Words for the healthcare debate

Not from partisans, spinsers, profit-protectors or folk looking to cash in. Just a flat-out expert:

tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/robert_reich/2009/06/why-the-critics-of-a-public-op.php?ref=fpd

and a real insider not pushing an agenda:
www.huffingtonpost.com/jamie-court/cigna-exec-whistleblower_b_220445.html

Algae and climate change

www.nytimes.com/2009/06/29/business/energy-environment/29biofuel.html?_r=2
Algae produces ethanol and oxygen. Oxygen is fed to a coal plant, which produces CO2. The CO2 is then fed back to the algae.

The coal is burned cleaner and ethanol is produced for fuel or to replace petrochemicals in plastics. What's the down side?

Even us Prius drivers wouldn't mind $1/gallon fuel.

---

Do you think global climate change is a good thing or a bad thing? If you said "bad thing", then, while you are correct, you would be a traitor according to the "fair and balanced" "reporting" at Fox "news".

crooksandliars.com/nicole-belle/fox-nation-calls-new-climate-bill-tre

And there are still Fox watchers that don't understand why people who
value real news look down at their source of infotainment.

Is Rafsanjani just another middle eastern name?

No.

If you want to understand what could happen in Iran, don't focus on the election of Ahmadinejad over Moussavi. First, Moussavi is not a reformer - he is not Khatami. Secondly, and more importantly, the President of Iran doesn't hold the power, the Supreme Leader does. You know, the position originally created by one Ayatollah Khomeini, he of the 1979 Islamic Revolution. That position is now held by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and that position is not permanent.

The real power struggle to watch is not between Ahmadinejad and Moussavi. It is between Khamenei and Rafsanjani

www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/06/28/iran.rafsanjani/index.html

(disclaimer: I'm no expert, just trying to be less than totally uninformed. Can't trust the spoonfeeding of mainstream US media for world affairs.)

Picture of the day from Iran

(from http://photos-e.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs119.snc1/4868_198552000530_851205530_7457372_8158796_n.jpg)

It's one thing to point out the atrocities of the Bush Administration while they were being committed. But I never thought I'd be taken away and tortured, or killed, for doing so. The protesters in Iran are facing those very real possibilities for their actions.

www.usatoday.com/news/world/2009-06-24-iranianwomen_N.htm

Non-partisan economic primer - how'd we get here

Yes, the current budget deficit is courtesy of George W. Bush, even though he inherited a massive budget surplus. Yes, President Obama's plans to fix the economy might be too ambitious to succeed. Why? Because, thanks to the last 8 years, we are now at the mercy of foreign investors.

www.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/business/economy/10leonhardt.html

The conservatives try to blame Obama for 100% of the budget deficit, saying his plans are failure because he could not fix 8 years of abuse in just 6 months. They say his lavish spending is the cause. The reality is that President Obama's initiatives are responsible for 3% of the deficit, and his continuation of the economic stimulus to end this recession accounts for 7%. The other 90% of the deficit was inherited from failed Republican economic policies under Bush.

Sorry Republican blamesters, that's the actual unspun truth.

Iranian elections

Imagine, massive political rallies, completely peaceful. A citizenry that wants to oust hard-line conservatives, religious extremism and political rhetoric in favor of peace with the US and prosperity for themselves. A desire for democracy where we're told, by our own mass media, that military options are the best options because of religion.

www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/06/10/iran.election.rallies/index.html
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/06/08/ballen.iran/index.html

The (still freshly ousted) neo-conservatives in the US must be beside themselves with anger. They had been beating the drums of war for so long that they must have felt that they could taste the profits that would come from destroying and "rebuilding" another oil-rich country. Now, however, their grand, long-range plans may come to ruin with open and honest dialog threatening to take over US/Iran relations, replacing saber rattling with peace.

Palin non sequitur

So, let me get this straight. Sarah Palin and the Republican Party trotted out Bristol, Sarah's unwed pregnant teenager, all over the 2008 campaign trail, using her as a political prop as a symbol of superior family values. All the old guard at the party that used to rail against teen pregnancies instantly switched their morals to show support.

Now David Letterman makes a joke about it, and Palin and the Republicans are all over him, calling him sick and perverted. They're twisting his joke (any joke can be interpreted as funny or not) to insist that he meant something completely different, and repeating their "alternative" interpretation of Letterman's joke to any talk show that will put her on.

How desperate is Palin for publicity that she has to make up this kind of garbage and slander someone because she didn't like a joke? How desperate is the Republican Party for any kind of leadership that they're looking to someone like Palin, and sad tactics like that?

The GOPpers are getting more pathetic every day.

MAJOR judicial ruling

The US Supreme Court has ruled that it is NOT OK to bribe elected judges with campaign contributions. While this should seem like an obvious decision, we here in Wisconsin just look back at two recent elections that were bought by corporate interests, putting horrible and corrupt candidates Ziegler and Gableman on our state's highest court.

www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/06/08/us/AP-US-Supreme-Court-Judicial-Ethics.html?_r=2&hp

Even more telling was the Supreme Court's dissenters. All 4 justices that are widely viewed as completely politically-driven appointments voted against. (there are legitimate arguments that Thomas' independent streak should keep him off the list, but on political issues most important to the GOP, he is usually in alignment)

Let me make it clear what that last paragraph means. Supreme Court Justices Roberts (Chief), Alito, Scalia and Thomas are on record saying that it is OK for an individual or corporation to donate massive amounts of money to get a judge elected, and for that judge to decide cases regarding that person or company. Bribery is OK with the hard-right Republican wing of the Supreme Court.

Do NOT improve healthcare, I'm warning you

How scared are the Republican Party's corporate financial backers that President Obama might actually IMPROVE the state of healthcare in the United States, perhaps even making it one of the best 10 countries instead of 37th?

They're actually making pre-emptive threats against such actions.

www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31170941

GOP Senator Orin Hatch: 'Democrats would live to regret it if they insist on a public plan'

Such is the concern that massive profits at the expense of ordinary citizens could be tempered in any way. The big profiteers in US healthcare want more profits, and the Republican party is dutifully repeating their talking points.

South Carolina - new common sense, same rhetoric

South Carolina's Republican Governor Mark Sanford used to proudly proclaim that he would turn down all federal economic stimulus money. While this would directly harm the citizens of South Carolina, that approach was in line with the Republican Party goals of causing failure whenever President Obama tried to lift the country out of the severe economic downturn that he inherited.

Well, the esteemed Governor has seen the light, and has quietly changed his mind. He will now allow South Carolina to receive the same federal economic stimulus that other states are receiving, benefiting the people of South Carolina. The one catch? In public, he will still insult the very stimulus that he's now receiving.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/8547940

What a piece of work the new GOP is...