Thursday, December 18th, 2014
Stephan: The absurd and counterproductive shunning of Cuba has made Cuban society quite distinctive in the Latin world. Just one example: Cuba's greatest export is doctors. In the Ebola crisis American provided logistics, which no one else could really do, and Cuba contributed highly skilled physicians who knew how to work in Third World conditions. No other country in Latin America could have done that.
Obama has broken a 50 year political taboo and I think this will be remembered as one of his major achievements.
I have read all kinds of misinformation about this in the conservative media, and even in the general corporate media. It seemed useful to me to publish exactly what is happening here.
Today, the United States is taking historic steps to chart a new course in our relations with Cuba and to further engage and empower the Cuban people. We are separated by 90 miles of water, but brought together through the relationships between the two million Cubans and Americans of Cuban descent that live in the United States, and the 11 million Cubans who share similar hopes for a more positive future for Cuba.
It is clear that decades of U.S. isolation of Cuba have failed to accomplish our enduring objective of promoting the emergence of a democratic, prosperous, and stable Cuba. At times, longstanding U.S. policy towards Cuba has isolated the United States from regional and international partners, constrained our ability to influence outcomes throughout the Western Hemisphere, and impaired the use of the full range of tools available to the United States to promote positive change in Cuba. Though this policy has been rooted in the best of intentions, it has had little effect – today, as in 1961, Cuba is governed by the Castros and the Communist party.
We cannot keep doing […]
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Thursday, December 18th, 2014
Stephan: I deliberately chose a far right assessment of this dreadful situation to show that even the Right recognizes how desperate the situation has gotten. Society is being radically restructured just as the Millenial generation is coming on line, and the results of are very painful. Few millenials, with whom I have spoken, or whose blogs I have read, have the kind of optimistic view of the future that was commonplace before 9/11 and the financial crash. And they are experiencing a level of general poverty that has not been seen in decades.
Credit: www.sharedjustice.org849
One in five young adults – ages 18 to 34 years old – live in poverty, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau. (emphasis added)
“More millennials are living in poverty today, and they have lower rates of employment, compared with their counterparts in 1980,” the Census states. “One in five young adults lives in poverty (13.5 million people), up from one in seven (8.4 million people) in 1980.”
The data comes from a new Census release called “Young Adults: Then and Now,” which “illustrates characteristics of the young adult population (age 18-34) across the decades using data from the 1980, 1990 and 2000 Censuses and the 2009-2013 American Community Survey.”
In 1980, according to the Census, 14.1 percent of the total population ages 18 to 34 were living in poverty, which is determined by the millennial’s income in the past 12 months. In 1990, the percentage of millennials in poverty increased to 14.3 percent. In 2000, it climbed to 15.3 percent. And in 2009-2013 it reached the highest […]
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Thursday, December 18th, 2014
Russell Berman, Asssociate Editor - The Atlantic
Stephan: Here is the latest in the dismantling of Marijuana Prohibition. This is a very interesting trend to watch because it was based on almost entirely bogus information and none of the things predicted to happen should prohibition be ended, based on that bogus reality -- increased crime, massive upswing in teen usage, major health destruction, etc -- have come to pass. As this report describes this change is also one of the very few policy positions where both voters and politicians agree.
Congress may have tried to stop residents of the nation’s capital from being able to light up joints with impunity, but lawmakers retreated last week in another important drug-war front: medical marijuana.
The $1 trillion spending bill that passed last week included a provision that blocks the Justice Department from spending any money to enforce a federal ban on growing or selling marijuana in the 32 states that have moved to legalize it for medical use. It marks a huge shift for Congress, which for years had sided with federal prosecutors in their battle with states over the liberalization of drug laws. “The war on medical marijuana is over,” Bill Piper, a lobbyist with the Drug Policy Alliance, declared to the Los Angeles Times.
Another leading advocate of legalization, Allen St. Pierre of NORML, was pleased but not quite so jubilant. After all, under President Obama, the Justice Department in the last five years has sharply curtailed its raids on pot growers and sellers. But directives from Washington, he said, had not stopped overzealous prosecutors and DEA […]
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Wednesday, December 17th, 2014
Michael Snyder, - Men's News Daily
Stephan: As we enter into the holiday season with its focus on children I think it is important we keep in mind the real state of children in the U.S. If you can do something to help a child or children please do so.
Did you know that 65 percent of all children in the United States live in a home that receives aid from the federal government? We live at a time when child poverty in America is exploding. Yes, the U.S. economy is experiencing a temporary bubble of false stability for the moment, but even during this period of false stability the gap between the wealthy and the poor continues to rapidly expand and the middle class is being systematically destroyed. And sadly, this is having a disproportionate impact on children. This is happening for a couple of reasons. First of all, poorer households tend to have more children than wealthier households. Secondly, most people tend to have children when they are in their young adult years, and right now young adults are being absolutely hammered by this economy. As a result, things just continue to get even worse for children living in this country. Here are 14 facts that show that the number of children in America living in poverty this Christmas is at an all-time record high…
#1 The […]
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Wednesday, December 17th, 2014
Dana Milbank, - The Washington Post
Stephan: For sheer brass this story is a Goebbels Big Lie award winner. True Orwellian Doublespeak -- white is black, up is down. I don't think this is the only time we will hear this story line from the carbon energy industry.
A coal-fired power plant in Juliette, Ga.
Credit: John Amis/Associated Press
For years, the fossil-fuel industries have been telling us that global warming is a hoax based on junk science.
But now these industries are floating an intriguing new argument: They’re admitting that human use of coal, oil and gas is causing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to rise — but they’re saying this is a good thing. We need more CO2 in our lives, not less.
“CO2 is basically plant food, and the more CO2 in the environment the better plants do,” proclaimed Roger Bezdek, a consultant to energy companies, at an event hosted Monday by the United States Energy Association, an industry trade group.
The session, at the Ronald Reagan Building in downtown Washington, was devoted to demonstrating that “CO2 benefits clearly outweigh any hypothesized costs.” And though Bezdek is an economist, not a scientist, he played one on Monday — showing a PowerPoint presentation that documented a tree […]
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Today, the United States is taking historic steps to chart a new course in our relations with Cuba and to further engage and empower the Cuban people. We are separated by 90 miles of water, but brought together through the relationships between the two million Cubans and Americans of Cuban descent that live in the United States, and the 11 million Cubans who share similar hopes for a more positive future for Cuba.
