June 2015 archive

Battle Flag of the Army of Northern Virginia

Fast Track Advances

This afternoon the Trade Promotional Authority passed cloture by a hair, 60 – 37 setting it up for passage on Wednesday

The Senate on Tuesday voted to advance President Obama’s trade agenda, approving a measure to end debate on fast-track authority.

The 60-37 motion sets up a vote on final passage on Wednesday. If the Senate approves fast-track or trade promotion authority (TPA), it would then be sent to Obama’s desk to become law.

Fast-track authority would allow Obama to send trade deals to Congress for up-or-down votes. The White House wants the authority to conclude negotiations on a sweeping trans-Pacific trade deal.

Thirteen Democrats backed fast-track in Tuesday’s vote, handing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) a major legislative victory. Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) voted against the procedural motion.

The bill will then go to President Obama’s desk for his signature. However, the bill is being moved forward does not contain the Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) measure that would provide financial aid and job training to workers who lose their jobs due to foreign competition. TAA, in truth, is a sucker deal

For starters, the money in TAA is a pittance, compare to the direct damage that this deal will do to American workers. And it does nothing to protect consumers and citizens from the other elements of the deal that weaken regulatory standards.

Trade Adjustment Assistance is not really about doing much for workers. Mainly, it’s about giving Democrats who are in bed with corporate elites some political cover. The cover is pretty threadbare.

It also stands little chance of passing in the House, even if the Senate manages to pass it, as House Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has promised. The president has said the he would no sign TPA without the TAA.

Many Senate Democrats insisted their vote on Wednesday was conditional on the passage of separate TAA legislation. The Senate will likely pass that legislation on Wednesday, but the bill faces steeper challenges in the House, where Republicans overwhelmingly oppose it. Obama has said he wants both TAA and the fast-track bill to be enacted. House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has said he will deliver the votes necessary for its passage.

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said Tuesday that Obama expects Congress to send him the TAA bill this week, but didn’t say whether the president would sign the TPA bill before that happened. House Democrats could join Republicans to vote down TAA, potentially daring Obama to sign fast-track without the program. [..]

(Sen. Patti) Murray, on her way to the Senate floor, told reporters she’d been given assurances by McConnell and Boehner that Congress would take up assistance to workers displaced by the deal. In the prior Senate vote on TPA, which took place in May, Murray had urged Democrats not to vote with McConnell without major concessions from the GOP leader. She and Cantwell ultimately cut a deal with McConnell to get a vote reauthorizing the Export-Import Bank. McConnell embarrassed Murray by delivering only a nonbinding vote on the measure.

Democrats now hope to attach a reauthorization to a highway bill as an amendment.

Wyden said Tuesday that Boehner’s late promises helped win votes.

While, eventually, the Trans-Pacific Trade Agreement will most likely pass the Senate, its fate in the House is unknown sonce the Tea Party caucus opposes any agenda proposed by Pres. Obama. GOP presidential candidates Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Rand Paul (R-KY) are also opposed to the bill and are reliant on the Tea Party votes of their base. Both voted against TPA passage today. If you’re shaking your head in wonder that the sane Democrats would have to rely on the GOP lunatic fringe, you’re not alone

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On This Day In History June 23

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

Click on images to enlarge.

June 23 is the 174th day of the year (175th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 191 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson meets with Soviet Premier Aleksei Kosygin. Hopes for better U.S.-Soviet relations run high as U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson meets with Soviet Premier Aleksei Kosygin in Glassboro, New Jersey, for a three-day summit. The meeting ended inconclusively, however, as issues such as Vietnam and the Middle East continued to divide the two superpowers.

Background

With the United States gradually losing ground in the Vietnam War, the administration was looking for other solutions to the conflict.

On 5 June 1967 the Six-Day War began between Israel and the Arab states. The war led to an increase in Soviet-US diplomatic contact and cooperation; there were some who hoped this could continue to help the US solve the Vietnam war and other pressing international issues. Several days later the Soviet Union sent Premier Alexei Kosygin to New York to hold a speech on the then-ongoing Middle Eastern crisis at the United Nations headquarters. When the United States government was informed of this the Americans gladly welcomed Kosygin to a meeting between him and President Lyndon B. Johnson. On 13 June 1967 Johnson sought out J. William Fulbright, a Senator, at a White House reception. Llewellyn Thompson, then US ambassador to the USSR, believed that a conference could “start the process of moving toward an understanding with the Soviets”. Fulbright even believed that Johnson was reconsidering his Vietnam strategy. Later Fulbright wrote two letters to Johnson about the importance of a summit between the two nations. Johnson agreed, and wrote a letter in return, which said they were waiting for a Soviet response for US invitation. Walt Rostow, the National Security Adviser at the time, said it was a 20 percent chance of the summit having a good effect on Soviet-US relations, and only a 10 percent chance of the summit going awry.

The Soviet Political Bureau (Politburo) were divided over the usefulness of the summit. Andrei Gromyko, the Minister of Foreign Affairs at the time and still not a member of the Politburo, was able to win support for it. Gromyko noted that Soviet-US dialogue which had been suspended in 1963 should be reactivated, despite the Vietnam War putting a great deal strain on the two countries’ relations.

Kosygin agreed to address the United Nations wished to conduct the summit in New York. Johnson, wary of encountering protesters against the war in Vietnam, preferred to meet in Washington, D.C.. Roughly equidistant, Hollybush was selected as a compromise. The summit took place at Glassboro State College (now Rowan University) in Glassboro, New Jersey.

The Daily/Nightly Show (The Al Franken Decade)

You stop being racist and I’ll stop talking about it.

Tonightly Obama drops the N-bomb.  Our panel is Gayle King, Riki Lindhome, and Jordan Carlos.

Continuity

If you haven’t seen this yet, you really should.

This week’s guests-

Al Franken is kind of a disappointment to me.  I’ve met him personally exactly once at a reception to promote his candidacy and he’s funny as you might imagine and doesn’t give off the same sellout weasel vibe that radiates from Joe Lieberman like the heat from a baking, humid parking lot when you open an air conditioned door, the kind that smacks you in the face from 20 feet away.

On the other hand he’s bad on Intellectual Property, not so good on trade, fair to middling on most everything else, and pretty ok on Foreign Policy and Drone Assassination, Domestic Surveillance, and Torture.

So there are worse Senators, but there are better ones too.  Feel the Bern.

Women’s World Cup 2015: Round of 16

The U.S. Women’s Football team is currently ranked third in the world after Japan and Germany, the defending champions.

During the Group competition the U.S. advanced as expected, winning their Group which was considered the toughest, but while undefeated they didn’t win all their matches like the Japanese.  Also they’ve had difficulty scoring, converting only 4% of their chances (for comparison their team average is 11% and the average of all the remaining teams is 15%).

Starting with this round it is single elimination.  Ties will be decided in extra time or, if necessary, Shootouts.  If things go to plan Team USA will face Germany in the Semifinals June 30th and Japan in the Finals on July 5th.

Advancing so far in the Round of 16 are-

China 1 Cameroon 0
Germany 4 Sweden 1
France 3 South Korea 0
Australia 1 Brazil 0
Canada 1 Switzerland 0

Tonight’s contest is against Columbia which they should win, but they take their football very seriously in South America and there aren’t many weak programs.  If they advance they will face China on June 26th.  China’s program is improving quite rapidly though they are not considered top contenders.

Television coverage is on Fox Sports One at 8 pm ET.

Anti-Capitalist Meetup: Leftist Analysis of Gilbert & Sullivan “Utopia Ltd”

or the Flowers of Progress

By Waldmarschall

Hello, all.

Here’s the piece I promised the comrades at Kos on Utopia.  It’s one of Gilbert and Sullivan’s last collaborations, and most critics and enthusiasts alike seem to scorn it.  My partner and I came very close to getting this staged at our college two years ago, and I still crave a chance to be involved with this show, or at least see it in its entirety.  (I’ve listened to every version of the soundtrack I can find including one which includes the full libretto).

I’d particularly recommend finding “In Every Mental Lore/Let all Your Doubts Take Wing”, “A King of Autocratic Power We”, “Zara’s Return”, “It’s Understood, I Think”, “Some Seven Men form an Association”, Act 1 Finale, “Society has Quite Forsaken” (the show stopper) and the libretto-heavy penultimate song (the finale is a shameless tribute to British superiority, apparently thrown in to soften the blows landed earlier in the show) on youtube before reading this, but to each her own.

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On This Day In History June 22

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

Click on images to enlarge.

June 22 is the 173rd day of the year (174th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 192 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs into law the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944, commonly known as the G.I. Bill.

The G.I. Bill was an omnibus bill that provided college or vocational education for returning World War II veterans (commonly referred to as G.I.s) as well as one year of unemployment compensation. It also provided many different types of loans for returning veterans to buy homes and start businesses. Since the original act, the term has come to include other veteran benefit programs created to assist veterans of subsequent wars as well as peacetime service.

By the time the original G.I. Bill ended in July 1956, 7.8 million World War II veterans had participated in an education or training program and 2.4 million veterans had home loans backed by the Veterans’ Administration (VA). Today, the legacy of the original G.I. Bill lives on in the Montgomery G.I. Bill.

Harry W. Colmery, a World War I veteran and the former Republican National Committee chairman, wrote the first draft of the G.I. Bill. He reportedly jotted down his ideas on stationery and a napkin at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, DC.[2] U.S. Senator Ernest McFarland was actively involved in the bill’s passage and is known, with Warren Atherton, as one of the “fathers of the G.I. Bill.” One might then term Edith Nourse Rogers, R-Mass., who helped write and who co-sponsored the legislation, as the “mother of the G.I. Bill”.[citation needed] Like Colmery, her contribution to writing and passing this legislation has been obscured by time.

The bill was introduced in the House on January 10, 1944, and in the Senate the following day. Both chambers approved their own versions of the bill.

The bill that President Roosevelt initially proposed was not as far reaching. The G.I. Bill was created to prevent a repetition of the Bonus March of 1932 and a relapse into the Great Depression after World War II ended.

An important provision of the G.I. Bill was low interest, zero down payment home loans for servicemen. This enabled millions of American families to move out of urban apartments and into suburban homes. Prior to the war the suburbs tended to be the homes of the wealthy and upper class.

Another provision was known as the 52-20 clause. This enabled all former servicemen to receive $20 once a week for 52 weeks a year while they were looking for work. Less than 20 percent of the money set aside for the 52-20 Club was distributed. Rather, most returning servicemen quickly found jobs or pursued higher education.

Six In The Morning

On Sunday

 Charleston shootings: Emanuel AME church to reopen

   

BBC

The African-American church in which nine parishioners were shot dead in South Carolina is to reopen for services on Sunday.

Members of Emanuel AME church met again on Saturday in the room where their friends died on Wednesday.

Many more people are expected to attend the service at 09:00 (13:00 GMT).

Meanwhile, police are investigating an online post, possibly by the gunman, that appears to outline his motivation for the attack.

One of those who attended Saturday’s meeting, Harold Washington, said the church’s doors would be open to all on Sunday.

“We’re gonna have people come by that we’ve never seen before and will probably never see again, and that’s OK,” he said.




Sunday’s Headlines:

11 myths about the future of gun control, debunked after the Charleston shooting

We cannot destroy Isis. We will have to learn to live with it

The New Kingdom: Saudi Arabia’s Contradictory Transformation

‘If the theatre decided to take a step that is political, there is a price’

8 million mummified animals, mostly dogs, in catacombs at Egypt site

Summer Solstice 2015

Once again we are halfway through the year. I was up at dawn as the last Spring thunderstorms passed through, I watched as the sky lightened through thick clouds to bid good bye. After making some coffee, I went into the yard to check the gardens for damage from the torrential rains that fell through the night. I wiped off the table and dried a chair. I watched the sky as the clouds thinned could already feel the air getting warmer. Summer is here.

Summer officially arrived at 12:38 PM as the Earth tilted towards the sun at its Northern maximum, the Tropic of Cancer then quickly began its journey back to the south.

It is a but a moment in time significant for so many cultures, religions and countries. Here in the US there are many cities that will light huge fires in public places to celebrate the longest day of the year, Midsummer. The fires will be lit in the fire pit in my yard. I’ll fix a dinner tonight with some of the newly harvested vegetable that are available at the local markets and seasoned with the herbs from my garden.

A Solstice Approaches, Unnoticed By James Caroll

ONCE, HUMANS were intimate with the cycles of nature, and never more than on the summer solstice. Vestiges of such awareness survive in White Nights and Midnight Sun festivals in far northern climes, and in neo-pagan adaptations of Midsummer celebrations, but contemporary people take little notice of the sun reaching its far point on the horizon. Tomorrow is the longest day of the year, the official start of the summer season, the fullest of light – yet we are apt to miss this phenomenon of Earth’s axial tilt, as we miss so much of what the natural world does in our surrounds.

In recent months, catastrophic weather events have dominated headlines as rarely before – earthquakes and tsunami in Asia; volcanic cloud in Europe; massive ice melts at the poles; tornadoes, floods, and fires in America. “Records are not just broken,” an atmospheric scientist said last week, “they are smashed.” Without getting into questions of causality, and without anthropomorphizing nature, we can still take these events as nature’s cri de coeur – as the degraded environment’s grabbing of human lapels to say, “Pay attention!”

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