Poor No More! Or That 'Hard-Working Middle Class'

by Sherman Yellen

Protest in Wisconsin, 2011

When have you last heard the term "hard-working poor" coming from any politician? Probably not in the past decade. Nobody is a member of the working poor anymore. Everyone is a member of the over-worked, over-taxed, hard-working middle class. That includes those making $25,000 a year as a Wal-Mart store manager, to those making $450,000 as a hedge fund clipper, to those making $12,000 dollars as a part time hospital cleaning woman. Continued...

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Ocean's Thirteen: Crime without punishment

by Sherman Yellen

Nobody knows if BP will be able to cap the raging oil well and end the spill in the coming days, weeks, or months. But what we do know is that there will be no real punishment for its crimes against our environment, our wildlife, and the men and women who have for generations lived for the sea and by the sea. This is no mere accident. It is a high crime against men, women, children, and the natural world. 

Punishment means that the company’s top execs spend some real time in the slammer for the deaths of twelve workers, and for those environmental crimes which occurred through their cost cutting practices and Cheney chicanery. In an ideal world the company and all its profits would be confiscated: their billions used to clean up the mess if the cleanup is even possible. And that’s for openers.

There is of course the Cheney question. Nobody knows what happened in those secret meetings with oil company execs which Cheney held in the White House, but an educated guess would be that the relaxation of safety standards that brought about this tragedy came in with Halliburton’s Oil Slick Dick – deregulation for fun and profits.

Disgrace is what happens to most of these people, but disgrace is hardly a true reckoning for BP and its minions, the BP execs behaving as if the very questioning of their motives and competence is an act of incredible colonial rudeness.  Continued...

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That Acrid Smell in the Air

by Sherman Yellen

Oh how I hate an ism. Born in the first half of the twentieth century I've lived through them all. That century was cursed with fascism, communism, and McCarthyism. In the twenty first we have Islamic terrorism. 

I must apologize if I am adding to the already overcrowded list of isms -- but with the threats from Republican Congressmen, the bulls-eye targeting of Sarah Palin of the Democrats she disagrees with, and the racist and homophobic curses from the Tea Party ringing in our ears after the passage of the health care bill, I suggest that we take a look backwards at the sad story of Timothy James McVeigh and see the McVeighism that is festering. 

Here was a man so filled with rage and resentment against the government for its Waco and Ruby Ridge raids, and a generalized hatred for American foreign policy, that he used explosives to blow up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal building in April of 1995 killing 168 people, injuring 450 others, nineteen of them small children in a day care center. Continued...

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Palin Loses Attempt to Block Protection of Alaska's Whales

by Janet Ritz

When the Center for Biological Diversity's 2006 request to have Alaska's beluga whales put on the endangered list came up for consideration last April, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin questioned the scientific evidence that the population was declining and lobbied for a six month delay to count the whales.

The answer is in. According to the National Marine Fisheries Service, run by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the whales, whose population declined by 50& in the 1990's, have shown no recovery despite the protections already in place. As such, the federal government determined on Friday that the "beluga whales species native to Anchorage, Alaska, is endangered and will require protection to survive."

"NOAA scientists estimated the Cook Inlet beluga population at 375 for both 2007 and 2008," NOAA stated. "Estimates have varied from a high of 653 belugas in 1994 to a low of 278 belugas in 2005."

The listing has the potential to affect major Alaska projects including an expansion of the Port of Anchorage, additional offshore oil and gas drilling, a proposed $600 million bridge connecting Anchorage to Palin's hometown of Wasilla and a massive coal mine 45 miles south of Anchorage.

Palin had opposed the endangered listing -- as well as one decreed for polar bears due to melting summer sea ice -- in part by questioning the science and saying the listings would hinder oil and natural gas drilling.

NOAA's decision to list whales means any federal agency that funds, authorizes, or carries out new projects or activities in the area must first consult with NOAA to determine the impact on Anchorage's beluga whales.

Friday's listing follows an accusation by the Center for Biological Diversity of stalling by the Bush Administration, citing federal law that required the identification of a critical habitat listing by last April.

NOAA has stated they will determine -- within one year -- the changes needed in the whales' habitat for their survival. In the meantime, the placement of the beluga whales on the endangered list provides for their protection according to NOAA scientists' assessment of the species' needs which supersedes Governor Palin's and the Bush Interior Department's interpretation of science... Continued...

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2010 Scenarios - Which country do you want first?

by Janet Ritz

Have you thought about what America will be like two years into the next administration?

Here are four scenarios:

First scenario - McCain:

It is 2010. President McCain has fired the head of the SEC, FEC, FCC, SIPC (note spelling)... and has formed the M.F.I. Commission to study the collapsed economy under Treasury Secretary Phil Gramm, while Saudi Arabia and Dubai (where Dick Cheney is living out his retirement) have matched China, India and Iraq in owning our over thirty-three trillion dollar national debt.

We're in proxy wars with Russia and in a bomb, bomb, bomb war with Iran.

Out-of-work parents say goodbye to their enlisted sons and daughters.

President McCain adds more cars to the thirteen(?) he currently owns.

Ditto on the houses.

A safe education is available only for the home-schooled or vouchered.

Health care becomes more out of reach to those who can't afford it.

Drilling is everywhere but ANWR and, yet, oil is over $200 a barrel.

Alternative fuels legislation receives lip-service but little effective support.

There are no salmon.

Tucker Bounds becomes Press Secretary. Doug Holtz-Eakin is the new CEO of Blackberry.

Questions about policies are met with blame and obfuscation.

Sound far-fetched? Perhaps.

But what if it's not?

Second scenario - McCain:

It is 2010. President John McCain defies his right wing and lobbyist backers and tries to do the right thing, but receives no support from a partisan congress or from the right wingers and lobbyists he's betrayed.

See above for the rest.

Sound far-fetched? Perhaps.

But what if it's not?


Third scenario - Palin:

It is 2010. Out-of-work parents say goodbye to their sons and daughters on their way to the trenches of Iran and Russia, while President Palin (sworn into office in 2009 after President McCain's untimely demise) and President Ahmedinejab rave about their respective end-times.

Social Security and Medicare are discontinued. Health care is unattainable.

Tent cities spring up in city parks. National parks are buzzed by aerial hunters.

Hurricanes wipe out the Gulf coast, the oceans have become one big dead zone with only lionfish and jellyfish, America's beaches are covered with garbage; the Midwest is a permanent flood zone (between tornadoes), cities, chokingly polluted, are filled with paranoid citizens with gun permits, new prisons are the only new home construction, twenty-five percent of endangered species have passed the tipping point to extinction, though not on any government list, and Saudi Arabia and Dubai (where Dick Cheney is living out his retirement) have matched China, India and Iraq in owning our over thirty-three trillion dollar national debt.

Sound far-fetched? Perhaps.

But what if it's not?


Fouth scenario - Obama:

It is 2010. President Barack Obama has formed a coalition with our (once again) allies to put pressure on Iran to belly up to the diplomacy bar. Joe Biden and Bill Clinton are dispatched to speak with world leaders who respect them.

A worldwide coalition has formed to combat the root causes of terrorism and shore up failing states.

Bipartisan government programs, pushed through by a Democratic majority in both houses, are instituted to forestall foreclosures while forcing corporate responsibility. Wall Street and Main Street (slowly) recover.

The homeless, rather than being beaten up by unattended teens, are ushered into community programs, as are unattended teens. Continued...

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It’s Tough Being A Teenaged Parent

by Sandra Cuneo

Statistics on the fate of teen mothers and the futures of children born to mothers aged 18 and under continue to be disappointing. Few teen mothers have a an adequate, structured support system to help them and their children – including an intact family or paternal assistance and love for their children -- and the negative consequences for these mothers and for their children are disturbing.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, by 12th grade, over 60 percent of teens have had sex. Moreover, improvements in contraceptive use have leveled off and that the teen birth rate is on the rise for the first time in 15 years. According to the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, one in three teenage girls becomes pregnant before the age of 20, 8 out of 10 of these pregnancies are unintended, and 80 percent of teen births are out-of wedlock. The teenage birth rate in the U.S. is the highest in the developed world.

The consequences for teen parents are stark: having a child before age 19 significantly reduces the probability of a teen girl’s finishing high school or going to college, and increases the probability of her reliance on public assistance programs such as TANF, food stamps and housing assistance. Teen fathers of teen mothers’ children earn less than adult fathers.

The consequences for the children of young teen mothers are also distressing: an Illinois study showed that teen mothers were 2.2 times more likely to have a child placed in foster care during the first five years after a birth. They were also twice as likely to have a reported case of abuse or neglect— almost one in ten children of young teen mothers were reported for abuse or neglect.

Children of teen mothers are also more likely to drop out of high school. Sons of adolescent mothers are 2.2 times more likely to spend time in prison -- nearly 14 percent of the sons of adolescent mothers have been in prison by their late-30s, compared to six percent of the sons of mothers aged 20-21. Daughters of adolescent mothers are more likely to become teen mothers themselves.

Teen childbearing in the United States costs taxpayers at least $9.1 billion, according to a 2006 report by Saul Hoffman, Ph.D. and published by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy. Most of these costs are the result of the negative consequences for the children of teen mothers, including increased costs for health care, foster care, and incarceration.

While fathers of children born to teen mothers need to provide support and love to their children, teen marriages are generally not the solution to teen pregnancy: they are particularly unstable and result in a significantly higher divorce rate than that of couples who marry when they are out of their teens. Girls who marry between conception and birth are less likely to return to school than those who don’t marry. Young relationships also involve high levels of violence. Teen marriages often result in a rapid second birth and worse economic and educational outcomes for the mother and her child. However, marrying before the birth of a child may also lead to greater paternal support, a residential father, and even if the couple divorces, greater financial support and greater paternal access to the child. Continued...

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Sarah Palin as George Bush

by Janet Ritz

In a polemic penned by George Bush's former speechwriter, Sarah Palin attempted to define Barack Obama as her equal and John McCain as above them both, while avoiding any subject of substance.

Sorry, Sarah, that husky don't hunt.

Palin's (Matthew Scully's) speech revealed a surprising parallel to George Bush -- albeit with phonetic care given to the correct pronunciation of certain words -- in her bid to become vice president to an aging politician with a history of health problems amid a pointed lack of relevance to the issues at hand and a cynical willingness to distort the truth.

The RNC talking points/heads are now questioning the media for pointing out that Palin's speech was written by Bush's former speechwriter (who'd only met her a week before).

What about the democrats, they charge; are you asking them who writes their speeches???

The answer, in the case of Barack Obama, at least -- since he was the focus of Scully's speech -- is that Barack Obama is the primary writer of his own speeches, a point the RNC has made many times in their attempts to denigrate his abilities as both a writer and speaker.

As for Senator Biden, no one can accuse him of not speaking his mind or of not caring about women's issues, given that he was the driving force behind the Violence Against Women Act.

What was missing from Scully's speech for Palin, aside from actual support for women's issues, was any discussion of policy, any mention of current events; no compassionate conservatism about the huge ice sheet -- the size of Manhattan -- that just broke loose in the Arctic; the approach of Hurricane Ike that has already swelled to a Category 4; the wolves she rewards her constituents for shooting; the fact that she does not believe in man-made global warming; her support for the teaching of creationism in schools; her opposition to equal pay, access to health care and those pesky books she wanted banned from libraries...

[Former Wasilla mayor] Stein says that as mayor, Palin continued to inject religious beliefs into her policy at times. "She asked the library how she could go about banning books," he says, because some voters thought they had inappropriate language in them. "The librarian was aghast." The librarian, Mary Ellen Baker, couldn't be reached for comment, but news reports from the time show that Palin had threatened to fire her for not giving "full support" to the mayor.

Those who question Palin's policies do not receive an answer to their questions, while any concern about her qualifications as a future commander-in-chief are dismissed as sexism. That's silly, of course. Especially when the only information her speechwriter has offered constitutes identity politics and divisive attacks on community organizers, parroting a new campaign by Rush Limbaugh to define such community organizers, many of whom are ethnic in background, as "radical activists."

Are we to accuse the RNC and their media allies of racism?

Or perhaps it's conservative elitism: We don't need no stinking "radical activists" stirring up disenfranchised ethnic communities and getting them to demand a fair shake. Continued...

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