Wednesday, July 1, 2009

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Congress's Travel Tab Swells Top
WASHINGTON -- Spending by lawmakers on taxpayer-financed trips abroad has risen sharply in recent years, a Wall Street Journal analysis of travel records shows, involving everything from war-zone visits to trips to exotic spots such as the Galápagos Islands.
 
Al Giordano: Honduras' Coup Congress Erases Five Basic Liberties Top
Despite the best efforts of what I call "the Oligarch Diaspora" to flood the Internet with near identical messages that the Honduran coup "is not a coup" and that was a "constitutional succession" (cough, cough) dressed in the blue-and-white flag of Honduran democracy, the coup regime bared its fangs today. And like any vampire, it's coming out at nightfall. The same Congress that, after the military had kidnapped, beaten and dumped President Manuel Zelaya in Costa Rica, had declared one of its own, Roberto Micheletti as the coup "president" today passed an emergency law stripping Hondurans of the following rights from the country's constitution: 1. The right to protest. 2. Freedom in one's home from unwarranted search, seizure and arrest. 3. Freedom of association. 4. Guarantees of rights of due process while under arrest. 5. Freedom of transit in the country. Tomorrow morning's papers are already out across the ocean in Europe, and correspondent Pablo Ordaz of the Madrid daily El Pais has reported from Tegucigalpa about the Coup Congress' decree: "Minute by minute, step by step, Honduras moves farther from its freedoms..." Read the defenders of the coup and they are united by one powerful feeling: fear. They're afraid of the growing demonstrations in the streets, like the in the capital city this afternoon captured in the video above, where despite the brutal repressions against the people, each day the opposition crowds grow larger, more emboldened, and better organized. In the defiant but smiling faces of the Hondurans opposing the coup you can see the palpable difference between their passion and the lack of it from the passive bumps on a log that attended yesterday's pro coup rally. The Congressional decree specified that only at night may those five freedoms be disappeared. And so tonight, a new reign of terror begins. The coup defenders are afraid, they say, of Honduras becoming another another Cuba, or Venezuela, or Nicaragua, of losing their "freedoms" and their "democracy." But today, in one fell swoop their leaders erased those very freedoms, atop all the other ones they've already burned alive - freedom of the press, freedom to elect their own president, among them - and buried democracy with it. For democracy is not possible unless a people has freedom to protest, freedom from unwarranted invasion of their homes, freedom of association, rights of due process under law, and freedom of travel in its own country. That's over now, and will be as long as the coup regime remains in power. The Oligarch Diaspora will not likely blink, comforting themselves with the Kool-Aid that this attack on civil rights and freedoms is not (well, not yet) aimed at them, but, rather, at "those people," the workers, the poor, the farmers, the indigenous, the rebel students and youth, their social organizations, organizer priests, defense attorneys, human rights observers and authentic journalists, the ones that want their democracy back so much that they risk life and limb now each time they say it. The Oligarch Diaspora will continue spamming the Internet with their hysterical claims that the rest of the world "just doesn't understand," that the coup was "legal" (attorney Alberto Valiente Thorensen made mincemeat of that claim today ), that they represent a majority (unsaid is that they are afraid to let that majority vote on a non-binding referendum, revealing that even they know they are not), that "Honduras wants the coup." But if the opposition were so small would the Coup Congress really have needed to enact the State of Siege and its repeal of those five basic freedoms? But what they don't tell you is that they don't want those freedoms for all Hondurans, just for the ones with money and property and political power and privilege: themselves. The rest must be subordinated to them and controlled, by force if necessary. And so today, Honduras said goodbye to the following articles of its Constitution : Article 69: "A persons liberty is inviolable and can only be restricted or suspended temporarily through process of law." Article 71: "No person can be arrested nor kept incommunicado for more than 24 hours without being placed before a competent authority to be judged. Judicial detention during an investigation must not exceed six consecutive days from the moment that the same is ordered." Article 78: "Freedoms of association and meeting are always guaranteed when they are not contrary to public order and good customs. Article 79: "All persons have the right to meet with others, peacefully and without weapons, in public demonstration or transitory assembly, in relation to their common interests of any type, without necessity of notice or special permission." Article 81: "All persons have the right to circulate freely, leave, enter, and remain in national territory. No one can be obligated to change home or residence except in special cases and with those requirements that the Law establishes." The Oligarch Diaspora says that the democratically elected president was removed by force because he supposedly "violated the Constitution" by proposing a nonbinding referendum to ask all Hondurans if they wanted the chance to vote about whether they wanted to rewrite it through a Constitutional Convention. But the coup leaders the Oligarch Diaspora defends just rewrote that same constitution today without any formal process of consulting the people at all. They claim they're fighting for their constitution, but they just ripped it apart. Gone. All gone. Everything they claim to be defending is gone now, destroyed and in tatters at the hands of the very political class that claimed it was protecting them. And now, with the Congress' invitation to enter the people's door, the vampires begin to come out... tonight. (Crossposted from The Field .) More on Honduras
 
Unlocked: The Secrets Of Schizophrenia Top
Scientists have discovered a remarkable similarity between the genetic faults behind both schizophrenia and manic depression in a breakthrough that is expected to open the way to new treatments for two of the most common mental illnesses, affecting millions of people.
 
Bar Refaeli Naked On A Bed (VIDEO) Top
Bar Refaeli stars in a new black and white video floating around the internet. Set to music and with no dialogue, the Israeli supermodel is naked and wrapped in a sheet as she lolls about in bed. The video was supposedly made to promote an art exhibition in her native country. WATCH: Follow HuffPo Entertainment On Twitter! More on Video
 
Highest Paid Actresses Of 2008: Jolie Vs. Aniston For #1 Top
Forbes magazine has put out their annual Celebrity 100 . In a neverending battle fit for the tabloids, the top spot for highest-paid actress was a battle between Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Aniston. Below is a slideshow of the top 5. Just missing out and tied at #6 with 2008 take-home salaries of $15 million were Sandra Bullock and Reese Witherspoon. PHOTOS: Follow HuffPo Entertainment On Twitter! More on Photo Galleries
 
John Milewski: In Search of the "Muslim World" Top
Tonight I had the privilege of screening an advance copy of a powerful new documentary that will premiere on the Fourth of July. The film, Journey Into America , will make its debut during the 46th annual convention of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) this weekend in Washington, DC. The film is one of the byproducts of a remarkable nine-month, 75-city exploration of America conducted by the brilliant anthropologist and Islamic scholar, Akbar Ahmed, and his outstanding team of former students. The film portrays the experiences of Muslim-Americans. It does that, but also ends up doing much more since it has a lot to say about the American experience beyond that of any one hyphenated group. The Muslim-America revealed in the film, provides much food for thought about how we think about any designated group of Americans and in this case, Muslim-Americans. For me it brought to mind the impulse of those of us in media to talk about diverse groups of people as if they think and act alike based on some shared affiliation. Governments and news media often have more in common than either cares to admit. For example, each loves to organize diverse groups of humans into what appear to be monolithic groups by assigning broad labels to entire swaths of populations. The result is things like politicians speaking of "African-American voters," or "Latino voters," or news stories that explore the latest from the "Evangelical community," or the "Muslim world." The labels almost always describe some minority element of the greater whole. Reading between the lines, there is the implication that the group in question behaves differently than the unidentified norm (whoever they are). Another unspoken assumption suggested by these labels is that we can predict or understand the actions or opinions of individuals if we can identify them as members of a group. The language also suggests that a place like, "the Muslim world," actually exists, and that we can visit it, "reach out" to it, engage it in dialogue, or perhaps even wage war with it. As someone who has spent some time on the airwaves over the years, I am guilty as charged. "How will Christian voters react to President Clinton's infidelity?" "Will African-American voters support this candidate?" "What will be the reaction in the Muslim world?" These are just a few examples of the types of simplistic categorizing that many others and I have been guilty of resorting to when trying to understand and describe the world around us. What this type of labeling amounts to is an attempt to understand and describe the complex behavior of somewhat arbitrarily assigned groupings through oversimplification. In most, if not all cases, these types of broad generalizations don't hold up to scrutiny. We essentially attempt to define reality by distorting it. There are inherent dangers associated with this type of lazy thinking. "Islam is a religion of violence." "The religious right is intolerant." These are just two examples of the types of flawed conclusions that can result from pretending such monolithic groups actually exist. All of this brings me back to, Journey Into America , the film I just watched. The so-called, Muslim world the film uncovers is not some exotic locale a world away but is instead a place you can find right outside your door. And in the end, the world we visit isn't so much a Muslim world or a Muslim-America as much as it is our shared world, a hyphen free America filled with problems, dreams, fears, and hope. Professor Ahmed's stated goal is to, "improve understanding and increase dialogue between different people, different cultures, different religions." One of the ways in which this profound and important film does so is by showing us that we are not as different as the labeling game suggests. Journey Into America makes an important contribution to challenging the simplistic shorthand that distorts our sense of reality. There is no easily defined "Muslim-America" any more than there is a distinct "Christian-America," or "Jewish-America." There is, however, an America populated by people of many beliefs, some shared and some different. That's the America I discovered again when watching the film. An imperfect America, that also happens to be the most diverse and tolerant nation on earth. I wish you a happy and healthy Fourth of July. And when the fireworks are over, I encourage you to see Journey Into America for a powerful reminder of what the American experiment is all about.
 
Evelyn Leopold: UN CHIEF VISITS BURMA: A POLITICAL GAMBLE Top
UNITED NATIONS - U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon goes to Myanmar (Burma) for the July 3-4 weekend in what both friends and detractors view as a political gamble. With an agenda that asks the ruling military junta to open its doors to national "reconciliation" (which would end their solitary rule), Ban is convinced he can persuade the country's recalcitrant leaders that reforms are for their own good. The deck is stacked against him. He arrives on the day the show trial resumes against opposition leader and Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, 64. She was jailed after John Yettaw, an American Mormon, swam to her home, saying he had a vision that she would be assassinated by terrorists. She had never met him and is accused of violating the terms of her house arrest. Suu Kyi was transferred from house arrest to prison after spending more than 13 of the past 19 years secluded in her home after her party, the National League for Democracy, won a huge victory in 1990 elections but the military refused to budge. Without any relief for Suu Kyi - and only the reclusive junta leader Senior General Than Shwe can grant that - Ban's visit may disappoint. For Ban, a former South Korean foreign minister, Myanmar is a challenge. He points with pride at convincing Than Shwe to allow UN agencies to deliver relief after Cyclone Nargis devastated coastal areas last May after everyone else had failed. He says the international workers helped save half a million people from ruin. Sadly, they arrived only after some 140,000 people had died, countless others lost their homes and at least 21 Burmese aid workers who sought to help survivors were jailed. This time Ban's goals are politically more ambitious and he listed three in several news conferences: "First, the release of all political prisoners, including Daw Aung San Suu Kyi; the resumption of dialogue between the government and opposition as a necessary part of any reconciliation process; and third, the need to create conditions conducive to credible elections next year." Asked about the timing, he said, he was very conscious that it coincided with Suu Kyi's trial but said finding an appropriate time had been a challenge. The UN chief said he intended to make a public speech and invite all civil society leaders to attend. Ban will probably meet Than Shwe in the newly-built remote administrative capital of Naypyidaw, reachable by air or by bumpy roads. (When annoyed at the world body, Ibrahim Gambari, a Nigerian diplomat who has travelled to Myanmar on behalf of the secretary-general several times, was forced to go by road, although last week he flew by air, diplomatic sources said). The United States has been steadfast in opposing the military and its planned restricted election next year, meant to legitimize the junta by keeping Suu Kyi and her followers away from campaigns and polls. In the last two years, the number of political prisoners has doubled to 2,100 according to Human Rights Watch. Rape as a Weapon of War Laura Bush, the former first lady who made Burma a personal project, wrote recently in the Washington Post that it was crucial Ban press the regime to take immediate steps to end human rights abuses, particularly in ethnic minority areas where rape was common. She said the youngest victim was 8, the oldest 80. "Inside Burma, more than 3,000 villages have been forcibly displaced -- a number exceeding the mass relocations in genocide-racked Darfur. The military junta has forced tens of thousands of child soldiers into its army and routinely uses civilians as mine-sweepers and slave laborers...Human trafficking, where women and children are snatched and sold, is pervasive. Summary executions pass for justice, while lawyers are arrested for the 'crime' of defending the persecuted." http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-yn/content/article/2009/06/26/AR2009062603459_pf.html Although sanctions have been imposed by the United States and many European nations, Burma's neighbors, including India and China, trade liberally in timber and other natural resources. And the giant French-based oil company Total does a thriving business, arguing that if it left, another oil company would take its place and pay less attention to the plight of its employees. Various U.N. bodies have adopted some 38 resolutions against Myanmar without results. The 15-nation U.N. Security Council, whose resolutions are binding, was thwarted by a double veto from China and Russia (and a negative vote by South Africa) in January 2007. But the Council in May did agree on a statement calling for the release of all political prisoners, including Suu Kyi. However, Bertil Lintner, a Swedish journalist who has written several books on Burma, says Ban's visit is bound to fail. Authoritarian regimes "never negotiate away their hold on power" and usually crumble when someone inside the establishment, mainly troops, refuse to carry out orders, he told the Wall Street Asia. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124647558411281981.html Western diplomats are divided on Ban's trip. They welcome the U.N. chief bringing Burma to the world's attention again. (The junta renamed the country Myanmar, which the U.N. but not the United States and other nations recognize). On the other hand, they fear that if he does not come away with substantial progress, his visit would serve to give the generals legitimacy. And that progress centers on Suu Kyi. More on Aung San Suu Kyi
 
Palin Emails Show Infighting With Staff Top
Internal campaign e-mails exchanged three weeks before Election Day offer a rare look at just how frustrated then Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin had become with the manner in which top McCain campaign aides were handling her candidacy. The e-mails, obtained exclusively, also highlight the power struggle and thinly veiled acrimony that pervaded the relationship between Palin and the campaign's chief strategist, Steve Schmidt. More on Sarah Palin
 
Les Leopold: Redefining Chutzpah: Wall Street Using Bailout Money to Kill Financial Consumer Protection Agency Top
"Banks and mortgage lenders are placing top priority on killing President Obama's proposal to create a new consumer protection agency that would regulate home loans, credit card fees, payday loans and other forms of consumer finance... [I]ndustry executives vowed on Tuesday to fight Mr. Obama's plan with everything they have, even though banks are still heavily dependent on many taxpayer-supported loans and loan guarantees to get through the crisis." -- Edmund L. Andrews, New York Times , July 30, 2009. We are living through the most serious financial crash since the Great Depression. The problems of the financial sector pushed the rest of the economy off the cliff. Jobs are disappearing and millions of home buyers are having a great deal of difficulty making payments. Tens of thousands are walking away from their homes. Too many of these home buyers got in over their heads because mortgage lenders engaged in questionable practices. Mortgages of all shapes and sizes hit the market, including dangerous adjustable loan packages; teaser rates; no income verification; no down payment; interest only; interest tacked on to principal; predatory loans; loans to dead people. It didn't matter as long as the loan got made. Why? Because Wall Street set up a fabulously profitable securitization business that needed those mortgages in order to create vast pools to chop up and sell. These pools, combined with derivatives, created layer after layer of synthetic securities that earned Wall Street billions upon billions in fees. This was its most profitable enterprise and it drove the mortgage and housing markets to dazzling heights... until it crashed. (See The Looting of America for a walk on the wild side of this dangerous game.) When unsustainable growth in housing prices began to stall and then reverse, the whole edifice of fantasy finance came crashing down with it. By September 2008, we were in a real panic as the financial market froze. The real economy, so dependent on credit, crashed as well. Trillions of dollars of tax payer dollars in the form of TARP funds and asset guarantees flooded into Wall Street in order to keep us from the next Great Depression. We put the entire financial sector on the dole. All of this happened because we engaged in a grand experiment starting in the late 1970s. We decided that the best thing for our economy was to move money to the super rich and to deregulate the financial sector. This would lead to more investment and all boats would rise. Instead we sunk the Titanic. Wages for the average worker, after inflation, have declined. Household debt increased. The super-wealthy took more and more of their money and bought up Wall Street's fantasy finance securities. It's is the most expensive failed experiment in history. Part of the cure is to re-regulate the financial sector. The proposed Consumer Financial Proteciton Agency is designed explicitly to protect us from the next round of mortgage mania. But the captains of Wall Street, who are being propped up by our tax dollars, have set up an enormous lobbying effort to kill it. With a straight face they are telling us that they don't need to be heavily regulated -- that regulations will kill innovation and stifle consumer choice. And they're not kidding. What's worse is that our tax dollars are paying for their lobbying efforts. Most of them -- including many that did not receive direct infusions of taxpayer dollars -- would have gone under had we not bailed out AIG, Bank of America, Citicorp, and their ilk. It's more than gall. It's more than chutzpah. It's precisely what happens when we turn over the wealth of our nation to a tiny handful of elites. It is truly incredible that they want to fight the proposed consumer agency with "everything they have," when right now what they have is what we are giving them. It's the oldest story in the world: Elites think that taking what they want for themselves is good for everyone, always, without question. But in this case they are acting so selfishly that it could create an enormous backlash. Or as my editor put it, "If ever there were a compelling argument in favor of nationalization, even if just temporary, this is it. I mean, jeez Louise!" Les Leopold is the author of The Looting of America: How Wall Street's Game of Fantasy Finance destroyed our Jobs, Pensions and Prosperity, and What We Can Do About It , Chelsea Green Publishing, June 2009. More on Financial Crisis
 
August Provost, Gay Sailor, Found Dead On Base In Suspected Homicide Top
CAMP PENDLETON -- The body of a 29-year-old sailor was found in a Camp Pendleton guard shack Tuesday, and a "person of interest" was taken into custody in connection with the suspected homicide, Navy officials said yesterday.
 
World Vision: The Italian Job: What the 2009 G8 Summit Must Deliver on Health and Aid for Africa Top
The 2009 G8 summit in early July will take place in the midst of one of the deepest economic downturns of recent decades, and at a moment of flux in the international system. The London summit of the G20 heads of state in April and the challenges to which it was trying to respond have raised fundamental questions about the future role and relevance of the G8. As chair, Italy has placed the global economy, environment and Africa at the top of the agenda for two days of discussion that at different points will bring together the leaders of major middle income economies, African nations and international institutions. With a further G20 summit in Pittsburgh in September, and UN climate talks in Copenhagen at the end of the year, the summit outcomes will be judged partly on whether they can usefully set the scene for these subsequent meetings. Yet it is on Africa and the focal issue of health where Italy in particular, and the G8 collectively, face their greatest credibility test. In 1995, when they met in Gleneagles, the G8 heralded a major breakthrough when they announced a doubling of aid to Africa by 2010, as part of a wider package of measures designed to accelerate progress towards the Millennium Development Goals on poverty, hunger, education and health. Four years on, what was dubbed a 'Marshall Plan' for Africa in 2005 risks disintegrating into a partial plan: While non-G8 donors, responsible for a quarter of the total aid increase, are delivering on their side of the deal, aid from the G8 countries has actually fallen. So far, G8 countries have raised aid by just one third of the total they pledged in 2005. Italy, the host nation, continues to slash its aid spending, and now gives less than a fifth of one per cent of its national income to poverty reduction. Failure to deliver on recent promises will cost the G8 heavily in terms of credibility. But more importantly, it threatens a huge social cost at a time when the global recession is hitting low-income countries hardest. The World Bank estimates that as many as 2.8 million additional child deaths could result between now and 2015 unless urgent action is taken to mitigate the impact of the economic slowdown on household income and public spending. Some G8 countries -- most notably Italy -- have suggested that the fiscal squeeze in Europe and North America makes delivery of current pledges unaffordable. But on closer scrutiny this is a flimsy alibi: the global aid increase promised by 2010 is equivalent to just 2% of the total stimulus package announced for G8 countries at the London G20, and would be equivalent to about 1% of public spending in most EU member states. Inaction by the G8 is the real unaffordable luxury, not least from the perspective of the 9.2 million children who continue to die each year from easily preventable disease. Where the G8 has delivered additional aid for areas such as health, it has made a lasting and positive impact. A 90% reduction in deaths from measles in Africa since 2001, and provision of life-saving antiretroviral drugs for 4 million people with HIV and AIDS would not have been possible without the support of G8 countries. This is a platform that needs to be built on when the G8 meet in L'Aquila, not squandered. When the leaders of the world's richest countries meet in Italy, they must rise to the challenge posed by the global economic crisis, and take the following actions on health and aid. On health : Intensify efforts to meeting existing commitments on child and maternal mortality, and with other countries increase aid for primary health care from4.6 billion to at least15 billion a year by 2010 Work with other donors to improve the quality of aid for health, and ensure that innovative funding mechanisms don't become a substitute for existing efforts Take the necessary steps to achieve universal access to HIV and AIDS prevention, treatment and care by 2010, including through support for the Global Fund On aid : Publish timebound plans for how each donor will meet its aid promises, and together reach the collective target of giving130 billion in aid by 2010 Establish a monitoring system which flags where the international development goals are off track, and takes action to mitigate any roll-back of progress Develop a joint plan with other donors to achieve the 2010 aid effectiveness targets, and to review progress annually Watch here! -- By Patrick Watt, World Vision advocacy campaigns director. More on Italy
 
Michael Likosky: Secretary Chu's Bank Top
Before being nominated for Secretary of Energy, Nobel Prize-winner Steven Chu helped draft the Council on Competitiveness's ' A 100-Day Energy Action Plan for the 44th President of the United States .' The Council is a group of CEOs, university presidents and labor leaders devoted to America's prosperity. The Action Plan proposed the creation of a National Clean Energy Bank. A version of it has been included within the American Clean Energy and Security Act now in the House. The Clean Energy Bank is essential to deliver on President Obama's mandate to 'make sure that we are investing in what's required for long term growth.' The same goes for the Infrastructure Bank also now in Congress. The sibling banks will move energy and infrastructure decisions away from the short-sighted earmark system and toward making sustainable carefully-planned investments in public works based upon the merits. In a time of budgetary crisis, the idea is that these government banks can achieve progressive goals on the cheap. Modest public subsidies can be used to leverage large amounts of private capital. However, the infrastructure and energy banks must be vigilant to ensure that the public interest drives private investment decisions. Moreover, it is essential that the government banks do not presume that the private sector is the best vehicle for producing public goods. We must be mindful of the fact that our federal government is injecting enormous amounts of public money into private banks and AIG to address a market failure. Furthermore, by flooding money into the private financial institutions and under-capitalizing cities and states, we are distorting the market. Unfortunately, the infrastructure and energy banks are being promoted mainly as ways of raising quick cash. We should worry when Reason Foundation, Howard Dean, Newt Gingrich, Ed Rendell, and Jeb Bush so readily reach consensus on this approach to recovery. It may be that the bipartisan progressive coalition is based more upon an appreciation of the power of subsidies and less on a shared concept of the public interest. Our recovery should not be another wave of the Reagan Revolution. In fact, our financial crisis itself has resulted in part from the hidden costs of privatization, which created incentives to under-invest in our public infrastructure for decades. Moreover, the fact that the financial figures and job creation numbers are being produced by TARP banks raises red flags. Also worrisome is the fact that advocates for the Clean Energy Bank want to base it on the US Export-Import Bank and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation. These US government banks promote development abroad by giving subsidies to our firms. In an earlier post, I described the lawsuit recently settled between these banks, on the one hand, and a group of American cities and civil society organizations, on the other. The plaintiffs argued with some success that these government banks were subsidizing companies pursuing projects that dramatically aggravated global warming. The discussion of the institutional design of the sibling Infrastructure Bank is no more reassuring. There, supporters are modeling it on the European Investment Bank, which promotes European integration through corporate subsidies. The European Bank, like the American export banks, has a mixed record, with successes and failures. It has opposed meaningful citizen participation in decisions and not effectively addressed power disparities on the Continent. All of this is not to dissuade us from embracing both the energy and infrastructure banks. In fact, durable equitable recovery depends upon having these banks on line quickly. However, they must be publicly controlled institutions. Moreover, private actors who receive government subsidies must imbibe the public interest. Our siblings banks must be judged based upon their effectiveness in producing public goods.
 
ACLU: Government Using False Confessions To Justify Confinement Of Detainee Captured When He Was 12 Top
The American Civil Liberties Union yesterday accused the Obama administration of using statements elicited through torture to justify the confinement of a detainee it represents at the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
 
Robert Rose: Critical Thinking: Impossible in Schools? Top
The process of critical thinking or teaching of these skills are possible in schools, but I think what is attempted should be called clearer thinking. I would leave critical thinking in the realms that call for challenging accepted knowledge. I don't think this occurs often in schools. An excellent article in California Educator, June 2009, describes how some teachers are teaching clearer thinking by ways of organizing thinking. I will mention a few of these and whenever you are teaching or discussing any reading you can add these to your repertoire. Dr.Christianna Alger states that asking the right questions may build a critical thinking classroom. (Many of the times you see baffled looks from students is due to the question not being clearly stated or it is not the correct question for the answer that you believe is right.) CLARITY. Can you state that in a different way? Can you elaborate on what you said? Can you give an example? Is there another word or phrase that communicates the problem? ACCURACY. How do we check to see if that statement is valid? How do we know it is correct? Where did you get the information? How can we verify or test it? (This is less of a problem when the sources are known and controlled by the teacher or district, but does it allow for challenges?) DEPTH. What factors make this a difficult problem? What are some of the complexities inherent in this problem? (We tend to go towards simple answers.) RELEVANCE. How does that relate to the problem? How does that help us with the issue? FAIRNESS. Do you have a vested interest in this issue? Are you sympathetically representing the relevant viewpoint of others? (This gets to the heart of my objection in calling it critical thinking. Is the student able to present a radically different viewpoint without it conflicting with what the teacher wants, believes is correct, or will accept?) Jeffrey Lantos, LA District, uses plays and songs to reenact what they read and research. (Plays and songs stimulate more of the brain than quiet reading does.) Betty Lightfoot, Lake Elsinore district, uses, "Thinking maps." These were developed Dr.David Hyerle. A circle map shows context. A flow map demonstrates sequencing and a tree map classifying, grouping. (This is very helpful when you want an outline or a summary. I see these and many others in use at every level of education and they do make it easier for students to organize their thinking.) Mira Blazy, Palm Springs District, uses manipulatives and experiments in her 8th grade science classes. Jack Stafford, same district, uses students to correct papers. They have a rubric to follow and usually they evaluate the papers from a different class. (I struggled for years experimenting with ways to make my rubrics easy to use and still get students to grasp the most important elements in thinking through and communicating their message.) The above are all useful ways to get more skill practice and more content from any reading by offering them different approaches that keep them motivated. They work well. (My teachers are using these with the novel, Rick and Bobo .) In my recent book, Abuses of Power in Education: Challenging Practically Everything , I explain how power differences (inequalities) make education more difficult than it needs to be. Mr. Stafford's excellent use of students correcting papers won't work with some teachers. I used that technique throughout my career and I was told I was lazy (true), the kids couldn't do it (untrue), and it would create discipline problems in the class (true unless the teacher creates a safe classroom and teaches the students how to do the corrections.) The main reason it doesn't work is when there is no trust between the teacher and students. There has to be a sense that if a student is angry about the correction that it can be handled civilly and fairly. This doesn't happen unless the students are part of the planning before any correcting occurs. When teachers are reluctant to share their power the students doing the correcting feel (and are) used. When students use and apply the rubrics in correcting others' papers it becomes a valid teaching technique! Negotiating and sharing power builds mutual trust and respect. When teachers try this method the students don't believe them. They abuse their new powers and the teacher gets defensive and angry and returns to his power position. I tell students that I know some of them don't trust me and it'll take some time for me to prove I am willing to take the time to show them how this will improve their lives. I took this technique as an example, but it is true of any of the complex relationships in school between any individuals or groups. Each needs the power to do the job with minimal interference from those with more power. However, when power is shared, then accountability for behavior goes with it. When I say I'm sharing power, I emphasize that they are sharing responsibility for outcomes. Once they discover I mean it (I follow through with the consequences they believe fit the offense) and they have more real freedom most accept their part of accountability. This brings me to the meat of my concern and doubt that schools do teach critical thinking. They can teach the process as I have shown some are doing, but without sharing of power they cannot teach students to think critically. If the teacher has to constantly worry that anything he says may offend someone and it could mean his job or minimally harassment, why should he deal with controversial thoughts? It's easier to teach the process and use known and agreed upon, safe answers and topics. The areas most upper grade and secondary students are concerned about are social relations, sexuality, religion, and to a lesser degree politics. All these things are taboo! In Los Angeles in 1961 teachers were not allowed to discuss communism. I taught all the various forms of government knowing I was courting trouble. The PTA President had her sixth grader in my class. She told me the PTA had discussed what I was doing and stated they'd back me if anything happened. Nothing did because I gave my honest appraisal of each type's strengths and weaknesses. Our discussions in class were wild and exciting and continued into their homes (mostly lower middle class). My students understood why some people so strongly believed in their political system without them trashing their own. From 1986 -1995 I ran an at-risk program for the most dysfunctional fifth to eighth graders in our district (many had failed one to three times). I had hour-long intake interviews and told the parents that I would answer ANY questions the students asked. If they came home and the parents were upset by what I had said they (or anyone that represented their viewpoint) could come in and discuss it with me in front of the class. They understood that the class could challenge them like they did me. Some of their questions and discussions would have made Jerry Springer blush (another reason teachers shy away from this). In both (and all) settings I created a classroom environment that didn't merely tolerate differences of opinion I encouraged it! We had discussions every day and they dealt with the curriculum too, but they knew they could bring up the topics that were most important to them. This does not and cannot happen in the way our schools are structured with their hierarchical power base that punishes thinking that differs from the status quo. For that reason I repeat we can teach the process and skills of clearer thinking, but we can't teach them to think critically and apply those skills to the real worlds they live in. It goes against too many vested interests that fear their power will be diluted Until teachers have the freedom to teach using the best of their abilities without fear of job loss or constant harassment and students have the freedom to honestly, civilly disagree there cannot be critical thinking.
 
Daryl Hannah: Why I Was Arrested in Coal River, West Virginia Top
Why would I fly across the country on my own dime knowing I would most likely end up in jail in one of the poorest parts of America? Well, have you ever heard of MTR? Don't feel bad, my friends are intelligent, well-read and informed people, but most of them had never heard of MTR (Mountain Top Removal) either. So, I went to Coal River to help bring much needed attention to this hidden, criminal (but somehow legal) form of mining. I was honored to be joining an inspiringly brave group of concerned Americans, which included NASA climate scientist James Hansen who was among the first to sound the alarm on the climate crisis. The sharp, charismatic, 94 year old, former West Virginia U.S. Representative and Secretary of State Ken Hechler, who was the first congressman to introduce a Federal bill to abolish strip mining in 1971. (If passed the bill could have prevented this mess we find ourselves in.) And I was deeply moved to be arrested with those affected by MTR in Kentucky, and the many local residents fighting for their very lives, including a half dozen senior citizens, canes, walkers and all. Mountain Top Removal is a devastatingly destructive form of mining and has already destroyed 2,000,000 acres in the Appalachian Mountains. Coal companies have literally blown up over 500 mountain tops to access the coal seams and then dumped the refuse into the valleys below, killing over 3000 miles of headwater streams. The EPA just gave the go ahead for an additional 42 mountaintops to be blown off with another 6 permits pending. Mountain Top Removal leaves behind a virtual hideous moonscape of devastated earth, billions of gallons of poisonous toxic sludge, and boarded up towns with dramatically high rates of cancer. Don't get me wrong, I have great respect for, and am deeply indebted to the miners working in coalmines and on MTR projects who risk their lives daily to bring power to our country. I understand they feel threatened by anything that might take away their jobs. And, I don't want to see them lose more jobs, as 75% of mining jobs have already been lost to the machines and explosives of MTR. While it takes fewer miners to remove coal with Mountain Top Removal, there are just as many dangers, accidents and fatalities! It is a cheaper way for the companies to mine and that's why it's becoming so pervasive. Yesterday, I received this email from a woman in Virginia: Dear Daryl, Thank you so much for coming to West Virginia and trying to save our mountains from Mountain top removal. I am a 9th generation Appalachian and it pains us to see what is happening. If it was not for the Internet I wouldn't have known about your efforts. Massey has quite a bit of influence of the local media in the coalfields. I am sorry you were arrested but I thank you for standing up for what is right. We need to work on sustainable communities here in the mountains so that coal miners will have opportunities for jobs not so dangerous. My brother works, when he can't find anything else, at the mines driving the large dump trucks that haul the coal out of the pits. It's dangerous work even if you are not underground. You just wouldn't believe the equipment they give them to work with. This one site he was in this massive huge dump truck that the floorboard was rusted out with open holes. Rocks would fly back into the cab from the tires. And when it rains, it's a mudslide. One of his co -workers was killed when the dump truck went over an embankment last year. Reporting gets you fired. And yet these workers will defend the job because there is nothing else. So thank you for standing up with us. We do appreciate it. Then there's the sickness... According to WVU's institute for health policy research, coal county residents are more likely to suffer from chronic heart, lung and kidney diseases, cancers and generally suffer from excess numbers of premature death. There's a high cancer risk for up to 1 out of every 50 Americans living near the more than 100 billion gallons of toxic sludge in the clay-lined and unlined (the majority unlined) coal ash landfills and slurry ponds, such as the TVA Kingston ash sludge landfill that collapsed into the Emory River in December. Tennessee Valley Authority officials consistently have said the ash spilled in December from the utility's Kingston Fossil Plant wet landfill in Harriman, Tenn., and in January from its Widows Creek pond in Stevenson, Ala., is non-hazardous... but after the spill, regulatory and independent testing have found high levels of toxicity in the spilled waste and raw water where the two spills occurred. Thirty-one of the landfills and slurry ponds in Tennessee, Georgia and Alabama are on or near major waterways! The slurry pond above the Marsh fork elementary school where we held our protest holds 2.8 billion gallons (it's one of the smallest ponds -- one nearby in brushing fork holds 9 billion gallons) of sludge in unlined pits containing arsenic, lead, cadmium, and mercury. Tragically but predictably in coal river valley, the children are often sick with headaches and asthma, and among the 200 students and teachers at Marsh Fork elementary school cancer rates are higher than average. Three teachers have died from cancer and one is struggling with the disease now. In 2005 one student died from ovarian cancer at age seventeen and another is still battling ovarian cancer. Today I received this from a man in Raleigh County, West Virginia: West Virginia. It is hell. Every morning a 6 am my cat starts coughing. My eyes burn, my nose burns (sometimes bleeds), I get ill, and my health continues to fall apart. I got two forms of cancer, I can't drink the water... and we are 15 miles from Marsha Fork where they are making (was supposed to be shut down) a cyanide based pesticide that in an accident killed 1800 people in India. My kid is lead poisoned, my wife is- and in a mile radius 10 people have had heart attacks or died from whatever is here. The dust is full of arsenic and the Massey power plants create a blue haze which is really sulfuric acid. EPA won't come near this place. It is owned by the coal industry. Thousands, who live here and are dying from 100 miles of rivers under coal sludge, Do the earth a favor and check on this and if you feel like improving our life send us a ticket out of here. I am sending you a picture of my son. He is being poisoned here. It breaks my heart. We cannot even get workman's comp and have huge families. We are the poor of southern West Virginia.. State regulators are telling the people that it's an "improvement" to flatten a forested mountain, seed it with grass and hope that some shrubs will grow -- and then allow hunters who have signed "the appropriate waivers of liability, indemnifications and assumptions of risks" to hunt whatever animals might choose to inhabit such barren fields. As humorist Dave Barry says, we're not making this up, although we wish we were. Let me make one thing clear... there is no such thing as clean coal!!! I wish President Obama would stop using the term and take CEQ chief Nancy Sutley and EPA head Lisa Jackson to visit these unfortunate mining sites under their jurisdiction. When we flip the switch to turn our lights on, most of us have no idea where that power comes from. According to the U.S. dept. of energy, more than 50% of our electricity comes from coal. Coal emits much more carbon (CO2) per unit of energy than oil and natural gas. From the acid drainage of mines polluting rivers and streams, to the release of mercury and other toxins when its burned into the atmosphere, the fine particulates that wreak havoc on human health, and the colossal waste, coal pollutes every step of the way "Clean coal" is the industry's attempt to "clean up" its dirty image -- the industry's greenwash buzzword. It is not a new type of coal. "Clean coal" methods only move pollutants from one waste stream to another. Coal is a dirty business! The good news is we have a solution! A study of the long-term benefits of infinite Wind Power versus finite coal MTR in Coal River Mountain, West Virginia already exists. They show "excellent potential" for efficiency, productivity and economic benefit. Though it doesn't have short-term financial returns, wind promises to provide clean, inexpensive energy and offers scores of safe jobs for the long term. Just check out the staggering figures from a report released by the American Wind Energy Association: "wind industry jobs jumped to 85,000 in 2008, a 70% increase from the previous year." Renewable energy will continue to grow exponentially, whereas mining jobs have decreased or remained relatively stagnant at "81,000 workers" for over 20 years, according to the 2007 U.S. dept of energy report. I can understand why those who live in coal towns are frustrated, because while we have this technology available to us now -- it is still just "a promise" in these regions. It's imperative we let our president, our elected public servants and entrepreneurs know that this is where we want our investment to be directed. Hopefully some wise, forward thinking heroes will step up the plate, build the wind farm and take this incredible win, win, wind, opportunity to bury the dirty dinosaur of Mountain Top Removal forever. www.crmw.net www.appvoices.org ilovemountains.org More on Celebs Talk Politics
 
Jessica Simpson Sings For Tony Romo And Tiger Woods (PHOTOS) Top
Jessica Simpson and Tony Romo are still going strong. Simpson sang the National Anthem at the opening ceremonies for the pro-am AT&T National golf tournament on Wednesday in Bethesda, Md., where her football star boyfriend Romo played a practice round alongside Tiger Woods. Some Redskins fans in attendance booed the Cowboys quarterback. PHOTOS: More on Sports
 
AP source: DEA joins Jackson death investigation Top
WASHINGTON — The Drug Enforcement Administration is joining the investigation into Michael Jackson's death, a law enforcement official said late Wednesday. The DEA is stepping in at the request of the Los Angeles Police Department, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the ongoing investigation. The federal agency can provide resources and experience in investigating drug abuse, illicit drug manufacturers known as "pill mills" and substances local police may not be familiar with, the official said. The DEA would likely play a role in looking at Jackson's doctors, the drugs they prescribed and whether the doctors were registered with the DEA to prescribe those substances as federal law requires. Also, investigators are expected to look at the sources of the drugs provided to Jackson or his associates to determine if there was a pattern of trafficking. Following Jackson's death, allegations emerged that the 50-year-old King of Pop had been consuming painkillers, sedatives and antidepressants. But Cherilyn Lee, a registered nurse whose specialty includes nutritional counseling, said she encountered a man tortured by sleep deprivation and one who expressed opposition to recreational drug use. Lee told the AP Tuesday she repeatedly rejected Jackson's demands for the drug, Diprivan. Several months ago, Jackson had begun badgering Lee about Diprivan, also known as Propofol, Lee said. It is an intravenous anesthetic drug widely used in operating rooms to induce unconsciousness. It is generally given through an IV needle in the hand. But the federal law enforcement official said that Propofol is not a controlled substance. "It's not the kind of drug the DEA has seen being abused," the official said.
 
WATCH Mark Levin: Obama's Policies Are "Bernie Madoff Times A Thousand" Top
Right-wing talk radio firebrand Mark Levin was a guest on Sean Hannity's self-titled Fox News show and unleashed a diatribe against President Obama. Responding to Hannity's question of why his book "Liberty and Tyranny" is doing so well, Levin lit into Obama, calling his policies "Bernie Madoff times a thousand;" Obama "is taking a wrecking ball to this;" and that Obama's ultimate goal is to "destroy the middle class." Hannity cheers him on the whole way through (his favorite way of referring to Levin is as "The Great One"), although it's questionable if the Republican party wants Levin out there as the face of their ideology considering the man has a history of embarrassing himself and conservatism. WATCH Mark Levin to Hannity: Because I think the American people are fundamentally liberty-loving people. And what's going on in this country is really anti-liberty. The President, you know, they just put Bernie Madoff away for life; the President's policies are Bernie Madoff times a thousand. He is taking a wrecking ball to this society. The American people love this country. They love its institutions; they revere the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. What the President is peddling is something utterly foreign. He's dragging us into what de Toqueville called a 'soft tyranny.' And really I don't know what the limits are on the power of the presidency anymore. They used to call Bush an imperial president, which was ridiculous, this is a real, live imperial president, who wants to dictate light bulbs to what medicines you get, to student loans and credit card interest rates. He doesn't have the constitutional authority to be doing all these things. [...] He lied. Matter of fact he's taken his page right out of Saul Alinsky's rules for radicals. Saul Alinsky essentially said, look, you gotta sound like you're for the middle class. You gotta sound like you're from the middle class. And then you destroy the middle class. More on Fox News
 

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