The Lull Before the Storm

Joe Nocera explains it clearly

2009-03-05T21:08:00.000-08:00

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The 13th Amendment

2008-10-26T23:57:00.000-07:00

This 90 year old woman is great!

Ron Howard, Andy Griffith & Henry Winkler for Obama

2008-10-24T00:43:00.000-07:00

See more Ron Howard videos at Funny or Die

This is very cute -- the trio go back in time with current questions and endorse Barak Obama.

Conservatives discuss why they are voting for Barak Obama

2008-10-23T08:00:00.000-07:00

These conservatives have gone on camera to give us some insight into their decision.

McCain supporters slash tires and shout "terrorists" at early voters in NC

2008-10-21T09:02:00.000-07:00

That there be no doubt about certain elements of the Republican campaign.

"Early voters in North Carolina, most of whom were black, were heckled and mocked by McCain supporters as they their cast their ballots Sunday. According to Washington Times reporter Christina Bellatoni primarily white McCain supporters shouted "terrorist" and complained that "Sundays are for church not voting" more...

Protecting Palin from 'every form of witchcraft'

2008-10-11T09:16:00.000-07:00

See the full story in the Times.

McCain Pushed Iraq War Agenda Two Months after 9/11

2008-09-30T22:38:00.000-07:00

And here it is...

Bush Administration War Crimes Conference

2008-09-15T23:18:00.000-07:00

Above is video of testimony to the House Judiciary Committee on Bush Administration war crimes. This past Saturday morning in Andover, Massachusetts, about 120 activists, academics, constitutional scholars, public officials and legal experts gathered in the Wyndham hotel to start a landmark war crimes conference, the goal of which was to plan the prosecution of Bush Administration officials. Read more...

Barbara Walters Interviews John McCain

2008-09-14T11:34:00.000-07:00

More about this story here...

McCain: Pants on Fire

2008-09-13T05:16:00.000-07:00

Shameful.

Lose your house, lose your vote

2008-09-10T23:03:00.000-07:00

Michigan Republicans plan to foreclose African American voters

The chairman of the Republican Party in Macomb County Michigan, a key swing county in a key swing state, is planning to use a list of foreclosed homes to block people from voting in the upcoming election as part of the state GOP’s effort to challenge some voters on Election Day. Read more...

What has this country come to?

2008-09-04T22:23:00.000-07:00

Every American should take a look at this and think very hard about what kind of America we've become, and vote accordingly.

Using Gustov to improve standings?

2008-09-01T09:42:00.000-07:00

We know the real McCain. McCain alters convention plans because of Gustov, yet voted against relief for Katrina victims, and a commission to look into the abismal failures there. More on this story...

Greening the Iraq War

2008-08-09T22:20:00.000-07:00

Ignoring the obvious (stop the war), these talking heads discuss ways of 'greening' it. Courtesy of "The Onion".

Rep. Dennis Kucinich

2008-07-18T00:06:00.000-07:00

On creating peace among other things...

Organic Farming Saves the Air!

2008-05-17T13:05:00.000-07:00

There is a very informative article, one sample graphic above that documents amazing gains against global warming that can be made by organic farming methods. Read the full article.

Homeland Insecurity

2008-04-05T11:26:00.000-07:00

The Every Child Matters Education Fund has released a new report which shows that where a child lives in the US is important. Here's a summary table from the "Geography Matters" report.

Table 11. Overall Child Vulnerability

Click on the Arrow to See the State Profile

Top States		Bottom States
1	Vermont	50	Louisiana
2	Massachusetts	49	Mississippi
3	Connecticut	48	New Mexico
4	Rhode Island	47	Oklahoma
5	New Hampshire	46	Texas
6	Hawaii	45	South Carolina
7	Iowa	44	Arkansas
8	Minnesota	43	Nevada
9	Washington	42	South Dakota
10	Maine	41	Arizona
11	Wisconsin	40	Alabama
12	New York	39	Florida
13	New Jersey	38	Georgia
14	North Dakota	37	West Virginia
15	Pennsylvania	36	Tennessee
16	Michigan	35	Indiana
17	Illinois	34	North Carolina
18	California	33	Kentucky
19	Maryland	32	Wyoming
20	Kansas	31	Alaska
21	Utah	30	Delaware
22	Oregon	29	Montana
23	Nebraska	28	Missouri
24	Virginia	27	Colorado
25	Idaho	26	Ohio

Source - The Every Child Matters Education Fund. Click here for a detailed description of the methodology and calculations for this measure.

Click here to see the data and ranking for each measure.

The Case for Optimism

2008-03-28T00:40:00.000-07:00

Dr. Brilliant makes a moving case.

Doreen, The Downer

2008-02-26T22:47:00.001-08:00

This video would be more humorous if it weren't so true.

Earth to America

2008-02-20T12:34:00.000-08:00

Very creative, and packs a punch!

Take that Iraq war off my bill!

2008-02-12T19:25:00.000-08:00

How long should we pay?

When Handouts Keep Coming, the Food Line Never Ends

2007-11-21T07:46:00.000-08:00

"...And here we are, putting on the same play again this year. But come Friday, as most of us stuff more leftovers into our bulging refrigerators, 35 million Americans will take their place in line again at soup kitchens, food banks and food stamp offices nationwide. The good souls who staff America's tens of thousands of emergency food sites will renew their pleas to donors fatigued by their burst of holiday philanthropy. Food stamp workers will return to their desks and try to convince mothers that they can feed their families on the $3 per person per day that the government allots them. The cycle of need -- always present, rarely sated, never resolved -- will continue.

Unless we rethink our devotion to food donation." Read more...

Peace is Creeping up on us!

2007-11-10T00:22:00.000-08:00

There are those trends that creep slowly in the negative, and happily, there are also quite positive trends so slow that we miss them without a good call-out such as this one by Steven Pinker.

Olbermann: On Waterboarding and Torture

2007-11-07T00:23:00.000-08:00

Part I

Speaks for itself.

Part II

Interesting Clip from Fox News

2007-11-03T21:53:00.001-07:00

Surpised?

The world changed by increments

2007-10-22T22:50:00.000-07:00

"What no one seemed to notice was the ever widening gap between the government and the people. And it became always wider.....the whole process of its coming into being, was above all diverting, it provided an excuse not to think....for people who did not want to think anyway gave us some dreadful, fundamental things to think about.....and kept us so busy with continuous changes and 'crises' and so fascinated.....by the machinations of the 'national enemies,' without and within, that we had no time to think about these dreadful things that were growing, little by little, all around us.....

"Each step was so small, so inconsequential, so well explained or, on occasion, 'regretted,' that unless one understood what the whole thing was in principle, what all these 'little measures'.....must some day lead to, one no more saw it developing from day to day than a farmer in his field sees the corn growing.....Each act is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next and the next.

"You wait for one great shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join you in resisting somehow. You don't want to act, or even talk, alone.....you don't want to 'go out of your way to make trouble.' But the one great shocking occasion, when tens or hundreds or thousands will join with you, never comes.

"That's the difficulty. The forms are all there, all untouched, all reassuring, the houses, the shops, the jobs, the mealtimes, the visits, the concerts, the cinema, the holidays. But the spirit, which you never noticed because you made the lifelong mistake of identifying it with the forms, is changed. Now you live in a world of hate and fear, and the people who hate and fear do not even know it themselves, when everyone is transformed, no one is transformed.

"You have accepted things you would not have accepted five years ago, a year ago, things your father.....could never have imagined."

Milton Mayer, They Thought They Were Free, The Germans, 1938-45 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1955)

Specific Suggestion: General Strike

2007-09-24T08:27:00.000-07:00

Garrison Keizer writes an intriguing article in Harper's October 2007 issue . Some excerpts from "Specific Suggestion: General Strike".

"...what day more fitting for a strike than the first Tuesday of November, the Feast of the Hanging Chads? What other day on the national calendar cries so loudly for rededication?"

"...the passengers who rushed the hijackers on Flight 93 were not repeating the mantra “It won’t do any good” while scratching their heads and their asses in a happy-hour funk."

"People who could not, for whatever reason, cease work could at least curtail consumption. In fact, that might prove the more effective action of the two. They could vacate the shopping malls. They could cancel their flights. With the aid of their Higher Power, they could turn off their cell phones. They could unplug their TVs."

Sounds like a kind of national Sabbath to me. The article is thought-provoking and worth a read. And who knows what could happen if people actually took it up in great numbers?

And thanks to Cranky who pointed out this article in his post - Worriers of the World, Unite.

Ever wanted to change the world?

2007-09-16T13:42:00.000-07:00

If you have a video camera, and ever wanted to inspire change, here's your chance!

Divorce foretells child's future care for elderly parent

2007-09-15T14:17:00.000-07:00

A press release tells of a study that shows children of divorced parents are less likely to be involved in the day-to-day assistance for their aging or elderly parents. This is certainly a creeping change, and with the boomer generation aging, it could have significant social impacts. The full article is quite interesting. The map above shows that the middle of the country actually has the highest concentration of seniors - our traditional bread basket.

Hans Rosling: New Insights on Poverty...

2007-09-09T12:56:00.000-07:00

Here is a very interesting video which certainly illustrates slow moving, yet quite important developments.

From Waste to Watts (KQED)

2007-07-15T10:50:00.000-07:00

Waste to fuel -- interesting video.

Sicko - Gitmo detainees get better care than 911 heros

2007-06-10T16:57:00.000-07:00

This one needs to be seen to be believed. Sicko opens on June 29th!

PVC - Sneaks its way into your home

2007-06-06T00:08:00.001-07:00

I had no idea! Informative clip with an easy way to spot PVC! Another thing that can creep up unnoticed!

"Safe" Houses

2007-03-24T08:33:00.000-07:00

Now if this isn't a creeping(y) motivation. Keep those homes free of clutter! Why? See: "The House in the Middle 1954". Check out the sponsor!

Nuclear Creeps

2006-10-12T22:24:00.000-07:00

Last night I was again at the edge of my seat when hearing about the nuclear picture the world is painting itself into. Dr. Caldicott was interviewed by Michael Krasney, and is a world-class edge-of-the-seat speaker. (You can catch the interview on KRCB on November 2nd in the bay area - channel 22). Hearing the compliation of details of the precarious nuclear situation the worlds keeps inching towards is enough to glue one in the chair in fright. For a taste of her speaking, listen to part of her speech at St. Andrews Wesley Church in Vancouver. Jo-Ann and I went away feeling like we should pick up a geiger counter on our way home to measure our food. No kidding. The terrorists don't need to steal a bomb, we have potential 'bombs' all over the country.

Nuclear power the answer to global warming? -- well read this except which was part of a televised debate with Dr. Caldicott, Ian Lowe and Brendon Gleeson.

Dr. Caldicott:

"It's a propitious day to have this panel, because on the front of the Good Weekend magazine today there's an article with Tim Flannery talking about nuclear power could possibly be the answer to global warming. So that goes really well with my book, which is Nuclear power is not the answer to global warming," she chuckles. "The first chapter deals with the fact that nuclear power produces large quantities of carbon dioxide in its own right. There's a study by Storm Van Leeuwen and Phillip Smith from Holland, estimating the amount of fossil fuel which is needed to mine the uranium, to mill it and crush it, to enrich it, build a massive reactor, to then decommission it after 30 or 40 years - which requires more energy input than building the reactor - and then storing and transporting the radioactive waste for half a million years.

"At the moment, a nuclear power plant produces 30 per cent of the amount of CO2 [carbon dioxide] as a fossil fuel plant, or gas fired plant. But shortly, as the uranium concentration declines, the amount of CO2 produced by a nuclear reactor will equal the amount of CO2 produced by a gas-fired plant - number one.

"Number two; uranium is very finite. If all electricity today was generated by nuclear power, there's only nine years' supply of uranium. Number three; we're at peak oil, and peak gas. How will we keep the radioactive waste cool for thousands of years without any oil or natural gas? That argument has not yet entered the lexicon of the discussion, and that's an extremely important discussion.

Obviously the issue of how we generate energy is creeping and a lot is slid under the rug. NPRI, founded by Dr. Caldicott is a good place to learn more in depth on the nuclear issue. Following the fortunes of solar, wind and other alternative fuels and encouraging our leaders to provide serious support/funding for research and implementation seems much more important than chasing boogeymen terrorists.

Creeping Bankruptcy or Poor = Rich?

2006-09-24T09:24:00.000-07:00

This is quite Orwellian with a twist. I remember War = Peace, Strength = Ignorance and Slavery = Freedom, but Poor = Rich? "What's the real federal deficit?" $318 billion deficit in 2005, or $3.5 Trillion? The difference is between unaudited vs audited books. Last weekend the Hungarians took to the streets over government lies about their deficit - "Truth telling here, there". Brian Riedl, a federal budget analyst with the Heritage Foundation, a conservative Washington think tank, says that federal spending from 2001 to 2006 has risen at the highest rate, as a percentage of gross domestic product, since the Great Depression and World War II.

“Spending has increased more under President Bush than any president since FDR,” Riedl said.

What Laurence J. Kotlikoff of Boston University contends really matters though, is tracking generational accounting as reported in "When Words Get in the Way: The Failure of Fiscal Language". Jerry Green of Harvard University points out that while the level of "taxes" that the government reports is arbitrary, the net economic benefit to each generation is well-defined.

"In Fuzzy Math: Fantasy vs. Reality in the Federal Budget", it is noted that the harsh truth of accrual-based accounting underscores just how reckless the administration is. Lyndon Johnson's guns-and-butter policy during the Vietnam war looks almost prudent juxtaposed against Bush's policy of fighting a major war while cutting taxes necessary to pay for it.

Tell me now, what do you think the real price of gas is?

Bird Flu

2006-09-22T22:18:00.000-07:00

Here's an example of a problem that started small -- H5N1 has been around since at least 1959, appearing in Scotland at that time. But the jump off to our current worries began in 2003 when it began infecting poultry in China and spreading to other East Asian countries,then making the jump to humans in isolated cases. According to an article in Le Monde (October 14, 2005):

"At that stage, the H5N1 equation was rather easy to resolve. A vaccination to immunize poultry exists. Rich countries should have reacted immediately by freeing up the financial resources to arrest this bird plague where it came from. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimated that investments over the next three years for that purpose would come to 100 million dollars. But up to now, only 20 million dollars have been promised, while, according to the British daily "Financial Times," the United States alone is getting ready to place an order for antiviral medicine of over a billion dollars."

Moving forward to 2006, in today's news "WHO Ranks Bird Flu as Top Health Threat". A few days ago the World Bank estimated that "Bird Flu Pandemic to Cost Two Trillion Dollars". Meanwhile, in February, it was estimated that "Iraq War Is Costing $100,000 per Minute". Keeping the peace in Afghanistan seems a veritable bargain at $18,000 per minute (cited in same article). This is like one of those 'connect-the-dot' puzzles we were fond of as kids, but with real consequences as to the world we're creating for the little ones coming up.

Talking Politics in Tiburon

2006-09-22T15:45:00.000-07:00

Since I've been spending so much time indoors during this beautiful weather in Marin, I thought I would start out the day right by enjoying breakfast at the New Morning Cafe in Tiburon. (See my food & life blog for food details). Eating alone with the latest issue of the San Francisco Business Times, I couldn't help overhearing an increasingly escalating political discussion from the back corner. Appears there was a lone Republican in town, visiting from Florida, and the local Democrats were having fun with him. After the party broke up, all but the gentleman visiting from Florida left, and he breathed more freely and made some remark about all the Democrats in the restaurant having left. I had to pipe up, "not quite"... and engage in a little discussion with him finding out that we graduated from high schools in the same area of Washington State. I brought up that it seemed funny that within a couple days of my opening this blog, political discussion was around me in the unlikeliest places! And that we probably shared a lot of values, just may disagree on the methodology of solving issues. We actually probably passed each other on the streets of Bothell as I visited my parents there often in the 90's, and that's where he was living at the time.

Iraq: Creeping Occupation

2006-09-21T23:31:00.000-07:00

Well, I wasn't going to lead out on this one, but my Congresswoman, Lynn Woolsey sent an e-mail with her lastest efforts to clarify the Iraq situation, or should I say creeping occupation? I'm glad that she's taking a hard look rather than passing a blank check because of buzzwords that incite fear.

Congressional Forum to Examine Human, Financial & Global Standing Costs of the Continued Occupation of Iraq

WASHINGTON, D.C. - On Tuesday, September 26th, from 2:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m., U.S. Representative Lynn Woolsey (D-CA) will host a Congressional Forum examining the financial, military, and opportunity costs of the occupation of Iraq. Woolsey will be joined by colleagues in the House, as well as two sets of panelists who will address the different aspects of the costs associated with the continued occupation.

Panel One: Analysis of current conditions and realities on the ground in Iraq

-- Dr. Pillar (a 30 year veteran of the CIA, and currently a professor of Security Studies at Georgetown University) will address the escalating civil war and other realities on the ground in Iraq.

-- Gen. Odom (Currently a Senior Fellow with Hudson Institute who served under President Reagan as the Director of the National Security Agency) will address the importance of changing America's strategic posture in the region, beginning with the urgent need to remove U.S. troops from Iraq

Panel Two: Analysis and first-hand accounts of costs of Iraq occupation

-- Ms. Chloe O'Gara, (Director of Global Education Program, Save The Children) will discuss how the occupation has affected Iraqi children and families.

-- Ms. Anita Dancs, (Research Director, National Priorities Project) will highlight some of the urgent national priorities that have not been addressed, even while more than $300 billion has been spent in occupying Iraq.

-- Mr. Peter Laufer (author of Mission Rejected: U.S. Soldiers Who Say No to Iraq) will discuss the morale of troops serving in Iraq.

-- Tentative: Adrian Atizado (Assistant National Legislative Director, Disabled American Veterans) will address the under-funded, and unmet needs of America's veterans.

What:

Congressional forum on the cost of the war in Iraq.

When:

2:00 p.m. on Tuesday, September 26, 2006

Where:

US Capitol
Room HC-6
Washington, DC

Launching

2006-09-20T10:37:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking for some time about issues that are seemingly 'hidden' and then pop up as a crisis. Most of these do not come out of nowhere. They've been lurking around in one guise or another waiting and growing until the 'crisis' arrives. Some of these might even be termed 'unsolvable' problems... like poverty. Some can be solved with resolute attention, such as hunger. Many of the worlds ills might be solved, or at least alleviated with persistent attention. When to do that ... during the lull. When the storm hits, it's grown into a Godzilla-like creature which can cause a sense of hopelessness or giving up at the thought of the resources needed to actually mitigate or bring it under control. Issues of public health such as AIDS, bird flu and flavor-of-the-day exotic diseases fall into this category, often wreaking havoc beyond the immediate illness into the economy and ability of a society to maintain conditions that assure its continued development. Most of these the big-name ills could have been brought under control with a little planning before they blossomed into resource-sucking monsters. I hope to highlight some issues in this blog that are creeping, either small or already blossomed into those monsters. And hopefully highlight some resources and actions that will take us down the path of persistent progression towards a better globe. Stay tuned.