City powers down in energy crisis

I wish it were not a crisis that prompted their conservation, but the results are nonetheless positive. Perhaps these high fuel prices will produce a similar reduction in consumption with a commensurate movement towards greater efficiency all across our nation?! The last three paragraphs provide the greatest hope.



JUNEAU, Alaska - First, there was a run on energy-efficient light bulbs. When those ran out, people began asking for lamp oil. But when they started demanding clothespins in this land of mist and rain, it was clear Alaska's capital city was caught in a serious energy crunch.

"We sold all our clothespins the first day," said Doug White, general manager at Don Abel Building Supplies. "I don't think kids even knew what they were for, but they're learning now."

Avalanches earlier this month knocked down transmission lines and cut off Juneau's source of low-cost hydroelectric power. Threatened with a five-fold increase in utility bills, Juneau quickly powered down.

Stores, though open, went partially dark. Neon signs were switched off and vending machines unplugged. At home, residents of this former Gold Rush town began living a little bit like pioneers, dusting the snow off the grill, stringing clotheslines in the backyard and flicking off their TV sets. Within a week, electrical usage across town was down as much as 30 percent.

Conservation can be a tough sell

Energy conservation is a hard sell in much of the U.S., but Juneau has proved that people will change their ways if the financial incentives are big enough.

"Turn off, turn down, unplug," said Sarah Lewis, chairwoman of the Juneau Commission on Sustainability. "That's what everyone is doing and being vigilant about and commenting when others are not."

The April 16 snow slides that roared out of the mountains some 25 miles southeast of town uprooted transmission towers and plowed through 1.5 miles of high-voltage lines that link this largely isolated community of 30,000 to the Snettisham hydroelectric dam. (The Legislature had already ended its session, and most lawmakers had gone home.)

As back-up diesel generators shouldered the load, the electric company began warning customers that life in Juneau — already expensive — was about to get a lot more so.

With oil prices reaching a record $120 a barrel, Alaska Electric Light and Power said customers might have to pay for an extra $25 million in diesel over the three months it would take to repair the lines. The utility warned that rates would probably leap from an average of 11 cents per kilowatt-hour to more than 50 cents, or about five times the national average of 10.3 cents.

Conversations all over town turned from the governor's new baby and the legislative session to kilowatt hours, tariff rates and saving energy.

Heidi Graves said her 16-year-old son, Levi — the one who never would turn off his Nintendo — was the first to get on board. He was worried that the family of six would have to cancel its vacation next August.

Levi multiplied the electric bill by five and came up with $950. "It's more than our house payment," said his mother.

Eating dinner by candlelight

Now members of the Graves family eat dinner by candlelight, do dishes by hand, plan to dry their clothes on a rack by the wood stove, and limit their time on the computer.

"My husband has bruised himself and tripped over the dog just to keep the lights off," Graves said.

Graves also ordered a history of past electrical use so that the family could ferret out which appliances were the real power hogs, and they learned how to read their own electric meter, which they are now doing several times a day.

Though the Graves heat solely with wood, perhaps one in five houses in Juneau is wired for electric heat because hydroelectric power is relatively cheap and natural gas is unavailable.

In part because Juneau is so far removed from the Lower 48 and is inaccessible by road, its cost of living is 34.5 percent higher than that of the average U.S. city, and its housing costs are 50 percent higher, according to a survey of 300 American cities. Even an oil change is $60, twice what it costs in many places down south.

Residents will see the sobering new rates on paper — and the early results of their conservation efforts — when the first electric bills begin arriving in mailboxes Friday.

Energy expert Allen Meier of California's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory is visiting Juneau this week to offer advice on the crisis. He said the closest comparison may be Brazil in 2001, when severe drought gripped the hydropower-dependent country. Brazilians were told to reduce their electricity usage by 20 percent or be disconnected.

"In two months, the whole country cut their demand by 20 percent and they never really returned to the same level of consumption after that," Meier said.

Eighth-grader Matthew Staley is hoping the people of Juneau will likewise develop new habits over the course of three months, and "realize that — wow — we have to keep this up. Like switching to fluorescent lights, they'll just keep on with them."

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24373676/

© 2008 MSNBC.com

White House slows EPA tests, inquiry finds

Now ask yourself...do the following words describe the actions of the Bush administration:

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

Do they? Is this government of the people, by the people, and for the people? Is it?



WASHINGTON - The Bush administration is undermining the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to determine health dangers of toxic chemicals by letting nonscientists have a bigger — often secret — say, congressional investigators say in a report obtained by The Associated Press.

The administration’s decision to give the Defense Department and other agencies an early role in the process adds to years of delay in acting on harmful chemicals and jeopardizes the program’s credibility, the Government Accountability Office concluded.

At issue is the EPA’s screening of chemicals used in everything from household products to rocket fuel to determine if they pose serious risk of cancer or other illnesses.

A new review process begun by the White House in 2004 is adding more speed bumps for EPA scientists, the GAO said in its report, which will be the subject of a Senate Environment Committee hearing Tuesday. A formal policy effectively doubling the number of steps was adopted two weeks ago.

Cancer risk assessments for nearly a dozen major chemicals are now years overdue, the GAO said, blaming the new multiagency reviews for some of the delay. The EPA, for example, had promised to prepare assessments on 10 major toxic chemicals for external peer review by the end of 2007, but only two reached that stage.

GAO investigators said extensive involvement by EPA managers, White House budget officials and other agencies has eroded the independence of EPA scientists charged with determining the health risks posed by chemicals.

The Pentagon, the Energy Department, NASA and other agencies — all of which could be severely affected by EPA risk findings — are being allowed to participate “at almost every step in the assessment process,” said the GAO.

Those agencies, their private contractors and manufacturers of the chemicals face restrictions and major cleanup requirements, depending on the EPA’s scientific determinations.

“By law the EPA must protect our families from dangerous chemicals,” said Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., the Senate committee’s chairman. “Instead, they’re protecting the chemical companies.”

The EPA’s risk assessment process “never was perfect,” Boxer said in an interview Monday. “But at least it put the scientists up front. Now the scientists are being shunted aside.”

'Black box of secrecy' criticized

The GAO said many of the deliberations over risks posed by specific chemicals “occur in what amounts to a black box” of secrecy because the White House claims they are private executive branch deliberations.

Such secrecy “reduces the credibility of the ... assessments and hinders the EPA’s ability to manage them,” the GAO report said.

The White House said the GAO is wrong in suggesting that the EPA has lost control in assessing the health risks posed by toxic chemicals.

“Only EPA has the authority to finalize an EPA assessment,” Kevin F. Neyland, deputy administrator of the White House budget office’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, wrote in response to the GAO. He called the interagency process “a dialogue that helps to ensure the quality” of the reviews.

One EPA scientist with extensive knowledge of the changes in the agency’s risk assessment policies ridiculed the claim that the EPA still has the final say.

“Unless there is concurrence by other agencies, ... things don’t go forward. It means we stop what we are doing,” said the scientist, speaking on condition of anonymity because of fear of endangering his career.

“The (EPA) scientists feel as if they have lost complete control of the process, that it’s been taken over by the White House and that they’re calling the shots,” the scientist said.

The GAO investigation focused on the EPA’s computerized database, known as IRIS — the Integrated Risk Information System. It contains data on the human health effects of exposure to some 540 toxic chemicals in the environment. New chemicals are being proposed constantly for inclusion under a complicated assessment process that can take five years or more.

After years of stops and starts, the GAO said, the EPA has yet to determine carcinogen risks for a number of major chemicals such as:

• Naphthalene, a chemical used in rocket fuel and manufacturing a wide range of commercial products, including mothballs, dyes and insecticides. It is a major source of contamination at many military bases. The EPA wants to determine if it should be reclassified from a “possible” to “likely” human carcinogen. A long-standing dispute with the Pentagon over the chemical prompted the White House in 2004 to initiate a new EPA policy requiring more interagency involvement in assessing the health risks of a chemical. “Six years after the naphthalene assessment began, it is now back at the drafting stage,” said the GAO.

• Trichloroethylene, or TCE, a widely used industrial degreasing agent and a common contaminant in air, soil and both surface and ground water. The EPA in 2001 issued a draft assessment that TCE is “highly likely to produce cancer in humans.” Interagency reviews have concluded more outside studies are needed. “Ten years after EPA started ... the TCE assessment is back at the draft development stage,” the GAO said.

• Perchloroethylene, or “perc,” a chemical widely used in dry cleaning fabrics, degreasing metal and making chemical products. The EPA began its risk review of perc a decade ago and an interagency review was completed two years ago. Since then the assessment has been in limbo because of a dispute among senior EPA officials over what the cancer risk assessment should be. The dispute has prevented the proposed assessment from being forwarded to the National Academy of Science for peer review.

• Formaldehyde, a colorless, flammable gas used to make plywood and other building materials, which the EPA has been reviewing since 1997 to determine if should be upgraded from a “probable” to a “known” carcinogen. The EPA does not expect to complete that review for another two years.

• Royal Demolition Explosive, or RDX, a chemical explosive used in munitions and classified as a possible human carcinogen. The chemical is known to leach from soil to groundwater. The EPA began a risk assessment of the chemical in 2000 but has made minimal progress, the GAO said.

Environmentalists say these chemicals have been widely found at military bases and Superfund sites and in soil, lakes, streams and groundwater.

The findings, after an 18-month investigation by the congressional watchdog agency, come at a time of growing criticism from members of Congress and health and environmental advocates over alleged political interference in the government’s science activities.

Last week, a confidential survey by an advocacy group of EPA scientists showed more than half of the 1,600 respondents worried about political pressure in their work.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24358037/

Earth's Climate Relief Regulator Is Being Overwhelmed

This is a very intriguing article on climate change. The findings could actually bring opposing sides together. The earth has a regulation system built into itself. My analogy may not be a good one, but it seems to work similarly to the voltage regulator on my antique car. It can handle the loads that it was created for long ago, but it surely cannot handle the loads that would be placed on it today. Over the past 200 years humans have simply overloaded the atmosphere with too much carbon. I wonder if we should not only be focused on reduction of carbon emissions, but also finding ways to remove existing atmospheric carbon in a way complementary to the Earth's own system?



WASHINGTON - Before humans began burning fossil fuels, there was an eons-long balance between carbon dioxide emissions and Earth's ability to absorb them, but now the planet can't keep up, scientists said on Sunday.

The finding, reported in the journal Nature Geoscience, relies on ice cores taken from Antarctica's Lake Vostok that contain air samples going back 610,000 years.

Climate scientists for the last 25 years or so have suggested that some kind of natural feedback mechanism regulates our planet's temperature and the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Those skeptical about human influence on global warming point to this, not fossil fuel emissions, as the cause for recent climate change.

"We have provided the first observational evidence for the operation and efficacy of this feedback, which reveals its essential role for stabilizing the Earth’s long-term climate," the study authors wrote.

This feedback mechanism has been thrown out of whack by a steep rise in carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of coal and petroleum for the last 200 years or so, said Richard Zeebe, a co-author of the report.

'Entirely out of equilibrium'

"These feedbacks operate so slowly that they will not help us in terms of climate change ... that we're going to see in the next several hundred years," Zeebe said by telephone from the University of Hawaii. "Right now we have put the system entirely out of equilibrium."

In the ancient past, excess carbon dioxide came mostly from volcanoes, which spewed very little of the chemical compared to what humans activities do now, but it still had to be addressed.

This ancient excess carbon dioxide — a powerful greenhouse gas — was removed from the atmosphere through the weathering of mountains, which take in the chemical. In the end, it was washed downhill into oceans and buried in deep sea sediments, Zeebe said.

Zeebe analyzed carbon dioxide that had been captured in Antarctic ice, and by figuring out how much carbon dioxide was in the atmosphere at various points in time, he and his co-author Ken Caldeira, of the Carnegie Department of Global Ecology at Stanford University, determined that it waxed and waned along with the world's temperature.

"When the carbon dioxide was low, the temperature was low, and we had an ice age," he said. And while Earth's temperature fell during ice ages and rose during so-called interglacial periods between them, the planet's mean temperature has been going slowly down for about 600,000 years.

Lots more molecules in air

The average change in the amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide over the last 600,000 years has been just 22 parts per million by volume, Zeebe said, which means that 22 molecules of carbon dioxide were added to, or removed from, every million molecules of air.

Since the Industrial Revolution began in the 18th century, ushering in the widespread human use of fossil fuels, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen by 100 parts per million.

That means human activities are putting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere about 14,000 times as fast as natural processes do, Zeebe said.

And it appears to be speeding up: the U.S. government reported last week that in 2007 alone, atmospheric carbon dioxide increased by 2.4 parts per million.

The natural mechanism will eventually absorb the excess carbon dioxide, Zeebe said, but not for hundreds of thousands of years.

"This is a time period that we can hardly imagine," he said. "They are way too slow to help us to restore the balance that we have now basically distorted in a very short period of time."

updated 5:25 p.m. CT, Sun., April. 27, 2008

Copyright 2008 Reuters.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24339280/

© 2008 MSNBC.com

Oops, That Is Not Funny!

Bill Moyers interviews the Reverend Jeremiah Wright in his first broadcast interview with a journalist since he became embroiled in a controversy for his remarks and his relationship with Barack Obama. Wright, who retired in early 2008 as pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, where Senator Obama is a member, has been at the center of controversy for comments he made during sermons, which surfaced in the press in March.

More than 3,000 news stories have been penned since early April about Jeremiah Wright and Barack Obama. But behind the five second loop is a man who has preached three different sermons nearly every Sunday since 1972. In his interview on BILL MOYERS JOURNAL, Reverend Wright discusses what drew him to the pulpit and the recent controversy surrounding him.

About Reverend Jeremiah Wright

Jeremiah Wright was raised in Philadelphia's Germantown neighborhood, his father was a prominent Baptist minister and his mother a respected educator. In the early 1960s, Wright left college at Virginia Union University and signed up for the United States Marine Corps. After his required duty ended, Wright transferred to the Navy and served three more years as a medical technician.

After leaving the Navy, Wright transferred to Howard University in Washington, D.C. to complete his undergraduate degree. He went on to take degrees from Chicago Divinity School and United Theological Seminary. After spending some time teaching religious history, Jeremiah Wright elected to instead pursue "public ministry". Public ministry, as his friend and mentor Martin E. Marty explains, means focusing on: "conventional pastoral roles and carrying the message and work of the church to the public arena."

About Trinity Church

Jeremiah Wright became the pastor of Trinity Church in 1972. At the time, it was a struggling congregation with only 87 members. In his interview on BILL MOYERS JOURNAL, Wright explains that his predecessor, Reverend Dr. Reuben Sheares, coined the phra se "Unashamedly black and unapologetically Christian" to answer a two-fold problem that he felt black Christians faced as African-Americans and Christians: "Blacks coming out of the '60s were no longer ashamed of being black people, nor did they have to apologize for being Christians. Because many persons in the African-American community were t eased enough, Christians, of being a white man's religion. And no, we're not ashamed of Christianity. And we don't have to apologize for who we are as African-Americans." Some aspects of Trinity's philosophy falls within tradition of Black Liberation Theology. James Cone in first laid out in BLACK POWER AND BLACK THEOLOGY in 1969.

Trinity Church has grown in size and scope under Wright's leadership. He and his congregation have made pilgrimages to Africa, welcomed women leaders and gay members and made Trinity a social force with over 70 ministries addressing community needs ranging from youth groups to day care. The Church today boasts a congregation of 8500 members — making it the largest in the otherwise predominately white United Church of Christ denomination.

Published on April 25, 2008.

Guest photo by Robin Holland

© Public Affairs Television 2007

Bill Moyers Interview -- Part 1

Bill Moyers Interview -- Part 2

Bill Moyers Interview -- Part 3

Bill Moyers Interview -- Part 4

VA Hid Suicide Risk, Internal E-Mails Show

How very, very sad. Not only are our emotionally wounded and scared soldiers facing such depression, anxiety, doubt, and fear...the agency charged with the task of caring for them has been hiding the truth about the scope of the problem. Lip service about patriotism and valor...is that all we can provide to our soldiers? The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America is proposing that we honor our soldiers in both word and deed. Check out their proposal for a New G.I. Bill.



April 21, 2008 (CBS)

CBS News chief investigative correspondent Armen Keteyian reports...

The Department of Veterans Affairs came under fire again Monday, this time in California federal court where it's facing a national lawsuit by veterans rights groups accusing the agency of not doing enough to stem a looming mental health crisis among veterans. As part of the lawsuit, internal e-mails raise questions as to whether top officials deliberately deceived the American public about the number of veterans attempting and committing suicide.

In San Francisco federal court Monday, attorneys for veterans' rights groups accused the U.S. Department of Veteran's Affairs of nothing less than a cover-up - deliberately concealing the real risk of suicide among veterans.

"The system is in crisis and unfortunately the VA is in denial," said veterans rights attorney Gordon Erspamer.

The charges were backed by internal e-mails written by Dr. Ira Katz, the VA's head of Mental Health.

In the past, Katz has repeatedly insisted while the risk of suicide among veterans is serious, it's not outside the norm.

"There is no epidemic in suicide in VA," Katz told Keteyian in November.

But in this e-mail to his top media adviser, written two months ago, Katz appears to be saying something very different, stating: "Our suicide prevention coordinators are identifying about 1,000 suicide attempts per month among veterans we see in our medical facilities."

Katz's e-mail was written shortly after the VA provided CBS News data showing there were only 790 attempted suicides in all 2007 - a fraction of Katz's estimate.

"This 12,000 attempted suicides per year shows clearly, without a doubt, that there is an epidemic of suicide among veterans," said Paul Sullivan of Veterans for Common Sense.

And it appears that Katz went out of his way to conceal these numbers.

First, he titled his e-mail: "Not for the CBS News Interview Request."

He opened it with "Shh!" - as in keep it quiet - before ending with
"Is this something we should (carefully) address … before someone stumbles on it?"

On Monday, CBS News showed the e-mail to Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., who chairs the House Committee on Veterans Affairs.

"This is disgraceful. This is a crime against our nation, our nation's veterans," Filner told CBS News. "They do not want to come to grips with the reality, with the truth."

And that's not all.

Last November when CBS News exposed an epidemic of more than 6,200 suicides in 2005 among those who had served in the military, Katz attacked our report.

"Their number is not, in fact, an accurate reflection of the rate," he said last November.

But it turns out they were, as Katz admitted in this e-mail, just three days later.

He wrote: there "are about 18 suicides per day among America's 25 million veterans."

That works out to about 6,570 per year, which Katz admits in the same e-mail, "is supported by the CBS numbers."

In an e-mail late Monday to CBS News, Katz wrote that the reason the numbers were not released was due to questions about the consistency and reliability of the findings - and that there was no public cover up involved.

© MMVIII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.

McCain Asks N.C. GOP Not to Run Ad

I am not sure if I agree with all of his policies, but I like his politics. Senator McCain is, once again, demonstrating his character and integrity by being willing to speak truth to his own power base.



INEZ, Ky. - Republican John McCain asked the North Carolina GOP not to run a television ad that brings up the controversial former pastor of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

North Carolina Republican party officials insisted the ad will run as planned despite McCain's request.

The ad opens with a photo of Obama and the Rev. Jeremiah Wright together and a clip of Wright, whose incendiary comments about race have bedeviled Obama.

"He's just too extreme for North Carolina," the narrator says in the 30-second spot.

Dividing the American people

"We asked them not to run it," McCain told reporters on his campaign bus in Kentucky Wednesday. "I'm sending them an e-mail as we speak asking them to take it down.

"I don't know why they do it. Obviously, I don't control them, but I'm making it very clear, as I have a couple of times in the past, that there's no place for that kind of campaigning, and the American people don't want it," McCain said.

McCain said the ad was described to him: "I didn't see it, and I hope that I don't see it."

Republican National Committee chairman Mike Duncan, campaigning Wednesday with McCain, said he had left a voice mail message for state party chairwoman Linda Daves asking her to pull the ad.

McCain, in an e-mail to Daves, said he will draw sharp contrasts with Democrats. "But we need not engage in political tactics that only seek to divide the American people."

North Carolina GOP spokesman Brent Woodcox said the ad will begin running statewide on Monday, a week before the state's crucial May 6 primary.

'It is entirely appropriate'

The ad actually targets gubernatorial candidates Richard Moore and Bev Perdue, Democrats who have endorsed Obama.

"We have a great relation with the RNC and we fully support John McCain for president," Woodcox said. "But this is an ad about two North Carolina candidates for governor. The ad is going to run."

Daves defended the ad, saying it "presents a question of patriotism and judgment."

"It is entirely appropriate for voters to evaluate candidates based on their past associations," Daves said.

North Carolina Democratic Party chairman Jerry Meek said the ad is an attempt to distract attention from real issues.

"It's one thing to criticize somebody for associating with somebody else," Meek said. "But to criticize somebody for associating with somebody who associates with somebody else is ludicrous. Where does it end?"

Obama has denounced the most inflammatory of Wright's comments, but says the pastor shouldn't be judged solely on a handful of remarks. Obama has expressed admiration for the pastor, who officiated at his wedding, baptized his two daughters and inspired the title of his best-selling book, "The Audacity of Hope."

North Carolina's primary will divide 115 delegates among the Democratic presidential candidates and decide the party's nominee for governor. Polls indicate that Obama holds a comfortable lead over rival Hillary Rodham Clinton in the state.

updated 12:51 p.m. CT, Wed., April. 23, 2008
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24276517/

© 2008 MSNBC.com

Was Your LendingTree File hacked?

There are several key issues in this blog entry that I found at the Red Tape Chronicles that caught my attention. I placed them in bold font below. By the way, I found a picture of the LendingTree CEO upon being notified of the fraud...



LendingTree has told its customers that former employees helped unauthorized mortgage lenders hack into its systems and steal customer information from 2006 to 2008.

The incident reveals just how aggressive the mortgage loan business was during the height of the housing boom, and also raises fears for consumers who share their information with companies that help them shop around for the best deal. And it highlights what experts say is an often overlooked source of data theft -- the inside job.

According to a letter sent to customers recently, former LendingTree LLC employees shared "confidential passwords" with lenders, who in turn used the login information to "access LendingTree's customer loan request forms."

The forms contained critical personal data, including names, addresses, Social Security numbers, income and employment information. The company said the lenders did not use the information to commit identity theft or fraud, but simply to "market their own mortgage loans to ... customers."

In connection with the incident, LendingTree, based in Charlotte, N.C., has filed lawsuits against three small California-based home loan companies.

A LendingTree spokeswoman said the company was not granting interviews to discuss the data theft. She would not say how many customers were affected nor how much data was stolen, but instead supplied a copy of the customer letter sent by the firm.

While LendingTree says in the letter it has no reason to suspect its consumers are at heightened risk for identity theft, it did suggest consumers obtain a free credit report and file a fraud alert with the nation's credit bureaus.

Upon learning of the security breach, LendingTree says, it "promptly enhanced the security of our system."

Given that data was accessed from 2006 to early 2008, it can be inferred that passwords used by former employees remained operational for months or even years after their employment was terminated, generally considered poor security practice, said identity theft expert Rob Douglas, editor of InsideIDTheft.info.

"This plays into everybody's fear that this happens all the time," Douglas said. "When consumers share their information with companies, they assume it ends up in other companies' hands."

One victim who received the LendingTree letter -- but who requested anonymity -- was annoyed that LendingTree offered no compensation for the trouble.

"Rather than offer a free credit report they suggest that I use my annual free credit report," the consumer said, referring to the once-per-year free peek that consumers get at their report by visiting AnnualCreditReport.com.

In its letter, LendingTree includes a pamphlet called "Guide to Protecting Your Credit and Identity." Consumers who obtain their credit report and see anything suspicious are told to "contact the credit bureau."

Consumers who visit LendingTree expect their personal information to be shared with other companies. They are hoping LendingTree will help them find a mortgage firm with the best rate, and expect several companies to "bid" for the right to supply their home loan.

But in this incident, loan applications were viewed by unauthorized lenders, who used the information to market their own loan products, LendingTree said.

"We suggest that you remain vigilant by reviewing account statements and monitoring your credit reports for the next 24 months," the letter says.

The Red Tape Chronicles
Posted: Tuesday, April 22 at 03:30 pm CT by Bob Sullivan

U.N.: 100,000 More Dead in Darfur Than Reported

(a heavy sigh) This is wrong. This is someone's child. This is an innocent one. This is what we ignore. We have now be made aware. We are no longer innocent. This is my child. End the wrong!



* In March, death toll in Darfur given as 200,000; 2.5 million people displaced
* U.N. official now says that figure is closer to 300,000 dead since 2006
* Official reports that sexual violence has increased, food rations hurt in region
* Darfur conflict began five years ago when ethnic African tribesmen took up arms

NEW YORK (CNN) -- The number of deaths in Sudan's Darfur region since 2006 may have been underestimated by as much as 50 percent, the U.N. undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs said Tuesday.

In March, international figures, including U.N. data, put the death toll in Darfur at 200,000, with another 2.5 million people displaced.

But 300,000 are believed to have died in the tribal conflict in the past two years, said John Holmes, who also is the United Nations emergency relief coordinator.

Holmes said that sexual violence has increased and that food allotments for civilians affected by the civil war will be halved in a few days.

Holmes gave the U.N. Security Council an update on conditions in the western Sudan region, revisiting a report he gave a year ago.

"I am sad to say that the humanitarian situation remains as grim today as it was then, if not more so," he said.

In 2008, 100,000 civilians have fled their homes, many not for the first time.

The Darfur conflict began five years ago, when ethnic African tribesmen took up arms, complaining of decades of neglect and discrimination by the Sudanese government.

Sudan's Arab-dominated government is accused of responding by unleashing tribal militias known as Janjaweed, which are said to have committed the worst atrocities against Darfur's local communities.

There also have been intra-rebel and tribal clashes, Holmes added.

He blamed the military arm of the Justice and Equality Movement faction of the Sudan Liberation Movement for the most recent round of violence, and he accused the government of using "disproportionate force" and failing to differentiate between civilians and rebels in their response.

"Darfur today is still characterized by insecurity, lawlessness and impunity," he said. "A particularly worrying feature is evidence of high levels of sexual violence and exploitation in the northern corridor of west Darfur over the past two months."

This is shown by the increased number of women and girls seeking treatment after sexual brutality, Holmes said.

The World Food Programme announced last week that it will have to cut back its food distributions in May, partly because of attacks on convoys that reduced the amount of supplies they can get through, Holmes said.

Six aid workers have been killed this year, and 42 humanitarian posts have been attacked.

The supply line also is hurt by soaring food prices: The price of staples such as millet has doubled since April 2007, Holmes said.

While expressing gratitude to the Sudanese government for improved cooperation under various agreements, Holmes said there still is no physical access to internally displaced persons and some other groups.

He said he was "saddened and angry" that after five years, there has been no lasting solution to the suffering.

He made several recommendations to the government, including disbanding the Janjaweed, providing security for citizens, ending impunity for criminals and shouldering more of the financial burden for humanitarian aid.

Holmes also said rebels must stop their attacks against people and humanitarian convoys.

Find this article at:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/africa/04/22/darfur.holmes/index.html?eref=rss_topstories

© 2008 Cable News Network

No Words Necessary...

Army, Marines Enlisting More Felons

Redemption and restoration are central to my identity. If I were to speak to myself from the other side, I would say how proud I was to live in a country that does not throw people away, even convicted felons. Nonetheless, I do not see that noble goal as the primary motivator of the United States Army Recruiting Command. (Wow, be careful when you click this!!!)

Bush and Cheney have both presented themselves as friends of
the military. With friends like these...Sheesh!?!



WASHINGTON - Under pressure to meet combat needs, the Army and Marine Corps brought in significantly more recruits with felony convictions last year than in 2006, including some with manslaughter and sex crime convictions.

Data released by a congressional committee shows the number of soldiers admitted to the Army with felony records jumped from 249 in 2006 to 511 in 2007. And the number of Marines with felonies rose from 208 to 350.

Those numbers represent a fraction of the more than 180,000 recruits brought in by the active duty Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines during fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2007. But they highlight a trend that has raised concerns both within the military and on Capitol Hill.

The bulk of the crimes involved were burglaries, other thefts, and drug offenses, but nine involved sex crimes and six involved manslaughter or vehicular homicide convictions. Several dozen Army and Marine recruits had aggravated assault or robbery convictions, including incidents involving weapons.

Struggling to find recruits

Both the Army and Marine Corps have been struggling to increase their numbers as part of a broader effort to meet the combat needs of a military fighting wars on two fronts. As a result, the number of recruits needing waivers for crimes or other bad conduct has grown in recent years, as well as those needing medical or aptitude waivers.

House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, who released the data, noted that there may be valid reasons for granting the waivers and giving individuals a second chance.

But he added, "Concerns have been raised that the significant increase in the recruitment of persons with criminal records is a result of the strain put on the military by the Iraq war and may be undermining military readiness."

The services use a waiver process to let in recruits with felony convictions, and many of the crimes were committed when the service members were juveniles.

"Waivers are used judiciously and granted only after a thorough review," Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Jonathan Withington said.

He added that "low unemployment, a protracted war on terror, a decline in propensity to serve," and the growing reluctance of parents, teachers and other adults to recommend young people go into the military, has made recruiting a challenge.

According to the Army, 18 percent of the recruits needed conduct waivers in fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2007, compared to 15 percent in the 12-month period ending in Sept. 30, 2006.

"We are growing the Army fast and there are some waivers; we know that," said Army Lt. Gen. James D. Thurman, deputy chief of staff for operations. "It hasn't alarmed us yet."

He added that "the better part of making soldiers is about leadership. Somebody invested in me, you know. That's the beauty of the United States Army. It's about leadership ... You've got to give people an opportunity to serve."

Easing waiver requirements

Late last fall, the Pentagon quietly began looking for ways to make it easier for people with minor criminal records to join the military. The goal of that review is to make cumbersome waiver requirements consistent across the services — the Army, Marine Corps, Navy and Air Force — and reduce the number of petty crimes that now trigger the process.

According to the data released Monday, a bit more than half of the Army's 511 convictions in 2007 were for various types of thefts, ranging from burglaries to bad checks and stolen cars. Another 130 were for drug offenses.

The remainder, however, included two in 2007 for manslaughter, compared to one in 2006; five for sexual crimes (which can include rape, incest or sexual assaults) compared to two in 2006; and three for negligent or vehicular homicide, compared to two in 2006. Two received waivers for terrorist threats including bomb threats in 2007, compared to one in 2006.

At least 235 of the Marine Corps' 350 waivers were for various types of thefts in 2007, and another 63 were for assaults or robberies that may also have included use of a weapon. The remainder included one for manslaughter in 2007, compared to none in 2006; four for sex crimes, compared to one in 2006; and five for terror threats, including bomb threats, compared to two in 2006.

The total number of sailors who received felony waivers dipped from 48 in 2006 to 42 in 2007. Most were for a variety of thefts or drug and drunk driving convictions. Two in 2007 were for terror or bomb threats compared to three in 2006.

There were no Air Force recruits with waivers for felony convictions in 2007.

Army spokesman Paul Boyce said that offering waivers for those who are otherwise qualified "is the right thing to do for those Americans who want to answer the call to duty." He said the burden remains on them to prove they should be admitted to the service.

Waivers must be approved by an officer who is ranked as a brigadier general or above, and recruits must have written recommendations and endorsements from community leaders showing they would be a good bet for the military.

The Associated Press

updated 3:34 p.m. CT, Mon., April. 21, 2008

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24243460/

© 2008 MSNBC.com

New York Times Reports That U.S. Military Groomed TV Analysts

The Bush administration is demonstrating once again that it is operating without an acceptable guiding ethic and is devoid of integrity. In the same way that we cannot overcome evil by using evil means; we cannot combat lies with lies of our own. Speak truth to power!



Paper: Extensive ideological, business ties raise issue of manipulation

NEW YORK - Many U.S. military analysts used as commentators on Iraq by television networks have been groomed by the Pentagon, leaving some feeling they were manipulated to report favorably on the Bush administration, The New York Times said in Sunday editions.

A Times report examining ties between the Bush administration and former senior officers who acted as paid TV analysts said they got private briefings, trips and access to classified intelligence meant to influence their comments.

"Records and interviews show how the Bush administration has used its control over access and information in an effort to transform the analysts into a kind of media Trojan horse — an instrument intended to shape terrorism coverage from inside the major TV and radio networks," the newspaper said.

The Pentagon defended its work with the analysts, saying they were given only accurate information.

Ties to military contractors

Many of the commentators also have ties to military contractors who are vested in U.S. war efforts, but those business links are seldom disclosed to viewers, and sometimes not even to the networks on which they appear, the newspaper said.

President George W. Bush has been engaged in a long struggle to halt a drain in public support for the Iraq war, in which more than 4,000 American soldiers have died, and to boost support for his post September 11 war against terrorism.

One case cited by the Times was in the summer of 2005, when accusations were rife over human rights violations at the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay on Cuba, where foreign terrorism suspects are held.

The Times said administration communications officials flew a group of retired military officers to the camp on a jet normally used by Vice President Dick Cheney to give their side of the case. Many in the group have subsequently appeared as commentators on the TV networks.

The Times quoted Robert Bevelacqua, a retired Green Beret and former Fox News analyst, as saying, "It was them (the Bush administration) saying, 'We need to stick our hands up your back and move your mouth for you.'"

'I felt we'd been hosed'

Kenneth Allard, a former NBC military analyst who taught information warfare at the National Defense University, told the Times the campaign amounted to a "coherent, active," sophisticated information operation.

As the situation in Iraq deteriorated, he saw a gap between what analysts were told in private briefings and what subsequently was revealed in inquiries and books.

"Night and day," he told the Times. "I felt we'd been hosed."

Some analysts said they had suppressed doubts about the situation in Iraq for fear of jeopardizing their access.

Many others, however, denied having been co-opted or allowing their business interests to affect their on-air work, while some said they had recused themselves from coverage that touched on business interests, the Times report said.

Report mentions NBC analysts

The Times cited several examples involving NBC News analysts. (Msnbc.com is a joint venture of NBC Universal and Microsoft.)

The newspaper said NBC analyst Montgomery Meigs, a retired Army general, reported favorably on the U.S. military detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, after the military flew analysts there for a carefully choreographed visit in June 2005.

The Times said that two NBC analysts, Barry R. McCaffrey and the late Wayne A. Downing, were on the advisory board of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, which the paper described as an advocacy group created with White House encouragement in 2002 to make the case for overthrowing Saddam Hussein. The Times said the men were on the boards of major military contractors.

It quoted Rick Francona, an NBC analyst, as saying that he didn't think the network was aware that he was participating in frequent briefings the Pentagon conducts with selected military analysts.

The newspaper said NBC News declined to discuss how it hires and monitors military analysts. The Times quoted the network as saying in a short statement: “We have clear policies in place to assure that the people who appear on our air have been appropriately vetted and that nothing in their profile would lead to even a perception of a conflict of interest.”

8,000 pages of documents

The Times said it based much of its report on 8,000 pages of e-mail messages, transcripts and records it secured by suing the Defense Department and which it said described years of private briefings, trips and what it called "an extensive Pentagon talking points operation."

It said Pentagon documents referred to the military analysts as "message force multipliers" or "surrogates" who could be counted on to deliver administration "themes and messages" to millions of Americans "in the form of their own opinions."

Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman defended the Defense Department's work with military analysts, saying they were given only factual information about the war.

"The intent and purpose of this is nothing other than an earnest attempt to inform the American people," he told the Times, adding it was "a bit incredible" to think retired military officers could be "wound up" and used as "puppets of the Defense Department."

updated 11:50 p.m. CT, Sat., April. 19, 2008

Copyright 2008 Reuters.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24220130/

© 2008 MSNBC.com

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Science Confirms 'The Colbert Bump'

I wonder why appearances have boosted funds for Democrats but not Republicans? Especially since Colbert tries to cater his humor to the conservative wit? The research speculates, "that Republicans have to be in an extremely confident position before they're willing to take a chance in being made fun of, whereas Democrats are just the opposite."



With the intense competition between the two contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination, pundits have mused over whether Hillary Clinton’s appearance on "The Colbert Report" last night will give the former First Lady a so-called "Colbert bump," a surge in popularity which the show’s host claims will accrue to any politician that appears on the show.

Stephen Colbert first coined the eponymous term on his show after John Hall won in a close election to become a representative from New York in 2006 after an appearance on the "Report." Hall defeated incumbent Sue Kelly, who had declined to make an appearance on the show. Colbert himself commented on this after the election:

"And how did he beat Kelly? According to the American Prospect, quote, 'Her refusal to appear on cable's popular "The Colbert Report" may have also proved somewhat costly,'" Colbert reported, adding, "Somewhat? All what. She could've gotten the 'Colbert bump,' instead she got the 'Colbert dump.'"

Ever since, Colbert’s fans have been touting the powers of "the bump" in blogs, claiming it has boosted support for numerous politicians.

But most of the evidence cited lacks a certain amount of scientific rigor, said James Fowler, a political scientist at the University of California, San Diego, and a fan of the show.

"I saw people talking about the 'Colbert bump' online, but ... [they] took no account of the fact that most of the candidates who agreed to go on the show were running against candidates who really didn't have a chance of winning. They were very protected," Fowler said.

So he decided to put Colbert’s claim to a real test.

Apples to apples

To really see if a "Colbert bump" exists, you have to compare the performance of political candidates who did appear on the show with those who didn't, Fowler says, and you have to do it by comparing apples to apples.

Incumbents must be matched to other incumbents, Democrats to other Democrats (the same goes for Republicans, of course). And because the study measured increased popularity by comparing campaign donations before and after an appearance, the amount of money candidates were taking in before their stint on the show had to match up.

Fowler jokes that the set-up is like running a medical study, where you have a control group and a treatment group. In this case, "Colbert is the treatment," Fowler said. His results will be published in an upcoming issue of PS: Political Science & Politics.

Democrat bump, Republican bust?

Fowler used Federal Election Commission data on all individual contributions made to U.S. House campaigns between Jan. 1, 2005, and Oct. 30, 2007, and used them to find matches for 47 candidates who appeared on "The Colbert Report" segment, "Better Know a District."

He compared both the number of donations and the amount of money received by each "Colbert candidate" to their match. The results showed that there might be, as Colbert himself would put it, some "truthiness" to the "Colbert bump" claims after all. At least for Democrats.

Democrats who appeared on the show raised about 44 percent more money after their appearance than they did before. Republicans, on the other hand, didn't fare as well after their Colbert appearance. Their appearance either had no effect, or a slightly negative one.

Self selection

So why the difference between the two parties?

The first place many look is the show's audience, which has a perceived liberal leaning (though Fowler says there's no specific evidence of that). Fowler says this reason is plausible, but that the viewership of the "Report" is small, with a Nielsen average viewership of just 1.3 million for 2007. "I think it's incredibly unlikely that any of Colbert's viewers watch the show and then, you know, get out their checkbook," Fowler told LiveScience.

Fowler also rules out any agenda on the part of the show, since their main aim is to be funny. "They're just trying to get a laugh," he said. "Comedy first, news second."

More likely, Fowler says, is that the candidates are self-selecting their appearances on the show based on how they're doing beforehand.

"Republicans who agree to go on the show have to be doing much, much better than average in order to appear on the show," Fowler said his results showed. "So what this looks like is that Republicans have to be in an extremely confident position before they're willing to take a chance in being made fun of, whereas Democrats are just the opposite."

Democrats who agree to appear on the show are actually doing worse than the average candidate, "so Colbert seems more like an opportunity than a risk of destroying the campaign," Fowler added.

Ripple effect

Just how the show can have an effect with such a comparatively small audience, Fowler attributes to a ripple effect through the mainstream media. "When someone goes on his show, the fact that someone went on his show becomes news," Fowler said. "And a single appearance turns into an incident that's reported to 30 [million], 50 million people."

"His show is very influential among people who influence others," he added.

This could explain Mike Huckabee's upsurge in popularity after his "Colbert" appearance (which Colbert touted by saying he increased Huckabee's polling percentage by 300 percent – from 1 to 3 percent.) "The whole struggle in presidential primaries is just getting your name on people's minds," Fowler said, so Huckabee's appearance probably wouldn't have increased campaign donations (given the apparent Republican bust), but could've bumped him from a fifth to a second-place finish in a primary.

So what about Hillary? Whether or not Clinton's appearance on the show last night will boost her flagging popularity remains to be seen, but Fowler did notice that she made the announcement about her appearance the day after an editorial he wrote about his research appeared in The Los Angeles Times.

By Andrea Thompson

LiveScience

updated 12:37 p.m. CT, Fri., April. 18, 2008

© 2008 LiveScience.com. All rights reserved.

Liar Paradox

In 270 BC: Philitas of Cos, poet and critic reportedly wasted away and died of insomnia while brooding about the Liar paradox.

In philosophy and logic, the liar paradox encompasses paradoxical statements such as "This sentence is false." or "The next sentence is false. The previous sentence is true." These statements are paradoxical because there is no way to assign them a consistent truth value. Consider that if "This statement is false" is true, then what it says is the case; but what it says is that it is false, hence it is false. On the other hand, if it is false, then what it says is not the case; thus, since it says that it is false, it must be true.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liar_paradox

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Fact Check: Obama and Former Radical William Ayers

An analysis of the facts by The Associated Press...





SPRINGFIELD, Ill. - Democratic Sen. Barack Obama is defending his relationship with William Ayers, a college professor who was once part of the radical Weather Underground and spent years as a fugitive after a 1970 explosion that killed three members.

Obama suggests he barely knows Ayers and shouldn't be held accountable for anything Ayers said or did. But others, including Democratic rival Hillary Rodham Clinton, say the relationship gives Republicans an issue to exploit against Obama.

The spin
Obama was asked about Ayers as part of a discussion of his patriotism in a presidential debate Wednesday night in Philadelphia.

Obama responded that Ayers is "a guy who lives in my neighborhood" but hasn't endorsed him and doesn't regularly exchange ideas with him.

"And the notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago when I was 8 years old, somehow reflects on me and my values, doesn't make much sense," Obama said.

Clinton seized on Ayers as "an issue that certainly the Republicans will be raising." She pointed out that Obama and Ayers served on a charity board together and brought the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks into the mix by noting that an interview in which Ayers denied any regret for the radical group's bomb-making happened to appear on the day of the attacks.

The facts
Ayers was part of the Weather Underground, a radical group that claimed credit for explosions at the U.S. Capitol, the Pentagon and more. Originally known as the Weathermen, the group took its name from a Bob Dylan lyric: "You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows."

In 1970, a bomb the group was making — to use against an Army base — exploded at a New York townhouse, killing three members. Ayers fled and spent years as a fugitive. He met and married fellow fugitive Bernadine Dohrn during that period.

The two surfaced in 1980. Ayers had been charged with various offenses stemming from demonstrations in Chicago in 1969, but those charges had been dismissed for prosecutorial misconduct. He never faced any charges related to the townhouse explosion. Dohrn pleaded guilty to two counts of aggravated battery and two counts of bail-jumping in connection with a 1969 anti-war protest.

Ayers now teaches at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and Dohrn heads the Children and Family Justice Center at Northwestern University. Ayers has advised Chicago Mayor Richard Daley on education issues.

Ayers and Obama both served on the board of directors of the Woods Fund, a Chicago-based charity that focuses on developing community groups to assist the poor. A variety of business executives, journalists and academics serve on the board.

When Obama was organizing his first race for the state legislature, the incumbent lawmaker he hoped to replace introduced him to her supporters and urged them to back Obama. One introductory event took place at the home of Ayers and Dohrn.

Ayers contributed $200 to Obama's legislative campaign in 2001, but there is no other sign that he has actively aided Obama's political career.

During Wednesday's debate, Obama argued that if the candidates are to be held responsible for distant connections to the Weather Underground, then Clinton would fail, too. He pointed out that her husband, just before leaving the White House, commuted the sentences of two members of the group who had been convicted of weapons and explosives charges.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.

updated 12:30 p.m. CT, Thurs., April. 17, 2008

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24184752/

© 2008 MSNBC.com

Bloomberg on the Next President: ‘At least we’ll have an adult in office’

Posted: 07:19 PM ET on The CNN Wire

(CNN) — New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Thursday that, whoever wins the presidency, “at least we’ll have an adult in office who can lead and accomplish something.”

© 2008 Cable News Network

Senate Eyes Probe of Mystery Earmark

Wow! What has happened to us...this is just plain cheating the process and so corrosive to our Republic. Well, at least someone in the Congress is speaking truth back to the Congress?!



April 16, 2008

Posted: 09:20 PM ET on PoliticalTicker

WASHINGTON (CNN) — The Senate may seek a federal investigation into a 2005 earmark on a highway funding bill that was mysteriously altered after Congress approved the measure but before President Bush signed it.

The $10 million earmark, originally designated for improvements to Interstate 75 in Lee and Collier Counties in Florida, was changed to direct the money to build an interchange in Lee County, an apparently violation of congressional rules.

"This wasn't an ordinary earmark," Sen. Charles Schumer, D-New York, said, defending the decision by Democratic leaders to invite the Justice Department to probe internal congressional practices. "It was the specific circumstances here that are highly unusual."

The Senate is expected to vote Thursday whether to direct the Justice Department to investigate "allegations of impropriety" and to "ascertain if a violation of Federal criminal law has occurred." No lawmaker has acknowledged making the change.

"If there's something untoward done, whether it's morally wrong, criminally wrong, let's take a look at it," argued Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada.

Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, who was then the chairman of the transportation committee and chief author of the bill, says he asked for the initial project money during the 2005 congressional session for "widening and improvements for I-75 in Collier and Lee counties."

But before the bill got to the President's desk for his signature, the wording of the earmark was changed and the $10 million was redirected to build the "Coconut Road interchange I-75, Lee County."

Democrats widely believe Young directed someone to change the language. They note that as the bill was moving through Congress, Young received $40,000 in campaign contributions from local business leaders who stood to gain from a new highway interchange at that location.

In a brief exchange with CNN as he left the House floor Wednesday, Young repeatedly said "no comment" when asked if he had anything to do with the change to the earmark.

It was unclear if the Justice Department would be bound by a Senate vote to seek an investigation. Democratic lawmakers argued that the department would be required to launch the investigation, but Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Oklahoma, argued that the department would not necessarily have to launch the probe.

Coburn, who champions reforming the earmark process, is pressing for a special congressional committee to investigate the matter. But Democratic leaders oppose the idea because they say it would be unconstitutional for senators to investigate members of the House.

© 2008 Cable News Network. All Rights Reserved.

Once Again, Just Who Is My Neighbor?

One of my former professors, Dr. John Meadors, led a study this evening at church. He was reflecting on a work by Søren Aabye Kierkegaard, Works of Love: Some Christian Reflections in the Form of Discourses. "You Shall Love Your Neighbor," II B. John contends that Kierkegaard wanted the church to clear up just exactly what "love" is commanded in Christianity...is it romantic/erotic love, friendship, or the love of neighbor?...because "to except a single person from love negates love as Christian love." John concluded his lecture with a final passage from Kierkegaard...

"One's neighbor is one's equal. One's neighbor is not the beloved, for whom you have passionate preference, nor your friend, for whom you have passionate preference... Your neighbor is every man, for on the basis of distinctions he is not your neighbor, nor on the basis of likeness to you as being different from other men. He is your neighbor on the basis of equality with you before God; but this equality absolutely every man has, and he has it absolutely."

Can you see where Søren Kierkegaard admittedly got some of his ideas?!

On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. "Teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?" "What is written in the Law?" he replied. "How do you read it?" He answered: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind'; and, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'" "You have answered correctly," Jesus replied. "Do this and you will live." But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?"

In reply Jesus said: "A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn in Jericho and took care of him. The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper. 'Look after him,' he said, 'and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.'

"Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?"

The expert in the law replied, "The one who had mercy on him." Jesus told him, "Go and do likewise."

-- Gospel of Luke, chapter 10 verses 25-37

State Department Warns of Forced Service in Iraq

Eeek! You mean there are not enough young, brash, and committed neoconservatives who want to support our noble war of liberation and democracy in Iraq. I am shocked and appalled! As an aside question, both for the State Department and the Armed Forces, what would you do if we decided that the 13th Amendment to the Constitution applies to forced employment in high death/injury areas and stop-loss? Again, eeek!

* U.S. diplomats may be forced to fill positions in Iraq, State Department says
* "We face a growing challenge of supply and demand," says cable to employees
* Last fall, foreign service officers objected to being forced to work in a war zone
* State Department found volunteers to fill the needed posts last year

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- U.S. diplomats may be forced to serve in Iraq next year if enough qualified candidates do not apply for certain jobs, the State Department warned employees Tuesday.

A similar threat to call up diplomats last year drew fire among foreign service officers. Many of them objected to being forced to work in a war zone, even though Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Iraq was the department's priority.

A cable to employees, obtained by CNN, said the State Department would soon begin to identify candidates for jobs at the U.S. embassy in Baghdad, Iraq, and other provinces.

"We face a growing challenge of supply and demand in the 2009 staffing cycle," according to the cable.

The cable added that no other open State Department jobs would be filled until the Iraq jobs were filled. It also noted that more than 20 percent of the foreign service's 12,000 officers have already served in Iraq and Afghanistan, considered the two major hardship posts.

In 2007 the issue caused an uproar in the State Department, resulting in a contentious town hall-style meeting in October. One official called the order to serve in Iraq "a potential death sentence."

"I just have no respect for the whole process because you've demonstrated a lack of respect for your own colleagues," said foreign service officer Jack Croddy.

"Thank you for that comment. It's full of inaccuracies, but that's OK," Harry Thomas Jr., director general of the foreign service, shot back.

Others pointed out the risks of such assignments, considering the dangers of a war zone, lack of security and regular rocket attacks on U.S. personnel.

Rice, who did not attend the meeting, tried to calm things by underscoring the State Department's attempts to do "everything that we can to try and protect our diplomats."

However, she said, "This is one of the highest priority tasks of the United States, and we're going to meet our obligations."

In the end, the State Department found enough volunteers to fill the needed posts. The latest cable says officials hope the same thing will happen this year.

By Elise Labott

Find this article at:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/04/15/iraq.state/index.html

© 2008 Cable News Network

Barbour Emails Come at High Cost: Barbour responds to records request with $14,000-plus price tag

Things that make you go, Hummmm...?!

April 14, 2008

The Clarion-Ledger

Seeking government transparency can be costly.

Using the state's public-records law, The Clarion-Ledger in February asked Gov. Haley Barbour's office to produce four days' worth of e-mails from Barbour's staff of about 40 people. The governor's office replied on March 27 with a cost estimate of $14,170.48.

Leslie Graves, president of the Wisconsin-based Lucy Burns Institute, which promotes open government issues, said that is by far the highest dollar figure she has heard for such a request.

"You win," she said, adding that in an age of increasing technological ease, Barbour's response to the request was "prehistoric."

The estimate includes $7,500 to hire private attorneys to review the e-mails for exempted material, $5,400 to bring in an out-of-town computer consultant, nearly $800 for staff from the Department of Finance and Administration's Office of Information Technology to collect the messages, and just under $500 for the governor's press secretary to give them a final review.

Graves is one of the organizers of the Sunshine Blogger Project, an effort to find out whether governors are preserving the electronic documents according to each state's public-records law and whether they can produce them in response to a public-records request. The Clarion-Ledger, which has an open-government blog on its Web site, participated in the exercise by submitting a request to Barbour's office Feb. 21 for all e-mails sent or received from midnight Feb. 15 through Feb. 19.

Graves noted Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen, a Democrat, and Charlie Crist, the Republican governor of Florida, responded to identical requests by producing the e-mails within a few days and at no cost. Those who required requesters to pay for the e-mails assessed charges ranging from $200 to $1,350 for the records.

Buddy Bynum, Barbour's director of communications, said the estimate is reasonable given the breadth of the request.

"It seems to me that it is the best assessment for what it would cost for your request," he said.

Bynum said the governor's office properly archives all its e-mails but has no ability to retrieve them without assistance from technology experts.

"It may already be archived or filed or taken off of our active system," he said.

He would not explain why the request requires the state to bring in an out-of-town computer consultant.

"The letter speaks for itself on that. You are welcome to quote from it," he said. "I'm not prepared to go beyond the letter. We're, just as a courtesy, talking to you."

The letter explains: "The Mississippi Department of Finance & Administration does not maintain these e-mail records for the Governor's office in a separate file, and extracting them from the system will entail a significant amount of time and expertise which DFA personnel can not handle internally. DFA will require the assistance of a consultant to properly respond."

Before estimating cost, the governor's office twice asked The Clarion-Ledger to narrow the request to a specific subject matter "to avoid the substantial expense" of reviewing all the e-mails for the period requested.

The majority of the costs come from nonstate employees the governor plans to hire to complete the request. Bynum said that is in the best interest of the state as a whole.

"The governor's staff and the DFA can't work on your request ... and neglect their work on every other front," he said.

When asked if retrieving a single e-mail from that time period would require outside help from computer and legal experts, Bynum said, "We don't answer the hypothetical."

Leonard Van Slyke, an expert on Mississippi public records law and an attorney for The Clarion-Ledger, said state law allows the governor to recover the actual cost of retrieving requested records. However, he said he does not believe it covers the hiring of nongovernmental employees to do it.

"I would certainly think there is someone in the government of the state of Mississippi that could pull e-mail from the system," he said.

Ninety-one percent of the costs estimated by the request come from the hiring of outside consultants.

"The ability to charge actual costs should not ever be used as a method to keep from producing records requested," Van Slyke said. "A government entity is not entitled to go outside and run up cost."

Graves said the governor's solutions seem to describe a system that is not set up to be transparent. Such extreme costs would place public records from Barbour office out of reach for ordinary citizens.

Bynum, who was aware of the project, noted some governors would not release the e-mails at all.

"It definitely would be cheaper to refuse to answer," he said.

In Mississippi, the governor's e-mails are public record, although some material can be excluded for specific reasons, such as discussion of personnel issues or the trade secrets of government contractors.

Clarion-Ledger Executive Editor Ronnie Agnew said the paper is exploring its options.

"The loser in the quest for accountability is the regular taxpayer, who, if making a similar request, would be in a state of shock to receive such a staggering bill. Anyone who knows anything about technology knows that it should not cost $14,000 to forward a bunch of emails," he said. "It's an insult to us and to taxpayers to suggest that such a basic use of technology is worth the cost of a good, mid-priced car."

Chris Joyner

chris.joyner@jackson.gannett.com

Obama says, "I didn't say it as well as I should have."

Making comments about faith, gun ownership, and rural politics should be handled delicately since it is so easy to be misunderstood. I personally find Senator Obama no more elitist or out of touch than Senator Clinton or Senator McCain, each have their opinion on how the nation could/should be ordered and governed. Nonetheless, it is hard to get the cat back back into the bag now! I wonder if the only safe venue to explore faith, gun ownership, and rural politics is pillow-talk?! I imagine the following proposition is all but insane; but, could we all try to speak the same message no matter who is present in the audience or where we are speaking? Let the truth simply be the truth...

* Obama tells paper if he offended anyone, he deeply regrets it
* Obama last week said some Pennsylvanians are bitter and cling to guns, religion
* McCain, Clinton have accused him of being elitist, out of touch

MUNCIE, Indiana (CNN) -- Sen. Barack Obama on Saturday tried to clarify what he meant when he said some small-town Pennsylvanians are "bitter" people who "cling to guns and religion."

"I didn't say it as well as I should have," Obama admitted in Muncie, Indiana, on Saturday, the day after he first defended his comments, "because the truth is that these traditions that are passed on from generation to generation -- those are important."

The Illinois senator made the controversial comments at a California event that was closed to the media last Sunday.

Obama defended his point of view amid intensified criticism from Democratic rival Hillary Clinton and presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain that's he's elitist and out of touch.

"Obviously, if I worded things in a way that made people offended, I deeply regret that," Obama said Saturday in an interview with the Winston-Salem Journal, according to a transcript provided by his campaign. VideoWatch how the 'bitter' battle is playing out on the trail »

"The underlying truth of what I said remains, which is simply that people who have seen their way of life upended because of economic distress are frustrated and rightfully so," he told the North Carolina newspaper. "And I hear it all the time when I visit these communities."

Clinton, speaking in Indianapolis, said she was "taken back" by what she referred as "demeaning remarks" about "small-town" Americans.

"Sen. Obama's remarks are elitist and out of touch. They are not reflective of values and beliefs of Americans, certainly not the Americans I know, not the Americans I grew up with, not the Americans I lived with in Arkansas or represent in New York," the senator from New York said.

She said Americans who believe in the Second Amendment, the right to bear arms, "believe it's a matter of constitutional right." And she said "Americans who believe in God believe it's a matter of personal faith."

Tucker Bounds -- spokesman for McCain, the senator from Arizona -- also said that the reverence for faith and the Second Amendment in the United States are "cornerstone customs" and that Obama's "dismissal of those values is revealing."

"Barack Obama's elitism allows him to believe that the American traditions that have contributed to the identity and greatness of this country are actually just frustrations and bitterness."

Obama told the Muncie audience that the back-and-forth between him and his rivals is "typical."

His campaign emphasized that the "traditions" Obama referred to in his remarks are those of gun ownership and religion. Obama added that those traditions are "what sustains us."

Obama also labeled the dust-up that's developed as "a little typical sort of political flare-up" because, as he contends, he said something that "everybody knows is true."

The Democratic candidate continued to maintain -- as he did Friday night after the initial story began to circulate -- that people are frustrated because Washington isn't listening to the average American. VideoWatch a Pennsylvania senator defend Obama »

"There are a whole bunch of folks in small towns in Pennsylvania, in towns right here in Indiana, in my home town in Illinois who are bitter. They are angry."

"When you're bitter, you turn to what you can count on," Obama said, adding that they then turn to voting "about guns" and "taking comfort" in their faith and family.

"That's a natural response."

Obama's original comments were posted Friday on the Web site Huffingtonpost.com. VideoWatch how the firestorm started »

"You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. ...

"And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are going to regenerate and they have not," he said.

"And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations," he also said.

CNN's Dana Bash, Peter Hamby and Chris Welch contributed to this report.

Find this article at:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/04/13/obama.clinton/index.html

© 2008 Cable News Network

The P-Mate

And now for something completely different!

I am a huge believer in the equality of men and women; but, I am not convinced that the freedom to pee standing up is crucial to egalitarianism...but I have the original parts that enable me to pee standing up. So, to demonstrate my political correctness I encourage you to purchase this product and declare with me...ERA NOW!!!



The P-Mate is EASY
The P-Mate is CONVENIENT
The P-Mate is SANITARY



Pmates give women the freedom to discreetly pee standing up

Have you ever found yourself in a dirty, unhygienic port-a-potty?

Have you ever had a full bladder with no bathroom in sight?

Have you ever been afraid to pull down your pants to squat and pee and risk being seen or peeing on your shoes?

Then the P-Mate is for you!

* The P-Mate is a revolutionary way for women to pee discreetly without having to pull down their pants and squat.
* The P-Mate allows women to pee standing up.
* The P-Mate is the most amazing female urinary device.
* The P-Mate gives women the freedom to pee like men.
* The P-Mate is clean and hygienic.
* The P-Mate is covered with a 4-leaf clover design as it is good luck to have one with you when you are in need.
* The P-Mate does NOT get all wet and soggy after use. You can easily slip it back into a pocket or bag for later disposal if you are outdoors where there is no garbage can.

P-Mate was invented by a creative Dutch woman. They allow girls and women of all ages the ability to neatly pee standing up.

The P-Mate is basically like a cardboard shoe with the toe cut off. You place the entrance of the 'shoe' directly under your urethra, between your legs, pee into the shoe and then make sure that the hole at the toe end is funnelling the urine out somewhere other than on your feet.

Order Yours Today!

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Clinton's Top Strategist Quits

* Mark Penn is CEO of public relations giant Burston Marsteller
* Penn met with Colombia ambassador over trade pact
* Colombia fired Penn's company on Saturday
* Penn will continue to have advisory role in campaign

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sen. Hillary Clinton's chief presidential campaign strategist is quitting his post amid criticism of his public relations firm's contacts with the Colombian government over a pending free-trade deal, Clinton's campaign announced.

Mark Penn and his political consulting firm will continue advise the New York senator's Democratic presidential bid, but Penn will give up his job as chief strategist, campaign manager Maggie Williams said.

"After the events of the last few days, Mark Penn has asked to give up his role as chief strategist of the Clinton campaign," Williams said.

Clinton did not answer reporters' questions about Penn's exit during a campaign stop in New Mexico on Sunday.

Penn is CEO of public relations giant Burston Marsteller and is president of Penn, Schoen and Berland, his political consulting firm.

Friday, he acknowledged he had met with the Colombian ambassador to the United States earlier in the week in his role as Burston Marsteller's chief to discuss the pending U.S.-Colombia trade pact, which Clinton has criticized on the campaign trail.

Penn called the meeting "an error in judgment that will not be repeated," and apologized. That prompted Colombia's government to fire the company Saturday, calling the remarks "a lack of respect to Colombians."

Clinton and top aides were sharply critical of rival Democrat Barack Obama in February when reports indicated that his top economic adviser had suggested to a Canadian official that Obama was not as supportive of changes to the North American Free Trade Agreement as the Illinois senator claimed to be on the campaign trail.

Penn said Friday that Clinton's opposition to the U.S.-Colombia pact, which the Bush administration is trying to push through Congress, "is clear and was not discussed" during his meeting with the ambassador. And Clinton spokesman Mo Elleithee said Penn's meeting was "not in any way done on behalf of the campaign."

But Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell -- a key Clinton backer in his state's April 22 primary -- suggested Sunday that Penn needed to go.

"I think you've got to make it very clear for someone who is a consultant, who you are representing and who you are not representing, and I would hope that Mr. Penn, when he talked to the Colombians, made that clear. And it doesn't sound to me like he did, and that's something the campaign should take into question," Rendell told NBC's "Meet the Press."

Sources in the Clinton campaign said that Penn realized this weekend that he needed to step aside, and that Clinton was disappointed that he had met with the Colombians.

Find this article at:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/04/06/clinton.campaign/index.html?eref=rss_topstories

© 2008 Cable News Network

A Word to the Wise from a Few Former Presidents

"We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people."

-- John F. Kennedy


"Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear."

-- Harry S. Truman, message to Congress, August 8, 1950


Gleaned from http://quotes.forbiddenlibrary.com/

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This story on Countdown back in October 10, 2006 inspired me act and add my voice to the growing scream to stop George Bush and the Republican led Congress from destroying THE fundamental right enumerated in our Constitution...habeas corpus. Thank you, Keith Olbermann, for speaking when others were silent. Bless you!



If you are interested, I found my original post from Thursday, June 07, 2007.

Obama Camp: McCain Not a 'Warmonger'

An example of good politics...now seen from both McCain and Obama.



WASHINGTON - Democrat Barack Obama's presidential campaign on Saturday repudiated a liberal talk show host's description of Sen. John McCain as a warmonger, a comment made to an audience that Obama later addressed.

Ed Schultz, host of a nationally syndicated radio program that is based in Fargo, N.D., was warming up the crowd Friday at a $100-a-person fundraiser for the North Dakota Democratic party in Grand Forks when he tagged the Republican presidential nominee-in-waiting as a "warmonger," Schultz acknowledged in a telephone interview Saturday.

He said he has used the term many times on the air to refer to McCain because of his support for the war in Iraq.

"He voted for this war. He's a perpetrator of the war. He's an advocate of the war," Schultz said. "In my personal definition, that's a warmonger."

Obama was not in the room when Schultz spoke. The candidate spoke after a series of introductions by the state's three Democrats in Congress.

Obama thanked Schultz and called him "the voice of progressive radio."

But on Saturday, Obama campaign spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement: "John McCain is not a warmonger and should not be described as such. He's a supporter of a war that Senator Obama believes should have never been authorized and never been waged."

At a campaign appearance in Arizona Saturday, McCain said Obama should condemn Schultz's use of warmonger.

"I would hope that in keeping with his commitment that Senator Obama would condemn such language, since it was part of his campaign," McCain said.

"That kind of language is unnecessary," he said.

Jamie Selzler, director of the North Dakota Democratic Party, defended Schultz. "I'm not going to criticize Ed Schultz. He gave a rousing speech that got the group excited and we appreciated that he did that," Selzler said.

The roles were reversed in February, when McCain quickly condemned the anti-Obama remarks of conservative talk radio host Bill Cunningham when he spoke at a McCain campaign rally. Cunningham referred repeatedly to Obama using his full name — Barack Hussein Obama — and called him a "hack, Chicago-style" politician.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.
updated 4:43 p.m. CT, Sat., April. 5, 2008

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23972398/

© 2008 MSNBC.com

Soldiers' Deployments to Go Gack to 1 year

It is about freaking time! The utter incompetence of the Bush Administration, combined with its lack of integrity, has shaken the common defense of our nation, tarnished the honor of our troops, weakened families, broken marriages, and destroyed lives. The Democrats are either unwilling or unable to stop the tyranny of the president...come on Republicans and conservatives, stand up for what you believe in! The policies of George Bush and Dick Cheney have resulted in the complete opposite of what you state is crucial to our nation. Speak truth to power...even if it means speaking painful truth to your own!


Do you really want to be remembered as the party that supported Nixon and Bush...?


* Deployments were extended to 15 months last year for military buildup
* Top military officials worry about Iraq war's growing strain on troops and families
* Restoration to one-year combat tours will begin in summer, the AP says
* Senior official says soldiers will deploy for 12 months, get 12 months rest at home

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Bush administration plans to announce next week that U.S. soldiers' combat tours will be reduced from 15 months to 12 months in Iraq and Afghanistan beginning later this summer, The Associated Press has learned.

The decision is expected to get final, formal approval in the days ahead. It comes as Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, prepares to deliver a progress report to Congress next week on the improved security situation there. He is also expected to make recommendations for future troop levels.

A senior administration official said Friday that plans are to deploy soldiers for 12 months and then give them 12 months rest time at home. Exactly which units would be affected is not clear. The official spoke on condition of anonymity ahead of the announcement.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates made the decision to extend deployments from 12 to 15 months last year, because that was the only way the Army could provide enough troops for the Bush-ordered military buildup aimed at quelling the violence in Baghdad.

Gates; Gen. George Casey, Army chief of staff; and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have since said that they wanted to go back to 12-month tours as soon as possible.

Casey has pushed shorter deployments to reduce the strain on troops battered by long and repeated tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. But that goal has been hindered by the security demands in Iraq.

Officials have been tightlipped in recent days about the move to reduce the tours.

Gates said Friday that he expected a decision by President Bush "fairly soon" on the Army's proposal. But he also cautioned that cutting troops' time on the battlefront will impose limits on what the military can do in the future.

"So I think the bottom line is, we're all still looking at that. But I think we'll have a better idea of what we think we can do, what we ought to do, in the fairly near future," Gates said.

What the future holds for troops in Iraq will become clearer when Petraeus goes before congressional committees Tuesday.

Petraeus is expected to lay out his proposal for a pause in troop cuts after July, when the last of the five additional brigades ordered to Iraq last year have come home. And he will probably tell lawmakers how many more troops could be withdrawn this year, as long as conditions in Iraq remained stable.

His presentation will include Iraq war statistics reflecting the reduction in violence over the past seven months, but it will also note the latest spike in fighting in Basra, as Iraqi security forces took on Shiite militias, and the attacks that stretched out into Baghdad.

Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, are expected to tout political advancements by the Iraqis, although they will note that much more needs to be done.

Officials said Friday that the Army proposal to reduce tours is on track. Top military leaders made it clear to Bush in a closed-door meeting late last month that they are worried about the war's growing strain on troops and their families.

There are now 158,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, including 18 combat brigades, down from a peak of 20 brigades for much of the past year. By the end of July, military leaders have said those numbers would fall to 140,000 troops, including 15 combat brigades.

Casey has said he could reduce combat tours if the demands on the Army were cut back to a total of 15 brigades in the war zone. At the end of July, there would be 13 in Iraq, along with two Marine units, and two Army brigades in Afghanistan.

In a related move Friday, Democrats signaled that they don't see much hope in ending the Iraq war this year so long as Bush insists that U.S. troops remain committed there in large numbers.

Still, party leaders wrote to Bush on Friday to tell him it's not too late to change course and plead with him not to leave the war for the next president to handle.

"We are deeply concerned that you and the congressional Republican leadership are intent on staying the current course throughout your administration and then handing the Iraq war off to future presidents," the Democrats wrote.

Others said they hope to see continued efforts to force troop withdrawals, but they acknowledged that they were unlikely to succeed.

"I expect most of our troops to still be there" come the end of the year, said Sen. Carl Levin, D-Michigan, chairman of the Armed Services Committee.

"Until there's either a big enough majority in the Senate or a change in the president's [approach], I don't see a significant improvement situation improvement in Iraq," Levin said.

Sen. Joe Biden, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, predicted that the situation in Iraq will grow considerably worse by September "because the administration seems to have no political game plan."

Since Democrats lack a veto-proof majority, they have repeatedly failed to force Bush to accept any anti-war legislation, including one measure supported by many Republicans that would have required that troops spend more time at home between combat tours.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

Find this article at:


http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/04/05/combat.tours.ap/index.html?iref=topnews