Saturday, 31 July 2010
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article thumbnail Here Comes Single Payer in Another State
David Swanson

A bill to create single-payer healthcare in California has passed that state's senate for the third time now. Californians just need to persuade a governor to sign it. Single-payer healthcare bills...

Civil Rights/Race

article thumbnail Some find irony in Shirley Sherrod's USDA incident
Krissah Thoompson | Washington Post

There is a glaring irony in the wake of Shirley Sherrod's firing and subsequent reinstatement offer, say those who know her in Georgia. She lost...

Labor

article thumbnail God Is Not on the Side of Union Busters
Tuesday, 06 July 2010 | Dick Meister | Truthout OpEd

God may or may not be on the side of unions, but a Catholic scholars group says that being on the other side, that is being against unions, is a "grave violation" of the church's social doctrine....

Environment

article thumbnail Water Test Sample Explodes
Monday, 19 July 2010 | Human Rights Examiner

One of the water test samples from multiple beaches in and around the Gulf region where children...

Accountability

 
 
Breitbart & Co. trash the truth

Errol Lewis | New York Daily News

article thumbnail
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Black Caucus Slams Vilsack 'Overreaction'

David Patten

article imageThe Congressional Black Caucus called Wednesday afternoon for the reinstatement of USDA official Shirley Sherrod, and charged that Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack had "overreacted." CBC chief...
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The Roots of White Anxiety

Ross Douthat | New York Times

article thumbnailIn March of 2000, Pat Buchanan came to speak at Harvard University’s Institute of Politics. Harvard being Harvard, the audience hissed and sneered and made wisecracks. Buchanan being Buchanan,...
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Float Like a Butterfly, Sting Like a Bee

Ricardo Levins Morales

article imageA political ecology of change Don’t fight the riptide. It’ll wear you down. A riptide occurs when water at high tide gets pooled behind reefs or sand bars so when the sea goes out again, the...
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Report Details How States Respond to Citizens United

PRNewswire.com

article thumbnailAKRON, Ohio, July 13 /PRNewswire/ -- State and Federal Communications, Inc. -- which provides government affairs compliance information and consulting -- is sharing a report on how states are...
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Some Hard Truths

Robert Parry | Consortium News

article imageA hard truth about the U.S. economy is that corporations don’t need as many of us as workers but still need us as consumers. That dilemma helps explain why unemployment is stuck near 10 percent and...
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In Alabama, Rep. Bobby Bright avoids perils of anti-government mood

Amy Gardner | Washington Post

article thumbnailMONTGOMERY, ALA. -- For a first-term Democrat in a solidly Republican district, Rep. Bobby N. Bright did something curious on a recent weekday morning while speaking at a Kiwanis Club breakfast: He...
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Iraq/Iran

Latest News Plus Date 1

The Peace Movement's Progress
05 July 2010 14:59
article thumbnailThe peace movement has made significant progress in the United States since its low point of late 2008, and just about everything anyone in it has done has been a contribution.  If everyone keeps...

Veterans

Latest News Plus Date 2

VA relaxes application process for benefits for post-traumatic stress disorder
13 July 2010 13:24
article thumbnailThe Department of Veterans Affairs is encouraging military veterans previously denied benefits for post-traumatic stress disorder to start reapplying Tuesday as the agency's tedious claims process...

Middle East

Latest News Plus Date 3

Breitbart & Co. trash the truth
22 July 2010 09:19
article thumbnailThe disgraceful smear and rush to judgment in the case of fired federal worker Shirley Sherrod (above) is the latest in a series of sleazy cut-and-paste video hit jobs orchestrated and magnified by...
More in: Latest

Regional

Latest News Plus Date 4

Breitbart & Co. trash the truth
22 July 2010 09:19
article thumbnailThe disgraceful smear and rush to judgment in the case of fired federal worker Shirley Sherrod (above) is the latest in a series of sleazy cut-and-paste video hit jobs orchestrated and magnified by...
More in: Latest
 
Progressive Strategy South
Rep. Lee on Passage of Fair Sentencing Act PDF Print E-mail
Written by Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA)   
Friday, 30 July 2010 07:25
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Washington D.C. – Today, Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-Oakland) released the following statement after the House on Wednesday passed S. 1789, the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010. The legislation changes a 1986 law under which a person convicted of crack cocaine possession received the same mandatory prison term as someone with 100 times the same amount of powder cocaine. The legislation reduces that ratio to about 18-1.

 The bill will now go to the President’s desk for his signature.

“Some 25 years ago, in the attempt to address the rampant use of crack cocaine and reduce violent crime in urban communities throughout the country, Congress enacted laws that subjected an untold number of African Americans to unreasonably long prison terms for crack cocaine possession convictions,” Congresswoman Lee said. “The unfortunate reality is that the same law provided far more lenient prison terms for people arrested for the possession of powder cocaine.

“With the passage of the Fair Sentencing Act, we have started to move toward creating a more reasonable and balanced system of sentencing that reduces the disparity between prison sentences for crack and powder cocaine.  While more changes are needed in our drug sentencing guidelines, I do believe the passage of the Fair Sentencing Act is an important first step in reducing sentencing disparities that adversely affected African Americans. I will continue to work on this important matter until we achieve full equity by having a 1-1 fair sentencing system.

 “We must eliminate any form of discrimination faced by defendants based on the type of cocaine they are charged with possessing. Moreover, I am committed to addressing the root causes of drug use.”

Last Updated on Friday, 30 July 2010 07:32
 
Some find irony in Shirley Sherrod's USDA incident PDF Print E-mail
Written by Krissah Thoompson | Washington Post   
Friday, 23 July 2010 08:05

There is a glaring irony in the wake of Shirley Sherrod's firing and subsequent reinstatement offer, say those who know her in Georgia.

She lost her job in a matter of hours under the suspicion of racism, but officials in the Department of Agriculture who were found to have withheld loans from Sherrod and her husband's farming cooperative were never fired.

"Discrimination happens in USDA. . . . And it's there because the agency never did deal with the people who caused it," Sherrod said Thursday morning on the "Today" show. "No one lost their job because they discriminated against black farmers, Hispanic farmers, Native American farmers, women farmers. . . . Those individuals . . . some have retired, but many of them are still there."

That is the irritation that remains as the White House and the USDA try to repair their mistreatment of Sherrod, who was fired based on a selectively excerpted video that made it appear as if she had denied help to a white farmer, said Jerry Pennick, director of the Federation of Southern Cooperatives Land Assistance Fund, where Sherrod worked before joining the USDA. The government's poor treatment of her has resonated loudly and badly among farmers who have faced discrimination.

Read more...
 
Rights leaders, clergy rally for diversity PDF Print E-mail
Written by ANNE BLYTHE AND YONAT SHIMRON | Wake County Observer   
Thursday, 22 July 2010 04:34

RALEIGH -- On a day that promised political drama about the dismantling of the Wake County schools diversity policy, about a thousand people took to the streets in the sweltering heat for a march and rally that culminated in arrests reminiscent of the civil rights era.

The opposition to the school board majority, which has scrapped the policy of busing for diversity in favor of neighborhood-based schools, attracted religious leaders, students, parents, labor organizers and others from the Triangle and beyond. They framed the issue as a step backward to a time when schools were segregated.

A few hours after the late-morning march and rally, the school board, which was not scheduled Tuesday to take up items directly related to the majority's neighborhood-schools strategy, was stymied by the crescendo of criticism and the disruption of chanting protesters.

By day's end, 19 people were arrested, all of them either outside or inside the administrative building on Wake Forest Road where the school board held its meeting. Among those charged were two rally organizers: the Rev. Nancy Petty of Pullen Memorial Baptist Church and state NAACP Chairman the Rev. William Barber, both accused of second-degree trespassing.

The march and rally on Fayetteville Street, downtown blocks rich with history just beyond the state Capitol, strongly echoed the 1960s-era clergy-led civil rights marches with placard-waving, hymn singing and arrests for civil disobedience.

Read more...
 
Organizing the Unemployed PDF Print E-mail
Written by Sue Sturgis | Institute for Southern Studies   
Monday, 19 July 2010 19:06

The federal jobs numbers released earlier this month showed that a whopping 14 million Americans are unemployed, with 6.8 million out of work now for more than 27 weeks.

The unemployment crisis has led to growing calls for the labor movement to take action to help the jobless -- by organizing them.

"We need the AFL-CIO, we need central labor councils that bring together different members to pool their resources and start organizing the unemployed," Bill Fletcher Jr. of the Center for Labor Renewal recently said in an interview with GRITtv.

The idea of organizing the jobless is not new: In 1894, populist politician Jacob Coxey of Ohio led unemployed workers in a protest march on Washington that came to be known as "Coxey's Army." The first significant protest march ever held in the nation's capital, it took place during the second year of a four-year economic depression that at the time was the worst the country had ever experienced. The marchers called on the government to create jobs through public works.

Later, during the Great Depression, militant left-wing labor organizations like the Workers Alliance, the Unemployed Workers' Councils and the Unemployed Citizens' League mobilized out-of-work Americans to pressure state and local governments for jobs and benefits. According to one historical account:
In cities like New York, Chicago, and Detroit, the Unemployed Councils made an immediate impact, staging large attention-getting demonstrations in the winter and spring of 1930 and in subsequent years building neighborhood based Councils that fought for public assistance and rallied neighbors to conduct rent strikes and resist evictions.
Last Updated on Monday, 19 July 2010 19:10
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Water Test Sample Explodes PDF Print E-mail
Written by Human Rights Examiner   
Monday, 19 July 2010 08:32

One of the water test samples from multiple beaches in and around the Gulf region where children were playing and swimming, when mixed with organic solvent used to separate the oil from the water, exploded.

The News 5 investigation team collected the samples, finding that the one from Dolphin Island Marina explosive according to Intel Hub's Alex Thomas.

"The obvious reason for such an explosion is methane gas.

 

Last Updated on Monday, 19 July 2010 08:38
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Latest News

Some find irony in Shirley Sherrod's USDA incident
23 July 2010 13:05
article thumbnailThere is a glaring irony in the wake of Shirley Sherrod's firing and subsequent reinstatement offer, say those who know her in Georgia. She lost her job in a matter of hours under the suspicion of...
More in: Latest

Progressive Strategy Alliance

New Black Panthers and the right's new Southern strategy
17 July 2010 09:43
article thumbnailThe latest fake controversy makes clear the ugliness of the right's Obama era political strategy The right, as you may have heard, is all worked up about the Justice Department dismissing voter...

State News

Citizens United Effects Kentucky
17 July 2010 15:03
article thumbnailCraig Dilger, chairperson of the Kentucky Registry of Election Finance (KREF), stated the Citizens United ruling directly conflicts with the state's constitution. Dilger also stated the state will...

Take Action

Contact House Committees Now
17 September 2009 05:00
article thumbnail     About half the Democratic Committee members (in red) belong to the Blue Dog and/or New Democrat Coalition. These Caucuses oppose a public plan or support a more limited public plan:...