The Daily Take Team, The Thom Hartmann Program, - Truthout
Stephan: I have written almost a dozen essays on the correlation between social values and social outcomes showing that the Theocratic Right's social policies inevitably produce inferior social outcomes. (See At the Cost of Your Life: Social Value, Social Wellness http://www.explorejournal.com/article/S1550-8307%2813%2900249-8/fulltext).
And yet, Americans vote for the Theocratic Right over and over, even though it is literally degrading their lives.
It’s time to let them go.
Over the past few years, it’s become increasingly clear that as long as far-right crazies and ultra-conservatives in Washington are preaching policies that eat away at the very ideals our nation was built on, the American Dream will remain out of reach for millions of Americans.
So, if we want to have any chance at taking back the American Dream, we should just let those far-right crazies and ultra-conservatives running around Washington and in the red states have their dream of their own country.
Let them secede and start their own far-right Any Rand-inspired paradise.
Cliven Bundy, Louie Gohmert, Ted Cruz, Ted Nugent, Shawn Hannity and the rest of America’s far-right wingers can all move to west Texas, and create a country of their own, free from the “tyrannical” influences of the US government. They can even call this new Ayn Rand-inspired country “Galt’s Gulch.”
They can run around firing off their guns, not paying taxes, and defying authority all they like.
Meanwhile, the rest of us back in America will get back to rebuilding the American Dream that Reaganomics has largely torn apart.
But as Nicholas Kristof points out over at The New York Times, we may have to rename […]
No Comments
JASON WELLS, - Los Angeles Times
Stephan: Yet another crisis in crude oil transportation. Between the pipeline failures, and the railroad tanker car bombs, it should be obvious to even the densest politician that our infrastructure is simply not up to the tasks we need done. It is a measure of the carbon energy's control of the Federal government and its regulatory agencies that these issues are not be adequately addressed.
10,000-gallon crude-oil spill in Atwater Village early Thursday was expected to take 24 hours to fully clean up, officials said.
Firefighters responding to the spill shortly after 1 a.m. in the 5100 block of West San Fernando Road were able to hem in much of the oil by using loads of sand from a nearby cement company to build a dam-like berm, creating a sort of “lagoon” that tanker trucks were able to sip from using their vacuum lines.
Crude oil spill
A map shows the approximate location of a pipeline rupture that spewed 10,000 gallons of crude oil in Atwater Village. (Bing Maps)
Those trucks were able to provide more accurate readings, which firefighters used to downgrade the size of the spill after initially estimating its size at 50,000 gallons.
The burst pipe had sent a geyser 20 to 50 feet in the air, blasting the adjacent Gentlemen’s Club, which had to evacuate, Los Angeles Fire Department Capt. Jamie Moore said. Some 10 vehicles were also stuck in the club’s lot due to the oil, he added.
Two people at a nearby medical center who complained of nausea, possibly due to the oil, were transported to a local hospital, Moore said.
lRelated 10,000-gallon crude oil […]
No Comments
JAMES GERKEN, - The Huffington Post
Stephan: It seems to be coming as a surprise that climate change has military and security implications. I find that quite extraordinary. The oldest treaty in the world is a treaty resulting from conflict over water rights. The word rival comes from the Latin Rivalis, which means to take water from another's stream. It is a measure of how deranged the Republican Party has become that while they claim to be for strong national security, they unanimously reject the science of climate change.
A report released Tuesday from an advisory group of retired U.S. military leadership echoes the findings of other recent reports on climate change: It is real, it is already happening and it poses major threats to the U.S. and the rest of the world.
The federally funded Center for Naval Analyses and its Military Advisory Board, a group of 16 retired three- and four-star generals and admirals, affirm in the report that climate events like flooding, prolonged drought and rising sea levels, and the subsequent population dislocation and food insecurity, will serve as “catalysts for instability and conflict” in vulnerable regions of the world.
“We no longer have the option to wait and see,” former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta write in a foreword to the report, which they describe as a “bipartisan call to action.”
The report laments the politicization of climate change and continued inaction from Congress on the issue. “Politically charged debate has silenced sound public discourse,” it reads in part.
“We hope this report will both influence public opinion as well as influence national security policymakers and leaders,” retired Navy rear admiral and co-author David Titley told The Huffington Post. “We are speaking out […]
No Comments
JONATHAN KAIMAN, - The Guardian
Stephan: I find the exuberance, and audacity typical of America up until the 1970s -- only this energy is now found in China.
BEIJING — China is considering plans to build a high-speed railway line to the US, the country’s official media reported on Thursday.
The proposed line would begin in north-east China and run up through Siberia, pass through a tunnel underneath the Pacific Ocean then cut through Alaska and Canada to reach the continental US, according to a report in the state-run Beijing Times newspaper.
Crossing the Bering Strait in between Russia and Alaska would require about 200km (125 miles) of undersea tunnel, the paper said, citing Wang Mengshu, a railway expert at the Chinese Academy of Engineering.
“Right now we’re already in discussions. Russia has already been thinking about this for many years,” Wang said.
The project – nicknamed the “China-Russia-Canada-America” line – would run for 13,000km, about 3,000km further than the Trans-Siberian Railway. The entire trip would take two days, with the train travelling at an average of 350km/h (220mph).
The reported plans leave ample room for skepticism. No other Chinese railway experts have come out in support of the proposed project. Whether the government has consulted Russia, the US or Canada is also unclear. The Bering Strait tunnel alone would require an unprecedented feat of engineering – it would be the world’s longest […]
No Comments
Stephan: Anti-Semitism, like Anti-Islamic views, or racism, are unreasoning responses, expressions of fear of the "other" that never die. But culture can play a huge role. Note particularly the differences between countries.
NEW YORK — Anti-Semitism remains prevalent around the world with one in four adults surveyed in a new international study expressing anti-Jewish sentiment, according to a new study released Tuesday by the Anti-Defamation League.
The ADL Global 100 Index found someone to be anti-Semitic if they answered “probably” or “definitely” true to six or more of 11 stereotypes about Jews offered on the survey.
The survey, which the ADL called “the broadest survey of anti-Jewish attitudes ever conducted,” found the lowest level of anti-Semitism in Laos, with just 0.2 percent of the adult population expressing such views. The highest level of anti-Semitism was found in the Palestinian territories of West Bank and Gaza at 93 percent.
Greece was the most anti-Semitic country in Western Europe, with 69 percent of the adults surveyed expressing such opinions and Sweden, with four percent, was the least. In the United States, nine percent of adults were found to harbor anti-Semitic views.
“Our findings are sobering but sadly not surprising,” said ADL National Director Abraham H. Foxman. “We can now identify hotspots, as well as countries and regions of the world where hatred of Jews is virtually non-existent.”
Foxman said findings about Greece had already led to an invitation from […]
No Comments
