"Ted Rall" - 9/11: Ten Years Later, Americans Still Stupid and Vulnerable

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/08/28

Published on Sunday, August 28, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

by Ted Rall

They say everything changed on 9/11. No one can dispute that. But we didn't learn anything.

Like other events that forced Americans to reassess their national priorities (the Great Depression, Pearl Harbor, Sputnik) the attacks on New York and Washington were a traumatic, teachable moment.

The collective attention of the nation was finally focused upon problems that had gone neglected for many years. 9/11 was a chance to get smart—but we blew it.

First and foremost the attacks gave the United States a rare opportunity to reset its international reputation. Even countries known for anti-Americanism offered their support. "We are all Americans," ran the headline of the French newspaper.

The century of U.S. foreign policy that led to 9/11—supporting dictators, crushing democratic movements, spreading gangster capitalism at the point of a thousand nukes—should and could have been put on hold and reassessed in the wake of 9/11.

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"Paul Vallely" - There is No Moral Case for Tax Havens

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/08/28-1

Published on Sunday, August 28, 2011 by the Independent/UK

They are the epitome of unfairness and injustice, leaving ordinary citizens to foot the bill for multinational corporations

by Paul Vallely

 

There is a building in the Cayman Islands that is home to 12,000 corporations. It must be a very big building. Or a very big tax scam. Tax havens are in the spotlight since the Chancellor, George Osborne, did a deal the other day with the Swiss authorities to slap a levy on secret bank accounts held there by British citizens. Opinions are divided on the move, which could net the Treasury £5bn, but which tacitly legitimizes bank accounts kept secret from the Inland Revenue. It is a de facto amnesty for those guilty of tax evasion crimes. And they will pay less than they would if they declared their income to the British taxman.

Are there any legitimate reasons why anyone would want to have a secret bank account – and pay a premium to maintain their anonymity – or move their money to one of the pink dots on the map which are the final remnants of the British empire: the Caymans, Bermuda, the Turks and Caicos and the British Virgin Islands?

The moral case against is clear enough. Tax havens epitomize unfairness, cheating and injustice. They replace the old morality embodied in the Golden Rule of reciprocity – that we should do as we would be done by – with a new version that insists that those who have the gold make the rules.

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"The Japan Times" - Japan's Cesium Leak Equal to 168 '45 A-Bombs

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/08/27-0

Published on Saturday, August 27, 2011 by The Japan Times

NISA compares contamination to Hiroshima blast

The amount of radioactive cesium ejected by the Fukushima reactor meltdowns is about 168 times higher than that emitted in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, the government's nuclear watchdog said Friday

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency provided the estimate at the request of a Diet panel but noted that making a simple comparison between an instantaneous bomb blast and a long-term accidental leak is problematic and could lead to "irrelevant" results.

The report said the crippled Fukushima No. 1 plant has released 15,000 terabecquerels of cesium-137, which lingers for decades and can cause cancer, compared with the 89 terabecquerels released by the U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima.

The report estimated each of the 16 isotopes released by the "Little Boy" bomb and 31 of those detected at the Fukushima plant. NISA has said the radiation released at Fukushima was about one-sixth of that released during the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

"Little Boy," dropped Aug. 6, 1945, destroyed most of the city and eventually killed as many as 140,000 people.

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"Robert Ray" - After Irene: Little Damage Seen in Many Places

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/08/26-12

Published on Sunday, August 28, 2011 by the Associated Press

by Robert Ray

KILL DEVIL HILLS, N.C. — From North Carolina to New Jersey, Hurricane Irene appeared to have fallen short of the doomsday predictions. But with rivers still rising, and roads impassable because of high water and fallen trees, it could be days before the full extent of the damage is known.

More than 4.5 million homes and businesses along the East Coast lost power, and at least 11 deaths were blamed on the storm. But as day broke Sunday, surprisingly light damage was reported in many places, with little more than downed trees and power lines.

"I think it's a little strong to say we dodged a bullet. However, it certainly could have turned out worse for the Hampton Roads area" in Virginia, said National Weather Service meteorologist Mike Montefusco.

At the same time, officials warned of the possibility of severe flooding over the next few days as runoff from the storm makes its way into creeks and rivers. In some parts of the Northeast, the ground was soggy even before the storm because of an extremely rainy August.

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett cautioned: "The rivers may not crest until Tuesday or Wednesday. This isn't just a 24-hour event."

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"Progressive Radio Network Host Mike Feder, Thursday's @ 1pm(EDT") - Friends

Friends,

It is obviously a very dark time in the world-- in out country.
It's hard to even look the paper or TV- or listen to the radio (however you get your regular dose of news).
Maybe, like me, you're just exhausted from the relentless shocks to the system that all these visions and reports of wars, murders, disease, corruption, poverty and pure insanity engender.
In particular, after last Tuesday's great giveaway by The President, it's hard to have any hope that the country can be reclaimed from the pirates and their hired (or, at the very least, cowed and brainwashed) politicians, judges and agency heads.

But, once in a while, there is a brief glimmer of hope in this bleak landscape...
One such glimmer is a man named Tim DeChristopher who was sentenced to two years in Federal Prison in Federal Court in Salt Lake on July 26th.
Briefly--here's the background:

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"The San Francisco Chronicle" - Nuclear Reactors on East Coast Brace for Hurricane Irene's Wrath

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/08/26-2

Published on Friday, August 26, 2011 by The San Francisco Chronicle

NEW YORK -- More than a dozen nuclear reactors along the U.S. East Coast are being prepared for potential loss of power and damage from high winds and storm surges as Hurricane Irene bears down on the region.

Nuclear plants in Irene's path continued to operate as workers secured loose equipment, checked diesel fuel supplies for backup generators and stowed cots and food for workers who may be stranded during the storm.

At Dominion Resources Inc.'s Millstone nuclear station, which sits on a narrow peninsula in the Long Island Sound near Waterford, Connecticut, workers were examining flood barriers and submarine doors designed to keep reactors dry from a hurricane's storm surge.

"That's part of our storm preparations: ensuring those flood barriers are in place, ready to do their job," said Ken Holt, a spokesman for Richmond, Virginia-based Dominion, in an interview yesterday.

Irene, a Category 3 hurricane, is on track to become the first major storm to strike the U.S. since Hurricane Ike in 2008, following a similar path to Gloria in 1985, which swept through New York City into New England.

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Progressive Radio Network Host Bhavani Jaroff" - Farm to Table Cooking Class

Join us for a Farm to Table Cooking Class

followed by a candlelit dinner 

in the garden

Thursday, September 1st, 6:00-9:00 pm

$75.00 per person

Space is limited

Farm to Table Cooking Class 9-1-11.doc

iEat Green Registration Form.dociEat Green Registration Form.doc

Farm to Table Cooking Class 9-1-11.doc



"Jaclyn Gallucci" - A Look Inside The Immunization Dilemma

http://www.longislandpress.com/2011/06/23/a-look-inside-the-immunization-dilemma/

By Jaclyn Gallucci on June 23rd, 2011

The 1952 polio epidemic was one of the largest and most frightening public health crises in the United States, with outbreaks in all 50 states. Of the nearly 58,000 cases reported that year, 3,145 people died and 21,269 were left paralyzed. Until 1955, when New York City’s Dr. Jonas Salk introduced his vaccine, polio was a constant terror. When asked in a televised interview who owned the patent for the vaccine, Salk replied, “There is no patent. Could you patent the sun?”

Well, times have changed. Now pharmaceutical companies are highly protective of their assets, because vaccines are not just medical breakthroughs, they are also big business. In fact, Salk’s vaccine went on to raise manufacturer Eli Lilly’s profit by 90 percent in 1956, bringing in a total of $13.7 million in revenue for the company, in addition to the millions it made other manufacturers of the time. Today, companies like Merck bring in billions by manufacturing vaccines for everything from chicken pox to the flu.

And, today, children who follow the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended schedule receive 69 doses of 16 vaccines—46 more doses than they did 30 years ago, and the highest amount given in any country in the world.

Parents, faced with a barrage of polarizing opinions and a handful of conflicting studies, remain in a constant search for definitive answers. But right now, there aren’t any.

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"Mark Engler" - Dramatizing Obama's Climate Dilemma

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/08/26-6

Published on Friday, August 26, 2011 by Dissent

by Mark Engler

President Obama now has a clear choice on climate change. Major energy corporations are seeking to build a 1700-mile oil pipeline from Canada’s tar sands to refineries in Texas. The Keystone XL Pipeline would itself carry social and environmental costs: cutting through fragile ecosystems, creating risk of spills, and negatively affecting indigenous communities. But, most significantly, it would be a boon to efforts to exploit the tar sands.

The Canadian tar sands are a particularly dirty source of fossil fuels that could produce egregious carbon emissions. As Elizabeth Kolbert reported at the New Yorker:

[B]ecause tar-sands oil is so heavy, it has to be very heavily processed, which requires tremendous amounts of energy, usually in the form of natural gas. It’s been estimated that, on what’s known as a well-to-tank basis, tar-sands oil is responsible for eighty percent more greenhouse-gas emissions than ordinary crude.

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"Michelle Chen" - To Stop Corruption, Fight the Power, Not the People

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/08/26-4

Published on Friday, August 26, 2011 by ColorLines

by Michelle Chen

Absolute power corrupts absolutely, and in a world where the gap between the powerful and powerless grows wider each day, corruption in political and economic institutions spreads much faster than shame.

Political power is abused wherever it exists—with scandals ranging from political graft in India to white collar crime on Wall Street to bribery of government regulators in China. Nonetheless, some communities seem especially vulnerable to the cycle of corruption, repression and impunity. And lately, we’ve seen many of them getting fed up with living under regimes that have lost legitimacy in the eyes of the people. Corruption has been one of the major issues driving the unrest across the Middle East and North Africa, and it has catalyzed a Gandhi-esque movement in the streets of New Delhi.

Indian activist Anna Hazare has inspired huge demonstrations in support of his hunger strike to promote a strict, controversial anti-corruption measure known as the Jan Lokpal bill. The government’s recent crackdown on Hazare only steeled protesters’ resolve under the slogan “India is Anna, Anna is India.”

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