Robert Bryce - When the chairman of the world’s largest food company says that using food crops to make biofuels is “absolute madness,” sensible people should take heed.
Alas, President Obama, along with a Congress that is dominated by Big Ag interests, just doesn’t seem to care that Peter Brabeck, the chairman of the Swiss food giant, Nestle, made that very declaration last month. And that blithe ignorance of the madness of biofuels is resulting in some truly horrifying results. Here are the numbers: This year, the US corn ethanol sector will consume 40 percent of all US corn – that’s about 15 percent of global corn production or 5 percent of all global grain – in order to produce a volume of motor fuel with the energy equivalent of about 0.6 percent of global oil needs.
Congress not only lavishes subsidies on the corn ethanol scam, it has mandated the use of corn ethanol, and provided tariff protections to an industry that is helping push global food prices to all-time highs and shrink grain reserves at the very same time that global grain production is faltering and protests over food prices are commonplace.
The quantity of grain to be consumed this year for US ethanol production – 4.9 billion bushels – boggles the mind. That’s more than twice as much as all the corn produced in Brazil and more than six times as much as is grown in India. Put another way, that’s more corn than the output of the European Union, Mexico, Argentina, and India combined.
Despite these facts, last month, President Obama, in his State of the Union speech, said “we can break our dependence on oil with biofuels.” Meanwhile, the Iowa Caucus, the nation’s first presidential primary is now less than one year away. And Newt Gingrich, the former speaker of the US House, who's dearly hoping that he can be a viable candidate for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, was recently in Iowa cravenly wooing the ethanol producers and slamming “big city” critics of the ethanol industry. Alas, there’s little reason to expect much bravery out of Gingrich’s fellow Republicans on Capitol Hill. Speaker of the House John Boehner recently told reporters not to expect cuts to the ethanol subsidies because they are “not in the discretionary spending pot.”
While Obama prevaricates and Congress dithers, ethanol boosters are once again claiming that their sector has negligible effect on grain prices. Instead, they blame surging grain prices on, well, everything but their industry. To be sure, bad weather in Russia and Australia has cut grain harvest in those countries. In addition, rising demand for grain in the developing world is affecting prices.
But the events of the last few weeks -- corn futures at near-record highs and social unrest related to food prices – are nearly identical to the mayhem that occurred in 2007 and 2008. Back then, at least 15 studies, including ones by Purdue University, the World Bank and the Congressional Research Service, exposed the link between increasing ethanol production and higher food prices. Soaring food prices led to violent protests in Egypt, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Haiti, Mauritania, Ethiopia, Madagascar, the Philippines and Indonesia. And worries about adequate food stocks led several countries to ban food exports.
New studies are, once again, finding a direct link between the corn ethanol scam and higher food prices. In December, a study by two US agriculture economists, Thomas Elam and Steve Meyer, found that corn prices are being pushed dramatically higher by demand from the ethanol sector. Elam and Meyer, who have done consulting work for the meat industry, found that without the ethanol mandates, the average price of corn would now be lower by more than $2 per bushel. And they conclude that “biofuels policy has caused significant cost increases for all users of feedgrains.”
There are many unfortunate aspects to America’s corn ethanol insanity. But among the most unfortunate is that US policymakers were warned, and they were warned by the Rand Corporation, one of the most conservative defense-oriented think tanks in America. In May 2008, Rand Corporation issued a report which said that diverting corn to the ethanol sector was not only bad economics, but a security threat: “Using corn for ethanol is economically inefficient and has harmed US national security. Diverting corn from food to ethanol production has pushed up world market prices for grains and other foods, which, in 2008, resulted in riots in a number of developing countries.”
In recent weeks, we’ve seen food-price hikes and protests that are reminiscent of 2008. There have been food riots in Algeria and Mozambique. Last month, some 8,000 Jordanians protested in the streets of Amman and other cities to protest rising food prices. In Egypt, the world’s biggest wheat importer, wheat prices are up by 30 percent over the past 12 months. This week, protesters took to the streets in India to protest surging food costs.
The surging price of wheat is being stoked by rising corn prices, which have doubled over the past six months and are now at about $7 per bushel. “Higher corn prices always means higher wheat prices,” says Bill Lapp, president of Advanced Economic Solutions, an Omaha-based commodity consulting firm.
David Orden, a senior research fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington, told me that surging corn prices is “a continuation of what happened in 2008.” The push for biofuels, he said, “has clearly tightened up agricultural commodity markets. That’s good for farmers, but it is not good for poor people around the world.”
Many of those poor live in the US. Some 43.6 million Americans, about 14 percent of the population, are now receiving federal food stamps. Since October 2008, the number of Americans relying on food stamps jumped by 41.5 percent and enrollment in the program has increased for 26 consecutive months. And thanks to the ethanol scam, those many millions are being priced out of the meat aisle. Over the past year, beef prices have risen more than 6 percent and pork prices are up 11 percent. Economists are expecting overall grocery prices in the US to rise by about 5 percent this year.
But the real – and likely more dangerous – food-price increases will happen outside the US. Last year, the OECD projected that global grain prices are likely to be as much as 40 percent higher by 2020, and a London-based non-profit entity, ActionAid, predicted that some 600 million more people could be left hungry by 2020 due to increased production of biofuels.
Brabeck, the chairman of Nestle, the world’s biggest food company, has rightly put the spotlight on the biofuels madness. As the head of a company with $100 billion in annual food-related revenues, Brabeck clearly has a keen understanding of the global food industry. And last month during the World Economic Forum in Davos, he identified the stunningly obvious solution to the ongoing insanity. “No food for fuel,” he said.
“No food for fuel” should be the rallying cry on Capitol Hill and at the United Nations. It should be a required oath for all of the candidates (and Gingrich in particular) who are planning to campaign in Iowa for the 2012 presidential contest. As the biggest ethanol-producing state, Iowa has long had a stranglehold on America’s presidential selection process because it holds the first primary. And because it holds the first primary, the state’s powerful agriculture interests have, for decades, prevented viable candidates from speaking out against the corn ethanol madness.
It’s time – no, it’s long past time -- to heed Brabeck’s advice. Stop the madness.
Monday, February 28, 2011
WaPo: Battle Between Wisconsin Gov't Workers And Average American Taxpayers
Ed Morrissey - Give the Washington Post credit for putting the fight over state budgets in the proper perspective. Union protesters attempted to cast the debate as one of the rich against the middle class, but that presumes that the entire middle class works in the public sector and that everyone else is “the rich.” Elected officials — even some Democrats — see it more as a battle over control of public policy between public-sector unions and the taxpayers, and have begun to understand that the taxpayers and voters should prevail:
At least some elected officials normally sympathetic to industrial unions were questioning whether they should side with government workers.
“I believe in what unions do, but as an elected official I represent the taxpayers,” said Jeff Berding, a registered Democrat on the Cincinnati City Council who ran as an independent after he opposed the party on a union issue. “I’m trying to get the best deal for them.”
The divide between government worker unions and their opponents, playing out now in several state capitals, highlights a critical aspect of the evolving labor movement.
The teachers union attempted to explain why union representation should matter to taxpayers:
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, was in Columbus this week for protests. She said in an interview that the argument that public unions are fighting the taxpayer is misguided.
“You have long-standing history in Ohio of using collective bargaining to do transformative things in education,” she said.
Transformative? Let’s take a look at the results in Ohio for students. Ohio barely outscores the national average in science and writing, and the gap narrowed in mathematics and reading over the last several years. What percentage of students have demonstrated grade-level proficiency by the 8th grade in Ohio? The results are hardly transformative:
* Mathematics: 36%
* Reading: 37%
* Science: 41%
* Writing: 32%
How about Wisconsin, the scene of this month’s protests?
* Mathematics: 39%
* Reading: 34%
* Science: 41%
* Writing: 36%
But what is transformative in Wisconsin is the amount of money that the teachers union can squeeze out of the state through collective bargaining on benefits, which the Walker budget-repair bill would disallow. The WEA Trust, explains a report from reform group Public School Spending, makes a fortune for the Wisconsin Education Association by imposing a Cadillac health-care plan (which would be immune from the ObamaCare tax) at Lamborghini pricing:
WEA Trust, an insurance company established and closely associated with the Wisconsin Education Association Council (WEAC), siphons millions of crucial dollars from K-12 schools and their students every year.
WEA Trust has grown very fat on public school dollars, with a net worth of $316 million and a team of 12 administrators all receiving compensation packages worth six figures per year. …
The problem is state law, which makes the identity of a school district’s employee health insurance carrier a topic of collective bargaining. That means school boards and local school employee unions must agree on the insurance company that will provide health coverage.
So most unions have traditionally come to the negotiating table demanding expensive WEA Trust insurance coverage, and the strategy has been effective. About 64 percent of Wisconsin’s 426 districts carry WEA Trust insurance, despite its prohibitive costs.
What “transformative” result do taxpayers get from this added expense? None at all, except for a wealth transfer from taxpayers to the WEA and its dozen administrators making six-figure salaries. In fact, the WEA Trust looks like a racket to fund union activities rather than provide responsible health-care coverage to public employees.
It’s the clearest example of the need to end collective bargaining. If states and localities don’t have the ability to find cost-efficient coverage for their employees, then it will be impossible for government to maintain any kind of cost control while unions control public policy.
At least some elected officials normally sympathetic to industrial unions were questioning whether they should side with government workers.
“I believe in what unions do, but as an elected official I represent the taxpayers,” said Jeff Berding, a registered Democrat on the Cincinnati City Council who ran as an independent after he opposed the party on a union issue. “I’m trying to get the best deal for them.”
The divide between government worker unions and their opponents, playing out now in several state capitals, highlights a critical aspect of the evolving labor movement.
The teachers union attempted to explain why union representation should matter to taxpayers:
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, was in Columbus this week for protests. She said in an interview that the argument that public unions are fighting the taxpayer is misguided.
“You have long-standing history in Ohio of using collective bargaining to do transformative things in education,” she said.
Transformative? Let’s take a look at the results in Ohio for students. Ohio barely outscores the national average in science and writing, and the gap narrowed in mathematics and reading over the last several years. What percentage of students have demonstrated grade-level proficiency by the 8th grade in Ohio? The results are hardly transformative:
* Mathematics: 36%
* Reading: 37%
* Science: 41%
* Writing: 32%
How about Wisconsin, the scene of this month’s protests?
* Mathematics: 39%
* Reading: 34%
* Science: 41%
* Writing: 36%
But what is transformative in Wisconsin is the amount of money that the teachers union can squeeze out of the state through collective bargaining on benefits, which the Walker budget-repair bill would disallow. The WEA Trust, explains a report from reform group Public School Spending, makes a fortune for the Wisconsin Education Association by imposing a Cadillac health-care plan (which would be immune from the ObamaCare tax) at Lamborghini pricing:
WEA Trust, an insurance company established and closely associated with the Wisconsin Education Association Council (WEAC), siphons millions of crucial dollars from K-12 schools and their students every year.
WEA Trust has grown very fat on public school dollars, with a net worth of $316 million and a team of 12 administrators all receiving compensation packages worth six figures per year. …
The problem is state law, which makes the identity of a school district’s employee health insurance carrier a topic of collective bargaining. That means school boards and local school employee unions must agree on the insurance company that will provide health coverage.
So most unions have traditionally come to the negotiating table demanding expensive WEA Trust insurance coverage, and the strategy has been effective. About 64 percent of Wisconsin’s 426 districts carry WEA Trust insurance, despite its prohibitive costs.
What “transformative” result do taxpayers get from this added expense? None at all, except for a wealth transfer from taxpayers to the WEA and its dozen administrators making six-figure salaries. In fact, the WEA Trust looks like a racket to fund union activities rather than provide responsible health-care coverage to public employees.
It’s the clearest example of the need to end collective bargaining. If states and localities don’t have the ability to find cost-efficient coverage for their employees, then it will be impossible for government to maintain any kind of cost control while unions control public policy.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Iraq's Largest Oil Refinery Shutdown After Attack
BAGHDAD – Gunmen attacked Iraq's largest oil refinery before dawn Saturday, killing a guard and detonating bombs that sparked a fire and forced the facility to halt operations, officials said.
A few hours later, a small refinery in the south shut down after a technical failure sparked a fire in a storage unit, an official said.
If not fixed swiftly, the two shutdowns could translate into long lines at fuel stations and longer electricity outages. The dearth of reliable electricity — some Iraqis get just a few hours a day — was one of the leading complaints of protesters during violent anti-government protests across Iraq on Friday.
The attack on Iraq's largest refinery, Beiji, began at about 3:30 a.m. Assailants carrying pistols fitted with silencers attacked guards and planted bombs near some production units for benzene and kerosene, said the spokesman for Salahuddin province, Mohammed al-Asi.
One guard was killed and another wounded, al-Asi said.
Iraqi Oil Ministry spokesman Assem Jihad said an investigation would be launched and that he hoped operations could resume shortly.
The Beiji refinery, located about 155 miles (250 kilometers) north of Baghdad, has two sections. The attackers targeted the installation's North Refinery that handles 150,000 barrels a day. The second section, the Salahuddin Refinery, is under renovation. It used to process 70,000 barrels per day.
At the height of the insurgency from 2004 to late 2007, the Beiji refinery was under control of Sunni militants who used to siphon off crude and petroleum products to finance their operations.
Hours after the Beiji facility was attacked, a small refinery in Samawa, a city on the Euphrates River about 230 miles (370 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad, went offline due to a fire in the storage unit, according to a local official.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to release information, said the fire was caused by a technical failure, not foul play. He wouldn't say when work would resume at the plant which has the capacity of 30,000 barrels of a day.
Iraq's overall refining capacity is currently slightly over 500,000 barrels per day. Its three main oil refineries — Dora, Shuaiba and Beiji — process slightly over half of the 700,000 barrels-per-day capacity they had before the 2003 U.S. invasion.
Iraq sits on the world's third-largest known oil reserves with an estimated 115 billion barrels, but its production is far below its potential due to decades of war, U.N. sanctions, lack of foreign investment and insurgent attacks.
Iraq has been importing refined products since 2003 because of the dilapidated refining sector and booming local demand.
Saturday's closures could spell trouble for Iraqi consumers, especially at a time when the weather is just beginning to warm and more citizens will be relying on their air conditioning.
Also Saturday, health officials and police said two teens, ages 12 and 18, died of injuries sustained in the anti-government protests, bringing the death toll for the day to 14. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release information.
On Friday, thousands marched on government buildings and clashed with security forces in cities across Iraq in an outpouring of anger, the largest and most violent anti-government protests in the country since political unrest began spreading in the Arab world weeks ago.
The protests, billed as a "Day of Rage, were fueled by anger over corruption, chronic unemployment and shoddy public services from the Shiite-dominated government.
A few hours later, a small refinery in the south shut down after a technical failure sparked a fire in a storage unit, an official said.
If not fixed swiftly, the two shutdowns could translate into long lines at fuel stations and longer electricity outages. The dearth of reliable electricity — some Iraqis get just a few hours a day — was one of the leading complaints of protesters during violent anti-government protests across Iraq on Friday.
The attack on Iraq's largest refinery, Beiji, began at about 3:30 a.m. Assailants carrying pistols fitted with silencers attacked guards and planted bombs near some production units for benzene and kerosene, said the spokesman for Salahuddin province, Mohammed al-Asi.
One guard was killed and another wounded, al-Asi said.
Iraqi Oil Ministry spokesman Assem Jihad said an investigation would be launched and that he hoped operations could resume shortly.
The Beiji refinery, located about 155 miles (250 kilometers) north of Baghdad, has two sections. The attackers targeted the installation's North Refinery that handles 150,000 barrels a day. The second section, the Salahuddin Refinery, is under renovation. It used to process 70,000 barrels per day.
At the height of the insurgency from 2004 to late 2007, the Beiji refinery was under control of Sunni militants who used to siphon off crude and petroleum products to finance their operations.
Hours after the Beiji facility was attacked, a small refinery in Samawa, a city on the Euphrates River about 230 miles (370 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad, went offline due to a fire in the storage unit, according to a local official.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to release information, said the fire was caused by a technical failure, not foul play. He wouldn't say when work would resume at the plant which has the capacity of 30,000 barrels of a day.
Iraq's overall refining capacity is currently slightly over 500,000 barrels per day. Its three main oil refineries — Dora, Shuaiba and Beiji — process slightly over half of the 700,000 barrels-per-day capacity they had before the 2003 U.S. invasion.
Iraq sits on the world's third-largest known oil reserves with an estimated 115 billion barrels, but its production is far below its potential due to decades of war, U.N. sanctions, lack of foreign investment and insurgent attacks.
Iraq has been importing refined products since 2003 because of the dilapidated refining sector and booming local demand.
Saturday's closures could spell trouble for Iraqi consumers, especially at a time when the weather is just beginning to warm and more citizens will be relying on their air conditioning.
Also Saturday, health officials and police said two teens, ages 12 and 18, died of injuries sustained in the anti-government protests, bringing the death toll for the day to 14. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release information.
On Friday, thousands marched on government buildings and clashed with security forces in cities across Iraq in an outpouring of anger, the largest and most violent anti-government protests in the country since political unrest began spreading in the Arab world weeks ago.
The protests, billed as a "Day of Rage, were fueled by anger over corruption, chronic unemployment and shoddy public services from the Shiite-dominated government.
Day Of Rage: More Proof That Democracts Hate Democracy In America
Doug Ross Journal - The voters of Wisconsin traditionally vote Democrat. But in 2010 they'd had enough. Enough taxes. Enough failure. Enough bloated local government. And enough of the Obama-Pelosi-Reid triumvirate that jammed thousand-page bills down the taxpayers' throats without bothering to read them or, worse, understand them.
So they kicked the Democrats out of office.
But that hasn't stopped the very same defeated Democrat thugs and losers from trying to sabotage the democratic process -- because they hate the voters and they hate America.
In the end, the bill that frightened off the entire Democratic caucus in the Wisconsin state Senate passed easily in the lower chamber, 51-17, in what had been a foregone conclusion:
After a bitter, 61-hour debate that was the longest in living memory, the sleep-starved state Assembly voted in just seconds early Friday to approve a watershed proposal repealing most union bargaining rights held by public workers.
Just after 1 a.m., Republicans cut off debate on Gov. Scott Walker’s bill and in pell-mell fashion the body voted 51-17 to pass it. In the confusion, nearly one-third of the body – 28 lawmakers including 25 Democrats, two Republicans and the body’s lone independent – did not vote on the bill at all.
Watch this stunning video of their reaction to the vote. It sounds like the monkey cage at the zoo after a wolverine has snuck in. I am not kidding – they don’t even sound human.
Don't be disheartened.
As Maksim says, "I don’t know about anyone else but listening to the proggies freak out makes me smile ear to ear."
So they kicked the Democrats out of office.
But that hasn't stopped the very same defeated Democrat thugs and losers from trying to sabotage the democratic process -- because they hate the voters and they hate America.
In the end, the bill that frightened off the entire Democratic caucus in the Wisconsin state Senate passed easily in the lower chamber, 51-17, in what had been a foregone conclusion:
After a bitter, 61-hour debate that was the longest in living memory, the sleep-starved state Assembly voted in just seconds early Friday to approve a watershed proposal repealing most union bargaining rights held by public workers.
Just after 1 a.m., Republicans cut off debate on Gov. Scott Walker’s bill and in pell-mell fashion the body voted 51-17 to pass it. In the confusion, nearly one-third of the body – 28 lawmakers including 25 Democrats, two Republicans and the body’s lone independent – did not vote on the bill at all.
Watch this stunning video of their reaction to the vote. It sounds like the monkey cage at the zoo after a wolverine has snuck in. I am not kidding – they don’t even sound human.
Don't be disheartened.
As Maksim says, "I don’t know about anyone else but listening to the proggies freak out makes me smile ear to ear."
Thursday, February 24, 2011
New Yorkers 51% Unfavorable Opinion Of Teachers Union
NEW YORK (Reuters) – New Yorkers want decisions about which teachers to fire based on performance not seniority, a poll showed on Thursday, giving Mayor Michael Bloomberg a boost in his conflict with the teachers' union.
By a margin of 85 percent to 12 percent, voters say layoffs should be based on performance rather than seniority, the Quinnipiac University poll said.
The poll was statewide, but the issue is hotly contested in New York City, where Bloomberg proposed laying off thousands of teachers in his budget for fiscal 2012 and wants to end the practice of eliminating the most recently hired.
The dispute is part of a national debate about how cities and states should balance budgets under stress from the sluggish economy and reduced federal aid, a crisis that has injected volatility into the traditionally safe $2.8 trillion municipal bond market.
Fifty percent of respondents said they had a favorable opinion of public school teachers versus 22 percent with an unfavorable opinion, but a similar majority of 51 percent said teachers' unions played a negative role in education. Thirty-nine percent said unions played a positive role.
Bloomberg and the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) have been in a running dispute on the "last in, first out" policy.
The union says layoffs should not be necessary under the city's budget and that past methods to evaluate teachers were flawed and a new system begun last year was still unproven.
School principals oppose a discretionary firing policy because of the politics involved, UFT spokesman Dick Riley said.
"They (principals) know layoff by seniority is not an ideal system, but it's better than letting politics take over the process, and they know that's what's going to happen if you let politicians start making these decisions," Riley told Reuters in an email.
UFT television ads target Bloomberg for emphasizing who to fire rather than how to save jobs and criticize his tax policy for not extracting more from the wealthy to help fund education.
The February 15-21 poll of 1,457 registered voters had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.6 percent, Quinnipiac said.
By a margin of 85 percent to 12 percent, voters say layoffs should be based on performance rather than seniority, the Quinnipiac University poll said.
The poll was statewide, but the issue is hotly contested in New York City, where Bloomberg proposed laying off thousands of teachers in his budget for fiscal 2012 and wants to end the practice of eliminating the most recently hired.
The dispute is part of a national debate about how cities and states should balance budgets under stress from the sluggish economy and reduced federal aid, a crisis that has injected volatility into the traditionally safe $2.8 trillion municipal bond market.
Fifty percent of respondents said they had a favorable opinion of public school teachers versus 22 percent with an unfavorable opinion, but a similar majority of 51 percent said teachers' unions played a negative role in education. Thirty-nine percent said unions played a positive role.
Bloomberg and the United Federation of Teachers (UFT) have been in a running dispute on the "last in, first out" policy.
The union says layoffs should not be necessary under the city's budget and that past methods to evaluate teachers were flawed and a new system begun last year was still unproven.
School principals oppose a discretionary firing policy because of the politics involved, UFT spokesman Dick Riley said.
"They (principals) know layoff by seniority is not an ideal system, but it's better than letting politics take over the process, and they know that's what's going to happen if you let politicians start making these decisions," Riley told Reuters in an email.
UFT television ads target Bloomberg for emphasizing who to fire rather than how to save jobs and criticize his tax policy for not extracting more from the wealthy to help fund education.
The February 15-21 poll of 1,457 registered voters had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.6 percent, Quinnipiac said.
Saudi Arabia Rulers Offer $36 Billion in Assistance
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – Saudi Arabia's rulers answered the Arab world's winter of rage with money: throwing $36 billion into housing and other social assistance channels in attempts to quell rumblings of dissent. Iran's president offered more bombast as Tehran tries to project sympathy for protesters.
The two approaches this week — largesse versus rhetoric — captures the style and stakes for the region's heavyweight rivals as Iran hunts for gains and Saudi tries hard to stamp out any threats.
Already, the region has been reshaped by the fall of decades-old regimes and growing pressures on others, including Moammar Gadhafi's 42-year rule in Libya. But the ultimate questions for many are whether the pro-Western Saudi monarchy can ride out the unrest, and if Iran will capitalize on the changes with more footholds and influence in areas closely tied to Washington's interests.
"If an uprising occurs in Saudi Arabia, it will have a dramatic impact that is off the charts," said Theodore Karasik, a regional affairs expert at the Dubai-based Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis. "Policymakers will have to grapple with it for decades."
Both nations have been touched by the region's two-month-old turmoil: Iran with a renewal of street clashes and Saudi's rulers facing rare challenges to their absolute power, including a call for protests March 11.
Their responses, meanwhile, have reflected their mutual suspicions and their own survival instincts.
Saudi authorities have stood strongly behind Bahrain's Sunni monarchy, which is under siege by a revolt from that tiny kingdom's Shiite majority after decades of grievances over discrimination and other abuses. For the Saudis — and the rest of the Gulf's Sunni rulers — the Shiites in Bahrain represent a potential beachhead for Shiite powerhouse Iran.
On Wednesday, Bahrain's monarch held urgent talks in neighboring Saudi Arabia with King Abdullah only hours after he returned home from recuperating from back surgery. In a clear sign of concern, Abdullah made the decree for the flood of cash into social programs and bank funds even before his plane touched down from Morocco.
Social media sites have been buzzing with appeals for a pro-reform march next month and calls for more freedoms, including lifting some of the strict limits on women such as bans on driving and voting. Activists also are pushing for the release of university professors jailed for forming a political party.
"We are witnessing a rebellion of the Arab peoples throughout the Arab world," said Nicholas Burns, Nicholas Burns, a former top State Department diplomat with long experience in the region. "While it may be most acute in Bahrain and Libya, there is every reason to believe that it will continue to spread for the time being."
Iran, meanwhile, has shown again its split personality. Its leaders, including President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have portrayed Iran as a sort of father figure for the pro-democracy movements, which they claim have taken inspiration from its Islamic Revolution against the U.S.-backed shah.
At the same time, Iranian authorities are showing no mercy to oppositions groups in a country rejuvenated by the chain-reaction uprisings. Protesters' chants were similar to those during the chaos after Ahmadinejad's disputed elections in 2009, but with a current twist.
"Ben Ali, Mubarak, it's Seyed Ali's turn," protesters cried last week, linking the toppled Tunisian and Egyptian presidents with Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Riot police moved in with tear gas and batons.
"It is unimaginable that there is someone who kills and bombards his own people. This is very grotesque," Ahmadinejad said Wednesday on national TV after Gadhafi's forces attacked protesters.
More than once, the Obama administration and others have taken jabs at Tehran's "hypocrisy."
But Western policy makers cannot so easily dismiss the prospect that Iran could come out of the Mideast shake-ups with some new opportunities — just as the U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan cleared the way for Iran gaining major influence with Shiite brethren.
One longtime foe, Hosni Mubarak, is gone. Egypt's emerging political class, which includes Islamist groups, is unlikely to be so tightly glued to U.S. policies on Iran. The Shiite-led uprising in Bahrain and relentless pressure on the American-allied president in Yemen also could hand Iran some new political space in the region.
And any significant cracks in the king's hold on Saudi Arabia, which has a small Shiite minority, would undoubtedly be hailed by Tehran.
Iran sent two warships through the Suez Canal this week for the first time since the 1979 Islamic Revolution on a voyage to Syria that could take the vessels just outside Israeli waters.
Iran's plans for the Mediterranean were announced before Egypt's protests threatened Mubarak's regime. But it was a significant display of Tehran's confidence and efforts to expand its military reach beyond the Gulf, where the Bahrain-based U.S. 5th Fleet is the Pentagon's main counterweight.
Iran's Revolutionary Guard sent ships on a courtesy call to Qatar in January and held navy maneuvers with Oman this month in further signs of expanding ties in the Gulf.
The Dubai-based analyst Karasik said Iran increasingly views itself "as a pure regional hegemon because of the uprisings."
"They're taking advantage of the strategic change," he said.
It also suggests that Washington's clout could be slipping as its old-guard friends fall way or face demands for serious political overhauls.
"The rising tide of people power is so intense that the Middle East will either become democratic or will come under more stern control," said Ehsan Ahrari, a regional analyst and commentator based in Alexandria, Virginia. "Either way, the days of U.S. capabilities to influence events seem to be numbered."
There is still no clear signal about how far the protest wave with reach. The next test may come in Kuwait, where the nation's strong opposition groups have called for rallies outside parliament on March 8.
Many experts see a messy interregnum in the region with various groups competing for the upper hand and international investors running scared. The only obvious takeaway so far is that the political voices in the new Mideast will be far younger, deeply Web savvy and come in greater varieties — all of which could alter the rules of the Saudi-Iran standoff that has defined the region for decades.
The players include Egypt's once-outlawed Muslim Brotherhood and Bahrain's majority Shiites who have long been under the thumb of the kingdom's Sunni rulers.
"There will be trial and error in the combat for a new era," said Labib Kamhawi, a political analyst in Jordan. "But people, especially the young generation, seem strong and determined to succeed
The two approaches this week — largesse versus rhetoric — captures the style and stakes for the region's heavyweight rivals as Iran hunts for gains and Saudi tries hard to stamp out any threats.
Already, the region has been reshaped by the fall of decades-old regimes and growing pressures on others, including Moammar Gadhafi's 42-year rule in Libya. But the ultimate questions for many are whether the pro-Western Saudi monarchy can ride out the unrest, and if Iran will capitalize on the changes with more footholds and influence in areas closely tied to Washington's interests.
"If an uprising occurs in Saudi Arabia, it will have a dramatic impact that is off the charts," said Theodore Karasik, a regional affairs expert at the Dubai-based Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis. "Policymakers will have to grapple with it for decades."
Both nations have been touched by the region's two-month-old turmoil: Iran with a renewal of street clashes and Saudi's rulers facing rare challenges to their absolute power, including a call for protests March 11.
Their responses, meanwhile, have reflected their mutual suspicions and their own survival instincts.
Saudi authorities have stood strongly behind Bahrain's Sunni monarchy, which is under siege by a revolt from that tiny kingdom's Shiite majority after decades of grievances over discrimination and other abuses. For the Saudis — and the rest of the Gulf's Sunni rulers — the Shiites in Bahrain represent a potential beachhead for Shiite powerhouse Iran.
On Wednesday, Bahrain's monarch held urgent talks in neighboring Saudi Arabia with King Abdullah only hours after he returned home from recuperating from back surgery. In a clear sign of concern, Abdullah made the decree for the flood of cash into social programs and bank funds even before his plane touched down from Morocco.
Social media sites have been buzzing with appeals for a pro-reform march next month and calls for more freedoms, including lifting some of the strict limits on women such as bans on driving and voting. Activists also are pushing for the release of university professors jailed for forming a political party.
"We are witnessing a rebellion of the Arab peoples throughout the Arab world," said Nicholas Burns, Nicholas Burns, a former top State Department diplomat with long experience in the region. "While it may be most acute in Bahrain and Libya, there is every reason to believe that it will continue to spread for the time being."
Iran, meanwhile, has shown again its split personality. Its leaders, including President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have portrayed Iran as a sort of father figure for the pro-democracy movements, which they claim have taken inspiration from its Islamic Revolution against the U.S.-backed shah.
At the same time, Iranian authorities are showing no mercy to oppositions groups in a country rejuvenated by the chain-reaction uprisings. Protesters' chants were similar to those during the chaos after Ahmadinejad's disputed elections in 2009, but with a current twist.
"Ben Ali, Mubarak, it's Seyed Ali's turn," protesters cried last week, linking the toppled Tunisian and Egyptian presidents with Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Riot police moved in with tear gas and batons.
"It is unimaginable that there is someone who kills and bombards his own people. This is very grotesque," Ahmadinejad said Wednesday on national TV after Gadhafi's forces attacked protesters.
More than once, the Obama administration and others have taken jabs at Tehran's "hypocrisy."
But Western policy makers cannot so easily dismiss the prospect that Iran could come out of the Mideast shake-ups with some new opportunities — just as the U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan cleared the way for Iran gaining major influence with Shiite brethren.
One longtime foe, Hosni Mubarak, is gone. Egypt's emerging political class, which includes Islamist groups, is unlikely to be so tightly glued to U.S. policies on Iran. The Shiite-led uprising in Bahrain and relentless pressure on the American-allied president in Yemen also could hand Iran some new political space in the region.
And any significant cracks in the king's hold on Saudi Arabia, which has a small Shiite minority, would undoubtedly be hailed by Tehran.
Iran sent two warships through the Suez Canal this week for the first time since the 1979 Islamic Revolution on a voyage to Syria that could take the vessels just outside Israeli waters.
Iran's plans for the Mediterranean were announced before Egypt's protests threatened Mubarak's regime. But it was a significant display of Tehran's confidence and efforts to expand its military reach beyond the Gulf, where the Bahrain-based U.S. 5th Fleet is the Pentagon's main counterweight.
Iran's Revolutionary Guard sent ships on a courtesy call to Qatar in January and held navy maneuvers with Oman this month in further signs of expanding ties in the Gulf.
The Dubai-based analyst Karasik said Iran increasingly views itself "as a pure regional hegemon because of the uprisings."
"They're taking advantage of the strategic change," he said.
It also suggests that Washington's clout could be slipping as its old-guard friends fall way or face demands for serious political overhauls.
"The rising tide of people power is so intense that the Middle East will either become democratic or will come under more stern control," said Ehsan Ahrari, a regional analyst and commentator based in Alexandria, Virginia. "Either way, the days of U.S. capabilities to influence events seem to be numbered."
There is still no clear signal about how far the protest wave with reach. The next test may come in Kuwait, where the nation's strong opposition groups have called for rallies outside parliament on March 8.
Many experts see a messy interregnum in the region with various groups competing for the upper hand and international investors running scared. The only obvious takeaway so far is that the political voices in the new Mideast will be far younger, deeply Web savvy and come in greater varieties — all of which could alter the rules of the Saudi-Iran standoff that has defined the region for decades.
The players include Egypt's once-outlawed Muslim Brotherhood and Bahrain's majority Shiites who have long been under the thumb of the kingdom's Sunni rulers.
"There will be trial and error in the combat for a new era," said Labib Kamhawi, a political analyst in Jordan. "But people, especially the young generation, seem strong and determined to succeed
Moammar Gadhafi Forces Strike Back At Protesters
BENGHAZI, Libya – Army units and militiamen loyal to Moammar Gadhafi struck back against protesters who have risen up in cities close to the capital Thursday, attacking a mosque where many had taken refuge and blasting its minaret and opening fire on others protecting a local airport.
The assaults aimed to push back a rebellion that has moved closer to Gadhafi's bastion in the capital, Tripoli. The revolt has already broken away nearly the eastern half of Libya and unraveled parts of Gadhafi's regime.
In the latest blow to the Libyan leader, a cousin who is one of his closest aides, Ahmed Gadhaf al-Dam, announced that he has defected to Egypt in protest against the regime's bloody crackdown against the uprising, denouncing what he called "grave violations to human rights and human and international laws."
In the city of Zawiya, 30 miles (50 kilometers) west of Tripoli, an army unit attacked a mosque where protesters had been camping inside and in a lot outside for several days, calling for Gadhafi's ouster, a witness said. The soldiers opened fire with automatic weapons and hit the mosque's minaret with anti-aircraft missiles, he said. Some of the young men among the protesters had hunting rifles.
He said there were casualties, but couldn't provide exact figures. He said a day earlier an envoy from Gadhafi had come to the city and warned protesters, "Either leave or you will see a massacre." Zawiya is a key city near an oil port and refineries.
"What is happening is horrible, those who attacked us are not the mercenaries; they are sons of our country," he said, sobbing. After the assault, thousands massed in the city's main Martyrs Square, shouting "leave, leave," in reference to Gadhafi, he said.
"People came to send a clear message: we are not afraid of death or your bullets," he said. "This regime will regret it. History will not forgive them."
The other attack came at a small airport outside Misrata, Libya's third largest city, where rebels claimed control on Wednesday. Militiamen on Thursday attacked a line of residents who were protecting the facility, opening fire with rocket-propelled grenades and mortars, said a resident who saw the assault
"They left piles of human remains and swamp of blood," he said. "The hospitals are packed with those killed and injured." But he could not provide exact figures.
After the attack ended before noon, another Misrata resident said the local radio, now in opposition hands, urged people to march on the airport in support of the protesters. Both residents said the rebellion continues to control the city, located about 120 miles (200 kilometers) east of Tripoli. They and other witnesses around Libya spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.
Gadhafi's crackdown has so far helped him maintain control of Tripoli, a city that holds about a third of Libya's 6 million population. But the uprising by protesters, backed by army units that joined their ranks, has divided the country and threatened to push it toward civil war.
The leader's cousin, Gadhaf al-Dam, is one of the most high level defections to hit the regime so far, after many ambassadors around the world, the justice minister and the interior minister all sided with the protesters. Gadhaf al-Dam belonged to Gadhafi's inner circle, officially his liaison with Egypt, but he also served as Gadhafi's envoy to other world leaders and frequently appeared by his side.
In a statement issued in Cairo on Thursday, Gadhaf al-Dam said he had left Libya for Egypt "in protest and to show disagreement" with the crackdown.
International momentum has been building for action to punish Gadhafi's regime for the bloodshed.
President Barack Obama said the suffering in Libya "is outrageous and it is unacceptable," and he directed his administration to prepare a full range of options, including possible sanctions that could freeze the assets and ban travel to the U.S. by Libyan officials.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy raised the possibility of the European Union cutting off economic ties.
Another proposal gaining some traction was for the United Nations to declare a no-fly zone over Libya to prevent it using warplanes to hit protesters. U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said that if reports of such strikes are confirmed, "there's an immediate need for that level of protection."
Italy's Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said estimates of some 1,000 people killed in the violence in Libya were "credible," although he stressed information about casualties was incomplete. The New York-based Human Rights Watch has put the death toll at nearly 300, according to a partial count.
Moammar Gadhafi's son claimed Thursday that the reported death tolls have been exaggerated, although he didn't provide his own figure. In a press conference aired on state TV, he said the number killed by police and the army had been limited and "talking about hundreds and thousands (killed) is a joke."
He also said a committee had been formed to investigate alleged foreign involvement in the protests.
Earlier Thursday, Libyan TV showed Egyptian passports, CDs and cell phones purportedly belonging to detainees who had allegedly confessed to plotting "terrorist" operations against the Libyan people. Other footage showed a dozen men lying on the ground, with their faces down, blindfolded and handcuffed. Rifles and guns were laid out next to them.
The assaults aimed to push back a rebellion that has moved closer to Gadhafi's bastion in the capital, Tripoli. The revolt has already broken away nearly the eastern half of Libya and unraveled parts of Gadhafi's regime.
In the latest blow to the Libyan leader, a cousin who is one of his closest aides, Ahmed Gadhaf al-Dam, announced that he has defected to Egypt in protest against the regime's bloody crackdown against the uprising, denouncing what he called "grave violations to human rights and human and international laws."
In the city of Zawiya, 30 miles (50 kilometers) west of Tripoli, an army unit attacked a mosque where protesters had been camping inside and in a lot outside for several days, calling for Gadhafi's ouster, a witness said. The soldiers opened fire with automatic weapons and hit the mosque's minaret with anti-aircraft missiles, he said. Some of the young men among the protesters had hunting rifles.
He said there were casualties, but couldn't provide exact figures. He said a day earlier an envoy from Gadhafi had come to the city and warned protesters, "Either leave or you will see a massacre." Zawiya is a key city near an oil port and refineries.
"What is happening is horrible, those who attacked us are not the mercenaries; they are sons of our country," he said, sobbing. After the assault, thousands massed in the city's main Martyrs Square, shouting "leave, leave," in reference to Gadhafi, he said.
"People came to send a clear message: we are not afraid of death or your bullets," he said. "This regime will regret it. History will not forgive them."
The other attack came at a small airport outside Misrata, Libya's third largest city, where rebels claimed control on Wednesday. Militiamen on Thursday attacked a line of residents who were protecting the facility, opening fire with rocket-propelled grenades and mortars, said a resident who saw the assault
"They left piles of human remains and swamp of blood," he said. "The hospitals are packed with those killed and injured." But he could not provide exact figures.
After the attack ended before noon, another Misrata resident said the local radio, now in opposition hands, urged people to march on the airport in support of the protesters. Both residents said the rebellion continues to control the city, located about 120 miles (200 kilometers) east of Tripoli. They and other witnesses around Libya spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.
Gadhafi's crackdown has so far helped him maintain control of Tripoli, a city that holds about a third of Libya's 6 million population. But the uprising by protesters, backed by army units that joined their ranks, has divided the country and threatened to push it toward civil war.
The leader's cousin, Gadhaf al-Dam, is one of the most high level defections to hit the regime so far, after many ambassadors around the world, the justice minister and the interior minister all sided with the protesters. Gadhaf al-Dam belonged to Gadhafi's inner circle, officially his liaison with Egypt, but he also served as Gadhafi's envoy to other world leaders and frequently appeared by his side.
In a statement issued in Cairo on Thursday, Gadhaf al-Dam said he had left Libya for Egypt "in protest and to show disagreement" with the crackdown.
International momentum has been building for action to punish Gadhafi's regime for the bloodshed.
President Barack Obama said the suffering in Libya "is outrageous and it is unacceptable," and he directed his administration to prepare a full range of options, including possible sanctions that could freeze the assets and ban travel to the U.S. by Libyan officials.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy raised the possibility of the European Union cutting off economic ties.
Another proposal gaining some traction was for the United Nations to declare a no-fly zone over Libya to prevent it using warplanes to hit protesters. U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said that if reports of such strikes are confirmed, "there's an immediate need for that level of protection."
Italy's Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said estimates of some 1,000 people killed in the violence in Libya were "credible," although he stressed information about casualties was incomplete. The New York-based Human Rights Watch has put the death toll at nearly 300, according to a partial count.
Moammar Gadhafi's son claimed Thursday that the reported death tolls have been exaggerated, although he didn't provide his own figure. In a press conference aired on state TV, he said the number killed by police and the army had been limited and "talking about hundreds and thousands (killed) is a joke."
He also said a committee had been formed to investigate alleged foreign involvement in the protests.
Earlier Thursday, Libyan TV showed Egyptian passports, CDs and cell phones purportedly belonging to detainees who had allegedly confessed to plotting "terrorist" operations against the Libyan people. Other footage showed a dozen men lying on the ground, with their faces down, blindfolded and handcuffed. Rifles and guns were laid out next to them.
Zogby Poll: 52% Support Gov. Walker Plan In Wisconsin
UTICA, New York - Two-thirds of likely voters agree that state legislatures have the authority to cut state employee salaries and 52 percent agree they can void collective bargaining agreements to reduce spending, according to a Zogby International poll.
Voiding collective bargaining agreements is also seen as preferable to continuing to pay state employees at current levels or layoffs of state workers in order to reduce spending and control deficits.
These results come from a Zogby Interactive poll conducted from Feb. 18-21, 2011.
Voiding collective bargaining agreements is also seen as preferable to continuing to pay state employees at current levels or layoffs of state workers in order to reduce spending and control deficits.
These results come from a Zogby Interactive poll conducted from Feb. 18-21, 2011.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Oil Prices Surge To $100 A Barrel
Joshua Schneyer - I had a nice discussion last night about the transfer of the organizational and confrontational tactics of the left to the right (see my post from last year on the subject). Last night my best example was the startling story that the Wisconsin Department of Regulation and Licensing has started to investigate more than 300 email complaints against those doctors who were giving out fraudulent "notes" that purported to excuse teachers from working so that they could demonstrate against Republicans. Conservatives never used to be that smart. They have learned, in part because they have adopted the teachings of Saul Alinsky who -- and this part is hilarious -- they only heard of in the first place because the Democrats nominated a community organizer to run as their candidate for president.
Today we get another example of a deft procedural counter-punch from Republicans, albeit from inside the parliamentary system:
Sometimes politics makes you laugh out loud. Hot Air has a roundup of the latest from Wisconsin, of which the greatest is this: the Republicans have adopted a rule that Senators have to collect their paychecks in person, on the Senate floor. Hilarious! Can the Democratic Party survive the shame of this debacle? I suppose so, but no amount of ridicule is too much.
Whatever you might think, this whole confrontation in Madison is nothing if not amusing. "That is why it is imperative the Saudis release some extra barrels into the market now to calm the situation, rather than simply trying to talk the price down."
Many analysts expect Libya's violence to take a heavy toll on the North African country's oil output, potentially crimping exports for months or years.
BRENT SPREAD WIDENS
Brent traded at a $12.58 a barrel advantage to U.S. WTI, widening from a $10.85 gap on Tuesday, as traders bet conflict in the Middle East could hit European oil supply hardest. Libyan exports usually feed a quarter of Italy's oil demand.
However, the spread has narrowed sharply from a record $16.51 hit on February 17.
U.S. crude rallied through a long-term uptrend resistance, on course for the biggest weekly gain since the financial crisis.
Traders geared up for U.S. weekly inventory data, the first of which will be released by the industry group American Petroleum Institute later on Wednesday at 4:30 p.m. EST.
A Reuters poll forecast that U.S. crude stockpiles rose 1.3 million barrels last week, while distillate inventories fell 1.4 million barrels and gasoline supplies rose 400,000 barrels.
Today we get another example of a deft procedural counter-punch from Republicans, albeit from inside the parliamentary system:
Sometimes politics makes you laugh out loud. Hot Air has a roundup of the latest from Wisconsin, of which the greatest is this: the Republicans have adopted a rule that Senators have to collect their paychecks in person, on the Senate floor. Hilarious! Can the Democratic Party survive the shame of this debacle? I suppose so, but no amount of ridicule is too much.
Whatever you might think, this whole confrontation in Madison is nothing if not amusing. "That is why it is imperative the Saudis release some extra barrels into the market now to calm the situation, rather than simply trying to talk the price down."
Many analysts expect Libya's violence to take a heavy toll on the North African country's oil output, potentially crimping exports for months or years.
BRENT SPREAD WIDENS
Brent traded at a $12.58 a barrel advantage to U.S. WTI, widening from a $10.85 gap on Tuesday, as traders bet conflict in the Middle East could hit European oil supply hardest. Libyan exports usually feed a quarter of Italy's oil demand.
However, the spread has narrowed sharply from a record $16.51 hit on February 17.
U.S. crude rallied through a long-term uptrend resistance, on course for the biggest weekly gain since the financial crisis.
Traders geared up for U.S. weekly inventory data, the first of which will be released by the industry group American Petroleum Institute later on Wednesday at 4:30 p.m. EST.
A Reuters poll forecast that U.S. crude stockpiles rose 1.3 million barrels last week, while distillate inventories fell 1.4 million barrels and gasoline supplies rose 400,000 barrels.
Republicans Finally Learn To Fight Back
Tiger Hawk - I had a nice discussion last night about the transfer of the organizational and confrontational tactics of the left to the right (see my post from last year on the subject). Last night my best example was the startling story that the Wisconsin Department of Regulation and Licensing has started to investigate more than 300 email complaints against those doctors who were giving out fraudulent "notes" that purported to excuse teachers from working so that they could demonstrate against Republicans. Conservatives never used to be that smart. They have learned, in part because they have adopted the teachings of Saul Alinsky who -- and this part is hilarious -- they only heard of in the first place because the Democrats nominated a community organizer to run as their candidate for president.
Today we get another example of a deft procedural counter-punch from Republicans, albeit from inside the parliamentary system:
Sometimes politics makes you laugh out loud. Hot Air has a roundup of the latest from Wisconsin, of which the greatest is this: the Republicans have adopted a rule that Senators have to collect their paychecks in person, on the Senate floor. Hilarious! Can the Democratic Party survive the shame of this debacle? I suppose so, but no amount of ridicule is too much.
Whatever you might think, this whole confrontation in Madison is nothing if not amusing.
Today we get another example of a deft procedural counter-punch from Republicans, albeit from inside the parliamentary system:
Sometimes politics makes you laugh out loud. Hot Air has a roundup of the latest from Wisconsin, of which the greatest is this: the Republicans have adopted a rule that Senators have to collect their paychecks in person, on the Senate floor. Hilarious! Can the Democratic Party survive the shame of this debacle? I suppose so, but no amount of ridicule is too much.
Whatever you might think, this whole confrontation in Madison is nothing if not amusing.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Detriot Ordered To Close Half Its Public Schools
Daily Mail Reporter - Half of Detroit's schools are set to close in order to wipe out the district's $327million deficit by 2014.
The four-year plan was submitted last month by Robert Bobb, the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools (DPS).
It was seen as the final resolution if the district failed to find new revenue sources and so far it hasn't.
Slash: Robert Bobb, the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools, is looking to downsize the number of schools to 72 from 142 pushing class sizes up to 60 students
Slashed: Robert Bobb, the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools, is looking to downsize the number of schools to 72 from 142 pushing class sizes up to 60 students
Mr Bobb is now looking to downsize the number of schools to 72 schools from 142 and the financial restructuring will likely increase the average high school class to 60 students.
He said the strategy was ill-advised because it was likely to drive students away, depriving the district of much-needed state funds - a veritable catch-22 situation.
Despite this state officials approved the plan earlier this month, but it only became public knowledge today.
Decision: The plan, proposed by Mr Bobb, was seen as the final resolution if the district failed to find new revenue sources - so far it hasn't
Decision: The plan, proposed by Mr Bobb, was seen as the final resolution if the district failed to find new revenue sources - so far it hasn't
'This is the route we're forced to take under state law,' Steven Wasko, a spokesman for DPS said.
'However we continue to look for longer-term plans so we can avoid this. Robert Bobb has eliminated over $500million of budget requests in his short two years here. But we still have these additional cuts to make.'
The Detroit Federation of Teachers has hit back against the state's decision, calling for an emergency lobbying in the state capital of Lansing tomorrow to protest against bills like Mr Bobb's.
They argue that emergency financial managers have the power to axe union contracts, dissolve school boards and set wage and benefit levels without debate.
'Everybody knows that this deficit elimination plan was a plan that was put on the table that was never supposed to see the light of day,' school board president Anthony Adams told Fox News.
'I know it's a very ugly topic to talk about increasing the taxation, especially at a time when most people are suffering, but I think voters in the City of Detroit have always showed a propensity to fund education,' he added.
The four-year plan was submitted last month by Robert Bobb, the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools (DPS).
It was seen as the final resolution if the district failed to find new revenue sources and so far it hasn't.
Slash: Robert Bobb, the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools, is looking to downsize the number of schools to 72 from 142 pushing class sizes up to 60 students
Slashed: Robert Bobb, the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools, is looking to downsize the number of schools to 72 from 142 pushing class sizes up to 60 students
Mr Bobb is now looking to downsize the number of schools to 72 schools from 142 and the financial restructuring will likely increase the average high school class to 60 students.
He said the strategy was ill-advised because it was likely to drive students away, depriving the district of much-needed state funds - a veritable catch-22 situation.
Despite this state officials approved the plan earlier this month, but it only became public knowledge today.
Decision: The plan, proposed by Mr Bobb, was seen as the final resolution if the district failed to find new revenue sources - so far it hasn't
Decision: The plan, proposed by Mr Bobb, was seen as the final resolution if the district failed to find new revenue sources - so far it hasn't
'This is the route we're forced to take under state law,' Steven Wasko, a spokesman for DPS said.
'However we continue to look for longer-term plans so we can avoid this. Robert Bobb has eliminated over $500million of budget requests in his short two years here. But we still have these additional cuts to make.'
The Detroit Federation of Teachers has hit back against the state's decision, calling for an emergency lobbying in the state capital of Lansing tomorrow to protest against bills like Mr Bobb's.
They argue that emergency financial managers have the power to axe union contracts, dissolve school boards and set wage and benefit levels without debate.
'Everybody knows that this deficit elimination plan was a plan that was put on the table that was never supposed to see the light of day,' school board president Anthony Adams told Fox News.
'I know it's a very ugly topic to talk about increasing the taxation, especially at a time when most people are suffering, but I think voters in the City of Detroit have always showed a propensity to fund education,' he added.
Defiant Muammar Gaddafi Vows To Fight To The End
TRIPOLI (Reuters) – A defiant Muammar Gaddafi said he was ready to die "a martyr" in Libya, vowing to crush a growing revolt which has seen eastern regions break free of his 41-year rule and brought deadly unrest to the capital.
Swathed in brown robes, Gaddafi seethed with anger on Tuesday and banged a podium outside one of his residences that was damaged in a 1986 U.S. airstrike aiming to kill him. Next to him stood a monument of a fist crushing a U.S. fighter jet.
"I am not going to leave this land. I will die here as a martyr," Gaddafi said on state television, refusing to bow to calls from some of his own ministers, soldiers and protesters who braved a fierce crackdown to clamor for him to go.
Huge popular protests in Libya's neighbors Egypt and Tunisia have toppled entrenched leaders, but Gaddafi said he would not be forced out by the rebellion sweeping through his vast oil-producing nation of just 7 million people, which stretches from the Mediterranean into the Sahara.
"I shall remain here defiant," said Gaddafi, who has ruled the mainly desert country with a mixture of populism and tight control since taking power in a military coup in 1969.
In New York, the U.N. Security Council condemned the use of violence and called for those responsible for attacks on civilians to be held to account.
The turmoil in Libya, which pumps nearly 2 percent of world oil output, sent Brent crude prices above $108 a barrel to a 2 1/2 year high and triggered Wall Street's worst day since August as investors dumped stocks.
The White House said the international community must speak with one voice in response to the "appalling violence" in Libya and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the United States would take "appropriate steps" in time.
But Washington has little leverage over Libya, which was a U.S. adversary for most of Gaddafi's rule until it agreed in 2003 to abandon a weapons-of-mass-destruction program and moved to settle claims from the 1988 Lockerbie bombing.
GADDAFI DEFIANT
But Gaddafi was unrepentant. Protesters were "rats and mercenaries" who deserved the death penalty, he said in the rambling, 75-minute speech. Gaddafi said he would call on people to "cleanse Libya house by house" unless protesters surrendered.
He urged Libyans to take to the streets to show their loyalty. "All of you who love Muammar Gaddafi, go out on the streets, secure the streets, don't be afraid of them ... Chase them, arrest them, hand them over," he said.
Libya's official news agency quoted him as telling Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi that "Libya is fine, its people are ... holding on to its security."
But British Foreign Secretary William Hague said there were "many indications of the structure of the state collapsing in Libya." Britain and other European nations have said they are trying to evacuate nationals from Libya by plane.
Several hundred people held a pro-Gaddafi rally in Tripoli's central Green Square on Tuesday, a Reuters reporter there said. "Our leader!" and "We follow your path!," they chanted, waving green Libyan flags and holding aloft portraits of Gaddafi.
"There are several hundred (Gaddafi) supporters making their way into the city center. They are in cars, making lots of noise and carrying his portrait," said a resident of the Mediterranean coastal city of 2 million, which is key to controlling Libya.
A government spokesman accused international media of exaggerating the gravity of the situation in the country.
But swathes of Libya are no longer under government control.
In Sabratah, 50 miles west of the capital, the Libyan army had deployed a "large number" of soldiers after protesters destroyed almost all the security services offices, the online Quryna newspaper said.
Refugees streaming across Libya's eastern border into Egypt said Gaddafi was using tanks, warplanes and foreign mercenaries to fight the rebellion.
The reports of the bloody crackdown have put pressure on President Barack Obama to intervene, with U.S. politicians criticizing his silence and calling for military action ranging from bombing Libyan airfields to imposing no-fly zones.
Eastern Libya is no longer under Gaddafi's control, rebel soldiers in the city of Tobruk told a Reuters reporter there.
Tobruk residents said the city had been in the hands of the people for three days. They said smoke rising above the city was from a munitions depot bombed by troops loyal to one of Gaddafi's sons. There was the occasional explosion.
"All the eastern regions are out of Gaddafi's control ... The people and the army are hand-in-hand here," said former army major Hany Saad Marjaa.
"NO SURRENDER"
As the fighting has intensified some supporters, including ministers and ambassadors, have abandoned Gaddafi.
Libya's Interior Minister Abdel Fattah Younes al Abidi became the latest senior defector, Al Jazeera said. It aired video showing Abidi at his desk reading a statement urging the army to support the people and their "legitimate demands."
On the Libyan side of the border with Egypt, anti-Gaddafi rebels armed with clubs and Kalashnikov assault rifles welcomed visitors. One man held an upside-down picture of Gaddafi defaced with the words "the butcher tyrant, murderer of Libyans," a Reuters correspondent who crossed into Libya reported.
Hundreds of Egyptians flowed out of Libya on tractors and trucks, telling harrowing tales of state violence and banditry.
The U.N. refugee agency urged Libya's neighbors to grant refuge to those fleeing the unrest.
Egypt's new military rulers, who took power following the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak on February 11, said the main crossing with Libya would be kept open round-the-clock to allow the sick and wounded to enter.
In the eastern town of Al Bayda, resident Marai Al Mahry told Reuters by telephone that 26 people including his brother Ahmed had been shot dead overnight by Gaddafi loyalists.
"They shoot you just for walking on the street," he said, sobbing uncontrollably as he appealed for help.
Protesters were attacked with tanks and warplanes, he said.
"The only thing we can do now is not give up, no surrender, no going back. We will die anyways, whether we like it or not. It is clear that they don't care whether we live or not. This is genocide," said Mahry, 42.
Human Rights Watch said 62 people had died in clashes in Tripoli in the past two days, on top of its previous toll of 233 dead. Opposition groups put the figure far much higher.
A showman-like figure with his flowing robes and a penchant for female bodyguards, Gaddafi has been one of the most recognizable figures on the world stage.
He was shunned for much of his rule by the West, which accused him of links to terrorism and revolutionary movements. U.S. President Ronald Reagan called him a "mad dog" and sent war planes to bomb Libya in 1986.
Gaddafi was particularly reviled after the 1988 Pan Am airliner bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland, by Libyan agents in which 270 people were killed.
(Reporting by Tarek Amara, Christian Lowe, Marie-Louise Gumuchian, Souhail Karam; Brian Love, Daren Butler; Dina Zayed, Sarah Mikhail and Tom Perry in Cairo and a Reuters correspondent in Libya; Henry Foy in New Delhi; Writing by Jon Hemming and Dominic Evans; Editing by Maria Golovnina)
Swathed in brown robes, Gaddafi seethed with anger on Tuesday and banged a podium outside one of his residences that was damaged in a 1986 U.S. airstrike aiming to kill him. Next to him stood a monument of a fist crushing a U.S. fighter jet.
"I am not going to leave this land. I will die here as a martyr," Gaddafi said on state television, refusing to bow to calls from some of his own ministers, soldiers and protesters who braved a fierce crackdown to clamor for him to go.
Huge popular protests in Libya's neighbors Egypt and Tunisia have toppled entrenched leaders, but Gaddafi said he would not be forced out by the rebellion sweeping through his vast oil-producing nation of just 7 million people, which stretches from the Mediterranean into the Sahara.
"I shall remain here defiant," said Gaddafi, who has ruled the mainly desert country with a mixture of populism and tight control since taking power in a military coup in 1969.
In New York, the U.N. Security Council condemned the use of violence and called for those responsible for attacks on civilians to be held to account.
The turmoil in Libya, which pumps nearly 2 percent of world oil output, sent Brent crude prices above $108 a barrel to a 2 1/2 year high and triggered Wall Street's worst day since August as investors dumped stocks.
The White House said the international community must speak with one voice in response to the "appalling violence" in Libya and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the United States would take "appropriate steps" in time.
But Washington has little leverage over Libya, which was a U.S. adversary for most of Gaddafi's rule until it agreed in 2003 to abandon a weapons-of-mass-destruction program and moved to settle claims from the 1988 Lockerbie bombing.
GADDAFI DEFIANT
But Gaddafi was unrepentant. Protesters were "rats and mercenaries" who deserved the death penalty, he said in the rambling, 75-minute speech. Gaddafi said he would call on people to "cleanse Libya house by house" unless protesters surrendered.
He urged Libyans to take to the streets to show their loyalty. "All of you who love Muammar Gaddafi, go out on the streets, secure the streets, don't be afraid of them ... Chase them, arrest them, hand them over," he said.
Libya's official news agency quoted him as telling Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi that "Libya is fine, its people are ... holding on to its security."
But British Foreign Secretary William Hague said there were "many indications of the structure of the state collapsing in Libya." Britain and other European nations have said they are trying to evacuate nationals from Libya by plane.
Several hundred people held a pro-Gaddafi rally in Tripoli's central Green Square on Tuesday, a Reuters reporter there said. "Our leader!" and "We follow your path!," they chanted, waving green Libyan flags and holding aloft portraits of Gaddafi.
"There are several hundred (Gaddafi) supporters making their way into the city center. They are in cars, making lots of noise and carrying his portrait," said a resident of the Mediterranean coastal city of 2 million, which is key to controlling Libya.
A government spokesman accused international media of exaggerating the gravity of the situation in the country.
But swathes of Libya are no longer under government control.
In Sabratah, 50 miles west of the capital, the Libyan army had deployed a "large number" of soldiers after protesters destroyed almost all the security services offices, the online Quryna newspaper said.
Refugees streaming across Libya's eastern border into Egypt said Gaddafi was using tanks, warplanes and foreign mercenaries to fight the rebellion.
The reports of the bloody crackdown have put pressure on President Barack Obama to intervene, with U.S. politicians criticizing his silence and calling for military action ranging from bombing Libyan airfields to imposing no-fly zones.
Eastern Libya is no longer under Gaddafi's control, rebel soldiers in the city of Tobruk told a Reuters reporter there.
Tobruk residents said the city had been in the hands of the people for three days. They said smoke rising above the city was from a munitions depot bombed by troops loyal to one of Gaddafi's sons. There was the occasional explosion.
"All the eastern regions are out of Gaddafi's control ... The people and the army are hand-in-hand here," said former army major Hany Saad Marjaa.
"NO SURRENDER"
As the fighting has intensified some supporters, including ministers and ambassadors, have abandoned Gaddafi.
Libya's Interior Minister Abdel Fattah Younes al Abidi became the latest senior defector, Al Jazeera said. It aired video showing Abidi at his desk reading a statement urging the army to support the people and their "legitimate demands."
On the Libyan side of the border with Egypt, anti-Gaddafi rebels armed with clubs and Kalashnikov assault rifles welcomed visitors. One man held an upside-down picture of Gaddafi defaced with the words "the butcher tyrant, murderer of Libyans," a Reuters correspondent who crossed into Libya reported.
Hundreds of Egyptians flowed out of Libya on tractors and trucks, telling harrowing tales of state violence and banditry.
The U.N. refugee agency urged Libya's neighbors to grant refuge to those fleeing the unrest.
Egypt's new military rulers, who took power following the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak on February 11, said the main crossing with Libya would be kept open round-the-clock to allow the sick and wounded to enter.
In the eastern town of Al Bayda, resident Marai Al Mahry told Reuters by telephone that 26 people including his brother Ahmed had been shot dead overnight by Gaddafi loyalists.
"They shoot you just for walking on the street," he said, sobbing uncontrollably as he appealed for help.
Protesters were attacked with tanks and warplanes, he said.
"The only thing we can do now is not give up, no surrender, no going back. We will die anyways, whether we like it or not. It is clear that they don't care whether we live or not. This is genocide," said Mahry, 42.
Human Rights Watch said 62 people had died in clashes in Tripoli in the past two days, on top of its previous toll of 233 dead. Opposition groups put the figure far much higher.
A showman-like figure with his flowing robes and a penchant for female bodyguards, Gaddafi has been one of the most recognizable figures on the world stage.
He was shunned for much of his rule by the West, which accused him of links to terrorism and revolutionary movements. U.S. President Ronald Reagan called him a "mad dog" and sent war planes to bomb Libya in 1986.
Gaddafi was particularly reviled after the 1988 Pan Am airliner bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland, by Libyan agents in which 270 people were killed.
(Reporting by Tarek Amara, Christian Lowe, Marie-Louise Gumuchian, Souhail Karam; Brian Love, Daren Butler; Dina Zayed, Sarah Mikhail and Tom Perry in Cairo and a Reuters correspondent in Libya; Henry Foy in New Delhi; Writing by Jon Hemming and Dominic Evans; Editing by Maria Golovnina)
Rep. Allen West Slams CAIR Lackey "Must See Video"
Shark Tank - The folks at the Shark Tank captured this clip, in which CAIR’s Nezar Hamze tries to sandbag retired Lt. Col, Rep. Allen West on the subject of radical Islam. That, as you’ll see in the video, was a mistake. Hamze’s opening argument is ridiculous, West knows his facts, and it’s clear that Hamze is really only interested in grandstanding and playing for emotion. When West claims, with great credibility, that he put his life on the line to defend the rights of Muslims (in Iraq), the crowd goes wild.
Now, since CAIR is out trying to ambush heroes like Rep. West, let’s take a look at what CAIR actually is. Their clever, cuddly name masks the fact that the Council on Islamic American Relations is a front for the Muslim Brotherhood. The FBI identified them as such in court documents years ago, based on internal Muslim Brotherhood documents.
In testimony Tuesday, FBI Agent Lara Burns reported before the jury in the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) trial that the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) was listed as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee, right alongside HLF, the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP), and the United Association for Studies and Research (UASR). Agent Burns further testified that CAIR received money from HLF – a claim that Nihad Awad blatantly denied in a congressional testimony in September of 2003.
Burns also said that both Omar Ahmed and Nihad Awad, CAIR co-founders who today serve as CAIR’s chairman emeritus and executive director, respectively, were also listed as individual members the Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee in America.
There’s more at the link. As part of the Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee, here’s what CAIR is supposed to do in America:
The memo calls on the Palestine Committees, to work to “increase the financial and the moral support for Hamas” to “fight surrendering solutions,” and to publicize and focus on “the savagery of the Jews.”
And-
-“Collecting of donations for the Islamic Resistance Movement from the Ikhwan and others.”
-“Bringing to the media light the case of [HAMAS founder] Sheik Ahmad Yasin and his ailing condition.”
-“Making use of what relationships the Ikhwan have in all fields and gatherings to serve the cause.”
Now, since CAIR is out trying to ambush heroes like Rep. West, let’s take a look at what CAIR actually is. Their clever, cuddly name masks the fact that the Council on Islamic American Relations is a front for the Muslim Brotherhood. The FBI identified them as such in court documents years ago, based on internal Muslim Brotherhood documents.
In testimony Tuesday, FBI Agent Lara Burns reported before the jury in the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) trial that the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) was listed as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee, right alongside HLF, the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP), and the United Association for Studies and Research (UASR). Agent Burns further testified that CAIR received money from HLF – a claim that Nihad Awad blatantly denied in a congressional testimony in September of 2003.
Burns also said that both Omar Ahmed and Nihad Awad, CAIR co-founders who today serve as CAIR’s chairman emeritus and executive director, respectively, were also listed as individual members the Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee in America.
There’s more at the link. As part of the Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee, here’s what CAIR is supposed to do in America:
The memo calls on the Palestine Committees, to work to “increase the financial and the moral support for Hamas” to “fight surrendering solutions,” and to publicize and focus on “the savagery of the Jews.”
And-
-“Collecting of donations for the Islamic Resistance Movement from the Ikhwan and others.”
-“Bringing to the media light the case of [HAMAS founder] Sheik Ahmad Yasin and his ailing condition.”
-“Making use of what relationships the Ikhwan have in all fields and gatherings to serve the cause.”
Col. Muammar Gaddafi Turns Tanks on Protesters in Libya
TRIPOLI (Reuters) – Libya's Muammar Gaddafi used tanks, helicopters and warplanes to fight a growing revolt, witnesses said on Tuesday, as the veteran leader scoffed at reports he was fleeing after four decades in power.
The U.N. refugee agency urged to Libya's neighbors not to turn back those fleeing the violence, as hundreds of refugees streamed into Egypt on tractors and trucks, describing a wave of killing and banditry unleashed by the revolt.
In the eastern town of Al Bayda, resident Marai Al Mahry told Reuters by telephone that 26 people including his brother Ahmed had been shot dead overnight by Gaddafi loyalists.
"They shoot you just for walking on the street," he said, sobbing uncontrollably as he appealed for help.
Protesters were attacked with tanks and warplanes, he said.
"The only thing we can do now is not give up, no surrender, no going back. We will die anyways, whether we like it or not. It is clear that they don't care whether we live or not. This is genocide," said Mahry, 42.
In Tripoli, residents told Reuters there was no visible security force presence on the streets. The only police present were directing traffic, they said, the day after reports that warplanes had bombed portions of the capital and mercenaries had shot civilians.
Refugees fleeing into Egypt told of a wave of violence and crime.
"Five people died on the street where I live," Mohamed Jalaly, 40, told Reuters at Salum on his way to Cairo from Benghazi. "You leave Benghazi and then you have ... nothing but gangs and youths with weapons," he added. "The way from Benghazi is extremely dangerous," he said.
Libyan guards have withdrawn from their side of the border and Egypt's new military rulers -- who took power following the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak on February11 -- said the main crossing would be kept open round-the-clock to allow the sick and wounded to enter.
Libyan security forces have cracked down fiercely on demonstrators across the country, with fighting spreading to Tripoli after erupting in Libya's oil-producing east last week, in a reaction to decades of repression and following uprisings that have toppled leaders in Tunisia and Egypt.
Human Rights Watch says at least 233 people have been killed and opposition groups put the figure much higher but independent verification is impossible.
The revolt in OPEC member Libya has driven oil prices to a 2 1/2 year high above $108 a barrel.
As the fighting has intensified some supporters have abandoned Gaddafi. Tripoli's envoy to India, Ali al-Essawi, resigned and told Reuters that African mercenaries had been recruited to help put down protests.
"The fall of Gaddafi is the imperative of the people in streets," he said. The justice minister also quit and a group of army officers urged soldiers to "join the people." Two pilots flew their warplanes to nearby Malta.
DEFIANCE AND CONDEMNATION
Gaddafi's son Saif on Sunday vowed his father would keep fighting "until the last man standing" and the Libyan leader appeared on television after days of seclusion to dismiss reports he had fled to the Venezuela of his ally Hugo Chavez.
"I want to show that I'm in Tripoli and not in Venezuela. Do not believe the channels belonging to stray dogs," said Gaddafi, who has ruled Libya with a mixture of populism and tight control since taking power in a military coup in 1969.
World powers have condemned the use of force against protesters, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon accusing Libya of firing on civilians from warplanes and helicopters. The Security Council was to discuss Libya at 9 a.m. EST.
Washington and Europe have demanded an end to the violence and Germany's Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said: "A ruling family, threatening its people with civil war, has reached the end of the line."
Demonstrations spread to Tripoli from the second city Benghazi, cradle of the revolt that has engulfed a number of towns and which residents say is now in the hands of protestors.
Residents said anxious shoppers were queuing outside stores to try to stock up on food and drink. Some shops were closed.
In Tripoli, one resident said locals were patrolling their neighborhood at night to protect it from roaming mercenaries, reporting sniper fire and the use of military transport helicopters to ferry security forces about.
"Gaddafi obviously does not have any limits. We knew he was crazy, but it's still a terrible shock to see him turning mercenaries on his own people and just mowing down unarmed demonstrators," he told Lisa Goldman, a Canadian-Israeli journalist based in Tel Aviv.
ENERGY DISRUPTION
Spain's Repsol suspended all operations in Libya and trade sources reported operations at Libyan oil ports had been disrupted due to the unrest. Others said gas supplies from Libya to Italy had slowed since Late Monday but Italy said they had not yet been interrupted.
Shell said it was pulling out its expatriate staff from Libya temporarily and a number of states were seeking to evacuate their nationals.
The upheavals which deposed the presidents of Tunisia and Egypt have shaken the Arab world and inspired protests across the Middle East and North Africa, threatening the grip of long-entrenched autocratic leaders.
A flamboyant figure with his flowing robes and bevy of female bodyguards, Gaddafi was famously branded a "mad dog" by one U.S. president and has long been accused by the West of links to terrorism and revolutionary movements.
But this changed when Libya renounced its weapons of mass destruction to secure an end to its international isolation and a rapprochement with western governments, keen to tap its oil and gas wealth and lucrative trade and investment deals.
The U.N. refugee agency urged to Libya's neighbors not to turn back those fleeing the violence, as hundreds of refugees streamed into Egypt on tractors and trucks, describing a wave of killing and banditry unleashed by the revolt.
In the eastern town of Al Bayda, resident Marai Al Mahry told Reuters by telephone that 26 people including his brother Ahmed had been shot dead overnight by Gaddafi loyalists.
"They shoot you just for walking on the street," he said, sobbing uncontrollably as he appealed for help.
Protesters were attacked with tanks and warplanes, he said.
"The only thing we can do now is not give up, no surrender, no going back. We will die anyways, whether we like it or not. It is clear that they don't care whether we live or not. This is genocide," said Mahry, 42.
In Tripoli, residents told Reuters there was no visible security force presence on the streets. The only police present were directing traffic, they said, the day after reports that warplanes had bombed portions of the capital and mercenaries had shot civilians.
Refugees fleeing into Egypt told of a wave of violence and crime.
"Five people died on the street where I live," Mohamed Jalaly, 40, told Reuters at Salum on his way to Cairo from Benghazi. "You leave Benghazi and then you have ... nothing but gangs and youths with weapons," he added. "The way from Benghazi is extremely dangerous," he said.
Libyan guards have withdrawn from their side of the border and Egypt's new military rulers -- who took power following the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak on February11 -- said the main crossing would be kept open round-the-clock to allow the sick and wounded to enter.
Libyan security forces have cracked down fiercely on demonstrators across the country, with fighting spreading to Tripoli after erupting in Libya's oil-producing east last week, in a reaction to decades of repression and following uprisings that have toppled leaders in Tunisia and Egypt.
Human Rights Watch says at least 233 people have been killed and opposition groups put the figure much higher but independent verification is impossible.
The revolt in OPEC member Libya has driven oil prices to a 2 1/2 year high above $108 a barrel.
As the fighting has intensified some supporters have abandoned Gaddafi. Tripoli's envoy to India, Ali al-Essawi, resigned and told Reuters that African mercenaries had been recruited to help put down protests.
"The fall of Gaddafi is the imperative of the people in streets," he said. The justice minister also quit and a group of army officers urged soldiers to "join the people." Two pilots flew their warplanes to nearby Malta.
DEFIANCE AND CONDEMNATION
Gaddafi's son Saif on Sunday vowed his father would keep fighting "until the last man standing" and the Libyan leader appeared on television after days of seclusion to dismiss reports he had fled to the Venezuela of his ally Hugo Chavez.
"I want to show that I'm in Tripoli and not in Venezuela. Do not believe the channels belonging to stray dogs," said Gaddafi, who has ruled Libya with a mixture of populism and tight control since taking power in a military coup in 1969.
World powers have condemned the use of force against protesters, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon accusing Libya of firing on civilians from warplanes and helicopters. The Security Council was to discuss Libya at 9 a.m. EST.
Washington and Europe have demanded an end to the violence and Germany's Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said: "A ruling family, threatening its people with civil war, has reached the end of the line."
Demonstrations spread to Tripoli from the second city Benghazi, cradle of the revolt that has engulfed a number of towns and which residents say is now in the hands of protestors.
Residents said anxious shoppers were queuing outside stores to try to stock up on food and drink. Some shops were closed.
In Tripoli, one resident said locals were patrolling their neighborhood at night to protect it from roaming mercenaries, reporting sniper fire and the use of military transport helicopters to ferry security forces about.
"Gaddafi obviously does not have any limits. We knew he was crazy, but it's still a terrible shock to see him turning mercenaries on his own people and just mowing down unarmed demonstrators," he told Lisa Goldman, a Canadian-Israeli journalist based in Tel Aviv.
ENERGY DISRUPTION
Spain's Repsol suspended all operations in Libya and trade sources reported operations at Libyan oil ports had been disrupted due to the unrest. Others said gas supplies from Libya to Italy had slowed since Late Monday but Italy said they had not yet been interrupted.
Shell said it was pulling out its expatriate staff from Libya temporarily and a number of states were seeking to evacuate their nationals.
The upheavals which deposed the presidents of Tunisia and Egypt have shaken the Arab world and inspired protests across the Middle East and North Africa, threatening the grip of long-entrenched autocratic leaders.
A flamboyant figure with his flowing robes and bevy of female bodyguards, Gaddafi was famously branded a "mad dog" by one U.S. president and has long been accused by the West of links to terrorism and revolutionary movements.
But this changed when Libya renounced its weapons of mass destruction to secure an end to its international isolation and a rapprochement with western governments, keen to tap its oil and gas wealth and lucrative trade and investment deals.
Bahrain Orders Release Of Political Prisioners
By BARBARA SURK and HADEEL AL-SHALCHI, Associated Press Barbara Surk And Hadeel Al-shalchi, Associated Press –
MANAMA, Bahrain – Bahrain's king ordered the release of some political prisoners Tuesday, conceding to another opposition demand as the embattled monarchy tries to engage protesters in talks aimed at ending an uprising that has entered its second week.
The king's decree — which covers several Shiite activists accused of plotting against the state — adds to the brinksmanship on both sides that has included a massive pro-government rally Monday, an opposition march in response and the planned return of a prominent opposition figure from exile.
It's unclear how many prisoners will be freed, said government spokeswoman Maysoon Sabkar.
But they include some of the 25 Shiite activists on trial for allegedly plotting against the Sunni rulers of the strategic island kingdom, a leading member of Bahrain's Shiite opposition, Abdul Jalili Khalil, told The Associated Press.
He called the prisoner release "a good step" and a "positive gesture."
Two of those in the case are being tried in absentia, including opposition leader Hassan Meshaima, who has been in self-exile in London since last year. He was expected to return to Bahrain later Tuesday.
Mesheima's presence could bolster opposition forces seeking a harder line against the monarchy, including some who have called for the complete ouster of the king and the royal dynasty that has ruled for more than 200 years.
Meshaima's group, known as Haq, is considered more radical than the main Shiite political bloc that has so far taken a central role in the revolt, which began last week with marches but quickly met with violent resistance from security forces.
The primary Shiite group includes 18 members of the 40-member parliament, who resigned Thursday to protest the killing of demonstrators by security forces.
More than 100,000 opposition supporters marched Tuesday through the capital of Manama, carrying Bahrain's red-and-white flag and circling the Bahrain Mall and Manama's financial district — symbols of the country's prosperity in recent decades. Security forces did not move to confront the procession, but helicopters circled overhead.
"Egypt, Tunisia, are we any different?" they chanted.
The government said the overall death toll was seven from street clashes, which included the army opening fire on protesters. But it's unclear whether it included a man who died of injuries on Monday. Reports from opposition groups and hospital officials in the past week set the death toll at eight and hundreds wounded — far more than the 25 listed by authorities.
The attacks on protesters have brought stinging denunciations from Bahrain's Western allies, including the United States. The U.S. maintains very close ties with Bahrain, which hosts the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet.
Bahrain authorities withdrew the military Saturday and allowed protesters to reclaim the landmark Pearl Square, which has been the center of the Shiite-led uprising.
Bahrain's Shiite majority has complained of discrimination and political persecution in the kingdom. They have staged protests in the past, but the current unrest — inspired by the toppling of regimes in Tunisia and Egypt — is the most serious against the Sunni rulers.
In a brief statement on Bahrain's official news agency, the king ordered the release of "a number of prisoners" and a halt to "several trials" of Shiite activists.
On Monday, Bahrain's crown prince called off Formula One's season-opening race scheduled for March 13, handing another victory to protesters.
Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa owns the rights to grand prix and serves as commander of the armed forces. Protesters said it would have been disrespectful the hold the race.
The crown prince told F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone by telephone that the race would not go ahead.
"We felt it was important for the country to focus on immediate issues of national interest and leave the hosting of Bahrain's Formula One race to a later date," the crown prince said in a statement.
Sabkar told reporters the "immediate priority is to keep the peace and maintain calm." She said the government, led by the same prime minister — the king's uncle — for 40 years, was "deeply saddened by the tragic events of the past few days and its condolences go out to those families who have lost loved ones."
Opposition leaders have called for the government to resign after last week's bloodshed to pave the way for a dialogue with the crown prince.
"The government has taken a decision to shoot at its people," said Khalil, a Shiite opposition leader. "Our objective remains for this government to resign after failing to protect its people."
MANAMA, Bahrain – Bahrain's king ordered the release of some political prisoners Tuesday, conceding to another opposition demand as the embattled monarchy tries to engage protesters in talks aimed at ending an uprising that has entered its second week.
The king's decree — which covers several Shiite activists accused of plotting against the state — adds to the brinksmanship on both sides that has included a massive pro-government rally Monday, an opposition march in response and the planned return of a prominent opposition figure from exile.
It's unclear how many prisoners will be freed, said government spokeswoman Maysoon Sabkar.
But they include some of the 25 Shiite activists on trial for allegedly plotting against the Sunni rulers of the strategic island kingdom, a leading member of Bahrain's Shiite opposition, Abdul Jalili Khalil, told The Associated Press.
He called the prisoner release "a good step" and a "positive gesture."
Two of those in the case are being tried in absentia, including opposition leader Hassan Meshaima, who has been in self-exile in London since last year. He was expected to return to Bahrain later Tuesday.
Mesheima's presence could bolster opposition forces seeking a harder line against the monarchy, including some who have called for the complete ouster of the king and the royal dynasty that has ruled for more than 200 years.
Meshaima's group, known as Haq, is considered more radical than the main Shiite political bloc that has so far taken a central role in the revolt, which began last week with marches but quickly met with violent resistance from security forces.
The primary Shiite group includes 18 members of the 40-member parliament, who resigned Thursday to protest the killing of demonstrators by security forces.
More than 100,000 opposition supporters marched Tuesday through the capital of Manama, carrying Bahrain's red-and-white flag and circling the Bahrain Mall and Manama's financial district — symbols of the country's prosperity in recent decades. Security forces did not move to confront the procession, but helicopters circled overhead.
"Egypt, Tunisia, are we any different?" they chanted.
The government said the overall death toll was seven from street clashes, which included the army opening fire on protesters. But it's unclear whether it included a man who died of injuries on Monday. Reports from opposition groups and hospital officials in the past week set the death toll at eight and hundreds wounded — far more than the 25 listed by authorities.
The attacks on protesters have brought stinging denunciations from Bahrain's Western allies, including the United States. The U.S. maintains very close ties with Bahrain, which hosts the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet.
Bahrain authorities withdrew the military Saturday and allowed protesters to reclaim the landmark Pearl Square, which has been the center of the Shiite-led uprising.
Bahrain's Shiite majority has complained of discrimination and political persecution in the kingdom. They have staged protests in the past, but the current unrest — inspired by the toppling of regimes in Tunisia and Egypt — is the most serious against the Sunni rulers.
In a brief statement on Bahrain's official news agency, the king ordered the release of "a number of prisoners" and a halt to "several trials" of Shiite activists.
On Monday, Bahrain's crown prince called off Formula One's season-opening race scheduled for March 13, handing another victory to protesters.
Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa owns the rights to grand prix and serves as commander of the armed forces. Protesters said it would have been disrespectful the hold the race.
The crown prince told F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone by telephone that the race would not go ahead.
"We felt it was important for the country to focus on immediate issues of national interest and leave the hosting of Bahrain's Formula One race to a later date," the crown prince said in a statement.
Sabkar told reporters the "immediate priority is to keep the peace and maintain calm." She said the government, led by the same prime minister — the king's uncle — for 40 years, was "deeply saddened by the tragic events of the past few days and its condolences go out to those families who have lost loved ones."
Opposition leaders have called for the government to resign after last week's bloodshed to pave the way for a dialogue with the crown prince.
"The government has taken a decision to shoot at its people," said Khalil, a Shiite opposition leader. "Our objective remains for this government to resign after failing to protect its people."
Monday, February 21, 2011
Prepare Yourself Tea Party For A GOP Cave In
Protein Wisdom - Somebody’d better contact these “moderate” Republicans and tell them that to “compromise” on something that is to the left of FDR, for Chrissakes, is to surrender the country. Period. Full stop.
Thing is, if Walker’s coalition breaks down, Ohio will do the deed.
That supposed GOP “moderates” are looking for some cheap grace here is repulsive enough. But doing so after watching the thuggish, childish, and downright anti-democratic behavior of the left over this past, just goes to show that the establishment GOP is fighting tooth and nail to remain the party of surrender.
Fair warning: if the GOP goes this route and decides to follow the “moderates,” it is essentially dead as a party. To me, at least.
Period.
Thing is, if Walker’s coalition breaks down, Ohio will do the deed.
That supposed GOP “moderates” are looking for some cheap grace here is repulsive enough. But doing so after watching the thuggish, childish, and downright anti-democratic behavior of the left over this past, just goes to show that the establishment GOP is fighting tooth and nail to remain the party of surrender.
Fair warning: if the GOP goes this route and decides to follow the “moderates,” it is essentially dead as a party. To me, at least.
Period.
Governor Walker's Common Sense Approach To Reforms
B.Daniel Blatt - On Facebook, a friend whom I love and respect despite her left-of-center politics linked a web-page which supports the truant Wisconsin lawmakers and calls the legislation they seek to block, a “radical attack on nurses, teachers and public employees”. Governor Scott Walker’s judicious proposal is anything but radical and is in fact the modest kind of reform we need here in California to address the spiraling cost of benefits for our public employees, costs which, former Democratic State Assembly Speaker Willie Brown contends, account for “80 percent of the state, county and city budget deficits“.
Over at the Weekly Standard, Stephen Hayes quotes the Badger State’s bold and brave governor to show just how modest his reforms are:
Walker believes the changes he’s proposing are relatively modest. “I’m asking them to contribute 5.8 percent of their salary to their pension – right about the national average for contributions. And I’m asking them to pay 12 percent of their health care premiums – up from 6 percent. The national average is around 25 percent.”
So Wisconsin’s public employees will still have benefit plans more generous than most workers across the country. And these steps are being taken with the express purpose of avoiding major layoffs and dramatic paycuts. . . . What’s more, Wisconsin teachers pay as much as $1100 each year in compulsory union dues. If the legislation passes, they will no longer be required to pay thosee dues – returning that money to their own pockets.
Emphasis added. With the dues no later automatically deducted from their paychecks, Wisconsin state employees now have the choice whether or not to pay them. In addition to ending ” government collection of union dues,” Walker’s reforms would “allow workers to opt out of unions, and require unions to hold recertification votes every year.”
That makes a lot of sense. Right now, the Wisconsin state government has served as the collection agency for institutions which “spent $573,868 on Wisconsin’s 2010 elections — almost all of it going to Democrats“.
“Currently,” Larry Kudlow writes, “most state employees pay nothing for their pensions and virtually nothing for their health insurance.” (Via Jennifer Rubin.) Few private sector employees have compensation packages that generous. While unions would lose their collective bargaining rights, Kudlow adds, public employees will keep their jobs:
Unions could still represent workers, but could not get pay increases above the CPI. Nor could they force employees to pay dues. And in exchange for this, Walker promises no furloughs for layoffs.
Without Walker’s common sense reforms, as many as 12,000 state and local government workers could lose their jobs. These reforms seem pretty reasonable to me.
Over at the Weekly Standard, Stephen Hayes quotes the Badger State’s bold and brave governor to show just how modest his reforms are:
Walker believes the changes he’s proposing are relatively modest. “I’m asking them to contribute 5.8 percent of their salary to their pension – right about the national average for contributions. And I’m asking them to pay 12 percent of their health care premiums – up from 6 percent. The national average is around 25 percent.”
So Wisconsin’s public employees will still have benefit plans more generous than most workers across the country. And these steps are being taken with the express purpose of avoiding major layoffs and dramatic paycuts. . . . What’s more, Wisconsin teachers pay as much as $1100 each year in compulsory union dues. If the legislation passes, they will no longer be required to pay thosee dues – returning that money to their own pockets.
Emphasis added. With the dues no later automatically deducted from their paychecks, Wisconsin state employees now have the choice whether or not to pay them. In addition to ending ” government collection of union dues,” Walker’s reforms would “allow workers to opt out of unions, and require unions to hold recertification votes every year.”
That makes a lot of sense. Right now, the Wisconsin state government has served as the collection agency for institutions which “spent $573,868 on Wisconsin’s 2010 elections — almost all of it going to Democrats“.
“Currently,” Larry Kudlow writes, “most state employees pay nothing for their pensions and virtually nothing for their health insurance.” (Via Jennifer Rubin.) Few private sector employees have compensation packages that generous. While unions would lose their collective bargaining rights, Kudlow adds, public employees will keep their jobs:
Unions could still represent workers, but could not get pay increases above the CPI. Nor could they force employees to pay dues. And in exchange for this, Walker promises no furloughs for layoffs.
Without Walker’s common sense reforms, as many as 12,000 state and local government workers could lose their jobs. These reforms seem pretty reasonable to me.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Libyan Protesters Return To Streets After Masscare
Arthur Bright - Protesters are returning to the streets in Libya's second-largest city of Benghazi Sunday, despite violence the day before that left more than 20 people dead at the hands of government troops in what witnesses called a "massacre."
The violence is just the latest in the recent unrest in Libya, where more than 100 people have died protesting against the regime of Col. Muammar Qaddafi.
Hundreds of protesters have gathered at a square outside a court building in Benghazi, reports the Associated Press, just a day after government forces opened fire with heavy weaponry on a funeral march.
Think you know the Middle East? Take our geography quiz.
The BBC reports that Saturday's violence was triggered when a funeral procession passed a major security compound in Benghazi, the epicenter of anti-government protests. Witnesses say government forces opened fire on the mourners with heavy machine guns, mortars, and even a missile. Human Rights Watch put the overall death toll in the Libyan protests at more than 100, though the organization called its figure conservative.
The Daily Telegraph posted video footage from the violence in Benghazi, showing protesters apparently fleeing and carrying wounded civilians.
It was a "massacre," multiple sources told Al Jazeera.
"The military is shooting at all the protesters with live bullets, I've seen it happen with my own eyes," one doctor told the Qatar-based satellite news network. "The military forces are everywhere, even from the hospital I work, we are not safe."
Al Jazeera also notes that the protests appear to be spreading westward, towards Colonel Gaddafi's stronghold in Tripoli. Sources told Al Jazeera that in Misurata, just 100 miles from Tripoli, there were protests against the government's brutality. Mohamed Abdulmalek, the chairman of Libya Watch, said that the lack of protests in western Libya is due to the large security presence there, which is dissuading people from taking to the streets.
In a video posted on Al Jazeera's live blog of events in Libya, British Foreign Secretary William Hague called the reports from Libya "horrifying," and warned the Libyan government that "just because there aren't television cameras present at the scenes that are going on in Libya, that does not mean that the world is not watching, and that doesn't mean that the world is going to ignore the way in which protesters and demonstrators are treated."
There are conflicting reports on the status of Benghazi, writes Reuters, with some witnesses saying Libyan forces have almost no presence in the city aside from a single military compound. But a security source said that the region is "80 percent under control."
Reuters also reports that the government's violent crackdown on protesters prompted a public plea from 50 religious leaders to security forces, as Muslims, to stop using violence against the people.
"This is an urgent appeal from religious scholars (faqihs and Sufi sheikhs), intellectuals, and clan elders from Tripoli, Bani Walid, Zintan, Jadu, Msalata, Misrata, Zawiah, and other towns and villages of the western area," said the appeal.
"We appeal to every Muslim, within the regime or assisting it in any way, to recognize that the killing of innocent human beings is forbidden by our Creator and by His beloved Prophet of Compassion (peace be upon him)... Do NOT kill your brothers and sisters. STOP the massacre NOW!"
Saudi television network Al Arabiya notes that there are reports that Libyan forces have been bolstered by "African mercenaries." Witnesses say that protesters in Benghazi captured a number of mercenaries, who they said were in Libyan military uniforms but spoke French. Libya's national language is Arabic.
The violence is just the latest in the recent unrest in Libya, where more than 100 people have died protesting against the regime of Col. Muammar Qaddafi.
Hundreds of protesters have gathered at a square outside a court building in Benghazi, reports the Associated Press, just a day after government forces opened fire with heavy weaponry on a funeral march.
Think you know the Middle East? Take our geography quiz.
The BBC reports that Saturday's violence was triggered when a funeral procession passed a major security compound in Benghazi, the epicenter of anti-government protests. Witnesses say government forces opened fire on the mourners with heavy machine guns, mortars, and even a missile. Human Rights Watch put the overall death toll in the Libyan protests at more than 100, though the organization called its figure conservative.
The Daily Telegraph posted video footage from the violence in Benghazi, showing protesters apparently fleeing and carrying wounded civilians.
It was a "massacre," multiple sources told Al Jazeera.
"The military is shooting at all the protesters with live bullets, I've seen it happen with my own eyes," one doctor told the Qatar-based satellite news network. "The military forces are everywhere, even from the hospital I work, we are not safe."
Al Jazeera also notes that the protests appear to be spreading westward, towards Colonel Gaddafi's stronghold in Tripoli. Sources told Al Jazeera that in Misurata, just 100 miles from Tripoli, there were protests against the government's brutality. Mohamed Abdulmalek, the chairman of Libya Watch, said that the lack of protests in western Libya is due to the large security presence there, which is dissuading people from taking to the streets.
In a video posted on Al Jazeera's live blog of events in Libya, British Foreign Secretary William Hague called the reports from Libya "horrifying," and warned the Libyan government that "just because there aren't television cameras present at the scenes that are going on in Libya, that does not mean that the world is not watching, and that doesn't mean that the world is going to ignore the way in which protesters and demonstrators are treated."
There are conflicting reports on the status of Benghazi, writes Reuters, with some witnesses saying Libyan forces have almost no presence in the city aside from a single military compound. But a security source said that the region is "80 percent under control."
Reuters also reports that the government's violent crackdown on protesters prompted a public plea from 50 religious leaders to security forces, as Muslims, to stop using violence against the people.
"This is an urgent appeal from religious scholars (faqihs and Sufi sheikhs), intellectuals, and clan elders from Tripoli, Bani Walid, Zintan, Jadu, Msalata, Misrata, Zawiah, and other towns and villages of the western area," said the appeal.
"We appeal to every Muslim, within the regime or assisting it in any way, to recognize that the killing of innocent human beings is forbidden by our Creator and by His beloved Prophet of Compassion (peace be upon him)... Do NOT kill your brothers and sisters. STOP the massacre NOW!"
Saudi television network Al Arabiya notes that there are reports that Libyan forces have been bolstered by "African mercenaries." Witnesses say that protesters in Benghazi captured a number of mercenaries, who they said were in Libyan military uniforms but spoke French. Libya's national language is Arabic.
Shocking Video: Bahrian Protesters Gunned Down By Military
As Bahrain’s social unrest grows, the country’s military has begun violently surpressing public assemblies. In this shocking video, a group of protesters come under fire from automatic weapons, allegedly from unseen soldiers. It was unclear what happened to the individuals who appeared to be hit.
This video is from YouTube user shaffeem, published Feb. 18, 2011. It contains graphic violence and discretion is advised.
This video is from YouTube user shaffeem, published Feb. 18, 2011. It contains graphic violence and discretion is advised.
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Herman Cain Rallies Tea Party In Wisconsin Against The Unions
National Review Online - As Gov. Scott Walker (R., Wis.) battles the public-sector unions, Cain says Madison has become “ground zero for the rest of the nation.”
“For the last couple of days, America has heard from ten percent of the workforce. It’s now time for them to hear from the [other] 90 percent of the workforce,” Cain told the crowd. “Maybe the ten percent has forgotten that we pay the bills.”
The more I hear of Herman Cain, the more I like his prospects in the 2012 GOP Presidential race.
“For the last couple of days, America has heard from ten percent of the workforce. It’s now time for them to hear from the [other] 90 percent of the workforce,” Cain told the crowd. “Maybe the ten percent has forgotten that we pay the bills.”
The more I hear of Herman Cain, the more I like his prospects in the 2012 GOP Presidential race.
Outrage: Republicans Establishment Reject Tiny Spending Cuts
Patterico's Pontifications - Unbelievable — and yet, all too believable:
The House rejected a measure cutting an additional $22 billion from the Republican spending bill, as conservatives ran into a wall of opposition from the GOP establishment over the depth of reductions to federal funding.
$22 billion is too much for our side? $22 billion??
The amendment backed by the conservative Republican Study Committee failed, 147-281, but not before putting the GOP spending divide under a spotlight on the House floor. Authored by RSC chairman Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the proposal would have dramatically reshaped an appropriations bill that already slashes federal spending by $61 billion over the next seven months.
More than half of the Republican conference backed the measure in opposition to two party chiefs, Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), who voted with every Democrat against it. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) did not vote, as is traditional for Speakers.
Let me remind you what my man Chris Christie said about people who would promise to do something about the debt and fail to deliver:
This afternoon at the American Enterprise Institute, New Jersey governor Chris Christie said he wants House Republicans to “put up or shut up” on entitlement reform and had a message for those candidates he campaigned for in 2010: “If the people who I campaigned for don’t stand up and do the right thing, the next time they’ll see me in their district [it will be] with my arm around their primary opponent,” Christie said. “Because you asked me to put my reputation on the line for you based on a promise that you were going to deal with these hard issues.”
As a reminder, here is what we do not want to see: cowardice from people who want to put the burden on the other side to handle the problem:
And as another reminder, here is what we do want to see: people standing up and talking about the problem and what we need to do to fix it — even when saying these things is politically risky:
I know I already showed you that video . . . but God, I love it so much.
And the contrast to the Geither video is telling. Geither’s attitude that, hey, sure our plan sucks, but let’s see if you people can somehow muster the political will to do better! . . . that is exactly what Gov. Christie is talking about.
If you want to claim to be a leader, try leading.
The House rejected a measure cutting an additional $22 billion from the Republican spending bill, as conservatives ran into a wall of opposition from the GOP establishment over the depth of reductions to federal funding.
$22 billion is too much for our side? $22 billion??
The amendment backed by the conservative Republican Study Committee failed, 147-281, but not before putting the GOP spending divide under a spotlight on the House floor. Authored by RSC chairman Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the proposal would have dramatically reshaped an appropriations bill that already slashes federal spending by $61 billion over the next seven months.
More than half of the Republican conference backed the measure in opposition to two party chiefs, Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), who voted with every Democrat against it. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) did not vote, as is traditional for Speakers.
Let me remind you what my man Chris Christie said about people who would promise to do something about the debt and fail to deliver:
This afternoon at the American Enterprise Institute, New Jersey governor Chris Christie said he wants House Republicans to “put up or shut up” on entitlement reform and had a message for those candidates he campaigned for in 2010: “If the people who I campaigned for don’t stand up and do the right thing, the next time they’ll see me in their district [it will be] with my arm around their primary opponent,” Christie said. “Because you asked me to put my reputation on the line for you based on a promise that you were going to deal with these hard issues.”
As a reminder, here is what we do not want to see: cowardice from people who want to put the burden on the other side to handle the problem:
And as another reminder, here is what we do want to see: people standing up and talking about the problem and what we need to do to fix it — even when saying these things is politically risky:
I know I already showed you that video . . . but God, I love it so much.
And the contrast to the Geither video is telling. Geither’s attitude that, hey, sure our plan sucks, but let’s see if you people can somehow muster the political will to do better! . . . that is exactly what Gov. Christie is talking about.
If you want to claim to be a leader, try leading.
Friday, February 18, 2011
Wisconsin Public Unions Show Their True Face
Phineas - Forget the overheated rhetoric and signs comparing democratically elected governors and legislators to Hitler and rapists. Forget the spoiled-brat demands and Athens-style protests for the unquestioned continuation of gold-plated benefits that most private-sector workers would give their eye teeth for. You want to know just how much of a threat to democracy, representative government, and the general safety public-employee unions can be when threatened?
Try to take away their goodies, and they’ll go after your mother:
Idaho has a “superintendent of public instruction,” and his name is Tom Luna. He has proposed some measures that the teachers’ union doesn’t like, at all. And his opponents have made sure that he feels good and threatened.
Someone went to his mother’s house — his mother’s. Someone slashed his tires and spray-painted a threat onto the door. As reported in this article, Luna has said, “Family and personal property are off-limits. You don’t cross that line . . .”
Oh, yes, you do. At least some do. I will repeat what I have already said this morning: I don’t want to hear from the Left about “civility” for the rest of my life.
Neither “civility” nor “democracy.” And this is in deep-Red Idaho!
This isn’t just (or at all) a fight over benefits or economics; this is a struggle over who has power — the elected representatives of the people or union bosses and their paid-for allies in the Democratic Party. Right now it’s just Idaho, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Indiana, but the battles here and, inevitably, in other states will determine who has that power. The Left has drawn such hard lines already against any reform that the governors can’t afford to back down, lest they let Labor know the elected representatives of the people can be intimidated through intransigence and thuggery. It’s a sad thing for decent union members who would likely have accepted reasonable compromise if the situation had been honestly explained to them, but their leaders have lead them into a battle that forces the governors to break the unions in order to keep faith with their voters — the taxpayers who are the public employees’ real bosses.
More than being about fiscal soundness, this is a battle between representative democracy and corporatism.
Regarding the President’s shameful insertion of himself into what is purely a matter for state governments, Matt Welch at Reason cuts through the bull and asks “Is this how a President should act?”
I have written in the past about how libertarians are pretty lonely in the political scheme of things in terms of constantly being challenged to defend themselves against the “logical conclusion” of their philosophy. But I think it’s time to amend that. We are witnessing the logical conclusion of the Democratic Party’s philosophy, and it is this: Your tax dollars exist to make public sector unions happy. When we run out of other people’s money to pay for those contracts and promises (most of which are negotiated outside of public view, often between union officials and the politicians that union officials helped elect), then we just need to raise taxes to cover a shortfall that is obviously Wall Street’s fault. Anyone who doesn’t agree is a bully, and might just bear an uncanny resemblance to Hitler.
The president’s heavy-handed involvement, along with House Republicans’ refusal to sign off on any new bailout of the states, means that this may very well be America’s biggest and most widespread political fight in 2011. It’s a cage match to determine first dibs on a shrinking pie. A clarifying moment.
And that clarity will not work to the unions’ benefit. The public is on to their racket.
Break them.
Try to take away their goodies, and they’ll go after your mother:
Idaho has a “superintendent of public instruction,” and his name is Tom Luna. He has proposed some measures that the teachers’ union doesn’t like, at all. And his opponents have made sure that he feels good and threatened.
Someone went to his mother’s house — his mother’s. Someone slashed his tires and spray-painted a threat onto the door. As reported in this article, Luna has said, “Family and personal property are off-limits. You don’t cross that line . . .”
Oh, yes, you do. At least some do. I will repeat what I have already said this morning: I don’t want to hear from the Left about “civility” for the rest of my life.
Neither “civility” nor “democracy.” And this is in deep-Red Idaho!
This isn’t just (or at all) a fight over benefits or economics; this is a struggle over who has power — the elected representatives of the people or union bosses and their paid-for allies in the Democratic Party. Right now it’s just Idaho, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Indiana, but the battles here and, inevitably, in other states will determine who has that power. The Left has drawn such hard lines already against any reform that the governors can’t afford to back down, lest they let Labor know the elected representatives of the people can be intimidated through intransigence and thuggery. It’s a sad thing for decent union members who would likely have accepted reasonable compromise if the situation had been honestly explained to them, but their leaders have lead them into a battle that forces the governors to break the unions in order to keep faith with their voters — the taxpayers who are the public employees’ real bosses.
More than being about fiscal soundness, this is a battle between representative democracy and corporatism.
Regarding the President’s shameful insertion of himself into what is purely a matter for state governments, Matt Welch at Reason cuts through the bull and asks “Is this how a President should act?”
I have written in the past about how libertarians are pretty lonely in the political scheme of things in terms of constantly being challenged to defend themselves against the “logical conclusion” of their philosophy. But I think it’s time to amend that. We are witnessing the logical conclusion of the Democratic Party’s philosophy, and it is this: Your tax dollars exist to make public sector unions happy. When we run out of other people’s money to pay for those contracts and promises (most of which are negotiated outside of public view, often between union officials and the politicians that union officials helped elect), then we just need to raise taxes to cover a shortfall that is obviously Wall Street’s fault. Anyone who doesn’t agree is a bully, and might just bear an uncanny resemblance to Hitler.
The president’s heavy-handed involvement, along with House Republicans’ refusal to sign off on any new bailout of the states, means that this may very well be America’s biggest and most widespread political fight in 2011. It’s a cage match to determine first dibs on a shrinking pie. A clarifying moment.
And that clarity will not work to the unions’ benefit. The public is on to their racket.
Break them.
New York Times Endorse Mob Rule In Wisconsin
Legal Insurrection - Now this represents real change.
After two years of using the pages of The NY Times to lash out at peaceful health care protesters and Tea Parties, the Board of Editors of The New York Times has decided that actual violence by unions in Wisconsin is "not surprising" (emphasis mine):
"Like many governors, [Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker] wants to cut the benefits of state workers. But he also decided a budget crisis was a good time to advance an ideological goal dear to his fellow Republicans: eliminating most collective bargaining rights for public employees.
Not surprisingly, thousands of workers descended on the Capitol building, pounding on windows and blocking doors, yelling “shut it down.” ...
Keeping schools closed and blocking certain public services is not a strategy we support and could alienate public opinion and play into the governor’s hand. Short of that, the unions should make their voices heard and push back hard against this misguided plan."
And just what does "push back hard" mean? Those sound like fighting words to me.
If one of the union members hurts someone, will that also be "not surprising"? Are the Editors contributing to a "gale of anger" the consequences of which will be their responsibility?
And what process is it that the Editors find so distasteful that they feel mob rule is needed? Why, it's the democratic process in the Wisconsin state legislature.
After two years of using the pages of The NY Times to lash out at peaceful health care protesters and Tea Parties, the Board of Editors of The New York Times has decided that actual violence by unions in Wisconsin is "not surprising" (emphasis mine):
"Like many governors, [Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker] wants to cut the benefits of state workers. But he also decided a budget crisis was a good time to advance an ideological goal dear to his fellow Republicans: eliminating most collective bargaining rights for public employees.
Not surprisingly, thousands of workers descended on the Capitol building, pounding on windows and blocking doors, yelling “shut it down.” ...
Keeping schools closed and blocking certain public services is not a strategy we support and could alienate public opinion and play into the governor’s hand. Short of that, the unions should make their voices heard and push back hard against this misguided plan."
And just what does "push back hard" mean? Those sound like fighting words to me.
If one of the union members hurts someone, will that also be "not surprising"? Are the Editors contributing to a "gale of anger" the consequences of which will be their responsibility?
And what process is it that the Editors find so distasteful that they feel mob rule is needed? Why, it's the democratic process in the Wisconsin state legislature.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Why Isn't Wall Street Thugs In Jail?
Matt Taibbi - Over drinks at a bar on a dreary, snowy night in Washington this past month, a former Senate investigator laughed as he polished off his beer.
"Everything's fucked up, and nobody goes to jail," he said. "That's your whole story right there. Hell, you don't even have to write the rest of it. Just write that."
I put down my notebook. "Just that?"
"That's right," he said, signaling to the waitress for the check. "Everything's fucked up, and nobody goes to jail. You can end the piece right there."
Nobody goes to jail. This is the mantra of the financial-crisis era, one that saw virtually every major bank and financial company on Wall Street embroiled in obscene criminal scandals that impoverished millions and collectively destroyed hundreds of billions, in fact, trillions of dollars of the world's wealth — and nobody went to jail. Nobody, that is, except Bernie Madoff, a flamboyant and pathological celebrity con artist, whose victims happened to be other rich and famous people.
This article appears in the March 3, 2011 issue of Rolling Stone. The issue is available now on newsstands and will appear in the online archive February 18.
The rest of them, all of them, got off. Not a single executive who ran the companies that cooked up and cashed in on the phony financial boom — an industrywide scam that involved the mass sale of mismarked, fraudulent mortgage-backed securities — has ever been convicted. Their names by now are familiar to even the most casual Middle American news consumer: companies like AIG, Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America and Morgan Stanley. Most of these firms were directly involved in elaborate fraud and theft. Lehman Brothers hid billions in loans from its investors. Bank of America lied about billions in bonuses. Goldman Sachs failed to tell clients how it put together the born-to-lose toxic mortgage deals it was selling. What's more, many of these companies had corporate chieftains whose actions cost investors billions — from AIG derivatives chief Joe Cassano, who assured investors they would not lose even "one dollar" just months before his unit imploded, to the $263 million in compensation that former Lehman chief Dick "The Gorilla" Fuld conveniently failed to disclose. Yet not one of them has faced time behind bars.
Invasion of the Home Snatchers
Instead, federal regulators and prosecutors have let the banks and finance companies that tried to burn the world economy to the ground get off with carefully orchestrated settlements — whitewash jobs that involve the firms paying pathetically small fines without even being required to admit wrongdoing. To add insult to injury, the people who actually committed the crimes almost never pay the fines themselves; banks caught defrauding their shareholders often use shareholder money to foot the tab of justice. "If the allegations in these settlements are true," says Jed Rakoff, a federal judge in the Southern District of New York, "it's management buying its way off cheap, from the pockets of their victims."
Taibblog: Commentary on politics and the economy by Matt Taibbi
To understand the significance of this, one has to think carefully about the efficacy of fines as a punishment for a defendant pool that includes the richest people on earth — people who simply get their companies to pay their fines for them. Conversely, one has to consider the powerful deterrent to further wrongdoing that the state is missing by not introducing this particular class of people to the experience of incarceration. "You put Lloyd Blankfein in pound-me-in-the-ass prison for one six-month term, and all this bullshit would stop, all over Wall Street," says a former congressional aide. "That's all it would take. Just once."
But that hasn't happened. Because the entire system set up to monitor and regulate Wall Street is fucked up.
Just ask the people who tried to do the right thing.
"Everything's fucked up, and nobody goes to jail," he said. "That's your whole story right there. Hell, you don't even have to write the rest of it. Just write that."
I put down my notebook. "Just that?"
"That's right," he said, signaling to the waitress for the check. "Everything's fucked up, and nobody goes to jail. You can end the piece right there."
Nobody goes to jail. This is the mantra of the financial-crisis era, one that saw virtually every major bank and financial company on Wall Street embroiled in obscene criminal scandals that impoverished millions and collectively destroyed hundreds of billions, in fact, trillions of dollars of the world's wealth — and nobody went to jail. Nobody, that is, except Bernie Madoff, a flamboyant and pathological celebrity con artist, whose victims happened to be other rich and famous people.
This article appears in the March 3, 2011 issue of Rolling Stone. The issue is available now on newsstands and will appear in the online archive February 18.
The rest of them, all of them, got off. Not a single executive who ran the companies that cooked up and cashed in on the phony financial boom — an industrywide scam that involved the mass sale of mismarked, fraudulent mortgage-backed securities — has ever been convicted. Their names by now are familiar to even the most casual Middle American news consumer: companies like AIG, Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America and Morgan Stanley. Most of these firms were directly involved in elaborate fraud and theft. Lehman Brothers hid billions in loans from its investors. Bank of America lied about billions in bonuses. Goldman Sachs failed to tell clients how it put together the born-to-lose toxic mortgage deals it was selling. What's more, many of these companies had corporate chieftains whose actions cost investors billions — from AIG derivatives chief Joe Cassano, who assured investors they would not lose even "one dollar" just months before his unit imploded, to the $263 million in compensation that former Lehman chief Dick "The Gorilla" Fuld conveniently failed to disclose. Yet not one of them has faced time behind bars.
Invasion of the Home Snatchers
Instead, federal regulators and prosecutors have let the banks and finance companies that tried to burn the world economy to the ground get off with carefully orchestrated settlements — whitewash jobs that involve the firms paying pathetically small fines without even being required to admit wrongdoing. To add insult to injury, the people who actually committed the crimes almost never pay the fines themselves; banks caught defrauding their shareholders often use shareholder money to foot the tab of justice. "If the allegations in these settlements are true," says Jed Rakoff, a federal judge in the Southern District of New York, "it's management buying its way off cheap, from the pockets of their victims."
Taibblog: Commentary on politics and the economy by Matt Taibbi
To understand the significance of this, one has to think carefully about the efficacy of fines as a punishment for a defendant pool that includes the richest people on earth — people who simply get their companies to pay their fines for them. Conversely, one has to consider the powerful deterrent to further wrongdoing that the state is missing by not introducing this particular class of people to the experience of incarceration. "You put Lloyd Blankfein in pound-me-in-the-ass prison for one six-month term, and all this bullshit would stop, all over Wall Street," says a former congressional aide. "That's all it would take. Just once."
But that hasn't happened. Because the entire system set up to monitor and regulate Wall Street is fucked up.
Just ask the people who tried to do the right thing.
President Obama Accuses Wisconsin Conducting An "Assualt On Unions"
Ed Morrissey - Barack Obama spoke with Wisconsin television station WTMJ earlier this morning to weigh in on Governor Scott Walker’s efforts to force unions to accept restructuring of the public sector to solve long-term budget crises in the state. Wisconsin Republicans swept the state elections in 2010 in the aftermath of large budget shortfalls. Obama conceded the need for action, and claimed credit for his federal pay freeze as an example of his own leadership, but accused Walker of conducting “an assault on unions.” Eyeblast provided this clip:
He told TODAY’S TMJ4 in an exclusive interview that sacrifices should be made to deal with fiscal changes, but that public employees should not be vilified.
“Some of what I’ve heard coming out of Wisconsin, where they’re just making it harder for public employees to collectively bargain generally, seems like more of an assault on unions,” Mr. Obama said to TODAY’S TMJ4′s Charles Benson in a one-on-one talk.
“I think everybody’s got to make some adjustments, but I think it’s also important to recognize that public employees make enormous contributions to our states and our citizens.”
This is yet another meaningless cliche from Obama. Everyone contributes to someone, either customers or communities, or both. Public-sector workers get compensated for their “contributions,” and they do so with a great deal less accountability, more job security, and in most cases better compensation than employees in the private sector do. Walker’s efforts intend on rectifying that balance by bringing pension contributions and health-insurance costs in line with the private sector and making it easier to terminate those employees who waste taxpayer money through incompetence, non-performance, and insubordination.
Taxpayers want more accountability and less bureaucratic entrenchment from their government. Unions have conducted an assault on those concepts for decades. All that Walker, Chris Christie, and even Andrew Cuomo have done is to stop retreating and start fighting back for fiscal sanity and public-resource accountability. For Obama, that is apparently one retreat too few.
He told TODAY’S TMJ4 in an exclusive interview that sacrifices should be made to deal with fiscal changes, but that public employees should not be vilified.
“Some of what I’ve heard coming out of Wisconsin, where they’re just making it harder for public employees to collectively bargain generally, seems like more of an assault on unions,” Mr. Obama said to TODAY’S TMJ4′s Charles Benson in a one-on-one talk.
“I think everybody’s got to make some adjustments, but I think it’s also important to recognize that public employees make enormous contributions to our states and our citizens.”
This is yet another meaningless cliche from Obama. Everyone contributes to someone, either customers or communities, or both. Public-sector workers get compensated for their “contributions,” and they do so with a great deal less accountability, more job security, and in most cases better compensation than employees in the private sector do. Walker’s efforts intend on rectifying that balance by bringing pension contributions and health-insurance costs in line with the private sector and making it easier to terminate those employees who waste taxpayer money through incompetence, non-performance, and insubordination.
Taxpayers want more accountability and less bureaucratic entrenchment from their government. Unions have conducted an assault on those concepts for decades. All that Walker, Chris Christie, and even Andrew Cuomo have done is to stop retreating and start fighting back for fiscal sanity and public-resource accountability. For Obama, that is apparently one retreat too few.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
President Obama Will Veto GOP Cuts
David Rogers - President Barack Obama signaled his openness to larger deficit-reduction talks with Congress on Tuesday but drew a sharp line at the immediate spending cuts proposed by the House, even suggesting that Republicans were jeopardizing the Pentagon’s ability to “meet vital military requirements.”
The thinly veiled veto threat was delivered in a formal statement of administration policy just hours after debate opened in the House on the Republican plan.
And the suggestion that Republicans risked hurting the nation’s defense amounts to an especially hardball political response designed to play on divisions in the GOP over the level of Pentagon cuts.
“The bill proposes cuts that would sharply undermine core government functions and investments key to economic growth and job creation and would reduce funding for the Department of Defense to a level that would leave the department without the resources and flexibility needed to meet vital military requirements,” the statement read. “If the president is presented with a bill that undermines critical priorities or national security through funding levels or restrictions, contains earmarks or curtails the drivers of long-term economic growth and job creation while continuing to burden future generations with deficits, the president will veto the bill.”
In fact, Republicans have already sworn to keep all earmarks out of the bill, and their primary focus remains domestic and foreign-aid spending. But under pressure to meet the goal of cutting $100 billion from Obama’s 2011 requests, the House Appropriations Committee agreed to cut $15 billion from what Secretary of Defense Robert Gates had requested for 2011.
In the early rounds of the floor debate Tuesday, the $516.2 billion defense chapter of the bill was the first up for amendments — and the immediate target of more spending cuts offered by newly elected conservatives.
Pro-defense forces prevailed in the first series of votes last night. But House Armed House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) has grown increasingly agitated with the level of cuts and most fears the prospect that, unless the spending impasse is resolved soon, it will be impossible to get a final defense budget in place.
“Whatever it takes, we need to get a bill,” McKeon told POLITICO.
But going to his friend Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), and seeking relief, was not an option at this stage. “Boehner’s in a box right now,” McKeon said of the pressure on the leadership from the right and tea party freshmen. “Boehner’s got parameters that he has to work within.”
“They [the speaker and GOP leadership] worked out what they thought was workable, and the freshmen and other conservatives kind of told them it wasn’t enough. He has to get some kind of deal.”
In this light, the White House veto threat fits into a Democratic strategy of standing back, perhaps poking at the Republican majority but largely hoping that divisions arise within the GOP itself.
For example, South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn, a member of the Democratic leadership, delivered emotional remarks during a news conference on the education cuts in the bill — speaking of the impact on districts, like his own, that have a large concentration of poverty and on as many as seven historically black colleges targeted by the GOP.
“You explain to me how that will provide us the wherewithal to compete,” Clyburn said of the cuts. “They’ve just gone in with a meat ax chopping stuff out in order to get to some magic number without regard to what this means to the people that we are trying to prepare for the future and what it means to this country if we are going to compete.”
But limited by the rules governing debate, restoring funding would be difficult, and Clyburn appears to be focusing on directing what remains to the areas of greatest need.
Senate Democrats are Obama’s real line of defense, but in turn, the president is under pressure there to show that he is willing to make more of a commitment to a longer-term deficit reduction scheme akin to suggestions that came out of his presidential commission last year.
“I’m not suggesting that we don’t have to do more,” Obama said at the White House, in the face of criticism that his new budget fell short of the mark.
“It’s a matter of everybody having a serious conversation about where we want to go and then ultimately getting in that boat at the same time so it doesn’t tip over.”
“Congress and the president always have this dance,” said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.). “This is the beginning of the question, if at the end of the day you can have a dramatic agreement, I still think it’s very possible. This time it’s different.”
And whatever the disappointment with Obama’s budget, those dreaming bigger still met Tuesday morning and reported progress on their own efforts.
“My personal thing is the numbers are wrong, it’s highly inaccurate and doesn’t go near where we need to be, and I think they realize that,” said Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) of the White House. “This is the first bid. It is a negotiating chip.”
The thinly veiled veto threat was delivered in a formal statement of administration policy just hours after debate opened in the House on the Republican plan.
And the suggestion that Republicans risked hurting the nation’s defense amounts to an especially hardball political response designed to play on divisions in the GOP over the level of Pentagon cuts.
“The bill proposes cuts that would sharply undermine core government functions and investments key to economic growth and job creation and would reduce funding for the Department of Defense to a level that would leave the department without the resources and flexibility needed to meet vital military requirements,” the statement read. “If the president is presented with a bill that undermines critical priorities or national security through funding levels or restrictions, contains earmarks or curtails the drivers of long-term economic growth and job creation while continuing to burden future generations with deficits, the president will veto the bill.”
In fact, Republicans have already sworn to keep all earmarks out of the bill, and their primary focus remains domestic and foreign-aid spending. But under pressure to meet the goal of cutting $100 billion from Obama’s 2011 requests, the House Appropriations Committee agreed to cut $15 billion from what Secretary of Defense Robert Gates had requested for 2011.
In the early rounds of the floor debate Tuesday, the $516.2 billion defense chapter of the bill was the first up for amendments — and the immediate target of more spending cuts offered by newly elected conservatives.
Pro-defense forces prevailed in the first series of votes last night. But House Armed House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) has grown increasingly agitated with the level of cuts and most fears the prospect that, unless the spending impasse is resolved soon, it will be impossible to get a final defense budget in place.
“Whatever it takes, we need to get a bill,” McKeon told POLITICO.
But going to his friend Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), and seeking relief, was not an option at this stage. “Boehner’s in a box right now,” McKeon said of the pressure on the leadership from the right and tea party freshmen. “Boehner’s got parameters that he has to work within.”
“They [the speaker and GOP leadership] worked out what they thought was workable, and the freshmen and other conservatives kind of told them it wasn’t enough. He has to get some kind of deal.”
In this light, the White House veto threat fits into a Democratic strategy of standing back, perhaps poking at the Republican majority but largely hoping that divisions arise within the GOP itself.
For example, South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn, a member of the Democratic leadership, delivered emotional remarks during a news conference on the education cuts in the bill — speaking of the impact on districts, like his own, that have a large concentration of poverty and on as many as seven historically black colleges targeted by the GOP.
“You explain to me how that will provide us the wherewithal to compete,” Clyburn said of the cuts. “They’ve just gone in with a meat ax chopping stuff out in order to get to some magic number without regard to what this means to the people that we are trying to prepare for the future and what it means to this country if we are going to compete.”
But limited by the rules governing debate, restoring funding would be difficult, and Clyburn appears to be focusing on directing what remains to the areas of greatest need.
Senate Democrats are Obama’s real line of defense, but in turn, the president is under pressure there to show that he is willing to make more of a commitment to a longer-term deficit reduction scheme akin to suggestions that came out of his presidential commission last year.
“I’m not suggesting that we don’t have to do more,” Obama said at the White House, in the face of criticism that his new budget fell short of the mark.
“It’s a matter of everybody having a serious conversation about where we want to go and then ultimately getting in that boat at the same time so it doesn’t tip over.”
“Congress and the president always have this dance,” said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.). “This is the beginning of the question, if at the end of the day you can have a dramatic agreement, I still think it’s very possible. This time it’s different.”
And whatever the disappointment with Obama’s budget, those dreaming bigger still met Tuesday morning and reported progress on their own efforts.
“My personal thing is the numbers are wrong, it’s highly inaccurate and doesn’t go near where we need to be, and I think they realize that,” said Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) of the White House. “This is the first bid. It is a negotiating chip.”
There Is No New Era Of Civility On The "Left"
Ed Driscoll - Not that it ever existed of course.
First up, here’s Ed Morrissey on AlterNet’s racist attack on Herman Cain, the former CEO of Godfather Pizza, after his speech at CPAC this past weekend:
While young conservatives chased out a white-supremacist recruiter from CPAC, it seemed that one site on the Left felt more comfortable with racist attacks. AlterNet, a site that proudly proclaims its “strong content” and “huge readership and reach,” offered its analysis of Herman Cain’s speech at CPAC by calling the former CEO of Godfather Pizza a “monkey in the window”:
In the immortal words of Megatron in Transformers: The Movie, Herman Cain’s speech at CPAC really is bad comedy. As you know, I find black garbage pail kids black conservatives fascinating not because of what they believe, but rather because of how they entertain and perform for their White Conservative masters.
When race minstrelsy was America’s most popular form of mass entertainment, black actors would often have to pretend to be white men, who then in turn would put on the cork to play the role of the “black” coon, Sambo, or Jumping Jim Crow. Adding insult to injury, in a truly perverse and twisted example of the power of American white supremacy black vaudevillians would often pretend to be white in order to denigrate black people for the pleasures of the white gaze. …
In total, CPAC is a carnival and a roadshow for reactionary Conservatives. It is only fitting that in the great tradition of the freak show, the human zoo, the boardwalk, and the great midway world’s fairs of the 19th and 20th centuries, that there is a Borneo man, a Venus Hottentot or a tribe of cannibals from deepest darkest Africa or Papua New Guinea on display. For CPAC and the White Conservative imagination, Herman Cain and his black and brown kin are that featured attraction.
We always need a monkey in the window, for he/she reminds us of our humanity while simultaneously reinforcing a sense of our own superiority. Sadly, there are always folks who are willing to play that role because it pays so well.
Gotta love that “he/she” there — even in the midst of a racist attack on a prominent conservative, it’s important to reflexively use the appropriate gender-neutral pronouns, lest one commit a politically correct thoughtcrime.
Meanwhile, National Lampoon, with its glory days now decades in the rear-view mirror, enters the gutter and continues to descend, wishing AIDs upon Andrew Breitbart for being “a meanie.”
Wait, being “mean” is now a pejorative at the Lampoon? Michael O’Donoghue must be rolling over in his grave.
And while those are both euphemistic attacks, CBS journalist Lara Logan was physically assaulted in Egypt — and then further rhetorically trashed by Nir Rosen, a fellow at the NYU Center for Law and Security, in a vile stream of tweets screencapped by Jim Geraghty, who writes:
Nir Rosen deleted some of his worst comments about Logan on his Twitter feed, but… it’s the Internet. It’s never gone forever.
I’m sure Rosen will apologize at some point, and perhaps we’ll get some tut-tutting statement from NYU about the need for “civility” and “restraint” and “sensitivity.” Brows will be furrowed. Maybe they’ll hold a seminar about technology and emotional reactions to breaking news events.
But let’s just remember one thing going forward: Nir Rosen believed this was the right moment to let the world know that he “ran out of sympathy for her” and that we should “remember her role as a major war monger” and that we “have to find humor in the small things.”
Your move, NYU.
Perhaps they said something to him, as Rosen has since tweeted an apology. Though it should be placed into context with this item from blogger Armed Liberal, who writes, “When last seen on these pages, Nir Rosen was a journalist embedded with the Taliban who used his US documents to pass a band of Taliban through an Afghan government checkpoint.”
(And sadly, the right wasn’t immune to attacking Logan as well, as Debbie Schlussel responds to Logan’s attack by writing, “As I’ve noted before, it bothers me not a lick when mainstream media reporters who keep telling us Muslims and Islam are peaceful get a taste of just how ‘peaceful’ Muslims and Islam really are. In fact, it kinda warms my heart.” Classy.)
First up, here’s Ed Morrissey on AlterNet’s racist attack on Herman Cain, the former CEO of Godfather Pizza, after his speech at CPAC this past weekend:
While young conservatives chased out a white-supremacist recruiter from CPAC, it seemed that one site on the Left felt more comfortable with racist attacks. AlterNet, a site that proudly proclaims its “strong content” and “huge readership and reach,” offered its analysis of Herman Cain’s speech at CPAC by calling the former CEO of Godfather Pizza a “monkey in the window”:
In the immortal words of Megatron in Transformers: The Movie, Herman Cain’s speech at CPAC really is bad comedy. As you know, I find black garbage pail kids black conservatives fascinating not because of what they believe, but rather because of how they entertain and perform for their White Conservative masters.
When race minstrelsy was America’s most popular form of mass entertainment, black actors would often have to pretend to be white men, who then in turn would put on the cork to play the role of the “black” coon, Sambo, or Jumping Jim Crow. Adding insult to injury, in a truly perverse and twisted example of the power of American white supremacy black vaudevillians would often pretend to be white in order to denigrate black people for the pleasures of the white gaze. …
In total, CPAC is a carnival and a roadshow for reactionary Conservatives. It is only fitting that in the great tradition of the freak show, the human zoo, the boardwalk, and the great midway world’s fairs of the 19th and 20th centuries, that there is a Borneo man, a Venus Hottentot or a tribe of cannibals from deepest darkest Africa or Papua New Guinea on display. For CPAC and the White Conservative imagination, Herman Cain and his black and brown kin are that featured attraction.
We always need a monkey in the window, for he/she reminds us of our humanity while simultaneously reinforcing a sense of our own superiority. Sadly, there are always folks who are willing to play that role because it pays so well.
Gotta love that “he/she” there — even in the midst of a racist attack on a prominent conservative, it’s important to reflexively use the appropriate gender-neutral pronouns, lest one commit a politically correct thoughtcrime.
Meanwhile, National Lampoon, with its glory days now decades in the rear-view mirror, enters the gutter and continues to descend, wishing AIDs upon Andrew Breitbart for being “a meanie.”
Wait, being “mean” is now a pejorative at the Lampoon? Michael O’Donoghue must be rolling over in his grave.
And while those are both euphemistic attacks, CBS journalist Lara Logan was physically assaulted in Egypt — and then further rhetorically trashed by Nir Rosen, a fellow at the NYU Center for Law and Security, in a vile stream of tweets screencapped by Jim Geraghty, who writes:
Nir Rosen deleted some of his worst comments about Logan on his Twitter feed, but… it’s the Internet. It’s never gone forever.
I’m sure Rosen will apologize at some point, and perhaps we’ll get some tut-tutting statement from NYU about the need for “civility” and “restraint” and “sensitivity.” Brows will be furrowed. Maybe they’ll hold a seminar about technology and emotional reactions to breaking news events.
But let’s just remember one thing going forward: Nir Rosen believed this was the right moment to let the world know that he “ran out of sympathy for her” and that we should “remember her role as a major war monger” and that we “have to find humor in the small things.”
Your move, NYU.
Perhaps they said something to him, as Rosen has since tweeted an apology. Though it should be placed into context with this item from blogger Armed Liberal, who writes, “When last seen on these pages, Nir Rosen was a journalist embedded with the Taliban who used his US documents to pass a band of Taliban through an Afghan government checkpoint.”
(And sadly, the right wasn’t immune to attacking Logan as well, as Debbie Schlussel responds to Logan’s attack by writing, “As I’ve noted before, it bothers me not a lick when mainstream media reporters who keep telling us Muslims and Islam are peaceful get a taste of just how ‘peaceful’ Muslims and Islam really are. In fact, it kinda warms my heart.” Classy.)
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Iran The New Protests Part 2
WASHINGTON – Amidst a new wave of protests in Iran, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday accused the Iranian government of "hypocrisy," saying it must listen to the wishes of its demonstrators.
"What we see happening in Iran today is a testament to the courage of the Iranian people, and an indictment of the hypocrisy of the Iranian regime -- a regime which over the last three weeks has constantly hailed what went on in Egypt," Clinton told reporters.
"We wish the opposition and the brave people in the streets across cities in Iran the same opportunities that they saw their Egyptian counterparts seize."
Iranian opposition protesters took part in a banned march to support the Egyptian and Tunisian uprisings that overthrew their governments. They reported Monday on a website that dozens were arrested.
"Let me, clearly and directly, support the aspirations of the people who are in the streets in Iran today," Clinton said.
Unlike in Egypt, where now-resigned autocratic leader Hosni Mubarak was a friend to the US, American officials seemingly feel freer to denounce the regime and side firmly with the reform movement.
Widespread protests broke out in Iran in 2009, when many were killed, but the Iranian regime held power after a controversial election that fueled the belief that the government was illegitimate.
A witness told Reuters that Iranian security forces used tear gas to scatter and intimidate the demonstrators. The regime's security apparatus has been forceful in cracking down on even peaceful dissent since the unsuccessful uprising of 2009.
Clinton called for a more "open" society in Iran.
"We think that there needs to be a commitment to open up the political system in Iran to hear the voices of the opposition and civil society," she said.
"What we see happening in Iran today is a testament to the courage of the Iranian people, and an indictment of the hypocrisy of the Iranian regime -- a regime which over the last three weeks has constantly hailed what went on in Egypt," Clinton told reporters.
"We wish the opposition and the brave people in the streets across cities in Iran the same opportunities that they saw their Egyptian counterparts seize."
Iranian opposition protesters took part in a banned march to support the Egyptian and Tunisian uprisings that overthrew their governments. They reported Monday on a website that dozens were arrested.
"Let me, clearly and directly, support the aspirations of the people who are in the streets in Iran today," Clinton said.
Unlike in Egypt, where now-resigned autocratic leader Hosni Mubarak was a friend to the US, American officials seemingly feel freer to denounce the regime and side firmly with the reform movement.
Widespread protests broke out in Iran in 2009, when many were killed, but the Iranian regime held power after a controversial election that fueled the belief that the government was illegitimate.
A witness told Reuters that Iranian security forces used tear gas to scatter and intimidate the demonstrators. The regime's security apparatus has been forceful in cracking down on even peaceful dissent since the unsuccessful uprising of 2009.
Clinton called for a more "open" society in Iran.
"We think that there needs to be a commitment to open up the political system in Iran to hear the voices of the opposition and civil society," she said.
Andrew Sullivan Breaks Ties With Obama
John Treacher - Andrew Sullivan, forensic obstetrician and blogger for The Atlantic, pauses in his neverending search for Trig Palin’s afterbirth to announce that he has torn his Barack Obama poster off his bedroom wall and thrown himself facedown on the bed in despair. Opining on Obama’s new budget — “cynical and unrealistic,” according to the WSJ — Sullivan keens:
…this president is too weak, too cautious, too beholden to politics over policy to lead. In this budget, in his refusal to do anything concrete to tackle the looming entitlement debt, in his failure to address the generational injustice, in his blithe indifference to the increasing danger of default, he has betrayed those of us who took him to be a serious president prepared to put the good of the country before his short term political interests. Like his State of the Union, this budget is good short term politics but such a massive pile of fiscal bullshit it makes it perfectly clear that Obama is kicking this vital issue down the road.
To all those under 30 who worked so hard to get this man elected, know this: he just screwed you over. He thinks you’re fools. Either the US will go into default because of Obama’s cowardice, or you will be paying far far more for far far less because this president has no courage when it counts. He let you down. On the critical issue of America’s fiscal crisis, he represents no hope and no change. Just the same old Washington politics he once promised to end.
This from the man who once wrote: “We may in fact have finally found that bridge to the 21st century that Bill Clinton told us about. Its name is Obama.” I’ve got another bridge I’d like you to take a look at, Andrew. It’s in Brooklyn…
…this president is too weak, too cautious, too beholden to politics over policy to lead. In this budget, in his refusal to do anything concrete to tackle the looming entitlement debt, in his failure to address the generational injustice, in his blithe indifference to the increasing danger of default, he has betrayed those of us who took him to be a serious president prepared to put the good of the country before his short term political interests. Like his State of the Union, this budget is good short term politics but such a massive pile of fiscal bullshit it makes it perfectly clear that Obama is kicking this vital issue down the road.
To all those under 30 who worked so hard to get this man elected, know this: he just screwed you over. He thinks you’re fools. Either the US will go into default because of Obama’s cowardice, or you will be paying far far more for far far less because this president has no courage when it counts. He let you down. On the critical issue of America’s fiscal crisis, he represents no hope and no change. Just the same old Washington politics he once promised to end.
This from the man who once wrote: “We may in fact have finally found that bridge to the 21st century that Bill Clinton told us about. Its name is Obama.” I’ve got another bridge I’d like you to take a look at, Andrew. It’s in Brooklyn…
Monday, February 14, 2011
Rep. Paul Ryan Slams Obama $3,73 Trillion Budget
Ed Morrissey - Chris Wallace asks Paul Ryan whether the new Obama budget is “dead on arrival,” and Ryan replies in his Fox News Sunday interview that he will have to see the full proposal first. According to White House leaks, however, Ryan assumed that the budget would contain “paltry” cuts followed by spending increases recast as “investments,” along with tax hikes to raise funds. “Borrowing and spending is not the way to prosperity,” Ryan warns, and blasts the President for failing to lead:
The budget proposal was pretty much as expected from the leaks, with the addition of previously-rejected tax hikes:
President Barack Obama’s budget proposal resurrects a series of tax increases that were largely ignored by Congress when Democrats controlled both chambers. Republicans, who now control the House, are signaling they will be even less receptive.
The plan includes tax increases for oil, gas and coal producers, investment managers and U.S.-based multinational corporations. The plan would allow Bush-era tax cuts to expire at the end of 2012 for individuals making more than $200,000 and married couples making more than $250,000. Wealthy taxpayers would have their itemized deductions limited, including deductions for mortgage interest, charitable contributions and state and local taxes. …
Obama’s $3.729 trillion budget proposal for fiscal 2012 shows the deficit rising to $1.645 trillion in fiscal 2011, then falling sharply to $1.101 trillion in 2012.
This trend would trim the deficit as a share of the U.S. economy to 3.2 percent by 2015 from 10.9 percent this year, and meet a pledge Obama made to his Group of 20 partners to halve the deficit by 2013. The news was well-timed, with G20 finance ministers meeting in Paris on Friday and Saturday.
In other words, we’re not going back to 2008 budgetary levels, but instead going back to somewhere between 2009 and 2010. These are basically symbolic cuts rather than any sea change in Beltway business.
The budget proposal was pretty much as expected from the leaks, with the addition of previously-rejected tax hikes:
President Barack Obama’s budget proposal resurrects a series of tax increases that were largely ignored by Congress when Democrats controlled both chambers. Republicans, who now control the House, are signaling they will be even less receptive.
The plan includes tax increases for oil, gas and coal producers, investment managers and U.S.-based multinational corporations. The plan would allow Bush-era tax cuts to expire at the end of 2012 for individuals making more than $200,000 and married couples making more than $250,000. Wealthy taxpayers would have their itemized deductions limited, including deductions for mortgage interest, charitable contributions and state and local taxes. …
Obama’s $3.729 trillion budget proposal for fiscal 2012 shows the deficit rising to $1.645 trillion in fiscal 2011, then falling sharply to $1.101 trillion in 2012.
This trend would trim the deficit as a share of the U.S. economy to 3.2 percent by 2015 from 10.9 percent this year, and meet a pledge Obama made to his Group of 20 partners to halve the deficit by 2013. The news was well-timed, with G20 finance ministers meeting in Paris on Friday and Saturday.
In other words, we’re not going back to 2008 budgetary levels, but instead going back to somewhere between 2009 and 2010. These are basically symbolic cuts rather than any sea change in Beltway business.
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