at that depressed level over the full year, our GDP would decrease by around 2.75%. That means that even if the stimulus package passed by Congress earlier this year does everything it was intended to do and stimulates domestic demand, unless exports bounce back as well, we are not likely to see any real impact on overall economic growth and job creation here at home. The US has been working closely with many other countries to try to coordinate our responses to the crisis and spur global demand and growth. But it has been the emerging market economies, which were previously the drivers of strongest growth in US exports, that are suffering the worst of this crisis. Last year, 51% of all merchandise exports and 65% of all farm exports from the US went to emerging markets and developing countries. Their economic health is vitally important to the US economy. Unlike the US and other developed nations, the financial crisis that originated in the US and in Europe has dramatically limited developing countries' ability to access traditional sources of funding needed to keep themselves afloat. It is precisely in these cases that the IMF is of crucial importance as a provider of financial stability and as the lender of last resort. It is a role that they have already played with great skill and speed in Pakistan, Hungary, Ukraine and elsewhere. When President Obama attended his first G-20 Leaders Summit in London last month, the world's economic picture was even more clouded than it is today. After two days of meetings, the announcement of increased funding for the IMF caused a collective sigh of relief around the world, both for its size -- which was even more than many had hoped for -- and for the leadership that President Obama showed in driving the effort for the IMF increase. By that act, the president showed that he understood the global nature of the crisis and the yearning for big, bold steps on the part of the US to address the needs of those countries most at risk of failure. While the IMF has not always been popular, or even successful in all of its previous endeavors, during this crisis, it has shown itself to be creative, flexible and forward looking. In particular, the creation of a new flexible credit line earlier this year was announced just in time to provide a boost to countries like Poland, Colombia and Mexico -- before they actually needed it. In seeking additional funds for the IMF, President Obama has shown that he recognizes its importance and the stabilizing role that it plays. It is crucial that Congress approve the IMF funding authorization. Failure to do so would send a terrible signal across the globe that the US can't be counted on to lead in a time of crisis. It would significantly weaken President Obama's (and the US) claim to global leadership and could well spark another round of uncertainty in emerging markets, just as they are beginning to show signs of stability. Besides, not only is funding the IMF something that even political opposites like Bob Rubin and Henry Kissinger can agree to, we might even make a profit. Douglas Rediker is the Director of the Global Strategic Finance Initiative at the New America Foundation in Washington DC.
 
Amy Goldwasser: Red the Book: He Called His Penis John Wayne. He Lied. Top
Lying is one of the few activities I have never mastered. Though I more than possess the creativity to lie, I lack the stamina necessary to uphold it. It's similar to my relationship to running: yes, I have legs, but is that really how I want to use them? People -- and by people I mean me, before Denis and I became victims of the same liberal-arts college last year -- are for the most part ready to accept what another person says as the truth. Why wouldn't they? No one wants the burden of constant second-guessing, just as no New Yorker wants to believe that he or she is a permanently hardened, cynical, paranoid citizen of the island. My readiness to believe others and my inability to lie stem from classic, if not gifted, moral fortitude. That and the fact that the post-tall tale guilt is rarely worth whatever it is I was trying to weasel out of, or whoever it is I was trying to impress. Then again, I suppose there are times, especially in the romantic realm, where a loosely defined lie can be just the thing, like showing just the right amount of false enthusiasm when a lover gives you a bamboo present for Valentine's Day. Crying is gimmicky, but 'what the hell is this?' isn't appropriate either. Until I met Denis, I took pride in the fact that, despite not being a liar myself, I was pretty good at telling when someone else was lying. Denis grew up in England and would rivet everyone with tales of fistfights in British schoolyards and rugged, narrow escapes -- at the same time maintaining a perfect 4.0 GPA, playing in a professional orchestra, and speaking Gaelic. But the rough-but-refined James Bondian balance was not what made Denis cool. That would be the way he always sounded just about fed up with everything -- his teachers, his peers, the food, America, the weather, south-facing windows, people indoors, people outdoors. Our efforts to befriend, feed, provide light in the classroom were never good enough. We failed with Denis, and we failed big. On top of his revolting but hugely irresistible angst, Denis was easily the most handsome guy in our year. He was nicknamed Bobby Kennedy for his eloquent speech (one heard pedigree), thick hair, and incandescent blue eyes. Last January, much to the jealousy of the 200 straight, desperate girls at our 85-percent female college, Denis and I started dating. We spent winter afternoons in my cubicle room, arguing everything from Proust to Tex Mex (and the inevitable, laughable connection between the two). We swapped stories about family and past relationships, crippling to enviable. That's how I got to know, or believe I got to know, Denis. In the dark of our three-foot wide bed, he revealed a scar on his upper thigh and directed my attention to two broken ribs from falling six feet into a pit -- an ostrich pit. Under the watch of an incompetent nanny, six-year-old Denis had climbed a rickety fence at the zoo, falling into a pile of ostrich droppings the size of fists. "That can't be true." "I swear to God it is. I was in that pit for ten minutes, shaking. It took the staff ten minutes to get their act together and get me out. The mother ostrich clawed me in the leg. Have you ever seen an ostrich claw?" "No. Is it true they bury their heads in sand?" "That's not the point!" "Right. Sorry. Did you have to get stitches?" "Twelve." I was dating a fighter -- an ostrich fighter. I relished in telling everyone the story. Some days, there were just a few ostriches. Others, I'd make it sound like the rabid big-dopey-bird rehabilitation center. Who would make up such an unlikely tale and swear to God that it was true? Who would repeatedly tell the story without faltering on any of the gritty details regarding sloppy zoo bureaucracy in the U.K.? Besides, I got to see Denis in his knickers. Denis called his penis John Wayne. He told me how he'd dressed up as a cowboy and gone to visit his elderly neighbor, Mrs. Rose, who said he looked like John Wayne. He then flashed her, either to reinforce the point or to prove her wrong. Denis was four years old at the time, though I often find myself leaving that detail out. The story plays better when listeners imagine Denis of an unspecified age giving a British granny an eyeful. By February, he and I were spending snowy weekends away from school at my Manhattan apartment. Overjoyed at unfrequented levels of domesticity, I spent afternoons baking. When he casually hinted at his conservative views on marriage and family, I was quietly willing goodbye to 14 years of expensive tuitions, hello to babies and baked goods. Our children could play instruments. I could make instrument-shaped cookies. But a few weeks later, Denis disappeared. He stopped coming to classes, stopped calling. Once in awhile, I'd receive a cryptic text message saying he was fine but tired. Faculty began to grill me on his whereabouts. Two weeks into his vanishing I could no longer make excuses on his behalf. Then, one Sunday evening, he called: "So, I know you must be wondering what's going on." "..." "Why I've been away so much lately..." "..." "I've decided to drop out of school and move to Texas." Dial tone. I requested a meeting with his angry professors, then I baked and slept peacefully. The next morning, I marched right up to them. I brought ukulele cookies. "So, anyway, I'm sure you're wondering why I've called you here. I know Denis has missed a few classes lately..." "He's lost most of his credits and is on academic probation." "Right, like I said, he's a little behind. But I think we're focusing on the wrong issue here. I think Denis may have suffered a mental breakdown." "What makes you think that? Should we inform health services? Has he endangered himself or others in any way?" "Well no, not yet at least. He's under the impression that he wants to drop out of school and move to Texas." Nervous laughter. "Of all places. So, you see, we have to act immediately..." "Maybe it's a good idea for him to go home if he's not well." "Oh no, Professor, you misunderstood me. I said Texas. Like, cattle and Dixie Chicks, Texas." "Yes, we understand. Denis is from Texas. We consulted his forms when we met with the dean this morning. He probably made the healthy decision to go home." This was the beginning of the unraveling of Denis. I wish I could say I'd caught on at some point sooner, or that I'd suspected he was lying and chose to protect his pride by not confronting him. We met once after our phone conversation, long enough for him to apologize for what was a trip to the isles of his effortless talent and pathology. Names, places, and anecdotes were all debunked. He couldn't speak Gaelic. The song he'd claimed to have written for my birthday was a folk song featured in the credits of In Bruges . Nothing he'd lied about was of direct consequence to me -- he hadn't been cheating or put me at risk of anything -- but I couldn't stomach the thought that I'd been so carelessly, uselessly duped over the past few months. "What about the ostrich? What about the scar?" "It was dark, you didn't actually see a it. You only believed what you wanted to believe." Denis was wrong. I've been fairly consistent in the qualities I seek in a partner, and not once have I wanted to believe that a boyfriend was an ostrich fighter. I was humiliated, heartbroken. Spring came with its soft light; flurries of petals covered the campus. Though confronted with questions about Denis' disappearance, I never revealed his whereabouts or his lies. And despite his unforgivable behavior, I missed him daily. I felt uneasy and nervous. I doubted everyone, most of all myself. Honesty is always cited as the most desired feature in a relationship, and often one of the hardest to obtain and maintain. A violation of that honesty in a relationship, however, is usually just code for someone screwing around -- which makes it all very clear. Out with the liar. Denis lied repeatedly, but most of his lies were arguably insignificant. What did I care if he couldn't speak Gaelic? Or if he didn't write a beautiful song that he still played in a woo-worthy way? Is there such a thing as a harmless lie? A white lie, one that doesn't darken your under-eyes afterwards? Where do lies reside in the cosmos of language, of relationships? Why does society support lying about your feelings and opinions in the name of protecting someone else's, but not about where you've been or what you've done? Denis still claims to have never lied about his feelings for anyone and, in his short time at school, managed to offend fewer than a dozen students and faculty with this policy. But he left many times that number in awe of his stories. Lies are the plasticware of life's delivery: temporary fixes, neither enchanting nor enduring. So I loved a storyteller. Don't we all? Is there anything more seductive, really? From the moment we're born we're dazzled by stories of love and heroism, bravery and danger, dragon if not ostrich hunting. A story is an agreement to accept something romanticized -- in the case of a relationship, a mutual agreement to suspend disbelief in accepting eachother's narratives. But a lie is a story slipped under false pretense, like poison in the queen's goblet, or the fence collapsing under Denis's weight, and then my own. Denis's lies were never harmless, because liars do something powerful: they alter our sense of security. It's not that you can't believe them, it's that they can make it difficult to believe what you know of yourself. It took six batches of cookies to reaffirm my confidence in my baking alone. Is it because I need validation from others? Yes, of course it is. Perceptions of our talents, our attractiveness, that we are each unique and special and therefore lovable, come largely from what other people tell us. Just as we yearn to tell stories, vent, and establish commonality, so we find ourselves wanting to captivate, charm -- particularly that one other person who deeply agrees with what we think and say, who buys our mythology and where we tell them we come from. We breathe for yes, go on , for tenderness from our favorite fellow storyteller. But we want clear categories for truth and fiction. Denis returned to his small Texas town to 1) play in a mariachi band, 2) work for a childcare center, 3) fall into the pit of another wild beast. Things that were reaffirmed upon his leaving: that I can bake, that I consume more coffee than should be possible, that I'm a pool shark and premier flower doodler. That the John Wayne story gets better every time. Some things even I needn't have reaffirmed. This post was written by Maya-Catherine Popa, 20 , an author of RED the Book , a collection of personal essays written by 58 American teenage girls, now available in paperback and in development for TV, film, and theater. She attends Barnard College, where she is getting her BA in English Literature and Creative Writing with a focus on Women's Studies. She edits for and has also had work featured in the Columbia Review and A Gathering of the Tribes . She was recently awarded the Amy Loveman Memorial Award for undergraduate poetry.
 
National Organization For Marriage: New Ad Features "Confused" Children Top
I think that the people behind this newish ad from panicky gay marriage freakout group National Organization for Marriage intended this to read as some sort of plaintive explication of how being asked to consider the possibility of gay marriage will make children fundamentally confused. This seems weird to me -- after all, it's not the concept of gay marriage that's likely to confuse children, it's homosexuality itself. Seems to me that once you get your kid over that hump, the concept of marriage becomes the easy part. Unless, of course, the child comes from one of the many, many broken homes and failed marriages of heterosexuals. Those are FILLED with confusion and sadness. Here's the thing, now that these children have gotten a start in the world of commercial television, they'll be able to come to terms with the issue in the same safe, warm, and judgment-free environment that I did: high school drama club. ANOTHER BRILLIANT MANEUVER, NOM! [WATCH.] [Would you like to follow me on Twitter ? Because why not? Also, please send tips to tv@huffingtonpost.com -- learn more about our media monitoring project here .] More on Video
 
Bruce Nilles: Hundreds Tell EPA to Regulate Global Warming Pollution Top
Bruce Nilles is on vacation this week. This post is by Mary Anne Hitt, deputy director of the Sierra Club Beyond Coal Campaign. On Monday, close to 300 Sierra Club members and activists, clergy and people of faith, scientists, health professionals, and even a former 007 turned out for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) global warming endangerment hearing in Arlington , VA . Support for the endangerment finding and further regulation of cars and coal plants overwhelmed any opposition, with an unofficial estimate of more than 90% of testimony in favor of the endangerment finding. The day began with a representative from the State of New York speaking on behalf of Gov. David Paterson, and a representative from the Association of Clean Air Agencies - and from then on it was one excellent speaker after another all urging EPA to take action on regulating global warming pollution. We heard doctors talk about the health impacts, scientists discuss the climate models, regular citizens tell personal stories, and many clergy people talking about why we should take action and why their faith communities are involved. "(They) were really amazing," said one Sierra Club staffer. "To hear perspectives from almost every major tradition on the importance of acting on global warming was a powerful experience-- one that the EPA panel was still talking about during one of the breaks." Keely and Pierce Brosnan also showed up to testify and really enjoyed themselves. We were all appreciative of the willingness of the Brosnans to stay through additional testimony after they spoke, spend some time afterward talking to hearing attendees, and take a few pictures. (Then the paparazzi chased the Brosnans' car - which I was riding in - from the hearing all the way back to DC, and then the cameras followed us into a Barnes and Noble, where security finally chased them away. The good news is that I loaded the Brosnans up with good books on coal and global warming.) EPA moved very quickly through all the testimony, and the hearing wrapped at 8pm. We agree whole-heartedly with David Bookbinder, Sierra Club's Chief Climate Counsel, who said Monday that  "it's clear, from the crowd of people who turned out today, and the thousands of people who have already submitted comments, that there is broad public support for strong action on global warming." Tomorrow in Seattle is the second EPA public hearing on the global warming endangerment finding. You can sign up to attend our mid-day rally, and if you can't make that - then be sure to send your comments to the EPA about why they should regulate global warming pollution.
 
Diane Francis: Hooray for emission curbs Top
America finally has a smart leader, not a good old boy from Texas and his sidekick who were in the hip pockets of the Saudis and oil interests at home and abroad. Yesterday's announcement of dramatically enhanced fuel efficiency standards on vehicles recognizes that environmental, economic, trade and foreign policies converge and can be addressed all at once. To wit, curb America's oil addiction, and you balance the books, trade, save the environment and, possibly, Detroit from itself. Here's what President Obama announced yesterday and below that is what I wrote last summer which includes important background to this issue. "In the next five years, we're seeking to raise fuel-economy standards to an industry average of 35.5 miles per gallon in 2016, an increase of more than eight miles per gallon per vehicle. That's an unprecedented change, exceeding the demands of Congress and meeting the most stringent requirements sought by many of the environmental advocates represented here today," he said. "As a result, we will save 1.8 billion barrels of oil over the lifetime of the vehicles sold in the next five years. Just to give you a sense of magnitude, that's more oil than we imported last year from Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Libya, and Nigeria combined," he added. The usual suspects from the right dubbed this a US$1,300 car tax, the estimated increase in costs for a small efficient car - totally ignoring the US$2,800 in fuel costs saved based on current gasoline prices. Here's my 2008 blog/column on the issue: "America's oil addicts need rehab now. "The United States is the world's third biggest oil producing nation behind Saudi Arabia and Russia, but you wouldn't know it given its huge oil import tab. This year, at $130 a barrel, oil imports could total $578 billion, equivalent to 81.5% of 2007's trade deficit of $708.5 billion for imports of every kind. "The Saudis produce 10.72 million barrels daily, Russia, 9.67 and the U.S. 8.37 million. But consumption is 20.59 million barrels a day, making net imports 12.2 million a day. This is more than Germany, Japan, France and Italy import. "We [I'm Canadian and American] Americans are spoiled and greedy oil users and spill or waste more than any 20 undeveloped countries. Despite the whining about $4-a-gallon (at peak oil prices), Americans pay dramatically less for gasoline than do Canadians at $6 a gallon or Europeans at up to $11 a gallon. "Instead of seeing our wasteful ways as the problem, the public and politicians are externalizing blame and looking for scapegoats. "But the Bush regime's intelligence has been about as smart when it comes to comprehending the global supply-demand issue for oil and all commodities as it was unearthing weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. "So America needs an energy intervention right now which will have added benefits such as helping to clean up the environment, slash trade deficits, reduce dependency on nasty foreign regimes and finance research into new technologies. "Here is a simple, sensible 21st Century energy policy: 1. Mandate increased fuel efficiencies of at least 10 miles per gallon for every vehicle and within two years require all new cars sold in the U.S. to be hybrids. Measures should be considered, such as subsidies, to help retire the nation's gas guzzlers more quickly. Why? If all vehicles in the U.S. were 10-miles-per-gallon more efficient, the country would cut oil consumption by four million barrels daily, eliminating $189.8 billion, or 27%, from the total trade deficit. 2. But another measure is essential in tandem with fuel efficiencies: an increase in gasoline taxes. This is because studies show that fuel efficiencies don't necessarily decrease consumption but increase it because the same money can buy more tankfuls. So the combination of fuel efficient cars, and more expensive gasoline, would result in lower consumption. 3. Higher gasoline taxes, call it a n energy research levy, could be earmarked for research into alternatives. In other words, all Americans have to do is live like Europeans who use smaller, lighter and more efficient vehicles less often. These prices are not temporary nor are they a conspiracy or a bubble. Supplies from Alaska, the North Sea, Mexico and China have been declining dramatically as demand around the world soars. John McCain's remedy is to chop gasoline taxes which will make matters worse. Plentiful and relatively cheap gasoline has led the United States into this predicament in the first place by allowing Detroit to hook the nation on SUVs, pick-up trucks and heavy luxury vehicles. Obama has a grasp of what's needed. He's rejected the tax cut gimmick, recognizes the need for revenue to do research and connects cheap oil with pollution and the dangerous dependency on hostile and rogue regimes around the world." Add to that zoning that dramatically enhances urban densities and stops sprawl; better public transportation and a program to subsidize people to trade in their guzzlers for fuel efficient vehicles, underway in many European countries. These and other measures may help cure what ails America and, indirectly, Canada too. More on Mexico
 
W. Norton Grubb: More Than Money Needed To Improve Schools Top
In dire fiscal times like these, with the utter failure of Tuesday's budget propositions, must all school improvement grind to a halt until California finds more revenue? Since the 19th century, we've been told that money alone will improve school outcomes and that to reform schools, all we need is more money. That's the money myth. And it's just plain wrong. When I led a team that examined 12 years of national education data, including California's, one big surprise emerged: The numbers showed that the relationship between spending per pupil and student outcomes in California (and elsewhere) is somewhere between weak and nonexistent. Many initiatives in California on which we've spent billions of dollars have nothing to show for it, from class size reduction and initiatives to improve low-performing schools, to older efforts to restructure schools altogether. That's the bad news. The good news is that understanding what resources do matter, and which ones are relatively costless (yet priceless), means we could continue to improve schools despite California's abysmally low funding levels, which now put us 45th among the states. This doesn't mean money doesn't matter. Of course it does. It's impossible to educate students without teachers, books and buildings. And these all cost money -- public money. California's anti-tax groups promised that tax cuts, starting with Proposition 13, would not affect schools. But of course they have, in many obvious and unforeseen ways. The aspiring urban principals I teach are in schools where there's little energy for substantial reforms -- everyone has too many jobs, there are too many district and state regulations, and the pressures to score well on simple-minded tests are too relentless. But while money is necessary, it is not sufficient. To have any influence on student outcomes, it must be spent well and wisely. Five key factors show why money and outcomes are only weakly linked. First, all too often, money is wasted. It's spent on ineffective resources, promising reforms that new principals or superintendents reverse, or is spent without any plan. Second, sometimes schools and districts spend money on expensive, but counterproductive practices such as traditional vocational education, remedial programs, poorly conceived after-school programs or ineffective curricula. Third, many schools fail to understand the importance of instructional quality. This includes teacher control of the curriculum, support for innovation and teaching with more conceptual approaches. Fourth, schools and districts often ignore a range of abstract resources, from school climate (the relationships needed to make a school dedicated to academic improvement), to student commitment and trust, to the coherence of the curriculum (i.e., it is developed from a compatible set of assumptions about education) and the stability of the students (students who interrupt their education with frequent moves don't learn as well, often disrupt class and are at risk for dropping out.) Finally, almost no one pays much attention to diagnosing, and then correcting, the specifically racial and ethnic dimensions of achievement gaps among white, Asian American, African American and Latino students. For resources to be effective, they must be used with vision, leadership, cooperation from everyone in a school and district support. No store or Web site sells high quality teaching or improved school climate. Some improvements will require waiting for more revenues, such as more adults to make schools more personalized or better salaries and working conditions to reduce teacher turnover. Where, then, could we begin to transform California's schools with the current insufficient funds? By addressing the five key factors I outline above. Over the long run, California needs to generate new and stable revenue sources for a world-class education system. The current uncertainties -- pink slips every March, schools not knowing their funding until August, program categories that constrain how money is spent -- create their own forms of waste, and drain teachers and principals of energy. The agenda for improvement is large. Fortunately, though, some of it doesn't cost much money, and it therefore need not wait for California to solve its money woes. W. Norton Grubb, author of "The Money Myth: School Resources, Outcomes and Equity" (Russell Sage Foundation, 2009), is the David Gardner Chair in Higher Education, UC Berkeley, and faculty director of its Principal Leadership Institute. This article appeared on page A - 15 of the San Francisco Chronicle More on Stimulus Package
 
Laurence Leamer: The Birth of the Bold New Peace Corps Top
The bold new Peace Corps was born today in room 2172 in the Rayburn House Office Building. It took place as members of the House of Representatives were marking up the Foreign Affairs Appropriations Bill authored by Committee Chairman Rep. Howard Berman. For almost every item, the California Democrat kept to the figures in President Obama's budget, but when it came to the budget for the Peace Corps he tossed out the administration's fiscal year 2010 figure of $373 million and made it $450 million. In terms of the overall budget this was chump change, but if the bill passes Congress, the Peace Corps will be able to begin the extensive reform that it needs and to move toward a doubling of the 7,000 volunteers. Rep. Berman is a loyal Democrat and a team player of the first order. It took courage for him to support this enlarged figure, seemingly opposing the administration's number. In fact, Berman stood up for President Obama's highest ideals and values. Berman supported the movement that elected Obama. Berman saved Obama's own vision. Obama is the one who in his campaign promised to double the size of the Peace Corps by its fiftieth anniversary in 2011. Obama is the one with a profound understanding of service as an essential feature of the American spirit. Obama is the one who has gone ahead to include in his budget tripling the size of the domestic volunteers to a massive 275,000. What is increasingly apparent is that at its top levels, the Obama administration does not realize that it has reneged on the President's fervent campaign pledge. I know how unlikely that sounds, but it is the truth, and Berman has done the President an immense service. If the Peace Corps is able to reinvent itself for the 21st century, Berman will deserve a place not simply in the history of the organization but in a new American presence in the world. He does not stand alone. The politician was accepting figures in a bill written by Rep. Sam Farr, cosigned by 120 of his colleagues. Obama has a plate piled to overfilling with an endless heaping of intransigent problems, and it is understandable why he has not paid attention to the Peace Corps. But the time has come in the next few weeks when he can ensure this bold new Peace Corps will be a reality. Obama has a blueprint of what must be done sitting on his desk: the twenty-page transition document written by his own team. The impressive piece of work manages to be both positive about the Peace Corps and its role in the world, and yet honing in on the problems of the organization and suggesting how they can be fixed so that the volunteer base can be broadly expanded. This bold new Peace Corps needs a bold new leader with the initiative, energy and decisiveness to turn the organization from a child of the Sixties until a vibrant creature of the 21st century. That's the immediate task the Obama administration has before it, choosing a new director and an equally impressive deputy director. With the added budget, they and their associates will have one of the greatest opportunities in government. Rep. Berman has written a new beginning for the creation of a bold new Peace Corps. It's up to the rest of us now who care about the Peace Corps to work to see that it becomes a reality. The first thing we should all do is to call the White House at 202 456-1111 and tell the operator that we support a bold, new Peace Corps for the new century. More on Foreign Policy
 
Amb. Marc Ginsberg: A Fictional Iran Intel Account of the Obama-Netanyahu Summit Top
TOP SECRET FROM: Washington, D.C. Agent Mossadeq - Ministry of Intelligence & Security TO: Office of the Supreme Leader Grand Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Khameni RE: OBAMA-NETANYAHU MAY 18 SUMMIT Holy Imam: The following report summarizes our Washington intelligence unit's assessment of Monday's summit meeting between the Zionist leader (Prime Minister Netanyahu) and the American President Barack Obama. On Monday, May 18, the two conspirators against our beloved Islamic Republic met in secret in the White House Oval Office for one hour and forty-five minutes at the White House in Washington, D.C. By all media accounts, Iran and our nuclear weapons program was the central topic of discussion during their private meeting, but the future of Palestine may have also been discussed. We have reason to believe that their meeting was cordial, but the summit evidenced important differences between the two nations that may inure to Iran's benefit. Imam, although we do not have direct information to report from the two leaders' private discussions, there is positive news to report. Even though the two leaders could be engaged in a master deception at our expense, based on all accounts, Iran faces no immediate prospect of a joint Israeli-American military attack against our nuclear facilities even though President Obama reiterated that a nuclear-armed Iran is a threat to the U.S. (not just a threat to Israel). Media reports and intercepted communications about the visit disclose varying degrees of significant disagreement between the two leaders regarding our sacred nuclear program. America's refusal to fully support Israel's position will undoubtedly have great bearing on your calculations even though the uneducated masses believe that soon-to-be reelected President Ahmadenijad sets Iran's nuclear course. When will those infidels ever learn! Notwithstanding Netanyahu's publicly expressed fears over Obama's Iranian "engagement" policy, the United States President stated his determination to proceed with his still unspecified efforts to talk directly to Iran to determine whether our nation can be dissuaded from developing a nuclear weapon (these Americans like to use this word "engage" a lot, but in this case, it does not refer to pre-marital status). Our American unit can also confidently report that Washington diplomacy is focused on three tracks: 1) direct (but as of yet unspecific) engagement with Iran; 2) broader engagement with Iran's friends and allies to place greater diplomatic and economic pressure on Iran to reverse its nuclear ambitions; and 3) a new American Middle East peace initiative which President Obama will unveil during his visit to the Infidel Sunni Egyptian nation to promote Palestinian statehood as a means to persuade Arab autocratic regimes and the international community to align against Iran and encircle us further to impede our regional hegemonic goals. In other words, the American plans are right out there in public, and nothing suggests that anything more conspiratorial was agreed to behind the scenes (but do not forsake such a possibility). America is so preoccupied with Pakistan, Afghanistan and its self-inflicted economic woes, that the American people have, in our view, no interest in going to war against the Islamic Republic, and President Obama is determined to test his belief that you can be dissuaded from provoking America. Anyway, a few positive comments from your spokesman about Obama and the Americans will be diplomatic money in the bank -- like buying time in a bottle. So far, our sources advise that President Obama has not completed assessing what incentives America plans to offer you to put off a political decision on moving toward constructing a nuclear weapon now that, as most intelligence agencies know Iran is on the verge of mastering the technology to do so. We are available to assist you in developing your American "wish list." Moreover, it is also clear from their meeting that the American President considers the military option the least acceptable course for the Americans (unlike those trigger happy Israelis) and seems to place great hope that the prospect of tougher international economic sanctions (as if we haven't experienced the maximum sanctions already) coupled with American assurances that regime change has gone by the way of the Axis of Evil graveyard. At a so-called post meeting press conference, President Obama repeated the Great Satan's often expressed support for Israel's security and opposition to Iran's nuclear program, but did not expressly assert that the United States would use its military forces encircling us to destroy Iran's nuclear installations. In fact, President Obama made very clear that while all options are "...on the table" (American surreptitious slang for the military strike against Iran option) Obama intentionally avoided directly mentioning the potential use of military force (we will have to further assess for you as events dictate exactly what the President may have in mind should he deem his engagement policy fruitless). However, unlike the empty belligerency that characterized the threats against us from Bush, Cheney and Rice, President Obama was careful to avoid making any overt threats or commit explicitly to any timetable for exhausting his diplomatic initiatives toward us. He made a somewhat vague statement speculating that by year's end his administration would have a better sense whether you were adequately responding to Washington's diplomatic outreach efforts before he decided on further moves against us. Moreover, President Obama expressly disagreed with Netanyahu when Obama asserted that movement on Palestinian statehood is necessary before he could strengthen his international diplomatic efforts against us (and we are working hard to forestall that possibility, as you have instructed us to do). In this regard, dear Imam, our Hamas brothers have no intention of humoring the President's grand designs against Iran. Indeed, our Damascus unit has separately reported yesterday that under your instructions, Hamas leader Meshaal dismissed his deputy for daring to consider reconciliation with the traitorous Palestinian Authority. We know from intercepted media accounts that Obama's agent, George Mitchell, is working hard with the Egyptians to bring about a unity government, but so far, there is no reason to believe that Washington feels confident that that is likely anytime soon and so far our Syrian allies are steadfastly giving the back of the hand to American diplomacy. The Egyptian leader is due in Washington soon before Obama goes to Cairo, but without a Hamas trophy. The Palestinians are hopeless because they cannot make a decision about their fate, and our Hamas brothers are gaining strength each day against the Palestinian Authority. Imam, our American unit can also report to you that just before Netanyahu's Washington visit, Obama dispatched his CIA Director Panetta to Tel Aviv to inform Tel Aviv that the U.S. will not support a preemptive Israeli attack against our nuclear installations. Our informants advise us that Panetta warned Tel Aviv that the American interests in the Middle East would face serious consequences should the Israelis act alone and would not have the required American military support should they so act. We also can assuredly report that the Pentagon Chief and the Director of National Intelligence oppose American military attacks on Iran. Coupled with President Obama's summit statements, this collectively points to a unique period of unmistakable diplomatic imbalance between these two steadfast allies that plays into our hands. OUR SUMMARY ASSESSMENT: Israel and the United States still do not see eye to eye on how to stop Iran's nuclear program. Unit DC can assure you that there will be no prospect of joint military action against Iran so long as President Obama is committed to the diplomatic track, which at the earliest will continue through the end of 2009 unless Iran takes unexpected actions such as booting out IAEA inspectors or appearing ready to test a nuclear device. Since Obama's diplomatic track, by his own words, includes achieving progress on Palestinian statehood to better position America against Iran's nuclear program, more Hamas and Hezbollah mischief may be in order to forestall any such progress and buy Iran more time to achieve its nuclear ambitions. You can at least be reasonably certain that Iran has many more months given the President's own timetable to progress forward. This is not to say that Israel will not act alone militarily against us even before Iran orders the removal of IAEA inspectors. But without the support of its key ally, the probability that Israel will move alone before 2010 has decreased as a result of this summit. The Americans remain wary of adding to their Middle East woes. Yours eternally, Agent Mossadeq P.S. We recommend as a demonstration of your scorn for their conspiratorial summit you proceed to test fire another great Islamic Republic missile today to show Iran will not be intimidated by idle threats from either Tel Aviv or Washington. More on Israel
 
Ina Pinkney: Plastic Surgery Top
One Sunday, a family came in and said they had decided that during these really hard times for restaurants they would only support owner-operated places, figuring that the chains can always find a way to survive. They did an Internet search and came up with a list that, thankfully, included Ina's. They also said they would not use a credit card at these places because they knew that the fees charged by the Big Three were enormous for a small operation. It started me thinking that most people have no idea how credit cards really work and just how much they cost all of us. From the CardReport Web site: Visa and MasterCard are joint ventures -- or, as they call themselves, "associations" -- created, owned, governed and operated by and in the interests of their member banks. The Visa and MasterCard associations do not issue credit or debit cards directly. They are each collectively comprised of thousands of banks worldwide. These banks pay membership fees to the associations, and are thus permitted to issue cards. American Express, Diners Club and Discover are not associations; each of these companies issues its cards directly, and maintains its own clearance network. Because their memberships are virtually identical, the associations communicate frequently, exchange data and coordinate much of their activity through joint programs and consciously parallel activities. Major banks and the Visa and MasterCard associations charge excessive "interchange fees" to retailers when customers pay for goods using a Visa or MasterCard. Retailers have to pay the interchange fees in order to receive payments from transactions made using those cards, and these fees are disproportionately high compared to the money we receive from the transaction. Did you know that retailers pay different interchange rates depending on the card you use-- personal, business, awards, your alma mater, debit, etc.? The statement we get once a month requires a degree in rocket science to decipher. Did you know that debit cards "hold" money aside after a transaction for up to 48 hours? For example, you eat dinner at Ina's and the bill is $27.00. You go home, check your account and it clearly says your dinner at Ina's was $33.75. You know you left a cash tip, and so where did that $6.75 come from? You call me and I explain that your card company sets aside up to 25 percent of the amount charged as a "just in case." Since we don't send the credit card transactions in to be cleared until the end of the day, perhaps, they think, you put a tip on the bill. But you didn't and it takes them 48 hours(!) to adjust your account back to the $27.00 you actually charged. Yes, they get to keep your $6.75 for two days. So, let's see how this works for them. You pay interest, late fees, exceeding credit limit fees and sometimes an annual fee. (NOTE: The amount of money generated by penalty fees like late charges and exceeding credit limits had increased by about $1 billion annually in recent years, and should top $20 billion this year.) I pay a lot of fees ($30,000+ per year) to accept the cards and have to wait 48 business hours to get MasterCard and Visa and 72 business hours to get American Express into my bank -- which can mean you charge a meal on Friday, and I don't see that money until the following THURSDAY! -- and more than 40,000 banks pay Visa and MasterCard a membership fee to "join" the associations. Not my idea of a fair and balanced business exchange. I propose a new way of thinking about transactions that is based on paying cash as a bridge to connect human beings in relationships of service. When a 20-something comes in and wants to buy a cup of coffee with a debit card because there isn't a dollar in his or her pocket, it is clear that any insight into economic life has lost the intangible deeper social value, that buying and paying is an exchange of energy (i.e. I worked hard for this money and I pay you because you worked hard for the goods or services I am buying). It is transparent, healthy and humane. Paper money creates a direct and open dialogue and has different meanings and qualities when used for a gift, a loan or a purchase. It was easy to see this crisis of spirit coming when the healthy balance of fear and greed on Wall Street disintegrated with deregulation taking away the fear and leaving only greed; when people decided that a corporate executive was worth 400 times more than the lowest-paid employee; when a company would not provide health care and retirement to the loyal workers but a million dollar renovation of a boardroom was seen as essential and appropriate. That was not progress. We all have wants and needs that come from feelings and desires. Deeds and actions must come from our will. We must change our expectations and habits and decide how and where we spend our money ... our paper money.
 
Pawlenty: I'd Like A Second Senator But It's Out Of My Hands Top
Tim Pawlenty responded on Wednesday to Tim Kaine's request that he sign Al Franken's election certificate, telling the DNC Chair in a letter that he is legally bound to see the state's recount election through its conclusion. Trying to strike a balance between the desires of national Republicans -- who want Norm Coleman to drag the process out further -- and his local constituents -- who want a resolution to the recount -- the Minnesota Governor said he understood "the frustrations of my fellow Minnesotans who rightfully deserve to be represented by two senators." But he proclaimed the law to be fairly strict and clear in terms of what he could do, arguing that he was prohibited from issuing an "election certificate until the election contest process is complete." "In your letter, you asked that I commit to signing an election certificate 'as soon as the Court issues a ruling.' As a fellow Governor and attorney, I am sure you can appreciate that such a commitment would be premature. For example, the Minnesota Supreme Court might remand the case to the three-judge panel and ask them to consider various issues that were raised in the election contest. Under such a circumstance, Minnesota law would prohibit the issuance of an election certificate. "I understand the frustrations of my fellow Minnesotans who rightfully deserve to be represented by two senators. It is important that our state have our full complement of Senators representing us in Washington, D.C. as soon as possible. It is also important that the thoughtful and thorough election process outlined in Minnesota law be allowed to proceed as intended." The one thing that stuck out among the letter's content was Pawlenty's reference to a court ruling denying Franken's effort to have an election certificate certified. The state Supreme Court, Pawlenty noted, held that "'state law does not require, indeed does not permit, issuance of a certificate of election until the election contest in state court is completed'" Political observers in Minnesota point to this passage as the likely reason Franken will be seated once the state Supreme Court makes its upcoming decision on Coleman's latest appeal. Noting that the certification will come once the contest "in state court" is finalized, the argument follows that Pawlenty will be ordered to sign off on Franken's victory even if Coleman pledges to take the case to the federal level. This could be, Professor David Schultz of Hamline University argues, Pawlenty's dream scenario. "Then, at least, he has the cover from the national Republicans by being able to say, 'Well, I'm under court order to do this.'" Click here for a PDF of the letter. Get HuffPost Politics On Facebook and Twitter! More on Tim Kaine
 
Jill Schlesinger: Credit Card Reform Stinks for Responsible Consumers (aka "Deadbeats") Top
When the Senate passed the "Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act " by a 90-5 margin yesterday, I thought "Guess who's going to get screwed again? Responsible people who pay their bills on time!" Don't get me wrong -- I think it's a great idea to make the credit card companies accountable for their sneaky ways, but this legislation is likely to cost card issuers $12 billion a year in lost fees and income. To replace that revenue, don't be surprised if firms find other ways to recoup that money. On " The CBS Early Show " this morning, I outlined the ways that consumers who routinely pay off credit card balances -- also called "deadbeats" by the card companies, because they can't make money on us -- might end up paying more for the privilege of credit. Continue reading on moneywatch.com
 
Guns On CAMPUS, Texas Senate Allows Top
AP -- Texas concealed handgun license holders could carry weapons into public college classrooms and dorms under a bill given preliminary approval Tuesday by the state Senate. Supporters say the bill reinforces the constitutional right to bear arms and could prevent mass murders such as the 2007 shootings at Virginia Tech. Opponents say it would make campuses more dangerous -- adding the potential for typical college disputes over grades, romances and fraternity rivalries to become deadly -- and also could lead to more suicides. The author of the measure, Republican Sen. Jeff Wentworth of San Antonio, said similar dire warnings were made in 1995 when Texas passed its concealed weapons law. "Opponents predicted it would be the wild, wild west; there would be blood on the streets," Wentworth said. "None of that has happened." College campuses in Texas are currently gun-free zones. Texas concealed handgun license holders must be at least 21 years old and pass a training course and a criminal background check. Texas issued 73,090 licenses in fiscal year 2008. The bill still faces significant hurdles to become law before the June 1 end of the legislative session. It still needs a final Senate vote -- which could come as early as Wednesday -- before it goes to the House. A similar House bill died when it ran up against a legislative deadline. According to a legislative analysis, 23 states with concealed weapons permits do not ban license holders from carrying weapons on campus. Even so, only 12 colleges and universities allow them. The Texas bill allows private schools to ban weapons from campus. The Senate rejected several attempts to make the ban optional for public schools and to create gun-free dorm rooms. A ban on taking weapons to college sports events would not change. Wentworth said allowing guns on campus will protect student safety. At Virginia Tech, 32 people were gunned down before the shooter killed himself. Last year, a gunman at Northern Illinois killed five and wounded 18. "I would feel personally guilty if I were to wake up some morning and find out on some Texas college campus, a similar tragedy had happened," Wentworth said of the Virginia Tech massacre. "They were picked off like sitting ducks in the classroom." Opponents argue allowing guns won't prevent similar scenarios and will confuse law enforcement if they arrive on a crime scene and find several people carrying weapons. "We don't need to incentivize campus Rambos," said Sen. Rodney Ellis, a Houston Democrat who voted against the bill. "It makes us feel like we've gotten tough -- deputizing students -- but the fact is that the universities don't want it and law enforcement doesn't want it because they know it will not make our campuses safer," Ellis said. The bill is supported by the National Rifle Association and Students for Concealed Carry on Campus, a group that claims more than 37,000 members across the country. It also has run into fierce resistance from other campus groups. At the University of Texas, which has its own history of shooting violence, the idea has met stiff opposition. Charles Whitman's 1966 shooting rampage from the top of the university tower killed 16 people and wounded dozens more. It stood as the worst campus shooting in history until the Virginia Tech bloodbath. The UT student government, the graduate student assembly and the faculty advisory council have all passed resolutions against the campus guns bills. Texas graduate student John Woods was a Virginia Tech student in 2007 and his girlfriend was among those killed. He has helped organized resistance to the Texas bill. "The Senate voted against allowing a student to be in a gun-free dorm room; this shows exactly how little concern our lawmakers actually have for student safety," Woods said.
 
Group Of World's Richest People Hold Secret Meeting In New York Top
Under a cloak of secrecy, some of the world's wealthiest people gathered in an unprecedented meeting early this month in New York City possibly to coordinate strategies for giving their vast fortunes to charity in the midst of the financial crisis. More on Oprah
 
Elizabeth Holtzman: The Phony Debate About Torture Top
Former Vice President Dick Cheney has triggered a roaring debate by his recent and repeated claim that torture "worked." Last week, Senator Lindsay Graham echoed the claim that torture "works" and added that is has for five hundred years (a timescale which connects us to the Spanish Inquisition). Recent polls show a slim majority of Americans opposing any investigation or prosecution of torture under the Bush Administration, even though a majority acknowledges that torture took place. Cheney's claims may have had a major impact on public opinion. The reliability and truthfulness of information obtained under torture is in serious doubt. But even if it weren't, the whole argument over the claim that torture works is grotesquely beside the point. The issue is not whether torture works, but whether there are other methods of obtaining equivalent or better information that don't incur the enormous moral, legal and security hazards torture entails. Torture advocates want us to think that there is no other way to obtain this critical information in the "war on terror," but it's simply not so. Standard interrogation procedures, both in the criminal justice system and in the military, routinely produce valuable intelligence. Highly skilled and trained professional interrogators regularly get people to talk about and confess to serious crimes like murder, without using coercive techniques. As a former Brooklyn District Attorney, I know that non-coercive interrogation works. My office was one of the nation's largest, handling prosecutions of tens of thousands of serious crimes annually, with no coercion whatsoever. Yet we videotaped thousands of voluntary confessions. Across America, police and prosecutors handle dangerous crimes every day without resorting to waterboarding, stress positions, sleep deprivation, food deprivation, nudity, exposure to extremes of temperatures, slamming people into walls, or the like. Whether it involves homegrown terrorists such as the Oklahoma bombers, organized crime or "ordinary" murderers and rapists, the criminal justice system solves crimes, learns who else is involved and brings the culprits to justice -- without torturing them. Professional interrogators might not get confessions every time they ask questions. But no one knows how often torture produces truthful confessions, if ever. What we do know is that our regular criminal justice system, with its due process and noncoercion, produces convictions where torture doesn't. The criminal justice system identified and convicted some of those involved in the 1993 World Trade Center attacks. By contrast, not one person has been prosecuted for the 9/11 attacks, although seven and a half years have gone by. Even Khalid Sheik Mohammed, one of the masterminds of 9/11, is unlikely ever to be convicted in US courts because he was repeatedly subjected to torture. Significantly, the cruel and torturous methods used on detainees never yielded enough information to capture Osama Bin Laden or his chief deputy. So much for the claims of torture's efficacy. But beyond that, in America, torture can never be used because our Constitution bans it. There are no exceptions -- not for heinous crimes or ticking bombs. The use of torture against a criminal defendant would only constitute another crime and immunize the defendant from conviction. Similarly, the Geneva Conventions prohibit the cruel and degrading treatment of detainees even in wartime. Military interrogations in wartime are critically important. They might reveal, for example, where the enemy is going to strike next, and affect the lives of thousands of American troops. Yet until the Bush Administration took office, the US did not adopt torture as an official tool to extract such information. It's good to recall why. After horrific mistreatment of detainees during World War II, including the torture of American POW's by the Japanese, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the supreme commander of Allied forces, urged the US to ratify the Geneva Conventions. General Douglas McArthur voluntarily instituted the Conventions for American troops in the Korean War, even before they were ratified. These commanders supported the Geneva Conventions, not because they thought it acceptable to "tie our hands" during combat and expose American troops to unnecessary risk, but because they realized the real danger to our country lay in using torture, not in abstaining from it. They saw professional interrogations produced important information without torture. They knew torture only weakens our reputation and our ability to project "soft power" -- to command respect and persuade abroad. They perceived inhumane treatment of the enemy would only further endanger the lives of American troops. They were right. In our own time, US use of torture at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere has become a major recruiting tool for Al Qaeda, and led to the loss of hundreds, possibly thousands, of American lives. The FBI, no friend to terrorists, rejected the CIA's torture program because it understood the untenable consequences. The FBI began the interrogation of terrorist detainees, but once the CIA began to use torture it stopped participating and walked away. It refused to engage in what it believed were war crimes that would only undermine the effort to get the information we needed and endanger Americans. What vital intelligence have we lost because the FBI had to withdraw its expertise? The FBI rejected torture, our Constitution bans it, and we have ratified the Geneva Conventions as the law of our land, not because we are nation of wimps or bleeding hearts. Unlike former Vice President Cheney, who ran from the Vietnam War, and former President George Bush, who never saw a day of combat in his life, those who wrote the Bill of Rights fought a bloody revolution to win their independence from Britain. They weren't afraid to fight hard to create and keep this country. They rejected torture not out of weakness, but out of strength. They weren't interested in any specious claim of torture's efficacy; they knew that torture produced unreliable information. They also knew that forcing people to incriminate themselves was a slippery slope. Once torture was condoned in one case, it would become irresistible in other cases, particularly involving political opponents, religious dissidents and the like. Above all, they knew torture was inimical to the conception of human dignity that underlay our constitutional framework, so they adopted a granite opposition to it. Now as then, Americans should reject specious arguments justifying torture. They should not be misled by former Vice President Cheney's unverified claims that torture worked, and recognize that even though the CIA's Inspector General long recommended a thorough, expert analysis of the question of torture's "efficacy," it was never conducted because the Bush Administration didn't want to know the truth. Now it is important for Americans of all political persuasions to reaffirm the truth, as drafters of the Bill of Rights believed so deeply and etched so indelibly into our constitution, that torture is a moral and human atrocity that never makes us safer, and in the end only causes our nation incalculable harm. It follows from this that we must hold government officials who ordered or engaged in torture accountable under our laws. Applicable US statutes make torture and other cruel and abusive treatment of detainees a federal crime. It's time we commenced investigations to determine if criminal charges should be brought under those laws. That's the vital question that the phony debate over torture's "efficacy" serves to obscure. More on Dick Cheney
 
Greg Archer: Hope, Pride and Courage at GLAAD Awards Top
Hope, pride and courage were the dominant themes at the 20th Annual Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamatio (GLAAD) Media Awards, which unraveled with a burst of energy in San Francisco this month. Chatfest darling Chelsea Handler played hostess at the well-attended ceremony, which honored the best in television and journalism. But others turned heads as well. Everybody from the city's mayor, Gavin Newsom, to attendees like finance queen Suze Orman, actors Jason Lewis, Robert Gant, Wilson Cruz and others, delivered spirited commentaries on the advances of LGBT civil rights over the past year. Meanwhile, actor Chad Allen and Milk screenwriter Dustin Lance Black nabbed significant honors for their work. It was the third and final GLAAD Awards event this season -- previous awards were handed out in New York and Los Angeles last month -- and it was met with enthusiasm, delivering the very thing everybody seemed to hoping for: recognition and inspiration. I was on the Red Carpet prior to the event to interview several of the attendees. Take a peek: More on Video
 
Lance Simmens: From Nashville to Copenhagen Top
This past weekend nearly 500 dedicated activists met in Nashville to spend two and a half days reflecting on the current science and direction of the Earth's changing climate. There were truly inspiring presentations by Nobel Laureate Al Gore and an array of scientists intended to inform and educate an assemblage of extraordinary citizens of the planet who give their time and effort to bring a simple message to their communities: namely, we are in midst of a planetary emergency and we need to address it now . Just over two and a half years ago I answered Gore's call to join a movement to transform a complicated and technical set of scientific issues into an understandable and practical message that would educate and inspire fellow citizens to take effective actions that would no less than ensure the survival of our planet. Since then, over 2,500 individuals have heeded the call worldwide and over 50,000 presentations have been delivered, reaching at least 5 million people. Surely, the catalyst for these presentations has been the documentary, An Inconvenient Truth , and each of us has been trained to dissect the PowerPoint slides which proved to be the centerpiece of the movie. The genius of this documentary is that it molded earth science into a comprehensive and comprehensible set of propositions that unitiated individuals could easily get their arms around. This alone has proved to be a feat of historic proportions. Since its release, the basic message remains as potent as ever and an avalanche of new scientific data and statistics have effectively accelerated the urgency for the need for action. The consequences of inaction have pushed us ever closer to an inevitable "tipping point" where certain conditions become irreversible. Indeed, the Union of Concerned Scientists contends that we have already crossed the threshold of mitigation and must accept a degree of adaptation to climate change. It is said that timing in life is everything. If so, with respect to this issue, we must act immediately. It is all too easy to fall into the trap of reciting dire and dour statistics to illuminate just how serious this crisis is. It is far more difficult to illustrate the interconnectivity of issues and events that are occurring in front of our very eyes. And while in Chinese the word crisis is composed of two characters, one representing danger, the other opportunity, it is far easier to focus on the former than the latter. But I am convinced that it is critically important that we accentuate the opportunities inherent in the crisis, if for no other reason than to dampen a general fatigue among the populace that has set in in reaction to a long litany of fear-mongering. Gore opened the session with an incredibly uplifting statistic. The average age of the Houston Space Center technician when Neil Armstrong first set foot on the moon in 1969 was twenty-six, meaning that when John F. Kennedy first issued his call to safely send a man to the moon some eight years and two months earlier their average age would have been eighteen. The call to public service, to civic activism, to expanding the reach of scientific endeavor was palpable and infectious. The inspiration elicited by this bold announcement projected upon an entire generation. We need that same resolve today. We are turning the corner. Science and scientific method now are at the public policy table again. Congress is poised to seriously tackle this issue. Pending before the U.S. House of Representatives is legislation sponsored by California Rep. Henry Waxman and Massachusetts Rep. Ed Markey that sets the table on carbon emissions targets on the environmental side of the equation and a cap and trade system on the economic front. The importance of effectively integrating the economic and environmental aspects to this issue cannot be overstated. The importance of having an aggressive national effort to limit carbon emissions here in the only industrialized nation on earth that turned its back on the Kyoto Treaty is monumental. As we prepare for the Copenhagen Summit in December, it is critical that the U.S. assume the mantle of leadership on the most important global issue of the century. In the 80 presentations I have conducted on this issue over the past 30 months I have witnessed two distinct developments: first, the climate crisis has deteriorated much greater and much faster than scientists had predicted; second, where circumstances under the previous Administration forced us to concentrate our efforts solely at the grass roots level due to a lack of political will in the Executive Branch, we are now witnessing a deliberate national strategy to act, and this enhances the grass roots efforts already underway. We are now focusing on the opportunities inherent in this crisis. Waxman-Markey offer us the ability to advance the ball towards Copenhagen, and that will allow us to lead the world in the development of a new economic paradigm that will effectively lessen if not displace our dependence on fossil fuels to power our collective economic engines. Lest we not forget to remind those who fret over the economic consequences of such a paradigm shift, the opportunities for innovation, creativity, and economic ingenuity present a bounty that far surpasses our bankrupt addiction to oil. We are replacing the certainty of inaction with the uncertainty of action, and much like President Kennedy's challenge nearly a half century ago, it is a clarion call to change, and after all, change is what the American people overwhelmingly support at this point in our history. A future where power is derived from the sun and the wind, where electric cars and the infrastructure to support them makes the inefficient internal combustion engine obsolete, where respect for ecology and the environment combines with economic opportunity to foster a cleaner and more productive planet. As we left Nashville, we were energized by the knowledge that we can and must do what we can to make this world a reality. Our future depends upon it. More on Green Energy
 
Kim Jong Chol, Kim Jong Il's Middle Son, Being Groomed As Heir: Report Top
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - North Korean leader Kim Jong Il is grooming his middle son as successor, not the youngest son as has been widely speculated, a news report said Wednesday quoting a former political aide who defected. Kim Jong Chol is holding a secret high-level post in the North's ruling Workers' Party as part of his successor training and reports directly to the leader, Seoul's Dong-a Ilbo newspaper quoted defector Kim Duk Hong as saying. The 29-year-old "is highly likely to take over the father's post," Kim said. Who will eventually rule the nuclear-armed North has been the focus of intense media speculation since leader Kim, 67, reportedly suffered a stroke last summer. Kim succeeded his father, who died in 1994, in communism's first hereditary power succession. He rules the country with absolute authority and has allowed no opposition, raising concerns about a power struggle if he dies suddenly without naming a successor. Wednesday's report contrasts with widespread media speculation that leader Kim considers the middle son too "girlish" to become leader, and is grooming the third and youngest son, Jong Un, 26, as his successor. Media reports have said the Swiss-educated middle son is suffering from an excess of female hormones. Kim's eldest son, Jong Nam, 38, had long been considered the favorite to succeed his father _ until he was caught trying to enter Japan on a fake passport in 2001, reportedly telling Japanese officials he wanted to visit Tokyo Disneyland. The paper said the defector declined to reveal where he obtained the information. He was an aide to former North Korean parliamentary speaker Hwang Jang Yop, and the two defected to the South in 1997. Hwang is the highest-level Pyongyang official ever to defect to Seoul. Seoul's Unification Ministry and the spy agency National Intelligence Service said they cannot confirm the report.
 
Craig Newmark: Public service on the Net: CDC.gov Launches Metrics Dashboard Top
People in government are finding better ways to use the Net for public service, doing so in impressive ways. Here's something new from the CDC, which helps us all get better info faster regarding situations regarding their performance and the health of Americans. (Note to self: check out the weight stuff.) CDC.gov launched the first phase of an online metrics dashboard to provide an enterprise view of key performance indicators for CDC's Web site, social media, and Web 2.0 products. While the first phase of this project will post updated metrics quarterly, later versions of this tool will use automated feeds for daily reporting. CDC is planning on using this tool to track and monitor results for Web-based health communications efforts and support ongoing research on the efficacy of social media communication campaigns. Making this tool publicly available not only supports CDC's commitment to transparent government but also demonstrates its willingness to share, learn, and collaborate. The CDC is truly interested in engaging the public. Check out CDC's new metrics dashboard src="http://transparency.cit.nih.gov/widgets/swinelinks.cfm?javascript"> src="http://transparency.cit.nih.gov/widgets/swinelinks.cfm" name="swineframe" frameborder=0 id="swineframe" scrolling="no" height="160" width="198" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" >Swine Flu Info
 

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