The Sunday I Met B.Z. over Joe's Garlic Bread

Crap-O-Union-Labor!!

A Lesson Too Long Unlearned

Sunday 27 December 2009
by: Dick Meister, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed

Union workers protesting. (Image: Jared Rodriguez / t r u t h o u t; Adapted: Grant Neufeld)

Despite the importance of unions in our lives, our schools pay only slight attention to that importance - or even to their existence.

Little is done in the classroom to overcome the negative view of organized labor held by many Americans; little is done to explain the true nature of organized labor. (Read More)


Crap-A-Regime-O-Quran !!

Anti-Government Protests Turn Deadly in Tehran
Sunday 27 December 2009
by: Thomas Erdbrink | The Washington Post

Photo from The Washington Post Photo Gallery

Tehran - Security forces opened fire at crowds demonstrating against the government in the capital on Sunday, killing at least five people, including the nephew of opposition political leader Mir Hossein Mousavi, witnesses and Web sites linked to the opposition said. (Read More)

It Rains the Sun down the Sunset Boulevard

Crap-A-Crack-O-Health-Insurance-Industry!!!

Compulsory Private Health Insurance: Just Another Bailout for the Financial Sector?
by: Ellen Hodgson Brown J.D., t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed

(Image: Jared Rodriguez / t r u t h o u t; Adapted: ChiBart, Tomas Fano)

Dr. Benjamin Rush, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, is quoted as warning two centuries ago:

"Unless we put medical freedom into the Constitution, the time will come when medicine will organize into an underground dictatorship. . . . The Constitution of this republic should make special privilege for medical freedom as well as religious freedom."
(Read More)

What Congress' Health Care Overhaul Likely Means for You
Friday 25 December 2009
by: Jordan Rau | Kaiser Health News | News Analysis

(Photo: joostvanderpost / Flickr)

Washington - Now that the Senate has passed a hotly debated health care bill, Congress is headed to the next step: House of Representatives-Senate negotiations in January to hammer out a final version. Given the Senate's difficulty in passing a bill, the final legislation is likely to tilt strongly toward that chamber's version. Here's where things stand and how you might be affected.

Q: What are the biggest disputes?
(Read More)

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Cold&Dry - Who Stopped the Rain?

Crap-O-Climate-A-Nuclear!!

(Photo: Whiskeygonebad)

Helen Caldicott Slams Environmental Groups on Climate Bill, Nuclear Concessions
by: Art Levine, t r u t h o u t | Report

Dr. Helen Caldicott, the pioneering Australian antinuclear activist and pediatrician who spearheaded the global nuclear freeze movement of the 1980s and co-founded Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR), has joined with left-leaning environmental groups here in an uphill fight to halt nuclear power as a "solution" to the global warming crisis. "Global warming is the greatest gift the nuclear industry has ever received," Dr. Caldicott told Truthout. (Read More)

Dr. Helen Caldicott Speaks Out:



Crap-O-Native-Roots!!

PEOPLE: Mary G. Ross blazed a trail in the sky as a woman engineer in the space race
Posted on December 22nd, 2009 by americanindiannews in December 2009

Photo by Mary McCarthy Mary G. Ross, at 96, joins the 2004 opening procession for the Smithsonian's new National Museum of the American Indian on the National Mall in Washington, D.C

When she was 96 years old, Mary Golda Ross asked her niece to make her something very special: the first traditional Cherokee dress that Ross, the great-great-granddaughter of renowned Chief John Ross, would ever own.

Because Ross, after a lifetime of high-flying achievement as one of the nation’s most prominent women scientists of the space age, wanted to wear her ancestral dress to the 2004 opening of the Smithsonian’s new National Museum of the American Indian. (Read More)
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Sunday Mist in SF

Crap-O-Day!

More Taxes = More Democracy

Tuesday 08 December 2009
by: Christian Chavagneux | Alternatives Économiques (French)

Researchers Andre Barilari and Thomas Brand have demonstrated that the tax man is a symbol of democracy. (Image: Howdy, I'm H. Michael Karshis)

For conservatives who go around repeating that more taxes are always equivalent to less individual freedom, two researchers recall Montesquieu's opposite teaching. And demonstrate, with the support of the numbers, that the French philosopher's observation still holds true two and a half centuries later.

In Book XIII of his work, "The Spirit of the Laws" (1748), Montesquieu enounces the following principle: "General Rule: one may raise higher taxes in proportion to subjects' freedom; and one is forced to moderate them to the extent that servitude increases." In other words, only democracies may allow themselves to raise significant taxes and high levels of taxation are a sign of democracy. (Full Story) (French Version)

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DEcember: Holiday's Note 2

Crap-Oakhemp-Land!!


One Small Soldier in a Big War
Wednesday 16 December 2009
by: Rick Cabral, t r u t h o u t | Report

Richard Lee rolls down the street in his wheelchair, popping in on any number of his businesses located in the "Oaksterdam district" of downtown Oakland, California. Once known for the wild finishes of its roughhouse Raiders, the city has quietly evolved into the Amsterdam of America. And Mr. Lee is spearheading the charge. (Full Story)

Tale-From-The-Crypt !!



Iran's Jails: An Inside View
Wednesday 16 December 2009
by: Iason Athanasiadis | GlobalPost

Istanbul, Turkey - Iran’s jails have a notorious reputation for brutal conditions and harsh interrogation methods that include torture.

Now Iranian and international human rights organizations warn that a string of hidden detention sites have been established throughout Tehran and its suburbs by the government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The disturbing reports come from many of the thousands of Iran’s opposition supporters who have been arrested in the anti-government demonstrations since the disputed June 12 elections. Several of those released describe being kept in unimaginable conditions inside industrial containers, storerooms and a former Revolutionary Guard arms factory hastily converted into a prison. (Full Story)

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December: Holiday's Note 1

Joe Lieberman and the Health Care Train Wreck
Tuesday 15 December 2009
William Rivers Pitt, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed

When last we heard from Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, he was throwing sand into the gears of the Democratic push for health care reform by declaring he would filibuster any legislation containing the so-called public option. "I feel so strongly about the creation of another government health insurance entitlement," said the senator back in November. "The government going into the health insurance business - I think it's such a mistake that I would use the power I have as a single senator to stop a final vote." (Full Story)

Lieberman Was for a Medicare Buy-In Before He Was Against it
Tuesday 15 December 2009
Jason Leopold, t r u t h o u t | Report

But as Brian Beutler of Talking Points Memo noted Monday, Lieberman has long "supported the idea of a Medicare buy-in as a promising vehicle for reform, including... as recently as three months ago." (Full Story)

Rare Author's Comment: My only comment is that Joe Six-Pack Lieberman doesn't deserve all these lime-light and my precious blog space. Period. The only reason I gave him the break is because we want American people to know what a traitor looks like.