“Jennifer Epstein” - Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn signs death penalty repeal

By JENNIFER EPSTEIN

3/9/11

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0311/50966.html

Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn signed a death penalty ban into law on Wednesday, making Illinois the 16th state to end capital punishment.

Quinn also commuted the sentences of the 15 inmates on death row in the state. Instead, they will serve life in prison without parole. The ban on executions will take effect July 1.

Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history,” the Democratic governor said after he signed the bill. “I think it’s the right and just thing to abolish the death penalty.”

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"James Hohmann"- David S. Broder, dean of political writers, dies at 81

By JAMES HOHMANN

Wednesday March 9, 2011

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0311/50962.html

David S. Broder, The Washington Post reporter and columnist long known as the dean of American political writers, died Wednesday of complications resulting from diabetes. He was 81.

Despite years of health problems, Broder had continued to write columns for the paper until last month. He died in Arlington, Va., surrounded by family.

He came to The Post in 1966 from The New York Times and soon became one of the paper’s biggest stars. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973 for his coverage of Watergate.

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“David Edwards” - Gingrich says he cheated on his wives because he felt so ‘passionately’ for ‘this country’

By David Edwards

Wednesday, March 9th, 2011

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/03/09/gingrich-says-he-cheated-on-his-wives-because-he-was-passionate-for-this-country/

Newt Gingrich (R-GA) loves the country so much that it has caused him to stray from his marriages.

At least, that what the former House speaker seemed to be saying in a recent interview with CBN's David Brody.

"There's no question at times of my life, partially driven by how passionately I felt about this country, that I worked far too hard and things happened in my life that were not appropriate," Gingrich said.

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“David Edwards” - NPR CEO resigns over conservative prankster’s video

By David Edwards

Wednesday, March 9th, 2011

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/03/09/npr-ceo-resigns-over-conservative-pranksters-video/

National Public Radio (NPR) President and CEO Vivian Schiller has resigned in the wake of a video sting by a conservative group.

A video by conservative prankster James O'Keefe's "Project Veritas" had allegedly showed NPR Foundation President Ron Schiller (no relation) saying the tea party was full of "racist people."

The NPR Foundation president also allegedly lamented Jewish control of newspapers, and said NPR would be better off without federal funding.

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“Sahil Kapur” - Schumer: Cantor ‘flat-out wrong’ for pushing Social Security cuts

By Sahil Kapur

Wednesday, March 9th, 2011

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/03/09/schumer-cantor-flat-out-wrong-for-pushing-social-security-cuts/

WASHINGTON – Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) tore into House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) on Wednesday for suggesting that Social Security needs to be cut in order to balance the budget.

"Rep. Cantor's claim that we need to cut seniors' Social Security checks today to balance the budget is flat-out wrong," Schumer said in a statement. "Blaming Social Security for our deficit is nothing but an ideological attempt to slash benefits and privatize the program."

Cantor told reporters Tuesday that Social Security cuts would be necessary to eliminate the deficit over the next decade.

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“Todd Woody” - Where do the greenest commuters live? Not Portland

by Todd Woody

9 Mar 2011

http://www.grist.org/article/2011-03-09-where-do-green-commuters-live-not-portland

Quick: Who are the loneliest commuters in the nation? That would be the residents of Southgate, Mich., where 91.6 percent of workers drive alone.

The city with the most pedestrian commuters? That's Ithaca, N.Y., where 41.8 percent of commuters walk  to work (particularly impressive given upstate New York's brutal winters). Meanwhile, no one in Sun City, Calif., apparently walks to work. (Not too surprising, as the Southern California suburb is a master-planned retirement community.)

Those are some of the thousands of data points on Americans transportation habits mined by FindTheBest, which might described as the mother of all comparison search engines, offering information on everything from summer camps to venture capital firms. The service was started by Kevin O'Connor, a cofounder of internet ad agency DoubleClick, now owned by Google.

But I've been geeking out over the "Modes of Transportation to Work" category. According to FindTheBest, the data comes from a United States Census Bureau 2008 report.

"All the information we use is publicly available and highly transparent, but the problem is the government does not make the data very easy to navigate or good for comparing," Brandon Coakley, a business development associate for FindTheBest, told me in an email.

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“The American Dream” - 21 Signs Of Impending Doom For The 2011 Economy

The American Dream

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

http://www.prisonplanet.com/21-signs-of-impending-doom-for-the-2011-economy.html

If you are not aware of how rapidly the global economic situation is unraveling you need to snap out of it and start paying attention.  The world economy was relatively stable in 2010, but here in 2011 things are deteriorating very quickly.  Right now there is major civil unrest in at least a dozen different nations in Africa and the Middle East.  The civil war going on in Libya has sent the price of oil skyrocketing and the protests that are scheduled to begin in Saudi Arabia later this month could send oil prices even higher.  Meanwhile, the sovereign debt crisis in Europe just seems to get worse by the day.  Several nations in Europe are suddenly finding that it has become extremely expensive to finance more debt.  It appears that it will only be a matter of time before more bailouts are needed.  Meanwhile, the United States is also covered in a sea of red ink and the economic situation in the largest economy on earth continues to deteriorate rapidly.  It is as if the entire world financial system has caught a virus that it just can’t shake, and now it looks like another massive wave of financial disaster could be about to strike.  Does the global economy have enough strength to weather a major oil crisis in 2011?  How much debt can the largest nations in North America and Europe take on before the entire system collapses under the weight?  Will 2011 be a repeat of 2008 or are we going to be able to get through the rest of the year okay?  Only time will tell.

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“Sandya Sagar” - The arranged marriage my parents won't give up on

I'm a 32-year-old, single Indian American woman. My parents think I'm too old. I think their traditions are

By Sandya Sagar

Wednesday, Mar 9, 2011

http://www.salon.com/life/feature/2011/03/09/dodging_an_arranged_marriage_open2011

My mother, roti roller in one hand and cordless phone in the other, barged into my room and ordered me to talk to her sister in South India. I already knew what this was about: My aunt had enlisted a professional matchmaker to find me a groom.

Ever since my last relationship ended a year ago, my folks have been trying to marry me off. In their minds, I'm running out of time. Since I live at home at 32 (not uncommon for unmarried Indian women, especially in this shaky economy), they try to introduce me to a different guy every other week. Had I gotten married to either man I dated seriously in the past five years, I would have ended up separated by now. But, according to my folks, I would have been happily married with children already if I'd listened to them. Somehow, they never mention the rise in divorces among Indian Americans.

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“Peter Finocchiaro” - Is Facebook's "real name" policy unfair?

A Chinese blogger can't have a page with his English pen name, but Zuckerberg can create one for his dog ...

By Peter Finocchiaro

Wednesday, Mar 9, 2011

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2011/03/09/facebook_real_name_policy_unfair

Facebook's policy requiring all members to use their legal names on accounts is meant to foster a safer and more accountable environment. But Chinese blogger Michael Anti says that the tech giant's rigid implementation of the policy is unfair -- that, in particular, it ignores cultural norms specific to Chinese writers, who use English names in their professional lives.

Michael Anti -- who writes under an English nom de plume that differes from his birth name, Zhao Jing -- discovered recently that his Facebook account had been deleted for violating the "real name" policy. Anti has used the alias for several years, both in writing and in his communications with Westerners, and is widely recognized by the name. He even sent Facebook a copy of a certificate from a Harvard fellowship he completed as proof of his name's validity, but was rebuffed yet again.

Says Anti:

It's insulting. They think my academic and journalistic work is less real than Zuckerberg's dog? I have lost more than a thousand contacts overseas ... It is part of my life.

By now, Michael Anti must be accostomed to fighting bans. In 2005, Microsoft deleted Anti's blog, folding against pressure from the Chinese government. 



"Ian Millhiser" - GOP Attorney General Runs Away From His Attack On Entire Affordable Care Act

By Ian Millhiser

March 9, 2011

http://thinkprogress.org/2011/03/09/mckenna-runs-away/

Washington Attorney General Rob McKenna (R) is one of about two dozen GOP state attorneys general who asked Tea Party Judge Roger Vinson to strike down the entire Affordable Care Act. After Vinson’s error-laden opinion took McKenna up on his suggestion, however, McKenna has suddenly decided that he doesn’t want anyone to know that he is fighting to take health insurance away from young Americans, drive up the cost of prescription drugs for seniors, and allow insurance companies to deny coverage to people with preexisting conditions:

An e-mail was circulated earlier this month by a member of Congress accusing me of trying to “wipe out” the entire health care reform law, eliminate health care coverage for children with congenital heart defects, and take prescription drugs away from seniors. Hours later, Gov. Chris Gregoire, flanked by U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, accused me of trying to have the entire law thrown out. She raised the specter that many seniors would each lose $250 worth of coverage and small business people would lose tax credits, among other ominous claims. [...]

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