ANS -- American dream is about equality, not wealth

Here's a lovely sentiment for Independence Day.  It's about The American Dream, and what it meant before the Consumer Hedonists took over the hearts and minds of America. 
Find it here:  http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/07/08/mills.debt.dream/index.html?hpt=hp_bn9  
--Kim

American dream is about equality, not wealth

By Nicolaus Mills, Special to CNN
July 8, 2011 2:45 p.m. EDT
 
STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• The battle over the debt ceiling is a battle over the American dream, Nicolaus Mills says
• History provides a view of the American dream that should encourage liberals, Mills says
• He says the term "American dream," coined in 1931, had nothing to do with getting rich
• Mills: For four centuries, the American dream has been about sharing and sacrifice

RELATED TOPICS

• U.S. History
• Barack Obama
• Franklin D. Roosevelt
• Abraham Lincoln
• Thomas Jefferson

Editor's note: Nicolaus Mills is a professor of American studies at Sarah Lawrence College. He is at work on a new book, "Season of Fear: 9/11 and the Road to Iraq."

(CNN) -- The battle between President Barack Obama and congressional Republicans over raising the debt ceiling has escalated into more than a fight over the budget and taxes. It has become a battle over who speaks for the American dream -- those who want the wealthy to pay a greater share of the nation's taxes or those who want to cut entitlements such as Social Security and Medicare.

A look back in time provides a view of the American dream that ought to encourage liberals.

The famed historian James Truslow Adams, in his 1931 study "The Epic of America," is credited with popularizing the term "American dream." But Adams' dream had little to do with the now-popular idea of "striking it rich" and achieving fabulous wealth. Adams' version of the American dream was a modest one. It was a shared dream in which men and women attain "the fullest stature of which they are capable" without trampling one another.

Adams was opposed to a system that, as he put it, "steadily increases the gulf between the ordinary man and the super-rich," and in this view Adams was not just speaking for himself. He was describing the egalitarian core at the center of the historic American dream.

In the 17th century, we see this modest version of the American dream most clearly in the "city upon a hill" sermon (a favorite of Ronald Reagan) that John Winthrop, one of the Massachusetts Bay Colony's early governors, gave as the Puritans were on the way to the New World. For Winthrop, it was crucial for the Puritans to remember that theirs was a collective enterprise in which they would succeed or fail by virtue of being "knit together" as one people. Sharing and sacrifice were prerequisites, in Winthrop's mind, for becoming a city on a hill that would serve as an example for others.

"We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our superfluities for the supply of others' necessities," Winthrop insisted.

More than a century later Thomas Jefferson found himself reaching a similar conclusion while serving as minister to France. In a 1785 letter to his friend James Madison, Jefferson expressed his horror at the inequality of life in pre-revolutionary France and then went on to discuss how America could avoid Europe's fate.

"The earth is given as a common stock for man to labour and live on," Jefferson wrote Madison, and then with the vastness of America in mind, he observed, "It is too soon yet in our country to say that every man who cannot find employment but who can find uncultivated land shall be at liberty to cultivate it, paying a moderate rent. But it is not too soon to provide by every possible means that as few as possible shall be without a little portion of land."

Almost a century later, with passage of the Homestead Act looming, President-elect Abraham Lincoln expressed similar thoughts. "I have to say that in so far as the government lands can be disposed of, I am in favor of cutting up the wild lands into parcels, so that every poor man may have a home," Lincoln told a cheering Ohio audience.

On July 4, 1861, in a special message to Congress, Lincoln went even further in describing the government's obligation to its most vulnerable citizens. In an address devoted to justifying the Union cause, Lincoln defended the idea of "government whose leading object is, to elevate the conditions of men -- to lift artificial weights from all shoulders -- to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all -- to afford all, an unfettered start." It was this view of government that in Lincoln's mind made the Civil War a "people's contest."

Nearly 75 years later, with unemployment at 25 percent, President Franklin Roosevelt advanced a similar description of government. In his 1933 inaugural address, Roosevelt spoke of the need for the country to move as an army "willing to sacrifice for the good of a common discipline," and over the next 12 years, Roosevelt never backed away from that idea.

Campaigning for the presidency in 1936, he assured voters, "Your government is still on the same side of the street with the good Samaritan and not with those who pass by on the other side," and in his triumphant second inaugural, Roosevelt made it clear what being a good Samaritan meant in the middle of the Great Depression. "The test of our progress," he proclaimed, "is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little."

World War II only heightened Roosevelt's egalitarian beliefs. In his first fireside chat after Japan's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, Roosevelt told the nation "ahead there lies sacrifice for all of us," and in his 1942 State of the Union address, he spelled out what sacrifice now meant. "War costs money," Roosevelt reminded Congress and the nation. "That means taxes and bonds and bonds and taxes. It means cutting luxuries and other nonessentials."

For Roosevelt, the notion of carrying on a war while simultaneously cutting taxes was unthinkable and unpatriotic.

Whose vision of the American dream will prevail in the budget battle between Obama and congressional Republicans is far from clear. Both sides, who are still "far apart," as the president put it, may end up compromising their beliefs to get an agreement.

But in the meantime we should have no doubt about the American dream. For four centuries, it has rested on the idea that government should do all it can to narrow the divide between those at the top and those at the bottom of society.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Nicolaus Mills.

ANS -- What Kind of Patriots Are These Republicans?

Here are two related bits from Andy Schmookler.  I think his analogy in the first one is very apt.  May it go viral. 
find them here:  http://www.facebook.com/notes/andy-schmookler/debt-talks-congress-heads-home-for-holiday-after-posturing-little-progress/223859334320395   and
http://www.opednews.com/articles/What-Kind-of-Patriots-Are-by-Andrew-Schmookler-110703-294.html  
--Kim

Debt talks: Congress heads home for holiday after posturing, little progress

by Andy Schmookler on Sunday, July 3, 2011 at 11:50am

Response to Washington Post article:

 

What would you think of a parent who held a gun to his own child's head and declared to onlookers, "Do what I say or I'll blow the kid's head off!"?

 

Would you believe his claim that he was a loving parent?

 

What would you think of an American political party that would hold a gun, figuratively speaking, to the nation's public good and declare, "Meet our demands or we'll hurt America!"?

 

Would you believe their claims that they're American patriots?

 

No. In both cases we would be appalled.

 

Even if the demands themselves were reasonable, no loving parent would take his own child hostage, and no true American patriots would hold hostage the well-being of the United States.

 

But that's what the Republicans have done three times in the last six months­most immediately with their refusal to raise the debt ceiling unless everyone else does exactly what they say.

 

Even major parts of the Republicans' own constituency –like the national Chamber of Commerce and major financial institutions­are warning of the grave damage to the American economy the Republicans are threatening to do.

 

But the Republicans demands are themselves scarcely more worthy than their threats. With taxes on multi-millionaires and billionaires at their lowest level in decades, with all the economic gains of the past decade having gone to the very top and millions of American families in severe economic distress, the Republicans demands are a travesty.

 

They are insisting that ALL the deficit reductions come from cuts to programs that help average Americans, and NONE of it come from additional revenues from the most privileged among us.

 

Could anything show more clearly what today's Republican Party has become?

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/debt-talks-congress-heads-home-for-holiday-after-posturing-little-progress/2011/06/30/AGMG4OuH_story.html?tid=sm_twitter_washingtonpost
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What Kind of Patriots Are These Republicans?

By Andrew Schmookler (about the author)



By Andy Schmookler for Congress

 

Is there good evidence, other than that they claim it, that these Republicans are patriots?

How does a patriot act?   What are the hallmarks of the patriot?

Well, being a person who loves his country, a patriot is someone who is willing, when necessary, to sacrifice some of his own personal (perhaps selfish) good for the good of the country.   Love is like that, including for country.

We show that we understand that when we honor our war dead: we make it a patriotic holiday to celebrate those who made the supreme sacrifice for their nation.

When have these Republicans shown a willingness to sacrifice anything, besides other people?  

How much weight have they given the nation's good over their individual advantage?   Well, there are clues.

As soon as a president from the opposition party took over, the Republicans made a priority of making him fail.   Trying to make the President fail may be politically advantageous, but especially at a time of multiple national crises, the president's failure inevitably means serious injury to the country.

No patriot would injure the country to get political advantage.

And now we've got these Republicans threatening to push the U.S. economy off a dangerous cliff if their demands aren't met.   So much for love of country.   And what are they are demanding?   They insist that the sacrifices in this country are to be made by average Americans and not by the rich and powerful, whom these Republicans serve.

No patriot would threaten to send a nation already in considerable distress (the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression) into a still deeper collapse--a scenario that many serious economists think quite possible if the Republicans make good their threat.

And what about those forces of plutocracy, for whose interests the Republicans are so fiercely fighting, and who have made out so well while the rest of America has been losing ground?   How ready are they to make a sacrifice when the nation requires it of them?  

With the nation's financial condition in a worrisome state, with the national debt having grown in relation to the economy as a whole, one would expect a patriot possessing great wealth to be willing to give up at least SOME of his enormous wealth to help his country out, even to offer it .   But these plutocratic interests, far from being willing to sacrifice, are demanding, through their Republican collaborators, that their taxes already at historic lows--be reduced.

So, other than waving the flag, just what have these Republicans and those whom they serve done that demonstrates genuine patriotism?

 
Andy Schmookler is running for Congress in Virginia's 6th District.

ANS -- Drowning Doesn’t Look Like Drowning

Everyone: Read this article!!! I read the over five hundred comments, and many lifeguards and other rescuers agree that drowning can be silent and look like nothing. 
find it here:  http://mariovittone.com/2010/05/154/   or   http://gcaptain.com/drowning/?10981 
--Kim

Drowning Doesn't Look Like Drowning

 

by Mario on May 3, 2010

in Boating Safety,Water Safety

Translations: – - ti ng Vi t – Español – Français – Português – român – Deutsch – Suomi – Svenska -  eština – -Íslenska – Audio Version

The new captain jumped from the deck, fully dressed, and sprinted through the water. A former lifeguard, he kept his eyes on his victim as he headed straight for the couple swimming between their anchored sportfisher and the beach. "I think he thinks you're drowning," the husband said to his wife. They had been splashing each other and she had screamed but now they were just standing, neck-deep on the sand bar. "We're fine, what is he doing?" she asked, a little annoyed. "We're fine!" the husband yelled, waving him off, but his captain kept swimming hard. "Move!" he barked as he sprinted between the stunned owners. Directly behind them, not ten feet away, their nine-year-old daughter was drowning. Safely above the surface in the arms of the captain, she burst into tears, "Daddy!"

How did this captain know – from fifty feet away – what the father couldn't recognize from just ten? Drowning is not the violent, splashing, call for help that most people expect. The captain was trained to recognize drowning by experts and years of experience. The father, on the other hand, had learned what drowning looks like by watching television. If you spend time on or near the water (hint: that's all of us) then you should make sure that you and your crew knows what to look for whenever people enter the water. Until she cried a tearful, "Daddy," she hadn't made a sound. As a former Coast Guard rescue swimmer, I wasn't surprised at all by this story. Drowning is almost always a deceptively quiet event. The waving, splashing, and yelling that dramatic conditioning (television) prepares us to look for, is rarely seen in real life.

The Instinctive Drowning Response – so named by Francesco A. Pia, Ph.D., is what people do to avoid actual or perceived suffocation in the water. And it does not look like most people expect. There is very little splashing, no waving, and no yelling or calls for help of any kind. To get an idea of just how quiet and undramatic from the surface drowning can be, consider this: It is the number two cause of accidental death in children, age 15 and under (just behind vehicle accidents) – of the approximately 750 children who will drown next year, about 375 of them will do so within 25 yards of a parent or other adult. In ten percent of those drownings, the adult will actually watch them do it, having no idea it is happening (source: CDC). Drowning does not look like drowning – Dr. Pia, in an article in the Coast Guard's On Scene Magazine, described the instinctive drowning response like this:

1. Except in rare circumstances, drowning people are physiologically unable to call out for help. The respiratory system was designed for breathing. Speech is the secondary or overlaid function. Breathing must be fulfilled, before speech occurs.
2. Drowning people's mouths alternately sink below and reappear above the surface of the water. The mouths of drowning people are not above the surface of the water long enough for them to exhale, inhale, and call out for help. When the drowning people's mouths are above the surface, they exhale and inhale quickly as their mouths start to sink below the surface of the water.
3. Drowning people cannot wave for help. Nature instinctively forces them to extend their arms laterally and press down on the water's surface. Pressing down on the surface of the water, permits drowning people to leverage their bodies so they can lift their mouths out of the water to breathe.
4. Throughout the Instinctive Drowning Response, drowning people cannot voluntarily control their arm movements. Physiologically, drowning people who are struggling on the surface of the water cannot stop drowning and perform voluntary movements such as waving for help, moving toward a rescuer, or reaching out for a piece of rescue equipment.
5. From beginning to end of the Instinctive Drowning Response people's bodies remain upright in the water, with no evidence of a supporting kick. Unless rescued by a trained lifeguard, these drowning people can only struggle on the surface of the water from 20 to 60 seconds before submersion occurs.
   (Source: On Scene Magazine: Fall 2006 (page 14))
   
   This doesn't mean that a person that is yelling for help and thrashing isn't in real trouble – they are experiencing aquatic distress. Not always present before the instinctive drowning response, aquatic distress doesn't last long – but unlike true drowning, these victims can still assist in their own rescue. They can grab lifelines, throw rings, etc.
   
   Look for these other signs of drowning when persons are in the water:
   • Head low in the water, mouth at water level
   • Head tilted back with mouth open
   • Eyes glassy and empty, unable to focus
   • Eyes closed
   • Hair over forehead or eyes
   • Not using legs – Vertical
   • Hyperventilating or gasping
   • Trying to swim in a particular direction but not making headway
   • Trying to roll over on the back
   • Appear to be climbing an invisible ladder.
   
   So if a crew member falls overboard and everything looks OK – don't be too sure. Sometimes the most common indication that someone is drowning is that they don't look like they're drowning. They may just look like they are treading water and looking up at the deck. One way to be sure? Ask them, "Are you alright?" If they can answer at all – they probably are. If they return a blank stare, you may have less than 30 seconds to get to them. And parents – children playing in the water make noise. When they get quiet, you get to them and find out why.
   
   Join me on Facebook
   
   ___________
   
   Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by the author are not necessarily those of the Department of Homeland Security or the U.S. Coast Guard.
   

ANS -- Fwd: IKEA’s dangerous little secret

Hi everyone -- I don't usually send on this kind of notice, but I thought this information was interesting, in that Sweden is now viewing America as a Third World country.  What do we think of that?  What do the Republicans, who have been working since 1964 to make us into a Third World country, think?  Are they pleased?  Are they enjoying it?  Gloating about it?  You bet they are, in private.... at least the rich ones are.  The poor ones are wondering what happened -- where did their America go, and who can they blame? The only ones answering that question to the Tea Party-ers is the Republicons and the right wing radio guys, and they blame liberals.  Why aren't liberals out there presenting the other side of the story to them? rather than just talking amongst ourselves....
--Kim

 

Tell IKEA to let its workers organize for fair wages and a safer workplace.





Dear Kim,

In Sweden, IKEA's factory workers are paid $19 per hour and get five weeks of paid vacation every year. In America? Not so much.

IKEA's Swedwood plant in Danville, Virginia is the most dangerous plant in the wood furniture industry -- workers there have suffered more than 1,536 days of lost work due to accidents on the job in a 30-month period. According to the LA Times, IKEA's Danville workers are paid as little as $8 an hour and face racial discrimination from their managers. Workers often find out on Friday night that they'll be forced to work for the entire weekend -- and if they can't make it, they face disciplinary action.

In Sweden, IKEA's factory workers are unionized, which is one reason they receive better wages and have a safer workplace -- but the company is going all out to prevent American workers from receiving those same rights and protections. Please sign the petition to tell IKEA to give its American workers the freedom to organize.

The workers in Danville have filed for an election to start a union of their own -- the election could come as soon as six weeks from now. But rather than pay its workers fair wages, Swedwood pays the notorious union-busting firm Jackson Lewis thousands of dollars a day to hold mandatory "captive audience meetings" with the Danville workers. At these meetings, the Jackson Lewis associates inundate the workers with anti-union propaganda and veiled threats that are backed up with random firings.

Here's the good news: The publicity surrounding this organizing drive has already made a difference -- last month, Swedwood announced that Danville workers would no longer be forced to work mandatory overtime. But Liz Cattaneo of American Rights at Work stresses that continued public pressure is extremely important: "If IKEA thinks the public isn't paying attention, they're going to play hardball … throughout the election process - which could mean more firings and more union busting."

Now that the workers have filed for a union election, you can bet IKEA will redouble its efforts to squash their rights. They need our support now more than ever.

Please sign the petition to tell IKEA's head of Corporate PR that we are paying attention, and we expect IKEA to treat its American workers just as well as its Swedish workers:

http://www.change.org/petitions/tell-ikea-to-respect-its-workers

Thanks for taking action,

- Jess and the Change.org team

 

This email was sent by Change.org to kimc@astound.net.
Start a petition. Unsubscribe from future weekly updates. Edit your email notification settings.
 
 

ANS -- The Soul Is Dead, But the Spirit Lives On

Here's an interesting article about the source of morality.  It's from a column called

Ed Searl's Journal: In My Estimation

Posted on this site are current events that relate to contemporary religion, especially of the American experience.

Find it here:  http://edsearl.blogspot.com/2011/05/soul-is-dead-but-spirit-lives-on.html   
--Kim

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

The Soul Is Dead, But the Spirit Lives On

I always read David Brooks's op-ed pieces in the New York Times. His politics are too right of center for my own point of view; however, he's always well-reasoned and even more importantly draws upon much of the scientific research that I find authoritative, regarding the human condition. Brooks has an interest in morality, as do I. He often cites evolutionary biologists and psychologists, as well as neuroscientists who explore the landscape of the mind.

I've long been convinced that these areas of science have successfully challenged traditional philosophy, ethics, and theology. The popular writer Tom Wolfe, relatively early on, recognized the impact the new sciences, neuroscience, in particular, would have in a 1996 article "Sorry Your Soul Just Died."In it he wrote, "Thereupon, in the year 2006 or 2026, some new Nietzsche will step forward to announce: 'The self is dead'­except that being prone to the poetic, like Nietzsche I, he will probably say: 'The soul is dead.' He will say that he is merely bringing the news, the news of the greatest event of the millennium: 'The soul, that last refuge of values, is dead, because educated people no longer believe it exists.'"

Today, Brooks has an article "Nice Guys Finish Last" in which he makes a case, based on recent scientific thought that human beings are intrinsically moral, though programmed by evolution to be selfish. Is this an oxymoron? No. Because evolution also involves complex equations to be cooperative and part of a community.If the group benefits, so the individual benefits, reasons Brooks.

He writes, "In his book, 'The Righteous Mind,' to be published early next year, Jonathan Haidt joins Edward O. Wilson, David Sloan Wilson, and others who argue that natural selection takes place not only when individuals compete with other individuals, but also when groups compete with other groups. Both competitions are examples of the survival of the fittest, but when groups compete, it's the cohesive, cooperative, internally altruistic groups that win and pass on their genes. The idea of 'group selection' was heresy a few years ago, but there is momentum behind it now.

In the end, Brooks makes a conservative pitch for religion ethics, saying, "[T]he big upshot is this: For decades, people tried to devise a rigorous 'scientific' system to analyze behavior that would be divorced from morality. But if cooperation permeates our nature, then so does morality, and there is no escaping ethics, emotion and religion in our quest to understand who we are and how we got this way.

If I could question David Brooks, I'd ask him to name the "people" who sought a scientific system divorced from morality. Sounds a bit like a straw man to me. I've never seen science (scientists) wanting to diminish morality­or religion or God. Such a judgment comes from the religionists or traditionalists who become defensive.

My bottom line maintains that we human beings, by virtue of millions of years of creaturely evolution are hardwired to be moral. A few years ago Jonathan Haidt, a leading evolutionary psychologist, described five moral colors, which he describes on his web site's home page as

1) Harm/care, related to our long evolution as mammals with attachment systems and an ability to feel (and dislike) the pain of others. This foundation underlies virtues of kindness, gentleness, and nurturance.

2) Fairness/reciprocity, related to the evolutionary process of reciprocal altruism. This foundation generates ideas of justice, rights, and autonomy. [Note: In our original conception, Fairness included concerns about equality, which are more strongly endorsed by political liberals. However, as we reformulate the theory in 2010 based on new data, we are likely to include several forms of fairness, and to emphasize proportionality, which is more strongly endorsed by conservatives]

3) Ingroup/loyalty, related to our long history as tribal creatures able to form shifting coalitions. This foundation underlies virtues of patriotism and self-sacrifice for the group. It is active anytime people feel that it's "one for all, and all for one."

4) Authority/respect, shaped by our long primate history of hierarchical social interactions. This foundation underlies virtues of leadership and followership, including deference to legitimate authority and respect for traditions.

5) Purity/sanctity, shaped by the psychology of disgust and contamination. This foundation underlies religious notions of striving to live in an elevated, less carnal, more noble way. It underlies the widespread idea that the body is a temple which can be desecrated by immoral activities and contaminants (an idea not unique to religious traditions).

Remarks in the previous blog regarding First Nature and Second Nature have relevance here. I'm thinking Second Nature is the rationalization and application of First Nature instincts, including the five moral colors. To these five instincts, I certainly add the mammalian bonding instinct which has resulted in a cornucopia of the various fruits of love.

To return to Wolfe and the soul, the soul may be dead, but the human spirit is more vibrant than ever­a source of awe and wonder.

ANS -- A GAY DAY IN THE USA!

I am sending you this article about divergent groups working together and not defeating themselves by their infighting, as a warning to the six different types of Progressives, who have been defeating each other for years.  Thank Chip Shirley for the article.
Find it here: http://chipshirley.blogspot.com/2011/06/gay-day-in-usa-anyone-who-wants-to.html#comments
--Kim



A GAY DAY IN THE USA!


Anyone who wants to learn how dreams come true instead of simply being wished for needs to read this New York Times story, The Road to Gay Marriage in New York.

The story gets to the gist of how a unified sense of purpose had to take control over and supplant the naked idealism which had previously fractured the cause of Gay Marriage equality in New York state.
Sadly the ink from Governor Cuomo's pen had hardly dried on the bill before some gay idealists (like Rachael Maddow) returned to the backbiting and bloodletting that had truly made them part of the problem and not the solution.

When President Obama repeats his old saw of wisdom 'Let not the perfect become the enemy of the good' he might henceforth be tempted to add the afterthought 'the way Rachael Maddow and Jon Stewart do'. For it is an undeniable fact that their childish and relentless self righteous snickering has consistently worked against their stated objectives. Whenever the president puts forth a goal that is clearly for the common good they harshly critisize him for not adding the words 'RIGHT NOW!'

History will show that no one did more to set the stage for the passage of this groundbreaking civil rights bill than President Obama did when he successfully fulfilled his campaign promise to end the discriminatory Don't Ask Don't Tell policy in the military. President Truman's decision to desegregate our armed forces destined that change in society. President Obama's signing of legislation ending discrimination based on sexuality in the military has done the same.

'Right Now Rachael' proved her ineptness as a liberal leader to me with her 'My version of the State of the Union' earlier this year, in which she snarkily delivered a rebuttal to President Obama's SOTU. She essentially promised that in the next year of a 'Maddow presidency' every problem on the face of the earth would be solved, not another drop of oil ever burned and we would all ride to work on pink ponies, where we would be paid to have pillow fights.

And while I'm balancing the books here, hey Jon Stewart, when President Obama was on your show he asked you a question you have yet to answer, 'why didn't you have your rally to restore sanity in August of 2008 instead of 2010?

I'll end with an excerpt from the NYT story that the link and picture above are from...
-Mr. Cuomo was diplomatic but candid with gay-rights advocates in early March when he summoned them to the Capitol's Red Room, a ceremonial chamber with stained-glass windows and wood-paneled walls.

The advocates had contributed to the defeat of same-sex marriage in 2009, he told them, with their rampant infighting and disorganization. He had seen it firsthand, as attorney general, when organizers had given him wildly divergent advice about which senators to lobby and when, sometimes in bewildering back-to-back telephone calls.
"You can either focus on the goal, or we can spend a lot of time competing and destroying ourselves," the governor said.
This time around, the lobbying had to be done the Cuomo way: with meticulous, top-down coordination. "I will be personally involved," he said.
The gay-rights advocates agreed, or at least acquiesced. Five groups pushing for same-sex marriage merged into a single coalition, hired a prominent lobbying firm with ties to Mr. Cuomo's office and gave themselves a new name: New Yorkers United for Marriage.

Those who veered from the script faced swift reprimand. When Assemblyman Daniel J. O'Donnell, an openly gay Democrat from Manhattan, introduced a same-sex marriage bill in May without first alerting the governor's office, he was upbraided by Mr. Cohen. "What do you think you're doing?" the governor's aide barked over the phone.-

Rachael Maddow, Jon Stewart, consider yourselves reprimanded.
Posted by CHIP at 1:52 PM 0 comments Links to this post

email the WhiteHouse

go to this page:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact

Fwd: ANS replies -- US orders news blackout over crippled Nebraska Nuclear Plant: report

Readers:  I got a couple of replies on this one that I thought you should see.  Here's the first one:

What do you think of this? It starts getting a little questionable half way through also referring to the Obama regime, but interesting if it's true.    --M

And here's the second one:

This sounds like bullshit to me.  It might be true, but we have only the word of the Russians, who are notoriously lax about safety regulations.  And all the nonsense in the middle about the "war" on the coal industry makes me doubt anything this writer says.  And a 35% increase in infant mortality?  What?   --J

Here's a third one: 

There is a very reputable (moderately liberal side) news magazine in the U. S. named "The Nation".  But I trust you didn't confuse this story with that source.  This "The Nation" is a Pakistani newspaper and I wouldn't necessarily trust what they say without a lot of further checking.

The only area of the Western U. S. that could conceivably have a quake/tsunami like Japan's (given current knowledge) is off the coast of Washington State, where there is a subduction zone offshore.  The Missouri River valley--e.g. Omaha area-- does not have a history of earthquakes--the Central Mississippi area has the New Madrid (mad' rid) fault, which is an uprising Magma "pimple" in the center of the North American Continental Plate. (Some shaking might get to Omaha--I can't remember).  Google that for when it has shaken and may again.  (If I were building something in St. Louis, I would design for it going within the life of the building).

Googling the name of this plant might be interesting--I am eager to see any nuclear plant have any kind of difficulty that is not a total disaster and enhances distrust of the technology!!!

PRC

And a fourth: 

here's the NYT article for today

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/21/us/21flood.html 

--PRC

and a fifth: 

I'm definitely against nuclear power Kim, but this article from the Nation doesn't jibe with other stories I've seen and heard. With all this coverage I don't see how they justify the claim of a news blackout. Maybe a Russian official did say that, but this is from today's front page in the Omaha World Herald...

http://www.omaha.com/article/20110621/NEWS01/706209922/0#cooper-was-near-flood-shutdown

Cooper was near flood shutdown

By Kevin Cole

World-Herald staff writer

Operators of the Cooper Nuclear Station near Brownville said they are optimistic that floodwaters will not force the plant to shut down â€" at least in the next few days.

The southeast Nebraska nuclear station came within about 18 inches of shutting down early Monday, when the Missouri River level at the plant rose to 43.8 feet.

The Missouri River must reach 45.5 feet (902 feet above sea level) before officials will shut down the plant, which sits at 903 feet.

The plant is operated by the Nebraska Public Power District. NPPD spokesman Mark Becker said the river dropped to 43.1 feet by mid-day Monday and was expected to continue to ebb.

Becker said a problem with the National Weather Service gauge at Brownville led some to conclude that the plant was within 3 inches of a forced shut down.

“We're operating at full capacity,” Becker said. “What we're seeing is the river leveling itself off, but we continue to watch and add protection around the plant.”

The Columbus-based utility sent a “Notification of Unusual Event” to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission when the river reached 42.5 feet about 4 a.m. Sunday. The declaration is the least serious of four emergency notifications established by the NRC.

Becker said workers have been preparing the station for flood conditions by filling sandbags, constructing barricades, stocking materials and supplies, and reinforcing the access road plant staff use to get to the station.

More that 5,000 tons of sand was brought in for constructing barricades, such as Hesco barriers, around the station's switchyard of transformers and other electrical equipment.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said the river at Brownville had surged about 2 feet from Saturday morning to Sunday due to a combination of factors, including heavy rain over a Missouri River tributary, the Nishnabotna River in southwest Iowa.

It was the second time that a Nebraska nuclear power plant has posted a notice of an unusual event with the NRC due to flooding in the past two weeks.

The Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant, operated by the Omaha Public Power District, posted such a notification on June 6. The Fort Calhoun nuclear plant, 20 miles north of Omaha, has been shut down since April for refueling. It has not been restarted because of the flooding.

The river has risen at least 1.5 feet higher than Fort Calhoun's 1,004-foot elevation above sea level. The plant can handle water up to 1,014 feet, according to OPPD.

In northern Missouri on Sunday, water was flowing over two levees choking off two more routes for people attempting to cross the Missouri River.

The surging water closed U.S. Highways 159 and 136 in western Missouri, which means drivers could no longer cross bridges at Brownville and Rulo, Neb. A spokeswoman for the Nebraska Department of Transportation said Sunday that the bridges are expected to be closed for the foreseeable future.

A third crossing, at Nebraska City, was closed when Iowa officials closed Highway 2 from the river to Interstate 29 due to rising water. All Missouri River bridges between Plattsmouth, Neb., and St. Joseph, Mo., are now closed.

At Omaha on Monday, city officials said the Nebraska National Guard has a Black Hawk helicopter is staged at Eppley Airfield if needed for flood emergencies. The helicopter can deploy sandbags weighing 1,500 pounds each in the event of a levee breach, officials said.

Sunday evening, officials at Lake Waconda near Plattsmouth advised all remaining residents to evacuate because of the appearance of several “sand boils” near the levee there. Sand boils occur when water under pressure wells up through a bed of sand and can contribute to levee failure.

Lisa Hathaway at the Lake Waconda caretaker's officer said engineers from the Corps of Engineers were en route to the levee Monday to try to determine its condition. Hathaway estimated that only a half dozen of the 200 lake residents were still there when the evacuation was advised.

In Missouri, authorities said water ­ some from recent rain ­â€" began pouring over levees Saturday night and Sunday morning in Holt and Atchison counties, flooding farmland and numerous homes and cabins.

A hole in the side of a Holt County levee continued to grow Sunday, deluging the state park and recreational area of Big Lake, a community of fewer than 200 people located 78 miles north of Kansas City and just across the river from Rulo.

Holt County Commissioner Mark Sitherwood said U.S. 159 was closed south of Big Lake because water was pouring over the road, and most of the west side of the community was flooded.

“It's going through in one place that we know of and overtopped in numerous places, and there is seepage everywhere,” Sitherwood said.

World-Herald staff writer Rick Ruggles and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

Contact the writer: 402-444-1272, kevin.cole@owh.com

I apologize, I didn't read it carefully enough, I was hasty.  I hope this clears it up.  I'm really impressed with you readers who don't take things on face value and reply about them.
Thanks for correcting me.
--Kim

 a news blackout.  What will they think of next?  This is crazy. 
Are we going to have a disaster like Japan?  Let's hope there's no earthquake/tsunami before they get this cleared up....
Find it here:  http://nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/International/18-Jun-2011/US-orders-news-blackout-over-crippled-Nebraska-Nuclear-Plant-report    
--Kim

US orders news blackout over crippled Nebraska Nuclear Plant: report

Submitted 2 days 18 hrs ago

 

A shocking report prepared by Russia's Federal Atomic Energy Agency (FAAE) on information provided to them by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) states that the Obama regime has ordered a "total and complete" news blackout relating to any information regarding the near catastrophic meltdown of the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant located in Nebraska.
According to this report, the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Plant suffered a "catastrophic loss of cooling" to one of its idle spent fuel rod pools on 7 June after this plant was deluged with water caused by the historic flooding of the Missouri River which resulted in a fire causing the Federal Aviation Agency (FAA) to issue a "no-fly ban" over the area.
Located about 20 minutes outside downtown Omaha, the largest city in Nebraska, the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Plant is owned by Omaha Public Power District (OPPD) who on their website denies their plant is at a "Level 4" emergency by stating: "This terminology is not accurate, and is not how emergencies at nuclear power plants are classified."
Russian atomic scientists in this FAAE report, however, say that this OPPD statement is an "outright falsehood" as all nuclear plants in the world operate under the guidelines of the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES) which clearly states the "events" occurring at the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant do, indeed, put it in the "Level 4" emergency category of an "accident with local consequences" thus making this one of the worst nuclear accidents in US history.
Though this report confirms independent readings in the United States of "negligible release of nuclear gasses" related to this accident it warns that by the Obama regimes censoring of this event for "political purposes" it risks a "serious blowback" from the American public should they gain knowledge of this being hidden from them.
Interesting to note about this event was the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Chief, Gregory B. Jaczko, blasting the Obama regime just days before the near meltdown of the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant by declaring that "the policy of not enforcing most fire code violations at dozens of nuclear plants is "unacceptable" and has tied the hands of NRC inspectors."
This report further notes that the "cover-up" of this nuclear disaster by President Obama is being based on his "fantasy" of creating so-called green jobs which he (strangely) includes nuclear power into as his efforts to bankrupt the US coal industry proceed at a record breaking pace.
Unknown to the American people about Obama's "war" on the US coal industry is it's estimated to cost them over a 60% increase in their electricity bills by 2014 and cause over 250,000 jobs to be lost in an already beleaguered economy.
More ominous for those American people whose lives depend on the coal industry that is being deliberately destroyed is the Obama regime's massive "security exercise" currently ongoing in the major coal mining States of Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia, and as we can read about, in part, as reported by InfoWars.Com:
"If you're still living under the delusion that the TSA is just restricted to airports then think again. A joint VIPR "security exercise" involving military personnel has Transportation Security Administration workers covering 5,000 miles and three states, illustrating once again how the TSA is turning into a literal occupying army for domestic repression in America.
The TSA, in alliance with a whole host of federal, state, local agencies as well as military personnel, is currently conducting a massive "security exercise" throughout Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia.
"The participating teams are composed of a variety of TSA assets including federal air marshals, canine teams, inspectors and bomb appraisal officers. They will be joined by state and local law enforcement officials to supplement existing resources, provide detection and response capabilities. The exercise will utilize multiple airborne assets, including Blackhawk helicopters and fixed wing aircraft as well as waterborne and surface teams," reports the Marietta Times.
Although the exercise is couched in serious rhetoric about preparedness, it relates to "no specific threat" and the details are nebulous to say the least and seems to revolve around little else than testing out high-tech surveillance equipment and reminding Americans who their bosses are."
Obama's fears of the American people turning against nuclear power, should its true dangers be known, appear to be valid as both Germany and Italy (whose people, unlike the Americans, have been told the truth) have turned against it after the disaster in Japan and vowed to close all of their atomic plants.
Perhaps even more sadly for the American people is this report stating that the Obama regime is "walking in lockstep" with Japan in their attempts to keep the truth of nuclear accidents from their citizens; which in the case of the Japanese can only be labeled as horrific as new evidence points to them knowing within hours of the Great Tsunami that their atomic reactors had melted down, but have only today ordered an evacuation of pregnant women from what are called "radiation hotspots."
With a country that some scientists are now warning may soon become uninhabitable due to radiation damage, and with reports of mutant rabbits and radioactive whales now being reported, one wonders if in knowing the truth the American people would really want to follow Japan's "example" instead of those people in Germany and Italy?
But, with an already documented 35% increase in the infant mortality rate for American mothers living in the western coastal regions of the US caused by radiation blowing onto them from Japan being ignored by these people there doesn't seem to be much hope for them. (The EU Times)

ANS -- The Feminine Side

This is an interesting analysis of the reason women don't go into science, technology, engineering and math as often as men do.  Instead of blaming the women, it postulates that the fields are lacking and could benefit from an infusion of feminine viewpoint. 
Disclosure: it's written by my "little" brother, Alan Cooper.
Find it here:  http://www.mralancooper.com/?p=201 
--Kim

The Feminine Side

February 28th, 2011

At the recent Interaction Eleven conference in Boulder CO, Cheryl Platz gave an excellent presentation on ways to encourage young girls to study science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) in school. Cheryl's talk highlighted the importance of this, as the number of young women so choosing has dropped dramatically since the early 1980s, and the field needs all of the bright contributors it can recruit, regardless of gender.

I agree wholeheartedly with Cheryl's remarks, and I support her recommendations without reservation. There is indeed some sort of barrier that discourages young women from getting into the technical professions, and it is well worth tearing it down.


Computer Engineering Barbie

But something about the presentation bothered me. After listening awhile, I realized that I was feeling the " framing effect", a well-known cognitive bias, wherein the way a question is worded affects the way people answer it. Cheryl's insistence that girls could enjoy studying math and science sounds right to me, but the way her argument was framed seemed to blame the girls for the shortfall.

While I earnestly support the idea that more girls should study math and science, I believe that the problem instead belongs to employers, educators, and the institutions they lead. I believe that the STEM disciplines would have more success with young women if they developed a stronger feminine side.

Rather than simply "boys" versus "girls", I prefer to think of personal inclinations in terms of one's "feminine side" and "masculine side". I believe that all men and all women possess both sides in varying degrees. I am proud of my strong feminine side, and I know many women whose strong masculine side makes them tough as nails.

What's more, there are many men and boys who are more comfortable in the soft studies and who eschew the harder sciences. There are many young men who struggle with math, but who could make excellent contributions to the fields of software development, technical literature, interaction design, visual design, cognitive and behavioral studies, and other closely related fields (for example, that would describe me).

I believe that girls reject math and science not because they are too girly, but because the purveyors of STEM education are too manly, or more accurately, too pointless and boring from the feminine point of view.

There are very real differences between the sexes, and these appear at a young age in all children. There is a large and growing body of literature in the fields of evolutionary and cognitive psychology that prove and illustrate these different ways the sexes behave in similar situations.

Women are quite capable of high achievement in STEM subjects, but they are disinterested because their motivations are different. Platz asserted that while men are content to learn math or science for the subject's own sake, women see those disciplines merely as a means for achieving broader human goals. Those goals are what motivate the feminine approach, and when the subjects are taught in isolation, they often lose interest.

What's more, I don't believe that the hard sciences discourage only girls; I believe that they also discourage those with a well-developed feminine personality.

This is admittedly a semantic quibble, but the framing effect is a very real thing, and the language we use powerfully influences our decisions. And when the feminine side is strongly influenced to stay away from science and technology, our entire society suffers. A solely masculine discipline is a weak and one-sided discipline.

One could make a strong argument that the feelings of frustration and failure people get from using technology were caused by our purely masculine approach to software design. Almost all of our digital artifacts are designed and built by men (and a few women with strong masculine sides) inside organizations led by the same, who learned their discipline from masculine teachers within masculine institutions using curricula and methods that embody strong masculine principles.

Bringing stronger feminine values and more feminine ways of thinking to science and technology will bring a larger, more human scale view to our disciplines. The feminine side approaches problems and group dynamics in a way that is very different from the masculine way. When some minor catastrophe occurs at work or play, I have seen groups of men standing around demanding "Who did this?" and "Who's going to fix this?" When that same catastrophe occurs amid a group of women, they ask "Did I cause this?" and "What can I do to fix this?" This positive, supportive attitude of women transforms the whole sense of teamwork and accomplishment.

It's certainly possible to go too far, as groups of only women can be as biased and problematic as groups of only men. By far, the strongest and most effective teams are the ones composed of both men and women, with strong masculine and feminine sides. The whole nature of the group changes for the better with mixed gender teams. When there are at least two members of each sex in a group, the dynamics improve dramatically. A recent study gives some empirical credence to my personal observations.

Unfortunately, almost the entire spectrum of education in computer and software subjects is taught in glacial isolation from any practical application that improves people's lives. The masculine side says "Computers are great because they can do anything!" while the feminine side says "I'd be very interested in computers if you could just tell me one useful thing they can do!"

I believe that the greatest burden of responsibility for bringing women into STEM education lies with the academic establishment. Young girls know who they are and what they want just as clearly as young boys do. As Cheryl noted in her talk, women are capable and willing of engaging with technology if it gives them command of something relevant in their lives. When educators connect their disciplines to the larger world, girls will be the first to see it, value it, and join up.

Many practitioners today seek redemption in a deeper understanding of the technical tools we use to build software. But that is such a masculine interpretation of the problem. Rather, I believe that a more worthwhile wellspring lies in understanding how human beings think and behave and what motivates their actions. That is, if the disciplines of science, technology, engineering, and math were to develop a stronger feminine side we'd not only see a lot more girls entering our fields, but our fields would be much better for it.

Tags: bias, cognitive, education, engineering, feminine, framing, gender, girls, masculine, science, software, stem, teaching, women
Posted in Interesting Stuff | 6 Comments »

ANS -- US orders news blackout over crippled Nebraska Nuclear Plant: report

 a news blackout.  What will they think of next?  This is crazy. 
Are we going to have a disaster like Japan?  Let's hope there's no earthquake/tsunami before they get this cleared up....
Find it here:  http://nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/International/18-Jun-2011/US-orders-news-blackout-over-crippled-Nebraska-Nuclear-Plant-report   
--Kim

US orders news blackout over crippled Nebraska Nuclear Plant: report

Submitted 2 days 18 hrs ago

 

A shocking report prepared by Russia�s Federal Atomic Energy Agency (FAAE) on information provided to them by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) states that the Obama regime has ordered a �total and complete� news blackout relating to any information regarding the near catastrophic meltdown of the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant located in Nebraska.
According to this report, the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Plant suffered a �catastrophic loss of cooling� to one of its idle spent fuel rod pools on 7 June after this plant was deluged with water caused by the historic flooding of the Missouri River which resulted in a fire causing the Federal Aviation Agency (FAA) to issue a �no-fly ban� over the area.
Located about 20 minutes outside downtown Omaha, the largest city in Nebraska, the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Plant is owned by Omaha Public Power District (OPPD) who on their website denies their plant is at a �Level 4� emergency by stating: �This terminology is not accurate, and is not how emergencies at nuclear power plants are classified.�
Russian atomic scientists in this FAAE report, however, say that this OPPD statement is an �outright falsehood� as all nuclear plants in the world operate under the guidelines of the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES) which clearly states the �events� occurring at the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant do, indeed, put it in the �Level 4� emergency category of an �accident with local consequences� thus making this one of the worst nuclear accidents in US history.
Though this report confirms independent readings in the United States of �negligible release of nuclear gasses� related to this accident it warns that by the Obama regimes censoring of this event for �political purposes� it risks a �serious blowback� from the American public should they gain knowledge of this being hidden from them.
Interesting to note about this event was the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Chief, Gregory B. Jaczko, blasting the Obama regime just days before the near meltdown of the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant by declaring that �the policy of not enforcing most fire code violations at dozens of nuclear plants is �unacceptable� and has tied the hands of NRC inspectors.�
This report further notes that the �cover-up� of this nuclear disaster by President Obama is being based on his �fantasy� of creating so-called green jobs which he (strangely) includes nuclear power into as his efforts to bankrupt the US coal industry proceed at a record breaking pace.
Unknown to the American people about Obama�s �war� on the US coal industry is it�s estimated to cost them over a 60% increase in their electricity bills by 2014 and cause over 250,000 jobs to be lost in an already beleaguered economy.
More ominous for those American people whose lives depend on the coal industry that is being deliberately destroyed is the Obama regime�s massive �security exercise� currently ongoing in the major coal mining States of Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia, and as we can read about, in part, as reported by InfoWars.Com:
�If you�re still living under the delusion that the TSA is just restricted to airports then think again. A joint VIPR �security exercise� involving military personnel has Transportation Security Administration workers covering 5,000 miles and three states, illustrating once again how the TSA is turning into a literal occupying army for domestic repression in America.
The TSA, in alliance with a whole host of federal, state, local agencies as well as military personnel, is currently conducting a massive �security exercise� throughout Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia.
�The participating teams are composed of a variety of TSA assets including federal air marshals, canine teams, inspectors and bomb appraisal officers. They will be joined by state and local law enforcement officials to supplement existing resources, provide detection and response capabilities. The exercise will utilize multiple airborne assets, including Blackhawk helicopters and fixed wing aircraft as well as waterborne and surface teams,� reports the Marietta Times.
Although the exercise is couched in serious rhetoric about preparedness, it relates to �no specific threat� and the details are nebulous to say the least and seems to revolve around little else than testing out high-tech surveillance equipment and reminding Americans who their bosses are.�
Obama�s fears of the American people turning against nuclear power, should its true dangers be known, appear to be valid as both Germany and Italy (whose people, unlike the Americans, have been told the truth) have turned against it after the disaster in Japan and vowed to close all of their atomic plants.
Perhaps even more sadly for the American people is this report stating that the Obama regime is �walking in lockstep� with Japan in their attempts to keep the truth of nuclear accidents from their citizens; which in the case of the Japanese can only be labeled as horrific as new evidence points to them knowing within hours of the Great Tsunami that their atomic reactors had melted down, but have only today ordered an evacuation of pregnant women from what are called �radiation hotspots.�
With a country that some scientists are now warning may soon become uninhabitable due to radiation damage, and with reports of mutant rabbits and radioactive whales now being reported, one wonders if in knowing the truth the American people would really want to follow Japan�s �example� instead of those people in Germany and Italy?
But, with an already documented 35% increase in the infant mortality rate for American mothers living in the western coastal regions of the US caused by radiation blowing onto them from Japan being ignored by these people there doesn�t seem to be much hope for them. (The EU Times)

ANS -- Bill Clinton's 14 Global Initiatives

You may have heard some or all of this, but it's definitely worth
reading. But I'm giving you the link because of the form and
pictures, instead of copying and pasting it here.
It's Bill Clinton's 14 suggestions for what to do to get the economy
going again. I just want everyone to know there are things we could
be doing, but the Republicans won't let us, because they think it's
more important to make Obama look like a failure than to rescue
America from doom. They are willing to kill us to make sure Obama
looks bad. That's insane. They are psychopaths.

find it
here:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/galleries/2011/06/20/bill-clinton-s-14-global-initiatives.html

--Kim

ANS -- How's that workin' for ya USA?

Here's an opinion piece by Chip Shirley, the Dixie Dove, on the economy.  The 60 Minutes link goes to a good but long article on the financial meltdown and who really knew what was going on.  There are links in the article to the 60 Minutes piece, I think: I haven't yet clicked on any of them: I just read the article.  It was really good. 
The core problem was that the companies that were supposed to rate the credit-worthiness of financial instruments were being paid by the companies that made the financial instruments, so they rated them AAA even when they were junk because that's what the boss wanted to hear.  In other words, the fox was guarding the henhouse.  Since when is that okay? Since Ronald Reagan.
Find it here:  http://chipshirley.blogspot.com/2011/06/hows-that-workin-for-ya-usa.html?showComment=1308548494452#c2922292464744124876   
--Kim

6/18/11

How's that workin' for ya USA?

Pay Us Back Now!

Corporate America put us in the shape we're in right now by any reasonable standard of measurement and they are doing well, unlike the rest, so, they have a large debt to pay in taxes by any fair measurement. They totally influenced policy and they crashed our economy. We did deregulate the financial industries in the 1980's and 90's and that was largely at the behest of Corporate American lobbying and donations.

It was the unregulated Ratings Industry which allowed millions of unscrutinized mortgages to be put in gold plated bundles and rated Grade A. This is the exact type of thing that goes all the way back to just before the Great Depression.

Corporate American donations and lobbying has MADE policy in the USA since Reagan took office.

Now they're stacking up against President Obama in every way shape and form.

How's that workin' for ya USA?
I'm not saying that people didn't get mortgages they couldn't afford. That's true, but the BIGGER PROBLEM that caused the whole global economy to bottom out was that the unregulated ratings agencies bundled rotten mortgages up into mega financial products and gave them perfect AAA ratings WITHOUT SCRUTINIZING THEM which is required by law! But since we had DE-REGULATED the finance industry in the 80s and 90s they weren't caught and then finally the xhit hit the fan!


Here are two links for proof. The first link is to a brilliant spot from 60 minutes on the subject that is a MUST SEE and it's only about 10 minutes. The second link is to a graph showing how bank failures virtually disappeared after the Glass-Steagall regulatory act was passed in 1932 and then failures surged again after that act was repealed in 1980.

60 Minutes on Cause of Crash:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/03/12/60minutes/main6292458.shtml?tag=contentMain;cbsCarousel

Bank failure Graph:
http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/09-087.pdf
Posted by CHIP at 7:37 PM

ANS -- Is there a Will?

This starts with the question of where did our backbone go?  Well, where did it go?  Is this the solution?  Is it possible?  do we have to start the Union movement over again?
Find it here:  http://www.groupnewsblog.net/ 
--Kim

Saturday, June 18, 2011

Is there a Will?

1945, one month after V-J Day, the Oil Workers� Union called a national strike
I often wonder where the backbones of the Progressive movement and the Democratic Party have gone? We are the children of Kent State, of the War protests, of the civil rights movement and yet we seem unable to rise when the stakes get higher and higher. FDL had a book salon with Joe Burns, Author of Reviving the Strike.

In Reviving the Strike, union negotiator Joe Burns draws on labor economics, history, and current analysis to show how only a campaign of civil disobedience can overcome an illegitimate system of labor control that has been specifically constructed over the past thirty years to reign in the power of the American worker. The book challenges prevailing views within the labor movement that say that tactics such as organizing workers or amending labor law can resolve the crisis of the American worker. Instead, Reviving the Strike offers a fundamentally different solution to the current labor crisis, showing how collective bargaining backed by a strike capable of inflicting economic harm upon an employer is the only way for workers to break free of the repressive system that has been inflicted upon them for the past three decades.

It is time to stop waiting for sanity to prevail. Time to stop letting the corporate agenda dictate our lives and our fortunes. Time to stop waiting for things to get better.

I don't advocate violence but I do advocate rising up and refusing to be a part of the systems that are destroying america. The clock is definitely ticking.

The Littlest Gator 2:27 PM Comments  

Labels: rising up, social justice, unions, workers

ANS -- Weekend Sleep Fails to Improve Performance, but Women Handle Workweek Sleep Loss Better

This is a short science article about catching up on missed sleep.
Find it here:  http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/06/110615015650.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Latest+Science+News%29&utm_content=Google+Reader
--Kim

Weekend Sleep Fails to Improve Performance, but Women Handle Workweek Sleep Loss Better

ScienceDaily (June 16, 2011) ­ Performance deteriorates when sleep is restricted to six hours per night for a week and does not improve after two nights of recovery sleep. However, women may be less affected than men by this workweek pattern of sleep loss, suggests a research abstract being presented in Minneapolis, Minn., at SLEEP 2011, the 25th Anniversary Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies LLC (APSS).

Results show that, in both men and women, performance decreased significantly after six nights of sleep restriction and did not improve after two nights of recovery sleep, suggesting that complete performance recovery may require more than just two nights of extended sleep. Sleep restriction also caused subjective and objective sleepiness to increase significantly; however, sleepiness did improve after recovery.

"After one workweek of mild sleep deprivation, two recovery nights were adequate in improving sleepiness but not performance," said principal investigator Dr. Alexandros N. Vgontzas, professor of psychiatry and endowed chair in sleep disorders medicine at the Penn State College of Medicine and director of the Sleep Research and Treatment Center at the Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center in Hershey, Pa. "The usual practice of extending sleep during the weekend after a busy workweek associated with mild sleep loss is not adequate in reversing the cumulative effects on cognitive function resulting from this mild sleep deprivation."

The study also found significant gender differences. Compared with men, women were found to have less subjective sleepiness and less performance deterioration during sleep restriction, as well as greater improvements after recovery. These differences were associated with increased amounts of slow-wave sleep, or "deep sleep," in women at baseline.

"In women, but not in men, deep sleep appeared to have a protective effect," said Vgontzas. "Women with a higher amount of deep sleep can handle better the effects of one workweek of mild sleep deprivation, and their recovery is more complete after two nights of extended sleep."

According to the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, slow-wave sleep, or deep sleep, is one of the sleep stages that make up a sleep cycle. Each complete cycle lasts about 90 to 110 minutes. Most adults will go through four to six cycles in a full night of sleep. During slow-wave sleep, there is an increase in high-amplitude, slow-wave brain activity, known as delta waves.

The study involved 34 normal sleepers: 16 men and 18 women. They had a mean age of 24.5 years. Participants spent 13 consecutive nights in a sleep lab, sleeping eight hours per night for the first four nights as a baseline measurement. Then sleep was restricted to six hours per night for six nights, followed by three recovery nights of 10 hours of sleep.

Sleepiness was measured subjectively using the Stanford Sleepiness Scale and objectively using the Multiple Sleep Latency Test. Performance was measured using the Psychomotor Vigilance Task. Measurements were taken on the fourth day for baseline data, on day 10 after one week of sleep restriction, and on day 13 after two nights of recovery sleep.

ANS -- The Sifted Bookshelf: Why Marx Was Right by Terry Eagleton

This is about what Marx actually said rather than the stereotype that most people think of Marxism.  It's from The Daily Sift by Doug Muder, and is a book report of a book by Terry Eagleton.
Find it here:  http://weeklysift.blogspot.com/
--Kim


The Sifted Bookshelf: Why Marx Was Right by Terry Eagleton

When a thinker has had an impact on history, it's hard to put that out of your mind and read his or her words in their original context. It's hard not to judge Christ by the Christians, or Freud by the Freudians. Nietzsche was done writing before Hitler was born, but it is hard not to equate Nietzsche's supermen with Hitler's master race.

That's what Terry Eagleton is asking us to do for Karl Marx: Put aside the distorting lens of Stalinism, Leninism, and Maoism and read Marx on his own terms -- as a 19th-century critic of capitalism rather than the patron saint of 20th-century communism. The book's main point is that most of what "everybody knows" about Marx is stereotype, not reality. Correctly understood, Marxist ideas about 19th-century capitalism still provide a lot of insight into what's going wrong with 21st-century capitalism.

Eagleton defeats one stereotype immediately: that Marxists are dour and humorless, and that they write in an impenetrable style whose jargon is meaningful only to other Marxists. Chapters of his books begins with plainly stated present-day attacks on Marx. Chapter One, for example :

Marxism is finished. It might conceivably have had some relevance to a world of factories and food riots, coal miners and chimney sweeps, widespread misery and massed working classes. But it certainly has no bearing on the increasingly classless, socially mobile, postindustrial Western societies of the present.

Each chapter is an answer to a particular attack like this, and is written in an engaging style that doesn't make you feel like you missed the prerequisite course. There's no Marxist glossary in the back, and I never felt the need for one.

Capital, property, and oppression. Here's the main definition you need in order to understand Eagleton's version of Marxism: Capital is labor that makes future labor more productive. The purpose of clearing and plowing a field, for example, is not any immediate consumption; the purpose is to make future planting and reaping more productive.

Economic progress happens because capital accumulates, and so labor keeps getting more productive. So I'm more productive as a journalist because I can use computers, which wouldn't be possible if people like Ben Franklin hadn't spent countless hours experimenting with electricity. Franklin's labor -- and the labor of generations of successor scientists and engineers -- is capital for me.

The fundamental mystery of economic progress, then, is: Why do people create capital? They could be laboring to produce something immediately consumable, or they could be resting or playing. Why labor to make future labor more productive?

Marx has two answers: property and oppression. A person will create capital if the surrounding society will recognize it as property. (I'll plant in the spring if my tribe will recognize that the fall crop is mine to reap. Otherwise I probably won't. Or I'll clear the stumps out of a field if people will recognize it as my field, so that it is my future labor that will be more productive.)

A society's level of technology determines what kinds of capital are possible, and that in turn determines what kinds of property the society will recognize. The Native Americans who sold Manhattan to the Dutch, for example, had no notion of what it meant to "own" an island. It would be like someone offering you trinkets in exchange for your share of the Moon. The Moon isn't property to us, but it could be to a space-traveling society.

The other reason people create capital is oppression -- someone forces them. They work, and the capital they create belongs to someone else. (Picture the slaves who dug the irrigation systems of ancient Sumer.)

Property and oppression interact. If I own all the arable land in a region, then people will work for me or they will starve. Naturally, I will set them to raising the food that they will consume. But I will also make them create capital that will belong to me, not them.

Subsistence and abundance. Looking at individuals, Marx saw two important production levels: subsistence, which is enough to keep the person alive, and abundance, the level at which a person will stop working and enjoy leisure. (When a deer is cooking, a tribal hunting band will not keep hunting. They'll gather around the fire and tell stories.)

Looking at societies, Marx saw that any surviving society had to be achieving subsistence. But until his own era, no society had achieved a level of production that could provide abundance for everyone. For that reason, he theorized that every previous society had needed oppression to keep growing its capital. Somehow, large numbers of people had to be kept working for future productivity, even though their present needs were not being satisfied.

So when Marx looked at any historical society, he saw:

• a technological level that determined what could be produced,
• a definition of property appropriate to that production system,
• a ruling class that owned the vast majority of the defined property,
• a system of oppression that forced everyone else to labor at creating capital for the ruling class.

He wasn't judgmental about this. It was just the way things had to be if a society was going to grow its capital to a point where it could provide abundance. (How, for example, could ancient peoples have invented writing -- a great capital improvement for the rest of history -- if slaves hadn't supported a class that had the time to think about such things?)

But in his own era, Marx believed that abundance-for-everybody was finally possible, because the highly efficient oppression of capitalism had accumulated enough capital to make labor sufficiently productive. If only the fruits of labor could be properly distributed, everybody could work enough to produce abundance for himself/herself, and then stop and enjoy leisure. To the extent that capital needed to develop further, it could be a kind of play -- like Ben Franklin mucking about with electricity or volunteers creating the Wikipedia.

In Marx's era (and even moreso today) considerable effort went into controlling production, so that overproduction didn't swamp the markets and ruin the capitalists. So you frequently had (and have) fallow fields, idle factories, unemployed workers, un-used raw materials -- and people whose needs go unsatisfied.

This state-of-affairs Marx did get judgmental about, because he believed we could finally be done with systems of oppression. The only thing that prevented this happy development was that society was still organized around the goal of growing capitalists' capital as fast as possible. He believed that a revolution was necessary to re-orient the economy towards producing abundance-for-everybody rather than ever-increasing capital for the ruling class.

So what didn't Marx foresee? Several things. He didn't foresee the European welfare state, which produces something like abundance-for-everybody by taxing capitalism rather than overthrowing it. He also didn't foresee the extent to which technology could create new products and advertising could create dissatisfaction, so that people would keep working for iPhones and HDTVs and designer jeans even after they had achieved a 19th-century level of abundance.

But mainly he didn't foresee that communist revolutions would happen in countries like Russia and China, which hadn't accumulated enough capital yet to provide abundance. So he didn't anticipate Stalinism: communist oppression to build mines, factories, and other productive capital. The kind of revolution Marx expected -- one in a highly developed capitalist economy like England -- has never happened.

Say you want a revolution? To Marx, it goes without saying that the ruling class rules for its own benefit, and preserves the institutions that solidify its power. Everything putters along nicely as long as the interests of the ruling class are in line with the economic possibilities of the era, and its institutions are socially productive.

But sooner or later new possibilities develop, and those possibilities line up with the interests of a new class. Eventually that class achieves enough consciousness to understand its potential, and then you have a tug-of-war until the new class comes out on top. The prime example here was what Europe had recently gone through: the transfer of power from the feudal aristocracy to the businessmen. Unlike the suddens spasms of the French or Russian Revolutions, the feudalism/capitalism revolution played out over centuries.

The symptoms of a revolution, then, are also symptoms of a ruling class being out of joint with its times. The institutions, traditions, concepts, and categories that support the ruling class become baggage rather than assets. Society has to do complicated tricks to keep them functioning, and they seem increasingly artificial rather than natural. (To see how artificial feudal traditions looked in the early capitalist era, read Jane Austen.)

In this context, it's interesting to look back at Martin Ford's The Lights in the Tunnel, which I reviewed two weeks ago. Ford is worrying about how we will provide human jobs in an era of intelligent machines, and so continue to have enough viable consumers to keep a consumer market economy going. He winds up with elaborate systems to pay people for socially productive behaviors that aren't considered "jobs" today.

Whatever you may think of Ford's specific suggestions, they're a symptom. Capitalist-era concepts like jobs and profits are starting to hobble economic thinking rather than facilitate it. Increasingly, the problem isn't how to produce stuff and distribute it; the problem is how to produce stuff at a profit and distribute it by paying people to work jobs.

Now that the 19th-century proletariat is shrinking, I don't have a clue what class Marx would think is achieving consciousness or what re-definitions could make the economy work for them. But it sure looks like this era is getting long in the tooth.

ANS -- Boortz Double Talk on Taxes

This is an article from Chip Shirley, the Dixie Dove.  It's about taxes, and whether taxes charged to big companies actually do get passed on to the consumer or not. 
Find it here:  http://chipshirley.blogspot.com/2011/06/double-talk-on-taxes.html  
--Kim

6/11/11

Boortz Double Talk on Taxes

There's an old saying my mother used to use to get me thinking when I was a little boy, it goes like this..."If you pick up a newborn calf and hold it over your head on the day it is born and then you come back to the barn the next day and do the same thing and keep that up every day, then when the calf is grown you'll be able to lift that full grown cow over your head." The wry smile and glint in her eye as she finished the story clued me into her true meaning. My mother wasn't trying to teach me how to become the world's strongest man, she was teaching me how to sniff out a line of bull when I heard it. I think this is a good parable for today and it cogently points out how easy it is for any would be con artist to start with a little fact and turn it into a big lie, that seems factual.

Such is the case with the notion that corporations and rich people pay no taxes (in essence) because any tax levied against them will simply be countered by their increasing their prices for consumers. And so it's said (by Neal Boortz and other rightwing talk show hosts) that if we increase taxes on corporations today, they will simply pass that increase on to the consumer, but this is as big a lie as my mother's cow story. Yes the corporations would like to pass this tax on the consumer in it's entirety and they certainly will try, but there's a little thing in their way called free market capitalism. If the USA had no rules governing commerce and disallowing monopolies in the market place this canard would be true. That is, if one large corporation were able to leverage its wealth and eventually buy out all competition so that this 'super corporation' was the only economic entity in the country, if they sold consumers 100% of the goods they purchase, then yes, they could theoretically charge whatever price they wanted, but this is not the case. We don't allow monopolies in America, although there is a wave of political sentiment (funded by large corporations) pushing us in that direction.

But here are the facts. Pertaining to this idea, income taxes on corporations function in the same manner as individual income taxes and various sales taxes and user fees in our society. One could argue that any sales tax at the grocery store isn't really deducted from the store's gross income because the store just raises prices to get around it, likewise one might argue that the tax on gasoline doesn't come out of the filling stations profits, but the consumer as the tax leads to higher prices. One could say that this formula applies to all taxes even individual income taxes, since in fact we all produce 'something' for the money we earn and if we are taxed at a higher rate might not we all demand more in wages to make up for it?

Proponents of lowering taxes on the wealthy and corporations use the term 'pass thru tax' to describe this supposedly inalienable fact of nature. It sounds sensible and it serves their purpose, but as I will explain here, it's just not true. Sadly, just as it is far easier to break something than to build it, it also takes a lot more work/words to disprove a lie than to tell one, but here goes.

If one assumes that corporations and wealthy business people charge the 'minimum' price for their goods and services in order to garner a profit that would be one thing, but they don't, they charge the 'maximum' price that the market they're in will bear. Any business entity which is operating with the bare minimum in profits to survive would be most tempted to raise prices with increased taxation, that is unless they had some cash reserve and decided to 'ride the storm out' and not raise prices (even in the face of short term losses) in the hopes that business might pickup and increase their profit margin. But in the case of a business entity which is experiencing large profits, even record profits (as oil companies presently are, along with corporations who have outsourced their workforce to cheap foreign labor) the temptation to raise prices to match increased taxation is tempered by the firm knowledge that if they can make do with slimmer profits and keep their prices the same while their competitors are opting to raise prices, then that might well be a formula for their increasing their market share, or sell more of their product and therefore increase their profits even more even in the face of higher taxes. It's called 'free market capitalism'.

We all hunger for 'easy answers' to the difficult questions we face on a daily basis. We wish we could come up with a simple rule of thumb for thorny issues like taxation and then just stick to it and be done with all the analysis of the situation, but in reality that doesn't work. While we may wish we could settle all troublesome matters with one short cogent sentence of wisdom, the truth on the ground is that things are always changing around us and so are the solutions to our problems.

It is an undeniable fact that before the stock market crash in 1929 and the ensuing Great Depression, tax rates in the US for corporations and wealthy individuals were relatively similar to what they are today and the solution FDR and the US Congress turned to in dealing with the dire straits we found ourselves in was to raise taxation on the most wealthy to double and triple what they had been and what they are today. The results? From 1940-1980 the wealthiest Americans paid between 70% and 90% in income taxes. Between 1940-80 we fought and paid for WWII, the Korean War and the Vietnam War, we built our entire US Interstate Expressway system and we went to the MOON six times and we were able to pay for it all in the end with debt and deficits only a fraction of what we are seeing today! That was America at our best, in our shining hour and not only did we set world records for economic growth and for bringing people from poverty to good middle class lifestyles (the American Dream) but we also saw a dramatic increase in the income of wealthy individuals because the US government used the money garnered from taxes to 'invest' in our nation's infrastructure (roads, bridges, highways, hospitals, communications, public education etc.) which created a far superior environment in which business could prosper. Investments like these in major projects are all but undoable without governmental leadership. That's not 'communism' that is common sense capitalism.

Taxation naysayers are fond of pointing out that liberal hero President JFK actually lowered taxes on the wealthy. Yes, the JFK administration did lower the upper income tax bracket on the most wealthy...to 70%. That's double what it is today! In the 1980s President Reagan slashed that tax rate in half and we got along ok for a while. In a growing economy it is possible to lower income taxes and simultaneously increase revenue to the federal government, but it still left us well short of the federal income from taxation that we needed to maintain our high level of investment and maintenance of the nation's infrastructure and it was these types of investments that had led to the forty years of explosive growth in our economy! So we were in fact 'eating our seed corn' so to speak. What that old saying means is this...a farmer might be tempted in the midst of winter to conclude, 'We could save a lot of money now while our income is low if instead of buying food at the store, we just eat our stored up grain. or seed corn.' The only problem is that come spring and the growing season, the farmer has nothing to plant and therefore no crops to harvest and sell later. It's a shortsighted recipe for disaster.

To make things worse, at least when Reagan was in office we still had almost 100% of the manufactured goods we consume produced here in the USA. That meant that despite the lower income taxes all of the money made by the US workers who produce the products we consume 'stayed in the system' and was spent here in the US thereby funding the tax coffers of every city and state. But then came Newt Gingrich and the Republican Revolution. That congress passed super-free trade legislation (with GATT and the WTO) which led inevitably to the loss of most of our manufacturing base and all of the income tax from workers in US manufacturing which had funded the USA so well for so long. It's true that a Democrat president (Bill Clinton) signed these deals while under the the coercion of impeachment over personal malfeasance, but lets keep track of who was really behind this whole thing, it was the Republicans. 


Posted by CHIP at 3:04 PM 3 comments Links to this post