December 11, 2010 archive

THE MEDICAL FILES

It was reported that NTT Communications and a consortium of other companies are developing a system in which users can get calorie counts of the food they’re about to eat by taking a picture of the dish with their keitai.

A 22-year-old Tokyo woman was arrested for terminating her pregnancy using the “abortion pill” mifepristone, which is illegal in Japan. The woman, who was five months pregnant, bought the drug over the internet at the urging of her boyfriend.

A 37-year-old anesthesiologist in Yokohama was busted for possessing and injecting himself with fentanyl, a narcotic “around 200 times stronger than morphine.”

It was reported that Japanese households consumed a record 21.25 billion kwh of power in October, thanks to the “lingering summer heat wave.”

So I made the mistake of going into a Walmart today. First off, I ask God for special dispensation when I go through the doors. Let’s face it, the company is built on slave labor. Shopping there is morally abhorrent. The conditions of its Chinese laborers alone is a sufficient abuse of human rights to have the whole fucking Walton family and their heirs imprisoned for life. Then there’s the abuse of American Walmart employees who are paid so little that they can’t afford the cheap crap they sell. They don’t get health care. They’re taught how to sign up for Medicare. Food stamps. Fuel assistance.

Anyway, it was on the way home, it was late and the only food store open. As I’m parking my car I’m noticing all the security cameras – light poles, on the building, going through the door, in the store in each aisle. I had enough cameras on me to produce a 3D documentary of one man’s quick stop to get some late dinner fixings.

Being the techie I am I wander to the back of the store to check geek and LCD prices. There at the back of the store is a wall of screens with the same loop running over and over…

The Department of Homeland Security this week stepped up its “If You See Something, Say Something” campaign, but you won’t be seeing more ads in New York City subway cars. No, the public service announcements will be featured in a far different location: Walmart.

DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano recorded a video clip that will be looped over and over again at a total of 588 Wal-Mart stores nationwide.

“Homeland security begins with hometown security,” Napolitano says in the clip. “That’s why I’m pleased Walmart is helping to make our communities more safe and secure. If you see something suspicious in the parking lot or in the store, say something immediately.”

I stood there in shock and awe. As in “Awe, fuck!”

This week’s selection could well serve as a sequel to last week’s choice, another song that could have easily been performed by a combination of the early Chicago Transit Authority and Blood, Sweat and Tears, particularly with David Clayton-Thomas on vocals.  

Last week’s choice appeared to appeal to only a handful of DD readers, so this week may well follow suit.  That said, this writer is at a loss to understand why this song has not been covered more than it has, and would nominate it for the Rodney Dangerfield Award as the classic rock song receiving the least respect.  Be that as it may, it is included this week.

Today I was captivated for 8.5 hours as Vermont’s Senator Bernie Sanders spoke about the tax bill.  But it wasn’t just the tax bill that he was talking about.  The speech was actually a progressive manifesto about the way that ordinary middle class and poor Americans are being plundered by the richest 1%.

And it was the most important political speech– by far– of the past two years.  Seldom, if ever, has anyone seized the spotlight to discuss and examine so thoroughly the the plundering of the nation by its wealthiest citizens.  And to demand so clearly that the government provide genuine relief for the millions of Americans who are now suffering the consequences of the plunder.

The top 1% need further tax relief like a fish needs a bicycle.  And if it took most of today to get that point across, it was worth it.

by Kathy Kelly

December 10, 2010

The Obama administration has announced the imminent release of a December Review which will evaluate the U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan.  The military has yet to disclose what the specific categories for evaluation will be.  Yet many people in Afghanistan might wish that hunger along with their anger over attacks against civilians could top the list.

In Afghanistan, a nation where 850 children die every day, about a quarter of the population goes hungry. The UN says that 7.4 million Afghans live with hunger and fear of starvation, while millions more rely on food help, and one in five children die before the age of five.  

“Do you think we like to live this way?” an Afghan man asked me, last October, as he led us toward a primitive tent encampment on the outskirts of Kabul. “Do you see how we live?  The cold and the rain are coming.  How will we protect our children?” He flicked his forefinger on a weather-beaten blanket covering a tent.  The blanket immediately ripped.

C-389, the bill to protect Canadian transpeople from discrimination, proceded through another step Wednesday.  The committee report passed the House of Commons with a standing vote of 143-131.  The timetable is to have third reading in March, two hours of debate, and then a final vote.

Holding a report stage vote is “not normal,” but this extra step proved not to be an insurmountable barrier.

The bill adds “gender identity” and “gender expression” to the Canadian Human Rights Act’s list of prohibited grounds for discrimination.