Biofuels, a "crime against humanity"?

I would agree. The corn-to-ethanol craze is a huge waste of money, energy, and land resources in the US.

"The UN special rapporteur on the right to food, Jean Ziegler, said he feared biofuels would bring more hunger." -- BBC News

In the match up between the world's poor and the industrialized world's need for fuel, it's clear who will win.

Thankfully there's a voice for sanity coming from the UN.

Cheney and Obama are Cousins?

According to Lynne Cheney's research, they are. However, Obama spokesman, Bill Burton, responds, "Every family has a black sheep". More here.

And, Archbishop George H. Niederauer has apologized for giving Communion to 2 Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. He says he delivered the Eucharist to two gay men dressed in nuns' habits by mistake. Read more about the Sisters here. Click in the window below to see the communion ceremony.

And, San Francisco chronicler, Mark Morford, weighs in on the EMF danger.

Wi-Fi, the death of us all You are going to die. Wireless gizmos are devouring your brain, right now. Very sorry

Thanks for reading the what amounts to "sane" news today.

Take 5 Minutes to Protect Your Privacy

Can you pick up the phone?

Congress is moving swiftly to "fix" the Protect America Act of 2007. The House Intelligence and Judiciary Committees have endorsed the Conyers-Reyes RESTORE Act (H.R. 3773) the acronym stands for "Responsible Electronic Surveillance that is Overseen, Reviewed and Effective."

Although this legislation is far better than the Protect America Act which the Administration wants to make permanent and expand, the ACLU wishes it were more "responsible" in terms of the Fourth Amendment. The Fourth Amendment requires individual warrants before a search. But the RESTORE Act includes blanket warrants, which aren't really warrants at all, but a blank check allowing the government to vacuum up our international telephone calls and emails.

Please contact your representative.

Immediately and tell him or her:

• There must be individual warrants included in any bill Congress passes. Such warrants are essential to bring the surveillance of Americans in line with the Constitution.
• Under NO circumstances should Congress give amnesty to the phone companies for their role in warrantless eavesdropping. These companies violated the law. Congress should insist on accountability.
• Congress should insist on true court oversight. If it is serious about keeping checks and balances intact, it must allow the judiciary to play a significant role in overseeing the surveillance of Americans.
• Congress should not continue to legislate in the dark. Insist that the White House and Department of Justice turn over documents related to the warrantless eavesdropping program which were supposed to be given to the Senate Judiciary Committee last July.

In brief: put individual warrants into the RESTORE Act and keep immunity for the telecom giants out. And find out the facts about what the government has been doing secrecy kills democracy.

Thanks to:

Nancy Murray
Director of Education
ACLU of Massachusetts

Why Not Impeachment?

Is impeachment still "off the table"? Do we accept we can do nothing? The Dems waffled on the war, on impeachment, so who's going to impeach?

"Why Not Impeachment?" is the title of a new argument by Robert Parry. Reading it makes me hopeful there are people with backbone left in the press. The gist of it is that Rumsfeld wasn't "fired" for incompetence, he was ousted because he went soft on the war. You heard me right. He wanted a rapid draw down of troops. The memo stating this is published. The Dems ignore it. You read the story. Don't ignore it.

In other words, Rumsfeld’s ouster didn’t signal Bush’s new flexibility on ending the war, as the Democrats hoped, but a repudiation of Rumsfeld for going wobbly on Iraq.

Even when the Rumsfeld memo surfaced in early December, the Democrats ignored it, sticking to their wishful script that the Rumsfeld-Gates switch marked a recognition by Bush that it was time to begin extricating U.S. forces from Iraq.

Those rose-colored glasses got smudged badly when Bush instead announced in January that he was ordering an escalation, sending more than 20,000 additional troops to Iraq.

But instead of responding with their own escalation – and putting impeachment back “on the table” – the Democrats opted for a strategy of wooing moderate Republicans to mild-mannered legislative protests.

Why not ask your Senator why impeachment is not "back on the table"?

Columbus and Che, Honored this Day

Columbus is honored this day for discovering huge material wealth for his superpower, Spain. Che Guevara was captured and later executed 40 years ago today in Bolivia, and is celebrated a hero, almost a Christ-like figure of hope and deliverance to millions. Both used violence to achieve their ends. One is reviled; the other, celebrated in all the "other" Americas. Columbus wanted wealth and fame for himself, gold and empire for his Queen; Che wanted a better life for the poor and oppressed he felt kinship with.

We don't know what would have happened in Latin America had Che lived - his friend Fidel is not an unblemished example - but we do know what the Columbus legacy meant for the Americas. The PBS series, Conquistadors, offers a fair and balanced view of that tragic history. Compared to Columbus, Fidel is a saint.

In the mid-20th century, guerrilla warfare was the tactic of change. Ho Chi Minh, Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, and Ronald Reagan were all supporters of armed insurgency. Ho and Fidel succeeded, Reagan and Che failed. Ho's Vietnam is now embraced by the US; Cuba, still an enemy. Reagan was like the Columbus saga, the agent of a superpower who sent armed insurgents to a foreign land (Nicaragua) for interests of empire. (Let's not forget the Nixon and Kissinger coup that successfully overthrew the democratically elected government of Chile in the '70s for the interests of the US corporate empire. Can you say, ITT?)

IMHO, Ron is largely reviled around the world, as are Nixon and Kissinger. Che is largely celebrated. And, although Che was captured and executed by the militarist government of Bolivia 40 years ago, his spirit is embraced by the Bolivian government today.

Listen to CIA man, Felix Rodriguez, talk about his part in the capture and execution of Che. Read more about he and Che here. Watch those who fought alongside him talk about him today.

And do a Google video search for "Che" and see how much he is remembered in the Spanish speaking Americas today. Below is a music video found in that search that has been viewed over 200,000 times.



One lesson for today's young would be, if you want to be remembered a hero, be more like Che, and a lot less like Columbus, or Reagan, or Kissinger, or Nixon. You get the drift. :>)

It's Time to Grant 'W' Permanent Spy Powers

Doesn't that just chill your blood? That's what's going to happen, though.

"Protect America" Act is about to be made permanent. Get ready to share your phone calls, emails, etc. permanently with your kindly Republican Big Brother. (You know him, the one who says interrogation is not torture, unwarranted listening is not spying, the Constitution is just a bunch of words.)

Won't that be fun, kids? And don't forget to tell your local FBI agent what your parents are up to. "Protect America" means opening wide. Your government is obscenely curious. I know I sound like a libertarian here, but I've been around long enough to know that the government tends to spy on it's perceived political enemies rather than the real bad guys. It just works that way if there is no oversight.

So everyone, here's how to join the government spying fun in your neighborhood.

What's to fear? Really. Our beneficent telecom industry has been working nicely with Big Brother these past months. The Director of National Intelligence said so in August - the telecom companies have played a key role in NSA eavesdropping. And, of course, we don't need to know these troublesome details. If it weren't for Congressman Ed Markey demanding to know how much big telecom cooperated in domestic spying, you wouldn't have known squat. (Thank him, will you?)

The big news is, you still won't know how much telecom and agents of the cabal have cooperated. The FCC declined to investigate.

OMG, if the coup isn't real, I don't know what is.

Do Liberty a very small favor. Write your Senators and Congresspeople and tell them what a bad idea it would be to continue the "Protect America" Act without fixing it. This is URGENT. Key votes are coming up this week.

Call Senator Reid (202 224 3542) and House Speaker Pelosi (202 225 4965). Tell them the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) must be fixed, not expanded. Warrantless domestic spying must be ended.

Get involved. Be creative. Get tough. The freedoms you lose will be your own. This is your time to stand up and deliver.

A Great Unconference for Sanity and Social Networking

It's been hard to update lately since there are so many unsanity events. From Justice Whoop-dee-damn-doo Thomas' strange diatribe of Anita Hill and others (is this what repressed anger does to recovered memory?) to the finding that Inca children were fattened up for sacrifice before being left on the mountaintop to die of exposure to George "Compassionate Conservative" Bush vetoing the Children's Health bill so as to please the ultra nasty rich right and the health insurance industry while embarrassing key Republican backers of the bill who worked out compromises with Dems to avoid the veto. There's so much to choose from I became overwhelmed. I will do better, promise.

The good news is that you can look forward to meeting up with the bright and healthy folks of the new web at the Podcamp Boston 2 "unconference" later this month in Boston . You really should try to make it. This is the cutting edge for web media and networking. If Boston is too far, contact the Podcamp 2 people and say you want a Podcamp where you live! Otherwise, I'll see you there!

Click To Play