"CHELLIS GLENDINNING" - The Growing Movement Against Electromagnetic Contamination

By CHELLIS GLENDINNING

http://counterpunch.org/glendinning07082011.html

A global movement challenging the increasing presence of electromagnetic (EMF)/ radiofrequency (RF) radioactive contamination via “smart” gadgets and meters, antennas, Wi-Fi, and WiMAX is indeed afoot. Yet it resides in the shadows of popular awareness because the public communication media -- who might, but do not report on the effort -- are largely owned by the same corporate entities perpetrating the contaminating technologies, and they are motivated to not reveal the health and ecological dangers of wireless technologies. And so welcome to an unheralded, but vastly important, movement that is growing every day:

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Jane Hamsher: Obama and the Death of the Democratic Party

Published on Friday, July 8, 2011 by FireDogLake

http://firedoglake.com/2011/07/07/the-breaking-point/

by Jane Hamsher

According to both the Washington Post and the New York Times, Obama is proposing cuts to Social Security in exchange for GOP support for tax hikes. Lori Montgomery in the Post:

At a meeting with top House and Senate leaders set for Thursday morning, Obama plans to argue that a rare consensus has emerged about the size and scope of the nation’s budget problems and that policymakers should seize the moment to take dramatic action.  As part of his pitch, Obama is proposing significant reductions in Medicare spending and for the first time is offering to tackle the rising cost of Social Security, according to people in both parties with knowledge of the proposal.

And Jay Carney’s carefully chosen weasel-words today do not contradict this:

“There is no news here – the President has always said that while social security is not a major driver of the deficit, we do need to strengthen the program and the President said in the State of the Union Address that he wanted to work with both parties to do so in a balanced way that preserves the promise of the program and doesn’t slash benefits.”

Nobody ever says they want to “cut” Social Security or Medicare. They want to “save” it.  Just ask Pete Peterson, he wants to “save” it. Likewise AARP.  They don’t want reduced benefits for senior citizens, they want to “preserve” it for future generations.  If they have an enormous customer base they can market private “add-on” accounts and other retirement products to when Social Security goes bye-bye, I guess that’s just a happy coincidence.

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Joseph Stiglitz: The Evils of Unregulated Capitalism

Published on Sunday, July 10, 2011 by Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/07/20117714241429793.html

by Joseph E. Stiglitz

Just a few years ago, a powerful ideology - the belief in free and unfettered markets - brought the world to the brink of ruin. Even in its hey-day, from the early 1980s until 2007, US-style deregulated capitalism brought greater material well-being only to the very richest in the richest country of the world.

Indeed, over the course of this ideology's 30-year ascendance, most Americans saw their incomes decline or stagnate year after year.

Moreover, output growth in the United States was not economically sustainable. With so much of US national income going to so few, growth could continue only through consumption financed by a mounting pile of debt.

I was among those who hoped that, somehow, the financial crisis would teach Americans (and others) a lesson about the need for greater equality, stronger regulation, and a better balance between the market and government.

Alas, that has not been the case.

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"Michael Collins" - Dow Jones-Wall Street Journal Head Drawn Into Murdoch UK Phone Jacking Scandal

July 9, 2011

By Michael Collins

Les Hinton is the chief executive of Dow Jones and the publisher of the Wall Street Journal, the most prestigious and valued media holdings of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporationmedia empire. Hinton is implicated as a key player in at least the cover up of illegal break-ins involving hundreds of voice mail accounts belonging to news worthy British citizens high and low. Hinton was chairman of News International, the parent company of Murdoch's London tabloids and newspapers (including the Times of London), at the time of the illegal activities and police investigations. (Image)

What Happened Under Hinton's Reign?

The UK phone jacking scandal started in 2007 when news broke that the News of the World, London's leading tabloid, had been breaking into to voice mail accounts of prominent British citizens:

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Lauren Kelley: Being Anti-War Is Not a Crime -- But That's Not Stopping the FBI From Raiding Activists' Homes

By Lauren Kelley, AlterNet
Posted on July 8, 2011, Printed on July 10, 2011
http://www.alternet.org/story/151570/being_anti-war_is_not_a_crime_--_but_that%27s_not_stopping_the_fbi_from_raiding_activists%27_homes

In the early morning of May 17, longtime anti-war and immigrant rights activist Carlos Montes awoke to the startling sound of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department SWAT Team breaking down his door. "They came in with guns on their shoulders, yelling. I was shocked," 63-year-old Montes told the Pasadena Star-News. "I thought, let me close my eyes so I can go to sleep and see if I wake up from this nightmare."

Authorities searched Montes' home, confiscating his cell phone and computer. Montes says the authorities also sorted through, stacked and organized a large number of personal documents and photos, many of them relating to his activist activities and trips he took to Colombia and Cuba (Montes founded the Brown Beret Chicano youth group in the 1960s and has been involved in anti-war efforts for four decades).

When authorities discovered an illegally purchased firearm in his home, Montes was arrested and charged with possession of a firearm by a felon (Montes was convicted in 1969 of assaulting a police officer), possession of ammunition, and four counts of perjury for lying on his gun registration.

Montes already felt the raid had less to do with firearms than with his political activism, but what happened next solidified that feeling.

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"Erik Wasson" - Sanders: Obama Proposal Would Impoverish 250,000

Published on Sunday, July 10, 2011 by The Hill (Washington, DC)

http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/budget/170543-sanders-obama-proposal-impoverishes-250000-people

by Erik Wasson

The Social Security Administration estimates that a proposal floated by the Obama administration would put 245,000 people into poverty, according to an analysis released by liberal senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Saturday.

That level of impact would be felt by 2050 if a proposal to change the way inflation is measured is adopted, Sanders announced. The change to the way SSA would calculate the Consumer Price Index has been floated in debt ceiling talks between Congress and the White House. The White House has suggested revising CPI for both the tax code, in order to generate more revenue, and for benefits.

Social Security Administration’s Office of Retirement Policy estimated that by 2030, according to the report prepared for Sanders, there would be 173,400 more people living in poverty in the United States.

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Caroline Arnold: How Much Blame Do We Share for Our Leaders' Failures?

Published on Sunday, July 10, 2011 by the Kent-Ravenna Record Courier (Ohio)

 http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/07/10-0

Are we rats or are we humans?

by Caroline Arnold

Six years ago, in the wake of the botched management of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath, a friend warned me against blaming Republicans.

I replied flippantly that as an unrepentant progressive, I quite enjoyed blaming Republicans, though I recognized that even the GOP, PNAC, and all their associated think-tanks and trained media rescue-dogs couldn’t have single-handedly created a disaster of that magnitude. I added that if the Republicans had planned Katrina, they probably would have directed it to Ohio. Of course there aren’t any hurricanes in Ohio, but heck, there weren’t any WMDs in Iraq, either.

Another friend who had volunteered in the cleanup of Katrina running a ham radio operation observed that among the agencies and organizations trying to help, the farther up the hierarchy of any institution, public or private, the worse prepared the people were, the more out of touch, the more incompetent, and the more their efforts were downright damaging.

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Ellen Brown: Why QE2 Failed -- The Money All Went Offshore

By Ellen Brown

Global Research, July 9, 2011

http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=25566

On June 30, QE2 ended with a whimper.  The Fed’s second round of “quantitative easing” involved $600 billioncreated with a computer keystroke for the purchase of long-term government bonds.  But the government never actually got the money, which went straight into the reserve accounts of banks, where it still sits today.  Worse, it went into the reserve accounts of FOREIGN banks, on which the Federal Reserve is now paying 0.25% interest. 

Before QE2 there was QE1, in which the Fed bought $1.25 trillion in mortgage-backed securities from the banks.  This money too remains in bank reserve accounts collecting interest and dust.  The Fed reports that the accumulated excess reserves of depository institutions now total nearly $1.6 trillion.    

Interestingly, $1.6 trillion is also the size of the federal deficit – a deficit so large that some members of Congress are threatening to force a default on the national debt if it isn’t corrected soon. 

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John Nichols: If Job Numbers Don't Improve Obama Can Kiss the 2012 Election Goodbye

By John Nichols, The Nation
Posted on July 8, 2011, Printed on July 10, 2011
http://www.alternet.org/story/151568/if_job_numbers_don%27t_improve_obama_can_kiss_the_2012_election_goodbye

The following article first appeared in The Nation magazine. For more great content from the Nation, sign up for their email newsletters here. 

The big story out of Washington—and rightly so—is the debt-ceiling fight that President Obama seems to be coming very close to losing. If the president abandons his 2008 campaigvn promise to be an absolute defender of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, he will have very little indeed to run on in 2012.

But that won't be what beats him.

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Carne Ross: Can We Trust Corporations That Profit Off Our Information? For Facebook, Twitter, Google and More, You're The Product

By Carne Ross, Comment Is Free
Posted on July 8, 2011, Printed on July 10, 2011
http://www.alternet.org/story/151559/can_we_trust_corporations_that_profit_off_our_information_for_facebook%2C_twitter%2C_google_and_more%2C_you%27re_the_product

On the internet, as elsewhere, information is money, and information is power. So why have we given it away so lightly?

Something extraordinary has taken place over the last few years. Voluntarily, and without coercion or, indeed, payment, internet users have handed over vast amounts of highly personal data – their preferences, where they live, who their friends are and what they do – to private companies, whose primary goal is to profit from that data. And every day, we hand over more, willingly.

On Facebook, we think we are sharing only with our friends the information – the news, the messages, the photos – that we place on "our" pages. But thanks to Facebook's confusing privacy settings, users are propelled to default and "recommended" settings that make public almost everything – and in so doing, also permit Facebook to make use of your information. Yet more obscure are the complicated and multi-caveated user and privacy agreements most never bother to read. It is only here that Facebook admits that the content (your "intellectual property") belongs to the company. They own it; once it's on the site, you don't.

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