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i am not young enough to know everything

“I am not young enough to know everything.”

~Oscar Wilde

Photobucket

Born:  October 16, 1854 in Dublin, Ireland

Died: November 30, 1900 (aged 46) in Paris, France

Occupation:  Playwright, novelist, poet

Nationality:  Irish

My impression of this quote is that only young children know everything. When they get older and slower in the mind, they are less likely to believe and therefore to less likely to know the most about unusual but interesting things.

Children believe in fairy tales or some forms of magical happenings, and they also believe in scientifically-incorrect theories such as aliens and Area 54. They believe in certain legends, myths, and fables, and all kinds of other stories.

Oscar Wilde was sometimes called the Man of Barbed Wit, because he could think of many insults to spout at one time that made many people laugh, and many people scowl. He was extremely smart until the day he died; never letting anyone place him as the butt of a joke.

He is saying in this quote that you only believe all those amazing things once, when you are a child. After you age, you begin to think of all those amazing things as foolishness, infantine. This is why it is good to enjoy being young while you are.

The insightful analysis of Oscar Wilde’s quote comes from a child… my young friend, Jonathan.

Jon is 12 and borders on brilliance… and I’m trying to encourage him to write some stuff for us. He has a quick, deep mind and when you meet the intellect of a 12-year-old, it can be both astounding and refreshing. And, as I think of it, life affirming.

I love what Jon wrote and how he thought of Mr. Wilde’s words.

Enjoy the wisdom of youth…

Sons without Fathers.

My father was born Roland Lucien Meyer in Perpignan, France.

Being Jews in 1943 with the country still occupied by the Germans, my grandparents quickly put my father and his older brother Claude in a Catholic Orphanage and changed their last names to the less semitic Clauchre.

There my father and my uncle lived for the next two years… kids both with and without parents… with and without an identity… with and without a real heritage.

Thankfully the war ended and my father got to return home… though not to his family.

See, it was soon discovered that my Grandfather Helmut had ANOTHER child with ANOTHER woman and the secret child was barely three months younger than my father.

Whoops.

I assume that’s when my Grandmother decided to make the trip across the Atlantic…

There’s a photo of my father, uncle and grandmother on the boat to America.

In the shot Roland and Claude sit on the deck, with my Grandmother behind them, surrounded by a dozen other immigrants, none of whom they knew before the voyage.

What striking about the shot is the space that’s been left where my Grandfather might have stood; a person sized gap between my Grandmother Thea and the gentleman in the tattered hat. Its clear that though Helmut had been left… he was not really gone yet.

When my father went through processing at Ellis Island the family’s name changed again, this time Meyer became Lieber, my Grandmother’s maiden name.

My father grew up in Chicago, ditching his accent, sublimating every last word of French, and, sometime in high school… he also jettisoned Lucien for the more American Leslie.

Fifteen years-old and this was his 4th new identity.

He became an architect (like the man who sponsored my family in this country), met and married my mother and then started having little Liebers… specifically fat, colicky, sleepless, bald me… and before I turned one he marched back to the registrars office in the loop and reverted back to his original French middle name.

Jump cut ahead two years to when my parents decide to take me to Europe on a vacation, but REALLY my father wanted to see if he could find Helmut.

My parents spent three weeks pushing me around in a brand new stroller that was so thrashed by the end of the trip that it was discarded before they went home.

Three days were devoted to Perpignan, but… no luck, my father’s father was gone.

My parents came home, my two siblings were born… and little to nothing was ever spoken of my grandfather, except when one of us was bad and my Grandmother would whisper how what we did was “just like something Helmut would have done.”

Helmut became the parking lot for all bad deeds.

It wasn’t until I was an adult that my father hired a private investigator to finally solve the mystery of his father.

It turned out Helmut WAS in Perpignan the week we were there…. just with YET ANOTHER NAME… having been in trouble with the law at some point.

Also, Helmut died only a few weeks before the investigator started searching for him.

So many near misses.

I type all of the above, because it fills my heart to do so, and because I just realized how and why I have a deep connection to this image:

Obama

Men without fathers… many struggles with foreign sounding names… a photo where there’s a natural space for father, standing just in the background.

And I will tell you that if the little child above turned out to be ANYTHING like the man who is my father, he will not be perfect, he will not always be right or wise, but he will be a strong, decent, hard working, inventive, wonderful, progressive, powerful man.

My fingers are crossed.

Why I don’t think the Greens can do it for the Progressive Movement.

I’ve been trying, in my humble way, to help jump-start a renewed Progressive Party presence.  But a question that is often asked of me is why not just join the Green Party.  I could go into a long and detailed explanation, but the short of it is that I don’t think they’re very organized and some of their campaigning methods rub me the wrong way.  (For the record, the reason I don’t say much about the Libertarian and Socialist Parties is because I don’t know enough about their organizational structure or their methods of campaigning to make an informed assessment.)

First, my distaste for the Green Party’s methods in campaigning.  As reported by CBS News, they accepted money and assistance in 2006 from then-senator Rick Santorum of the Republican Party in order to get on the ballot.  The state’s high court threw candidate Carl Romanelli off the ballot citing insufficient signatures, but the story exposed an even deeper rot within the Greens’ political machine in Pennsylvania: the willingness to be compromised just to try to stick it to the Democrats, whom Greens consider little or no better than the GOP.

There is, of course, a valid argument to be made in claiming there is difference between the two major political parties.  One need only look at the voting records of the two Prima Donna Democrats competing for their party’s nomination to run for president, and the complicit cowardice by most Congressional members in either chamber, to see the truth in this point of view.  But for the Greens to accept help from a GOPer so vile as to have had post-anal sex discharge named after him reveals both a lack of integrity and a sickening display of hypocrisy.  Such actions add otherwise undeserved legitimacy to charges by Democrats that greens are somehow bent on “stealing” votes they feel belong to their party.

Then there is the organization of their campaigns for national office.  Or, rather, the lack of organization.  As I have pointed out in my recent three-part series on Progressives, Liberals, Movements and Political Parties, trying to run presidential candidates before having secured enough state-level offices (especially state secretary, judicial, and legislative positions) waste resources that are better spent building up presences in the various states so as to achieve the ability to gain traction at the national level.  What good does it do to run candidates for president when the Green Party hasn’t even made headway winning state legislative and executive offices first?

That’s why I think it’s better to rally the Progressive Movement through its own namesake political party.  I’m not saying we can’t or shouldn’t work with Greens; since their platform so closely matches that of the overall Progressive Movement, they make natural political allies and might even be tempted to switch over.  But I think as long as some elements in the party are willing to help Republicans, and as long as the party leadership insists on trying to build the party in a more top-down manner, their effectiveness as a political party is severely limited.

waiting

I feel as if I’ve been waiting for a lot of things lately.  But mostly I’ve been waiting for my life to catch up to my head.  I’m always in that same state, but this year I’ve been particularly ambitious, so everything is moving much slower and faster than normal.  I’ve decided that I’m having a quarter life crisis.  Actually I decided I was a few months ago.  I’m chock full of self fulfilling prophecies.  Not that it’s necessarily a bad thing.  It can be, and it has been.  Especially as a teenager.  But I’m not a teenager anymore, and with every passing year I’ve gotten better at self fulfilling positive prophecies.  So here I am all moved into my place in what I’ve been instructed to refer to as ‘the proud and independent republic of Cambridge’ and more specifically Harvard square.  The room is furnished, so now I have a bed to sleep on.  The courtyard outside is brick and cobblestone, the building is old with hardwood floors and strange architectural anomalies that they have all but eliminated from modern construction for no good reason.  My roommate plays the guitar and sings beautifully in Russian as she practices to perform during the summers.  My ex left the set of chess pieces and analog clock he bought before his first tournament right when we started dating for me on the door the day I was leaving town.  We had dinner the night before, and quite honestly it was the most wonderful date I’ve ever been on [well, except our terrible waitress…but those are the fun parts of memories aren’t they?].  Our last words that night were tearful ‘I love you’s.  I wouldn’t have wanted to leave town any other way.  I’m secretly hoping 10 years from now we run into each other and our lives are back in sync.  I secretly have a fear I’ll never find someone who understands me the same way again.  But I can’t hold on to that, I’ve got plans for the future and they’re almost in the palm of my hand.  On the surface I guess that may sound selfish, but on the surface I’m much different.  And I’m guessing so are you.

My youngest sister is graduating from Boston University in a few weeks and of the three of us, she benefited the most from the least amount of involvement from my parents.  She’s a relatively normal, intelligent young woman now and at times I also secretly wish I had her life instead.  She’s moving to California at the end of the summer because her boyfriend will be going to graduate school at Stanford.  But I’ll have the summer to get to know her as an adult, a chance I haven’t had before this.  I’ve already made her commit to weekly lunches in alternating parts of the city to ensure our sisterly bonding.  My best friend told me that she wants everyone she knows to move far away from her so she always has somewhere to stay when she goes on vacation.  I agree.  My other sister is in Florida and getting married in about a month to a guy I’ve never met.  When we were younger she was my other half, through every move and every family drama we were always there for each other.  The last few years I’ve lost her and I realized I might not get her back.  Sometimes people are stuck in places that they can’t leave until they’re ready.  I’ll be here for her when she is, but until then there’s not much more I can do.  I’m currently pretending that this wedding won’t actually go through as an excuse not to worry about it until the last minute.  That maybe she’ll wake up and let me know…but maybe she never will.  Le sigh…[that’s how they say it in France.  Or at least they do in my head].

I haven’t been reading books as much lately as I’ve wanted to, but I have been re-reading Welcome to the Monkey House semi obsessively.  Besides Harrison Bergeron, Report on the Barnhouse Effect is my favorite story.  It was the first Vonnegut book I ever read and at 17 I was actually fairly upset I hadn’t been introduced to his work sooner.  There are only a handful of books I’ve read more than once [I’m a volume reader], but I’ve re-read almost all his and many multiple times.  I’ve also bought and borrowed and lent out and lost about 3 copies of everything he’s written.  I think it’s about time I invest in buying them all and reading them in order this time…  Did you know he studied as a chemist before he became a writer?  Chemists are an interesting breed of people.  And I’m not just saying that because technically I am, but I think it tends to be the science people end up in when they are curious about the way the world works and what the hell we’re doing here but aren’t quite sure how [or what] to think about it.  Physicists are another favorite of mine.  They can be off putting at times, but I always imagined it was like they had special math glasses they used to look at the world.  I really wish someone would invent a way to jump inside someone’s brain for a few minutes.  I would love to see what it’s like in other people’s heads.  I especially wonder if colors and objects look the same.  Like if your personal perspective filter makes things physically appear different when you interpret the image.  I’d imagine if someone jumped in my head for a few minutes it would seem like absolute chaos and a relief to step out of.  But maybe that’s just because every once in a while I’d like to get a break from myself.  I spend a great deal of time focusing my wondering mind.  But everything has a place, and I know where it is.  Even if I have to take obscure paths to get there.  …you should try finding something on my desktop….my computer files are [non]sensically organized and I realized the other day I have about 10 folders in 3 different places named ‘Random folders’.  But I know exactly what’s in each one and why.  …ah, my computer brain extension.  This is the first computer I’ve owned that was just mine and only mine and it’s the only part of my life that I’m protective about other people touching.  [Although I’m also the same way with my thoughts]  I need to get a laptop soon and I’ve realized how picky I am being about it.  Probably because now I can become mobile with my brain extension….scary ;p

And that’s what this is right now [no, not the brain extension part], but a focus for my wondering mind while I’m waiting.  Waiting for that email, waiting for my life to catch up to my head.  Waiting for the chance to finally fully focus my head into one place.  I guess my next life crisis is my mid-life.  I’m assuming time will be going much quicker in between now and then than it did for the time leading up to my quarter life.  Now that I’ve gotten somewhat of a handle on this whole existing thing I suddenly feel like I have catching up to do and not nearly enough time to do it in…Le psi…[That’s how physicists say it in France…]  

Vision

For the last 18 years, I’ve been the director of a non-profit organization working with urban youth who are starting to get in trouble at home, at school, or with the law. I came to this position naive and inexperienced, so I had a pretty steep learning curve. The toughest lessons I had to learn were about what it meant to organize and lead other people. But running a close second to all of that are the ongoing lessons about racism and its impact on me, our staff, and most importantly, the youth and families we work with.

In the beginning, I thought combating racism was all about learning information and hiring a diverse group of people. For awhile, that was the focus. One of my initial attempts to do that involved organizing a series of “brown bag” seminars with people from different cultures to facilitate discussions. The first person who came in was a Latino man who had worked with youth in this community for over 30 years. I’ll never forget his opening remarks, “Latinos come from 22 different countries with a vast array of cultural differences. My family comes from Mexico, so that is the only one of these that I can even begin to address.” I thought boy…we’re going to need a lot of seminars to cover all this!!!

It was then that I came across an African American woman who taught Social Work at a local university. She gave a presentation at a conference I attended titled “An Artistic View of Diversity.” Her basic premise was to correlate what one needed to be an artist and what one needed to traverse all the different frames of diversity. Knowledge, information, and technique are all important pieces of the puzzle. But, as with art, the most important piece is the vision…how you see the world. Anyone can learn and potentially misuse the information and techniques. What one needs to be an artist is to have a view of the world that can incorporate the complexities, challenges and struggles involved in embracing diversity. She used a song as part of her presentation. And the words to the chorus have always stuck with me.

It’s in every one of us

to be wise.

Find your heart,

open up both your eyes.

We can all know everything

without every knowing why.

It’s in every one of us

to be wise.

The line that stands out to me is “Find your heart, open up both your eyes.”

One of the critical components to the process of combating racism that she shared with us is the ability to incorporate a both/and rather than an either/or vision. An either/or vision sees the world in terms of right/wrong and winner/loser. A both/and vision finds balance and embraces all. It is a form of partnership rather than dominance and a key ingredient to that kind of vision is a balance between our outside and our inside…giving us a firm identity for ourselves and integrity in our actions. With that kind of vision, we can take responsibility for ourselves and not rely on techniques and formulas. We can open our hearts to others without fear, knowing that we all have a place at the table.

None of this takes away from the need to do the hard work of learning the information that is necessary to really begin to understand one another. But it is the foundation on which we need to build that understanding, the importance of which was described by Nezua at The Unapologetic Mexican this way:

The USA teaches us many myths: the Hero Myth, the Great White Myth, the Savages in the Wild Myth, the GodDaddyNation Myth….and so on. Fodder for our cartoons, bland teen movies, and unceasing war rationales. The truth, while somewhat less glitzy, is just as exciting, age-old, and far more empowering. For we-the centuries-strong, the been-here-all-along, the weak, the meek, the She, the black, the brown, the grown-up-from-this-ground, the despised and forgotten and the poor and ground down-are in this fight together. And it is a fight, look all around. A fight for equality, a fight for justice, and sometimes simply a fight for food and human dignity. And as long as we are divided and fighting over scraps and ladder rungs and tossed off politician-dung, there is no justice. So let us remember why it is that we stand here, why we stood up; let us loan one another our strength, and move side by side.

Crackpot Theories on McCain

crossposted from orange

I am going into speculative territory here about John McCain.

There’s something bugging me about him.  Yes, I know the press treats him as they do all Republicans — with even a little added approval because he knows how to play them.  The press loves the whole “maverick” conceit, keeps them from having to think about who he really is and analyze what he says and does from a rational point of view.

But the more I think about who John McCain is, the more I come up with a blank, a disconnect I find disturbing.

It seems to me that McCain has gone way beyond pandering; I get the sense he is utterly contemptuous of the political processes of a Presidential campaign.  Given the lunacy of our present electoral apparatus, I can’t say I find that surprising.

I think many Americans who are not political junkies still think of John McCain as a war hero and one of those “reasonable” Republicans, sort of middle of the road.

Of course his voting record says otherwise.  Here is a man who was tortured in Viet Nam and yet voted to uphold this misAdministration’s torture tactics.  That alone is breathtaking.  Unfortunately, in today’s corrupt and criminal culture, there is no time given to allowing the average citizen to focus on much of anything but constant and relentless spin.

So what is breathtaking becomes “ho-hum.”

Why does John McCain want to be President?  Does anyone really know?

He will pretty much say anything to anyone at this point, with no real concern as to whether he is contradicting himself or not.

Some would say (yeah, I’m using the phrase) that means he is a flip-flopper.

I think maybe it’s something else.  Maybe he is so cynical about the political process, after having gone through his own Rovian swift-boating experience, that the lesson he took away was that no one really listens to anything anyone says so it doesn’t really matter what you say to the press or to folks who come to see you give a speech on the campaign trail.

Maybe that cynicism has created such a contempt for the press, for the people, for the whole process, that John McCain feels very comfortable throwing out whatever answer comes to mind, and that at this point he is running for President simply to be President.  It’s all calculation now and no humanity.

I have never gotten a sense from McCain of what he would actually do in office.  He’ll say anything, make shit up on the spot and then blow off any criticism of inconsistency with the same lack of gravity and respect as when he made those inconsistent statements.  Who knows, maybe that’s why the press love him – because his cynicism and contempt mirrors their own.

And I think there are some McCain admirers who have their own tin-foil fantasies that once he gets in office he will turn out to be a superhero who was just waiting for his moment of power to make everything all right.

Well, I think there are a lot of Americans right now looking for that kind of mythical superhero, so I’m not surprised if this crackpot notion would have some truth to it.

Of course, you never know what a person will do once they gain this powerful an office.  Events and political factions challenge one constantly.

But I don’t get a sense at all of what he would do in office.  Most of all, I don’t get a sense of why on earth he wants to run for President.  No, not as a Republican or a politician, but as an American whose story we all know better than, perhaps, we’d like.

I am hoping that citizen bloggers will rip the lid off this charade, and in the coming months we will see who we are really dealing with when it comes to John McCain, in 2008.

The Journalism of Empire: an Exhibit in LA Times

(1:30PM EST – promoted by Nightprowlkitty)

Imagine a future in which the United States has been invaded and occupied by China.  Imagine that Chinese forces speeding through downtown Chicago open fire in an intersection and kill your son, as he sits in the passanger seat of your car.  Now imagine that the American Branch of the Chinese Government offers you money to make up for it.

Imagine that you say to the Chinese official holding out the cash, “I don’t want your money.  I want you to think American life is precious.”

According to an article in the LA Times headlined Blackwater shooting highlights a U.S., Iraq culture clash, you are weird and hard to understand; the product of an alien culture.

Baraa Sadoon had “60 fragments of bullet lodged in his abdomen”:

Several times he asked about his car, which was shot up in the incident. Investigators told him it was still needed for the investigation. They wanted to know whether he planned to ask for compensation. He was miffed.

“I want you to feel that Iraqi life is precious,” he said he told them.

It is an all-too-typical effect of war and occupation.  The population of the imperial power — in this case, you and I — is told that the occupied people are strange, their culture too hard for we more civilized people to understand.  The article both insults the intelligence of the reader and distorts and damages our understanding of ourselves and other human beings around the world.

Physician Haitham Rubaie doesn’t want money either. What he wants above all is justice for his wife, a doctor, and his son, a medical student, who died.

He rebuffed attempts to have a donation to an orphanage made in his family’s name. No amount of cash, no matter how well-intentioned, would sweep this under the rug.

“I don’t want any help from you,” he said he told them. “If you want to help the orphans, you give them money yourselves.”

As readers, we are asked to think of Dr. Rubaie as culturally distant from us.  A believer in a kind of justice we neither grasp nor would ever accept.

“Our system is so different from theirs,” said David Mack, a former U.S. diplomat who has served in American embassies in Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Tunisia and the United Arab Emirates. “An honor settlement has to be both financial and it has to have the right symbolism. We would never accept their way of doing things, and they don’t accept ours.”

Is this also an effect of imperialism?  That we, the occupiers, come to think that “ours,” our justice system, our sense of right and wrong, of just and the unjust, is so shallow and base?  Do we evict our souls so we can stand the thought of the killing and torture of civilians in other lands?  Do we reduce ourselves to imagining that we, in their position, would accept the money?

Note the emphasis on unimportant cultural accoutrements.  Iraqi “glasses of tea” are mentioned, and we are meant to understand that we, the readers, are not like that.  We don’t care about commiseration.  We don’t care about responsibility.  We know nothing of these “glasses of tea”:

But traditional Arab society values honor and decorum above all. If a man kills or badly injures someone in an accident, both families convene a tribal summit. The perpetrator admits responsibility, commiserates with the victim, pays medical expenses and other compensation, all over glasses of tea in a tribal tent.

A neighbor pays a neighbor’s medical expenses and admits responsibility.  They must be Martians.  

I take it that we are to adopt, actually, a feigned British accent, and imagine days of yore.  Perhaps the occupation of the land so vital to “our interests” goes badly, old chap, because those Arabs are so hard for our boys to understand.

Perhaps, longer ago, Roman citizens sitting around back home said things like this about Britain, too.

Our system is so different from theirs,” said David Mack, a former U.S. diplomat who has served in American embassies in Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Tunisia and the United Arab Emirates.

A product of that “different system” says:

“Let them apologize by saying those were innocent people,” Rubaie said. “Then we will be ready for understanding.”

The LA Times article is an object lesson in the collapse of basic decency that goes hand-in-hand with imperial ambition.  A failure of the heart; an end to empathy.  We are told that we don’t understand all of this.  We are told that we are less than human, or that the human is less than we.

Two days later, he said, he met with a Blackwater representative. The man offered him $20,000, Abdul-Razzaq said, “not as compensation, but as a gift.” Abdul-Razzaq said he refused again.

“If you write out an apology for me and confess your crime,” he recalled saying, “I will give you a similar paper with my signature promising not to press charges.”

He said the official told him such an arrangement was impossible. His company’s lawyers in America would never sign off on such a proposal.

The offical is you and me.  The offical is the one we understand.  So the journalism of empire would have us believe.  So we must believe, if we are to see all of this and be able to live with ourselves.

Pony Party: Sunday music retrospective

Janis Ian



At Seventeen

We met Janis in Fayetteville, AR, at a women’s conference.  I have an autographed playlist somewhere.  And a guitar pick.  I like Janis.  I hope you do as well

I’ve seen more recent videos of her and she looks much older.  But I selected ones where she looks as I remember.



Society’s Child



Jesse



On The OtherSide

Please do not recommend a Pony Party when you see one.  There will be another along in a few hours.

Docudharma Times Sunday May 4



This is a matter of utmost urgency

You might even call it a police emergency

Suckers got ill when they finally heard the G

Wasn’t sellin’ out

Sunday’s Headlines: Even the Insured Feel the Strain of Health Costs: Uranium claims spring up along Grand Canyon rim: Ireland’s immigrants return home as slump sharpens fear of racism: Vivaldi’s long-lost opera returns to Prague after 278: Betrayed: The Iraqis who risked all for Britain years: Baghdad hospital damaged by U.S. missile, dozens injured: Turkish Schools Offer Pakistan a Gentler Islam: Dalai Lama’s envoys begin talks with China: Zimbabwe’s opposition divided over boycott of election re-run: Can liberal democracy save Zim?: New Columbia drug gangs wreak havoc

Mahdi Army fighters grateful for sand storm standstills in Sadr City

On a bare patch of ground outside the entrance to Sadr general hospital, 15 women clad from head to foot in black squatted in a sandstorm, wailing and waiting for their dead.

Lightning flashed, thunder rolled and the women’s robes were spattered with mud falling from a sky filled with rain and sand, but they did not notice.

“Ya’mma, Ya’ba” (“Oh mother, oh father”), cried Amira Zaydan, a 45-year-old spinster, slapping her face and chest as she grieved for her parents Jaleel, 65, and Hanounah, 60, whose house had exploded after apparently being hit by an American rocket.

“Where are you, my brothers?” she sobbed, lamenting Samir, 32, and Amir, 29, who had also perished along with their wives, one of whom was nine months pregnant.

USA

Even the Insured Feel the Strain of Health Costs

The economic slowdown has swelled the ranks of people without health insurance.

But now it is also threatening millions of people who have insurance but find that the coverage is too limited or that they cannot afford their own share of medical costs.

Many of the 158 million people covered by employer health insurance are struggling to meet medical expenses that are much higher than they used to be – often because of some combination of higher premiums, less extensive coverage, and bigger out-of-pocket deductibles and co-payments.

Uranium claims spring up along Grand Canyon rim

A rush to extract uranium on public lands pits environmentalists, who worry about the local effect, against mining companies, which point out that nuclear power wouldn’t contribute to global warming.

GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK, ARIZ. — Thanks to renewed interest in nuclear power, the United States is on the verge of a uranium mining boom, and nowhere is the hurry to stake claims more pronounced than in the districts flanking the Grand Canyon’s storied sandstone cliffs.

On public lands within five miles of Grand Canyon National Park, there are now more than 1,100 uranium claims, compared with just 10 in January 2003, according to data from the Department of the Interior.

In recent months, the uranium rush has spawned a clash as epic as the canyon’s 18-mile chasm, with both sides claiming to be working for the good of the planet.

Environmental organizations have appealed to federal courts and Congress to halt any drilling on the grounds that mining so close to such a rare piece of the nation’s patrimony could prove ruinous for the canyon’s visitors and wildlife alike.

Europe

Ireland’s immigrants return home as slump sharpens fear of racism

With growing concerns over job losses and the credit crunch starting to bite, Ireland’s migrant workers are feeling the strain – not just in their pockets, but in their relationship with the adopted homeland. Henry McDonald reports from Dublin

Founded by immigrants from Dracula’s homeland, Transylvania FC is one of the many casualties of Ireland’s economic downturn. The Romanian football club that plays in Dublin, birthplace of the vampire’s creator, Bram Stoker, has seen its squad severely depleted as migrant construction workers leave either for home or more lucrative projects such as London’s Olympic village.

Like the tens of thousands of other immigrant workers who flocked to Ireland’s Celtic Tiger economy at the start of the 21st century, Marcello Rus sought a better life than the one he had in Romania. But Transylvania’s coach has noticed over the past eight months that many of his compatriots are going home. Rus, whose side gained promotion last season into one of Ireland’s top amateur soccer tournaments, the Leinster Senior League, has suffered from the slump.

Vivaldi’s long-lost opera returns to Prague after 278 years

After hunting the missing manuscript down in a German archive, Czech conductor revives ‘Argippo’

By David Randall

Sunday, 4 May 2008

A long-lost opera by Antonio Vivaldi was to have its first performance in centuries last night. Argippo, discovered by a Czech musician as he rummaged through an old archive of anonymous scores, was being staged at a castle in Prague, the city where it had its premiere in 1730. Fittingly, it will be conducted by Ondrej Macek, the man who found the manuscript, and played by his Baroque Music Ensemble Hofmusici.

Vivaldi, called by contemporaries “the Red Priest” for the colour of his hair, is known these days, to all but serious lovers of Baroque music, for a single work: The Four Seasons. However, he was a prolific composer who produced more than 500 concertos, 73 sonatas, numerous pieces of sacred music and 46 operas. One of them, Argippo, opened in the Palace of Count Spork in the centre of Prague 278 years ago.

Middle East

Betrayed: The Iraqis who risked all for Britain

Sami Faleh Mohammed, 44, was killed because he was a translator for the British Army. His widow says it failed in its duty of care. His is one of 12 families seeking justice. Robert Verkaik reports from Damascus

Sami Faleh Mohammed was one of thousands of exiled Iraqis who after the invasion of Iraq decided to give his country another chance.

In September 2004 he led his wife and three children from the safety of Jordan to Basra, where he found work as a translator for the British Army. Two years later he was dead, murdered by members of the Shia militias who have targeted Iraqis who risk their own lives to help the British try to bring stability to the region.

His case is now one of 12 test claims being brought in the High Court by Iraqi translators and other workers who believe they have been betrayed by Britain.

Baghdad hospital damaged by U.S. missile, dozens injured

BAGHDAD – A major hospital in Baghdad’s Sadr City slum was damaged Saturday when an American military strike targeted a militia command center just a few yards away, the U.S. military said.

American troops also killed 14 people in separate incidents in and around Sadr City as bloody street battles continued to mark the U.S. effort to rid the area of suspected Shiite Muslim militants, military officials said.

The rocket strike near Sadr Hospital injured 30 people, shattered the windows of ambulances and sent doctors and hospital staff fleeing the scene, hospital officials said.

Asia

Turkish Schools Offer Pakistan a Gentler Islam

KARACHI, Pakistan – Praying in Pakistan has not been easy for Mesut Kacmaz, a Muslim teacher from Turkey.

He tried the mosque near his house, but it had Israeli and Danish flags painted on the floor for people to step on. The mosque near where he works warned him never to return wearing a tie. Pakistanis everywhere assume he is not Muslim because he has no beard.

“Kill, fight, shoot,” Mr. Kacmaz said. “This is a misinterpretation of Islam.”

Dalai Lama’s envoys begin talks with China

Envoys for the Dalai Lama began a series of meetings Sunday with Chinese leaders, the first time the two sides have come together since violence broke out in the Tibetan regions of China in March.

The talks began Sunday morning, said Tenzin Takhla, the secretary to the Dalai Lama, from the northern Indian city of Dharamsala. Later in the week, the two sides will carry out further meetings, he said.

Chinese President Hu Jintao told Japanese reporters Sunday that he hopes the talks yield positive results.

“I am confident that through joint efforts by both sides, this visit will be able to achieve the expected results,” Hu said, according to a report by Japan’s Kyodo News agency.

Africa

Zimbabwe’s opposition divided over boycott of election re-run

MDC members fail to make a decision as their leader Morgan Tsvangirai remains abroad amid fears for his safety

After a day of top level meetings, Zimbabwe’s main opposition party yesterday failed to make a decision on whether it will take part in presidential run-off elections scheduled for next month. Observers now fear that there is a fierce dispute within the Movement for Democratic Change – whose leader Morgan Tsvangirai is staying out of the country for his safety – over whether to boycott the second round of voting that was announced on Friday by Zimbabwe’s Electoral Commission.

Tsvangirai claimed an outright majority after the polls and the MDC says the results released this weekend were doctored. Election officials announced on Friday that Tsvangirai had beaten Mugabe in the 29 March presidential poll but failed to win the absolute majority necessary to avoid a second ballot.

Can liberal democracy save Zim?

By Patrick Laurence

As the controversy over the Zimbabwean March 29 elections reaches a new level of acrimony on the question of whether the presidential election result has been skewed in favour of Robert Mugabe, it is appropriate to pause and appraise the significance of events in Zimbabwe over the past month.

A broadly based conclusion can be confidently offered: Mugabe’s grip on unfettered power has finally been broken, even if he succeeds in prolonging his tenure of the presidential office for a few more months.

The officially confirmed results of the parliamentary elections affirmed the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) as the winner, thereby conferring control of the legislative and budgetary processes on it.

Latin America

New Columbia drug gangs wreak havoc

The killing of a farm leader who opposed growing coca suggests the emergence of former right-wing paramilitary fighters.

SANTA ROSA, COLOMBIA — In the end, getting his picture taken with President Bush and attaining a modicum of local fame was no help to Miguel Daza. In fact, his high profile may have been the death of him.

The young farmer was killed in a roadside ambush in February near this mining and drug trafficking hub in north-central Colombia, apparently by one of a new generation of criminal gangs that have emerged in the two years since right-wing paramilitary fighters officially disbanded.

The status of the paramilitary fighters has serious ramifications for President Alvaro Uribe, a conservative U.S. ally who famously broke up the militias, which were playing a role in destabilizing the country. But he has seen his presidency challenged by revelations that many of his closest allies were tied to the right-wing gunmen.

The Latest News – Three Must Reads

Cross-posted from THE ENVIRONMENTALIST

New guest contributors (and our staff) have managed to break new ground with these posts:  

The Gas Tax ‘Holiday’ Shell Game

Senators Hillary Clinton and John McCain have challenged Senator Barack Obama over his refusal to support their proposal that would suspend the .18 Federal gas tax for three months this summer. ~snip~ The lone ‘expert’ in support of Senators Clinton and McCain in this scenario so far?  Spokesman for the Clinton campaign and SHELL OIL LOBBYIST, Steve Elmendorf.  

Hillary Clinton’s ‘Victory’ in Pennsylvania: The Rush Limbaugh Effect

What if Democratic voters and the uncommitted super-delegates come to learn that Rush Limbaugh had a greater impact on Hillary Clinton’s victory in Pennsylvania, and maybe Texas and Ohio, than say, the Reverend Wright, and the so-called ‘bitter’ comments?

‘Friends of the Earth’ endorse Obama

The Friends of the Earth Action, the PAC political arm of The Friends of the Earth environmental organization, has endorsed Senator Barack Obama for President, citing Senator Obama’s stand for “real energy solutions instead of sham Clinton-McCain ‘gas tax holiday'” as the key reason for endorsement.

More at THE ENVIRONMENTALIST

TA!

Evening Edition

(A little look at what I’ve been working on.  Instead of your Weekend News Digest today – promoted by ek hornbeck)

TBH480

World-

Africa

2 pm 12 Zimbabwe opposition mulls conditions for run-off

Asia

1 US strike takes out suspected militant hideout in Sadr City

2 China seeking "positive outcome" from Tibet talks

6am 1 Olympic torch arrives on safer terrain in mainland China

6am 2 US military: 4 Marines killed in Anbar province in Iraq

6am 3 Malaysia angers women with travel-restriction idea

6am 14 War shrine film opens in Tokyo amid tight security

10 am 2 Iraq’s first lady unharmed after her motorcade is bombed

10 am 3 Gunmen pull Iraqi journalist from car, kill her

10 am 5 Japan warns rising food prices could lead to unrest in Asia

10 am 6 ASEAN committed to free trade pact with Australia, NZ: minister

Europe

5 Poll rout raises questions over British PM’s future

South America

10 am 1 Bolivian state begins key, and defiant, autonomy vote

2 pm 13 Bolivia’s richest region votes on autonomy drive

2 pm 15 U.S. Rancher in Bolivia Showdown

U.S.-

News/Politics

3 Health care waits to ignite as campaign issue

7 Amtrak plans multi-city celebration of ‘National Train Day’

10 Is Liberal Catholicism Dead?

2 pm 7 Old cemetery poses grave dilemma for buyers of Vt. farm

2 pm 17 Democrats pick up House seat in Louisiana

Entertainment

6am 7 Lego’s latest brick trick: a virtual world

6am 8 GTA 4 poised to dominate Xbox Live

6am 11 Hollywood actors and studios extend labor talks again

6am 12 "Iron Man" gets heavy start at box office

6am 13 ‘Iron Man’ Hero Personifies Modern Military Contractors

Business

4 Microsoft withdraws offer for Yahoo

9 Pawnbrokers thrive as US economy falters

11 Buffett and Munger reassure shareholders about succession

12 Buffett says Fed avoided chaos in Bear bailout

13 ECB to stay on high alert until inflation fades: analysts

6am 9 Walmart.com using Wii Fit to boost Mom’s Day sales

10 am 4 Barclays eyes possible Korea investor: report

Science

14 Malaysian palm oil struggles to promote ‘green’ image

15 Africa’s biggest oil producer goes green

6am 4 Smarter electric grid could be key to saving power

6am 5 Crackdown on traffickers strains Thailand’s wildlife centres

6am 6 Asian vultures may face extinction in India, study warns

Health

6 Common drugs hasten decline in elderly: study

8 U.S. parents’ baby knowledge lacking, study finds

6am 10 Doctors to reassess antibiotics for ‘chronic Lyme’ disease

2 pm 25 24 Chinese children die of virus; other countries affected

Bloglines 5/4

2 pm 1 Bill Moyers– by tristero

2 pm 2 And Still We Have No Voice– by tristero

2 pm 3 The Wall– by digby

2 pm 4 Another Minuteman Outfit Consorts With Nazis– By David Neiwert

2 pm 5 The media, the Right and 1988: endless deja vu– by Glenn Greenwald

2 pm 6 Fox’s Faux Populism vs A Shadow Elite–pt. 2– by Paul Rosenberg

Hmm… this particular display took just as long as everything else combined because of the incorrect expansion of shortcut link brackets ‘[ ]’ that had to be replaced with the more difficult <a href=””></a> notation.

These were modified one link at a time pacified, maybe you can see a pattern in it that I cannot.

Oh, and they’re all direct copies (or were) of the originals that worked first time every time below with everything cut but the links (a handy way to collect ex post facto lists).

World-

Africa

2 pm 12 Zimbabwe opposition mulls conditions for run-off

By MacDonald Dzirutwe, Reuters

2 hours, 56 minutes ago

HARARE (Reuters) – Zimbabwe’s main opposition party is discussing possible conditions for its leader Morgan Tsvangirai to contest a run-off election against President Robert Mugabe, a senior MDC official said on Sunday.

The Movement for Democratic Change has not yet decided whether to contest the second round, rejecting official results of the March 29 election showing the former union leader won with less than the outright majority he needed to defeat Mugabe.

But if Tsvangirai does not stand, it would automatically hand victory to Mugabe, accused by opponents of ruining Zimbabwe’s once prosperous economy during his 28 years in power.

Asia

1 US strike takes out suspected militant hideout in Sadr City

By BRADLEY BROOKS, Associated Press Writer

1 hour, 9 minutes ago

BAGHDAD – The U.S. military fired guided missiles into the heart of Baghdad’s teeming Sadr City slum on Saturday, leveling a building 55 yards away from a hospital and wounding nearly two dozen people.

Separately, the U.S. military said late Saturday that four Marines were killed on Thursday by a roadside bomb in Anbar province. The military also said that a U.S. soldier died of wounds suffered in a roadside bomb that struck the soldier’s vehicle during a combat patrol in eastern Baghdad Friday. At least 4,071 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

AP Television News footage from Sadr City showed several ambulances destroyed and on fire, thick black smoke rising from them as firefighters worked to put out the flames.

2 China seeking “positive outcome” from Tibet talks

By John Ruwitch Reuters

37 minutes ago

SHENZHEN, China (Reuters) – China’s president said he was hoping for a “positive outcome” from talks with envoys of the Dalai Lama, which were due to open on Sunday, but state media kept up a barrage of attacks on Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader.

“I hope that the contacts with the Dalai Lama’s side from today will yield a positive outcome,” Hu Jintao told Japanese reporters in Beijing, Japan’s Kyodo news agency reported.

The fence-mending talks between Chinese officials and the two aides of the Dalai Lama, the first since an eruption of Tibetan protests and deadly riots in March, were scheduled to start on Sunday in the city of Shenzhen, near Hong Kong.

6 am 1 Olympic torch arrives on safer terrain in mainland China

By CARA ANNA, Associated Press Writer

1 minute ago

SANYA, China – Cheering Chinese stood on their chairs and waved flags as the Olympic torch started its mainland leg Sunday on the tropical island of Hainan – the first stop in what is expected to be a peaceful three-month journey to Beijing.

Protests followed the torch overseas, but organizers in the seaside resort of Sanya promised a trouble-free national tour that will wind through every Chinese province and region before arriving in Beijing before the Olympics start on Aug. 8.

Some Chinese, including the torch bearers, seemed to be relieved the flame was safely home.

6 am 2 US military: 4 Marines killed in Anbar province in Iraq

By BRADLEY BROOKS, Associated Press Writer

17 minutes ago

BAGHDAD – The U.S. military said Sunday a roadside bomb killed four Marines in western Anbar province – the deadliest attack in that area in months.

The Marines were killed Friday, but no other details of the incident were released.

Anbar was once a stronghold for insurgents battling against U.S. forces. But in the past year the vast desert province has largely been calmed with the rise of the Awakening Council movement – Sunni fighters who now turn their guns on al-Qaida instead of U.S. forces.

Thursday’s attack was the most lethal in Anbar since Sept. 6, when four Marines were killed in combat. The military did not release details of those deaths.

6 am 3 Malaysia angers women with travel-restriction idea

Reuters

Sun May 4, 2:22 AM ET

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) – Malaysian women’s groups reacted with outrage on Sunday to a government proposal to impose restrictions on women planning to travel overseas on their own.

The mainly Muslim country is considering requiring women to obtain the written consent of their families or employers before being allowed to travel alone outside the country, state news agency Bernama said on Saturday, quoting the foreign minister.

“It is totally ridiculous and it’s a totally regressive proposal with regards to women’s right to movement,” said Norhayati Kaprawi, spokeswoman for Sisters in Islam.

6 am 14 War shrine film opens in Tokyo amid tight security

AFP

Sat May 3, 3:57 AM ET

TOKYO (AFP) – A controversial film about a Japanese shrine that honours the nation’s war dead opened on Saturday in Tokyo amid tight security, defying threats from nationalists outraged at its content.

The film was screened as police patrolled the entrance of the cinema and were even posted inside auditoriums after threats that protesters would disrupt the event.

The documentary, which received a grant from Japan’s government, looks at the controversy surrounding the Yasukuni shrine, which honours 2.5 million war dead — including convicted war criminals from World War II.

10 am 2 Iraq’s first lady unharmed after her motorcade is bombed

By BRADLEY BROOKS, Associated Press Writer

35 minutes ago

BAGHDAD – A bomb hit a motorcade carrying Iraq’s first lady through Baghdad on Sunday, while the U.S. military said a roadside explosion killed four Marines in the deadliest attack in western Anbar province in months.

The motorcade bombing in Baghdad’s Karrada district injured four of Hiro Ibrahim Ahmed’s bodyguards but left her unharmed, according to the office of her husband, President Jalal Talabani.

She was headed to the city’s central National Theater to attend a cultural festival when the attack occurred just before noon, said the presidential office. It was unclear if she was the target or if the bombing was random.

10 am 3 Gunmen pull Iraqi journalist from car, kill her

Reuters

2 hours, 2 minutes ago

MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) – Gunmen shot dead an Iraqi reporter on Sunday after pulling her out of a car in northern Mosul, a notoriously violent city where journalists are often targeted and live in fear of their life.

Police said Serwa Abdul-Wahab, in her mid-30s, was on her way to work when gunmen forced her from her taxi in eastern Mosul, 240 miles north of Baghdad, and shot her once in the head.

There were conflicting reports about who she worked for and police were not immediately able to say why she might have been attacked. Police and fellow journalists said she was a contributor to www.muraslon.org, an Iraqi news website.

10 am 5 Japan warns rising food prices could lead to unrest in Asia

AFP

Sun May 4, 6:32 AM ET

MADRID (AFP) – Soaring prices for food staples, especially for rice which have tripled over the past year, could lead to social unrest in Asia, Japanese Finance Minister Fukushiro Nukaga warned Sunday in Spain.

“The recent hike in the price of rice will hit Asian countries particularly hard. The ones who are most affected are the poorest segment of the population including the urban poor,” he said at a meeting of the Asian Development Bank.

“It will have a negative impact on the living standards and also affect their nutrition. Such a situation may lead to social untrust and unrest and therefore safety nets addressing the immediate needs of the poorest are needed,” he added.

10 am 6 ASEAN committed to free trade pact with Australia, NZ: minister

AFP

2 hours, 58 minutes ago

JAKARTA (AFP) – ASEAN was showing strong commitment to try to wrap up negotiations on a free trade pact between the regional grouping, Australia and New Zealand, Australian Trade Minister Simon Crean said Sunday.

Crean, who attended the ASEAN Economic Ministers Closer Economic Relations talks in the Indonesia island of Bali on Saturday, said “we all agreed on the importance of successfully concluding the FTA negotiation in August.”

“Considerable work remains. But ministers have given a clear signal to officials that the political will is there to try and achieve a substantial outcome this year,” he said in a statement issued by his office.

2 pm 8 Iraq says to probe claims of Iran meddling

By Waleed Ibrahim, Reuters

Sun May 4, 10:19 AM ET

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Iraq on Sunday appeared to distance itself from U.S. accusations of Iranian meddling in Iraqi affairs, saying it would not be pushed into conflict with its neighbor and wanted its own inquiry into the evidence.

Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki had ordered the formation of a special committee comprised of representatives of the various security ministries “to document any intervention in Iraqi affairs.”

“The reason behind forming this committee is to find tangible information and not information based on speculation,” Dabbagh told a news conference in Baghdad.

2 pm 10 US-backed plan sees shiny future for embattled Green Zone

By BRADLEY BROOKS and QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA, Associated Press Writers

7 minutes ago

BAGHDAD – Forget the rocket attacks, concrete blast walls and lack of a sewer system. Now try to imagine luxury hotels, a shopping center and even condos in the heart of Baghdad.

That’s all part of a five-year development “dream list” – or what some dub an improbable fantasy – to transform the U.S.-protected Green Zone from a walled fortress into a centerpiece for Baghdad’s future.

But the $5 billion plan has the backing of the Pentagon and apparently the interest of some deep pockets in the world of international hotels and development, the lead military liaison for the project told The Associated Press.

2 pm 11 China farms the world to feed a ravenous economy

By DENIS D. GRAY, Associated Press Writer

20 minutes ago

CHALEUNSOUK, Laos – The rice fields that blanketed this remote mountain village for generations are gone. In their place rise neat rows of young rubber trees – their sap destined for China.

All 60 families in this dirt-poor, mud-caked village of gaunt men and hunched women are now growing rubber, like thousands of others across the rugged mountains of northern Laos. They hope in coming years to reap huge profits from the tremendous demand for rubber just across the frontier in China.

As Beijing scrambles to feed its galloping economy, it has already scoured the world for mining and logging concessions. Now it is turning to crops to feed its people and industries. Chinese enterprises are snapping up vast tracts of land abroad and forging contract farming deals.

2 pm 14 Georgia denies Abkhaz, Russian claims over spy planes

AFP

19 minutes ago

SUKHUMI, Georgia (AFP) – The war of nerves between Georgia, Russia and the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia stepped up a notch Sunday, as Abkhaz officials claimed to have down two unmanned Georgian spy planes.

As Russia issued a statement accusing Georgia of escalating tension in the region, Tblisi categorically denied it had lost any drones — but vowed it would continue flying the unmanned aircraft over Abhkazia.

The latest war of words started when Georgia’s rebel Abkhazia region said Sunday it had downed two Georgian drones two weeks after a similar incident stoked tensions in the region.

Europe

5 Poll rout raises questions over British PM’s future

by Phil Hazlewood, AFP

2 hours, 4 minutes ago

LONDON (AFP) – British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is battling to steady his Labour Party’s nerves after its worst election defeat for 40 years, but the rout raises serious questions about his future, commentators say.

The British prime minister was left reeling by local polls that saw the main opposition Conservative Party surge back into town halls in England and Wales and even oust eight-year London mayor Ken Livingstone from office.

But while nobody expects Brown to go anytime soon, some see the May 1 polls — 11 years to the day after Tony Blair led Labour into power — as presaging the beginning of the end for the party’s hold on national power.

South America

10 am 1 Bolivian state begins key, and defiant, autonomy vote

By DAN KEANE, Associated Press Writer

3 minutes ago

SANTA CRUZ, Bolivia – Indigenous socialism clashed with global capitalism on Sunday as residents of this self-reliant flatland state voted on an autonomy referendum whose likely passage is seen as a rebuke to the country’s leftist president.

Minor scuffles were reported in the outskirts of Santa Cruz’s namesake capital shortly after the polls opened. Pro-autonomy groups battled backers of President Evo Morales, who were trying to halt the vote with sticks and rocks. Scattered injuries were reported.

“We won’t let them stop this vote, because there are so many of us that want to be free,” said 26-year-old autonomy supporter Ivan Morales, brandishing a tree branch in front of a cardboard voting booth after a brief street fight in Plan 3000, a poor pro-government neighborhood.

2 pm 13 Bolivia’s richest region votes on autonomy drive

By Pav Jordan, Reuters

26 minutes ago

SANTA CRUZ, Bolivia (Reuters) – Bolivia’s richest region of Santa Cruz voted on Sunday on a plan for greater autonomy from the central government in a referendum seen as a defiant rejection of President Evo Morales’ leftist reforms.

Voting was mainly calm, although clashes broke out in several poorer areas of the tropical region soon after the polls opened as backers of Morales, a former coca farmer, ransacked polling stations and burned ballots in protest.

“This is a struggle for liberty. Liberation struggles are never easy,” Percy Fernandez, mayor of the region’s main city, told reporters.

2 pm 15 U.S. Rancher in Bolivia Showdown

By JEAN FRIEDMAN-RUDOVSKY/LA PAZ, Time Magazine

2 hours, 47 minutes ago

In his native Montana, Ronald Larsen’s current legal straits might be the stuff of an old-fashioned Western movie: A cattle rancher who believes the government and its allies are unfairly trying to seize his land, and picks up a rifle to signal his displeasure. But in contemporary Bolivia, where Larsen makes his home, his recent clash with the authorities is but another instance of rising tension over land-ownership between, on the one hand, left-wing President Evo Morales and his supporters among Bolivia’s indigenous population, and on the other, political opponents backed by the country’s wealthy eastern elite.

U.S.-

News/Politics

3 Health care waits to ignite as campaign issue

By John Whitesides, Political Correspondent, Reuters

41 minutes ago

DENVER (Reuters) – The sharply contrasting health care visions of Republican John McCain and his Democratic presidential rivals offer the promise of a grand campaign debate — if the candidates find room on a crowded agenda.

While health care reform ranks as the second-biggest domestic issue after the economy in most national opinion polls, it will compete with the Iraq war, taxes, high gas prices and other topics for a prime-time spot in the campaign for November’s presidential election.

Nearly two decades of health care debate has made little headway toward finding a consensus approach, and the issue has not been a key factor in a presidential election since the collapse of the Hillary Clinton-led reform effort in 1994.

7 Amtrak plans multi-city celebration of ‘National Train Day’

By SARAH KARUSH, Associated Press Writer

36 minutes ago

WASHINGTON – Amtrak is hoping live entertainment, exhibits and a national TV personality will lure people who don’t normally take the train into its stations – and then inspire them to return to ride the rails another day.

Dubbed “National Train Day,” the May 10 effort includes a performance by singer-songwriter Sara Bareilles in Washington’s Union Station. Al Roker, of NBC’s “Today” show, is serving as the official spokesman and will host the Washington events.

Elsewhere, the Harlem Globetrotters will perform in New York City’s Penn Station. Amtrak also is sponsoring events in Chicago and Los Angeles, and other groups are organizing smaller-scale festivities around the country.

10 Is Liberal Catholicism Dead?

By DAVID VAN BIEMA, Time Magazine

1 hour, 8 minutes ago

He may not have been thinking about it at the time, but Pope Benedict, in the course of his recent U.S. visit may have dealt a knockout blow to the liberal American Catholicism that has challenged Rome since the early 1960s. He did so by speaking frankly and forcefully of his “deep shame” during his meeting with victims of the Church’s sex-abuse scandal. By demonstrating that he “gets” this most visceral of issues, the pontiff may have successfully mollified a good many alienated believers – and in the process, neutralized the last great rallying point for what was once a feisty and optimistic style of progressivism.

2 pm 7 Old cemetery poses grave dilemma for buyers of Vt. farm

By LISA RATHKE, Associated Press Writer

1 hour, 27 minutes ago

HARTLAND, Vt. – The 130-acre property was exactly what Michel Guite and his family wanted: an old Vermont farm with mountain views, rolling hills and meadows.

There was, however, one wrinkle: The property included a small family cemetery – with the grave of a War of 1812 veteran – surrounded by a fence on a scenic knoll.

His proposal to move the graveyard so he can build a house and barn has set off protests. The town has passed a resolution aimed at blocking the move, a descendant of one occupant of the graveyard is trying to fight him in probate court and opponents including military veterans have asked the town to take over the cemetery and keep it where it is.

2 pm 17 Democrats pick up House seat in Louisiana

Reuters

2 hours, 21 minutes ago

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) – A Louisiana Democrat won a special congressional election in a district held by Republicans for more than two decades, increasing her party’s majority in the House of Representatives, results from the state showed on Sunday.

State Rep. Don Cazayoux narrowly defeated Republican Woody Jenkins for the seat in Louisiana’s 6th Congressional District, which includes part of the capital city of Baton Rouge.

Cazayoux’s received 49 percent of the vote, while Jenkins, a former state legislator and a favorite of the religious right, finished the race with 46 percent, according to results from the Louisiana Secretary of State.

Entertainment

6 am 7 Lego’s latest brick trick: a virtual world

By Reed Stevenson Thu May 1, 1:52 PM ET

BILLUND, Denmark (Reuters) – Millions of children pick up Lego bricks each year to spend hours — 5 billion, in fact — creating their own imaginary worlds.

Now the manufacturer of the little plastic playing blocks wants to take them online to “Lego Universe,” a virtual world for fans of the ubiquitous toy.

Lego Universe joins an established trend where toys and video games are cross-promoted, such as Nintendo Co Ltd’s (7974.OS) Pokemon TV show, game card, toys and video game franchise, and Mattel Inc’s (MAT.N) Barbie online shopping and gaming portal at barbie.com.

6 am 8 GTA 4 poised to dominate Xbox Live

By Kemp Powers, Reuters

Thu May 1, 9:43 AM ET

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Players of the popular “Grand Theft Auto” video game series have always reveled in its unique blend of beatings, shootings and vehicular mayhem.

With “Grand Theft Auto 4,” they are taking the carnage online, which may dethrone first-person shooters like “Halo 3” and “Call of Duty 4” from the top ranks of the popular Xbox Live service.

Only a few non-shooter games have ever sat at the top of the list of most-played games on the service, which debuted in 2002 and is viewed by many gamers as primarily the domain of shooter enthusiasts.

6 am 11 Hollywood actors and studios extend labor talks again

By Steve Gorman, Reuters

Fri May 2, 9:57 PM ET

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The Screen Actors Guild and major Hollywood studios said on Friday they had agreed to extend their contract talks again, this time on a day-by-day basis, with the aim of closing a deal by next Tuesday.

The announcement, coming as the parties neared a previous self-imposed deadline, revived hopes they could avoid renewed labor unrest in an entertainment industry still recovering from a 100-day screenwriters strike that ended in February.

The current three-year SAG contract covering 120,000 film and TV actors expires on June 30. But the union is under strong pressure to reach an early settlement in order to dispel strike jitters that continue to disrupt the film industry.

6 am 12 "Iron Man" gets heavy start at box office

By Steve Gorman, Reuters

Sat May 3, 5:34 PM ET

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – “Iron Man,” the latest Marvel comics title brought to the big screen, grossed an estimated $32.5 million from its first full day in North American theaters, independent box office analysts reported on Saturday.

That tally, generated from Friday showings in some 4,100 U.S. and Canadian cinemas, put “Iron Man” on track to meet or exceed the $85 million-plus opening weekends posted by sequels to two other Marvel franchises — “Spider-Man” and “X-Men.”

“Iron Man” stars Robert Downey Jr. as a billionaire industrialist and playboy named Tony Stark who wrestles with a midlife crisis as he invents a high-tech suit of armor that transforms him into a superhero.

6 am 13 ‘Iron Man’ Hero Personifies Modern Military Contractors

Jeremy Hsu, Staff Writer, LiveScience.com

Fri May 2, 1:16 PM ET

When superhero Tony Stark isn’t donning his Iron Man armor to personally rough up villains, he’s pitching the U.S. military on new gadgets to fight the War on Terror.

“They say the best weapon is one you never have to fire,” Stark tells a group of military officers in the “Iron Man” film that opens today. “I prefer the weapon you only have to fire once.”

The Marvel comic book character’s suit embodies a futuristic technology that may enhance human capabilities in war, but the current battlefield belongs to a growing swarm of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) and robots that could someday give even Iron Man a run for his money. UAVs clocked more than 500,000 hours in the air by the beginning of 2008, performing many of the tasks normally done by piloted aircraft.

Business

4 Microsoft withdraws offer for Yahoo

By Anupreeta Das, Reuters

1 hour, 34 minutes ago

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) walked away from its bid to buy Yahoo Inc (YHOO.O) on Saturday after the Internet company turned down its offer to raise the price by $5 billion to $47.5 billion.

Microsoft’s offer was for $33 a share but Yahoo would not lower its demand below $37, Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer said. The software company initially bid $31 per share for Yahoo more than three months ago.

“We believe the economics demanded by Yahoo do not make sense for us, and it is in the best interests of Microsoft stockholders, employees and other stakeholders to withdraw our proposal,” Ballmer said in a statement.

9 Pawnbrokers thrive as US economy falters

by Virginie Montet, AFP

1 hour, 41 minutes ago

WASHINGTON (AFP) – As other businesses struggle in an economic slowdown, US pawnbrokers are thriving thanks to increasing numbers of Americans forced to separate with their family jewels to make ends meet.

“We see more people coming in to raise money in these uncertain economic times,” said Rick Sussman of Northwestern Loan Company in Baltimore which, founded in 1919, is the oldest pawnbroker in the state of Maryland.

He added: “In better times you might see people from the lower end of the social economic class getting loans, and in bad economic times you tend to see additionally also people who are middle-class trying to raise money.”

11 Buffett and Munger reassure shareholders about succession

By JOSH FUNK, AP Business Writer

2 hours, 20 minutes ago

OMAHA, Neb. – Warren Buffett tried to reassure his shareholders Saturday that Berkshire Hathaway will be fine once he is gone, but the 77-year-old billionaire offered few new details of the company’s succession plan.

Berkshire vice chairman Charlie Munger may have done more to reassure the roughly 31,000 shareholders at the company’s annual meeting.

“Well, we still have a rising young man here named Warren Buffett,” Munger said, to which Buffett joked that everyone seems young to the 84-year-old Munger.

12 Buffett says Fed avoided chaos in Bear bailout

By Jonathan Stempel, Reuters

Sat May 3, 6:40 PM ET

OMAHA, Nebraska (Reuters) – Warren Buffett said on Saturday said the U.S. Federal Reserve avoided financial market “chaos” in coordinating the March bailout of Bear Stearns Cos (BSC.N), which faced imminent bankruptcy before agreeing to be acquired by JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N).

The central bank, led by Chairman Ben Bernanke, helped broker the buyout, after liquidity evaporated at Bear, which had been Wall Street’s fifth-largest investment bank.

JPMorgan, the third-largest U.S. bank by assets, agreed to pay $10 per share for Bear, and the Fed agreed to guarantee $29 billion of Bear’s assets.

13 ECB to stay on high alert until inflation fades: analysts

by Isabelle Le Page, AFP

2 hours, 41 minutes ago

FRANKFURT (AFP) – The European Central Bank will stay on high alert for many more months while keeping its main lending rates stable, analysts believe, as inflation poses a bigger threat than signs of an impending slowdown in the 15-nation eurozone economy.

A poll of 31 economists by Thomson Financial News and Agence France-Presse found all expected the ECB to maintain the monetary status quo when its governing council meets on Thursday in Athens.

“Despite a raft of weaker economic data, the ECB will maintain its benchmark rates given persistent dangers of inflation,” analyst Stefan Muetze at Helaba bank said in a summary of the market’s opinion.

While the US Federal Reserve has slashed lending rates in the United States to 2.0 percent, the ECB has followed its own guidance and its main refinancing rate has been locked in at 4.0 percent since June.

6 am 9 Walmart.com using Wii Fit to boost Mom’s Day sales

By Nicole Maestri, Reuters

Fri May 2, 12:03 AM ET

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Forget the flowers and candy — Nintendo Co Ltd’s (7974.OS) highly anticipated “Wii Fit” video game will debut in the U.S. later this month, and Wal-Mart Stores Inc’s (WMT.N) online division is trying to persuade shoppers to order the game as “a perfect gift” for Mother’s Day.

This weekend, the Walmart.com homepage will be dominated by the Wii Fit — a physical exercise program that uses a pressure-sensing board as a controller — including a link to order the product now, ahead of its May 19 U.S. launch.

Through May 11, shoppers who “pre-order” the $89.74 game, or pay in advance to guarantee delivery when the game launches, will also get a $10 online gift card to use for a future order at Walmart.com.

10 am 4 Barclays eyes possible Korea investor: report

Reuters

1 hour, 6 minutes ago

LONDON (Reuters) – British bank Barclays (BARC.L) has held talks with an investment fund backed by the Korean government as it explores options for raising billions of pounds of fresh capital, the Sunday Telegraph said.

The newspaper said it was unclear whether the talks with Korea Investment Corporation (KIC) were still live, but added that Britain’s third-biggest bank had held discussions with several other unnamed prospective investors.

Barclays, which already counts Singaporean government investor Temasek (TEM.UL) and state-owned lender China Development Bank (CHDB.UL) among its shareholders, declined to comment. KIC could not immediately be reached for comment.

2 pm 16 Washington must do more to help housing market : FHFB

By Natsuko Waki, Reuters

1 hour, 50 minutes ago

MADRID (Reuters) – The government must actively intervene in the domestic housing market to fix the subprime mortgage problems that interest rate cuts and tax rebates alone cannot, a Federal Housing Finance Board official said on Sunday.

Allan Mendelowitz, a member of the Board of Directors of the FHFB — a regulatory agency for banks providing home loans — noted the demand and supply situation painted a bleak picture for the U.S. housing sector.

“The problems in the housing sector are not over… Even statistics that look positive are an illusion of a much more problematic situation,” Mendelowitz told delegates at the annual meeting of the Asian Development Bank.

2 pm 18 Corporate boards’ pay grows with workload, regulations

By JOSH FUNK, AP Business Writer

8 minutes ago

OMAHA, Neb. – After ConAgra Foods’ board slashed the company’s dividend by 34 percent as part of a restructuring plan, a few shareholders suggested the board should also feel the pain and slash its own pay by roughly one-third.

Not surprisingly, the suggestion shareholder Don Hudgens made during the 2006 annual meeting, didn’t fly even though former ConAgra chief executive Mike Harper supported that idea. Board chairman Steven Goldstone was quick to defend what ConAgra pays its directors, saying it is difficult to find and keep good people on the board.

Board pay has been steadily increasing in recent years as new regulations increased the workload for directors and the use of compensation consultants became more common. And the only check on board member pay is shareholder outrage, which compensation experts say is rare, so the increases are likely to continue.

2 pm 19 Streak of trouble with FDA, other problems hits Merck

By LINDA A. JOHNSON, AP Business Writer

11 minutes ago

TRENTON, N.J. – The roller coaster ride for Merck & Co. shareholders and employees is on another speedy downhill run.

In barely a week, Merck has suffered a stunning streak of setbacks, including federal regulators rejecting two experimental drugs and publicly demanding the drugmaker clean up significant problems at its main vaccine plant.

Safety questions cropped up about two other drugs made by Merck. Share prices fell more than $2 last week and are down 35 percent since controversy struck its key cholesterol franchise in mid-January.

2 pm 20 Wall Street looks for more evidence to justify a rally

By JOE BEL BRUNO, AP Business Writer

13 minutes ago

NEW YORK – Wall Street goes into the new week in an upbeat mood, with investors growing more confident that the economy and the financial markets are heading toward a second-half recovery.

There’s been a steady stream lately of decent earnings reports and mostly benign economic data, and there’s a sense that the credit crisis that pummeled stocks since last fall is nearing an end. For the first time in weeks, there’s optimism that the government might have actually staved off a deep recession.

The U.S. consumer clearly isn’t that cheerful, judging from consumer confidence figures released last week, but traders and portfolio managers on Wall Street often get ahead of themselves, looking past any bad news and toward future profits.

2 pm 21 Buffett tells flock: Lower sights or sell Berkshire

By Jonathan Stempel, Reuters

1 hour, 1 minute ago

OMAHA, Nebraska (Reuters) – Warren Buffett told shareholders of his Berkshire Hathaway Inc (BRKa.N) (BRKb.N) not to expect the out-sized gains his insurance and investment company has historically enjoyed, but they could still sleep well owning its stock over the long haul.

“There is absolutely no question” that Berkshire’s returns will decline, Buffett said. “Anyone that expects us to come close to replicating the past should sell their stock. It isn’t going to happen. I think we’re going to get decent results over time, but we’re not going to get indecent results.”

The world’s richest person offered his warming on Saturday at Berkshire’s annual meeting in the Qwest Center in downtown Omaha, before what he called a record 31,000 shareholders.

2 pm 22 Yahoo, News Corp talks have “cooled”: source

By Kenneth Li, Reuters

3 minutes ago

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Yahoo Inc’s (YHOO.O) talks with Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp (NWSa.N) on an alternative deal to Microsoft Corp’s (MSFT.O) takeover bid have “cooled” in recent weeks, one source familiar with the matter said on Sunday.

There were no indications that the situation had changed this weekend, after Microsoft abandoned its offer to buy Yahoo for as much as $33 per share, or $47.5 billion.

Microsoft withdrew its offer on Saturday, after balking at Yahoo’s request to raise the bid to $37 per share.

The pressure on Yahoo to quickly assemble an alternative solution is high, analysts said, or else the Internet company will likely see its shares plunge on Monday and face a spate of shareholder lawsuits.

Science

14 Malaysian palm oil struggles to promote ‘green’ image

by Ivy Sam, AFP

2 hours, 42 minutes ago

KOTA KINABALU, Malaysia (AFP) – Malaysia is promoting its controversial palm oil industry as a model of eco-friendliness, but activists warn forests are still being destroyed to make way for vast plantations.

As palm oil prices boom, Malaysia has mounted a campaign to counter allegations that the crop is responsible for habitat destruction, air pollution from slash-and-burn farming, and pushing orangutans towards extinction.

It insists palm oil is only grown on legal agricultural land and that criticisms are an attempt by competitors in Europe and the United States to undermine growing demand for the commodity.

6 am 4 Smarter electric grid could be key to saving power

By BRIAN BERGSTEIN, AP Technology Writer

2 hours, 14 minutes ago

MILTON, Ontario – The glowing amber dot on a light switch in the entryway of George Tsapoitis’ house offers a clue about the future of electricity.

A few times this summer, when millions of air conditioners strain the Toronto region’s power grid, that pencil-tip-sized amber dot will blink. It will be asking Tsapoitis to turn the switch off – unless he’s already programmed his house to make that move for him.

This is the beginning of a new way of thinking about electricity, and the biggest change in how we get power since wires began veining the landscape a century ago.

6 am 5 Crackdown on traffickers strains Thailand’s wildlife centres

by Elizabeth Gibson AFP

Sun May 4, 1:33 AM ET

RATCHABURI, Thailand (AFP) – Staff at one of Thailand’s 23 state wildlife rescue centres are getting good at scrimping by.

The tigers are eating cheap chicken rather than expensive beef, and keepers only let the big cats mate one day a year to limit the number of new mouths to feed.

If the situation gets too dire, the centre’s director Pornchai Patumrattanathan says, they will feed their captive wild boars to the tigers.

6 am 6 Asian vultures may face extinction in India, study warns

AFP

1 hour, 19 minutes ago

NEW DELHI (AFP) – Asian vultures may face extinction in India unless a farm drug responsible for their large-scale decimation is banned outright, according to a report Sunday citing researchers.

The population of the oriental white-backed vulture has declined by 99.9 percent and the numbers of two other highly-endangered species by 97 percent since 1992 in India, a story in the Hindu newspaper said citing a study in the Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society.

The study had not yet been released on the society’s website and the authors were not immediately available for comment.

2 pm 9 History of Ancient Supercontinent’s Breakup Detailed

Monica Heger, LiveScience Staff

1 hour, 28 minutes ago

Dinosaurs roamed, mammals started to flourish, the first birds and lizards evolved, and a massive supercontinent began to split apart on Earth about 180 million years ago. Yet, the details of the breakup of one of the largest landmasses in history have stumped scientists until now.

The breakup of the supercontinent Gondwana eventually formed the continents in the Southern Hemisphere. Exactly how this happened has been debated by geologists for years. Most theories say Gondwana broke into many different pieces, but new research suggests the large land mass simply split in two.

Researcher Graeme Eagles of the University of London said he was suspicious of the theory that Gondwana had divided into many smaller continents because it was inconsistent with what is known about all other supercontinent breakups, including the breakup of Pangea into Gondwana and Laurasia.

2 pm 23 DNA tests reveal mystery surrounding playwright Schiller

By DAVID RISING, Associated Press Writer

1 hour, 33 minutes ago

BERLIN – Who is buried in Friedrich Schiller’s tomb? Several people, apparently, but none of them the famous poet and playwright, according to new research.

After two years of painstaking DNA research, experts have determined that none of the remains billed as those of Schiller belong to the German writer, who died in Weimar in 1805, Germany’s MDR television reported. The study, dubbed the Friedrich-Schiller Code, was undertaken by the television station, the Foundation of Weimar Classics and an international team of scientists.

“Two years ago I was certain that we would prove that it was him; now we have proved the opposite,” said foundation president Hellmut Seemann, whose organization oversees the Schiller archives and exhibitions. He spoke on an MDR documentary about the study that was broadcast Saturday night, before of the official release of the results on Monday.

2 pm 24 ‘Smart’ power meters herald future of our electricity use

By MARC LEVY, Associated Press Writer

15 minutes ago

ELIZABETHTOWN, Pa. – Determined to cut his electricity bill, Darrell Brubaker took the usual steps of raising his air conditioner’s thermostat and cooking more on the grill.

But the key to maximum savings – as much as 6 percent a month last summer – was his grasp of the state of the electrical grid and his family’s willingness to adjust their power usage accordingly.

His utility, PPL Corp., is among a growing number of electricity providers that are testing pricing plans in which rates are set higher during the hours of peak demand, roughly following the curves of supply and demand in the wholesale energy markets.

Health

6 Common drugs hasten decline in elderly: study

By Julie Steenhuysen, Reuters

Sat May 3, 9:41 AM ET

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Elderly people who took commonly prescribed drugs for incontinence, allergy or high blood pressure walked more slowly and were less able to take care of themselves than others not taking the drugs, U.S. researchers said on Saturday.

They said people who took drugs that block acetylcholine — a chemical messenger in the nervous system critical for memory — functioned less well than their peers.

“These results were true even in older adults who have normal memory and thinking abilities,” said Dr. Kaycee Sink of Wake Forest University School of Medicine in North Carolina, who led the study of 3,000 people of whom 40 percent were taking more than one anticholinergic drug.

8 U.S. parents’ baby knowledge lacking, study finds

By Julie Steenhuysen, Reuters

1 hour, 51 minutes ago

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Nearly a third of U.S. parents know surprisingly little about typical infant development, and this lack of understanding can rob their babies of much-needed mental stimulation, researchers said on Sunday.

“There are numerous parenting books telling people what to expect when they’re pregnant,” said Dr. Heather Paradis of the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York.

“But once a baby is born, an astonishing number of parents are not only unsure of what to anticipate as their child develops, but are also uncertain of when, how or how much they are to help their babies reach various milestones, such as talking, grabbing, discerning right from wrong, or even potty-training,” said Paradis, who presented her findings at Pediatric Academic Society meeting in Honolulu.

6 am 10 Doctors to reassess antibiotics for ‘chronic Lyme’ disease

By DAVE COLLINS, Associated Press Writer Sat May 3, 12:13 AM ET

HARTFORD, Conn. – Patients who believe they suffer long-term problems from Lyme disease are claiming victory over a national doctors group. The Infectious Diseases Society of America has agreed to review its guidelines, which say there’s no evidence long-term antibiotics can cure “chronic Lyme” disease – or even that such a condition exists.

The agreement settles an unprecedented antitrust investigation by Connecticut’s attorney general over the matter. The doctors group makes clear that current guidance for treating Lyme disease remains in place.

But that didn’t stop claims of success by the attorney general and people who believe they suffer long-term effects of the tick-borne disease.

2 pm 25 24 Chinese children die of virus; other countries affected

By MARGIE MASON, AP Medical Writer

Sun May 4, 11:27 AM ET

A common illness that typically causes little more than a fever and rash has killed 24 children in China, and health officials fear the worst may be yet to come as outbreaks occur in neighboring countries.

China’s Health Ministry issued a nationwide alert over the weekend after the enterovirus 71 virus, or EV-71, which causes hand, foot and mouth disease, infected more than 4,500 children in central Anhui province.

Vietnam and Singapore also have seen a increase in cases linked to EV-71.

Bloglines 5/4

digby

2 pm 1 Bill Moyers– by tristero

By the end of the weekend I realized how quaint was the mere suggestion that Christians of this type should learn to “be rational” or “set aside your religion” about such things as the Iraq War or other policy matters. Once you’ve made a journey like this – once you’ve gone this far – you are beyond suggestible. It’s not merely the informational indoctrination, the constant belittling of homosexuals and atheists and Muslims and pacifists, etc., that’s the issue. It’s that once you’ve gotten to this place, you’ve left behind the mental process that a person would need to form an independent opinion about such things. You make this journey precisely to experience the ecstasy of beating to the same big gristly heart with a roomful of like-minded folks. Once you reach that place with them, you’re thinking with muscles, not neurons.

2 pm 2 And Still We Have No Voice– by tristero

And I am left wondering where are those who were right all along, who watched in shocked disgust as Bush vogued on that carrier in his codpiece, because even then, they knew nothing had been accomplished except the start of the worst foreign policy debacle in living memory (and that includes, yes, Vietnam) – where are the experts?

2 pm 3 The Wall– by digby

There will be many things in a new administration that are going to disappoint us. I would suspect that those of us who would like to see less religiosity in civic life are going to be among the most disappointed. Indeed, it’s likely that the Democrats are going to give the Republicans a run for their money. There will be less social conservatism, which is the most important thing, but the pressure to conform to a religious norm is likely to be just as strong, if not stronger, than under the Republicans.

Firedoglake

2 pm 4 Another Minuteman Outfit Consorts With Nazis– By David Neiwert

Of course, this is hardly the first time neo-Nazis and various white supremacists have been associated with the Minutemen. Who can forget the very colorful Nazi and Dixie flags that sprouted at that rally featuring Minuteman honcho Jim Gilchrist at Laguna Beach, Calif.? Or the time Laine Lawless, the leader of another Minuteman spinoff, e-mailed an Ohio neo-Nazi leader with suggestions for how to stir up the immigrant shit (among the choice ideas: “Discourage Spanish-speaking children from going to school. Be creative.”). And there have been many, many other instances.

Glenn Greenwald

2 pm 5 The media, the Right and 1988: endless deja vu– by Glenn Greenwald

With the help of a media enthralled to such shallow, easy-to-chatter-about attacks, they succeeded in electing a highly unpopular figure from a scandal-plagued, discredited party. And Republicans, with their media partners, have been using that depraved playbook ever since, and will continue to do so this year. For the 1988 election, Reagan’s severe economic mismanagement, his disastrous foreign policy filled with savage covert wars, and widespread perceptions that top Reagan officials had blatantly lied about breaking the law were all just disappeared. Actual issues played virtually no role in George Bush the First’s 40-state triumph.

* * * *

In exactly the same way, John McCain’s only hope for winning is to ensure a similar disappearance of the issues which Americans continuously say are most important to them — namely, the disastrous Bush/Cheney economic policies and the need to extricate ourselves from the Iraq War. If the actual concerns of American voters are allowed to determine the election outcome — as they did in 2006 — the GOP has no chance. Thus, the only prospect for a McCain victory is to have the media flood the country with the types of childish, gossipy trash that has predominated thus far — lapel pins and Pledge of Allegiance symbolism and endless fixations on pastor sermons. That is what makes all the dark plagues which our political and media class have enabled — those images of dead Iraqi children and foreclosure signs and crushing collective debt and collapsed American credibility and a truly lawless government — blissfully disappear.

Open Left

2 pm 6 Fox’s Faux Populism vs A Shadow Elite–pt. 2– by Paul Rosenberg

While Barack Obama and legions of his supporters insist on seeing Reagan as his hagiographers have painted him–as a trascendental transformative figure–the simple reality is that he was nothing of the sort.  He was the beneficiary of an enormous amount of high-power myth-making.  But Nixon was the one who made it all possible.

OK, so 15 in half an hour at 2 am.  About 12 hours since I last harvested, a little less than 50% recharge in stories.

I’ll keep fussing with this so you can see kind of what it looks like and I can fine tune.  Still would like some help on web design, I have distinct preferences but lack the technical knowledge to get the results I want.

2 Asia, 1 Europe, 3 US N&P, 5 Business, 2 Science, 2 Health.

6 am update

4 Asia, 5 Entertainment, 1 Business, 3 Science 1 Health

10 am update

4 Asia, 1 South America, 1 Business

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