Iran Top Threat To Iraq, U.S. Says - washingtonpost.com

Iran Top Threat To Iraq, U.S. Says - washingtonpost.com
And so the drum beat begins to attack Iran....

Perfectly Legal Immigrants, Until They Applied for Citizenship - New York Times

Perfectly Legal Immigrants, Until They Applied for Citizenship - New York Times: "The Servanos are among a growing group of legal immigrants who reach for the prize and permanence of citizenship, only to run afoul of highly technical immigration statutes that carry the severe penalty of expulsion from the country. For the Servanos, the problem has been a legal hitch involving their marital status when they came from the Philippines some 25 years ago.

Largely overlooked in the charged debate over illegal immigration, many of these are long-term legal immigrants in the United States who were confident of success when they applied for naturalization, and would have continued to live here legally had they not sought to become citizens.

As applications for naturalization have surged, overburdened federal examiners, under pressure to make quick decisions and also weed out any security risks, prefer to err on the side of rejection, immigration lawyers and independent researchers said. In 2007, 89,683 applications for naturalization were denied, about 12 percent of those presented."

Fewer Options Open to Pay for Costs of College - New York Times

Fewer Options Open to Pay for Costs of College - New York Times: "Parents will have to navigate unfamiliar and difficult terrain when it comes time to pay for college this year, with student loan companies in turmoil and banks tightening their standards and raising rates on other types of borrowing.

Lawmakers and the administration are trying to head off any crisis by making sure that “lenders of last resort” stand ready to take the place of companies that have left the federal loan program. And a growing number of colleges have applied to participate in the federal direct loan program, in which students borrow from the government.

But families often use a combination of resources to pay for college, drawing on savings, federal loans, bank loans and home loans to plug the gap between college costs and financial aid."

Conflict of Interest Redefined: U.S. Politicos Invested in Iraq, Afghanistan | War on Iraq | AlterNet

Conflict of Interest Redefined: U.S. Politicos Invested in Iraq, Afghanistan | War on Iraq | AlterNet: "Political class stands to rake it in by continuing occupations."

By Abid Aslam, IPS News
Posted on April 11, 2008, Printed on April 11, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/81915/

Members of Congress invested nearly 196 million dollars of their own money in companies that receive hundreds of millions of dollars a day from Pentagon contracts to provide goods and services to U.S. armed forces, say nonpartisan watchdog groups.

Lawmakers charged with overseeing Pentagon contractors hold stock in those very firms, as do vocal critics of the war in Iraq, says the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP).

Senator John Kerry, the Democrat from Massachusetts who staked his 2004 presidential bid in part on his opposition to the war, tops the list of investors. His holdings in firms with Pentagon contracts of at least five million dollars stood at between 28.9 million dollars and 38.2 million dollars as of Dec. 31, 2006. Kerry sits on the Senate foreign relations panel.

Members of Congress are required to report their personal finances every year but only need to state their assets in broad ranges.

Other top investors include Representative Rodney Frelinghuysen, a New Jersey Republican with holdings of 12.1 million - 49.1 million dollars; Rep. Robin Hayes, a North Carolina Republican (9.2 million - 37.1 million dollars); Republican Rep. James Sensenbrenner Jr. of Wisconsin (5.2 million - 7.6 million dollars); and Rep. Jane Harman, a California Democrat (2.7 million - 6.3 million dollars).

Sen. Jay Rockefeller, the Democrat and former governor of West Virginia who chairs the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, invested some 2.0 million dollars in Pentagon contractors, CRP says.

Other panel chiefs who invested in defense firms include Sen. Joseph Lieberman, the Connecticut Independent who presides over the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and Rep. Howard Berman, the California Democrat who heads the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

In all, 151 current members of Congress -- more than one-fourth of the total -- have invested between 78.7 million dollars and 195.5 million dollars in companies that received defense contracts of at least 5.0 million dollars, according to CRP.

These companies received more than 275.6 billion dollars from the government in 2006, or 755 million dollars per day, says budget watchdog group OMB Watch.

The investments yielded lawmakers 15.8 million - 62 million dollars in dividend income, capital gains, royalties, and interest from 2004 through 2006, says CRP.

Not all the firms deal in arms or military equipment. Some make soft drinks or medical supplies and military contracts represent a small fraction of their revenues. Many are leaders in their industries and, as such, feature in the investment portfolios of millions of ordinary people who invest at least a portion of their savings in mutual funds, which in turn hold stocks in up to hundreds of companies.

"Giant corporations outside of the defense sector, such as Pepsico, IBM, Microsoft and Johnson & Johnson, have received defense contracts and are all popular investments for both members of Congress and the general public," says CRP.

"So common are these companies, both as personal investments and as defense contractors, it would appear difficult to build a diverse blue-chip stock portfolio without at least some of them," the group acknowledges.

If some of the stocks appear innocent, aides say legislators also are. Some did not buy the stocks in question but inherited them. Many hold them in blind trusts, so called because the investments are handled by independent entities, at least theoretically without the politicians' knowledge of how their assets are being managed.

Even so, according to CRP, owning stock in companies under contract with the Pentagon could prove "problematic for members of Congress who sit on committees that oversee defense policy and budgeting."

Members of the Senate Foreign Relations and Armed Services committees held 3.0 million - 5.1 million dollars in companies specializing in weapons and other exclusively military goods and services, it added.

Critics have assailed President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney for their ties to companies seen as benefiting from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Bush was characterized as pushing conflict in the interest of the oil fraternity whence he hailed.

Before becoming vice president, Cheney headed Halliburton, a major player in the oil services industry and the object of controversies involving political connections, government contracts, and business ethics.

Halliburton's subsidiary, Kellogg Brown & Root, was given multi-billion-dollar contracts to provide construction, hospitality, and other services to the U.S. military following the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The contracts drew fire because of Cheney's history and then-ongoing financial relationship with the firm, and because the company did not have to compete for the Pentagon's business. The firm was renamed KBR Inc. after Halliburton spun it off last year.

© 2008 IPS News All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/81915/

The Real McCain on Race and Immigration | Election 2008 | AlterNet

The Real McCain on Race and Immigration | Election 2008 | AlterNet: "It's not a pretty picture."

By Sara Robinson, Group News Blog
Posted on April 10, 2008, Printed on April 11, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/http://www.groupnewsblog.ne/81978/

Our buddy Cliff Schecter has been hard to miss the past couple days. The buzz over his forthcoming book, The Real McCain: Why Conservatives Don't Trust Him and Why Independents Shouldn't, has been heard even beyond the sheltered garden of liberal blogdom, and is now hitting the mainstream media with the thunder of an oncoming B-52.

And well it should. Cliff's got a hell of a tale to tell. Actually, perusing my advance copy, he's got several of them. His indelicacy in chewing out his wife -- you know, the one whose large personal fortune has made McCain's career possible -- and calling her the c-word in front of reporters is the story all over the front pages right now. But there's more. Much more.

The larger point that runs throughout Cliff's book is that Senator Straight Talk has a long record of being anything but. On any issue you can name, he's hemmed and hawed and twisted himself around to fit whatever group he was currying favor with (or taking funding from) on any given day. (That, in the end, is why conservatives don't trust him, and nobody else should, either.) And that habit absolutely extends to his record where issues like race and immigration are concerned.

McCain on Immigration: Way out front -- then nowhere to be seen

McCain's home state of Arizona has been ground zero in the immigration wars, so you'd expect the state's most visible national politician would have a strong voice and a well-considered and consistent point of view on this issue. And so he has -- right up until he started running for president.

On the plus side, he seems to clearly understand that the GOP's obsession with the issue is devastating its future prospects with the growing pool of Hispanic voters. He knows that building fences is futile. He came out against a draconian 2004 state initiative in Arizona that would have denied all public services to undocumented immigrant. The state's conservatives returned the favor by trying to pass a state resolution censuring McCain for refusing to cave into their racist demands.

Two years ago, he even went so far as to co-sponsor an immigration reform bill with Ted Kennedy. But as soon as he put himself in the running for the 2008 nomination, McCain suddenly was nowhere to be seen when immigration -- an issue he could have owned, and been the country's leading voice of sanity on -- was being discussed. By late 2006, he began to back away -- from the negotiations, from Kennedy, from any relationship to his bill at all. By May 2007, the Washington Post noticed that he'd taken his name off the bill, and wasn't making the meetings any more. A "top Senate Democrat" told the Post that McCain withdrew because "he knows it's killing him in the primary."

McCain on Race: Is it "offensive," or just "heritage"?

That same lack of moral center can be seen on his mushy handling of race issues. Cliff points out that McCain's ancestors were slaveowners and fought on the side of the Confederacy -- a piece of his personal history you can be quite sure wasn't prominently highlighted on last week's "Biography Tour." Perhaps because of this -- and because he's done almost nothing to stake out a strong stance for equality at any point in his career -- his record through the years has been all over the place.

One example, which was originally reported by Steve Benen in an August 2006 post at The Carpetbagger Report, regards McCain's attitude toward Bob Jones University and its student conduct policies, which McCain attacked in the 2000 primaries as "racist and cruel" and declared belonged in the 16th century, not the 21st. At that point, he was trying to draw a favorable contrast with George Bush, who had recently spoken at BJU. According to Benen:

McCain assailed the appearance, arguing that Bush's uncritical speech at BJU was tantamount to an endorsement of the school's policies. John McCain told reporters, "If I were there, I would condemn openly the policies of Bob Jones, because I would want to make sure that everybody knew that this kind of thing is not American."

It was hard to disagree. BJU, of course, is a rigidly Christian fundamentalist school with a record of virulent racism and anti-Catholic policies. (The school, for example, used to ban interracial dating among its students and school officials have repeatedly attacked the Roman Catholic Church, referring to the pope as the "Antichrist" and calling Catholicism a "satanic cult.")

But McCain changed his tune six years later, as his current bid for the nomination began to get underway. When asked if he'd accept an invitation from BJU in 2006, he left the door open, saying he'd have to look at the school's latest policies. "I understand they have made considerable progress," he said. "I can't remember when I've turned down a speaking invitation. I think I'd have to look at it."

To be fair: the school had lifted it interracial dating ban in the meantime. But it also sent Bush an effusively creepy note affirming his status as God's hand-picked gift to America -- follow the link to read it all. It's not an improvement. Really.

McCain on the Confederacy: Flapping in the breeze

On the issue of the Confederate flag, McCain also seems to wave with the slightest breeze -- and changes direction faster than the weather of a southern summer. Here's Cliff:

Nothing reveals McCain's contortionism better than his various positions on the Confederate flag. In September 1999, McCain said that choosing whether to fly the Confederate flag "should be left to the states." In January 2000, he proclaimed, "The Confederate flag is offensive in many, many ways, as we all know. It's a symbol of racism and slavery." Three days later, he said, "Personally I the flag as a symbol of heritage."

It's a long journey from "racism and slavery" to "heritage" in only three days. So it wasn't surprising to learn that it was a journey McCain never actually took. He made this clear in an April 2000 speech in South Carolina. McCain told the mostly supportive crowd, "I feared that if I answered honestly, I could not win the South Carolina primary...So I chose to compromise my principles. I broke my promise to always tell the truth."

About the only thing McCain been absolutely consistent on through the years has been his unwavering opposition to making Martin Luther King's birthday a federal holiday -- although he recently tried to back away from that record, too. According to a recent post at the Democratic Party's website:

John McCain today brought his effort to reinvent himself for the general election to a new low by misleading the voters on his full record on a holiday honoring Dr. Martin Luther King. McCain tried to suggest that his opposition to a holiday honoring Dr. King was limited to his 1983 vote against a federal holiday. In reality, McCain maintained his opposition to it until at least 1989, voted against funding for the commission working to promote the King Holiday in 1994, and used divisive language about state's rights to defend himself. McCain even supported Republican efforts to repeal a holiday in his state in 1987.

"It's frankly disingenuous for John McCain to try and reinvent himself for the general election by distorting his record of opposing a holiday honoring Dr. King," said Democratic National Committee Communications Director Karen Finney. "John McCain should be honest about his full record of opposing the federal holiday, opposing a state holiday four years later, using divisive language to defend himself, and voting to cut off funding for the commission working to promote the King holiday as recently as 1994."

The website goes on to list five votes between 1983 and 1994 in which McCain consistently voted against the holiday. Way to stand tall there, John.

McCain on Racists: Some of his best friends are

Finally, notes Cliff, McCain doesn't seem to mind consorting with the GOP's known racists. He campaigned heavily for George "Macaca" Allen in 2006. That same year, he hired Terry Nelson -- the guy who approved the notoriously racist "Call me, Harold," ads that tanked Harold Ford, Jr.'s senatorial bid in Tennessee -- as his first national campaign manager. In Florida, McCain's campaign co-chair was Bob Allen, who was arrested for soliciting sex from a police officer in the men's room at a Titusville city park. Allen blamed the event on the African-American police officer, who was "a pretty stocky black guy" and therefore somehow scared Allen in to propositioning him.

The overall picture here doesn't suggest that McCain is overtly or even covertly racist. In fact, it's clear that he has at least a cursory understanding of the logic of civil rights, and can speak to it when called to do so. But the record does reveal a distinct lack of conviction where racial equality is concerned. It's just not that important to him -- certainly not a matter of deeply-held principle. As far as McCain is concerned, this issue is infinitely negotiable: he'll sing whatever song the crowd wants to hear, whether it's a traditional tune of white "heritage" or a manly declaration that racism is "offensive."

That same flexibility is evident in his choice of friends: obviously, in the good-ol'-boy network of the GOP, there are any number of qualifications that will overcome a truly ugly record on the issue of race. And, given his persistent limpness on one of the country's core issues, we shouldn't doubt that those friends will push him to play the race card, over and over, starting the very moment Obama clinches the nomination. This wandering moral maverick has proven he doesn't have the will or the guts to stop them.

It's like Barack Obama said last month in Philadelphia:

We have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle - as we did in the OJ trial - or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright's sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she's playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.

We can do that.

But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we'll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.

McCain's flaccid record on race will guarantee that, if Obama's the man, the GOP's side of the 2008 campaign will fit this exactly. We're going to see race as spectacle, as tragedy, as media fodder, as a smear tactic. We're going to see the GOP hitch the demons unleashed by Hillary to the deepest racist fears of the party's base. And we can be sure that McCain, fearful for every vote, will try to say all the right things to everyone -- but, in the end, will not lift a finger to stop it.

And if he wins, nothing will change.

© 2008 Group News Blog All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/http://www.groupnewsblog.ne/81978/

What Does a Car Bomb Look Like? | Video | AlterNet

What Does a Car Bomb Look Like? | Video | AlterNet: "A soldier filming a drive down a road or highway for like what seems like an eternity and then, boom!"

How the Army Corps Is Swindling Americans | Water | AlterNet

How the Army Corps Is Swindling Americans | Water | AlterNet: "With the help of Congress, they've been ripping off Americans long before the Katrina debacle, and no one's willing to stop them."

The Torture Drawings the Pentagon Doesn't Want You to See | Rights and Liberties | AlterNet

The Torture Drawings the Pentagon Doesn't Want You to See | Rights and Liberties | AlterNet
Drawings by journalist Sami Al-Haj depicting torture at Gitmo have been censored.

McCain and conspiracy theorists agree that Washington is Satanic - Boing Boing

McCain and conspiracy theorists agree that Washington is Satanic - Boing Boing

Dan Morse of The Washington Post looks for evidence to support McCain's frequent claims that Washington is the "city of Satan."

First, McCain:

McCain, a Republican senator from Arizona, has regularly called Washington Satan's City over the past 10 years. He did so twice last month, including during a visit to the Atlanta headquarters of Chick-fil-A, the fast-food chain whose founder is such a devoted Baptist he keeps the eateries closed on Sundays. "It's harder and harder trying to do the Lord's work in the city of Satan," McCain said, according to an Associated Press account.

(Maybe McCain thinks Satan is going to try to stop him from carrying out a "a biblically prophesied end-time confrontation with Iran, which will lead to the Rapture, Tribulation, and Second Coming of Christ," as his new best friend forvever, Pastor John Hagee, prays for.)

Next, Cutting Edge Ministries director David Bay:

"McCain was right," said David Bay, speaking by phone from Lexington, S.C., where as director of Cutting Edge Ministries he has long asserted that Washington's streets are positioned to usher in Lucifer as "the ultimate master of Government Center."

"You will need to have your maps of Washington, D.C., opened in front of you as we proceed," reads a treatise on the subject posted on Bay's Internet site.

Using Dupont and Logan circles as northern points, Bay instructs, you can trace various interlocking streets to form a demonic pentagram, one that bores directly into 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

Other satanic hot spots cited by believers include the U.S. Capitol and the Washington Monument. The latter was described by Bay, the South Carolina author, as a filthy, phallic and satanic homage to the god Baal.

Link (Via The Day They tried to Kill Me)

UPDATE Steve Reed says: "I think that McCain might have missed the real threat in Washington. A giant malevolent dachshund bearing down on the Capitol! It's clearly visible (and angry) as you can see from my enhanced image."

Mafia boss: seven rules for running a successful business - Boing Boing

Mafia boss: seven rules for running a successful business - Boing Boing
Shane says: "Great article from the Guardian about how the letters of mob boss Bernardo Provenzano give good guidance about how to behave and succeed in the business world."

Rule 2: Mediation

"Be calm, clear, correct and consistent, turn any negative experiences to account, don't dismiss everything people tell you, or believe everything you're told. Always try to discover the truth before you speak, and remember that, to make your judgment, it's never enough to have just one source of information."

This letter has been described as "a manifesto of Cosa Nostra under Bernardo Provenzano". After a decade of unspeakable violence under the previous leader, Totò Riina, Provenzano changed the culture of Cosa Nostra by instructing his men in the art of negotiation and the importance of dialogue.

Link

Jefferson Muzzles awarded for 1st Amendment jackassery - Boing Boing

Jefferson Muzzles awarded for 1st Amendment jackassery - Boing Boing

Waldo Jaquith says:

Remember FEMA faking a press conference? The judge telling a rape victim that she couldn't use the word "rape" in her testimony? The guy who wasn't allowed to have a "GETOSAMA" license plate in New York? The woman who was charged criminally for swearing at an overflowing toilet in her own home? The people responsible for this jackassery are getting their comeuppance, in the form of the vaunted Jefferson Muzzle Awards. This dubious distinction has been handed out annually since 1992, highlighting the nation's most egregious violations of First Amendment rights. Muzzles were handed out to eleven other businesses, organizations, and government entities.

My favorite is the lifetime achievement award for the FCC, "for years of applying inconsistent (if not arbitrary) standards in determining what is 'indecent' on broadcast airwaves."

Link

Bill O'Reilly Hollywood Goatse Moment - Boing Boing

Bill O'Reilly Hollywood Goatse Moment - Boing Boing

Fifty greatest comedy sketches of all time - Boing Boing

Fifty greatest comedy sketches of all time - Boing Boing

USDA reports 406,000 pounds of "cattle heads containing prohibited materials recalled" - Boing Boing

USDA reports 406,000 pounds of "cattle heads containing prohibited materials recalled" - Boing Boing

Wal-Mart corporate archivist selling access to recordings of exec meetings to plaintiff-side lawyers - Boing Boing

Wal-Mart corporate archivist selling access to recordings of exec meetings to plaintiff-side lawyers - Boing Boing

The Art of Reading a Poem (According to Harold Bloom) | Open Culture

The Art of Reading a Poem (According to Harold Bloom) | Open Culture

Listening to Famous Poets Reading Their Own Work | Open Culture

Listening to Famous Poets Reading Their Own Work | Open Culture

50 Greatest Comedy Sketches of All Time | Open Culture

50 Greatest Comedy Sketches of All Time | Open Culture

Death by Lack of Health Insurance | PEEK | AlterNet

Death by Lack of Health Insurance | PEEK | AlterNet: "New Families USA reports crunch numbers state-by-state."

By Joshua Holland, AlterNet
Posted on April 9, 2008, Printed on April 10, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/www.alternet.org/81895/

Families USA has been crunching numbers compiled by the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, and the findings are quite eye-opening.

I'm a bit too lazy to add a lot of analysis right now, so here's the press release:

In 2002, a groundbreaking national study by the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences demonstrated the direct link between a lack of health coverage and deaths from health-related causes. Drawing on that study, Families USA, the national organization for health care consumers, has today made available reports for all 50 states that show how many people are expected to die in each state each week because they don’t have health coverage. A separate report is also available for the District of Columbia.

The individual reports, available on the Families USA Web site, provide eye-opening numbers for every state. Among the figures cited is the fact that more than seven working-age Texans die each day due to a lack of health insurance. Other reports reveal that, on average, approximately 960 people in Illinois died in 2006 because they had no health coverage, and nearly 9,900 uninsured New Yorkers between the ages of 25 and 64 died in the years 2000 to 2006.

“Our report highlights how our inadequate system of health coverage condemns a great number of people to an early death simply because they don’t have the same access to health care as their insured neighbors,” Ron Pollack, Executive Director of Families USA, said today. “The conclusions are sadly clear—a lack of health coverage is a matter of life and death for many people.

“Health insurance really matters in how people make their health care decisions,” Pollack said. “We know that people without insurance often forgo checkups, screenings, and other preventive care.”

As a result, he said, uninsured adults are more likely to be diagnosed with a disease, such as cancer, in an advanced stage, which greatly reduces their chance of survival. The Institute of Medicine found that uninsured adults are 25 percent more likely to die prematurely than adults with private health insurance.

Another recent academic study found that uninsured adults between the ages of 55 and 64 are even more likely to die prematurely. For this group, a lack of health insurance is the third leading cause of death, following heart disease and cancer.

In its 2002 report, the Institute of Medicine estimated that 18,000 adults nationwide died in 2000 because they did not have health insurance. That estimate was later updated by the Urban Institute, which reported that at least 22,000 adults died in 2006 due to a lack of health insurance.

Although 50 state reports were released by Families USA today, Pollack cautioned against trying to make state-to-state comparisons. The variables of population size, mortality rates, and uninsured rates for people ages 25-64 have made each state report unique.

Find your state's death-toll.

Joshua Holland is an editor and senior writer at AlterNet.

© 2008 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/www.alternet.org/81895/

Mother of Two Soldiers Latest to Allege Rape, Cover-up by KBR | Rights and Liberties | AlterNet

Mother of Two Soldiers Latest to Allege Rape, Cover-up by KBR | Rights and Liberties | AlterNet: "Certainly appears to be a pattern ... how many more have gone unreported?"

By Joshua Holland, AlterNet
Posted on April 10, 2008, Printed on April 10, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/www.alternet.org/81946/

Via ABC News, the third allegation of rape (and cover-up) against KBR to emerge in recent months:

Yet another woman has come forward saying she was brutally raped in Iraq while working for the U.S. contractor Kellogg Brown Root (KBR).

Dawn Leamon, who has two sons on active duty, says she was raped earlier this year by a U.S. soldier and a KBR colleague.

She will tell her horrific story to members of Congress today at a hearing of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.

Leamon says that following her rape, she spoke with a woman at the KBR Employee Assistance Program. "She discouraged me from reporting, saying, 'You know what will happen if you do,'" Leamon said.

Leamon says KBR then assigned full-time security guards to her which gave her no privacy to talk about the incident, and her movements around camp were restricted, yet her attackers' movements were unrestricted.

"KBR did little or nothing to restore my sense of safety after I reported being raped," said Leamon.

At the recent Winter Soldier Hearings, I learned that in many cases the military doesn't cover the cost of rape test-kits -- victims often have to pay for them out of pocket. That's not directly related to this story about KBR, a private contractor, but I think it's an eye-opening indication of the larger military culture in which the firm operates.

Joshua Holland is an editor and senior writer at AlterNet.

© 2008 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/www.alternet.org/81946/

Pensito Review » Cheney, Rice, Powell and Other Top Bush Officials Said to Have ‘Choreographed’ Torture Techniques

Pensito Review » Cheney, Rice, Powell and Other Top Bush Officials Said to Have ‘Choreographed’ Torture Techniques

ABC News is reporting that a gang of top Bush officials known as the “Principals” — but for whom a better moniker might be the “Sadists” — met, starting in 2002, to prescribe in detail which torture techniques, and what combinations, American interorogators could use on terror suspects.

At the time, the Principals included Dick Cheney, National Security adviser Condoleezza Rice, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Colin Powell, CIA Director George Tenet and John Ashcroft, a devout Christian who then served as U.S. attorney general.

What this group of high officials did in these meetings appears to have been not only horrifically immoral and unethical, but illegal and un-Constitutional:

In dozens of top-secret talks and meetings in the White House, the most senior Bush administration officials discussed and approved specific details of how high-value al Qaeda suspects would be interrogated by the Central Intelligence Agency, sources tell ABC News.

The so-called Principals who participated in the meetings also approved the use of “combined” interrogation techniques — using different techniques during interrogations, instead of using one method at a time — on terrorist suspects who proved difficult to break, sources said.

Highly placed sources said a handful of top advisers signed off on how the CIA would interrogate top al Qaeda suspects — whether they would be slapped, pushed, deprived of sleep or subjected to simulated drowning, called waterboarding.

The high-level discussions about these “enhanced interrogation techniques” were so detailed, these sources said, some of the interrogation sessions were almost choreographed — down to the number of times CIA agents could use a specific tactic.

All of these officials — these suspects — were unavailable or refused to comment when contacted by ABC News.

Torture is illegal in the United States, and it can’t be made legal by a cabal around George Bush, or any president, just because they say so. Or at least that’s the way it used to be, back in the quaint old times before 2000, when Americans — especially Republicans — demanded that our elected leaders abide by the U.S. Constitution.

Bush to Cut Army Tours to 12 Months - washingtonpost.com

Bush to Cut Army Tours to 12 Months - washingtonpost.com

Asked About the Deficit, McCain Cites Reagans Example - The Caucus - Politics - New York Times Blog

Asked About the Deficit, McCain Cites Reagans Example - The Caucus - Politics - New York Times Blog: "There was one thing he did not mention during his response: the deficit nearly tripled during the Reagan presidency, partly due to tax cuts and increases in military spending."

Pelosi Calls Out Petraeus For Parroting Bush Spin - Politics on The Huffington Post

Pelosi Calls Out Petraeus For Parroting Bush Spin - Politics on The Huffington Post

AP poll: Bush public approval at new low - Yahoo! News

AP poll: Bush public approval at new low - Yahoo! News: "A survey released Thursday showed 28 percent approve of the overall job Bush is doing. That was statistically tied with his previous low in the poll of 30 percent last month and in February."

Listen: Artie Lange Quits Howard Stern (Audio) | TV Crunch

Listen: Artie Lange Quits Howard Stern (Audio) | TV Crunch

HERE'S AN AUDIO LINK TO PART OF THE SHOW; HOWARD 100 ON SIRIUS WILL NOT REPLAY THIS SHOW, WHICH IS TOTAL BULLSHIT.....LISTEN TO IT - ITS PRETTY AWESOME!

Are You Fooled By Bottled Water? [VIDEO] | Water | AlterNet

Are You Fooled By Bottled Water? [VIDEO] | Water | AlterNet: "A new video shows that people are willing to believe anything about water as long as it's in a bottle."

Those Who Control Oil and Water Will Control the World | Water | AlterNet

Those Who Control Oil and Water Will Control the World | Water | AlterNet: "New superpowers are competing for diminishing resources. The outcome could be deadly."

By John Gray, Comment Is Free
Posted on April 7, 2008, Printed on April 10, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/80855/

History may not repeat itself, but, as Mark Twain observed, it can sometimes rhyme. The crises and conflicts of the past recur, recognisably similar even when altered by new conditions. At present, a race for the world's resources is underway that resembles the Great Game that was played in the decades leading up to the First World War. Now, as then, the most coveted prize is oil and the risk is that as the contest heats up it will not always be peaceful. But this is no simple rerun of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Today, there are powerful new players and it is not only oil that is at stake.

It was Rudyard Kipling who brought the idea of the Great Game into the public mind in Kim, his cloak-and-dagger novel of espionage and imperial geopolitics in the time of the Raj. Then, the main players were Britain and Russia and the object of the game was control of central Asia's oil. Now, Britain hardly matters and India and China, which were subjugated countries during the last round of the game, have emerged as key players. The struggle is no longer focused mainly on central Asian oil. It stretches from the Persian Gulf to Africa, Latin America, even the polar caps, and it is also a struggle for water and depleting supplies of vital minerals. Above all, global warming is increasing the scarcity of natural resources. The Great Game that is afoot today is more intractable and more dangerous than the last.

The biggest new player in the game is China and it is there that the emerging pattern is clearest. China's rulers have staked everything on economic growth. Without improving living standards, there would be large-scale unrest, which could pose a threat to their power. Moreover, China is in the middle of the largest and fastest move from the countryside to the city in history, a process that cannot be stopped.

There is no alternative to continuing growth, but it comes with deadly side-effects. Overused in industry and agriculture, and under threat from the retreat of the Himalayan glaciers, water is becoming a non-renewable resource. Two-thirds of China's cities face shortages, while deserts are eating up arable land. Breakneck industrialisation is worsening this environmental breakdown, as many more power plants are being built and run on high-polluting coal that accelerates global warming. There is a vicious circle at work here and not only in China. Because ongoing growth requires massive inputs of energy and minerals, Chinese companies are scouring the world for supplies. The result is unstoppable rising demand for resources that are unalterably finite.

Although oil reserves may not have peaked in any literal sense, the days when conventional oil was cheap have gone forever. Countries are reacting by trying to secure the remaining reserves, not least those that are being opened up by climate change. Canada is building bases to counter Russian claims on the melting Arctic icecap, parts of which are also claimed by Norway, Denmark and the US. Britain is staking out claims on areas around the South Pole.

The scramble for energy is shaping many of the conflicts we can expect in the present century. The danger is not just another oil shock that impacts on industrial production, but a threat of famine. Without a drip feed of petroleum to highly mechanised farms, many of the food shelves in the supermarkets would be empty. Far from the world weaning itself off oil, it is more addicted to the stuff than ever. It is hardly surprising that powerful states are gearing up to seize their share.

This new round of the Great Game did not start yesterday. It began with the last big conflict of the 20th century, which was an oil war and nothing else. No one pretended the first Gulf War was fought to combat terrorism or spread democracy. As George Bush Snr and John Major admitted at the time, it was aimed at securing global oil supplies, pure and simple. Despite the denials of a less honest generation of politicians, there can be no doubt that controlling the country's oil was one of the objectives of the later invasion of Iraq.

Oil remains at the heart of the game and, if anything, it is even more important than before. With their complex logistics and heavy reliance on air power, high-tech armies are extremely energy-intensive. According to a Pentagon report, the amount of petroleum needed for each soldier each day increased four times between the Second World War and the Gulf War and quadrupled again when the US invaded Iraq. Recent estimates suggest the amount used per soldier has jumped again in the five years since the invasion.

Whereas Western countries dominated the last round of the Great Game, this time they rely on increasingly self-assertive producer countries. Mr Putin's well-honed contempt for world opinion might grate on European ears, but Europe is heavily dependent on his energy. Hugo Chávez might be an object of hate for George W Bush, but Venezuela still supplies around 10 per cent of America's imported oil. President Ahmadinejad is seen by some as the devil incarnate, but with oil at more than a $100 a barrel, any Western attempt to topple him would be horrendously risky.

While Western power declines, the rising powers are at odds with each other. China and India are rivals for oil and natural gas in central Asia. Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia and Indonesia have clashed over underwater oil reserves in the South China Sea. Saudi Arabia and Iran are rivals in the Gulf, while Iran and Turkey are eyeing Iraq. Greater international co-operation seems the obvious solution, but the reality is that as the resources crunch bites more deeply, the world is becoming steadily more fragmented and divided.

We are a long way from the fantasy world of only a decade ago, when fashionable gurus were talking sagely of the knowledge economy. Then, we were told material resources did not matter any more -- it was ideas that drove economic development. The business cycle had been left behind and an era of endless growth had arrived. Actually, the knowledge economy was an illusion created by cheap oil and cheap money and everlasting booms always end in tears. This is not the end of the world or of global capitalism, just history as usual.

What is different this time is climate change. Rising sea levels reduce food and fresh-water supplies, which may trigger large-scale movements of refugees from Africa and Asia into Europe. Global warming threatens energy supplies. As the fossil fuels of the past become more expensive, others, such as tar sands, are becoming more economically viable, but these alternative fuels are also dirtier than conventional oil.

In this round of the Great Game, energy shortage and global warming are reinforcing each another. The result can only be a growing risk of conflict. There were around 1.65 billion people in the world when the last round was played out. At the start of the 21st century, there are four times as many, struggling to secure their future in a world being changed out of recognition by climate change. It would be wise to plan for some more of history's rhymes.

John Gray is author of Black Mass: Apocalyptic Religion and the Death of Utopia, published by Allen Lane in paperback on 24 April.

© 2008 Comment Is Free All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/80855/

The U.S Is Heading Towards Water Crisis | Water | AlterNet

The U.S Is Heading Towards Water Crisis | Water | AlterNet: "Decreasing water supplies are garnering the interest of the private sector and the potential for profit."

By Shiney Varghese, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy
Posted on April 8, 2008, Printed on April 10, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/81301/

I am amazed: since last summer, almost every day we see at least one news story on another water crisis in the U.S. The water crisis is no longer something that we know about as affecting developing countries or their poor in particular. It is right here in our own backyard. Today, in many parts of the U.S. we are nearing the limits of our water supplies. And that is getting our attention. The writing has been on the wall for some time. The private sector has been showing much interest in water as a source of profit, and water privatization has been an issue in many parts of the country.

The failure in public water systems has indeed been a contributing factor for this interest. In many cities, consumers have been organizing and opposing the privatization of water utilities, because they have been concerned about affordability or deterioration in the quality of service. Environmental organizations and consumer activists have also been concerned about the socio-economic, health and environmental implications of ever increasing bottled water use. But for most of us living in the U.S., water is something we take for granted, available when you turn your tap on -- to brush your teeth, to take a shower, to wash your car, to water your lawn, and if you have your own swimming pool then, to fill that as well.

So it was with alarm that many of us read the story of Orme, a small town tucked away in the mountains of southern Tennessee that has become a recent symbol of the drought in the southeast. Orme has had to literally ration its water use, by collecting water for a few hours every day -- an everyday experience in most developing countries, but unusual for the U.S. This is an extreme experience from the southeast region that has been under a year long dry spell. In fact, the region's dry spell resulted in the city of Atlanta setting severe water use restrictions and three states, Georgia, Florida and Alabama, going to court over a water allocation dispute (settled in favor of Florida and Alabama early last month).

Early this year we also heard that drought in the region could force nuclear reactor shut- downs. Nuclear reactors need billions of gallons of cooling water daily to operate, and in many of the lakes and rivers water levels are getting close to the limit set by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. It is possible in the coming months that we may see water lev- els decrease below the intake pipes, or that shallow water could become warmer and unusable as a coolant. While this may not cause blackouts, this can result in increased costs for energy as utilities have to buy from other sources.

Water concerns are not restricted to the southeast region -- similar issues have also been popping up in other parts of the United States. In the Midwest, concerns abound as to whether the newly emerging biofuel industry is putting undue pressure on the region's groundwater resources. The issue came into focus for the first time in the late summer of 2006 in Granite Falls, MN where an ethanol plant in its first year of operation depleted the groundwater so much that it had to begin pumping water from the Minnesota River.

In early February, it was reported that there is a 50 percent chance Lake Mead (on the Arizona/Nevada border), will be dry by 2021 if climate change continues as expected and future water use is not limited. Along with Lake Powell in Utah, Lake Mead helps provide water for more than 25 million people, and is a key source of water in the southwestern U.S. On the west coast, where water is a precious resource, water disputes abound: between farmers who want water for agriculture, environmentalists who want to conserve water for ecosystems, and cities who want to meet ever-growing urban water needs. Last summer, in a landmark decision, a federal judge ordered state and federal water project managers to reduce the amount of water pumped from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta to protect the threatened delta smelt from extinction. Along with excessive rains in other regions and increased incidence of hurricanes in the Gulf Coast, these changes are a constant reminder of an increasingly evident reality: climate change.

In fact, in early February, Nature reported that, "In the western US, where water is perhaps the most precious natural resource, anthropogenic global warming is responsible for more than half of the well-documented changes to the hydrological cycle from 1950 to 1999. Over the last half of the twentieth century, the region's mountains received less winter snow and more rain, with snow melting earlier, causing rivers to flow more strongly in the spring and more weakly in the summer."

Unlike Katrina's images that are as haunting as that of a severe sub Saharan drought, the images of the current North American drought are no more than a mild distraction for most Americans (though not for those who live in Orne). Yet there is no reason to be complacent. We are close to the limits of our water supplies. It is time for us to start thinking of this nation's susceptibility to these changes and disruptions and how to minimize our vulnerability to them. Barely three years ago in the wake of hurricane Katrina IATP's Mark Muller wrote: "The storm exposed some real vulnerability in the current agriculture system. As we recover from the tragedy of Katrina, we have an opportunity to rebuild and rethink how to strengthen agriculture, regional economies and the transportation and production infrastructure. He identified 10 areas of vulnerability exposed by Katrina, including energy, fertilizer, transportation markets for crops less dependent on inputs, CAFO regulation, on-farm water storage, valuing the commons and climate change."

I find these areas of vulnerability particularly relevant when it comes to the current water crisis. Like Katrina, this crisis gives us yet another opportunity to rethink and challenge issues that we need to raise: land use planning that allows unfettered development, energy production that is water intensive, and agricultural water use that is inefficient from a hydrological perspective. So far we have assumed that we can undertake any development we want, wherever we want, or we could grow whatever we want, however we want, and that water will always be available to support that growth. In the process we are draining our aquifers, polluting our rivers, tampering with ecosystems and destroying the diversity of life -- as if nature is ours to be manipulated to suit our wants. It is time to change some of our practices.

For more than a century, the federal government has spent billions of dollars, building our dams, reservoirs, aqueducts and pipelines. Ironically, in the same way that extracting/ transporting and processing water consumes large amounts of energy, the operation of power plants consume large amounts of water.

Thermal energy is one of the largest water users in the United States. However, irrigated agriculture accounts for 80 percent of water consumed in the U.S. This high percentage is partially because of low water use-efficiency (the portion of water actually used by irrigated agriculture relative to the volume of water withdrawn). For the western United States, agricultural farms are the single largest water user, half of which is used by the largest 10 percent of the farms. High levels of irrigation subsidies, combined with archaic water laws make water use in the western U.S. highly wasteful and inefficient. But there is room for improvement in agricultural water use in almost all parts of the U.S. Water use should be such that for a given locale, appropriate incentives are put in place to ensure that water withdrawals do not exceed the recharge rate; that water conservation techniques (such as rain water harvesting) are central to land use planning; that improved irrigation efficiency and better nutrient management (to reduce non-point water pollution from farm run-offs) are rewarded; and that growing water-intensive crops in water scarce regions discouraged.

Legal judgments, such the recent case involving the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, are an attempt to reverse earlier actions by state and federal water managers that have damaged the water system. But much more is needed. As Peter Gleick of the California based Pacific Institute points out in a recent article: "While predictions of economic disaster arising from the Delta decision may come true, they don't have to. But it will take a re-evaluation of our ideas about water-use and politi- cal courage by the governor, Legislature and water users to have open and honest discussions about how to redesign our water system so that it is smart, efficient and sustainable."

This is true for the nation as a whole: here in this land of plenty, we need to rethink our policies regarding urban development, energy production, and most importantly our agriculture and food systems, in order to avert an environmental crisis that many countries are already in the grip of.

Shiney Varghese is a Senior Policy Analyst at the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy.

© 2008 Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/81301/

John McCain's Greed-Based Health Care Plan | Health and Wellness | AlterNet

John McCain's Greed-Based Health Care Plan | Health and Wellness | AlterNet: "Mr. McCain's approach to health care is based on the fantasy that the magic of the marketplace can produce cheap health care for everyone."

By Paul Krugman, The New York Times
Posted on April 6, 2008, Printed on April 10, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/81501/

Elizabeth Edwards has cancer. John McCain has had cancer in the past. Last weekend, Mrs. Edwards bluntly pointed out that neither of them would be able to get insurance under Mr. McCain's health care plan.

It's about time someone said that and, more generally, made the case that Mr. McCain's approach to health care is based on voodoo economics -- not the supply-side voodoo that claims that cutting taxes increases revenues (though Mr. McCain says that, too), but the equally foolish claim, refuted by all available evidence, that the magic of the marketplace can produce cheap health care for everyone.

As Mrs. Edwards pointed out, the McCain health plan would do nothing to prevent insurance companies from denying coverage to those, like her and Mr. McCain, who have pre-existing medical conditions.

The McCain campaign's response was condescending and dismissive -- a statement that Mrs. Edwards doesn't understand the comprehensive nature of the senator's approach, which would harness "the power of competition to produce greater coverage for Americans," reducing costs so that even people with pre-existing conditions could afford care.

This is nonsense on multiple levels.

For one thing, even if you buy the premise that competition would reduce health care costs, the idea that it could cut costs enough to make insurance affordable for Americans with a history of cancer or other major diseases is sheer fantasy.

Beyond that, there's no reason to believe in these alleged cost reductions. Insurance companies do try to hold down "medical losses" -- the industry's term for what happens when an insurer actually ends up having to honor its promises by paying a client's medical bills. But they don't do this by promoting cost-effective medical care.

Instead, they hold down costs by only covering healthy people, screening out those who need coverage the most -- which was exactly the point Mrs. Edwards was making. They also deny as many claims as possible, forcing doctors and hospitals to spend large sums fighting to get paid.

And the international evidence on health care costs is overwhelming: the United States has the most privatized system, with the most market competition -- and it also has by far the highest health care costs in the world.

Yet the McCain health plan -- actually a set of bullet points on the campaign's Web site -- is entirely based on blind faith that competition among private insurers will solve all problems.

I'd like to single out one of these bullet points in particular -- the first substantive proposal Mr. McCain offers (the preceding entries are nothing but feel-good boilerplate).

As I've mentioned in past columns, the Veterans Health Administration is one of the few clear American success stories in the struggle to contain health care costs. Since it was reformed during the Clinton years, the V.A. has used the fact that it's an integrated system -- a system that takes long-term responsibility for its clients' health -- to deliver an impressive combination of high-quality care and low costs. It has also taken the lead in the use of information technology, which has both saved money and reduced medical errors.

Sure enough, Mr. McCain wants to privatize and, in effect, dismantle the V.A. Naturally, this destructive agenda comes wrapped in the flag: "America's veterans have fought for our freedom," says the McCain Web site. "We should give them freedom to choose to carry their V.A. dollars to a provider that gives them the timely care at high quality and in the best location."

That's a recipe for having healthy veterans drop out of the system, undermining its integrated nature and draining away resources.

Mr. McCain, then, is offering a completely wrongheaded approach to health care. But the way the campaign for the Democratic nomination has unfolded raises questions about how effective his eventual opponent will be in making that point.

Indeed, while Mrs. Edwards focused her criticism on Mr. McCain, she also made it clear that she prefers Hillary Clinton's approach -- "Sen. Clinton's plan is a great plan" -- to Barack Obama's. The Clinton plan closely resembles the plan for universal coverage that John Edwards laid out more than a year ago. By contrast, Mr. Obama offers a watered-down plan that falls short of universality, and it would have higher costs per person covered.

Worse yet, Mr. Obama attacked his Democratic rivals' health plans using conservative talking points about choice and the evil of having the government tell you what to do. That's going to make it hard -- if he is the nominee -- to refute Mr. McCain when he makes similar arguments on behalf of such things as privatizing veterans' care.

Still, health care ought to be a major issue in this campaign. I wonder if we'll have time to discuss it after we deal with more important subjects, like bowling and basketball.

© 2007 The New York Times

AlterNet is making this New York Times material available in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107: This article is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.

© 2008 The New York Times All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/81501/

Truck Drivers Block Freeway Traffic Across the U.S. to Protest Soaring Fuel Prices | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet

Truck Drivers Block Freeway Traffic Across the U.S. to Protest Soaring Fuel Prices | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet: "Faced with $4-per-gallon diesel fuel, truck drivers -- who deliver 70 percent of the nation's goods -- are hitting the brakes."

How the American Medical Association Got Rich | Health and Wellness | AlterNet

How the American Medical Association Got Rich | Health and Wellness | AlterNet: "The AMA rose to prominence by unfairly attacking and discrediting homeopathic medicine."

The 'Bush Boom' is an Epic Bust | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet

The 'Bush Boom' is an Epic Bust | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet: "There's no spinning this economic disaster."

By Hale Stewart, Huffington Post
Posted on April 9, 2008, Printed on April 10, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/81886/

Either we're in a recession or we're about to start one. Either way, the latest expansion is over. While there may be some question about when it happened (the expansion, that is) the reality is it was the least impressive expansion since WWII. Below I will explain why.

Before I move forward, let me address specifically any readers who still think the last expansion was "the Greatest Story Never Told." I am going to use facts to demonstrate why the latest expansion was terrible. If you don't like the facts please feel free to present you own facts. In fact, please do so. But please only use facts from reliable sources. Reliable sources would be the government agencies that collect and present this data. To sit at this table, you must bring data (properly adjusted for inflation) that is from sources used by all economists not from sources whose credibility is non-existent.

That being said (and I can't believe I even have to address this issue).

Let's start with the consumer side of the equation. First , job growth during this expansion is the weakest of any recovery since WWII. (This information comes from the National Bureau of Economic Research and the Bureau of Labor Statistics)

As a result, real median household income (income adjusted for inflation) is now lower than it was at the beginning of this expansion (this is the first time this has happened in 40 years) (This information comes from the Census Bureau).

So -- where did the money for consumer spending come from? Part of it came from savings. Here is a chart from the St. Louis Federal Reserve of U.S. national savings. Notice this number has been decreasing for the last 25 years and is currently hovering around 0 percent.

Debt is the real source of funds for this expansion (this information comes from the Federal Reserve's Flow of Funds report and the Bureau of Economic Analysis).

As a result of this increased debt load, a larger portion of consumer's income (which has been stagnant for this expansion) is going to debt payments:

So looking at the consumer we see the following picture emerge.

1.) Job growth was the weakest of any post WWII recovery.

2.) Real median income actually dropped for the duration of this expansion.

3.) To sustain consumption, consumers went on a mammoth debt acquisition binge, so that now

4.) Debt payments are as high as they have ever been on a percentage of disposable income basis.

So after 7 years of economic expansion we have lower incomes and more debt.

However, the consumer isn't the only person who ran up a ton of debt.

The Bush White House has again run up the national credit card. Here is a list of total debt outstanding at the end of the government's fiscal year:

09/30/2007 $9,007,653,372,262.48
09/30/2006 $8,506,973,899,215.23
09/30/2005 $7,932,709,661,723.50
09/30/2004 $7,379,052,696,330.32
09/30/2003 $6,783,231,062,743.62
09/30/2002 $6,228,235,965,597.16
09/30/2001 $5,807,463,412,200.06
09/30/2000 $5,674,178,209,886.86

The current debt outstanding is $9,437,425,175,221.31

Notice that since 2002 the Federal Government has issue over $500 billion of net new debt per year. And yet, we have continually been told the budget deficit is getting better. Let's ask a fundamental question: if you continually spent less than you made, would you have to borrow money?

As the US has become more reliant on debt financing it has also become more reliant on foreign governments for its financing. Here is a chart from the St. Louis Federal Reserve of the total U.S. debt held for foreign investors:

In short, growth at the national level is dependent on the issuance of debt. And we are now reliant on foreigners for an increasing percentage of our growth. A former Federal Reserve Chairman (Paul Volcker) explains why this is a bad development:

More recently, we've become more dependent on foreign central banks, particularly in China and Japan and elsewhere in East Asia.

It's all quite comfortable for us. We fill our shops and our garages with goods from abroad, and the competition has been a powerful restraint on our internal prices. It's surely helped keep interest rates exceptionally low despite our vanishing savings and rapid growth.

And it's comfortable for our trading partners and for those supplying the capital. Some, such as China, depend heavily on our expanding domestic markets. And for the most part, the central banks of the emerging world have been willing to hold more and more dollars, which are, after all, the closest thing the world has to a truly international currency.

The difficulty is that this seemingly comfortable pattern can't go on indefinitely. I don't know of any country that has managed to consume and invest 6 percent more than it produces for long. The United States is absorbing about 80 percent of the net flow of international capital. And at some point, both central banks and private institutions will have their fill of dollars.

Finally, the US trade deficit has exploded. Here is a chart of from the St. Louis Federal Reserve:

The St. Louis Reserve published a report in late 2006 that showed how important oil was to this figure. This indicates how important energy independence would really help with the trade deficit.

So let's sum up.

1.) The weakest job growth since WWII led to a declining median family income.

2.) In order to keep spending the U.S. consumer continued to save less and borrow more.

3.) At the national level, the U.S. government has issued over $500 billion dollars of net new debt per year since 2002. This has led to an increased reliance on foreign investors to finance our way of life.

4.) The trade deficit has continued to expand, although oil is responsible for a fair amount of that increase.

5.) In short, the U.S. continues to consume more than it produces.

At some point, we will have to pay the bill.

This is the end result of the "Bush boom" or "the greatest story never told."

If the story was so great, we wouldn't need people to remind us of how good it is.

Hale "Bonddad" Stewart is a former bond broker with several regional firms. He has been involved with the financial markets since 1995. He currently practices law in Houston, Texas. Stewart is the proprietor of the Bonddad Blog.

© 2008 Huffington Post All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/81886/

An Iraqi Contractor Gets Prosecuted While Blackwater's Contract is Renewed | War on Iraq | AlterNet

An Iraqi Contractor Gets Prosecuted While Blackwater's Contract is Renewed | War on Iraq | AlterNet: "As a translator who fled Saddam becomes the face of a 'crackdown' on contractors, Blackwater is rewarded with another year in Iraq."

John McCain’s New Superstar Economic Advisor an 'Innovator' at Hurting Workers | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet

John McCain’s New Superstar Economic Advisor an 'Innovator' at Hurting Workers | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet: "She pushed down wages, and left town with a fat severance package."

By Sam Pizzigati, Too Much: A Commentary on Excess and Inequality
Posted on April 10, 2008, Printed on April 10, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/81927/

John McCain has been taking quite a bit of flak on the economy of late. McCain, critics charge, doesn't understand how the real economy operates. Carly Fiorina, the former CEO of computer giant Hewlett-Packard and the first woman ever to run one of the nation's 20 biggest publicly traded companies, is having none of that. Fiorina is now serving as McCain's lead public voice on matters economic, and she couldn't be more tickled with her new role.

McCain, Fiorina feels confident, gets it on the economy. Says the superstar CEO: "He understands innovation."

We may have a bit of irony here. As CEO at Hewlett-Packard, Fiorina didn't exactly display much of an innovative streak. In fact, she followed standard, raze-and-reap CEO operating procedure chapter and verse. She merged. She purged. She walked off with a fortune.

Actually, Fiorina came into Hewlett-Packard with a fortune already assured. She began her CEO stint at HP with a four-year contract worth $90 million. Less than six years later, in 2005, that CEO stint would end with a kick out the door and $42.5 million in severance.

And, in between, what did Hewlett-Packard get for all those millions? A textbook display of how CEOs routinely operate in contemporary Corporate America. Sadly, that display came at a company with a corporate culture that once stood tall as a counterpoint to corporate business as usual.

That culture, nurtured over the years by company co-founders Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard, went by the name of the "HP way" and gave Hewlett-Packard something close to mythic status among Silicon Valley's technorati. Alone among the nation's computer giants, HP stood for something more than getting rich quick.

The company, for instance, had avoided layoffs in the hard times of the late 1970s by cutting pay 10 percent across the board, executives included. The company's CEO, even into the 1980s, worked out of a cubicle and not an opulent corner office. HP top executives did make good money, but nowhere near the magisterial sums pulled in by executives elsewhere.

This "egalitarian" Hewlett-Packard, to be sure, had faded considerably by the late 1990s. But the final insult to the "HP Way" would start with Fiorina's 1999 hiring. The company would welcome its new CEO superstar with $66 million worth of shares, the biggest no-strings stock grant up to then in U.S. corporate history, and assorted other pay goodies worth another $24 million.

A small price to pay, the HP board figured, for a CEO who could rev up Hewlett-Packard's fortunes -- and Fiorina would quickly reveal a plan to do that revving. To jump start the company, she would ask HP's 93,000 employees worldwide to accept voluntary cutbacks.

Employees would be able to pick their poison, either a 10 percent pay cut, a 5 percent pay cut and the loss of four vacation days, or the loss of eight vacation days. Workers could also choose none of the above.

Remarkably, 86 percent of HP's workforce picked one of the three cutback options. One company spokesperson credited this willingness to sacrifice to the legacy of the HP Way. The voluntary cutbacks would save HP $130 million.

Less than a month after HP employees made this noble collective sacrifice, Fiorina rewarded them for it. Management, in a surprise announcement, revealed plans to lay off 6,000 workers.

But the voluntary pay cuts and the massive layoffs would produce no upsurge in HP's fortunes. Fiorina proceeded to the predictable. She brokered a $19 billion merger with rival Compaq Computer, then moved to make her new enterprise profitable -- by eliminating over 15,000 of the merged company's 150,000 jobs.

Fiorina and her Compaq CEO counterpart, Michael Capellas, had made sure, of course, that their newly merged company would have plenty of room for them, Fiorina as chief executive, Capellas as president. They would work under two-year contracts worth a combined $117.4 million.

Capellas would go on to leave the new Hewlett-Packard a half year after the 2002 merger, with $16 million in severance. That exit left Fiorina in full command, but she was running out of options. Cutting jobs and benefits hadn't jumpstarted HP. Nor had swinging a huge merger deal. Nor had reshuffling HP's internal corporate bureaucracy, another well-worn trick in the standard contemporary U.S. CEO playbook.

By early 2005, a majority of the members on HP's board had had enough. They dumped Fiorina. The CEO they brought on to replace her, Mark Hurd, would win cheers from employees in his very first speech as HP's top exec.

"Building a great company isn't all about a CEO," Hurd inspiringly proclaimed to a workforce worn down by years of superstar grandstanding. "It's a team sport."

Alas, Hurd would soon display not much more team spirit than Fiorina. Shortly after his debut speech, HP workers learned that Hurd had been awarded a welcome package worth over $20 million. Four months later, he ended HP's traditional pension, for younger employees, and announced plans to cut another 15,000 HP jobs.

Not to be outdone by his predecessor, Hurd also reshuffled the HP bureaucracy, essentially undoing the reshuffling that Fiorina had wrought.

In Corporate America, that's called innovation.

Sam Pizzigati is the editor of the online weekly Too Much, and an associate fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies.

© 2008 Too Much: A Commentary on Excess and Inequality All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/81927/

Socialism for the Rich: Bailing Out the Bankers and Builders | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet

Socialism for the Rich: Bailing Out the Bankers and Builders | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet: "The centerpiece of the 'Foreclosure Prevention Act' approved by the Senate is a tax break for the homebuilders and the mortgage bankers."

By Dean Baker, TruthOut.org
Posted on April 10, 2008, Printed on April 10, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/81919/

Conservatives used to complain liberals always wanted to throw money at problems. While there may have been some truth at times to this charge, Congress decided to literally take this path in its approach to the housing bubble last week.

There are many villains in the story of the housing bubble, but the homebuilders and the mortgage industry would go on almost everyone's list. The homebuilders rushed ahead with new developments under the delusion the bubble would last forever. The result is an unprecedented glut in housing.

The mortgage industry aggressively promoted adjustable rate mortgages to the most vulnerable segments of the population, giving us the subprime crisis. They didn't care mortgages couldn't be paid because they could dump them into the secondary market almost immediately after they were issued.

During their spring recess, members of Congress heard from angry constituents who feared the loss of their home or the loss of much of their home equity due to plunging house prices. This prompted Congress to rush into action when it came back into session last week.

The centerpiece of the "Foreclosure Prevention Act" approved by the Senate is a tax break for the homebuilders and the mortgage bankers -- in effect throwing taxpayer dollars at two of the industries most responsible for the housing bubble. That should satisfy troubled homeowners.

But this may not be the end of it. There are plans for a large-scale buyout of bad mortgage debt. There are several different proposals being circulated, but the basic story is the same. The government would guarantee new mortgages that would be used to buy up existing mortgages of homes facing foreclosure.

While the new mortgages would be issued at prices that are less than the value of the original mortgage, they will almost certainly give the banks far more money than if the market was left alone.

For example, a bank may have issued a mortgage for $220,000 on a home that is now worth $200,000. Under the various proposals, the government-guaranteed mortgage would give the bank a check for between $170,000 and $200,000. This means a loss for the bank, but, almost certainly, a much smaller loss than if it carried through the foreclosure.

The handout to the banks is justified as an effort to keep homeowners in their houses. This may be reasonable in depressed markets like Detroit or Cleveland, but simple arithmetic shows this plan provides no benefit to homeowners in bubble-inflated markets like Los Angeles and Boston.

In these markets, houses now sell for more than 20 times the annual rent on a comparable unit. This means, even with a low 6 percent mortgage, after adding in taxes, insurance and maintenance, homeowners will likely pay 60 percent to 80 percent more in housing costs than if they rented. The additional housing costs will come at the expense of health care, quality childcare, and other necessary expenses. Furthermore, since house prices are falling in these bubble markets, it is extremely unlikely these families will accumulate any equity. In short, just like the tax breaks approved last week, these bailout proposals are yet another way to put money in the pockets of bankers under the guise of helping homeowners.

There are real ways to help homeowners facing foreclosure. Amending the bankruptcy law to allow judges to rewrite the terms of home mortgages, so families can keep their home, would be a good start. We can also change the rules on foreclosure to allow homeowners the option to remain in their home as renters paying the fair market rent.

This would provide security to homeowners, since they could not just be thrown out on the street. More importantly, it would provide lenders with a real incentive to negotiate terms that allow homeowners to stay in their homes as owners, since banks do not want to become landlords.

The Fed and Congress were incredibly negligent in allowing the housing bubble to grow to such enormous proportions. Acting on the advice of economists who couldn't see the bubble, Congress now seems determined to compound this failure.

It is trying to hand as many taxpayer dollars as possible to the banks in a futile attempt to prop up the bubble and keep homes unaffordable for young people.

Thankfully, it is an election year.

Dean Baker is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research.

© 2008 TruthOut.org All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/81919/

Dick Cheney's shades reflect a strange being - Boing Boing

Dick Cheney's shades reflect a strange being - Boing Boing -
Is that a naked chick in his glasses?
The White House website hosts a photo of Dick Cheney "fly-fishing on the Snake River in Idaho," wearing a pair of reflective glasses. Eagle-eyed William Gibson noticed that there's something awfully weird reflected in them: mutant hybrid sex-slave? Tentacle creature? Elder god? Link (Thanks, Bill!)

Florida sells unlimited water-pumping rights in drought-stricken State Park to Nestle for $230 - Boing Boing

Florida sells unlimited water-pumping rights in drought-stricken State Park to Nestle for $230 - Boing Boing: "The State of Florida has given a Nestle bottling plant the right to pump as much water as it can get out Madison Blue Springs State Park, which is presently in drought conditions. The right lasts until 2018, and cost Nestle $230 in permit fees. Florida is presently in bitter dispute with its neighboring states over a region-wide water-shortage."

The company got a permit to take water belonging to Floridians — hundreds of millions of gallons a year from a spring in a state park — at no cost to Nestle.

No taxes. No fees. Just a $230 permit to pump water until 2018...

The state did much more than fight to get Nestle the right to pump as much water as possible from the spring.

As an added incentive for Nestle, the state approved a tax refund of up to $1.68-million for the Madison bottling operation. To date, Nestle has received two refunds totaling $196,000 and requested a third tax refund.

Link (Thanks, Steven!)

See also: For Love of Water: infuriating and incredible documentary about world's water-crisis"

what the fuck?!

Slashdot | Scammers Exploit DTV Coupon Program

Slashdot | Scammers Exploit DTV Coupon Program: "An anonymous reader writes 'Analog TV users must purchase a DTV converter box before broadcasts go digital in 2009, and the US Government is offering $40 coupons to support the transition. The coupon program requires retailers to become certified by the NTIA (the Government body running the program) before processing orders for the boxes. Apparently the certification program is a bit lax, as the frenzy to purchase DTV boxes using these coupons seems to have drawn unscrupulous fraud artists into the mix. Memsen, via its web site convertmy.tv and its hardware partner Maxmedia, partnered apparently to pull a bait-and-switch game on unsuspecting consumers and the US Government.' Read on for details of the scam claimed by this anonymous reader."

"Maxmedia and convertmy.tv (CMTV) together promoted the Maxmedia MMDTVB03, which appeared to be the most feature-rich of the coupon-eligible converter boxes. The box drew public interest and even coverage by 3rd-party review sites.

CMTV quickly took pre-orders for the box, and promised delivery first in April, 2008, and later pushed the date back to May. The company immediately redeemed the Government coupons (in violation of the program rules, which prohibit back-ordering) and charged customer credit cards. Early-adopting consumers were willing to overlook these practices, feeling they would eventually own the best box on the market.

CMTV yesterday announced that they would not be shipping the MMDTVB03 at all — it would be replaced by the MMDTVB02, which they claim will have a better picture. Of course, the "new & improved" box will not ship until June. As an alternative, CMTV indicated it would allow customers to switch to an inferior box for $5 less.

Consumers are outraged by CMTV/MaxMedia's bait-and-switch tactics but are having difficulty finding out who these companies really are. Neither company publishes physical addresses or phone numbers on their web sites, and consumers have resorted to their own detective work to find the info.

As of April 8, 2008, the convertmy.tv web site is still accepting and processing orders for the "new" MMDTVB02 — in clear violation of the NTIA program rules, which only allows coupons to be applied to DTV boxes on its approved list."

Slashdot | AT&T, 2Wire Ignoring Active Security Exploit

Slashdot | AT&T, 2Wire Ignoring Active Security Exploit: "'2Wire manufactures DSL modems and routers for AT&T and other major carriers. Their devices suffer from a DNS redirection vulnerability that can be used as part of a variety of attacks, including phishing, identity theft, and denial of service. This exploit was publicly reported more than eight months ago and applies to nearly all 2Wire firmware revisions. The exploit itself is trivial to implement, requiring the attacker only to embed a specially crafted URL into a Web site or email. User interaction is not required, as the URL may be embedded as an image that loads automatically with the requested content. The 2Wire exploit bypasses any password set on the modem/router and is being actively exploited in the wild. AT&T has been deploying 2Wire DSL modems and router/gateways for years, so there exists a large vulnerable installed base. So far, AT&T/2Wire haven't done anything about this exploit.'"

Court to rule in Star Wars costume battle | News | guardian.co.uk Film

Court to rule in Star Wars costume battle | News | guardian.co.uk Film: "The British prop designer who created their famous white helmets and body armour is being sued by director George Lucas for £10m in a case starting at the high court tomorrow. Andrew Ainsworth was sued by the director's company, Lucasfilm, after reproducing the outfits from the original moulds and selling them for up to £1,800 each ."

Kraft's $100 Million Idea: Cream Cheese-Filled Bagels

Kraft's $100 Million Idea: Cream Cheese-Filled Bagels: "Kraft thinks it has a $100 million idea in Bagel-fuls—frozen bagel sticks, filled with Philadelphia cream cheese—which will launch this month with a TV campaign from The Kaplan Thaler Group, New York."

Grains Gone Wild - New York Times

Grains Gone Wild - New York Times: "I’m talking about the food crisis. Over the past few years the prices of wheat, corn, rice and other basic foodstuffs have doubled or tripled, with much of the increase taking place just in the last few months. High food prices dismay even relatively well-off Americans — but they’re truly devastating in poor countries, where food often accounts for more than half a family’s spending."

Captain Cassowary: The Hard Truth: Japan is Dying

Captain Cassowary: The Hard Truth: Japan is Dying: "Japan is doomed. It's partly a problem that other develped countries are facing, but partly a consequence of decades of inflexibility, racism and formality.

The agent of Japan's death is simple: depopulation.

The fertility rate in Japan is 1.29. That is 1.29 children per woman, whereas demographers consider replacement fertility to be about 2.1. All developed countries have lowering fertility rates, and its a problem of varying degrees. The liberation of women, higher ages of marriage, the cost of raising and educating children, all contribute towards low fertility. Japan suffers more than most (only Italy's fertility rate is lower) but it's a country-killer especially in Japan because

Japan refuses to take immigrants."

Yahoo responds to Microsoft ultimatum: more money please - Engadget

Yahoo responds to Microsoft ultimatum: more money please - Engadget: "Make no mistake about it, this is corporate war and will likely end with Yahoo's best engineers working for Google."

Man with suicide victim's heart kills self - Life- msnbc.com

Man with suicide victim's heart kills self - Life- msnbc.com: "A man who received a heart transplant 12 years ago and later married the donor's widow died the same way the donor did, authorities said: of a self-inflicted gunshot wound."

Wall St banks 'hooked on emergency funds scheme' | Business | The Observer

Wall St banks 'hooked on emergency funds scheme' | Business | The Observer: "The latest loan data released by the Fed shows that Wall Street banks and investment firms borrowed an average of $38.4bn every day last week, a big jump from the $32.9bn borrowed the week before, but almost three times the $13.4bn borrowed when the emergency scheme was launched on 17 March."

For Love of Water: infuriating and incredible documentary about world's water-crisis - Boing Boing

For Love of Water: infuriating and incredible documentary about world's water-crisis - Boing Boing
from boing boing:
"I've just watched Irena Salina's incredible, infuriating documentary FLOW: For Love of Water, a film about the often-invisible and underreported global water crisis. Ranging from widespread US contamination to the tragedy of developing nations who are forced by the World Bank to sell their water companies like Vivendi, Suez and Thames, who get sweetheart deals to offer substandard, overpriced monopoly water service, at terrible cost to human life.

Global water profiteering is at the center of a global healthcare crisis that kills more people than AIDS or malaria. The film shows the grim reality of water in Asia, Africa, South and Central America, and the USA. The mortality is awful, and not just from bad water or no water -- also from police forces in states like Bolivia who go to war against people whose water supply has been sold to foreign multinationals who are reaping windfall profits while they die.

In the US and Europe, the bottled water industry pulls in billions to sell products that are more contaminated and toxic than what comes out of the tap. The result is a gigantic mountain of empty plastic bottles that toxify the environment -- and three times more money spent on bottled water than it would take to solve the world's real water crisis. The companies like Nestle that pump out our aquifers use private investigators to harass people who sign petitions to stop them from pumping.

But it's not all doom and gloom -- low-cost, sustainable purification technologies like ultraviolet water-health run by village cooperatives can make dramatic development differences for the poorest, most vulnerable people in the world, who are able to maintain their own systems without foreign involvement. Local activists all over the world and fighting back and winning public, non-profit ownership of their waterworks.

The companies that control our water control our lives. Without us even noticing it, we've handed the planet's destiny to a few companies with a plan to line their pockets by holding our survival hostage.

Flow is seeking signatures for a petition to the UN: "Article 31: Everyone has the right to clean and accessible water, adequate for the health and well-being of the individual and family, and no one shall be deprived of such access or quality of water due to individual economic circumstance."

FLOW is on the festival circuit -- if you get the chance, see this film. Link, Link to sign up for DVD release new