Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei yesterday endorsed Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as president for a new four-year term, describing him as a “courageous” man but telling him to listen to his critics.
Category Archives: Politics
Obama’s Darfur policy can suck it
Darfur activists are concerned that the latest comments by the Obama administration’s special envoy for Sudan are a sign the United States is easing pressure on Khartoum.
Say WHAT? Well hey, since when was Darfur a big priority for our government anyway? Our leaders have been focusing on *real* issues, like…
- Finding a puppy that’s cute AND hypoallergenic
- Making fun of handicapped people
- Further inflating the already too-big Gates incident and turning a serious national discussion of racial profiling into a late-night beer jokes
Oh wait, *those* aren’t the issues! Those are the publicity stunts that Obama’s been using so people won’t pay *attention* to the economy, health care, and foreign policy! Not to mention Darfur…
On Thursday, the special envoy, Scott Gration, appeared to argue for easing sanctions when he told lawmakers at a Senate hearing that there is no evidence to back up the U.S. designation of Sudan as a state sponsor of terrorism. He said that the sanctions were hindering his work and called the terrorism designation “a political decision.”
*slaps forehead*
So let me get this straight.
Saddam Hussein’s government, which led the oil-rich nation of Iraq, killed Shi’ites and Kurds, and supposedly had weapons of mass destruction and ties to Al Qaeda circa 2003. That makes that government a terrorist government.
But the government of the oil-rich nation of Sudan has been slowly wiping out the Darfur region *since* 2003, with support from the landlord to America’s broke tenant, China. We’ve been hanging out in the apartments in the middle of the eastern section of its floor, but it really wanted to, it could crash Sudan’s kegger instead. But China will of course be at that party, so if we went, things would get even more awkward. So let’s *not* put the Sudan on our shit list of terrorists. And *not* designating Sudan’s government as a threat to human life for those reasons is totally NOT a “political decision”.
*Now* I get it.
Cash For Clunkers Helps Idaho Dealer
LEWISTON – You could say it was running on empty. After taking off this month, the popular Cash for Clunker trade-in program ran out of federal funding.
Friday the House passed $2 billion in emergency funds to keep it driving on.
Some Valley residents have already taken advantage of the first $1billion.
At Rogers Toyota, Sales Manager David Stockwell said the program has helped business.
I feel like Cash for Clunkers and all the other recent government interference in the private sector is a good idea…in the short term. Long term, we’ll see if it sets a bad precedent for America’s economic system.
“Cash For Clunkers” Increases Ford Sales
By Ben Tan — August 3, 2009
Ford’s July auto sales were up 2.3 percent, juiced by the government’s “cash for clunkers” $4,500 credit, the automaker reported.
“Cash for clunkers put us over the top,” said George Pipas, sales analyst for Ford on CNBC.
The short-term government spending program designated $1 billion to pay consumers up to $4,500 for trading in old cars for energy efficient vehicles. Money for the program ran out months earlier than expected, forcing the House to vote for $2 billion more on Friday. The Senate has yet to take up the additional funding request. Obama’s backers say the program proves that the president’s economic plan is correct.
“The so-called cash for clunkers program has actually been far more successful than people expected,” said National Economic Council President Larry Summers, “both in terms of the number of car sales it’s generated, and, I should say, in terms of the environmental benefit.”
Alan Greenspan, former head of the Federal Reserve, gave a thumbs-up to the cash for clunkers program but said yesterday it is popular because the economy is on its way back up, and not because it is stimulative. The program has worked to get people to buy cars and move stock, he said, but Greenspan did not necessarily recommend it as an economic fix.
“It’s an interesting issue,” he said on ABC’s “This Week.”
“I mean, I have qualms about the concept, but there is no doubt that that very extraordinary response is a very important indicator that the state of confidence in the economy is beginning to pick up. If we had been — the clunker program had been put in place six months ago, it would have probably been a dud.”
Ford’s monthly increase marks their first since November 2007. Ford is the first major automaker to report July sales. The automaker believed it would “fall short” of last year’s July sales until the government stimulus kicked in, Pipas said. Sales of Ford’s core brands, Ford, Lincoln, and Mercury, rose by 9 percent according to the report. Diminished fleet sales and other poor-performing brands dragged the overall number down to 2.3 percent.
House Committee Rejects Limiting Abortion Coverage
By Ben Tan — August 3, 2009
A House committee rejected an anti-abortion amendment to President Barack Obama’s sweeping healthcare overhaul bill late Thursday. The reversal came hours after the measure was approved. The amendment said healthcare overhaul legislation may not impose requirements for coverage of abortion except when a woman’s life is in danger, or her pregnancy resulted from rape or incest.
It was approved in the Energy and Commerce Committee by Republicans and conservative Democrats. But hours later committee Chairman Henry A. Waxman invoked House rules that allow him to bring up the amendment for a second vote, despite Republican objections. Conservative Democrat Rep. Bart Gordon of Tennessee changed his vote to no. A second conservative Democrat who hadn’t voted the first time, Rep. Zack Space of Ohio, voted no. It was enough to take down the amendment on a 30-29 vote.
The committee approved a Democrat-written measure specifying that abortions would not be required as part of basic gtovernment-approved insurance benefit packages. The measure, which passed 30-28, says health plans in a new purchasing exchange aren’t required to cover abortion, but each region of the country should have at least one plan that does so. The amendment also limits the use of federal funding for abortions. Democrats cast the measure as a compromise, though Republicans mostly opposed it.
The committee voted on various amendments late into the night and will resume today, when it is expected to vote on the full bill. The House Democrats have been pushing for a compromise health overhaul over liberals’ complaints, intent on success on Obama’s top domestic priority before a monthlong summer recess.
“We’ve got to pass the bill,” Waxman said.
“Not only do we have to, but we’re going to.”
His Energy and Commerce Committee was the last of three House committees to act on the sweeping legislation.
Howard Zinn on Obama, Class, and Economy
Chris
Elementary Ideas on Democracy
Changes come from the bottom, not the top. As everyone knows, Obama championed the vague concept of “change” to the American people throughout his campaign. And of course everyone ate it up because eight years of a right wing war criminal in office will do serious brain damage to you. So, people wanted a Democrat to fuck things up once again. Anyway, as history demonstrates major societal changes, such as severely kicking racism square in the pills (though it’s alive and well and still needs ass whooping)come through the struggles of everyday people and then the elites react to it. Your history and government textbooks want you to believe the opposite: the elitists, like the Supreme Court randomly decided to battle racism and end legal segregation in the South. Yes, it’s true that that wasn’t the top priority for the majority of America, but as Abbie Hoffman once stated, “You measure a democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.” Well, the black rights and civil rights activists, such as Richard Wright and Rosa Parks, and countless others were the “dissidents” and the American people were the “assimilated conformists.” In simple terms, democracy is everyone’s opportunity to participate and have a major influence in the political process. Not mob rule as school an TV have led you to believe. So, the very idea that Obama will clean up the mess of the Bush Administration and previous administrations through health care reform, abortion reform, etc. is absurd. The social ills affecting everyone, particularly the poverty stricken people he doesn’t care that much about, cannot be obliterated through reforms because reforms imply that the system is well intentioned and good, but needs some tidying up. WRONG! you never hear a politician say “we’re doing our best to reform rape” or “With our new program we plan to seriously reform child abuse.” Of course not! because we want to ABOLISH the evils of rape and child abuse. In short, we don’t need reforms, we need changes…. but don’t look to your pal Barry for that, look to one another and create some real dialogue.
Chris
Holy Crap, Banks Suck, Kill Me
This news makes me sick. I hate banks. I recommend you instead store your money under your mattress.
NEW YORK — The New York Attorney General’s office says Citigroup, one of the biggest recipients of government bailout money, paid out $5.33 billion in employee bonuses for 2008.
The attorney general has issued a report Thursday that outlines 2008 bonuses paid to the initial nine banks that received loans under the government’s Troubled Asset Relief Program.
Bank of America, which also received $45 billion in TARP money, paid $3.3 billion in bonuses.
U.N. Extends Darfur Peacekeeping Mission Mandate
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – The U.N. Security Council on Thursday unanimously extended the mandate for the joint U.N.-African Union peacekeeping mission which has been slowly deploying in Sudan’s conflict-torn Darfur region.
The force’s mandate has been extended until the end of July 2010.
It’s a little surprising and sad that this War in Darfur is shaping up to last longer than the Iraq War. But there’s a little bit of good news.
Sawers said there have been some encouraging developments in Darfur. He welcomed the improved cooperation between the U.N. secretariat and Khartoum in deploying UNAMID, which is currently at just over two-thirds of its planned strength of 26,000 troops and police.
New Teacher Program Creates Jobs, Controversy
In 2007, fresh out of the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, Chris Turk snagged a coveted spot with the elite Teach For America program, landing here at Cherry Hill Elementary/Middle School in a blue-collar neighborhood at the city’s southern tip. For the past two years, he has taught middle-school social studies.
One recent afternoon, during a five-week “life skills” summer-school course, Turk tells his five students that their final project, a movie about what they’ve learned, has a blockbuster budget: $70.
“We can go big here,” he says. “We can go grand.”
He might as well be talking about the high-profile program that brought him here.
Despite a lingering recession, state budget crises and widespread teacher hiring slowdowns, Teach For America (TFA) has grown steadily, delighting supporters and giving critics a bad case of heartburn as it expands to new cities and builds a formidable alumni base of young people willing to teach for two years in some of the USA’s toughest public schools.
Baltimore Superintendent Andres Alonso — who says he has seen “fewer retirements, fewer resignations and just greater stability in terms of our teaching ranks,” much of it because of a reluctance to leave a secure job in a recession — has doubled the number of TFA teachers, known as “corps members,” in city schools over the past two years.
Next week, more than 160 new TFAers arrive in Baltimore, up from 80 in 2007. They’ll make up about one in four new hires.
Nationwide, about 7,300 young people are expected to teach under TFA’s banner, up from 6,200 last year. TFA is expanding from 29 regions to 35, including Dallas, Boston and Minneapolis-St. Paul.
But critics say the growth in many cities is coming at the expense of experienced teachers who are losing their jobs — in some cases, they say, to make room for TFA, which brings in teachers at beginners’ salary levels and underwrites training.
I have mixed feelings about this program. Those experienced teachers are eventually going to retire anyway, right? But then again, “underwrites training”? Really? If that’s the case, schools are screwed.
Kids Like You & Me (KLYAM) 