PATTI DOMM, CNBC Executive News Editor - CNBC
Stephan: Regular SR readers know I have been saying for many months that this summer in a number of places we would see $5 a gallon gas -- it has already happened in some markets -- and that speculation and war would not allow the price to drop much, no matter what the crude price was. Here is the latest report. This is going to not only affect direct gasoline sales, it is also going to intersect with the growing food crisis, raising prices in that sector even further.
I believe Middle class people who are conservatives in the upcoming election are going to vote once again against their own self-interest, and I expect that by this time next year the devastation of the broad middle of the country will be stark and painful. All the wealth in the country is moving to the top few per cent, or being squandered on wars, further benefiting the few. Meanwhile returning vets can't find jobs, or afford to drive their cars.
While oil has fallen sharply since May, gasoline is down just about 10 percent and it is not likely to drop below $3 any time soon.
Investors have watched West Texas Intermediate crude [CLCV1 93.68 0.42 (+0.45%) ] drop like a rock on the Nymex, down more than 20 percent from its peak of just above $115 to around $93 a barrel Monday. But Brent [LCOCV1 111.65 -0.04 (-0.04%) ], which is a better reflection of global oil prices, at about $111, is down just $15 from its high.
‘Unfortunately, the most expensive grade of crude determines the price of gasoline,’ said Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst at OPIS. ‘Brent is the most expensive. It represents crude on the water.’
Gasoline prices have dropped to $3.64 a gallon nationally from a peak of $3.98 in mid-May, according to AAA. Diesel prices at the pump have fallen more slowly but are beginning to catch up and are now averaging $3.97 a gallon.
‘We may get down to that $3 to $3.25 neighborhood for some states that have lower taxes and cheaper supply,’ said Kloza. But the coasts, specifically the Northeast, will […]
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MARC PITZKE, - Der Spiegel (Germany)
Stephan: It is the nature of authoritarian governments everywhere to attempt to suppress any revelations of their failings and inevitable corruption. And that does not factor in the self-censorship of journalists who know that writing certain things can put a successful career in jeopardy; and the corporatization of all forms of media, and the resultant skew against whistleblowers who threaten the corporations as much as the government.
Note that this story is coming out of Germany, not an American a source.
How the times change. After years of being kept classified, the ‘Pentagon Papers’ can now be viewed at the United States National Archive in their entirety for the first time in history. In their original paper form, the papers filled 48 boxes. The electronically scanned versions of these historical data treasures comprise little more than six gigabytes — enough to fill a tiny USB stick that is smaller than a finger.
The documents, however, make fascinating reading, at least for history fans. Leslie Gelb, the head of the secret working group responsible for the report and later head of the Council on Foreign Relations, assured then-Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara in a Jan. 15, 1969 letter that his team had ‘checked and rechecked with ant-like diligence’ the documents in the report.
The more than 7,000 pages in the file are stamped ‘Top Secret – Sensitive.’
Four decades later, the US government is airing one of its most explosive secrets — the ‘Pentagon Papers,’ the legendary top secret report on the Vietnam War. Anyone interested can read the papers that led to deep changes in US policy at the National Archive or in the libraries of the three presidents who were involved in the […]
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ZAID JILANI, - truthout.org/Think Progress
Stephan: Osama bin Laden's plan, as he explicitly spelled it out, was to do to the United States what he had successfully done to the Soviet Union: to use the natural inclinations of the neocons, then in power -- and subsequently continued by the Obama Administration -- to bankrupt and disrupt the United States. Look at this list and ask yourself: Who's the winner here?
And this assessment doesn't take into consideration the hundreds of billions spent on Iraq, Libya, Yemen, or the insanities of Homeland Security.
President Obama is expected to announce within a week if and how many combat troops he plans to withdraw from the war in Afghanistan. Some of those who will be most impacted by the decision are U.S. soldiers and their families and Afghans who have been dealing with the ramifications of the war for nearly a decade.
Yet the war is affecting more than just Western soldiers and their families and Afghan citizens. It has become a costly drain on our nation’s treasury; the money that is being spent on the war represents resources that are being drained away from important domestic priorities in a nation with sky-high unemployment and crumbling infrastructure.
Using data from the National Priorities Project, ThinkProgress calculated ten investments America could’ve afforded if it didn’t spend $113 billion – the allotment made in Fiscal Year 2011 – on the war in Afghanistan. Each one of these policy options represents an equivalent $113 billion cost:
– Provide 57.5 Million Children With Low-Income Health Care For 2011
– Provide 23 Million People With Low-Income Health Coverage In 2011
– Give 20.2 Million $5,500 Pell Grants To Students In 2011
[…]
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DAN RATHER, - The Huffington Post
Stephan: Increasingly my view of President Obama is that he is a grave disappointment, that his administration has assaulted our civil rights as actively, if not worse, than the Bush Administration, that his foreign policy is just a little better than Bush-Cheney, and he is only marginally less in the bag to corporate masters -- but still better than any alternative I see.
Here’s one for the White House suggestion box: President Obama — Be careful about where you seek job creation advice.
This week marked the second meeting of the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, a 26-person panel of business and labor leaders appointed by President Obama to generate a national strategy for job creation.
Whether or not the Jobs Council can truly help fix America’s job crisis, it’s too soon to know, but there’s ample reason to be skeptical.
‘Good for Obama’s jobs council, good for America?’ was the question posed by The Washington Post, which went on to note that five of the companies with executives on the Council — General Electric, Citigroup, Intel, Procter & Gamble and DuPont — generate the bulk of their revenues overseas.
And the GOP blasted the President for his choice of venue — a manufacturer of energy-efficient lighting in Durham, NC, called Cree, Inc. President Obama praised Cree for ‘putting people back to work in a field that has the potential to create an untold number of new jobs and new businesses right here in America.’
But the Republican National Committee issued a release saying that Cree — which received a $39 million tax credit in stimulus funds […]
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JOSHUA HOLLAND, - AlterNet
Stephan: When do you think the sheeple are going to wake up and look around? Next year? Next decade? Never?
An abiding belief in American exceptionalism is more or less ubiquitous across the political spectrum. But in many ways, what makes America different from other advanced democracies are relatively modest differences in priorities. While all wealthy democracies share the same basic model –they derive the bulk of their economic activity from the private sector while offering some form of social safety net for those who fall through the cracks — even slight differences in priorities can have a huge impact on the lives of their people.
Here are 9 countries that do a better job providing for their citizens than we do.
Taking Care of the Ill: France
If you have access to the best health care in the United States, then you have some of the best care in the world. But that comes with an extremely steep price, and not everyone has that kind of access.
In 2008, the U.S. spent 16 percent of its economic output on health-care and covered 85 percent of its citizens. It was the only OECD country other than Mexico and Turkey to cover less than 90 percent of its people. We have the 37th longest average life expectancy, and a recent study found that American […]
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