Day: April 3, 2009

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Should Obama Control the Internet?

Dandelion Salad

By Steve Aquino
Mother Jones
Thu April 2, 2009 12:33 PM PST

A new bill would give the President emergency authority to halt web traffic and access private data.

Should President Obama have the power to shut down domestic Internet traffic during a state of emergency?

Senators John Rockefeller (D-W. Va.) and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) think so. On Wednesday they introduced a bill to establish the Office of the National Cybersecurity Advisor—an arm of the executive branch that would have vast power to monitor and control Internet traffic to protect against threats to critical cyber infrastructure. That broad power is rattling some civil libertarians.

The Cybersecurity Act of 2009 (PDF) gives the president the ability to “declare a cybersecurity emergency” and shut down or limit Internet traffic in any “critical” information network “in the interest of national security.” The bill does not define a critical information network or a cybersecurity emergency. That definition would be left to the president.

[…]

via Should Obama Control the Internet? | Mother Jones

FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

see

Domestic Spying on Dandelion Salad

Police State on Dandelion Salad

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Mosaic News – 4/2/09: World News From The Middle East

Dandelion Salad

Warning

This video may contain images depicting the reality and horror of war/violence and should only be viewed by a mature audience.

linktv

Mosaic needs your help! Donate here: http://linktv.org/contribute

Headlines coming soon. Produced for Link TV by Jamal Dajani.

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The Ones Who Got It Right by Ralph Nader

Dandelion Salad

by Ralph Nader
The Nader Page
April 3, 2009

Why is it that well regarded people working the fields of corporate power and performance who repeatedly predicted the Wall Street bubble and its bursting receive so little media and attention?

Instead, the public is still being exposed to the comments and writings of people like Alan Greenspan, Robert Rubin, James Glassman (of Dow 36,000 notoriety) while others like Timothy Geithner, Larry Summers, and Gary Gensler are newly-appointed at high levels in the Obama Administration. These men were variously architects, rationalizers and implementers of the massive de-regulation and non-regulation that unleashed the epic forces of greed, speculation and ruination of millions of livelihoods and trillions of dollars other peoples’ money worldwide.

Here are some of the people who got it right—early and often: Continue reading →

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Congratulations! British Authorities by Badrul Islam

Sent to DS by the author, thank you, Badrul.

by Badrul Islam
Dandelion Salad
April 3, 2009

BBC headlines reports” Banned Dutch MP held at Heathrow -A Dutch MP who called the Koran a “fascist book” is to be sent back to the Netherlands after attempting to defy a ban on entering the UK. We wish to congratulate the British Home Secretary and Immigration Authorities at Heathrow Airport for their wise decision. We appreciate BBC’s continuous efforts to keep the World informed. This happened on February 12, 2009.

BBC reports that Freedom Party MP Geert Wilders was invited to show his controversial film-(which links the Islamic holy book to terrorism) – in the UK’s House of Lords. But Wilders who faces trial in his own country for inciting hatred, has been denied entry by the Home 0ffice. The MP was invited to the House of Lords by the UK Independence Party’s Lord Pearson.

Continue reading →

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Gensler Sparks Conflict On Hill

Dandelion Salad

AmericanNewsProject
April 02, 2009

Barack Obama’s plan to name yet another Goldman Sachs alum to his economic team is proving too much for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT). Sanders put a hold on the nomination of Gary Gensler to head the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, effectively stopping the nomination process in its tracks. Sanders says Gensler, who spent 17 years at Goldman Sachs and then joined the Treasury Department under Bill Clinton, played too big a role in deregulating derivatives in the 90s’ to be trusted to reregulate the market now.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), however, has told ANP that he plans “move forward” with Gensler’s nomination despite Sanders’ hold. To Christopher Hayes, Washington editor of The Nation Magazine, the Majority Leader’s defense of Gensler and Goldman is a disturbing indication that it may be business as usual on the Hill when it comes to meaningful regulation on Wall Street.

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more about “Gensler Sparks Conflict On Hill“, posted with vodpod

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Tony Benn: Banks Should Be Publically Owned

Let’s Stop Wall Street Loan-Sharking by Senator Bernie Sanders + videos

Geithner’s ‘Dirty Little Secret’: The Entire Global Financial System is at Risk by F. William Engdahl

Sen Sanders “Private Insurance Companies Are Not About Supplying Health Care

The Economy Sucks and or Collapse 2

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Pennsylvania’s Signs of Spring by Rosemary and Walter Brasch

by Rosemary and Walter Brasch
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
www.walterbrasch.com
April 3, 2009

For some people, the first day of spring occurs when they see a crocus poking its purple head through the snow.

For others, it’s seeing the first robin.

But these are unreliable signs, for nature is so unpredictable.

For us, the harbinger of spring is seeing that first pylon on the Interstate and just about any state highway. Those orange, pointy cone things bring the first bright color to a drab winter landscape, forecasting what is to come.  Sometimes, there are even workers doing whatever it is that PennDOT workers do on the roads-all of them working behind signs that proclaim “Detour,” “Lane Closed,” and “Be Prepared to Stop.”.

Continue reading →

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Kucinich: I Simply Cannot Endorse a Budget or a Plan that Authorizes the Expansion of War

Dandelion Salad

by Congressman Dennis Kucinich
Washington D.C., Apr 2, 2009

Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) today issued the following statement after voting against H.Con.Res 85, setting forth the Congressional Budget for the fiscal year 2010:

“I am committed to doing everything I can to put our community and our nation on the path to economic stability. I led opposition to the bank bailout program TARP, I worked vigorously in favor of the stimulus package, and I have worked to save the automotive, steel and aerospace industries in America.

“This budget is a statement of principles for the upcoming year, and I cannot accept it in its entirety. I will not vote for a budget that ties military spending to the operational funding of our government. This year, the budget includes $130 billion for war funding. The Washington Post reports today another 10,000 troops may be sent to Afghanistan, bringing our total number of troops there to as much as 78,000 by 2010 – a more than 100% increase from today’s troop levels. This budget is a plan that authorizes the expansion of the war. I simply cannot endorse a budget or a plan that sends more of our brave men and women to Afghanistan, a conflict which has the potential to become this generation’s Vietnam.”

FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

see

Chomsky: It should be remembered that Germany went to the depths of barbarism in 10 years

Kucinich: Merrill Lynch Bonuses 22X Bigger Than AIG

Military Escalation and Obama’s “War on Terrorism” by Tom Burghardt

Thinking Positively About Monetary Policy by Dr. Ellen Hodgson Brown

The Economy Sucks and or Collapse 2

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Fake Faith and Epic Crimes By John Pilger

Dandelion Salad

By John Pilger
April 02, 2009 “Information Clearing House”

These are extraordinary times. With the United States and Britain on the verge of bankruptcy and committing to an endless colonial war, pressure is building for their crimes to be prosecuted at a tribunal similar to that which tried the Nazis at Nuremberg. This defined rapacious invasion as “the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.” International law would be mere farce, said the chief US chief prosecutor at Nuremberg, Supreme Court justice Robert Jackson, “if, in future, we do not apply its principles to ourselves.”

That is now happening. Spain, Germany, Belgium, France and Britain have long had “universal jurisdiction” statutes, which allow their national courts to pursue and prosecute prima facie war criminals. What has changed is an unspoken rule never to use international law against “ourselves,” or “our” allies or clients. In 1998, Spain, supported by France, Switzerland and Belgium, indicted the Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, client and executioner of the West, and sought his extradition from Britain, where he happened to be at the time. Had he been sent for trial he almost certainly would have implicated at least one British prime minister and two US presidents in crimes against humanity. Home Secretary Jack Straw let him escape back to Chile.

Continue reading →

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Interview with Chris Hedges, author of “I Don’t Believe in Atheists” (2008)

Interview with Chris Hedges
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad

By Charly Wilder
Salon Books
March 13, 2008

Audio interview with Chris Hedges:

http://static.salon.com/mp3s/2008/mar/conversations_hedges.mp3

Foreign correspondent and intellectual provocateur Chris Hedges explains why New Atheists like Christopher Hitchens are as dangerous as Christian fundamentalists.

Continue reading →

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Chomsky: How should NATO develop? Immediately disband.

Dandelion Salad

by Robert Harneis
http://www.russiatoday.com
02 April, 2009, 20:43

To mark the 60th NATO Anniversary Summit Noam Chomsky talked to Robert Harneis for RT on Kosovo, Afghanistan, as well as NATO – why it exists and its future. Professor Chomsky is a leading critic of NATO and US policy.

Q. A question asked more and more is ‘what is NATO for?’ If no one knows what it is for, why do you think it has survived 20 years after the end of the Cold War?

Professor Chomsky: Yes, that is the right question, isn’t it? You might ask why it lasted even one month after the end of the Cold War. Why did it survive? If you look back to when the Soviet Union collapsed, Gorbachev agreed to a quite remarkable concession. He agreed to let a united Germany join the NATO military alliance. Now it is remarkable in the light of history, the history of the past century, Germany alone had virtually destroyed Russia, twice, and Germany, backed by a hostile military alliance, centered in the most phenomenal military power in history, that’s a real threat. Nevertheless he agreed, but there was a quid pro quo, namely that NATO should not expand to the East, so Russia would at least have a kind of security zone. And George Bush and then-Secretary of State James Baker agreed that NATO would not expand one inch to the East. Gorbachev also proposed a nuclear free weapons zone in the region, but the US wouldn’t consider that. I don’t think they even replied to the proposal. So that was it, no more Soviet Union – game over.

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via “How should NATO develop? Immediately disband.” | Politics from 2009-04-02 | RT.

Continue reading →

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Who owns Colorado’s rainwater? + Catching rain water is against the law

Dandelion Salad

By Nicholas Riccardi
Los Angeles Times
March 18, 2009

Environmentalists and others like to gather it in containers for use in drier times. But state law says it belongs to those who bought the rights to waterways.

Reporting from Denver — Every time it rains here, Kris Holstrom knowingly breaks the law.

Holstrom’s violation is the fancifully painted 55-gallon buckets underneath the gutters of her farmhouse on a mesa 15 miles from the resort town of Telluride. The barrels catch rain and snowmelt, which Holstrom uses to irrigate the small vegetable garden she and her husband maintain.

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via Who owns Colorado’s rainwater? – Los Angeles Times.

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Catching rain water is against the law

By John Hollenhorst
ksl.com
August 12th, 2008 @ 11:49pm

Who owns the rain? Not you, it turns out. You’re actually breaking the law if you capture the rain falling on your roof and pour it on your flower bed! A prominent Utah car dealer found that out when he tried to do something good for the environment.

Rebecca Nelson captures rainwater in a barrel, and she pours it on her plants. “We can fill up a barrel in one rainstorm. And so it seems a waste to just let it fall into the gravel,” she said.

Car dealer Mark Miller wanted to do pretty much the same thing on a bigger scale. He collects rainwater on the roof of his new building, stores it in a cistern and hopes to clean cars with it in a new, water-efficient car wash. But without a valid water right, state officials say he can’t legally divert rainwater. “I was surprised. We thought it was our water,” Miller said.

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video: ksl.com – Catching rain water is against the law

FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

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Tony Benn: Banks Should Be Publically Owned

Dandelion Salad

AlJazeeraEnglish

Al Jazeera’s Anand Naidoo, standing in for Riz Khan, speaks to Tony Benn, the former British Labour MP and cabinet minister, about his reaction to the G20 summit in London.

Benn discusses whether any of the pledged money will go to poor and developing countries and whether more regulation will really help prevent a financial crisis from happening again.

see

Man dies during G20 protests in London (video link)

G20 protests rock London’s financial area + G20 What happened