Global
It’s fitting that Keith Kilty, Professor Emeritus at Ohio State University’s Department of Social Work, borrows from Sojourner Truth in titling his film “Ain’t I A Person?” At its core, the documentary does on video what Michael Harrington did in print with his epic book on poverty, The Other America.
Kilty, in the tradition of Harrington, is taking the all-too-often invisible poor and humanizing their plight. This is the ultimate success of this well done documentary. Produced primarily in Ohio with much of it set in urban Cincinnati, a city at one point with the highest rate of urban poverty in the U.S., the film succeeds not only as a record of human suffering but also functions as a primer on poverty.
Kilty centers the film around a variety of questions that are essential for any intelligent discussion of public policy aimed at reducing poverty. His years as a professor aid him in explaining what poverty is, how it is defined, and what are its root causes.
Kilty, in the tradition of Harrington, is taking the all-too-often invisible poor and humanizing their plight. This is the ultimate success of this well done documentary. Produced primarily in Ohio with much of it set in urban Cincinnati, a city at one point with the highest rate of urban poverty in the U.S., the film succeeds not only as a record of human suffering but also functions as a primer on poverty.
Kilty centers the film around a variety of questions that are essential for any intelligent discussion of public policy aimed at reducing poverty. His years as a professor aid him in explaining what poverty is, how it is defined, and what are its root causes.
Dear President Obama,
Why Atomic Energy Should Not be Used to Generate Electricity:
The plants are inherently unsafe
· Most of the current plants are operating beyond their age limit.
· Failure to inspect and maintain them.
· Operators are sometimes not reporting safety hazards to NRC.
· Human error puts them at risk.
· When there is an accident, there is risk of injury and death to a large numbers of people, areas becoming uninhabitable and food becoming unsafe to eat.
· Since insurance companies are unwilling to insure them, government assumes the liability.
Problems with spent fuel (atomic waste)
· It must be kept under water to cool it and protect personnel from radiation.
· There is no safe way to dispose of it after it can be taken out of the water. It is usually left on site. · It is dangerous for thousands of years.
· It can easily be used to make a “dirty bomb”.
Government must subsidize nuclear power plants in order that energy companies will invest in them.
Why Atomic Energy Should Not be Used to Generate Electricity:
The plants are inherently unsafe
· Most of the current plants are operating beyond their age limit.
· Failure to inspect and maintain them.
· Operators are sometimes not reporting safety hazards to NRC.
· Human error puts them at risk.
· When there is an accident, there is risk of injury and death to a large numbers of people, areas becoming uninhabitable and food becoming unsafe to eat.
· Since insurance companies are unwilling to insure them, government assumes the liability.
Problems with spent fuel (atomic waste)
· It must be kept under water to cool it and protect personnel from radiation.
· There is no safe way to dispose of it after it can be taken out of the water. It is usually left on site. · It is dangerous for thousands of years.
· It can easily be used to make a “dirty bomb”.
Government must subsidize nuclear power plants in order that energy companies will invest in them.
The facts all point to this “inconvenient truth” -- the time has
come to shut down California’s two nuclear power plants as part of a
swift transition to an energy policy focused on clean and green
renewable sources and conservation.
The Diablo Canyon plant near San Luis Obispo and the San Onofre plant on the southern California coast are vulnerable to meltdowns from earthquakes and threaten both residents and the environment.
Reactor safety is just one of the concerns. Each nuclear power plant creates radioactive waste that will remain deadly for thousands of years. This is not the kind of legacy that we should leave for future generations.
In the wake of Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant meltdown, we need a basic rethinking of the USA’s nuclear energy use and oversight. There is no more technologically advanced country in the world than Japan. Nuclear power isn’t safe there, and it isn’t safe anywhere.
The Diablo Canyon plant near San Luis Obispo and the San Onofre plant on the southern California coast are vulnerable to meltdowns from earthquakes and threaten both residents and the environment.
Reactor safety is just one of the concerns. Each nuclear power plant creates radioactive waste that will remain deadly for thousands of years. This is not the kind of legacy that we should leave for future generations.
In the wake of Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant meltdown, we need a basic rethinking of the USA’s nuclear energy use and oversight. There is no more technologically advanced country in the world than Japan. Nuclear power isn’t safe there, and it isn’t safe anywhere.
Modern history and current events are aligned in this excellent text from Dilip Hiro. Beginning with a short, concise back ground history on the arraignment of empires before and after World War II, “After Empire” then focuses more closely on the New World Order following on two main events. The first was the self-inflicted collapse of the Soviet Union following on Gorbachev’s perestroika and glasnost, followed by Yeltsin’s inebriated attempts to throw the country wide open to the capitalist free market west and the Washington consensus of the IMF and World Bank. The second event, a decade later, was the attack on the World Trade Center and the subsequent series of attacks and manipulations around the world combined with the stealthy annexation of the powers of the constitution towards executive supremacy in the U.S. government.
Democracy. Who used to have it in the USA, and who has it now? People with white skin privilege? People who were born male? People with piles of money, much of it stolen from other people's labor?
I often hear European Americans from all walks of life talking about democracy in the USA - how they want to reclaim it, like in the good old days - and I wonder about how differently from one another we experience this country. This is not our land; not my land nor your land. When European Americans arrived over 500 years ago, we murdered with bullets and small pox blankets - that we intentionally gave to them - the Indigenous people who had lived in balance here for thousands of years. Then we enslaved people of African descent to build the country's wealth, and kept women - who did not even get the vote until 1920 - second class citizens and the property of men for even longer.
I often hear European Americans from all walks of life talking about democracy in the USA - how they want to reclaim it, like in the good old days - and I wonder about how differently from one another we experience this country. This is not our land; not my land nor your land. When European Americans arrived over 500 years ago, we murdered with bullets and small pox blankets - that we intentionally gave to them - the Indigenous people who had lived in balance here for thousands of years. Then we enslaved people of African descent to build the country's wealth, and kept women - who did not even get the vote until 1920 - second class citizens and the property of men for even longer.
How do you get politicians living off legalized bribery to criminalize bribery? How do you persuade the corporate media to report on the interests of flesh-and-blood, non-corporate people? How do you take over a political party when the only other one allowed to compete is worse? These are not koans, but actual problems with a single solution.
It might seem like there are a million solutions: pass state-level clean election laws, build independent media, build a new party, etc. But the fundamental answer is that when the deck is stacked against you, you insist on a new deck. Power, as Frederick Douglas told us, concedes nothing without a demand. We cannot legislate our way out of plutocracy. Instead, we the people must seize power.
It might seem like there are a million solutions: pass state-level clean election laws, build independent media, build a new party, etc. But the fundamental answer is that when the deck is stacked against you, you insist on a new deck. Power, as Frederick Douglas told us, concedes nothing without a demand. We cannot legislate our way out of plutocracy. Instead, we the people must seize power.
The White House has a handy website to mislead you about your tax dollars at Tax Receipt.
It claims that only 26.3% goes to "National Defense." This is similar to the claim in the 1040EZ US income tax form booklet (see pages 36-37). Here are those two pages in a PDF. There the claim is that the U.S. government only spends 22% of its money on "National defense, veterans, and foreign affairs." The form admits that you could leave out the "foreign affairs" part and still be at 21%.
The White House website claims to calculate both veterans' expenses and foreign affairs separately and still put "defense" alone at 26.3%.
However, take a look now at the pie chart created by the War Resisters League, which shows 51% of the budget going to the military.
21% and 26.3% and 51% aren't even close to each other. This is not "good enough for government work." This is our money. What gives?
It claims that only 26.3% goes to "National Defense." This is similar to the claim in the 1040EZ US income tax form booklet (see pages 36-37). Here are those two pages in a PDF. There the claim is that the U.S. government only spends 22% of its money on "National defense, veterans, and foreign affairs." The form admits that you could leave out the "foreign affairs" part and still be at 21%.
The White House website claims to calculate both veterans' expenses and foreign affairs separately and still put "defense" alone at 26.3%.
However, take a look now at the pie chart created by the War Resisters League, which shows 51% of the budget going to the military.
21% and 26.3% and 51% aren't even close to each other. This is not "good enough for government work." This is our money. What gives?
BANGKOK, Thailand -- Three days of border fighting with mortars and rockets by Thailand and Cambodia has killed at least 10 soldiers and forced thousands of villagers to flee, while both sides try to dominate nearby ancient Hindu temple ruins which are potentially lucrative tourist sites.
Three Cambodian soldiers and three Thai troops died on Friday, followed by three more Cambodian soldiers' deaths and one more Thai army fatality on Saturday, officials said.
No deaths were reported on Sunday.
Thailand and Cambodia repeatedly blamed the other for firing first.
The three days of fighting were the worst clashes since February when four days of similar battles killed 10 soldiers and prompted the United Nations Security Council to call for restraint.
In New York during the weekend, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon again called on both countries to stop fighting and agree to a verifiable ceasefire.
Cambodia said Thai forces fired 75 mm and 105 mm shells "loaded with poison gas" and flew reconnaissance flights deep into Cambodian territory, but no evidence was provided and Bangkok denied both charges.
Three Cambodian soldiers and three Thai troops died on Friday, followed by three more Cambodian soldiers' deaths and one more Thai army fatality on Saturday, officials said.
No deaths were reported on Sunday.
Thailand and Cambodia repeatedly blamed the other for firing first.
The three days of fighting were the worst clashes since February when four days of similar battles killed 10 soldiers and prompted the United Nations Security Council to call for restraint.
In New York during the weekend, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon again called on both countries to stop fighting and agree to a verifiable ceasefire.
Cambodia said Thai forces fired 75 mm and 105 mm shells "loaded with poison gas" and flew reconnaissance flights deep into Cambodian territory, but no evidence was provided and Bangkok denied both charges.