Archive for November 2010
American Farmers Create 41,000 Acres of Wildflower Habitat for Bees in 2010
*For Immediate Release: November 29th, 2010*** SANET
Contacts:
*Kathy Kellison*, Executive Director, Partners for Sustainable Pollination, k.kellison@earthlink.net, (707) 321-4711
*Eric Mader*, Assistant Pollinator Program Director, The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, eric@xerces.org, (503) 232-6639
PORTLAND, Ore. – Responding to the ongoing decline of honey bees and wild pollinators, in 2010 American farmers enrolled in a USDA program to plant 41,231 acres of wildflowers.
This effort, a nationwide attempt to increase the availability of pollen and nectar for beleaguered pollinators, is made possible by new financial incentives established as part of the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP). Nearly 4,600 farmers signed up for the incentives, which were offered for the first time in the program’s 25 year history.
CRP is the largest private landowner conservation program in the United States, with up to 32 million acres eligible for enrollment in long-term conservation easements. In exchange for annual rental payments, participating farmers agree to take highly erodible land out of crop production, and establish permanent vegetation to protect topsoil and provide wildlife cover. The program, which is administered by the USDA’s Farm Service Agency (FSA), typically contracts with farmers to maintain these easements for 10 to 15 years.
“The new wildflower planting incentives represent a monumental shift in CRP,” said Eric Mader, Assistant Pollinator Program Director at The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, a pollinator advocacy group based in Portland, Ore. “In the past, most CRP land was maintained in non-native grasses, which had limited value to wildlife. This change will help pollinators, provide shelter for pheasants, songbirds and endangered butterflies, and can provide global environmental benefits by encouraging deep-rooted prairie wildflowers that help sequester carbon.”
William S. Burroughs, Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 28, 1986
Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 28, 1986
William S. Burroughs
For John Dillinger
In hope he is still alive
Thanks for the wild turkey and the Passenger Pigeons, destined to be shit out through wholesome American guts –
thanks for a Continent to despoil and poison –
thanks for Indians to provide a modicum of challenge and danger –
thanks for vast herds of bison to kill and skin, leaving the carcass to rot –
thanks for bounties on wolves and coyotes –
thanks for the AMERICAN DREAM to vulgarize and falsify until the bare lies shine through –
thanks for the KKK, for nigger-killing lawmen feeling their notches, for decent church-going women with their mean, pinched, bitter, evil faces –
thanks for “Kill a Queer for Christ” stickers –
thanks for laboratory AIDS –
thanks for Prohibition and the War Against Drugs –
thanks for a country where nobody is allowed to mind his own business –
thanks for a nation of finks — yes,
thanks for all the memories… all right, let’s see your arms… you always were a headache and you always were a bore –
thanks for the last and greatest betrayal of the last and greatest of human dreams.
***
“Thanksgiving Day” first appeared in the chapbook Tornado Alley, with illustrations by S. Clay Wilson. Gus Van Sant then made a short film of Burroughs reading the text, which you can view in RealityStudio’s multimedia section [or Youtube link above]. There are numerous variants of “Thanksgiving Day” floating around the internet, but RealityStudio took pains to correct them, copying this directly from the original printed text.
Endgame Legislation: Lame Duck Session Ushers in Tyranny
Eric Blair
Activist Post November 25, 2010
When most of us think about “lame duck” Congressional sessions we think of a “do-nothing” government. However, this so-called lame duck session appears to be a time where legislation that has the most restrictions to individual rights is being rammed through.
It seems the members of government who have been recently voted out of office are vying for corporate jobs by pushing such legislation as the Food Safety Modernization Act and the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act which are now on the fast track to becoming law. Both of these laws reek of tyranny for the citizens and a means of corporate consolidation for the big boys.
It seems whenever a piece of legislation has the word “safety” in it we can expect to lose our right to make our own decisions. For example, consumer protection groups pushed hard for the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act in 2008 after large numbers of Chinese-made toys and other products proved to have dangerously unhealthy toxins.
Consequently, the bill was passed with 407 Ayes, 0 Nays in the House. Only later did the public find out that the bill did more to regulate, tax, and impose fines on neighborhood garage sales than it did to stop dangerous Chinese imports. Clearly, the bill is used to clamp down on an individual’s right to sell their used items without governmental oversight. In other words, the corporate-government will not allow any form of black market to threaten their cartel control of consumerism.
LEFT AND RIGHT TOGETHER- Populism not Party!
By Dr. Robert M. Bowman, Lt. Col., USAF, Ret., 
National Commander, “The Patriots”
June, 2010
Patriotism and Populism
The United States is in trouble. We’re in danger of becoming a fascist dictatorship where big government and big business combine to rule, and where the people are considered just a source of labor. The marriage of government and the investor class has succeeded in exporting our jobs, importing illegal laborers to provide a pool of cheap labor, and driving down wages for all American workers, destroying the middle class. Their foreign and military policies have led us into unnecessary wars of aggression to gain raw materials and enhance profits of the global robber barons. Their trade policies have resulted in capital flight, job loss, trade deficits, and the ownership of much of our infrastructure by foreign interests.
We’ve gotten into this fix because our presidents, of both parties, have been servants of the global investors, and because our representatives in Congress, again of both parties, have abdicated their Constitutional responsibilities and subjected themselves to an imperial presidency.
A “patriot” is defined as one who loves, supports, and defends his country. The Latin and Greek roots refer to “father.” If, for a moment, we ignore the sexist nature of the ancient civilizations giving birth to the word, it is clear that to be a “patriot” is to have a parental love for the people of one’s tribe or nation. One cannot have a “patriotic love” for the corporations in one’s country or for its military-industrial complex, only for its people. Clearly then, those in our government who have served their corporate masters to the detriment of the people are not patriots, and have no claim to the word. The vast majority of Americans love our country in ways that equate to service to the people. We are the patriots. You can’t be a patriot without being a populist. Populism is patriotic.
Our Declaration of Independence and Constitution make it clear that the whole purpose of government is to serve and protect the people.. Ours is a government designed to be “of the people, by the people, and for the people.” We, the Patriots, have a right and a duty to demand and to secure such a government. If those in power will not fulfill their Constitutional duty to serve the people, then we must remove them and replace them with those who will.
The TSA is out of control
The government is doing what it does best – it’s lying.
“There is no problem.”
The media is doing what it does best – it’s presenting the story in a fragmentary, dismissive way.
NO ONE is putting all the pieces together.
This is a much bigger story than just Nazi-like behavior at the airports.
Subscribe to BrasscheckTV.com to get updates.
Even this video just scratches the surface – and please share this page with your friends.
If we don’t protest, it will only get worse.
Also see this video:
Michael Chertoff ordered the full body x-ray scanners *before* the so-called “underwear bomber” scare. Now he personally profits from selling them to the Department of Homeland Security
Why the Dems are as bad/worse than the GOP
In our rush to defend them, we compromise any chance of living with integrity. It’s a major sign of the times that this obvious fact matters so little to most people. I spent a number of years in the streets confronting illegitimate authority- when I was much younger and had more to lose. And now when the stakes are even higher, the preponderant vibe is malaise.
Meanwhile in our current wars, “official” figures acknowledge 4427 military deaths (32,900 wounded) in Iraq and 1385 dead in Afghanistan– all supposedly for “freedom” we no longer care about. Here again one of my favorite Founder’s quotes:
“If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude than the animated contest of freedom, go from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen!”
Samuel Adams
***
The World as He Finds It – Paul Krugman
“Right at the beginning of his administration, what Mr. Obama needed to do, above all, was fight for an economic plan commensurate with the scale of the crisis. Instead, he negotiated with himself before he ever got around to negotiating with Congress, proposing a plan that was clearly, grossly inadequate — then allowed that plan to be scaled back even further without protest. And the failure to act forcefully on the economy, more than anything else, accounts for the midterm “shellacking.” Even given the economy’s troubles, however, the administration’s efforts to limit the political damage were amazingly weak. There were no catchy slogans, no clear statements of principle; the administration’s political messaging was not so much ineffective as invisible.”
US government offers Israel $3 billion weapons deal in exchange for 3-month settlement freeze
In exchange for the temporary, partial moratorium on construction, the Israeli military would receive a gift of 20 F35 fighter jets, worth $3 billion, from the US. The US-made jets that Israel already has have been used for aerial bombardment of Palestinian civilian areas in violation of international law, and to drop missiles on Palestinians that Israel claims are ‘wanted’ for crimes against Israelis – but instead of being tried and convicted, they are extrajudicially assassinated by missiles, in violation of international law. The US government also promised Israel that after the 90-day moratorium, they would not seek an extension, and settlement construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem (all of which is illegal under international law) could continue unabated.
Democrats and the rule of law – Glenn Greenwald
If it were true — as most Obama defenders argued — that giving civilian trials to accused Terrorists is not merely a good option, but required by the Constitution, the rule of law, and our values, then isn’t it logically and necessarily true that Obama’s refusal to grant such trials constitutes a violation of our Constitution, our rule of law and our values? And if so, doesn’t this require rather severe condemnation from the same people who defended civilian trials as necessary under our system of government? After all, if the President is violating our Constitution, the rule of law, and our values, isn’t that cause for some rather serious protest and denunciation, no matter his motives?
FDA Caught Hiding The Truth About GMO Salmon
The Center for Food Safety (CFS) recently revealed a document that proves the U.S. Food and Drug Administration knowingly withheld vital information during recent hearings regarding the approval of GMO salmon.
The Biological Opinon, created by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in 2003, provides conclusive evidence that genetically modified (GMO) salmon pose a serious threat to endangered Atlantic salmon if accidentally released into the wild.
Sign the petition: Say NO to Frankenfish Salmon!
By failing to release this document prior to the September 19th public hearing on AquaBounty’s GMO salmon, the FDA continues an alarming trend that this agency and the U.S. government have engaged in since GMO foods first appeared in the 1990s (Food Democracy Now).
“This [document] adds further evidence that in fact GE salmon pose a serious threat to marine environments and is another compelling reason for the FDA not to approve the fish for commercial use,” said Andrew Kimbrell, Executive Director of the Center for Food Safety.
More Looting of Taxpayers: Wall Street Collects $4 Billion as Swaps Backfire
Bloomberg.com Nov 9, 2010
The subprime mortgage crisis isn’t the only calamity Wall Street created that’s upending the finances of U.S. states and cities.
….
Wall Street banks and insurers peddled financial derivatives known as interest-rate swaps to governments and nonprofits that bet they could lower the cost of borrowing. There were as much as $500 billion of the deals done in the $2.8 trillion municipal bond market before the credit crisis, according to a report by Randall Dodd, a senior researcher on the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, published by the International Monetary Fund in June.
Borrowers from New York to California are now paying to get out of agreements. Altogether, they have made more than $4 billion of termination payments to firms including New York- based Citigroup Inc., New York-based JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America Corp. since the beginning of 2008, according to a review of hundreds of bond documents and credit-rating reports by Bloomberg News.
In contrast to the subprime crisis, few taxpayers know anything about the cost of untangling municipal swaps. The only disclosure of payments to Wall Street often is buried in documents borrowers have to give investors when they sell bonds.
In many cases, firms getting payments aren’t explicitly identified and government officials often don’t call attention to payments made to cancel contracts. Many of the telephone calls and e-mails from Bloomberg News to dozens of government and nonprofit officials over the last eight months seeking comment on derivative transactions went unanswered…….
Vandana Shiva: Time to end war against the earth
Time to end war against the earth
By Vandana Shiva
When we think of wars in our times, our minds turn to Iraq and Afghanistan. But the bigger war is the war against the planet. A handful of corporations and of powerful countries seeks to control the earth’s resources and transform the planet into a supermarket in which everything is for sale. They want to sell our water, genes, cells, organs, knowledge, cultures and future.
Bill Moyers: “Welcome to the Plutocracy!”
You would think the rich might care, if not from empathy, then from reading history. Ultimately gross inequality can be fatal to civilization…. Pulitzer Prize-winning anthropologist Jared Diamond writes about how governing elites throughout history isolate and delude themselves until it is too late.
Wednesday 03 November 2010 t r u t h o u t 
The first Howard Zinn Memorial Lecture was delivered by veteran journalist, Bill Moyers, Friday, October 29, 2010, at Boston University .
. Howard Zinn (b. Aug. 24, 1922, in Brooklyn, N.Y.; d. Jan. 27, 2010, in Santa Monica, Calif.) was a professor of Political Science at Boston University from 1964 to 1988, historian, playwright, activist, and author of more than 20 books, including A PEOPLE’S HSTORY OF THE UNITED STATES: 1492 – PRESENT (1980), revised (1995)(1998)(1999)(2003).
* * * * *
I was honored when you asked me to join in celebrating Howard Zinn’s life and legacy. I was also surprised. I am a journalist, not a historian. The difference between a journalist and an historian is that the historian knows the difference. George Bernard Shaw once complained that journalists are seemingly unable to discriminate between a bicycle accident and the collapse of civilization. In fact, some epic history can start out as a minor incident. A young man named Paris ran off with a beautiful woman who was married to someone else, and the civilization of Troy began to unwind. A middle-aged black seamstress, riding in a Montgomery bus, had tired feet, and an ugly social order began to collapse. A night guard at an office complex in Washington D.C. found masking tape on a doorjamb, and the presidency of Richard Nixon began to unwind. What journalist, writing on deadline, could have imagined the walloping kick that Rosa Park’s tired feet would give to Jim Crow? What pundit could have fantasized that a third-rate burglary on a dark night could change the course of politics? The historian’s work is to help us disentangle the wreck of the Schwinn from cataclysm. Howard famously helped us see how big change can start with small acts.
We honor his memory. We honor him, for Howard championed grassroots social change and famously chronicled its story as played out over the course of our nation’s history. More, those stirring sagas have inspired and continue to inspire countless people to go out and make a difference. The last time we met, I told him that the stories in A People’s History of the United States remind me of the fellow who turned the corner just as a big fight broke out down the block. Rushing up to an onlooker he shouted, “Is this a private fight, or can anyone get in it?” For Howard, democracy was one big public fight and everyone should plunge into it. That’s the only way, he said, for everyday folks to get justice – by fighting for it.
I have in my desk at home a copy of the commencement address Howard gave at Spelman College in 2005. He was chairman of the history department there when he was fired in 1963 over his involvement in civil rights. He had not been back for 43 years, and he seemed delighted to return for commencement. He spoke poignantly of his friendship with one of his former students, Alice Walker, the daughter of tenant farmers in Georgia who made her way to Spelman and went on to become the famous writer. Howard delighted in quoting one of her first published poems that had touched his own life:
It is true
I’ve always loved
the daring ones
like the black young man
who tried to crash
all barriers
at once,
wanted to swim
at a white beach (in Alabama)
Nude.
That was Howard Zinn; he loved the daring ones, and was daring himself.
One month before his death he finished his last book, The Bomb. Once again he was wrestling with his experience as a B-17 bombardier during World War II, especially his last mission in 1945 on a raid to take out German garrisons in the French town of Royan. For the first time the Eighth Air Force used napalm, which burst into liquid fire on the ground, killing hundreds of civilians. He wrote, “I remember distinctly seeing the bombs explode in the town, flaring like matches struck in the fog. I was completely unaware of the human chaos below.” Twenty years later he returned to Royan to study the effects of the raid and concluded there had been no military necessity for the bombing; everyone knew the war was almost over (it ended three weeks later) and this attack did nothing to affect the outcome. His grief over having been a cog in a deadly machine no doubt confirmed his belief in small acts of rebellion, which mean, as Howard writes in the final words of the book, “acting on what we feel and think, here, now, for human flesh and sense, against the abstractions of duty and obedience.”
His friend and long-time colleague writes in the foreword that “Shifting historical focus from the wealthy and powerful to the ordinary person was perhaps his greatest act of rebellion and incitement.” It seems he never forget the experience of growing up in a working class neighborhood in New York. In that spirit, let’s begin with some everyday people.
Wake-up Call 