source http://www.activistpost.com/2010/08/ron-pauls-shocking-message-to-tea-party.html
Monday, August 30, 2010
Mexico Gunmen Assassinate Second Mayor in Two Weeks
source http://cryptogon.com/?p=17338 & http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-08-30/drug-cartel-gunmen-kill-a-mexican-mayor-4-year-old-daughter-is-wounded.html
Mexican gunmen assassinated the second mayor in less than two weeks in the violent northeast region of the country as a fight against drug traffickers intensifies.
Marco Antonio Leal Garcia, the mayor of Hidalgo in Tamaulipas state, was killed when his truck was ambushed by the gunmen. His daughter was also injured in the attack.
"This cowardly crime and the condemnable violent events that have recently occurred in this part of the country reinforce the commitment to continue fighting criminal groups with all the resources of the state," President Felipe Calderon's office said in an e-mailed statement.
Tamaulipas has become an epicenter in Mexico's fight against drug traffickers as the Gulf drug cartel battles its former allies, the Zetas, over smuggling routes into the U.S.
Last week, 72 murdered migrants were discovered at a ranch in the state and a car bomb was exploded outside the offices of Grupo Televisa SA, the world's largest Spanish-language broadcaster.
The frontrunner in the state's gubernatorial election was killed less than a week before the July 4 balloting.
In neighboring Nuevo Leon state, Santiago city Mayor Edelmiro Cavazos Leal was assassinated earlier this month.
Violence related to drug gangs and criminal organizations has intensified this year. Mexico has reported more than 28,000 deaths related to organized crime since Calderon took office in 2006.
To contact the reporter on this story: Jens Erik Gould in Mexico City at jgould9@bloomberg.net; Jonathan Levin in Mexico City at jlevin20@bloomberg.net
Progressive Caucus tells deficit panel: “Take Social Security off the table”
source http://peoplesworld.org/progressive-caucus-tells-deficit-panel-take-social-security-off-the-table/
WASHINGTON (PAI) - Members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus have told the two co-chairs of President Obama's deficit-cutting commission to "take Social Security off the table," caucus co-chair Rep. Raul Grijalva says.
In an Aug. 24 telephone press conference about the nation's top retirement program, the Democratic lawmaker from Tucson, Ariz., added that he and his colleagues suggested other ways of stemming the flood of federal red ink in future years.
Their proposals included closing corporate tax loopholes, letting the Bush tax cuts for the rich expire, ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, imposing higher royalties on firms that take valuable resources - such as minerals and oil - from federal lands and cutting defense and homeland security spending, Grijalva reported.
The 12 to 15 Progressive Caucus lawmakers who met with Grijalva and deficit commission co-chairs Erskine Bowles, a former top Democratic White House staffer, and Alan Simpson, a former GOP senator from Wyoming, also made the point that cutting Social Security wouldn't fly politically, either in Congress or the country.
"This was an affirmation of where we stand and of what we won't tolerate" in deficit-cutting plans, Grijalva added. "Because of its size and its impact, it's important to make the point now that Social Security must be off the table," he said - even before the deficit-cutting panel issues any findings and recommendations.
That ban includes any proposals to raise the retirement age, as GOP House Minority Leader John Boehner favors, or to cut benefits, Grijalva added.
Grijalva discussed the caucus meeting with Bowles and Simpson, which occurred just before Congress recessed in early August, as the Economic Policy Institute marshaled arguments to take Social Security off the deficit-cutting list. The commission co-chairs were non-committal, saying everything is being considered including the nation's retirement program, the congressman reported.
It shouldn't be, said EPI's Ross Eisenbrey, along with former Social Security chief actuary Harry Alexander and Nancy Altman, co-chair of a coalition - including the AFL-CIO and many major unions - formed in July to protect Social Security from the deficit-cutters.
That's because Social Security has its own trust funds and does not contribute to the flood of red ink the presidential panel is investigating, the four said. The lawmakers' caucus made that same point to Bowles and Simpson, Grijalva added.
Photo: Progress Ohio
Religious Right Launches Public Campaign to Defend School Bullying Against LGBT Kids
source http://www.openleft.com/diary/19977/a-new-low-religious-right-launches-public-campaign-to-defend-school-bullying-against-lgbt-kids
From the Department of You Can't Make This Crap Up, we get this story from the Denver Post about the Religious Right's new campaign in support of school bullying: Focus on Family says anti-bullying efforts in schools push gay agenda While the article goes on to say that Focus on the Family officially "supports bullying prevention," the message is pretty clear: The leadership of the Religious Right believes that kids should have the right to threaten, intimidate, physically harm and/or engage in all the other aspects of bullying - as long as that bullying is motivated by a hatred of LGBT individuals. Indeed, these leaders believe that stopping such bullying against LGBT individuals is a form of persecution - in their words, the anti-bullying efforts "belittle" Christians by daring to "portray" violence against LGBT individuals "as bigotry." The assumptions in this are truly grotesque. First and foremost, we are to assume that it isn't bigotry to want to commit - or, perhaps even to actually commit - such violence against an individual specifically because of their sexual orientation. The further assumption is that to claim it is bigotry is to actually expose oneself as the real bigot - in this case, against Christians. That consequently means we are to assume it is the inalienable right of citizenship to bully people whose sexual orientation we don't like. The Religious Right would have us accept these assumptions without question - as if they are entirely self-evident. The truth, of course, is that they are anything but. |
| David Sirota :: A New Low: Religious Right Launches Public Campaign to Defend School Bullying Against LGBT Kids |
| Nondiscrimination should mean nondiscrimination. Preventing bullying should mean preventing bullying - whether or not the bullying is motivated by a hatred for LGBT individuals. And bigotry is bigotry - whether it's directed at people because of race, gender or sexual orientation. Why is this such a serious issue when it comes specifically to the issue of school bullying? Because schools are one of the venues where bigoted persecution against LGBT individuals is most pronounced. Today, about one in three American kids is involved in bullying. Studies have shown that kids who identify as gay or lesbian are up to three times more likely to get bullied than other kids - and about one in four of those gay/lesbian kids report being physically assaulted because of their sexual orientation. The good news is that there are lawmakers like Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) who aren't being cowed by the Religious Right and who are taking the issue seriously by calling for some real reforms. "Right now we have laws that prohibit bullying based on pretty much everything, but not on gender identity and gay and lesbian kids," he said at a recent hearing in which he criticized that discrepancy. But if you listen to the Religious Right, that discrepancy is AOK - and to call for an end to it is "bigotry" and "belittling" of Christians. What we are left with, then, is a good example that illustrates how extreme these fundamentalist forces are. In effectively arguing that it should be the right of a child to inflict violence on another child because of that child's sexual orientation, the Religious Right is showing that it sees "equality," "nondiscrimination" and even "equal protection under the law" as principles that should protect only those demographics that Religious Right theocrats deems worthy of such freedoms. Regardless of which particular political party you belong to, that kind of extremism should disgust anyone who purports to oppose bigotry and claims to take basic constitutional ideals seriously. |
@bp_america Found: BP's Missing Oil
source http://motherjones.com/rights-stuff/2010/08/found-bps-supposedly-missing-oil
Remember when the media, and then the government, announced that all the oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill was gone, and then we all rejoiced because the troubles of those sad weathered Cajun dudes Anderson Cooper kept confronting us with were finally over, and then Pegasus came to my house and asked me if I wanted to make out and made me a batch of hummus that was too refreshing and light yet robust to be believed?
Well, some cleanup workers in Pensacola, Florida—which is not anywhere near as wrecked as any of the shores in Louisiana—are determined to ruin everyone's fairy-tale ending by talking about how they picked up 4,000 pounds of oil the other night (h/t @LibrlSandlapper). Nevertheless, their crews are being massively scaled down, which should definitely take care of this sort of thing being reported in the future.
Big cleanup cutbacks have also happened in Grand Isle, Louisiana. Sounds like the crisis there is over! Although Drew Wheelan of the American Birding Association sent me these pictures he's taken there over the last 10 days. What a jerk.
Oil all over the beach:
Oil under the water:
Oil in the shoals:
Oil beneath "clean" sand:
Stay tuned for more photos like that: This morning a contractor told me BP has informed cleanup supervisors that a 200-foot-by-2-mile swath of oil is going to make landfall on Grand Isle in the next couple of days.
Why is Obama Siding With Polluters?
The administration backs the country's biggest sources of planet-warming gases in a major court case. Enviros are livid.
source http://motherjones.com/environment/2010/08/obama-utilities-pollution-green-house-gases
source http://motherjones.com/environment/2010/08/obama-utilities-pollution-green-house-gases
US soldiers punished for not attending Christian rock concert
source http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/aug2010/army-a30.shtml
The US army is investigating accusations by soldiers that a commanding officer banished them to their barracks when they refused to attend a Christian rock concert at Fort Eustis, Virginia in May of this year.
Army spokesperson Colonel Thomas Collins told the Associated Press that the allegations against the officer, if true, would be contrary to Army policy. They also represent a clear violation of the separation of church and state and serve as the latest evidence of the impunity with which Christian fundamentalism is supplanting constitutional governance of the American military.
The first report of the concert and punishment of those who did not attend came from the Military Religious Freedom Foundation's (MRFF) web site. The group said multiple soldiers contacted them complaining about the incident, including those who suffered punishment for refusing to attend the concert. Mikey Weinstein, president of the MRFF, told the AP that Christian-themed events were "ubiquitous" in the military.
The concert was one of the "Commanding General's Spiritual Fitness Concerts," and featured the band Barlow Girl. According to the band's web site, BarlowGirl is "tender-hearted, beautiful young women [they are three sisters] who aren't afraid to take an aggressive, almost warrior-like stance when it comes to spreading the gospel and serving God."
Major General William E. Chambers, a self-described born again Christian, created the Commanding General's Spiritual Fitness Concert series at Fort Eustis when he was the commanding general there. MRFF reports that the Department of Defense has spent at least $300,000 on Christian musical acts for the series.
In letters to MRFF, punished soldiers described the extent to which superiors at Fort Eustis pressured them to attend the concert:
"[W]e were informed that instead of being dismissed for the day, the entire company (about 250 soldiers) would march as a whole to the event. Not only that, but to make sure that everyone is present we were prohibited from going back to the barracks (to eliminate the off chance that some might 'hide' in their rooms and not come back down) … A number of soldiers were disappointed and restless. Several of us were of different faith or belief .…
"We were marched back to the company area. To our dismay there was still no sign of us having a choice. We started marching to the theater. At that point two Muslim soldiers fell out of formation on their own….
"Those of us that chose not to attend (about 80, or a little less than half) were marched back to the company area. At that point the NCO issued us a punishment." Soldiers were locked in their barracks, and were denied use of phones, media, and books. Violators were threatened with further punishment.
National Guard Private Anthony Smith was one soldier at Fort Eustis reprimanded for refusing to attend the concert. "My whole issue was I don't need to be preached at," Smith told the AP. "That's not what I signed up for." Smith also contacted the MRFF about the incident.
Smith told Truthout.org that he and 20 other soldiers resolved to complain to the barracks' Equal Opportunity (EO) office, which is charged with ensuring fair treatment to personnel in terms of race, gender, religion, and other characteristics. EO officials discouraged him and his colleagues from filing a complaint, warning that such actions would create a "paper trail" and a "timeline." Gradually, all but Smith and one other soldier dropped their complaints.
Ten days after the concert and punishment, Smith wrote a letter expressing his deep concern to superior officers, but never delivered it. He later provided it to Truthout.org. The portion quoted below is notable for its defense of the constitutional principles reviled by Christian fundamentalist officers such as Gen. William Chambers:
"On May 13 the [non-commissioned officers] at Ft Eustis issued us a directive (equivalent to a law which we must obey) that we march towards a religious destination. In my mind that was an unlawful directive. Not only that but it was undermining the fundamental motive of me being in the United States altogether. I felt betrayed that in this instance the intent of the constitution seemed present only on paper but not in practice, that whoever is in charge might be turning to the oppressor the founding fathers were escaping from ... "
The reprisals against Smith and others, as well as the very existence of the Commanding General's Spiritual Fitness Concerts are the latest exposures of a broader process of Christian fundamentalist indoctrination of military personnel by the highest ranking officials, promoted and funded through the Pentagon itself. The evangelization of the military is deeply antidemocratic, producing a layer of officers and soldiers who can be trusted to carry out the brutalities of imperialism abroad and violate constitutional rights at home.
Concerning the Pentagon's investigation of the reprisals, one can be fairly sure a whitewash is forthcoming. This is precisely what happened in the Air Force's report on rampant Christian fundamentalist bigotry at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs in 2005.
The United States Air Force Academy (USAFA) and its highest teachers and administrators were implicated in condoning and promoting evangelical Christian views in separate reports by Yale Divinity School and Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Instances in the reports included an academy-wide email from the commanding officer in 2003 calling attention to the national day of prayer, the promotion of Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ in February 2004 and the football coach's hanging of a "Team Jesus" banner in the locker room.
The resulting investigation did not find a climate of "overt religious discrimination."
Nor did any section of the ruling elite, Republican or Democratic, seriously oppose these brazenly unconstitutional efforts to evangelize the officer corps and soldiery.
The revelations from Fort Eustis reveal that five years later, the push to convert the US military into an avowedly right-wing Christian force, has continued.
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