01/01/2013 - Your New Year Special Issue: Unemployment, Economy, Privacy, New Laws, Climate, Atheism, Whistleblowers, Palestine, and more!

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Made in the USA - By prisoner labor

Re-inventing the slave trade

Activists Dismayed at Renewal of Surveillance Bill

ivil rights campaigners voiced dismay on Friday over the US Senate's re-authorization of the government's warrantless surveillance program, and the defeat of two amendments that would have provided for basic oversight of the eavesdropping.

http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/335-156/15294-activists-dismayed-at-renewal-of-surveillance-bil

Bernie Sanders Slams Boehner and Right Wing House Extremists for Fiscal Cliff

US Senate reauthorizes FISA surveillance law 
The US Senate [official website] passed the Reauthorization Act of 2012 [text, pdf] on Friday in a 73-23 vote to extend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Amendments Act of 2008 (FISA) [text, pdf] for five years. FISA grants the National Security Agency (NSA) [official website] the authority to conduct surveillance of Americans’ phone calls and emails in attempts to protect against terrorism and other foreign threats. 
http://jurist.org/paperchase/2012/12/us-senate-reauthorizes-fisa-surveillance-law.php

There Is Nothing Heroic About Torture

he critical acclaim for the new Kathryn Bigelow movie "Zero Dark Thirty" has renewed the debate on the efficacy of torture.

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/287-124/15301-there-is-nothing-heroic-about-torture

The Foreclosure Cliff
e can thank Ben Bernanke for the phrase "fiscal cliff" -- a phrase many observers have tried to soften by pointing out they think it's more like falling down a slope, sliding down a curve, or even tripping over a curb. I can understand trying to find other metaphors to replace the nearly always fatal results of going off a cliff. But maybe those observers missed one effect that Bernanke knows drives the economy more than any else: housing.
http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/430-foreclosure/15302-the-foreclosure-cliff

The Financial Elite's War Against the US Economy

Today’s economic warfare is not the kind waged a century ago between labor and its industrial employers. Finance has moved to capture the economy at large, industry and mining, public infrastructure (via privatization) and now even the educational system. (At over $1 trillion, U.S. student loan debt came to exceed credit-card debt in 2012.) The weapon in this financial warfare is no larger military force. The tactic is to load economies (governments, companies and families) with debt, siphon off their income as debt service and then foreclose when debtors lack the means to pay. Indebting government gives creditors a lever to pry away land, public infrastructure and other property in the public domain. Indebting companies enables creditors to seize employee pension savings. And indebting labor means that it no longer is necessary to hire strikebreakers to attack union organizers and strikers.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/12/31-8

US War Machine Leaves Ugly Imprint in Afghanistan

If only in a microcosm, a dispatch from a remote outpost in Afghanistan reveals the damage and dysfunction created by years of US occupation and how little regard western military forces have for local communities when a final determination is made that an outpost should be abandoned.

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/12/31

2012 In Review: A Year of Extreme Weather, Mass Shootings, Drone Wars and Dark Money in Politics

Amid "Cliff-Hanger" Antics, Senator Bernie Sanders Defends Middle Class

The Top 12 Political Fallacies of 2012

Our nation was gripped by so many fallacies and delusions in 2012 that the whole Mayan calendar end-of-the-world thing didn’t even make the list.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/12/31-1

A Wee Comparison of Civil Liberties in the United States of America
Compare and contrast. Here is how seriously we take civil liberties when the subject can be plausibly labeled terrorism
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article33485.htm
8 Striking Parallels Between the U.S. and the Roman Empire
Lawrence Lessig’s Republic Lost documents the corrosive effect of money on our political process. Lessig persuasively makes the case that we are witnessing the loss of our republican form of government, as politicians increasingly represent those who fund their campaigns, rather than our citizens.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article33489.htm

The GOP Has Taken America Hostage -- Is There a Downside for Them?

Republicans are taking a beating in the polls. But it does not seem to weaken their position.

http://www.alternet.org/gop-has-taken-america-hostage-there-downside-them

Will the Economy Slow With or Without the Fiscal Deal?

What is most likely to damage the economy?

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/will-economy-slow-or-without-fiscal-deal

Companies Do Not Have The Right To Impose Owners’ Religion Onto Employees, Says Americans United
Church-State Watchdog Group Says Firms Don’t Have A Religious Liberty Right To Deny Workers Access To Contraceptives
https://www.au.org/media/press-releases/companies-do-not-have-the-right-to-impose-owners-religion-onto-employees-says

US Whistleblowers on Being Targeted by the Secret Security State

Privacy by the Numbers: A New Approach to Safeguarding Data

A mathematical technique called “differential privacy” gives researchers access to vast repositories of personal data while meeting a high standard for privacy protection

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=privacy-by-the-numbers-a-new-approach-to-safeguarding-data&WT.mc_id=SA_DD_20121231

Evolution and Atheism

I have been reading more about evolution and I am beginning to think that the radical clerics are right in a sense. A deep understanding of evolution may lead people away from god and religion, but not for the reasons that are commonly stated.

http://machineslikeus.com/news/evolution-and-atheism

Obama administration considering expansion of mortgage refinancing program

The US government is eyeing mortgage refinancing program expansion that will include borrowers whose mortgages aren’t backed by the government and who are liable to pay more than the worth of their homes.

http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/13704925-obama-administration-considering-expanding-mortgage-refinancing-program

Israel To Displace 1000 Palestinians Next Wednesday

Head of the Wadi Al-Maleh area, in the northern plains of the occupied West Bank, Aref Daraghma, stated that the Israeli army intends to displace around 10000 Palestinian Bedouins in the area in order to conduct military training.

http://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/2012/12/31/alert-israel-to-displace-1000-palestinians-next-wednesday/

Marc Morano: Climate Change Misinformer Of The Year

30.Dec.2012 - Threat to Occupiers, Warrantless Wiretapping, Environmental Justice, West Unleashing Terrorism Against Syria, Millennial Delusions, Anti-Government Propaganda, Times Erases Israel's Crimes, Vitamin Water Deception, War Made Easy, US Became an Orwellian State, Important Bills Blocked by GOP, Social Costs of Austerity, China Prison Labor, more.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: THIS IS NO TIME “FOR A POLITICALLY SELF-INFLICTED WOUND TO OUR ECONOMY”


FBI Ignored Deadly Threat to Occupiers: US Intelligence Machine Instead Plotted with Bankers to Attack Protest Movement

 New documents obtained from the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security by the Partnership for Civil Justice and released this past week show that the FBI and other intelligence and law enforcement agencies began a campaign of monitoring, spying and disrupting the Occupy Movement at least two months before the first occupation actions began in late September 2011.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/FBI-Ignored-Deadly-Threat-by-Dave-Lindorff-121227-423.html

Senate Reauthorizes Warrantless Wiretapping

After Defeating Moderate Reforms, Senate Extends Unchecked Surveillance Powers for Five Years

http://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2012/12/28-0

Deprogramming Progressives

 little bit of economics can be a truly terrible thing, for the introductory classes in micro and macro-economics are the most dogmatic and myth-filled part of the neoliberal curriculum. Dogmas that have been falsified for 75 years (such as austerity) are taught as revealed truth. The poor indoctrinated student is then launched into the world "knowing" that austerity is the answer and that mass unemployment and prolonged recessions are small prices to be paid (by others) to achieve the holy grail of a balanced budget. Students are taught that national budgets are really just like household budgets.

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/15270-focus-deprogramming-progressives

Matt Damon laments U.S. politics: ‘We’re genuinely f*cked’ on long-term issues

Hollywood star Matt Damon recently told Playboy he has little hope that Washington can address long-term environmental issues like using hydraulic fracturing to extract natural gas.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/12/28/matt-damon-laments-u-s-politics-were-genuinely-fcked-on-long-term-issues/

Idle No More: Indigenous-Led Protests Sweep Canada for Native Sovereignty and Environmental Justice

America's "Founding Fathers" Detested the Paradise of Delightful Debauchery and Freedom That Was 18th Century America

There was a lot of fun to be had in early America, before the prudish patrician types did everything they could to stamp it out.

http://www.alternet.org/books/americas-founding-fathers-detested-paradise-delightful-debauchery-and-freedom-was-18th-century

West unleashing terrorism against Syria: Mark Glenn

2012 Apocalypse, the Rapture and Other Millennial Delusions

I once had a noted New Age peace activist tell me that, because all spiritual practice has ripple effects outward, “my cat is a contemplative contributor to the universe.”

http://www.alternet.org/belief/2012-apocalypse-rapture-and-other-millennial-delusions

FBI Violated Constitution by Branding Occupy a Terrorist Threat

Power of Anti-Government Propaganda

Exclusive: By many standards, President Obama has done a remarkable job, steering the U.S. and the world away from a global depression and enacting reforms to benefit millions of Americans. But he has fought against a powerful dynamic of modern U.S. politics, a hatred of the federal government, says Robert Parry.

http://consortiumnews.com/2012/11/06/power-of-anti-government-propaganda/

How The New York Times erases Israel’s crimes

According to The New York Times, there is no siege of Gaza, no occupation of the West Bank, and never was there a Nakba (the 1948 ethnic cleansing of Palestine). Three recent articles erase these key Israeli crimes from the historical record.

http://electronicintifada.net/content/how-new-york-times-erases-israels-crimes/12042

The Vitamin Water Deception

17 Solutions for a Better America in 2013

Don't most Americans believe and want strong law enforcement against corporate crime and fraud and abuses against consumers, taxpayers, the environment and workers? The first step is telling your member of Congress to toughen the weak laws and beef up the law enforcement budgets which will pay for themselves many, many times over in deterrence, damage prevention to innocent people, and fines.

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/15286-focus-17-solutions-for-a-better-america-in-2013

War Made Easy

Oliver Stone: 'US Has Become An Orwellian State'


How the FBI Coordinated the Crackdown on Occupy

t was more sophisticated than we had imagined: new documents show that the violent crackdown on Occupy last fall - so mystifying at the time - was not just coordinated at the level of the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, and local police. The crackdown, which involved, as you may recall, violent arrests, group disruption, canister missiles to the skulls of protesters, people held in handcuffs so tight they were injured, people held in bondage till they were forced to wet or soil themselves -was coordinated with the big banks themselves.

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/441-occupy/15285-focus-how-the-fbi-coordinated-the-crackdown-on-occupy

What Could Have Been: The Most Important Bills Blocked by Republicans in 2012

The bills we could have passed if it wasn't for GOP obstructionism -- from a minimum wage increase to the Buffett Rule.

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/what-could-have-been-most-important-bills-blocked-republicans-2012

Renewing Warrantless Eavesdropping

To this day, many people identify mid-2008 as the time they realized what type of politician Barack Obama actually is. Six months before, when seeking the Democratic nomination, then-Sen. Obamaunambiguously vowed that he would filibuster "any bill" that retroactively immunized the telecom industry for having participated in the illegal Bush NSA warrantless eavesdropping program.

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/15275-renewing-warrantless-eavesdropping

The Social Costs of the Austerity Agenda

s we begin what appears to be the final long, slooooowwww roll down the Gentle Fiscal Incline, it is becoming clear that, among our governing elites, and among the courtier press that serves their interests, it is taken as a given that some sort of austerity agenda, which will not materially affect any of their lives, is going to be dropped on the rest of us, probably for our own good, as that good is defined from some tony little bistro in Georgetown, or from the parlor at Ben and Sally's.

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/279-82/15274-the-social-costs-of-the-austerity-agenda

Made in China - By prison labor

"A State Secret"

Congress Extends Surveillance Power

ongress approved a measure Friday that would renew expansive U.S. surveillance authority for five more years, rejecting objections from senators who are concerned the legislation does not adequately protect Americans' privacy.

http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/311-15/15289-congress-extends-surveillance-power

DOCUMENTARY OF THE DAY:

The Ka-Ching Dynasty

28.Dec.2012 - Syria Invasion, FBI Monitored OWS, Frontier Mentality, Next Financial Crisis, Female Troop Rapes, Nones Taking Over, Against Veterans, CIA's Secret Force, Obamacare Contraception Requirement, Occupied Territory, Gaza Without Water, Florida Homeowners Foreclose, 41 Palestinian Children Killed, Science and Faith Incompatible

US preparing for Military Invasion in Syria: Israel
A senior Israeli official says the United States is gearing up for a possible military intervention in Syria to prevent Syria's alleged chemical weapons from being used against civilians or falling into wrong hands.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article33452.htm

Another US Senator Makes a Pilgrimage To Israel


FBI Monitored Occupy Wall Street and Treated the Movement as a Potential Terrorist Threat


America’s Frontier Mentality
Here is part of an Associated Press article from Dec. 20: “Declaring the time for action overdue, President Obama promised … to send Congress broad proposals in January for tightening gun laws and curbing violence after last week’s schoolhouse massacre in Connecticut.”
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article33449.htm

Reality Check: The Next Financial Crisis

The calm before the storm?

The Price of Revolutionary Illusions

he 20 school kids slaughtered in their classrooms in Connecticut - and many other children who die of gun violence every day - are a sacrifice that some Americans feel is "worth it" for their personal dreams of waging some violent revolution sometime in the future, whether from the Right or the Left.

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/15254-focus-the-price-of-revolutionary-illusions

Almost a quarter of female troops become victims of sex assaults in combat zones

Almost half of all US women deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan say they were sexually harassed, while nearly one-quarter claim they were sexually assaulted. The findings shed light on the additional stress military women face when they work abroad.

http://rebel-institute.org/politics/americas/126-united-states/336438-almost-a-quarter-of-female-troops-become-victims-of-sex-assaults-in-combat-zones

2013: The Year Americans Realize They Cannot Afford Any More Wars For Israel

I met a US Marine Corps colonel who had killed a lot of men up close and personal in two of America’s many wars. It did not take more than a minute for him to absorb the truth after I started talking. I recently remarked that Great Britain fought two Opium Wars against China to benefit the Rothschilds and their business partners in the City of London. America is now fighting its second Opium War. The Rothschild Crime Network and its Gentile allies has an annual gross of one trillion dollars a year in illegal drugs and weapons sales. And that is why President Obama was told to keep American troops fighting and dying in Afghanistan until 2024.

http://rebel-institute.org/opinion/tyranny/335091-2013-the-year-americans-realize-they-cannot-afford-any-more-wars-for-israel

Consumer Confidence Plunges, Unadjusted New Homes Sales Slide To Lowest Since February

Just as we saw with UMich, it appears the hope for change is wearing thin among the people. Today's Consumer Confidence data missed by its biggest margin in 7 months, dropped below the year's average, and saw the largest 2-month drop in over 15 months. All age cohorts lost confidence with the eldest most and it appears those earning over $35k are also beginning to worry (as those between $35k and $15k seem more confident). Over 40% expect stock prices to decline and it is expectations that have plummeted from a hope-filled 80.9 to a 13-month low of 66.5.

http://rebel-institute.org/opinion/money/335475-consumer-confidence-plunges-unadjusted-new-homes-sales-slide-to-lowest-since-february

Which stories did the media ignore this year?

The Nones are Taking Over!

When the US set the military against veterans

80 years ago - and no one noticed

Higgs boson theorist criticizes Richard Dawkins over anti-religious ‘fundamentalism’

On one side is Richard Dawkins, the celebrated biologist who has made a second career demonstrating his epic disdain for religion. On the other is the theoretical physicist Peter Higgs, who this year became a shoo-in for a future Nobel prize after scientists at Cern in Geneva showed that his theory about how fundamental particles get their mass was correct.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/12/27/higgs-boson-theorist-criticizes-richard-dawkins-over-anti-religious-fundamentalism

Supreme Court refuses to hear challenge to Obamacare contraception requirement

The U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear a request by the Hobby Lobby chain of arts and crafts stores to temporarily block a provision in the Affordable Care Act making employers responsible for covering the insurance costs of their employees’ birth control, NBC News reported on Wednesday.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/12/26/supreme-court-refuses-to-hear-challenge-to-obamacare-contraception-requirement

Rape As Weapon of Domination

http://www.countercurrents.org/abubacker271212.htm

O Little Town In Occupied Territory

http://www.countercurrents.org/fleming271212.htm

Julian Assange, Noam Chomsky and Tariq Ali

Thousands remain without water, power one month after attack on Gaza

 On 17 November, four days into Israel’s eight-day assault on the Gaza Strip, deputy Israeli Prime Minister Eli Yishai publicly called for the Israeli army to “blow Gaza back to the Middle Ages, destroying all the infrastructure including roads and water.”

http://electronicintifada.net/content/thousands-remain-without-water-power-one-month-after-attack-gaza/12040

Tables Turn As Florida Homeowners Foreclose On Banks

When the housing bubble burst in Florida, about 400,000 homeowners had their mortgages foreclosed on by the banks and lenders that held them. But now the banks are in trouble for not paying dues and other expenses on those repossessed properties. The homeowners and condo associations are now turning the tables on them.

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/12/26/tables-turn-as-florida-homeowners-foreclose-on-banks/

41 Palestinian children killed during the Israeli aggression on Gaza

The report issued by the Euro-Mediterranean Observatory of Human Rights today, pointed out that the Israeli forces killed 41 Palestinian children, including seven infants and 21 under the age of ten, during the military operation which was launched on 14 November following the assassination of a military commander in the armed wing of Hamas.

http://occupiedpalestine.wordpress.com/2012/12/26/41-palestinian-children-killed-during-the-israeli-aggression-on-gaza/

Why science and faith are incompatible

26.Dec.2012 - FBI Documents Reveal Occupy Monitoring, Congress Protects Gun Industry, US Government Redistributes Wealth to Rich, Origins of Middle East Mess, US to Sell S. Korea Drones, Wake Up from the American Dream, Homeowners Associations Threaten Banks with Foreclosures, Economy Artificially Maintained, Rip-Off Wars, Case for a Living Wage, more. (plus Documentary: Truth About Secret Weapons)

FBI Secret Documents Reveal Nationwide Occupy Monitoring

BI documents just obtained by the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund (PCJF) pursuant to the PCJF's Freedom of Information Act demands reveal that from its inception, the FBI treated the Occupy movement as a potential criminal and terrorist threat even though the agency acknowledges in documents that organizers explicitly called for peaceful protest and did "not condone the use of violence" at occupy protests.

http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/440-occupy/15221-fbi-secret-documents-reveal-nationwide-occupy-monitoring

Why Is Congress Protecting the Gun Industry?

Since the Sandy Hook Elementary School killings, there have been widespread calls for Congress to pass gun control laws - and it should. But there has been less talk about another important tool that could be used to reduce gun violence: lawsuits against the gun industry. Some of these suits can succeed despite the PLCAA - as the Daniel Williams case shows - and we need more of them to be filed. But if Congress wants to get serious about gun violence, it should repeal the PLCAA.

http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/436-2nd-amendment-rights/15219-why-is-congress-protecting-the-gun-industry

U.S. Government Redistributes Wealth… to the Rich
For about thirty years now, the federal government has been implementing policies that take tax dollars from middle class Americans and give them to the rich, supposedly as a way to spur economic growth. Although Americans actually want greater economic equality, the net effect has been to redistribute wealth to the rich and create the most unequal developed society on earth.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article33436.htm

American Pro-Israel Groups Warm Up to Kerry as Top Diplomat
The bond Kerry has forged with the Jewish community because of his roots and because of his interest in the Middle East has helped smooth over rough patches when he has criticized Israel.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article33433.htm

America`s Retreat? What next for Afghanistan after NATO’s scheduled pullout?

On a snap visit to Kabul a few days ago, US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta declined to clarify what is in store for Afghanistan after NATO’s announced pullout in 2014. The American-led forces arrived in Afghanistan 11 years ago on a United Nations mission to combat terrorism. In a recent interview with Afghan television, Russian Ambassador Andrei Avetisyan said this mission is far from accomplished, as is the task of equipping Afghanistan with modern armed forces.

http://rebel-institute.org/opinion/violence/321868-america-s-retreat-what-next-for-afghanistan-after-nato-s-scheduled-pullout

The origins of the Middle East mess

Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan explained

US to sell $1.2bn in spy drones to S. Korea

The Pentagon has informed Congress of its plans to sell four Global Hawk high-altitude spy drones to South Korea. Under the deal Seoul’s surveillance capabilities would be greatly improved, even though the US DoD itself wanted to retire the aircraft.

http://rebel-institute.org/politics/americas/126-united-states/319632-us-to-sell-s12bn-in-spy-drones-to-s-korea

Slavery, Gun control and the Jewish elites

Abraham Foxman, head of Israel-Jewish lobby group ADL has called Minister Louis Farrakhan (born 1933), head of the Nation of Islam (NOI), an antisemite for later’s criticism of Steven Spielberg’s latest movie ‘Lincoln‘ for ignoring the fact that Jewish elites funded both sides during the American Civil War, played a major role in African slave trade but also hated president Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865). Rabbi Isaac M. Wise in his eulogy had said: “The lamented Abraham Lincoln believed himself to be bone from our bone and flesh from our flesh. He supposed himself to be a descendant of Hebrew parentage. He said so in my presence“.

http://rebel-institute.org/opinion/mena/323172-slavery-gun-control-and-the-jewish-elites

FBI Monitored Occupy Wall Street from Earliest Days

Generation Y Wakes Up From The American Dream, Faces An American Nightmare

Generation Y professionals entering the workforce are finding careers that once were gateways to high pay and upwardly mobile lives turning into detours and dead ends. Average incomes for individuals ages 25 to 34 have fallen 8 percent, double the adult population’s total drop, since the recession began in December 2007. Their unemployment rate remains stuck one-half to 1 percentage point above the national figure.

http://rebel-institute.org/opinion/money/328718-generation-y-wakes-up-from-the-american-dream-faces-an-american-nightmare

Sex, Lies, Iran, Israel and Wikileaks—Revisited

FBI Had Counterterrorism Agents Investigate Occupy Movement

It's the latest example of counterterrorism officials looking into domestic protest groups.

http://www.alternet.org/fbi-had-counterterrorism-agents-investigate-occupy-movement

Payback! Hundreds of Homeowners Associations Threaten Banks with Foreclosure

In Florida, banks who slack on maintaining their properties are getting a taste of their own medicine.

http://www.alternet.org/activism/payback-hundreds-homeowners-associations-threaten-banks-foreclosure

"Blood on Your Hands": CODEPINK Interrupts NRA’s Wayne LaPierre as He Calls for Guns in U.S. Schools

DOWNLOAD:  VIDEOAUDIOGET CD/DVDMORE FORMATS

As U.S. Faces Gun Epidemic Post-Newtown, Obama Urged to Break With NRA & Back Global U.N. Arms Treaty

DOWNLOAD:  VIDEOAUDIOGET CD/DVDMORE FORMATS

OWS Activists Called Domestic Terrorists

US history is littered with repressive laws. Constitutional protections and civil liberties have been targeted. The 1798 Alien and Sedition Acts restricted First Amendment freedoms. So did the 1917 Espionage Act, 1919 anti-communist Palmer raids, 1934 Special Committee on Un-American Activities, its House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) successor, FBI COINTELPRO crackdowns, 1996 Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act, 2001 USA Patriot Act, and other post-9/11 measures.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/OWS-Activists-Called-Domes-by-Stephen-Lendman-121226-658.html

Is Our Economy Being Artificially Maintained and Propped Up? If So, How and Why?

Out of one side of the establishment's mouth we hear excitement about "green shoots," and out of the other side comes breathless warnings of fiscal cliffs and the urgent need forunlimited bailouts   by the Fed in the form of ongoing "quantitative easing," which consists of the Federal Reserve Bank creating $85 billion a month out of thin air, and using it to buy two things:   1) huge amounts of government bonds from the US Treasury Department, and 2) huge amounts of near-worthless mortgage-backed securities from private banks (i.e. banksters).     What this amounts to is a kind of ongoing bailout and gift, which, at its core, is an ongoing transfer of wealth to rich banksters and other Wall Streeters, from the rest of us.    

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Is-Our-Economy-Being-Artif-by-Richard-Clark-121225-24.html

No Glory, No Spoils, No Closure - The Double Whammy of Rip-off Wars

Today's easy riddle: what will cost more, last longer, and accomplish less than our troop-heavy, anachronistic, perpetual overseas occupations? Nothing, nada, rien -- certainly not annual deficits, Bush tax cuts, or formal defense budgets. Put aside human suffering and unbelievable dislocation: we've all shouldered a four trillion dollar price tag on two failed wars, plus the double whammy that both Iraq and Afghanistan remain unstable havens for mayhem. Is any fiscal cliff that might happen worse than two indeterminate rat holes that have happened? 

http://www.opednews.com/articles/No-Glory-No-Spoils-No-Cl-by-Robert-S-Becker-121225-431.html

Wage History and The Case for A Living Wage

A conservative friend of mine was astonished to learn that a couple with two children in his town would need an income of  $52,000 per year to live there. "I'm a CPA and I've had partners who didn't make $57,000 some years," he said.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Wage-History-and-The-Case-by-Brian-Lynch-121225-974.html

God Particle or Hype Particle? What the Higgs Boson Means to You

Laws of War Violated During Gaza-Israel Fighting: Report

Occupy Homes, one year on and growing daily

On December 6, the one-year anniversary of the Occupy Homes movement, Meusa and Wheeler were only two among thousands of people who gathered for coordinated direct actions focused on the human right to housing. Building on a year filled with eviction blockades, house takeovers, bank protest and singing auction blockades, the anniversary of Occupy Homes demonstrated that the groups were still committed to risking arrest to keep people sheltered. Yet, even more significantly, the day’s events demonstrated a crystallization of the movement’s central message: that decent and dignified housing should be a human right in the United States.

http://wagingnonviolence.org/2012/12/occupy-homes-one-year-on-and-growing-daily

Zero Dark Thirty: Why the Film's Makers Should Be Defended And What Deeper bin Laden Controversy Has Been Stirred

To those critics of Zero Dark Thirty who claim the film misleads the public on the role that waterboarding and other torture played in the hunt for Osama bin Laden, I suggest they look forward to the making of some other film that represents their ideals rather than make Zero Dark Thirty their scapegoat for the many conflicting and misinformed statements issued by American policy makers concerning the use of torture (I will not here legitimize the misleading euphemism "enhanced interrogation techniques") during the War on Terror. 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/g-roger-denson/zero-dark-thirty-defendin_b_2357702.html

There Are Now As Many Nonreligious Americans As Evangelicals -- 6 Ways Politicians Can Court Their Vote

The nonreligious are proving to be a crucial voting bloc.

http://www.alternet.org/belief/there-are-now-many-nonreligious-americans-evangelicals-6-ways-politicians-can-court-their

DOCUMENTARY OF THE DAY:
THE TRUTH ABOUT STREET WEAPONS

Turn off the lights