THE FAILED REPUBLICAN RECORD: HEALTH CARE R F F M A N W H I

THE FAILED REPUBLICAN RECORD: HEALTH CARE R F F M A N W H I: "R
ECORD
F
ORTY
F
IVE
M
ILLION
A
MERICANS
N
OW
W
ITHOUT
H
EALTH
I
NSURANCE
The number of Americans without health insurance increased by 1.4 million last year and
5 million since the Bush-Cheney Administration came to power, reaching a total of 45
million – the largest number of uninsured Americans ever recorded. The percentage of
the population without health insurance rose from 15.2 percent in 2002 to 15.6 percent in
2003"

Firedoglake - Firedoglake weblog » Knuckleheads

Firedoglake - Firedoglake weblog » Knuckleheads: "Late Edition With Wolf Blitzer (Second Hour) Feisal al-Istrabadi, Iraq’s Deputy Ambassador to the United Nations is just as bullish on Iraq as our Condi. He doesn’t believe any of the civil war scenarios, and anticipates the various militias ultimately will be intergrated into a national security force under command of the Minister of Defense. Istrabadi can’t say when the troops of the 'multi-national forces' might be able to leave, but that the immediate withdrawal of those forces would be cataclysmic. Assurances were given that the middle classes aren’t really fleeing; Istrabadi says they’re just 'taking the opportunity to travel for the first time' in years."

Misjudgments Marred U.S. Plans for Iraqi Police - New York Times

Misjudgments Marred U.S. Plans for Iraqi Police - New York Times: "Bernard B. Kerik, the former New York City police commissioner sent to Iraq in 2003 to lead the police mission, said Pentagon officials gave him just 10 days notice and little guidance.

'Looking back, I really don't know what their plan was,' Mr. Kerik said. With no experience in Iraq, and little time to get ready, he said he prepared for his job in part by watching A&E Network documentaries on Saddam Hussein.

Field training of the Iraqi police, the most critical element of the effort, was left to DynCorp International, a company based in Irving, Tex., that received $750 million in contracts. The advisers, many of them retired officers from small towns, said they arrived in Iraq and quickly found themselves caught between poorly staffed American government agencies, company officials focused on the bottom line and thousands of Iraqi officers clamoring for help."

TomDispatch - Tomgram: Michael Schwartz on Dismantling Iraqi Life

TomDispatch - Tomgram: Michael Schwartz on Dismantling Iraqi Life: "The image of the Bush administration in Iraq as a bumbling giant, overwhelmed by the destructive forces within Iraqi society, is a pernicious misrepresentation. A close look at the facts on the ground demonstrates that the American occupation itself has been the primary destructive force in Iraq as well as the direct or ultimate source of the bulk of the violence; that the American military, in its zealous pursuit of the resistance, still generates much destruction; and that American reconstruction efforts have -- through greed, corruption, and incompetence -- only deepened the infrastructural crisis.

The American presence in Iraq continues to be a force for deconstruction."

The Post-Post-Cold War - New York Times

The Post-Post-Cold War - New York Times: "The Post-Post-Cold War
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

BUDAPEST

Being in Eastern Europe in the wake of Dick Cheney's warning to Russia against using its oil and gas exports as 'tools for intimidation and blackmail' has been revealing. The Financial Times noted that some Russian media presented Mr. Cheney's remarks as echoing Winston Churchill's 1946 speech in Fulton, Mo., warning that an 'Iron Curtain' was descending on Europe.

I actually don't think we're going back to the cold war. I think we're going forward. We're leaving the world we've been in — the post-cold-war world — and entering the post-post-cold-war world. Americans won't like the post-post-cold-war world, unless they get serious about energy.

The cold-war world was a bipolar world, stabilized by a nuclear balance between two superpowers. The post-cold-war world was, for Americans, a unipolar belle époque, in which an American Hyperpower, as the French dubbed it, seemed to dominate the global scene, economically and strategically — a scene characterized by a steady expansion of free markets and freely elected governments.

The post-post-cold war is a multipolar world, where U.S. power is being checked from every corner. China is rising as a power, thanks to hard work and high savings. Beyond China, though, other powers are r"

Putin Urges Plan to Reverse Slide in the Birth Rate - New York Times

Putin Urges Plan to Reverse Slide in the Birth Rate - New York Times: "Russia's population, now about 143 million, has been falling since the collapse of the Soviet Union, trimmed by emigration, rising death rates and declining birthrates. Both the government and demographers predict more downward pressure, including H.I.V. infections, that could shrink the population below 100 million by 2050.

Mr. Putin has raised the issue in the past, but never with such a clear set of instructions aimed at increasing the low birthrate, or at such length in a prominent speech. Among his proposals were one-time cash grants to mothers upon the birth of a second child, extended maternity leave benefits and a graduating scale of cash and day-care subsidies as a woman has more children. 'The situation is critical in that sphere,' he said."

Sinews of Peace (Iron Curtain) - The Churchill Centre

Sinews of Peace (Iron Curtain) - The Churchill Centre

Sinews of Peace (Iron Curtain) - The Churchill Centre

Sinews of Peace (Iron Curtain) - The Churchill Centre

To Some in Hartford, Coke Is a Real Evil Thing - New York Times

To Some in Hartford, Coke Is a Real Evil Thing - New York Times: "Mr. Williams said Coca-Cola was paying lobbyists 'hundreds of thousands of dollars' to dissuade legislators from supporting a bill banning the sale of carbonated beverages, including diet sodas; sugary drinks and junk food, in the state's public schools. He said the Senate is expected to vote soon on the bill, which Mr. Williams and Gov. M. Jodi Rell, a Republican, announced with great fanfare in February.

Mr. Williams said that Coca-Cola, with vending machine contracts in 80 percent of Connecticut public schools, has threatened to rescind scholarships and academic and athletic enrichment programs if the proposal becomes law. He said a review of several contracts showed that Coca-Cola is providing financial incentives to schools to promote sodas over less profitable water and juice drinks, also sold by Coke.

'It's a cynical marketing ploy,' Mr. Williams said. 'They want to brand into the minds of our children the Coca-Cola name and brand.'

But a lawyer for Coca-Cola, R. Bartley Halloran, said on Thursday that the company was not involved in any 'nefarious activity,' such as threatening districts or pushing soda on young children, noting that it does not sell soda in elementary schools."

Talking Points: The Big, Fat American Kid Crisis . . . - New York Times

Talking Points: The Big, Fat American Kid Crisis . . . - New York Times: "In the 1970's, the Federal Trade Commission proposed a rule to ban or severely restrict all television advertising to children. But guess what? The food lobbyists didn't like it, so Congress passed something it called 'The Federal Trade Commission Improvements Act of 1980' (see page 11). The 'improvements' in this case include stripping the agency of the authority to restrict advertising — a clear improvement from the point of view of Big Food. Instead of banning children's ads, the Congress gave us a voluntary system that is funded by the industry and doesn't really work."

Talking Points: The Big, Fat American Kid Crisis . . . - New York Times

Talking Points: The Big, Fat American Kid Crisis . . . - New York Times: "So, kid's television is a Pinocchio's Land of Toys — a sugary world where all the candy one can eat eventually turns children into junk-food donkeys. Extra-large donkeys. The Center for Science in the Public Interest recently announced plans to file a lawsuit in Massachusetts against the Kellogg Company and Viacom (which owns Nickelodeon) after determining that 88 percent of the ads on children's television were for cookies, pastries, sugary cereals, candy and other junk food. The center, allied with a Boston-based group called Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, argues that the advertising aimed at toddlers as young as two years old is 'creepy' and 'predatory.'"

Swords Crossed » The Overton window.

Swords Crossed » The Overton window.: "The Overton window.
Posted by Joshua Trevino @ 3:08 am, April 29th, 2006

As some may know, I work at a free-market think tank, and as such, qualify as a full-fledged member of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy. While places like the Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute and others are justly famous for their national-level work, it’s the network of state-level think tanks that are, to my biased mind, the unsung heroes of the movement.

So, with that being said, and mindful of my business-related absence for the latter half of this week, I’m going to share with you a little strategizing exercise from the bowels of the VRWC.


The mission of a think tank is to introduce ideas into public discourse and normalize them within the public discourse. The steps an idea takes to full legitimacy are roughly as follows:

# Unthinkable
# Radical
# Acceptable
# Sensible
# Popular
# Policy

This is a rough continuum. Not all ideas start at the same point, not all make it to the endstate — and some travel backwards. The think tank, with its advocacy and scholarship, does its best to make sure that its preferred ideas reach their endstate. But how does it do this in a systemic way? How does it stay within the bounds of possibility — the accep"

A Comedian's Riff on Bush Prompts an E-Spat - New York Times

A Comedian's Riff on Bush Prompts an E-Spat - New York Times: "After the clips of Mr. Colbert's performance were ordered taken down at YouTube — where 41 clips of the speech had been viewed a total of 2.7 million times in less than 48 hours, according to the site — there were rumblings on left-wing sites that someone was trying to silence a man who dared to speak truth to power.

But as became clear later in the week, this was a business decision, not a political one. Not only is the entire event available to be streamed at C-Span's Web site, c-span.org, but the network is selling DVD's of the event for $24.95, including speeches and a comedy routine by President Bush with a President Bush imitator."

Los Angeles Times: Many Youths Disregard Their Virginity Pledges, Harvard Study Says

Los Angeles Times: Many Youths Disregard Their Virginity Pledges, Harvard Study Says: "http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-virginity7may07,1,6880552.story?track=rss&ctrack=1&cset=true
From the Los Angeles Times
Many Youths Disregard Their Virginity Pledges, Harvard Study Says
According to interviews, more than half have sex within a year. But one pro-abstinence group disputes the findings.
By Elizabeth Mehren
Times Staff Writer

May 7, 2006

BOSTON — Virginity pledges, in which young people vow to abstain from sex until marriage, have little staying power among those who take them, a Harvard study has found.

More than half of the adolescents who make the signed public promises give up on their pledges within a year, according to the study released last week.

The findings have raised the ire of Concerned Women for America, a prominent conservative organization that advocates adolescent sexual abstinence.

'The Harvard report is wrong,' said Janice Crouse, a fellow at a Concerned Women for America think tank.

'This study is in direct contradiction with trends we have been seeing in recent years,' Crouse said. 'Those who make virginity pledges have shown greater resolve to save sex for marriage.'

Virginity pledges were introduced in the early 1990s as part of the Christian Sex"

Recipe: KATSUDON

Recipe: KATSUDON: " * 1 and 3/4 cups short-grain rice, scrubbed (California Kokhuo Rose and Nishiki brands are excellent; don't fall for the expensive 'gourmet sushi rice' gambit)
* 2 cups water
* 4 pork cutlets (or tenderloin slices), breaded by dipping each in one beaten egg, then fresh bread crumbs--crispy Panko bread crumbs if possible
* 1 small leek, sliced in 1/2-inch pieces (or 2 green onions sliced into 1-2 inch pieces)
* 2 cups Dashi stock
* 2/3 cup mirin (sweet rice cooking wine)
* 2/3 cup soy sauce (look for Kikkoman)
* 4 eggs

Prepare the rice an hour before the meal. First pour it into a big bowl of water and scrub the grains against each other to remove all starch. Strain the rice, then wash and rinse it well, until the water runs clear. Let drain in the strainer for as much as an hour. Bring the rice and 2 cups of water to a boil, give it a quick stir, then cover, reduce to the lowest possible simmer, and cook for 10-15 minutes. Turn off the heat and let steam for another 15 minutes (no peeking!). Then open the pot, gently fluff the rice with a wooden spoon or paddle, and re-cover the pot, placing a cloth or paper towel between the pot and the lid to prevent condensation into the rice.

Bring the dashi, mirin, and soy sauce to a boil, add the"

Daily Kos: I'm going to hell

Daily Kos: I'm going to hell: "For example I cannot help but recall in Luke 18 9-18: Jesus relates the following warning about public self-righteousness:

To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable: 10 'Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men--robbers, evildoers, adulterers--or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.' 13 'But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, 'God, have mercy on me, a sinner.' 14 'I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.'

and Then of course we have Jesus’ famous instructions on the best way to pray found in Matthew 6:5-6

5.'And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full.
6.But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who"

t r u t h o u t - Interview: 27-Year CIA Veteran with Will Pitt

t r u t h o u t - Interview: 27-Year CIA Veteran with Will Pitt: " Interview: 27-Year CIA Veteran by Will Pitt
t r u t h o u t | Interview

Thursday 26 June 2003

Ray McGovern was a CIA analyst for 27 years, serving seven Presidents. He is on the Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity. He is co-director of the Servant Leadership School, an outreach ministry in the inner city of Washington.

-------

PITT: Could you give me some background regarding who you are and what work you did with the CIA?

McG: I was a graduate student in Russian studies when I got interested in the Central Intelligence Agency. I was very intrigued that there was one central place to prevent what happened at Pearl Harbor from happening again. I had been commissioned in the US Army, so I needed to do my two years service there, but wound up down in Washington DC. I took a job with the CIA in 1963, and it was what it was made out to be.

In other words, I was told that if I were to come on as an analyst of Soviet foreign policy, when I sat down in the morning, in my In-Box would be a bunch of material from open sources, from closed sources, from photography, from intercepts, from agent reports, from embassy reports, you name it. It would be right there, and all I had to do was sift th"

The Walden Woods Projects Thoreau Institute Writings

The Walden Woods Projects Thoreau Institute Writings: "Paradise (to be) Regained*
By Henry D. Thoreau

[*Footnote: The Paradise within the Reach of all Men, without Labor, by Powers of Nature and Machinery. An Address to all intelligent Men. In two parts. By J. A. Etzler. Part First. Second English Edition. P. 55. London, 1842.]

We learn that Mr. Etzler is a native of Germany, and originally published his book in Pennsylvania, ten or twelve years ago; and now a second English edition, from the original American one, is demanded by his readers across the water, owing, we suppose, to the recent spread of Fourier's doctrines. It is one of the signs of the times. We confess that we have risen from reading this book with enlarged ideas, and grander conceptions of our duties in this world. It did expand us a little. It is worth attending to, if only that it entertains large questions. Consider what Mr. Etzler proposes:

'Fellow Men! I promise to show the means of creating a paradise within ten years, where everything desirable for human life may be had by every man in superabundance, without labor, and without pay; where the whole face of nature shall be changed into the most beautiful forms, and man may live in the most magnificent palaces, in all imaginable refinements of luxury, and in the most delightful gardens; "

Field Observations

Field Observations: "Berry: In the first place, to try to imagine people who aren't born yet is inevitably sentimental. It's sentimentalizing about something you don't know, which you have no right to do.

I love my little granddaughters, but to try to sit here and imagine the people they'll grow up to be, even though they're already here and certain things can be known about them, would be sentimentalizing. It would also be a form of oppression.

The first characteristic of a plan is that it won't work. The bigger the plan and the more far-reaching and 'futuristic' it is, the less likely it is to work.

There isn't a person who is alive and who has any appetite for living, who doesn't make plans. I make a plan for every day I live. I've got certain things I want to do that day, and if I didn't, I suppose I wouldn't do anything. But I can't help but notice, and I've been noticing for a good many years now, that my plans almost never work out. The day almost never exactly fits the plan. Some days depart wildly from the plan. So I conclude that even though you're going to make plans, if you're a live human being, one of the things you must learn to do is to take them lightly.

A plan really is useful for signifying to yourself and other people that you like living, that you're looking forward to living some more, that"