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Blacklisted News

• Report Warns Of Rise In Militia Groups Across U.S.

  Militia groups with gripes against the government are regrouping across the country and could grow rapidly, according to an organization that tracks such trends.

• Mobile phones get cyborg vision

  It's a gift that was once the preserve of fictional cyborgs. Call it Terminator Vision - a view of the world tagged with rich, location-relevant information whilst your gaze flickers here and there.

• 'Tamiflu turned my children into hallucinating, so ...

  This week, it was with no small measure of satisfaction that I watched Andy Burnham, our implausibly youthful Health Secretary, squirm on the GMTV sofa. Andrew Castle, it must be said, is no Jeremy Paxman. So when Mr Burnham agreed to take part in the show to discuss the alleged merits of Tamiflu ( ...

• Massachusetts Deputizes Dentists, Others to Help w ...

  Massachusetts health authorities took the unprecedented step yesterday of deputizing dentists, paramedics, and pharmacists to help administer vaccines against both the seasonal flu and the novel swine strain expected to make a return visit in the fall.

• Rep. Paul Broun: Obama’s ’socialist elite’ i ...

  The Athens Banner-Herald reports today that Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) told constituents yesterday that he thinks Democratic leaders are planning to declare martial law

Project Censored

• WALTER CRONKITE: THE END OF AN ERA – JULY 17, 20 ...

  WALTER CRONKITE: THE END OF AN ERA – JULY 17, 2009 The end of an era is a term too often over-used. But it is a term that is properly used when discussing the passing of Walter Cronkite. It is truly the end of an era in journalism. No other journalist could do what Walter did. He could cal ...

• You Can Now Find Our Investigative Research at the ...

  You can now find all of the investigative research that we have done over the years at our new and exciting Media Freedom International Website Please check the website often for news and updates.

• Analysis of Project Censored: Are We a Left-Leanin ...

  By Peter Phillips and Mickey Huff “Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe.” –Frederick Douglass ...

• Infotainment Society: Junk Food News and New ...

  By Mickey Huff and Frances A. Capell We can do the innuendo We can dance and sing When it’s said and done We haven’t told you a thing We all know that crap is king Give us dirty laundry! Don Henley, Dirty Laundry, 1982 The late New York University media scholar Neil Postma ...

• A Black President Doesn’t Mean Racism is gone in ...

  By Peter Phillips Racial inequality remains in the US. People of color continue to experience high rates of poverty, significant unemployment, police profiling and repressive incarceration. School segregation is a continuing concern among race scholars as well. According to a new Civil Rights re ...

Scoop - NZ

• Telecom and Vodafone ripping you off

  A campaign has been launched against the high termination fees charged by Telecom and Vodafone. Termination rates make up the extra cost you have to pay when you call or txt someone on another network » PLIGG_Visual_RSS_OriginalNews

• Paying with credit cards may incur a fee

  The Commerce commission has rules that businesses can charge consumers a fee for using a credit card. » PLIGG_Visual_RSS_OriginalNews

• US Still Paying Blackwater Millions

  Just days before two former Blackwater employees alleged in sworn statements filed in federal court that the company's owner, Erik Prince, "views himself as a Christian crusader tasked with eliminating Muslims and the Islamic faith from the globe," the Obama administration extended a contract with B ...

• We Can't Leave the US Middle Class Behind This Tim ...

  Even before we got to the White House, the President, the Vice President, and the economic team were crafting policies designed to offset the deepest recession since the Great Depression. Back in mid-December of last year, I remember a meeting in Chicago, with the snow swirling outside, as we began ...

• Steinbeck's Descendants

  Twice a week Sharon Risner pulls out of her driveway on White Lane and heads south on Highway 99. Around the five-mile mark she takes the Pumpkin Center exit. It's not the quickest route to work, but it does offer the best view of the land. This is the place where the sun kisses the soil and provide ...

Independent ( London )

• Leading Burma opposition member warns of fresh upr ...

  A leading member of Aung San Suu Kyi's opposition party has vowed the struggle for democracy in Burma will continue despite her incarceration and said that students and Buddhist monks could take to the streets again in the sort of mass demonstrations that rocked the junta two years ago.

• How Bush went from hero to zero in the eyes of Dic ...

  In office he was the eminence grise behind the George W Bush throne, a silent brooding figure who was the most powerful and probably the most unpopular vice president in modern United States history. Now however Dick Cheney is poised to go public, in a memoir charging that, in his second term at le ...

• Swiss move to ban minarets as 'symbols of Islamic ...

  The normally sleepy Swiss country town of Langenthal has become the focus of a virulent right-wing campaign to ban minarets from all mosques in the Alpine republic on the grounds that they symbolise ideological opposition to the country's constitution.

• Did Kremlin political chief really write murky gan ...

  Close to Zero is the tale of a Russian publisher operating in a murky political system featuring paid-off media, corrupt officials, dubious politicians and law enforcement agencies on the take.

• Bows, arrows and a dream of liberation

  A sound of gunshots filled the air as we clambered through thick undergrowth to a clearing. There, perched on a a steep mountainside surrounded by lush rainforest, was a breathtaking sight. Villagers charged around chanting in a state of high excitement.

CASMII - Campaign against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran

• Iran: Whose War?

  Summary: Huber The logical goal of Iran’s nuclear program is not possession of nuclear bombs but a thriving nuclear energy industry. Having nukes would merely make Iran a target—both Israel and the U.S. would have justification for a massive preemptive strike. We’d know they have them beca ...

• The Ever Present Military Option

  Summary: Last week, retired Air Force Gen. Chuck Wald published an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal declaring "There Is a Military Option on Iran." It’s probably not a coincidence that Wald’s piece was hot on the heels of John Bolton’s "While Diplomats Dither, Iran Builds Nukes." source: ...

• Clinton: US Supported Iran Protesters ‘Behind th ...

  Summary: In an interview today on CNN’s GPS with Fareed Zakaria, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that while the US didn’t want to come out too publicly in favor of the protesters in the wake of Iran’s disputed June elections, the State Department was “doing a lot” behind the sc ...

• Iranians selectively barred from Swedish universit ...

  Summary: Chalmers University Sweden’s national security service, Sapo, has issued a warning that Iranian citizens studying at Swedish universities could have ties to their nation’s nuclear and military establishments. Therefore, the government agency has advised Swedish universities to ban a ...

• IRAN: Nuclear Capability After 2013, Says U.S. In ...

  Summary: WASHINGTON, Aug 7 (IPS) - Iran is unlikely to be able to produce enough highly enriched uranium (HEU) for a nuclear weapon until at least 2013, according to a U.S. government intelligence estimate made public Thursday. source: IPS read more

The Daily Galaxy

• Photographic Memory In A Pill? New Research Finds ...

  The most interesting upgrades aren't for your computer, your car, or even the internet - they're for you. We've always tinkered with our own thought processes (using crude equipment like "alcohol" and "regular exercise") but now mankind has the tools...

• The Meaning Of Mars's Methane: Signs of Subsurface ...

  Scientists are studying the mysteries of the methane cycle on Mars, and have upgraded it from "We don't know" to "There's a lot more we don't know." But that's a good thing! Challenging the unknown instead of acting awkward about...

• The Galaxy's 'PBS' Model: Volunteer Your Clicks Do ...

  Our advertisers at the top of the page and on the right pay the bills that let us deliver great daily news and insights on the discoveries, people and events changing the planet. Please give our advertisers your support -click...

• Today's Most Popular Posts

  Is Mars Between Ice Ages? Experts Say "Yes" -A Galaxy Classic "The Black Cloud" - Could Non-Carbon Life Exist in Cold Clouds of Interstellar Dust? Antimatter: Angel or Demon? Mega-Mars Discovery: The "Block Island" Meterorite Ultimate Green Power! Will Bacteria...

• NASA's Volcanic Robo-Spiders: Sentinels of Future ...

  NASA has deployed a swarm of robo-spiders to stand guard over an active volcano. Possibly in preparation for appearing on a huge screen in the White House and demanding one hundred billion dollars (in funding for space science). But this...

Natural News

• H1N1 Swine Flu Scenarios: Best Case, Worst Case Pr ...

  (NaturalNews) When it comes to swine flu, the public predictions are all over the map: On one hand, governments don't want you to be so worried that you start to panic and stay home from work, but they want you to be worried enough to submit to a vaccine injection. Beyond the vaccine propaganda and ...

• Proton Pump Inhibitors to Treat GERD Cause Heartbu ...

  (NaturalNews) Prilosec, Nexium, Prevacid, Aciphex. These and a dozen more drugs known as proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) have quickly become superstars of Big Pharma. As recently reported by US News and World Report , last year people worldwide shelled out some $ 25.6 billion for these drugs that are ...

• States Drug Foster Kids to Death - Medical Neglect ...

  (NaturalNews) A shocking 31 percent of teenagers in foster care in the state of Florida have been placed on psychotropic drugs, the Miami Herald has revealed. "It is doubtful that so many children in Florida have severe mental illnesses such as schizophrenia," wrote columnist Daniel Shoer Roth. "Rat ...

• Resveratrol - The Miracle Nutrient for Cancer, Cho ...

  (NaturalNews) You've all heard the good news about resveratrol, commonly known as the "red wine nutrient." There's more to resveratrol than red wine, though, and it's helpful for far more than just preventing heart disease. It's also phenomenal for maintaining a healthy cholesterol balance and even ...

• Chinese Herbs Treat Endometriosis Better Than West ...

  (NaturalNews) Increasingly, Chinese herbal medicine (CHM) is being put to the test by Western scientists -- and the results are sometimes not only successful but downright astounding. A case in point: a new review of CHM research by British scientists just published in Cochrane Database of Systemati ...

• TheGallopingBeaver

• Brits in Afghanistan

  MICHAEL YON HAS AN INTERESTING COLLECTION OF PICTURES , well worth a look. He's a former Green Beret, native of Winter Haven, Fl. who has been reporting from Iraq and Afghanistan since December 2004. This report, from July 27-29 is from his experiences with the Welsh Guards. Great pictures, check it ...

• Forty Years Later . . . .

  For the good times . . . . (Cross-posted from Moved to Vancouver )

• Netroots Nation in Second Life

  This is going to be a long post, but bear with me, it's for your own good. Look, you've been reading this blog for a while and so you probably know I'm involved in Second Life, running movies and DJing parties and generally hanging out . And you know my politics are somewhat to the left of the mor ...

• The Only Thing Between You and Your Doctor Is . . ...

  A high-paid lobbyist, no doubt. One of the few real journalists left has been running a series of programs on US health care "reform" the past few weeks. I'm just catching up on my podcasts after travelling last week, and this Bill Moyers piece with Trudy Lieberman and Dr. Marcia Angell is great. ...

• Bad, bad crazy

  Southern Poverty Law Center has a new report out on the very recent rise in the number and scale of American terror groups.

Media Matters for America

• After previously debunking end-of-life falsehoods ...

  On August 13, ABC's Kate Snow and the Associated Press both characterized the established fact that end-of-life counseling under the House health care reform bill would be voluntary as simply something that President Obama "contends." But both ABC and the AP had previously reported that und ...

• Conservative media ignore their own long history ...

  Numerous media conservatives have misrepresented House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's comments that protesters are "carrying swastikas and symbols like that to a town meeting on health care" to express outrage that she would call the protesters "Nazis" -- even though she didn't. However, their outrage r ...

• Watching Fox & Friends can be hazardo ...

  Fox & Friends continued its pattern of consistently advancing falsehoods about health care reform when Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX) -- whom the program hosted to take questions about the reform legislation from viewers and "dispel the myths" -- falsely claimed that under the House proposal, "th ...

• Beck falsely claims White House never takes ques ...

  Fox News' Glenn Beck asserted, "I know [Fox News White House correspondent] Major Garrett doesn't ask the questions at the White House, because he's never called on. Hmmm. I wonder why." In fact, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs has responded to questions from Garrett during every press ...

• USA Today provides platform for Boehner ...

  USA Today published an op-ed by House Minority Leader John Boehner in which he claimed that a Democratic health care reform bill "would create a 'Health Benefits Advisory Committee' that would make determinations about what kinds of treatments, items and services can be covered within certain b ...

Global Research.ca

• Cracks Emerging in NAFTA

  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.

• 9/11 Mind Swell

  Scientific evidence refutes the official story

• Dennis Kucinich and Bob Chapman on The Global Rese ...

  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.

• Netanyahu behind Obama birth rumors: Report

  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.

• Iran proposes measure against nuclear facility att ...

  For more details, please click on the link to read the article.

TPM Cafe

• The Neocons' White Hope: Cheney in 2012

  Dick Cheney is running for President. Why else is he refusing to go away, giving interviews, writing a book, and serving as leader of the disloyal opposition. Why else would he be positing the idea that if another terror attack... Sponsored Topics: President - George W. Bush - Dick Cheney - Unite ...

• Mr Big Wells and the new faster SEC

  I just received and filled out a customer satisfaction survey from the Securities Exchange Commission. Its prompted me to take some time off from the mega-Fannie-and-Freddie series. I wasn’t satisfied – and the questions did not allow me to spell... Sponsored Topics: US Securities a ...

• Modelling Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac – Part III

  In the previous post I showed you what had caused the big losses at Fannie and Freddie to date. In short it was mark-to-market securities (on private label securities and the like) and interest rate hedging instruments that collapsed in... Sponsored Topics: Fannie Mae - Freddie Mac - Business - ...

• T. Friedman "sharing" with and "lecturing" IDF gen ...

  Thanks to Haaretz's Anshel Pfeffer for telling us about Tom's recent lecture gig with the IDF general staff. (HT: As'ad Abu-Khalil.) Pfeffer writes, Friedman gave a lecture last week to a number of members of the IDF General Staff. He... Sponsored Topics: Middle East - Haaretz - Israel - Warfare ...

• Presented By:

TruthOut

• Rove "Driving Force" Behind US Attorney Firings

  Karl Rove. (Photo: Charles Dharapak / The Associated Press) read more

• Olbermann: "Death Panel" Palin Dangerously Irrespo ...

  Sarah the Quitter incites mob violence and national disunity by "making stuff up." Finally as promised a Special Comment on this terrible moment in American history, and those unfortunate and irresponsible Americans who have brought us to it. read more

• Bombs Kill 14 Afghan Civilians, One US Soldier

  Bomb blasts in southern Afghanistan killed 14 Afghan civilians, including 11 members of one family, and a US soldier, officials said Thursday, in new attacks threatening elections next week. In an increasingly violent north, Afghan security forces fought off Taliban in a battle an official ...

• Europe: Financial Crisis Leads to Rapes

  Prague - Several groups across Eastern Europe have called for a crackdown on mafia-run job agencies amid reports that their members are raping and torturing migrant workers who have lost their jobs in the economic crisis. Media in the Czech Republic have carried reports that thousands of fo ...

• "Death to Obama" Sign Holder in Maryland Detained

  Hagerstown, Maryland - The Secret Service is investigating a man who authorities said held a sign reading "Death to Obama" outside a town hall meeting on health-care reform in western Maryland. The sign also read, "Death to Michelle and her two stupid kids," referring to the first name of P ...

The Heathlander

• Silencing civil society

  Former Israeli military commander Efran Efrati recently testified to the BBC that Palestinian children are ‘routinely ill-treated’ by Israeli soldiers: “You take the kid, you blindfold him, you handcuff him, he’s really shaking… Sometimes you cuff his legs too. Sometimes it cuts off the ci ...

• Gaza Freedom March

  For those who don’t know, Norman Finkelstein and others are organising a mass non-violent global march on Gaza to break the siege. Some updates: - Gaza Freedom March website: http://www.gazafreedommarch.org/ - YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/GazaFreedomMarch - A list of peop ...

• The latest anti-Hamas meme: “child brides”

  Last week, Hamas sponsored a mass wedding celebration in Gaza, perhaps in an attempt to reverse its flagging poll ratings: ‘Nearly a thousand Palestinians celebrated marriage on Thursday night in a ceremony organised by Hamas in the north of the Gaza Strip. Hamas dignitaries including Mahmud Zahar ...

• Chomsky on the ‘Responsibility to Protect’

  Earlier this week Noam Chomsky participated, along with Jean Bricmont, Gareth Evans (former Australian FM and long-time President of the International Crisis Group) and Ngugi wa Thiong’o, in a UN panel on the doctrine of ‘Responsibility to Protect’ (R2P). You can watch the three hour discussio ...

• How to lose friends and alienate people

  Hiring paid hasbaratchiks to “spew forth bullshit” online, parading out Ehud Olmert to convince Americans that opposing settlement construction is like opposing rainbows and kittens, launching a smear campaign against Human Rights Watch, one of the most conservative human rights organisations ar ...

• Water - AlterNet

• The CA Legislature Unveiled 5 New Water Bills -- A ...

  I would urge that California's water warriors hold their opinions until they actually read and digest these bills.

• Vitaminwater's Empty Calories Are at the Heart of ...

  Vitaminwater tells its customers to "hydrate responsibly." That means not drinking 125-calorie sugar rushes like ... Vitaminwater.

• Why Corporations, Emerging Powers and Petro-States ...

  In the past six months, big players in the global economy have grabbed 50 million acres of arable land, from Africa to Southeast Asia.

• The Southwest as We've Known it Over the Last 50 Y ...

  Water in the very near future will be neither cheap nor plentiful, and much of the Southwest is destined for real trouble.

• Will Obama Crack Down on Rocket Fuel in Drinking W ...

  EPA chief Lisa P. Jackson is revisiting the Bush administration's refusal to regulate rocket fuel pollution in the nation's drinking water.

TruthHugger

• Republicans Have Government Insurance, Why Can’t ...

  For weeks I have been listening to all the BS Republicans have spewed about health care reform. Republicans shouted it was socialized medicine and when that didn’t work they came up with other untruths. The fact of the matter is all members of Congress use the public option plan. Republicans are w ...

• Retire Early In Self Defense Could Be A Mistake †...

  /h3> Collect Now, or Later? Timing Your Social Security Benefits With the current state of US and world economy, the alternative to jumping out a window, committing a heinous crime or planting your pup tent under an overpass, is retire early and collect your meager social security check at gene ...

• Texas Progressive Alliance – July 13, 2009

  It’s Monday and it’s time for another version of the Texas Progressive Alliance weekly highlight reel. Off the Kuff suggests that a pro-science PAC could do a lot of good, nationally and in Texas. WCNews at Eye On Williamson reminds us that despite the brouhaha over transportation during the rec ...

• Protect Us From Another Celebrity Death and Networ ...

  The world is reeling from political upheaval, economic meltdown and environmental catastrophe. What does the national media focus on for two weeks? The high drama of a controversial musical artist who has the audacity of dying. News that effects each and every person on this planet is buried un ...

• Texas Progressive Alliance – July 6, 2009

  Now that we’ve celebrated another birthday for America, it’s time for the weekly Texas Progressive Alliance blog roundup. Here are your highlights from the holiday week. The loss of Ron Artest from the Rockets to the Lakers (essentially a trade for Trevor Arista) is a bad deal, writes PDiddie a ...

Dandelion Salad - Featured Writers' Posts

• Entering the Greatest Depression in History More B ...

  by Andrew Gavin Marshall Featured Writer Dandelion Salad August 7, 2009 Introduction While there i

• Sibel Edmonds Fights to Testify by Luke Ryland

  by Luke Ryland Featured Writer Dandelion Salad Luke’s blog post August 7, 2009 Bradblog has the la

• So easily you will lose your social status By Rola ...

  By Roland Michel Tremblay Featured Writer Dandelion Salad The Marginal 13 August, 2009 I work in

• Exclusive: Rage from within against the Amercian E ...

  by Rocket Kirchner Featured Writer Dandelion Salad Rocket Kirchner (blog) Rocket Kirchner (youtub

• A Recipe For Disaster by Bruce Gagnon + Day Last P ...

  Warning These videos may contain images depicting the reality and horror of war/violence and shoul

Unexplained Mysteries

• Invisible doorways one step closer

  A new theory has been developed that could take us one step closer to invisible doorways such as that on platform 9 and 3/4 from the Harry Potter nove...

• Giant 'meat-eating' plant found

  Botanists have discovered a new species of giant carnivorous plant in the Philippines. The plant is so large that it is able to catch not only insects...

• Killer whales visit 'social clubs'

  It has been revealed that Killer whales visit their own type of social clubs much the same way as humans do with congregations of up to 100 whales sig...

• "Mermaid" sightings grip Israel

  A spate of sightings of alleged Mermaids in Israel have created quite a stir in the country, one town council is offering a $1m reward to anyone who c...

• Two worlds collide in deep space

  Astronomers have observed two distant planets that collided thousands of years ago in what would have been a catastrophic event for both bodies, the s...

Grassroots

• Building a Movement, Haitian Style

  pigs.jpg I spent the better part of last week crisscrossing Haiti’s arid Northwest with Grassroots International’s partner the National Congress of the Peasant’s Movement of Papay (MPNKP). MPNKP is best known to our allies and friends fo ...

• Resilient Hondurans Lead The Way To Protect Democr ...

  IMG00292.jpg Today, thousands of people will fill the streets of Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras. They are students, housekeepers, children and farmers from different parts of country—many of whom walked 10-12 miles a day to get to the ...

• Yes, We Can - But Will We Join Our Neighbors to Re ...

  More than a month after the military coup in the Central American country of Honduras (for which the term “banana republic” was originally coined due to the overwhelming influence of U.S. fruit corporations in that country), the junta is still in power and shows little real sign of budging. re ...

• They Are Afraid of Us, Because We are Not Afraid o ...

  Tom Loudon from our ally the Alliance for Responsible Trade, which is a member of the Hemispheric Social Alliance (a Grassroots International grantee) is currently in Honduras as part of an international human rights monitoring delegation. Today, August 11th, the Global Day of Action for Honduras, h ...

• On the Global Day of Action for Honduras, Donate y ...

  Want to do something simple to help support Honduran democracy and keep the crisis in the public eye? Donate your status! It’s free, easy, and can make a huge impact. Right now, the corporate news media is mostly silent about what’s happening on the ground in Honduras and the role of US polic ...

Climate

• August 13, 2009

  U.S. Court Blocks Plan to Curb Mountaintop Mining (Reuters) A federal court in Washington has blocked an attempt by the Obama administration to overturn a Bush-era rule that made it easier for coal mining companies to dump mountaintop debris into valley streams. Australian Parliament Rejects C ...

• August 12, 2009

  Oil Sands Test of Obama's Green Credentials (Financial Times) The Obama administration faces a test of its environmental credentials in deciding whether to approve a pipeline carrying greenhouse gas-intensive oil sands fuel from Canada into the US. Virginia Judge Nixes Permit for Coal Power Pla ...

• August 11, 2009

  Alaska Lawmakers Override Palin Energy Veto (AP) In a final spat with former Gov. Sarah Palin, the Alaska Legislature voted to override her veto of $28.6 million in federal stimulus funds intended for energy efficiency projects. India Says Developing World Not Split in Climate Talks (Reuters) ...

• August 10, 2009

  Vast Expanses of Arctic Ice Melt in Summer Heat (AP) The Arctic Ocean has given up tens of thousands more square miles of ice on Sunday in a relentless summer of melt, with scientists watching through satellite eyes for a possible record low polar ice cap. China to Unveil Plan for 'New Energy ...

• August 8-9, 2009

  Climate Change Seen as Threat to U.S. Security (New York Times) Climate change will pose profound strategic challenges to the U.S., raising the prospect of military intervention to deal with the effects of violent storms, drought, mass migration and pandemics, military analysts have revealed. ...

TomDispatch

• Tomgram: Withdrawing by Bike from Iraq

  [ Note for TomDispatch Readers: So it's sayonara for a couple of weeks. I'm taking my usual August break. TomDispatch will return sometime the week of August 24th, but will be on a limited posting schedule through Labor Day. Let me take this opportunity once again to thank those of you who hav ...

• Tomgram: Mark Engler, Protesting at Climate Groun ...

  We're so past the Roman Empire by now that it's probably time to update the phrase "fiddling while Rome burns." What about, for instance, "writing fake letters ostensibly from real non-profit groups to weaken a climate-change bill while the planet burns"? It's true. According to the New York Ti ...

• Tomgram: Jamail and Lazare, Lost in Military Limb ...

  [ Note for TomDispatch Readers: In Chalmers Johnson's recent piece, "Three Good Reasons to Liquidate Our Empire," the mission of the Service Women's Action Network (SWAN) was mischaracterized. It has now been corrected at the piece. ] It's not exactly a secret that the U.S. Army and the U.S. M ...

• Tomgram: John Feffer, Their Martyrs and Our Heroe ...

  The way you imagine someone engaged in a suicide attack depends, not surprisingly, on which end of the attack you happen to be on -- in cultural, if not literal terms. In American films and pop culture, there were few acts more inexplicable or malevolent in the years of my childhood than those of ...

• Tomgram: Frida Berrigan, 64 Years Too Late and No ...

  As another August 6th approaches, let me tell you a little story about Hiroshima and me: As a young man, I was probably not completely atypical in having the Bomb (the 1950s was a great time for capitalizing what was important) on my brain, and not just while I was ducking under my school desk ...

• Smirking Chimp

• A Few More Thoughts About Single-Payer and Medicar ...

  Some critics have written, in response to my article calling for extension of the single-payer plan called Medicare to all Americans , that actually Medicare is a badly flawed program that leaves America's elderly without coverage for many important health services, and which requires them to pay fo ...

• Biking Out of Iraq

  On Troops That Don't Depart, Experts Who Never Leave the Scene, an Air Force That Suddenly Wasn't There, and a War That No Longer Needs a Justification — from TomDispatch The Bush administration invaded Iraq in March 2003 with a force of approximately 130,000 troops. Top White House and Pentagon of ...

• Threatening a Class War If Billionaires Have to Pa ...

  I've written before about how the Washington drumbeat for a "commission" to slash Social Security and Medicare is starting in earnest - and how that commission aims to artificially skew the terms of our tax and spending debate. If/when that commission is created, you can bet those parameters will be ...

• Obama on Drugs: 98% Cheney?

  Eighty billion dollars of WHAT? I searched all over the newspapers and TV transcripts and no one asked the President what is probably the most important question of what passes for debate on the issue of health care reform: $80 billion of WHAT? On June 22, President Obama said he'd reached agreement ...

• Glenn Beck: Government-owned GM to Make Cars Fuele ...

  Fox News host Glenn Beck stirred populist outrage today by reporting that taxpayer-aided General Motors is set to make cars that run on the fuel of euthanized grandmas. Mr. Beck said that the grandma-fueled cars were part of President Obama's "Hitler-like plan" to bail out the auto industry by conve ...

Ten Percent

• Would Obama Have Supported Pinochet?

  Honduras, from the Quixote Center (ht2 Otto)- In Tegucigalpa, the Teachers University resembles a military base. Large numbers of people remain detained and missing. The use of 1980’s torture centers as detention sites raises concerns that people are being tortured. COMAL and COPINH report that ...

• It’s Obama’s Back Yard Now

  (IPS) – The head of Colombia’s biggest association of indigenous people is concerned that allowing U.S. troops to use military bases in his country will signal a regression to former times when the United States exercised control over Latin America, while a native activist warned of an increase ...

• Honduran Coup Leaders Contracting Israeli Special ...

  A good example of how the web networks and spreads information, I read Borev, posted about it, IKN included me in a post and in that round up was also Machetera with an interview with René Andrés Pavón, President of the Honduran Human Rights Commission (CODEH) by Dick Emanuelsson, excerpt- Dick ...

• Capitalism Means To Kill You

  Look America it’s fine, flee from the evil NHS, keep being killed for corporations’ profits. Or… if you are going to fight this hard for something, make the fight worth it, the party claiming to represent your interest, they might be a bit fibby. Greg Palast- On June 22, President Obama said h ...

• A Canadian View Of The IPCC

  I cam across this while looking at Taser related gubbins and it’s interesting to see in an article about the lack of oversight of the Canadian police how our IPCC is described- On Tuesday, the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP issued a report that looked at the broad issue of how t ...

Paul Krugman

• The irresponsibility era

  Investors Business Daily: they're dumb, but they're also cowards.

• Even more gilded

  Inequality set a new record in 2007.

• Nobody could have predicted

  It's 1993 again.

• Will technology make workers obsolete?

  Will technology make ordinary workers obsolete?

• Bernie Madoff and the birthers

  The success of right-wing hate may represent a case of affinity fraud.

No Quarter

• Why We Won’t Get Bin Laden

  If we can’t kill hornets on a U.S. military base then we sure as hell can’t whack Osama bin Laden. What the hell am I writing about? I spent part of this week on a U.S. military base that houses an elite Special Operations unit. Can’t tell you where because the particular unit is [...]

• Far out! So the far-right lunatics weren’t compl ...

  HANG ON HERE! Are you telling me that those rightwing crazies were NOT completely out of their minds for wringing their hands, renting their garments, and loudly protesting an end-of-life provision in Obama’s health plan? This news story is in The Hill, an altogether sober publication, and featu ...

• He lied to you, Suckers!

  (Bumped up from Wednesday afternoon.) Who fell for these words and voted for him? He played you like a violin, didn’t he? Would you vote for him again in 2012? Words and promises during the campaign were thrown around willy-nilly with no intention of following through them. It was all a masterful ...

• Inhumanity To Women, Children, And Horses, Too

  Secretary Clinton does it again. Stands up for women, that is. Here is a brief clip of her speaking in the Democratic Republic of Congo as she continues on her trip through Africa: As she has done for so many years, Hillary Clinton speaks out for, and stands with, women and children, calling out ...

• there is plenty of bs for the plants in obama’s ...

  You know the drill - the liberal media has been smearing the Right and opponents of HCR calling them racist teabaggers. Now they are obsessed with swastikas and people displaying posters of Obama as Hitler. (Funny how none of them mention all the Bushitler attacks we saw the last eight years.) But, ...

Environmental Graffiti

• The Incredible Terraced Chalk Ponds of Pamukkale
• Amsterdam From Above
• Largest Temple Complex in Polynesia
• Insane Tribal Body Modifications
• Man Vs Alligator

Foreign Policy in Focus

• Lack of North American Leadership

  The three amigos met in Guadalajara and failed to usher in a new paradigm of North American cooperation.

• Learning from the British in Iraq

  History suggests that the United States won't be leaving Iraq any time soon.

• The Pursuit of True Security

  For all of the money we spend on defense, are we really all that safer?

• The Bully in Baghdad

  Politics has trumped democracy as Iraq just postponed a key vote on the status of U.S. forces in their country.

• Postcard From...Dharamsala

  Dharamsala is where Tibet 2.0 is being created.

Therapy News

• Temp Jobs Harm Mental Health - Study Suggests

  A GoodTherapy.org News Headline In the modern economic environment, many people are struggling with job loss or with the fear of losing their sources of income, and some are turning to temp jobs in an effort to stay afloat. While this may be a wise choice financially, a study conducted at McGill Uni ...

• Multi-National Study Links Many Mental Health Conc ...

  A GoodTherapy.org News Headline In the consideration of suicide, it’s a commonly held idea that those with symptoms of depression are most prone to thinking about suicide and exhibiting relevant behaviors. This may not be the case, however, as described by a recent study based on over one hundred ...

• Therapy for Smoking Cessation May Ward Off Dementi ...

  A GoodTherapy.org News Update Smoking Cessation Therapies May Ward Off Dementia Cognitive decline is a serious mental health issue affecting a large number of aging people, and tends to strike for a variety of reasons, sometimes without much of any warning. As the progress of medical science marches ...

• Annual Conference for OCD Helps Clients Cope

  A GoodTherapy.org News Headline While the effects, for both clients and their families, of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder or OCD can have far-reaching consequences that greatly impact elements of everyday life, many who grapple with the mental health concern remain untreated, even during the normal c ...

• Growing Awareness of Nutrition Sets to Foster Happ ...

  A GoodTherapy.org News Update Check into a given health-related news portal these days and you’re likely to find a wealth of material about obesity. Calling the increasing number of people who grow up overweight an “epidemic,” some medical professionals and reporters have represented the ...

Mountaintop Removal

• Pancake weather: WNC Read-for-All novel offers viv ...

  There may be no better insider's view of a community visited by mountaintop removal than Ann Pancake's novel “Strange as This Weather Has Been.”

• South Charleston Couple Arrested on Meth Charges ( ...

  Two people in the Kanawha Valley are behind bars facing meth charges.

• Nation Digest: Judge Rebuffs Obama on Mining Waste ...

  WEST VIRGINIA

• Dave Cooper: Rocker Ted Nugent to Emcee Pro-Coal " ...

  Nugent, whose on-stage antics include wearing a loincloth and inviting President Obama to "suck on my machine gun" will emcee the event, which also inculdes Sean Hannity and Hank Williams Jr.

• Nation Digest: Judge Rebuffs Obama on Mining Waste ...

  WEST VIRGINIA A federal judge on Wednesday rebuffed the Obama administration's attempt to reverse a Bush-era rule that allows surface mine waste to be dumped near streams.

Memeorandum

• BREAKING: Obama Official Linked to Racially Charge ...

  Michelle Oddis / Human Events : BREAKING: Obama Official Linked to Racially Charged Boycott of Glenn Beck — A racially charged activist group called “Color of Change” founded by Van Jones, a special advisor to the Obama Administration, is trying to silence popular radio and Fox News pers ...

• All Hail Bipartisanship! ... (Greg Sargent/The Plu ...

  Greg Sargent / The Plum Line : All Hail Bipartisanship! Grassley Kills End Of Life Provision, Attacks Dems For Leaving It “Open To Interpretation” — If there were ever a day where Dems had an opening to argue that Republicans are the ones responsible for putting hopes for a bipartisan ...

• Sources: Edwards to admit paternity of ex-mistress ...

  WRAL-TV : Sources: Edwards to admit paternity of ex-mistress' child — RALEIGH, N.C. — Sources have told WRAL News that they expect former U.S. Sen. John Edwards to admit that he is the father of his former mistress' 18-month-old daughter. — Edwards, a two-time Democratic presidentia ...

• Zeke Emanuel on Sarah Palin's Accusation of 'Death ...

  Political Punch : Zeke Emanuel on Sarah Palin's Accusation of ‘Death Panels’: 'It's An Absolute Outrage' — Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, the health-policy adviser at the White House's Office of Management and Budget — who has been caricatured by conservatives as a “Dr. Death” seeking to pul ...

• For 'Death Panels' Before She Was Against Them? .. ...

  Lee Fang / Think Progress : For ‘Death Panels’ Before She Was Against Them? Palin Endorsed End Of Life Counseling As Governor — In recent weeks, right-wing groups have been pushing the myth that health care reform will somehow kill seniors. One of the most high profile voices pushin ...

Energy & Environment News

• Australian Parliament Rejects Carbon Trade Plan

  The rejection brought the nation closer to a snap election and prolonged financial uncertainty for major emitters.

• In Obama Garden, Less Lead

  After tests of the White House’s kitchen garden site revealed high levels of lead, workers added lime, crab meal and compost to the soil in order to improve it.

• Amaranth Settles Charges of Market Manipulation

  The hedge fund controlled more than half the United States natural gas market before its collapse in 2006.

• Indian Point Nuclear Reactors Pass U.S. Safety Tes ...

  The owner of the plant, about 45 miles north of Times Square, would be able to safely manage them over 20 years, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission found.

• National Briefing | Environment: Bush Mining Rule ...

  A federal judge let stand a Bush administration rule that makes it easier for companies involved in mountaintop coal mining.

5+ quakes - 7 days

• M 5.7, Tonga

  Thursday, August 13, 2009 11:17:02 UTC Friday, August 14, 2009 12:17:02 AM at epicenter Depth : 14.70 km (9.13 mi)

• M 5.6, off the coast of Costa Rica

  Thursday, August 13, 2009 09:37:36 UTC Thursday, August 13, 2009 03:37:36 AM at epicenter Depth : 10.00 km (6.21 mi)

• M 5.8, Andaman Islands, India region

  Thursday, August 13, 2009 09:21:36 UTC Thursday, August 13, 2009 03:21:36 PM at epicenter Depth : 35.00 km (21.75 mi)

• M 5.3, Easter Island region

  Thursday, August 13, 2009 03:46:54 UTC Wednesday, August 12, 2009 07:46:54 PM at epicenter Depth : 10.00 km (6.21 mi)

• M 6.7, Izu Islands, Japan region

  Wednesday, August 12, 2009 22:48:51 UTC Thursday, August 13, 2009 07:48:51 AM at epicenter Depth : 51.00 km (31.69 mi)

China Dialogue

• Beginning of the end for oil?

  Greenpeace and others see the industry approaching a tipping point, thanks to price declines, technological advances and climate policies. Controversial investments in Canadian tar sands may be doomed. David Teather reports. A long-term decline in the demand for oil could undermine the huge investme ...

• Solar futures at the foot of Everest

  Passive solar homes could help to improve people’s daily lives and protect the environment on the Tibetan plateau, finds Cai Rupeng. The summer had only just started, but village elder Yuzhen was already looking forward to winter. Standing in front of her home in Tingri , Tibet, one looks up and s ...

• Leading the swine-flu battle

  WHO director Margaret Chan announced in June that a new virus had reached pandemic proportions. She tells Aida Edemariam how H1N1 is being fought and of the personal price she pays. Although she would no doubt point out that swine flu should properly be called H1N1, there is something pleasing in th ...

• “I openly call for emissions cuts” (2)

  In the second section of a two-part interview, Liu Jianqiang and Yi Shui talk to Hu Angang about how China’s climate-change policy is formed, and how it can change. [Produced in association with Rutgers Climate and Social Policy Initiative ] chinadialogue: Many Chinese people who oppose a comm ...

• “I openly call for emissions cuts” (1)

  He is one of the country’s best known economists, and a rare voice in calling on China to commit to reductions in greenhouse-gas pollution. Liu Jianqiang and Yi Shui talk to Hu Angang. [Produced in association with Rutgers Climate and Social Policy Initiative ] The publication of Hu Angang’s ...

Daily Censored

• Giuliani says Sarah Palin’s debunked ‘death pa ...

  Read the full story at Think Progress Yet another prominent Republican has endorsed former Alaska governor Sarah Palin’s astonishingly false claim, which she doubled down on today, that health care reform will lead to “death panels.” At the “GOPAC” political action committee convention ...

• GOP Rep Hands Out ‘Inflammatory’ Flier Saying ...

  Read the full story at Think Progress Speaking after a panel discussion at the Naperville Chamber of Commerce panel yesterday, Rep. Judy Biggert (R-IL) denounced the disruptions at congressional town halls over the August recess. “What bothers me the most about this is we do have some people that ...

• Honduran protestors target Dunkin Donuts, Burger K ...

  Read the full story at Christian Science Monitor | Top Stories Demonstrators calling for the return of deposed President Manuel Zelaya clashed with police Wednesday for the second day in a row. Curfew declared. …

• Hillary Clinton, in Liberia, targets good governme ...

  Read the full story at Christian Science Monitor | Top Stories The country, led by Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, has made significant strides since its brutal civil war ended in 2003. …

• Bill O’Reilly Discusses New Miley Cyrus “Pole ...

  Read the full story at News Hounds After discussing the question, on last night’s Factor’s “Back of the Book segment, of whether there is racism involved in the town hall protests (Bill doesn’t see it – but then he “doesn’t see color,” right?) the talk moved on to the ...

AlterNet's Breaking News

• Zambian court to rule on ex-leader's graft case

• Online news venture says over 500 publications sig ...

• Troop rise in Afghanistan still option for US: Gat ...

• Call to reassure region over US-Colombia base deal

• Disgraced Vick to return to NFL with Eagles: repor ...

Institute for Policy Studies

• Their Martyrs and Our Heroes

  Powerful, developed countries have suicide bombers too.

• Taxing Wealth for the Common Good

  Business leaders and wealthy individuals call for a repeal of the Bush-era taxes on high incomes.

• The Destruction of the Black Middle Class

  Left out of the commentary on race and class over the Gates affair has been talk of the increasing impoverishment — or, we should say, re-impoverishment — of African Americans as a group.

• Asia's Axis of Evil?

  Burma and North Korea are the pariahs of Asia. Are these birds of a feather flocking together?

• Obama: Renegotiate NAFTA as You Promised

  Mexican, Canadian, and U.S. leaders should scrap their failed "Security and Prosperity Partnership" and begin overhauling the North American Free Trade agreement at an upcoming Guadalajara meeting.

• Reuters - Most Popular Articles

• Legendary guitarist, inventor Les Paul dies, age 9 ...

  LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Legendary guitarist and inventor Les Paul, who pioneered the design of solid body Gibson electric guitars that bore his name, died Thursday at a New York hospital of complications from pneumonia. He was 94.

• Fox News' "Glenn Beck" loses advertisers

  NEW YORK (Nielsen Business Media) - Some of the nation's biggest advertisers are distancing themselves from Fox News host Glenn Beck after he called President Obama a racist during a July 28 broadcast.

• Food giants say U.S. running out of sugar

  CHICAGO (Reuters) - Large U.S. food companies have been pushing the Obama administration to ease sugar import curbs, threatening higher consumer prices and possible job losses, citing forecasts for unprecedented sugar shortages.

• Piracy feared as mystery of missing ship deepens

  MOSCOW (Reuters) - Pirates probably hijacked a merchant ship which disappeared after sailing through the English Channel last month, its operator said on Wednesday.

• Nude drunk loses way in hotel

  WELLINGTON (Reuters) - An extremely drunk, naked man lost his way at a New Zealand hotel and ended up sleeping in the wrong room, forcing its female occupant to hide in the bathroom, local media reported.

Godspace

• Unemployment as a Spiritual Practice

  I am now back from Australia and as you can imagine the posts for my series on What is a Spiritual Practice have been mounting up while I have had limited internet access and less time to focus on such things. Â Thanks for your patience and for your prayers during this challenging season. Today’ ...

• Editing your Life: The Spiritual Discipline of Edi ...

  I am sitting in Sydney on a beautiful but crisp winter’s morning watching the rainbow lorikeets out in the trees. Â My Dad’s funeral is over and I will head back to Seattle in 2 days time. Â I have been very aware of prayer and the grace of God in the midst of this. Â Thanks to [...]

• Living in Transition as Spiritual Practice

  I am now in Sydney Australia after what has been one of the easiest long international trips I have made for a long time. Â I even slept for several hours on the flight which makes me very aware of the fact that people have been praying for me. Today’s article comes from Guy Chmieleski who is [. ...

• Recent Additions to the Spiritual Practices series

  Here’s the round-up of the most recent Spiritual Practices posts: The Spiritual Practice of Apologizing by T Freeman Love-making as a Spiritual Practice by Mark Scandrette Smoking the Glory of God by Jason Clark The Spiritual Practice of Getting Honest With Myself by Jonathan Brink Spiritual Disci ...

• Between the Sheets: Sleeping as A Spiritual Practi ...

  I will be heading out to Australia this afternoon but am hoping to continue posting while I travel. Â The submissions continue to arrive which is wonderful and I am enjoying reading them before I post them. This morning’s post is from Teri Peterson a presbyterian pastor who loves her new bed (wh ...

Equality Trust

• Shattering the myth of equality

  An article by Boris Frankel in Melbourne's newspaper 'The Age'.

• Polly Toynbee: This bold equality push is just wha ...

  Polly Toynbee writing about the new Equality Bill today's Guardian. "Harriet Harman's bill is a frank recognition of the role of class in Britain. A decade earlier, it might have had a real impact..."

• Seumas Milne: This naked display of class egotism ...

  "It's more than a week since Alistair Darling's budget, but the howls of protest haven't stopped for a day ever since. That's not been the public sector employees facing a harsh squeeze on jobs and pay who've been squealing, or the million workers expected to join the dole queues in the next year, ...

• Bob Holman on social breakdown

  Bob Holman writes in the Glasgow Herald about the evidence in The Spirit Level.

• Inequality is the root of our unhappiness

  Former director of the Institute of Education Peter Mortimore, writing in today's Education Guardian.

IntelNews

• News you may have missed #0068

  US overt aid to Pakistan revealed. Intolerance of Arabs, Muslims led to torture, says US interrogator. China drops Rio Tinto espionage charges.

• Sri Lankan forces score massive intelligence victo ...

  Not only does the Sri Lankan government appear to be scoring a massive tactical victory in its 25-year military confrontation with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), it is also well on its way to smashing the LTTE’s intelligence infrastructure.

• Ex-FBI translator alleges Turkish intelligence act ...

  A former FBI translator has alleged that agents acting at the behest of the Turkish government have bugged, blackmailed and bribed US politicians.

• News you may have missed #0067

  David Wise on CIA assassinations. These are the architects of torture in 9/11’s wake. Defector recounts torture, terrorism by Uzbek government.

• News you may have missed #0066

  US court upholds conviction of CIA contractor. US ex-Attorney General comes out against CIA probe. A rare Chinese view on the Rio Tinto spy case.

Res'Eau-WaterNet

• Too Many Canadians Without Safe Water: $5.2M to He ...

  For six million Canadians, quenching their thirst isn’t a matter of simply turning on the kitchen faucet.

• Dr. David Wilkinson appointed Director of the Clea ...

  RES'EAU-WaterNET researcher Dr. David Wilkinson was recently appointed Director of the Clean Energy Research Centre (CERC), beginning July 1, 2009.

• Walkerton Clean Water Centre Receives Ontario Mini ...

  The Walkerton Clean Water Centre (WCWC) – a RES’EAU-WaterNET partner – received the 2008 Emerald Award for innovation from the Ontario Ministry of the Environment at an awards ceremony held on March 3, 2009.

• Filling the glass

  Innovation Canada : Showcasing Research Excellence in Canada

PDA AMERICA

• A Progressive Response to Mitch Stewart & OFA

  Dear Mitch Stewart & OFA, I am glad you are still Organizing for America — we need the activated grassroots energy that swept Mr. Obama into office to keep things moving forward. But I have ...

• Progressive Democrats take a stand on health care

  From the RNN: The Real News Network Some members of Congress are going to fight for a robust public option and a single-payer amendment VIDEO CAN BE VIEWED BY CLICKING HERE An amendment introduced by representative Anthony ...

• Who Decides About War?

  WhoDecidesAboutWar.org National Conference on War Powers, Law, and Democracy October 2-3, 2009 Washington D.C. Who decides about war and peace? Congress? The President? The Courts? The People? What kind of national defense should the U.S. have? What ...

• Another Scandal Near New Orleans

  By Jayne Lyn Stahl There have been no shortage of news stories about how detainees have been treated at Guantanamo Bay, and Abu Ghraib before it. Likewise, there has been a lot of talk about so-called ...

• CDPP Report for August 2009

  CDPP report, August 2009, Mervis Reissig and Anna Givens Two of us have volunteered to continue working with the Congressional District Point Person program for PDA. As CD Point People ourselves and longtime volunteers for ...

Marler Blog

• OK, I made a mistake - FSIS did publish Retail Rec ...

  I blew it. I look at the FSIS site daily and I missed that they had posted the below list of retail outlets that received the Salmonella Newport Beef: I am sorry. The Sterling Pacific Meat products subject to recall include: Fatburger Brand: * 20-pound packages of "8 oz. PUCK (80/20) GROUND BEEF P ...

• A week after FSIS announces a Class I Recall of Sa ...

  On August 6, 2009 Beef Packers, Inc., of Fresno, California recalled approximately 825,769 pounds of ground beef products linked to an outbreak of salmonellosis (disease that can be caused by antibiotic-resistant Salmonella Newport). This was announced on the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Sa ...

• Nestle Toll House Cookie Dough E. coli Outbreak, P ...

  There are a lot of things I love about my job, but one is the science behind linking people in dozens of states to food that they consumed that poisoned them. Once that link is scientifically determined, and the outbreak stopped, then the time comes to learn from the mistakes so the next outbreak c ...

• H.R. 2749 - Food Safety Enhancement Act of 2009 - ...

  Click on above image to see final bill passed from the House, or see my post below.

• 2008 E. coli O157:H7 Raw Goat Milk Outbreak Sicken ...

  The Outbreak On May 12, 2008 the Lawrence County Health Department (LCHD) was notified of a case of HUS in a child with a history of bloody diarrhea. The health care provider reported that the child had consumed unpasteurized goat’s milk obtained from a local store, the Herb Depot, in Barry Count ...

• IPS - Inter Press Services

• POLITICS-US: Irish Ex-President Awarded Medal Des ...

  WASHINGTON, Aug 13 (IPS) - U.S. President Barack Obama awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to former Irish President Mary Robinson Wednesday, despite a vigorous campaign from hardline supporters of Israel urging him to rescind the award.

• AFGHANISTAN: Holbrooke Heralds US Engagement Pre- ...

  WASHINGTON, Aug 13 (IPS) - Facing a worsening security situation in Afghanistan, as well as rapidly approaching elections in that country, the Obama Administration is touting a new, broad approach to winning the fight against insurgent groups in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

• HONDURAS: Violence in the Streets; Coup Govt Dele ...

  TEGUCIGALPA, Aug 13 (IPS) - A delegation of representatives of the de facto government headed by Roberto Micheletti in Honduras began to meet Thursday with State Department officials in Washington, while demonstrators demanding the return of ousted President Manuel Zelaya have been beaten and a ...

• DEVELOPMENT: Should Water Be Legislated as a Huma ...

  UNITED NATIONS, Aug 13 (IPS) - The growing commercialisation of water - and the widespread influence of the bottling industry worldwide - is triggering a rising demand for the legal classification of one of the basic necessities of human life as a human right.

• COLOMBIA: Indigenous People Troubled by U.S. Mili ...

  GENEVA, Aug 13 (IPS) - The head of Colombia's biggest association of indigenous people is concerned that allowing U.S. troops to use military bases in his country will signal a regression to former times when the United States exercised control over Latin America, while a native activist warned ...

The Intelligence Daily

• Ex-ISI Chief Says Purpose of New Afghan Intelligen ...

• Obama Promises Senators He Will Help Pass Bill Ban ...

• Why Won't Universal Healthcare Be Provided?

• It's Not a Recession. It's a planned demolition

• It's Still a Depression

My AntiWar

• Iran: Whose War?

  Summary: HuberThe logical goal of Iran?s nuclear program is not possession of nuclear bombs but a thriving nuclear energy industry. Having nukes would merely make Iran a target?both Israel and the U.S. would have justification for a massive preemptive strike. We?d know they have them because they w ...

• US, Syria Discuss Iraq Border Control
• Afghanistan Forces to Observe Election Cease-Fire
• Former Army Captain Pleads Guilty to Stealing $400 ...
• Iraq: Sinjar Suicide Blast Casualties Up to 20 Dea ...

• Rogue Government.com

• E-mails from public overload House Web site

  Amid a boisterous debate on health care reform, people flooded members of Congress on Thursday with so many e-mails that they overloaded the House's primary Web site.

• National Guard drill at high school to prepare fo ...

  Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School will be the site of a National Guard riot control drill Thursday morning to prepare in the event of a panic over distribution of serum to treat the swine flu.

• Rep. Paul Broun: Obama's Socialist Elite Is Plann ...

  The Athens Banner-Herald reports today that Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) told constituents yesterday that he thinks Democratic leaders are planning to declare martial law.

• Mobile phones get cyborg vision

  Mobile phone operators, at least, are hoping it will be the next big thing as programmers learn to corral all the bells and whistles of smart phones - GPS, video, accelerometers - into "killer applications".

• Judge Rules DVD-Copying Software Is Illegal

  A federal judge ruled here late Tuesday that it was unlawful to traffic in goods to copy DVDs.

Innovation Canada

• Ocean view

  The winch at the rear of the ship slowly lowers a 13-tonne steel capsule about the size of three minivans into still water in early July. The shell, painted a garish yellow, is a trawl-resistant frame designed to deflect fishing nets. More important, once settled on the ocean floor, the capsule will ...

• Space reader

  (Article courtesy of the University of Windsor) Bill McConkey probably won’t be around to see the day when humans are finally able to travel tremendous stretches through outer space to distant planets such as Jupiter. When they do make that journey, however, they’ll owe a significant debt of gra ...

• Filling the glass

  Walkerton, Ont., North Battleford, Sask., and the Kashechewan First Nation Reserve, in Northern Ontario, have all become high-profile — and tragic — examples of what can go wrong when a community’s drinking water becomes contaminated. Surprisingly, they are not alone. At any given time, 1,700 ...

• i2eye with Bartha Maria Knoppers

  “Don’t plan your career — be curious.” That’s the credo that Bartha Maria Knoppers, the new director of the Centre of Genomics and Policy at McGill University and Génome Québec Innovation Centre, espouses — and one she lives by. Knoppers turned her love of books into a master’s in c ...

• Environmental legacy

  (Article courtesy of University of Regina) University of Regina biologist Chris Somers is fascinated by how humans and wildlife interact and how animals respond to human-modified environments. “My research often combines animal ecology in the field, environmental chemistry and genetics,” explain ...

Signs of the times

• Multiple Wrongs Don't Make A Right, Especially Whe ...

  The 2009 Foster et al paper (In Press) "Comment on 'Influence of the Southern Oscillation on tropospheric temperature' by J. D. McLean, C. R. de Freitas, and R. M. Carter" was written by a who's who of climate scientists. The authors include G. Foster, J. D. Annan, P. D. Jones, M. E. Mann, B. Mullan ...

• Pesticides In Your Peaches?

  As we munch into the fragrant core of peach season, shoppers face an array of choices for the same fuzzy fruit but little guidance on which type to pick. Expensive organic? Pricey farmers market? Cheap peaches from the grocery store? Cost is certainly important. But there are essential numbers th ...

• Australian Senate Rejects Rudd's Cap and Trade Emi ...

  Australia's Senate rejected the government's climate-change legislation, forcing Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to amend the bill or call an early election. Senators voted 42 to 30 against the law, which included plans for a carbon trading system similar to one used in Europe. Australia, the world's big ...

• A Debate About Soil, Organics and Nutrition

  "The whole problem of health - in soil, plant, animal, and man - is one great subject." - Albert Howard, The Soil and Health

• National Guard drill at high school to prepare for ...

  Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School will be the site of a National Guard riot control drill Thursday morning to prepare in the event of a panic over distribution of serum to treat the swine flu. The school on Route 26 at the Paris-Norway town line has been designated by state officials as a dist ...

Threat Level

• Top Security Firm RSA Tries to Silence Blog

  RSA security, one of the top security firms in the country, has sent takedown notices to a blogger and his hosting company in an effort to silence his discussion of a vulnerability found on a bank web site that RSA helps monitor, according to the blogger. The firm has accused the blogger of tradema ...

• Hackers Use Twitter to Control Botnet

  Hackers are now using Twitter to send coded update messages to computers they’ve previously infected with rogue code, according to a report from net-monitoring firm Arbor Networks. This looks to be the first reported case of hackers using the popular micro-messaging company to control botnets, whi ...

• Canadian Bus Driver Refuses U.S. Background Check ...

  A Canadian school bus driver who refused to allow a U.S. security firm perform a mandatory background check out of privacy concerns has won her battle. Stephanie Sydiaha, a driver for First Student Canada, opposed the background check out of fear over what the private U.S. firm might do with her pe ...

• Cheney: We Didn’t Go Far Enough

  Former Vice President Dick Cheney felt that the Bush Administration didn’t go far enough in the policies it pursued and that had it not been saddled with a weak commander-in-chief, the policies could have been pushed much further. “If he’d been equipped with a group of people as ideologically ...

• Another Court Deals Major Blow to DVD Copying

  A California appeals court on Wednesday overturned a lower court ruling that paved the way for a $10,000 DVD copying system called Kaleidescape and other products from the company with the same name. The decision (.pdf) by the 6th District Court of Appeal in San Jose, California, was the second cour ...

PERRspectives : Blog

• Smoking Grassley on Health Care Reform

  After his predictable experience with unified Republican obstructionism on the stimulus bill, President Obama must be high if he thinks there's a glimmer of hope for bipartisan cooperation on health care reform. Not because Sarah Palin is doubling-down on her...

• Smoking Grassley on Health Care Reform

  After his predictable experience with unified Republican obstructionism on the stimulus bill, President Obama must be high if he thinks there's a glimmer of hope for bipartisan cooperation on health care reform. Not because Sarah Palin is doubling-down on her...

• Guns and Bitter in Pennsylvania

  During the Democratic primaries last spring, Barack Obama almost derailed his campaign with his unfortunate remark about "bitter" people in small town Pennsylvania who "cling to guns." Now after the second Keystone State shooting rampage in four months, that clumsy...

• The Unbearable Whiteness of Being...a Birther

  As has been documented in detail, the anti-Obama birther movement is strongest in precisely those states where Republicans poll best and, ironically, health care is worst. But despite experiencing serial embarrassments akin to learning the sun does not rise in...

• Bush Domestic Spying Ally Cornyn Now Fears Obama D ...

  If nothing else, Republican Senator John Cornyn is an irony producing machine. During the Terri Schiavo affair, the former Texas Supreme Court Justice was at the forefront of the GOP campaign to intimidate and threaten judges. Now after his fierce...

Blackspot News Feed

• Night Music: Fursaxa

  A recent discovery.

• A Woman You Don’t Meet Every Day

  All I really know about her is that she’s on Twitter as " kerridarling " and that she now wears these:

• Sandcastle QR code

  Via makezine.com

• In Illinois, Another Workers' Rebellion Flares Up ...

  In Illinois, a dozen union members blocked a road outside Wells Fargo’s local headquarters -- the latest in a wave of direct actions by workers.

• If Right-Wingers Get Their Way, 22,000 Americans W ...

  This is a battle against people who want to protect a system that has killed more Americans than WW II -- not a debate tournament.

Consortium News

• The Truth Will Not Out, on Its Own

  The hysterias over the Iraq War and now health-care reform suggest truth is a fragile U.S. commodity, writes Robert Parry. August 13, 2009

• Rove Implicated in Prosecutor Firings

  Political adviser Karl Rove pressed for the firing of a key U.S. Attorney who balked at prosecuting Democrats, reports Jason Leopold. August 12, 2009

• Palin's 'Death Panel' and GOP Lying

  Sarah Palin's rant about Barack Obama's "death panel" fits with a 30-year-old Republican strategy to deceive, says Robert Parry. August 11, 2009

• Holder Torture-Probe Plan Faulted

  Attorney General Eric Holder's intent to okay only a limited torture probe is called too narrow, reports Jason Leopold. August 10, 2009

• McGovern on 'Downing Street Minutes'

  Ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern revisits the curious case of the "Downing Street Minutes" and the Iraq War, reports TheRealNews. August 10, 2009

CounterPunch

• Winslow T. Wheeler : How Congress Pays For Its Por ...
• Tim Wise : Red-Baiting and Racism
• Eduardo Galeano : I Hate to Bother You
• Joanne Mariner : Letting Cheney Off the Hook
• Michael Donnelly : Burning Forests for Electricity

Institute for Middle East Understanding

• White flag deaths: Killings of Palestinian civilia ...

  This report documents seven incidents where Israeli soldiers fired on civilians with small arms during Israel's major military operations in Gaza in December 2008 and January 2009. These attacks killed 11 c ...

• Israeli soldiers shot dead 11 unarmed Palestinian ...

  A new report alleges that Israeli soldiers shot dead 11 unarmed Palestinian civilians carrying white flags during Israel's offensive in Gaza earlier this year - yet Israel has still failed to adequately inve ...

• Gaza fishermen protest Israeli attacks on their li ...

  Fishermen in the Gaza Strip are the frequent targets of Israeli forces. Israeli naval ships sometimes open fire, board boats, arrest the fishermen, even confiscate nets and the boats themselves. Today in Gaz ...

• Palestine's sounds of music (Al Jazeera)

  Lebanon's Beiteddine International Arts Festival held in the Chouf mountains may be a few hundred kilometres distance from the Palestinian city of Ramallah, but getting there has been a lifelong dream for Am ...

• Google launches Palestine-specific web domain (Ma ...

  Google unveiled its newest URL on Thursday, www.google.ps , a specific domain for residents of the occupied Palestinian territories, with the exception of East Jerusalem. "The new domain will give Arabic-spe ...

Planetsave

• Growing Acid in our Oceans: A Looming Threat to Se ...

  This picture is a picture of the beautiful Monterey, California coastline. This is where I grew up. It is famous for it’s beautiful sea life. Sea otters, jelly fish, sea lions, kelp forests all populate the Monterey coast. The Pacific Ocean is the largest ocean in the world. Yet, with all th ...

• Great Lakes Offshore Wind Aesthetics

  [social buttons] While public opinion remains divided about the risks and benefits of installing wind farms in the Great Lakes, several of the eight states with Great Lakes water are racing to be first to approve projects capturing energy from frequently strong offshore winds. It remains to be seen ...

• ET Text Home? Send your own Texts Into Space

  Gliese 581 d. Such a catchy name eh? You probably have never heard of it. It is 20 light years away, but in late April 2009 new observations by the original discovery team concluded that the planet is within the habitable zone where liquid water, and therefore, life, could exist. Some of you may h ...

• Australia Plans Airstrikes to Kill 650K Camels in ...

  Australia’s wild camel population is out of control. An estimated 1 million roam the outback, destroying fragile ecosystems, fouling water holes, and causing a threat to endangered wildlife. They are Australia’s largest invasive species, and the government is spending $19 million AUD to deal wi ...

• Dancing Rabbit Eco Village: The Inside Scoop

  Unless you live in an eco village or other form of intentional community, you’re probably curious about the lifestyle. You’ve probably already got some images stuck in your head (I know the commune from Easy Rider always comes to my mind). You may even cling to a few stereotypes. But, as you’v ...

Water Quality - WordPress

• Santa Monica's Green Street Explored

  Santa Monica's Bicknell Avenue Green Street, looking southwest toward the Santa Monica Bay Los A

• Fixing the Delta : How Will We Pay for It?

  Public Policy Institute of California / by Dean Misczynski http://www.ppic.org/content/pubs/report/R

• Nutrient Control Actions for Improving Water Quali ...

  National Research Council http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12544&utm_source=feeds&ut

• Live in west Michigan? Mark Aug. 22 on your calend ...

  If you enjoyed attending Breakfast on the Farm, then you may want to mark down Aug. 22 (2009) on you

• News and Events - 12 August 2009

  Some recent coverage of items that might be of interest to our fellow creek freaks – scroll do

Public Citizen in Texas

• Grassroots vs Astroturf- the difference in citizen ...

  Most people have a good general conception of what a real grassroots movement looks like: citizens get outraged over some injustice or inequity and get organized and get active. These campaigns are built from the bottom up. And what happens when you don’t have a grassroots movement but want to ...

• Boerne Makes Move on Local Renewable Power

  I came across this article recently in the Express-News’ Northwest Daily and had to share. Boerne, population c. 9,400, located about 30 miles northwest of San Antonio, will soon establish a framework for the development of distributed generation. Under the terms of an ordinance that passed a fir ...

• Texans care about climate change too

  Being an environmentalist in Texas, sometimes it feels like the whole world is against you. Â There’s a common assumption that folks around here just don’t care as much about the environment as elsewhere, and that people don’t see climate change as all that much of a threat. Â When I tell ...

• San Antonio Mayor’s Nuclear Town Hall Tonight

  Tonight, August 10, is Mayor Castro’s Town Hall Meeting, where he wants to allow the community to tell city council and himself what they think about going the nuclear route. This is so important to attend. It will be at the City Council Chambers downtown where Flores and Commerce meet (map belo ...

• Texas Progressive Alliance Weekly Round Up

  The Congress may be in recess, but the Texas Progressive Alliance is always in session. Here’s the weekly roundup of blog highlights. Off the Kuff takes a closer look at the crimefighting plan of Houston Mayoral candidate Annise Parker. WCNews at Eye On Williamson encourages everyone to get involv ...

Press TV

• Castro warns of US handling of econ crisis

  Former Cuban leader Fidel Castro has expressed skepticism about perceptions in the US that the world recession may be easing as he marked his 83rd birthday.

• 600 'buried alive' in Taiwan typhoon

  Hundreds of people are believed to have been buried alive in a Taiwan village worst affected by floods and massive mudslides triggered by the Typhoon Morakot.

• 2 more swine flu fatalities in Saudi Arabia

  Saudi Arabia's Health Ministry has announced two new swine flu deaths, taking the death toll from the pandemic to 11 in the country.

• Microsoft IE 8 aces web browser security test

  The NSS Labs, an independent security product testing lab, has found Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 to be the most secure browser to date.

• Pakistan to celebrate 63rd Independence Day

  It was on August 14, 1947 that the Islamic Republic of Pakistan emerged on the world map as an independent sovereign state, carved out from the Indian Sub-Continent.

Axis of Logic

• Latin America: Social Movements in Times of Econom ...

• The 'Anti-Starbucks' Starbucks

• Exclusive: Kill Them All and Cover Them with Bulls ...

• One State, Two States - Resolving the Israel/Pales ...

• The Empire strikes back!

They Gave Us a Republic

• Nightowl Newswrap

  Play on, man. Guitar legend Les Paul dies at age 94. Read a 1999 profile here. These damn reports are starting to sound like body counts. The Army release its suicide data for the month of July. "There have been 96 reported active-duty Army suicides during the period Jan. 1, 2009 - July 31, 2009. ...

• Another Real Democrat

  Crooks and Liars calls our attention to another Real Democrat standing up for liberal values. I'm certainly happy to see someone standing up for women's rights, and I'm a big believer in rewarding good behavior. If you like Democrats who stand up for our values, you can show Creigh Deeds some love h ...

• So... What About That Capitalist Hell Hole?

  I just wanted to stick my two cents (minus the 21% cut for the Wall Street slugs) worth in here on the story regarding health care in France. These are the kinds of stories that I latch on to for some weird reason... the ones that are based on one's own life experiences and for which there is no dis ...

• An American With Cancer Faces Death Panels in Fran ...

  And the verdict is: full, long-term treatment covered 100 percent. I live in such a country (France) though I am American and I should probably go ahead and admit that I am also a citizen of the place. I haven't blogged in here much lately because I was recently diagnosed with breast cancer and I'v ...

• Nightowl Newswrap

  He's dying of cancer, but still .... The man convicted of the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988 may be released next week. Many found; many more still missing. Taiwan sends 4,000 troops to search for hundreds missing in mudslides after last weekend's deadly Typhoon Morak ...

Care 2

• World's oldest polar bear dies in zoo- VIDEO

  The Indianapolis Zoo said the oldest living polar bear known to scientists was put down Wednesday after a health condition prevented the 35-year-old bear from being able to stand up. A press release from the zoo said veterinarians decided to humanely Submitted by Simone D. to Animals | Note-i ...

• Battling for the blues

  Eleven years have passed since a plan was approved to help endangered blue whale populations recover, yet the federal agency in charge of enforcing the recovery effort is failing to take the mandatory steps to save the world’s largest animal from Submitted by Simone D. to Animals | Note-it! | ...

• New life over Fife for rare sea eagles

  Fourteen rare sea eagle chicks brought over from Norway have been released in Fife this week as part of a national recolonisation scheme. The birds — which can grow to have an eight-foot wingspan — are part of the East Coast Sea Eagle project Submitted by Simone D. to Animals | Note-it! | ...

• Ask Umbra on corn plastic

  [...] But I can say that products from conventional corn, a petroleum-intensive crop, are not the magic bullet. The magic bullet is to bring your own cup (on your bike, of course). Submitted by Elena Pintilie to Green Lifestyle | Note-it! | Add a Comment

• G.M. Puts Electric Car’s City Mileage in Triple D ...

  WARREN, Mich. — General Motors said Tuesday that its Chevrolet Volt extended-range electric vehicle, scheduled for release in 2011, would achieve a fuel rating of 230 miles a gallon in city driving. Submitted by Mae B. to Science & Tech | Note-it! | Add a Comment

GreenBiz

• The Bottled Water Business Takes Another Licking

  In another sign that the worm has turned on the bottled water industry, Mother Jones magazine has an in-depth look at the impacts of FIJI Water on the planet and the island nation itself.

• Kraft Overhauls Its Manufacturing Ops to Cut Water ...

  In less than three years -- and a full two years ahead of its company-wide goal -- the snack giant has managed to save 3 billion gallons of water by adopting new manufacturing and cleaning methods.

• Bottled Water is Way More Complicated Than I Thoug ...

  It should be easy to phase out bottled water from company headquarters, right? Think again. It can bring up issues with a company's supply chain, cafeteria inventory and vending machines -- and don't forget the new dishwashers or glassware that may need to enter the picture.

• Green Wineries Embrace Innovation from the Fields ...

  Solar-powered vineyards, biodynamic farming, organically grown grapes and innovative packaging put several California wineries on the leading edge of sustainable wine production. Their remarkable results offer valuable lessons for green leaders in any industry.

• Coca-Cola Enterprises Emissions Reductions, Recycl ...

  The bottling, marketing and distribution arm of the beverage giant has set a goal to reduce CO2 emissions by 15 percent before 2020, as well as to recover 100 percent of its bottles for recycling.

• Reuters Global

• Pakistan’s Enemy No.1

  An overwhelming majority of Pakistanis consider the United States to be the greatest threat to the nation, far more than traditional rival India, and the Taliban, according to a new poll.

• Who is funding the Afghan Taliban? You don’t ...

  It is the open secret no one wants to talk about. In Afghanistan, one of the richest sources of Taliban funding is the foreign assistance coming into the country. International donors, primarily the United States, are to a large extent financing their own enemy.

• Targeted killings inside Pakistan;are they working ...

  The U.S. strategy of targeted killings inside Pakistan would seem to be working if the death of Baitullah Mehsud the leader of the Pakistani Taliban turns out to be true, as seems increasingly likely. But the jury is out over whether such strikes are effective over the longer term.

• Is a moral instinct the source of our noble though ...

  A growing number of psychologists, biologists and philosophers see the brain as the base of our moral views. Noble ideas such as compassion, altruism, empathy and trust, they say, are really evolutionary adaptations that are now instinctive responses fixed in our brains.

• Beware brain scientists bearing gifts (gee-whiz jo ...

  It's refreshing to hear experts who can dazzle you with their work but warn against falling for any hype about it. This "let's not overdo it" approach has been a recurrent theme in the Neuroscience Boot Camp at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.

Ezra Klein

• Tab Dump

  • Paul Krugman writes some science/economic fiction. • Ryan Grim gets one lobbyist to open up about the deal between the White House and the pharmaceutical industry. That said, the important thing isn't necessarily that the deal was struck, but that it's been abandoned. • Speaking of which, ...

• Why We Can't Have Good Policy

  So Sarah Palin was for death panels before she was against them. Sen. Johnny Isakson's staff is blasting out press releases emphasizing the difference between Isakson's amendment and the House bill when Isakson has, in the past, supported much stronger — and wiser — measures than anything consid ...

• Do We Have Enough Doctors For Health-Care Reform?

  A reader writes in with a common concern: It seems to me that if some version of the health care reform currently under consideration passes, and a substantial portion of the 40-50 million uninsured Americans gain access to health insurance, it will become more difficult for people already insure ...

• Speed Reading

  More DIY videos at 5min.com Via Tyler Cowen comes this video teaching speed reading. A longer explanation of the technique is here . The claim is quite grand: A few hours of training can result in "an average increase in reading speed of 386%," with no loss of comprehension. Some people can read t ...

• A Floor, Not a Ceiling

  This issue came up in today's chat, but I wanted to address it more directly. There is a difference between health-care systems that provide a ceiling and a floor. A floor on health care means everyone gets a certain, minimum amount of care. A ceiling means there is some theoretical maximum you can' ...

Booman Tribune

• Netroots Nation

  I'm sitting in the big hall at Netroots Nation waiting for Bill Clinton to arrive. Adam Bonin is doing a great job of entertaining the crowd. He's introducing Rep. Brad Miller (D-NC). Brad Miller, you may remember, has a history with Booman Tribune. This is from the Las Vegas Yearly Kos: The ...

• Grassley is Putting Himself at Risk

  Until recently, I didn't think that Chuck Grassley would have any difficulty getting reelected. The Democrats don't have really high-profile contenders, and Grassley has a lot of seniority and remains fairly popular in Iowa. But I'm starting to wonder whether Grassley might be putting himself in j ...

• Casual Observation

  I'm sitting in a conference with a big Power Point slide that says, "What makes bloggers employable?" I don't think there's a good answer. Almost no one gets paid in this business. But if you want to make the transition to blogging for a corporate enterprise, you can't be too bombastic, too moral ...

• Hello, Pittsburgh

  I have arrived in Pittsburgh. I haven't been here since I came to see the Dead play in 1988. That was a pretty decent show, actually. Maybe a little too much Brent. Anyway, the city looks fantastic. It's much nicer than I remember it. Of course, Philly is also much nicer than it was in 1988, a ...

• Open Thread

  When bats aren't invading you bedroom, your cat is dragging some half-dead animal into your kitchen. Or a skunk gets into your garage and sets off a stink-bomb. Got any good animal home invasion stories? I suppose insects work as well. I'm off to Steel City, so light blogging this morning.

European Tribune

• It's all right, then

  Geithner Says Financial Revamp is on Track WASHINGTON -- Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said he...

• European Salon de News, Discussion et Klatsch - 14 ...

  A Daily Review Of International Online Media Europeans on this date in history:1926 – Birth of...

• Thursday Open Thread

  Thursday!...

• War Porn

  Via Katherine Tiedeman: Asked about how to measure success and progress in Afghanistan, Holbrooke remarked,...

• Is the Eurozone recession ending?

  Apparently so: *The French and German economies both grew by 0.3% between April and June,...

Futurismic

• Biological cells as cloud computing networks

  In an interesting confluence of ideas, and of the unintentional biomimicry at work in cloud computing, researchers identify parallels between biological cells and computer networks: Gene regulatory networks in cell nuclei are similar to cloud computing networks, such as Google or Yahoo!, researchers ...

• iPhone sex app: What could go wrong?

  In a near-future episode of Seinfeld from the universe next door: George’s “Passion” iPhone app–“The timer measures duration, while the accelerometer measures activity and the microphone measures the orgasm”–is yanked by Apple right in the middle of the greatest performance of his life ...

• Wooden bones

  If you wanted to build artificial bones, what material would you use? I don’t know about you, but wood wouldn’t have been high up my list. To create the bone substitute, the scientists start with a block of wood — red oak, rattan and sipo work best — and heat it until all that remains is [.. ...

• Next-gen hearing aids have iPod jacks

  File under “elective implant technology that I don’t need but really wish I could afford anyway”: the bone-anchored next-generation hearing aid with audio jack input options. Older-style hearing aids amplify all sounds, making it almost impossible for wearers to hear conversations in noisy env ...

• Broke but happily stoned: economics and prohibitio ...

  New Scientist highlights some research that correlates economic pressures in the United States with the legal status of intoxicants, suggesting that perhaps the pro-pot lobby’s continued hassling of the Obama administration will pay off: Euan Wilson of the Socionomics Institute in Gainesville, Geo ...

Yahoo! Canada News

• YahooCanadaNews: Ryan M. for Y! CA News. Federal N ...

  YahooCanadaNews: Ryan M. for Y! CA News. Federal NDP to mull name change at N.S. convention http://tr.im/wmRD

• YahooCanadaNews: MK for Y! CA News. Small Canadian ...

  YahooCanadaNews: MK for Y! CA News. Small Canadian firm wins battle against Microsoft. http://bit.ly/FV0lE

• YahooCanadaNews: Ont. girl braces for unique heart ...

  YahooCanadaNews: Ont. girl braces for unique heart procedure http://tr.im/wgsA

• YahooCanadaNews: Ryan M. for Y! CA News. Iran cond ...

  YahooCanadaNews: Ryan M. for Y! CA News. Iran condemns 'rude' Western meddling into affairs http://tr.im/wgsw

• YahooCanadaNews: 'Kindle ate my homework.' Teen su ...

  YahooCanadaNews: 'Kindle ate my homework.' Teen sues Amazon after his copy of 1984 was obliterated from his Kindle without warning. http://tr.im/uX9L

Global Elite

• President European Commission Advocated World Gove ...

  Jurriaan Maessen. Infowars. July 24th, 2009 On September 7, 1992, two term President of the European Commission Jacques Delors gave a speech to the Royal Institute of International Affa ...

• Billions of People Expected to Die Under Current C ...

  Barbara Minton, Natural News, July 21st, 2009 Your right to eat healthy food and use supplements of your choice is rapidly vanishing, but every effort has been made to keep you in the d ...

• Bioweapons, Dangerous Vaccines, and Threats of a G ...

  Stephen Lendman, Global Research, July 7th, 2009 Although international law prohibits the use of chemical and bacteriological weapons, America has had an active biological warfare progr ...

• Today we’re all prisoners in the USA

  Papers, Please! June 2, 2009 As of today, June 1, 2009, even U.S. citizens are officially prisoners in the USA, or exiles barred from entering our own country without the government’s ...

• Biopiracy, GM Seeds and Rural India "Over 100,000 ...

  Priya Kumar, Global Research, June 2, 2009 The reality for the average Indian remains the same: agricultural cultivation and the ability to farm is the bedrock of rural living. With its historical practices, values, and communal sentiments of ...

Al Jazeera

• Taiwan appeals for storm relief aid

  Officials seek heavy lifting helicopters as criticism grows over pace of rescue efforts.

• UN 'concerned' over Suu Kyi arrest

  Security Council issues watered-down statement on opposition leader's house arrest.

• US in Afghanistan for 'a few years'

  US defence secretary warns more troops in Afghanistan would stretch army's resources.

• Iraqis seized from Denmark church

  Police clash with protesters trying to prevent arrest of Iraqi asylum seekers.

• Iraqis seized from Denmark church

  Police clash with protesters trying to prevent arrest of Iraqi asylum seekers.

Green Inc. - NYT

• As Prices Slump, Solar Industry Suffers

  A run of bad earnings has dampened confidence in once-booming solar companies.

• Exxon Fined for Causing Bird Deaths

  Exxon Mobil has pleaded guilty to causing the deaths of 85 protected birds -- and agreed to pay penalties amounting to $7,000 per bird.

• French Winemakers Sound Alarm Over Climate Change

  France could lose its treasured vineyards because of warming, experts warn.

• A Wind Boom in Missouri?

  Missouri has recently been adding wind power far more quickly than any other state. But can the growth continue?

• Montreal Exports its Bike-Sharing Program

  London and Boston plan to adopt Montreal's bike-sharing system.

Dot Earth News

• Data Gap on Atlantic Storms and Warming

  More questions raised about recent hurricane trends.

• A Billion Teenagers, for Better or Worse

  Some of the world's poorest and most turbulent regions are witnessing explosive population growth, meaning enormous numbers of teenagers and children.

• Landslide Losses Not Inevitable

  With planning, the risks from landslides like those in Taiwan can be reduced.

• In Praise of Activism

  Human progress on a finite planet will require lots of vigilant activists.

• The CO2 Shadow of the Recession

  Emissions of carbon dioxide in United States plunge, reflecting recession.

Doug Feith : Hong Pong

• Thanks to Rose for finding my phone! Plus: I'm sta ...

  I nearly had a horrible day today, leaving my trusty old Helio phone on a bench at the University of Minnesota mall. A good samaritan named Rose picked it up and called the Boiler Room coffee shop back after I tried the phone. I got it back! Thanks a ton, Rose, you saved yet another messy situation ...

• Hat tip for Joaquin Phoenix conspiracy

  Not a bad idea! Which makes this potentially one of the greatest performances any modern actor has ever given -- or at least one of the most baldly courageous. The closest comparison would have to be Andy Kaufman's utter commitment to his obnoxious Tony Clifton persona, but Phoenix is going Kaufman ...

• Tough times south of the border

  Duly noted: Mexican TV reporter ducking stray bullets: Hat tip to the thoughtful Texas farmer Don , who knows what you ought to know about the War On Drugs. This video was recently the #1 most discussed from Mexico on YooToob... Plus, don't miss the five stages of complete social collapse! http://c ...

• Pirate Bay Trial and Kopimi: The Kopimi Manifesto

  I can't say I get it. But I like it. In these apocalyptic and bitchy times, it is high time to get some sarcastic Swedish hacker philsophy out there. Now is the time. The spectrial is apparently the place. How could we forget the Pirate Bay Spectrial?! They released a Pirate Bay Manifesto - POwr, Br ...

• Some notes from the Abyss; Fusion Centers going to ...

  We're on the brink of disaster | Salon! As people lose confidence in the ability of markets and governments to solve the global crisis, they are likely to erupt into violent protests or to assault others they deem responsible for their plight, including government officials, plant managers, landl ...

• AlterNet Top Stories

• If Right-Wingers Get Their Way, 22,000 Americans W ...

  This is a battle against people who want to protect a system that has killed more Americans than WW II -- not a debate tournament.

• Hightower: Starbucks' Bizarre Branding Strategy -- ...

  Starbucks is now striving to be the anti-Starbucks, dressing up as funky neighborhood coffeehouses with a cool vibe.

• In Illinois, Another Workers' Rebellion Flares Up ...

  In Illinois, a dozen union members blocked a road outside Wells Fargo’s local headquarters -- the latest in a wave of direct actions by workers.

• Eating Meat Isn't Bad for the Planet, It's Our Sys ...

  Sadly too many have been fooled -- the culprit is not meat eating but rather the excesses of corporate/industrial agriculture.

• Christian Cowboy Plots to Bring Christ into Kids' ...

  David Barton likens himself to a biblical prophet. He wants to destroy the separation of church and state. Why is he designing school curricula?

Threat Level

• Top Security Firm RSA Tries to Silence Blog

  RSA security, one of the top security firms in the country, has sent takedown notices to a blogger and his hosting company in an effort to silence his discussion of a vulnerability found on a bank web site that RSA helps monitor, according to the blogger. The firm has accused the blogger of tradema ...

• Hackers Use Twitter to Control Botnet

  Hackers are now using Twitter to send coded update messages to computers they’ve previously infected with rogue code, according to a report from net-monitoring firm Arbor Networks. This looks to be the first reported case of hackers using the popular micro-messaging company to control botnets, whi ...

• Canadian Bus Driver Refuses U.S. Background Check ...

  A Canadian school bus driver who refused to allow a U.S. security firm perform a mandatory background check out of privacy concerns has won her battle. Stephanie Sydiaha, a driver for First Student Canada, opposed the background check out of fear over what the private U.S. firm might do with her pe ...

• Cheney: We Didn’t Go Far Enough

  Former Vice President Dick Cheney felt that the Bush Administration didn’t go far enough in the policies it pursued and that had it not been saddled with a weak commander-in-chief, the policies could have been pushed much further. “If he’d been equipped with a group of people as ideologically ...

• Another Court Deals Major Blow to DVD Copying

  A California appeals court on Wednesday overturned a lower court ruling that paved the way for a $10,000 DVD copying system called Kaleidescape and other products from the company with the same name. The decision (.pdf) by the 6th District Court of Appeal in San Jose, California, was the second cour ...

Reuters - Most Popular Articles

• Legendary guitarist, inventor Les Paul dies, age 9 ...

  LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Legendary guitarist and inventor Les Paul, who pioneered the design of solid body Gibson electric guitars that bore his name, died Thursday at a New York hospital of complications from pneumonia. He was 94.

• Fox News' "Glenn Beck" loses advertisers

  NEW YORK (Nielsen Business Media) - Some of the nation's biggest advertisers are distancing themselves from Fox News host Glenn Beck after he called President Obama a racist during a July 28 broadcast.

• Food giants say U.S. running out of sugar

  CHICAGO (Reuters) - Large U.S. food companies have been pushing the Obama administration to ease sugar import curbs, threatening higher consumer prices and possible job losses, citing forecasts for unprecedented sugar shortages.

• Piracy feared as mystery of missing ship deepens

  MOSCOW (Reuters) - Pirates probably hijacked a merchant ship which disappeared after sailing through the English Channel last month, its operator said on Wednesday.

• Nude drunk loses way in hotel

  WELLINGTON (Reuters) - An extremely drunk, naked man lost his way at a New Zealand hotel and ended up sleeping in the wrong room, forcing its female occupant to hide in the bathroom, local media reported.

Godspace

• Unemployment as a Spiritual Practice

  I am now back from Australia and as you can imagine the posts for my series on What is a Spiritual Practice have been mounting up while I have had limited internet access and less time to focus on such things. Â Thanks for your patience and for your prayers during this challenging season. Today’ ...

• Editing your Life: The Spiritual Discipline of Edi ...

  I am sitting in Sydney on a beautiful but crisp winter’s morning watching the rainbow lorikeets out in the trees. Â My Dad’s funeral is over and I will head back to Seattle in 2 days time. Â I have been very aware of prayer and the grace of God in the midst of this. Â Thanks to [...]

• Living in Transition as Spiritual Practice

  I am now in Sydney Australia after what has been one of the easiest long international trips I have made for a long time. Â I even slept for several hours on the flight which makes me very aware of the fact that people have been praying for me. Today’s article comes from Guy Chmieleski who is [. ...

• Recent Additions to the Spiritual Practices series

  Here’s the round-up of the most recent Spiritual Practices posts: The Spiritual Practice of Apologizing by T Freeman Love-making as a Spiritual Practice by Mark Scandrette Smoking the Glory of God by Jason Clark The Spiritual Practice of Getting Honest With Myself by Jonathan Brink Spiritual Disci ...

• Between the Sheets: Sleeping as A Spiritual Practi ...

  I will be heading out to Australia this afternoon but am hoping to continue posting while I travel. Â The submissions continue to arrive which is wonderful and I am enjoying reading them before I post them. This morning’s post is from Teri Peterson a presbyterian pastor who loves her new bed (wh ...

Pine River World News

• U.S. Marine Corps renews ban on social networking ...

  The following commentary is reprinted with permission from World Socialist Web Site. U.S. Marine Corps renews ban on social networking sites © World Socialist Web Site By Peter Kloze August 13, 2009 In another attempt by the Pentagon to control all information coming from the war zones of Iraq ...

• YEMEN: Houthis accuse army of airstrikes on villag ...

  IntelTrends - The following article is reprinted with permission from Yemen Times, Sana'a. Houthis accuse army of airstrikes on villages © Yemen Times By Mohammed Bin Sallam August 12, 2009 SA'ADA - The sixth Sa'ada war began on Tuesday as army personnel carried out offenses and airstrikes agai ...

• Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan: Statement 12-Aug-2 ...

  The following statement is issued by the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, via alqimmah.net. Who Controls the 13 Districts now? Sha'aban 20, 1430 A.H, August 12, 2009 In the name of Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate At least one or two weeks before the launching of operations in Helmand, the i ...

• Paul Craig Roberts: Spinning the Economic News

  The following column is reprinted with permission from Paul Craig Roberts. Spinning the Economic News © Paul Craig Roberts August 12, 2009 Last Friday a Bloomberg.com headline read: "U.S. Stocks Gain, Treasuries Drop as Unemployment Rate Declines." Let's have a look at the reported decline in th ...

• BURMA: American Vietnam War vet John Yettaw has 'f ...

  The following article is from Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB), Oslo. Yettaw has 'fulfilled duty to God' © DVB By Naw Say Phaw August 12, 2009 The U.S. citizen yesterday sentenced by a Burmese court to seven years in prison has told his lawyer that he has "fulfilled his duty to God". Lawyers for ..

• PsyBlog

• Consumer Psychology

  · How and why we consume and how our beliefs, ideas and senses influence consumption. Peter Drucker, the management consultant, famously argued that about 80% of all products and services fail or fall well short of targets within six months of launching. Clearly markets have little understanding ...

• Why Left to Right Punches Are More Aggressive, Pow ...

  Reading and writing from left to right is a skill so well-practised, so ingrained in language, that it's easy to ignore. Yet, according to some research, the direction in which language flows could have implications that spread into many other areas of our experience. Consider that people are often ...

• Persuasion: The Right-Ear Advantage

  If you want someone to comply with a random request for a cigarette, you should speak into their right ear, according to a new study by researchers in Italy. Marzoli & Tommasi (2009) had a female confederate visit a disco and approach 176 random people asking for a smoke. Clubbers were about twice ...

• 10 Rules That Govern Groups

  Much of our lives are spent in groups with other people: we form groups to socialise, earn money, play sport, make music, even to change the world. But although groups are diverse, many of the psychological processes involved are remarkably similar. Here are 10 insightful studies that give a flavou ...

• Are Your Initials Holding You Back?

  "What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet." ~Romeo and Juliet In these lines from Shakespeare's famous play, Juliet is trying to persuade Romeo that the bitter feud between their respective families doesn't matter, that he and his surname are easily divisib ...

After Downing Street.org

• Torture Programs for Sale

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• When the Dead Have No Say

  When the Dead Have No Say by Norman Solomon | Common Dreams Official Washington is buzzing about "metrics." Can the war in Afghanistan be successful? Don't ask the dead. Days ago, under the headline "White House Struggles to Gauge Afghan Success," a New York Times story made a splash. "As the Ameri ...

• The Guns of August and Afghanistan

  The Guns of August and Afghanistan By John Nichols | The Nation At the very least, members of the House should be urged to sign on as cosponsors of H.R. 2404, which would "require the Secretary of Defense to submit a report to Congress outlining the United States exit strategy for United States mil ...

• Jon Stewart on the Health Care: Town Hall or Tom J ...

  The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c PR www.thedailyshow.com Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Spinal Tap Performance read more

• We Need More Wellstone/Tasini Democrats in the Sen ...

  This week Representative Raul Grijalva and 15 other Democrats sent a letter to President Obama urging him to do more to reverse the coup in Honduras. Specifically, it urged him to speak up against human rights abuses under the coup regime: at least ten Hondurans have been killed since the coup (not ...

Grist - News

• Ruminations on the Obama era, with a side of spicy ...

• Cheap-chicken ad from KFC hides true cost of food; ...

• For a quick fix to school-lunch woes, pack an appe ...

• Stalking the wild leeks of spring

  What could improve a forest walk in early spring? Spotting a bunch of that delicious wild relative of the leek known as the ramp.

• From a zingy spring herb, a soup for sipping on th ...

  Gardeners and gastronomes fawn over sorrel—and almost everyone else ignores it. That’s a shame; it’s is a powerful addition to soups and sauces, and tasty in salads when picked young.

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Plotting the path of renewable power lines

San Francisco Chronicle

- Aug 13, 2009

- 4 hours ago

(08-13) 18:12 PDT -- A new state report tries to tackle one of the touchiest issues in California's effort to expand renewable power, suggesting possible ...

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When the Power Goes Out, Renewable Energy Trailer Goes to Work in ...

Reuters

- Aug 13, 2009

- 8 hours ago

By Cleantechnica - Cleantechnica By Jeff Kart When the (baseload, coal and nuclear) power went out after storms in Muskegon, a mobile renewable energy unit ...

clipped from Google - 8/2009

NV Energy and Renewable Ventures Agree on Power Purchase Agreement ...

WELT ONLINE

- Aug 13, 2009

- 6 hours ago

NV Energy, Inc. (NYSE: NVE) and Renewable Ventures, a Fotowatio company, announced that they have entered into a long-term power purchase agreement (PPA) ...

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Treasury & DOE To Release US $2B for Renewables Manufacturers

RenewableEnergyWorld.com

- Aug 13, 2009

- 7 hours ago

Authorized by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (Recovery Act), this new program will provide tax credits to manufacturers who produce renewable ...

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Human Habitat

ecology water energy

Ecology provides $11 million to boost stream flows, protect ...

Nisqually Valley News

- Aug 12, 2009

- Aug 12, 2009

In the past two years, Ecology provided $8.6 million for 32 stream-flow improvement projects and $11.2 million to 33 local watershed-planning groups, ...

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Anatomy of a deal: How local bidders landed former Sentinel building

San Jose Mercury News

- Aug 12, 2009

- Aug 12, 2009

A local consortium submitted the winning bid for the downtown building SANTA CRUZ -- Once a small nonprofit, Ecology Action has grown into a major force, ...

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Ecology and Crowley Maritime reach cleanup agreement

Access Washington

- Aug 11, 2009

- Aug 11, 2009

(Crowley) subsidiary and the Department of Ecology (Ecology) have signed an agreement to test soil, groundwater, and adjacent sediments for contamination at ...

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Insurer to Pay Final $800K for Toxic Cleanup of Tacoma Tide Flats

Insurance Journal

- Aug 13, 2009

- 16 hours ago

The Washington Department of Ecology is receiving $800000 from a settlement agreement, which will be used to advance cleanup of the former Lilyblad ...

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Water Power

water floods pollution

PepsiCo To Acquire Brazil Coconut Water Co Amacoco

CNNMoney.com

- Aug 13, 2009

- 15 hours ago

PepsiCo Inc. (PEP) will acquire Brazil's largest coconut water company in another step in the consumer-products giant's plan to revitalize its beverage ...

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President's water man promises stronger federal support for Delta

San Jose Mercury News

- Aug 12, 2009

- Aug 12, 2009

By Mike Taugher SACRAMENTO — The Obama administration's California water liaison Wednesday pledged more support than the Bush administration offered the ...

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Las Vegas pipeline delayed under water agreement

San Jose Mercury News

- Aug 13, 2009

- 8 hours ago

By BROCK VERGAKIS AP Writer SALT LAKE CITY—A growing and thirsty Las Vegas wouldn't be able to begin building a water pipeline from a shared aquifer with ...

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Immigration debate: Arizona volunteer convicted for leaving water ...

Chicago Tribune

- Aug 13, 2009

- 22 hours ago

As Staton, 27, had done for five years with the faith-based aid group No More Deaths, he lugged water up hills and through scrub brush to remote, ...

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