April 18, 2009 archive

For The Love Of Money

(brought to you by CobaltVA)

Ladies and gentlemen. The pride of Canton, Ohio, formerly the Triumphs of McKinley High School, Walter Williams, Bill Isles, Bobby Massey, William Powell, and Eddie Levert….members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Class of 2005….

Put your hands together! Give it up, y’all…for the O’JAYS!!!!!!

Special Guest Star: Terry “Moneybags and Carpetbags” McAuliffe.

Keith Olbermann: US Must “Move Forward” with Torture Accountability Now

From truthout.org: Keith Olbermann’s Special Comment on why a better future for the United States must begin with a criminal investigation into who is responsible for the Bush administration torture memos.

To read the full transcript, please see this page.

Weekend News Digest

From Yahoo News Top Stories

1 Kohn says Fed can prevent inflation surge

By Ros Krasny, Reuters

43 mins ago

NASHVILLE, Tenn (Reuters) – The Federal Reserve will not allow its unorthodox policies to lead to a surge in inflation, but may need to do more to ease credit if the economy fails to respond to stimulus measures, the Fed’s No. 2 official said on Saturday.

But even with U.S. economy now in its sixth quarter of recession, Donald Kohn, vice chairman of the Federal Reserve, said the central bank’s attempts to heal ailing credit markets and spur an economic recovery have been working, in ways that include lowering mortgage interest rates.

“The situation in financial markets and the economy would have been far worse if the Federal Reserve hadn’t taken the actions we did,” Kohn told a conference at Vanderbilt University in Nashville.

Forced Sterilizations of Indigenous Women

The sterilizations of indigenous women were covert means of the continuation of the extermination policy against the Indian Nations. At least three indigenous generations from 3,406 women are not in existence now as the result. The sterilizations were not unintentional or negligible. They were genocide. What would the indigenous culture and political landscape be now? One can only imagine, but the sterilizations like the relocations – were forced.

How To Build a National High Speed Rail system

Burning the Midnight Oil for Living Energy Independence

… A Four Step Program

Step 1. Give states a framework to develop plans, either individually or in groups, and present them to the Federal government for vetting, approval, and funding support.

Step 2. States do that.

Step 3. Fund a substantial number of seed corridors, so that a large number of metro areas (House) and States (Senate) have a stake in maintaining ongoing Federal HSR funding.

Step 4. Keep funding the construction of more.

That is my plan. But, OTOH, I’m just an obscure Development Economist with a field specialization in Regional Economics, so the fact that its my plan is neither here nor there.

More newsworthy, it seems to be the plan of the Obama administration. So, unlike the Bank Bail-out, I find myself on the “cheerleader” side of Administration activity.

Give Me an H! Give Me an S! Give Me an R! What’s It Spell? One Piece of the Energy Independent Transport Puzzle! YEAH!!!!

More than Nuremberg: Thousands Prosecuted for War Crimes After World War II

While the example of the Nuremberg Trials is used often these days to describe what prosecutions might look like, few seem to remember that the prosecution of war criminals after World War II was much larger and took place over a longer period of time than most people realize. This is important when one considers the context of President Obama’s granting of immunity to lower-level CIA interrogators (if they acted in “good faith” upon “authoritative” legal advice).

What even a cursory examination of historical precedent demonstrates is that after World War II prosecution of war criminals and accessories to war crimes were not limited to the famous Nuremberg 22 high-level Nazis, nor the few hundred or so prosecuted through the Nuremberg tribunals, but thousands of accused throughout Europe.

What follows is a brief lesson in how these prosecutions occurred, who was involved, and where and when they took place. It may surprise you that the United States, for instance, has an Office of Special Investigations (OSI) at the US Department of Justice. Its mission was to hunt down war criminals and bring them to justice. Established only in 1979, the OSI has a sterling record:

On The Anger Over The DHS Security Report {UpDated}

Yesterday I put up a post you can find here {this link takes you to the post at my site} on the recent DHS report that came out and many were extremely angry about as to labeling OIF and OEF Veterans as possible recruits to fanatical rightwing hate groups. The spin being it was labeling All Returning Vets as a possible problem, it didn’t, but a few Veterans Groups and The talking heads and Congressional members of the Republican party wanted the spin to come out as that.

Torture: Can they walk away unchanged?

Reading through opinion about “enhanced interrogation”, you will find that there is a pervasive assumption that if there is no physical evidence of torture after the fact, the victim of torture remains unharmed. In fact, the Bush administration defined this as one of the axioms that justified their legal opinions that supported their methods — and it is one that softens public opinion toward torture, as well. The fact is that if this assumption is wrong, the W administration’s torture policy falls like a house of cards.

The crucial issue at hand is that, in the memos, torture was defined as something different than it was in practice. To understand the fundamental flaw in a way that is more than superficial, though, we have to think about what happens to a prisoner that undergoes “enhanced interrogation.” We have to consider why these tactics cause long term harm. We also have to understand why a subject in a “cracked” state of mind will always provide dubious information.

So, what happens when Rambo cracks? Will he walk away unchanged by the experience? Even if he has no pre-existing psychological conditions?

The Morning News

The Morning News is an Open Thread

From Yahoo News Top Stories

1 GM readies plans for bankruptcy it hopes to avoid

By David Bailey and Kevin Krolicki, Reuters

Fri Apr 17, 3:31 pm ET

DETROIT (Reuters) – General Motors Corp Chief Executive Fritz Henderson said on Friday the automaker was readying detailed plans for a bankruptcy filing that now appears more likely even as it races to complete a business plan under federal oversight.

Henderson said GM faced no pressure from the Obama administration’s autos task force to make a decision on whether to file for bankruptcy before an established June 1 deadline and said it was “feasible” that the automaker could still avoid bankruptcy despite the short time frame remaining.

But Henderson also said the automaker was drawing up a game plan that would let it emerge as quickly as possible from bankruptcy if it needed to take that route.

Surprise Distractions

My Friday night distractions involve some images that were taken because of my surprise at seeing them, while others were taken because of the surprise the subjects were experiencing, or about to be.

I`ll open with this Iris montage that surprised me, when I opened my front door this morning. They are surrounding my little fountain.

Take a peek & change your outlook, maybe.

Things are pushing many of us to renounce our hopes, but those hopes were our dreams.

Hope may be lost, but dreams are forever.

FOUNTAIN FLOWERS (today)

TRIPLE POST

Torture Blogging 60’s Ba-looooooze

I’m Crying – Savoy Brown

I just hope that your love knows, what this life is all about

’cause I’m in the same position as when I started out.

Now I know there’re folk in hospital that are far worse than me,

Oh, but that don’t mean to much when my spirit don’t feel free

Yes I’m crying, yes I’m crying, hey i’m crying, hey I’m crying

Well the bouquet rocks my senses, and the blues they roll my mind,

and I’m in a strange condition and my head is hard to find.

And I just keep on searching, trying to seek my goal, and I just

keep on studying, Oh trying to find a road.

And I’m crying, and I’m crying, Hey I’m crying, hey I’m crying

Wait for the sunshine, look at the rain, look at my future all

seem the same. Hard to distinguish right from the wrong, look at

my troubles coming on strong.

Only God knows, oh where my search will end, ’cause a freak ain’t

got no money and a pauper has no friends, and there ain’t no use

in worrying and there ain’t no use in dying, oh, no use testifying

and there ain’t none you could buy.

And I’m crying, and I’m crying, hey I’m crying, oh, I’m crying

Only God knows where my search will end, cause a freak don’t have

no money and a pauper has no friends, and there ain’t no use testifying,

and there ain’t no use in lying,

And I’m crying, and I’m crying, hey I’m crying, oh, I’m crying

Torture Blogging 60’s Ba-looooooze

I’m Crying – Savoy Brown

I just hope that your love knows, what this life is all about

’cause I’m in the same position as when I started out.

Now I know there’re folk in hospital that are far worse than me,

Oh, but that don’t mean to much when my spirit don’t feel free

Yes I’m crying, yes I’m crying, hey i’m crying, hey I’m crying

Well the bouquet rocks my senses, and the blues they roll my mind,

and I’m in a strange condition and my head is hard to find.

And I just keep on searching, trying to seek my goal, and I just

keep on studying, Oh trying to find a road.

And I’m crying, and I’m crying, Hey I’m crying, hey I’m crying

Wait for the sunshine, look at the rain, look at my future all

seem the same. Hard to distinguish right from the wrong, look at

my troubles coming on strong.

Only God knows, oh where my search will end, ’cause a freak ain’t

got no money and a pauper has no friends, and there ain’t no use

in worrying and there ain’t no use in dying, oh, no use testifying

and there ain’t none you could buy.

And I’m crying, and I’m crying, hey I’m crying, oh, I’m crying

Only God knows where my search will end, cause a freak don’t have

no money and a pauper has no friends, and there ain’t no use testifying,

and there ain’t no use in lying,

And I’m crying, and I’m crying, hey I’m crying, oh, I’m crying

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