Wednesday, July 29, 2009

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Bill Scher: The President's Policies Are More Popular Than The President Top
Pundits keep saying that the President is more popular than his policies, undercutting his mandate to take bold action. But on health care, the opposite is true. Last week, I noted that one W. Post reporter repeated the knee-jerk conventional wisdom , when in fact, his own paper's poll just showed majority support for the main provisions in pending health care legislation, while Obama's approval rating on health care was below 50%. Today, two more polls show the public strongly supports Obama's actual health care policies, even though their support of Obama has declined. From MSNBC's writeup of the NBC/WSJ poll (emphasis added): Pluralities now say that the president's health care plan is a bad idea, and that it will result in the quality of their care getting worse. What's more, just four in 10 approve of his handling on the issue. The poll also finds that Obama's overall job-approval rating has dropped to 53 percent... ... [But] when read the specifics of his goals for health care -- like requiring insurers to cover those with pre-existing conditions, providing low-income families with subsidies to help them afford insurance, and raising taxes on the wealthy to pay for the subsidies -- 56 percent say they support Obama's plan . Only 38 percent oppose. Now, the NBC/WSJ poll does show more tepid support for the most critical piece, the public plan option, with a plurality of 46%. But that is out of step with every other poll ever taken gauging support for the public plan option, including today's NYT/CBS poll. That poll shows Obama overall approval rating at 58%, and his handling of health care at 46%. But when asked "would you favor or oppose the government offering everyone a government administered health insurance plan," a strong 66% support -- similar to what public plan option has garnered in most previous polls. Yes, Obama's numbers have slipped. Perhaps that's a mix of swing voters buying the spin that "Obama's plan" (as opposed to the actual plan) won't tackle rising costs, and some liberal voters unhappy that Obama hasn't been a stronger advocate for the public plan. Perhaps it's just the mere fact that Obama hasn't handled the issue well enough to get something passed by now. But whatever the reason is, it manifestly is not because the public has soured on the actual pillars of the bills that have advanced in the House and Senate. So there is no reason for pundits to keep saying the president is more popular than his policies. And there is no reason for skittish politicians to flinch from backing the public plan option based on these new polls. If anything, it should motivate them to help the president make the case that his actual ideas are essential to expanding coverage and reducing the deficit. Originally posted at OurFuture.org
 
Bashir Ahmad Gwakh: The Part-Time Taliban Top
The Taliban insurgents find it extremely easy to recruit unemployed impecunious young Afghans as part-time fighters. In a country where average income rate is less than $50 per month, Taliban's high-paid job offer is hard to deny. Also, it is flexible and could be done in various shifts. This means the newly recruits do not need to have a permanent membership of the infamous group. Taliban's pliable vacancy makes it easier for the struggling men to work according to their own schedules. They can 'work' for a few hours per week and go back to their daily chores just like any other citizen. These few hours of 'work' could earn them from $100 to $500 and more. All these young men need to do is kill some government or foreign troops and personnel. Placing land mines, kidnapping people, burning infrastructures and engaging in an hour or two clashes with bungling and inept Afghan police is highly risky but not a hard job for Afghans who have grown up with guns and bullets. So, almost every young Afghan could fulfill the requirements. Reports suggest that more than 75% of the Taliban fighters are unemployed young men just looking for a way to make some money and feed their families. It is clear that most of insurgents are in Taliban's lines for money, not ideology. It is difficult to recognize these part-timers as they have no weapons that prove them insurgents. They are only armed while they are fighting. After that hour of battle they are just normal people of their villages. To keep them undercover, Taliban deploy the young men outside their districts to avoid the possibility that they might be recognized by local residents. In order to tackle the issue, the Afghan Government and the international community should immediately start working on providing jobs to young Afghans otherwise security and development will remain a dream.
 
Frans de Waal: Whale Shows Empathy Top
With all the talk of empathy (or the lack thereof) in the Supreme Court , the health care industry, or society as a whole, it is good to realize that it is an ancient mammalian trait that is occasionally expressed by other animals. A twelve year old example is the gorilla, Binti Jua, who rescued a boy who had fallen into her enclosure at the Brookfield Zoo, in Chicago. But now we have a new hero, a Beluga whale, named Mila, who yesterday (July 28th) saved a member of our species. (In fact, animals far more often save members of their own species, which is what these behaviors obviously evolved for, but we tend to be more impressed when they help us!) At a Chinese zoo, they had the brilliant idea of organizing a competition in which divers had to sink to the bottom of an arctic pool and stay down for as long as they could without breathing equipment. They were surrounded by Belugas. One terrified diver became paralyzed, however, and would have died in the icy water if it weren't for one of the whales, who spotted her troubles before anyone else did, including the event's organizers. A visitor on the gallery took pictures . Saved by a whale! The rescued diver, Yang Yun, thought she was going to die, but was quickly pushed upwards: "I began to choke and sank even lower and I thought that was it for me -- I was dead. Until I felt this incredible force under me driving me to the surface." The capacity to empathize with others is what binds mammalian societies together: is it any different for ours? More about this question in The Age of Empathy (Harmony, September 2009). More on Animals
 
Doctors Create New Nose For Woman By Growing It On Her Arm (VIDEO) Top
Fox News has an uplifting report about how doctors were able to create a new nose for a woman from Guyana by first growing it on her arm. The young woman was involved in a drive-by shooting in her native country, and through the help of some benevolent doctors and the "Face to Face" program she was able to come to the U.S. for this operation. The surgery was a success and will go a long way towards returning normalcy to her life. WATCH: Send us tips! Write us at tv@huffingtonpost.com if you see any newsworthy or notable TV moments. Read more about our media monitoring project here and click here to join the Media Monitors team. More on Video
 
Steven Weber: Civil Warp Top
When the history of the last 10 years of this country is writ (if anyone will give a good goddamn or be able to read anything that's not in twit-speak) it will reflect the final moments before the two disparate, warring sides of the American psyche separated. The last, moist threads linking those two factions are at their breaking points, with each side the embodiment of an ideology whose ultimate fear is the opposition's complete dominion over the other, thus signaling the end of America as a country and arguably the greatest and most successful experiment in democracy the world has seen. On the current flashpoint of health care, the shrill voices of opposition, having hoarded their profits, are inundating the masses with primal fears of death and evoking iconic evil. And like good, sensitive, easily manipulated children, they believe Mommy and Daddy could never be wrong, could never be cruel. In the instance of health care for all Americans, they have declared a war on reason. The instigators of this assault, one must assume, had to have been emotionally broken as children. They cling to myths and have developed a mortal hatred of the truth. They seethe and simplistically demonize their opponents in order to understand the purpose of their own existence in this short life; if they didn't they might realize that perhaps they had no purpose, no practical reason for being here at all. And when their arteries eventually burst, they will need the very health care they assail as wicked. And the poor folks who are stirred to hurling mindless vitriol at the idea of health care for all Americans are, of course, the victims of a massive scam: drench the herds in low-brow entertainment, decry long-held fact based beliefs, isolate people's genuine feelings of pride and hope, add a dash of primal fear and stand back. They are the Gullible Americans (to go alongside their Ugly cousins) and their fear based psychology cannot conceive of traitors in their midst -- unless the traitor is of a darker color or has a foreign sounding name. From swift boats to birthers, the sales pitches have reached a level of fervor seen only in tent meetings, full of hyperkinetic gobbledygook and political glossolalia. The division is clear. It is, finally, right versus wrong. And on this side of the division we declare: it is wrong to for a modern, wealthy country to not provide all its citizens with health care. It is wrong to not provide better education. It is wrong to go to war unilaterally. It is wrong to cater to corporate interests when ordinary people are disadvantaged and struggling. It is wrong to cater to radical, ignorant, religious zealotry and to give it a place at the table when it should be banned to the fringes. It is wrong to foster a distrust of progress. It is wrong to have a fear of "otherness." It is wrong to perpetuate institutionalized racism. It is wrong to deny science and to avoid culpability in the polluting of our planet. These are the things a thinking, modern, progressive nation stands for. Those on the other side of the divide -- well, we've seen what they believe in. And, sadly, we've lived it.
 
Angelina, Shiloh And Zahara Go Toy Shopping Top
Aww, first they went to McDonald's, and now Toys "R" Us! Could this famous family be any more normal? Earlier on Tuesday, we snapped these pix of Angelina, Shiloh and Zahara leaving the toy superstore in Burbank after spending over an hour inside! It seems the girls purchased a whole shopping cart full of goodies WATCH: CLICK THROUGH FOR MORE PICS... More on Celebrity Kids
 
Visa Quarterly Profit Jumps 73 Percent Amid Recession Top
BOSTON — Visa Inc. on Wednesday said its fiscal third-quarter profit jumped nearly 73 percent, as recent cost-cutting helped offset declining payment processing volume driven down by the recession. Executives with the world's largest electronic payment network said they see recent stabilization in the economy. They offered a slightly more optimistic outlook for Visa's fiscal fourth quarter, citing recent moderation in the payment volume decline. "The velocity of the downturn has slowed," Chief Financial Officer Byron Pollitt told analysts on a conference call, adding that it was too early to characterize the shift as a broad economic turnaround. San Francisco-based Visa reported net income of $729 million, or 97 cents per share, for the three months ended June 30. That's up from a profit of $422 million, or 51 cents per share, in the year-ago period. Excluding one-time items including a gain from Visa's sale of an interest in its Brazilian affiliate, Visa's adjusted quarterly profit was $507 million, or 67 cents per share. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters expected a profit of 67 cents per share. Analysts' estimates typically exclude one-time items. Visa's revenue rose 2 percent to nearly $1.65 billion, slightly above analysts' forecast of about $1.64 billion. Visa said operating expenses fell nearly 15 percent to $824 million in the latest quarter after a cost-cutting campaign trimmed personnel and marketing costs. Adjusted for one-time items, the decline in operating expenses was more modest, at 9 percent. The reduced expenses boosted the company's profit margin. But that gain was partly offset by a 5 percent decline in payments volume, to $617 billion for the three months ended March 31, excluding the effects of currency fluctuations. Visa reports some operational results on a three-month lag. U.S. payments volume fell 2.5 percent from the year-ago period. But Chairman and CEO Joseph Saunders said Visa was encouraged that dropping volume has recently eased, remaining in "a relatively tight range," with declines of 2 percent to 4 percent throughout this calendar year. Accounting for currency movements, payments volume continued to grow in all other regions outside the U.S. in the latest quarter. Other regions of the world are increasingly embracing credit and debit payments over cash and checks. Total cards carrying the Visa brands rose 6 percent over a year ago, to more than 1.7 billion. Visa earns revenue primarily from fees it charges to process payments made with credit and debit cards, which has enabled it to weather the recession better than banks that issue credit cards and make loans. Visa continued to report increasing U.S. reliance on debit transactions rather than credit in the latest quarter, as consumers become more conservative. Visa also has recently seen U.S. consumers spend less per transaction, although Pollitt told analysts Wednesday that trend leveled off in the fiscal third quarter. Visa had previously forecast fiscal fourth-quarter revenue would grow in the low single digits in percentage terms. But Saunders said Wednesday that gain is "more likely to be in the mid-single digit range," based on recent results and the company's updated outlook. For the full year, Visa reaffirmed expectations for revenue growth in the high single digits. For next year, that growth is forecast at the lower end of the 11 percent to 15 percent range, depending on the pace of economic recovery. Visa slightly raised another aspect of its forecast, with expectations for an annual adjusted operating profit margin in the low 50 percent range through next year. That's up from the company's previous guidance of the high 40 percent to low 50 percent range. Visa reported earnings after its shares rose 48 cents to close at $66.78. In after-hours trading, shares fell 73 cents, or 1 percent, to $66.05. The stock has traded in a 52-week range of $41.78 to $78.90. The latest period was Visa's fifth full quarter as a public company. Visa went public in March 2008 in the biggest U.S. IPO ever. The launch came just as the U.S. economy fell deeper into a recession that is turning out to be longer-lasting and more far-reaching than most analysts had expected. (This version CORRECTS Corrects lede and headlines to show earnings gain of nearly 73 percent, sted 72 percent. UPDATES with comment from earnings conference call, other details. ADDS photo numbers.)
 
Helicopter Pilot Almost Causes Disaster At Kennedy Airport Top
A blundering small-town pilot nearly caused a disaster over Kennedy Airport when he steered his single-engine plane for a landing in front of a Boeing 747 and forced controllers to reroute other airliners out of his meandering path. Hundreds of lives were endangered around noon Saturday because 69-year-old John Prendergast of Sterling, Va., couldn't find his way to Republic Airport in Farmingdale, LI. More on Airlines
 
Suspect: Slain 'American Idol' Contestant Was Drunk Top
Daniel Bark, the 23-year-old accused of striking and killing American Idol contestant Alexis Cohen while allegedly fleeing police, is mounting a vigorous defense, his attorney tells PEOPLE. More on American Idol
 
Huff TV: Arianna Discusses Executive Compensation, Financial Crisis With Howard Dean (VIDEO) Top
Arianna appeared on "Countdown" tonight, guest-hosted by Howard Dean, to discuss the dysfunctional financial industry, and in particular Congress's battle to ensure that executive compensation doesn't stem from CEOs making risky moves that are not in the interest of shareholders and that could threaten the system itself. WATCH: Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News , World News , and News about the Economy More on MSNBC
 
Jude Law Told By Former Lover That He Is Having A 4th Kid Top
Jude Law, who has three children with ex-wife Sadie Frost, has discovered he's expecting a fourth child with an unidentified former lover. More on Celebrity Kids
 
Poll: Obama's Clout on Health Care Eroding But Still Trusted More Than Republicans Top
President Obama's ability to shape the debate on health care appears to be eroding as opponents aggressively portray the effort as a government-takeover that could limit Americans' ability to choose their doctor and course of treatment, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll.
 
Winnetka Beach Tops List Of Area's Most Polluted Beaches Top
A Winnetka beach topped the list of Cook County's most polluted beaches in 2008, according to a national water testing report issued today.
 
Delwyn Young On Pittsburgh Pirates Makes Unbelievable Catch (VIDEO) Top
Two Pittsburgh Pirates combined for an unbelievable catch during their recent game against the San Francisco Giants. As Bombastic Sports describes it: The Giants Randy Winn hit a fly ball that avoided Pirates centerfielder Andrew McCutchen's glove and instead ricocheted off his foot. Second baseman Delwyn Young dived and snatched the errant ball out of the air with his bare hand before it could hit the turf. WATCH: Send us tips! Write us at tv@huffingtonpost.com if you see any newsworthy or notable TV moments. Read more about our media monitoring project here and click here to join the Media Monitors team. More on Baseball
 
Kit Gallant: Congressman Courtney on Health Care: "Failure Is Not an Option" Top
This afternoon, I spoke with Representative Joe Courtney (CT-02) about the America's Affordable Health Choices Act -- the most promising health care reform legislation in years. We discussed politics, misinformation, hypocrisy, economic recovery, the importance of grass-roots support, and the urgent need for reform. Representative Courtney makes his compelling case for the America's Affordable Health Choices Act in the way that only a former small business owner and policy maker who refuses taxpayer-subsidized health insurance can. As Representative Courtney concluded, when it comes to health care reform, "failure is not an option." Check out the interview: In Part II, we discuss politicians' hypocrisy and the future of health care reform. (Click on the video below to watch.) (Full Disclosure: the author of this post holds an unpaid summer internship position in Congressman Courtney's Washington DC office.)
 
Craig Newmark: Serious Advice from Candi Harrison Re Online Governance Top
Okay, Candi's has worked a lot on this, and now she's free to speak out regarding real advice and experience in  Now the Real Innovation Begins. There's a lot of people in government ready to go, providing better customer service and internal processes, but there are regulatory issues and internal politics. But at some point, innovation in government always hits that brick wall of reality: the responsibility not only to serve citizens but also to respect and protect their rights and needs. Citizens count on government to do the right thing. Security and privacy and accessibility and open competition and fairness are important to citizens and the reality that government faces. These responsibilities can hobble innovation, and some innovators try to suppress or ignore these responsibilities - seldom a successful strategy. But I don't think that's going to happen this time. She cites three papers which are a big deal: " What Is the Most Important Thing ;" by Gwynne Kostin from DHS " Mixed Feelings About OGI Conference ," by Jaime Maynard (login required) " Why Do Governments Keep Getting Technology Wrong? " by Tanya Gupta
 
Michael Woods: Boxer Killed, Lessons Learned: Let the Wallet Go, and Our Gun Policy Is Crazy Top
Virtually every human being deserves the benefit of the doubt upon their passing. As we ponder a man's time upon this plane, we try to err on the side of generosity as we assess his time on Earth, and his accomplishments, if for no other reason than we ourselves would like the same treatment afforded to us. Also, most folks leave behind kin and friends who are grieving the loss of their son, daughter, mother, father, pal. Those left behind don't deserve to read a merciless evaluation laying out every misstep, every wrong road taken. Even Richard Nixon earned a gentle appraisal upon his exit, didn't he? With this in mind, let me state for the record that by all accounts, boxer Vernon Forrest was a solid citizen. As an athlete, he performed at a rarified level for two decades, represented his nation at the 1992 Olympic Games, which is in itself a laurel one could rest upon for a lifetime. He twice won welterweight crowns, and two times won junior middleweight titles. Arm and shoulder injuries lessened his legacy, but in the end, he will be recalled as a top-flight pugilist, maybe a Hall of Fame-level talent. More importantly even, he used his celebrity to advance the cause of the mentally and physically challenged. Forrest and partners started Destiny's Child Inc. in 1997, after Forrest, visiting a pal who worked with developmentally disabled kids, was put off by the sight of an autistic boy struggling for an hour to tie his shoes. Think you can do better, Vernon, defensive care-givers challenged Forrest. Go ahead. So he did. He opened up a house in suburban Atlanta which featured the sort of caregivers and sort of care you'd want if your own family-member was born mentally and/or physically challenged, and needed extra attention and tutoring. The boxer deftly managed two personas, that of an in-ring banger who wasn't afraid to put away a floundering opponent, and giant-hearted philanthropist who gave time and money to an underserved segment of society. "I been mean all my life, I'm a mean person, I know how to turn it on and off, like a light switch," he told HBO before his July 20, 2002 rematch with Shane Mosley. He said that with a chuckle, and while wearing one of the winningest smiles in the sport. Bottom line, based on what he did with Destiny's Child, concentrating on a group of people treated with contempt at worst, and indifference at best by too many of us, Vernon Forrest did more with his life and his acclaim than 99% of homo sapiens. And this is the primary reason why I was so disturbed to hear that Forrest made such an imperfect choice on the night of July 25, when he chose to chase the man who mugged him, and attempt to apprehend the criminal, or exert revenge on the miscreant who had robbed him of his wallet at a gas station. Forrest chased the man while carrying a firearm, and authorities say he engaged in a shootout with the mugger. Twenty to 24 shots were fired between Forrest and the criminal, who hasn't been apprehended. Such a shame that Forrest, who was accompanied by his godson, just 11 years old, chose retaliation, as he might in the ring, instead of acceptance. A wallet can be replaced. So can cash, and credit cards. Vernon Forrest, by all accounts a good man with an abnormally selfless nature, cannot and will not be replaced. I cannot ask Vernon's permission. But I am hoping he might accept that we use his death as a powerful message, and that moving forward, in situations such as the one Forrest found himself in, his death reminds us that the wiser choice is to practice acceptance. As hard as it is, let the wallet go. Let the cops do their job. Leave the firearms to the professionals, who are trained in marksmanship, and in situational strategy. Personally, I am violently opposed to the proliferation of handguns available in the United States, and believe that our nation's founders didn't foresee the world we live in today, where too many of us worship consumption, and acquisitiveness over a spirit of sharing, and caring, when they included the right to bear arms in the Constitution. With firearms so readily obtainable on the black market, so easily procured by deviant and desperate souls with nothing too lose, why our nation adheres so stubbornly to laws which were formulated when colonists were intent on maintaining freedom from the tyranny of British rule leaves me bewildered and saddened. The sadness is that much more grave when a good man gets taken out by a reckless robber. My informed guess is that someone under the thumb of a heavy drug habit, wielding a handgun likely manufactured by a corporation whose purpose is to accrue revenue, while the corporation's lobbyists maintain that their products are sold for "personal safety and protection," took down Forrest. That gun didn't make Forrest safer on July 25th. Instead, it made him a stat - -he is one of the estimated 30,000 Americans taken down by a gun in a murder, suicide, or accident annually. It didn't protect him, which is the primary reason for most firearm owners to purchase handguns. In fact, the gun quite possibly encouraged him to take the law into his own hands, and he paid the ultimate price. And think about it for a moment--remove guns from the equation on that fateful evening in Atlanta...that bad guy would have been mano a mano with Forrest. I like Forrest's chances in that scrap. I don't write this too demean Vernon Forrest, or degrade his memory; I write this to attempt to convince just one person who might be tempted to act as Forrest did, and look to take down a perp themselves, to think again. As a cayenne-blooded male who has once or twice chosen to battle on principle, and put myself in harm's way instead of shrugging off a slight or backing down from a clash of wills, I truly identify with Forrest's desire to right a wrong himself on July 25th. With unemployment in Georgia at 10%, with more people at the end of their proverbial rope, hopeless and broke, there will be more muggings, and more choices for others like Forrest to make--swallow my pride, and go to the station house and look at mugshot books, or try to play cop. To that one person who might be prone to play law enforcement offer with a gun in hand, in this dangerous age, don't do it. Let the wallet go. Let the sad soul take it. He evidently needs it more than you do. He has nothing to lose, if we can judge by his ruthless disregard for law and order, he doesn't much care if he takes one or more citizens down with him. Defenders of the right of non-professionals to bear arms huff and puff that guns don't kill people, people kill people. Well, until it is proven that humans own the requisite faculties that prove they deserve the right to handle a deadly weapon, which can remove a decent man like Vernon Forrest from this Earth in the blink of an eye, then what say we adjust our ideals, and our laws, and we do the right thing, and repeal the Second Amendment. People with guns are killing too many people -- how many more Vernon Forrest's will be taken from us before we do the obvious thing, the right thing?
 
Ex-GOP Rep. Tom Davis Warns Republicans: "We've Become A Rural And Southern Party" (VIDEO) Top
Tom Davis, a former GOP Congressman from Virginia, had some tough, but seemingly sensible, advice for his party during an appearance on "Hardball" on Wednesday night. Asked by Chris Matthews if the flood of white ex-Democrats into the Republican party who joined "because of civil rights back in the '60s" is "killing" Davis' party, the former Congressman honed in on how the politics of culture has wounded the GOP's mass appeal: Politics has been defined by culture over the last few cycles, and we've become a rural party and a Southern party. We've been losing inner suburbs and the like. A lot of this was the policies of the Bush administration. Another important point Davis made is that cultural politics, as perfected by Karl Rove and his disciples in the last administration, has caused a widening education gap in the makeup of the the parties: The high education areas Obama carried - 78 of the 100 counties with the highest education. McCain carried 88 of the 100 counties with the lowest education. As we move to cultural politics, that's been the shift. Matthews noted that during a Republican primary debate last year only three of the candidates standing on stage raised their hands when asked if they believed in evolution: "You have a party that doesn't believe what they were taught in high school." WATCH: Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News , World News , and News about the Economy Send us tips! Write us at tv@huffingtonpost.com if you see any newsworthy or notable TV moments. Read more about our media monitoring project here and click here to join the Media Monitors team. More on GOP
 
Maria Rodale: The Quest for the Secret of Really Green Pesto, Part 1 Top
The Challenge: A few months ago (well, in the winter, actually), I mentioned in my Organic Gardening magazine column that one of my goals this summer was to discover how to keep pesto really green. Really, really, green. Like the kind you sometimes get in restaurants when it comes out on your plate, and it still has that neon-fresh color as if it hasn't been exposed to any air. Pesto is one of my culinary specialties. Every year I grow lots of basil, and then one day in summer I make so much pesto that I freeze enough jars to last all winter long. All of my kids devour it, and would put it in their top 10 lists of favorite foods that I make. But we've all grown to expect that by the time it gets from the jar to the plate to the table, the color has turned dark and slightly brown -- which, when combined with whole wheat pasta, can seem like one of those meals that is better eaten without looking at it too closely. I got many, many emails and letters from readers with suggestions for keeping pesto green -- many of which I had already incorporated into my recipe. I always add a bit of lemon juice. I always put a layer of olive oil on top of the jar to keep air from turning the pesto brown as it's freezing. I always made sure to use really fresh, perfect leaves, and I leave out the cheese when I freeze. But still, the amateur scientist in me wanted to know how the heck to keep my pesto bright green. I received two suggestions that piqued my curiosity, and that I had never tried before. One suggestion, which I had suspected was the "restaurant secret," was to use a dextrose-based powder like Fruit-Fresh that is supposed to keep fruit and produce from turning brown. The other suggestion was to blanch the basil. Both ideas seemed like they would, at the very least, provide interesting results. So this last Saturday night I headed out to the garden, picked a whole sinkful of basil, and started pinching off the good leaves. I warned my family that they were in for a scientific experiment, and to come to dinner prepared to offer their best, most objective opinions on the results. Which do you think was the winning suggestion? To participate in our poll, visit Maria's Farm Country Kitchen . The results of the test will be revealed on my blog this Friday! For more from Maria Rodale, go to http://www.mariasfarmcountrykitchen.com .
 
Johann Hari: We Have Forgotten How Real Political Change Happens Top
When you are just one person sitting on a warming planet -- when you see economies collapsing, wars raging, and reasons for fear on every corner -- how should you react? What can you do? The current cluster of crises has stirred mood-responses that you can hear in every bar and coffee shop. It's worth looking at them, because beyond their siren messages, there is a road to real change that is being neglected. The first mood is to feel powerless, and to turn this into a defiant pessimism. You know the script. I can't make any difference. It's all going to happen, whatever I do. The political conversation is remote and boring and has nothing to do with me anyway. I'm going to buy an extra-big lock for my door, hug my kids a little tighter, and sit out the storm. We all have these moods from time to time, but they have now turned into the default mode of citizens in the supposedly advanced democracies. The second mood seems to be the opposite, but is actually its flipside. It says: what we need is a heroic leader who will save us. Enter Barack Obama. He's clever and articulate and has a conscience. He's the photographic negative of George W. Bush. He will sort things out. Leave it to him; breathe out at last. Both these moods leave you -- the ordinary citizen -- inert. All you can do is focus on your own personal life and wait, for disaster, or salvation. But these twin dispositions leave out the real option that is waiting for you. It is the only one that has ever delivered political change in the past, and it is the only one that will pull us out of the ditch now. It is where ordinary individual citizens -- you -- come together and raise their voices and offer solutions of their own. To get there, you have to deal first with the people who say that politics is irrelevant and boring and they don't care. I always offer them one fact. According to the best scientific evidence, if we have five degrees of global warming -- which is now a significant possibility in my lifetime, unless we change our behaviour fast -- there will be global crop failure. Food will not grow. Are you bored by this prospect? Is that dull? You won't be bored when you are hungry. Martha Gellhorn, the great war correspondent, said: "People will often say, with pride: 'I'm not interested in politics.' They might as well say, 'I'm not interested in my standard of living, my health, my job, my rights, my freedoms, my future or any future.'" Be serious. It might seem remote; it might seem difficult; it might be a world away from the arcane mumblings of Nancy Pelosi and Michael Steele; but unless you are a psychopath, you care. Far from being some dreamy call to kum-by-ya, collective political action is the single biggest reason your life is incalculably better than your great-grand-parents'. When people first called for equality for women, when people first started to conduct scientific experiments, when people first suggested paid weekends and holidays for ordinary workers, they were greeted by the same glib pessimism we hear today. It'll never happen! What can we do? But ordinary people who believed they were necessary gathered together. They spoke and argued and marched and lobbied in their defence -- and they won. These achievements were never handed down by people at the top. Who was the leader of feminism? Who was the leader of scientific progress? Who was the leader of workers' rights? Sure, there were inspirational individuals along the way. But they happened as a result of millions of ordinary people demanding it, and never giving up. If we had waited for leaders to spontaneously see the light, we would be waiting still. That's why the unquestioning faith in Barack Obama of the past year -- now slowly dispersing -- has been as disempowering as despair. Both ask nothing of you. In reality, Obama will only be a good president if ordinary people pressure him to be one -- if they shove him away from his errors (like aerial bombardment of Pakistan) and push him to pursue his good goals more vigorously (like building universal health care at home). Trusting him to do the right thing is a basic misunderstanding of how progress happens in a democracy. You choose the best leader available within the power structure -- which Obama undoubtedly was -- and then you pressure him like Hell. Great democratic leaders permit the public mood to prevail over the entrenched vested interests blocking their will. It's an art, but it's not the most important art: that lies with you, and me, and all ordinary citizens. That's why I get angry when I see movies or plays venerating leaders as quasi-Messiahs. In the otherwise-excellent new play at London's Trafalgar Studios, The Mountain-Top , Martin Luther King is given a premonition of Barack Obama as The One that will come after him. In the movie Bobby , about the assassination of Robert Kennedy, one character asks in tears: "Jack's dead. Bobby's dead. King's dead. Who's left?" The response is -- all of you. Bobby Kennedy's mind was changed on Vietnam by the vast public protests by ordinary people; Martin Luther King had power because he was part of a huge movement of concerned citizens. Neither were lone heroes: there is no such thing in political life. If you don't turn onto politics, politics will turn on you. In any society, the people who already have power will try to get the state to work in their interests. Every day, the oil companies and the billionaires are lobbying for their interests -- and they speak far louder than their numbers, because they have so much hard cash. If you sit back, shrug, and say you can't do anything, their interests will prevail over yours. That's how we got into the credit crunch that endangers your job, and the climate crunch that endangers your ecosystem. Banks spent billions on lobbyists and PR-mongers to make our governments scrap the rules restraining them, so they could then pile up mountains of risky profit. In the end, it caused the financial house to fall down on us all. Similarly, Big Oil and Big Coal spend a fortune to stop governments making the urgent transition to clean energy that we need. It will cause the ecological roof to fall in. In both cases, a small concentrated private interest prevailed over the public interest -- and you were screwed. Politicians respond to the pressures put on them. The banks and oil companies and billionaires never stop putting on their pressure, waving their cheques, and making their threats. We need to make sure our collective voices talk louder. The only way to do that is to give your time and energy and dedication to demand genuine democracy. This isn't something remote. It's very simple and very practical. Choose one or two groups, and donate a few hours of your time a week. There are a thousand of brilliant campaigning organizations -- I'd recommend Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, Womankind Worldwide, and Common Sense for Drug Policy, just for starters. They all have work for you to do, now. If there isn't a group for the cause you most believe in, start your own. Political change rarely happens in a satisfying orgasmic flash, but if enough of us demand it, it comes in the end. Democracy -- real, campaigning democracy, not the dessicated Westminster variety -- works like those Push Ha'Penny machines you find in old arcades. You remember: thousands of two pence coins lie on a moving shelf, and you have to drop in coins of your own in the hope it will cause the pennies to tumble down for you to collect. Sometimes it feels like you are wasting your coins and the piles aren't moving even a millimeter -- but then a ker-ching landslide happens, often when you least expect it. You are not powerless. You are surrounded by millions of people who share your frustrations and share your instinct for justice and rationality. It is your job as a citizen to connect with them. Together, you are powerful. If you remain alone and apart and soaked in cynicism, you can be sure the Rupert Murdochs and Wall-Marts and Exxon-Mobils will be fighting for their interests -- against yours, and humanity's. Johann Hari is a writer for the Independent. To read more of his articles, click here . You can email him at johann -at- johannhari.com
 

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