A US District Court has ruled that the government of Sudan has provided financing for al-Qaeda and as such is liable for the attack on the USS Cole. The government denies any role and is refusing to pay $8 million in penalties to the estates of the 17 murdered; although the amount awarded is far less than the $105 million sought.
What I'd really like to see is countries, and officials within them, indicted for their role in 9/11. Don't forget that 28 pages of the 9/11 Commission Report are still censored because they name names within the House of Saud. Given Saudi Arabia's longstanding connection to the Bush clan, it would be truly embarrassing to both 41 and 43 if it comes out (as it eventually must) that country was responsible for the attacks that day.
Meantime, Sudan can come up with another excuse to prevent peacekeepers from Darfur. After all, the UN is the tool of the US (according to Middle East and African fundamentalist governments).
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Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
So long, Weekly World News!
Close Encounter of the Fourth Kind: I Spent a Week on Pluto! Hitler Dead at 103: Suffered Congenital Heart Disease His Whole Life! Secret Prophecies of The Virgin Mary: World Will End [Insert Date]!
These were the kinds of stories one could only find in the most outrageous supermarket tabloid of them all, Weekly World News. Next month, it becomes the latest publication to switch to an all-Web only format.
Interesting sidebar: Their parent company also publishes the National Enquirer and the much more legitimate Men's Fitness. Make what you will of that.
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These were the kinds of stories one could only find in the most outrageous supermarket tabloid of them all, Weekly World News. Next month, it becomes the latest publication to switch to an all-Web only format.
Interesting sidebar: Their parent company also publishes the National Enquirer and the much more legitimate Men's Fitness. Make what you will of that.
Vote for this post at Progressive Bloggers.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Drew Carey gets Barker's TPiR slot
It's an interesting choice. It wouldn't have been my first (and who I would have picked is now irrelevant since the choice has been made) but I think Carey has the right stuff.
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Sunday, July 22, 2007
Free Free Dominion!
HT to Psychols: I too support free speech, period -- and oppose the attempts by some to silence the right-wing site Free Dominion, no matter how much I disagree with the viewpoints posted over there.
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Vote for this post at Progressive Bloggers.
Best argument yet for US public health care
Here's an FAQ from a coalition of US physicians who say it's time to have a single payer health care system like Canada has.
Scrolling down to the bottom, I found this nugget -- answering the latest dead donkey the neo-cons make against universal coverage; that a government run system would result in fiascoes like Walter Reed:
Remember who used to run Halliburton? That's right!
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Scrolling down to the bottom, I found this nugget -- answering the latest dead donkey the neo-cons make against universal coverage; that a government run system would result in fiascoes like Walter Reed:
As we consider what we can learn from the Walter Reed Army Medical Center debacle with regard to government-run efforts, some clarifications should be made:
1) Walter Reed Army Medical Center is an Army hospital and is run by the Department of Defense. The VA hospitals are run by the Veterans Administration (Veterans Health Administration) and are a separate structure. The reporting in the news media has clouded this fact and has led the public to presume that all government-run health efforts should be tarred and feathered and run out of town. Nevertheless, the VA health system continues to hold the position of the US health system with the most satisfied patients and one of the highest quality ratings for its use of information systems, access of patients to their medical records, transparency and accountability programs for dealing with medical errors, application of AHRQ quality guidelines to patient care for both inpatients and outpatients, and it won the Baldridge Prize (2004) for quality and patient-safety improvements.
2) There is a lot we can learn from the Walter Reed disgrace. Its operation was outsourced to a Halliburton-connected company in 2002, over the objections of some Army medical personnel and leadership, with a subsequent loss of government employees with institutional experience and a drastic reduction in staff. There was also some hanky-panky with the contracting process when the government employees’ bid for the operations contract came in lower than the Halliburton company’s bid, and the bids were subsequently “recalculated” to make the private company the lowest bidder.
Remember who used to run Halliburton? That's right!
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It's always you, you, you!
Today's Gospel reading in the Common Lectionary is the story about Martha and Mary -- you might be familiar with it; Martha's ticked off that Mary won't help her with the household chores and serving the dinner guests. Notice how Jesus gently rebukes Martha ... but also notice too that Martha still misses the point.
The point: Martha wanted someone to serve her. Me, myself, I. And that we need in turn to serve God; which unfortunately is what many televanglists also believe (meaning serve the preachers by paying up and shutting up). It's really the other way around: God came as a human being to serve us. And we need to pay attention to his service and learn from the example God has set for us.
Are we going to trip along the way in his service? Of course we are. But if we just focus on us -- that is, we each believe "I'm entitled to my entitlements," then we're certainly going to get that although it's not what we believe we're entitled to.
Compare that to the example of Abraham who was still struggling to make meet -- and served his guests without even questioning why he had to do that. His reward: His long barren wife Sarah became pregnant.
Wonder what Martha got as her "reward"? Or what today's "me first" politicians and preachers will get in the end? Let's face it, we're all more like Martha than we are Mary.
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The point: Martha wanted someone to serve her. Me, myself, I. And that we need in turn to serve God; which unfortunately is what many televanglists also believe (meaning serve the preachers by paying up and shutting up). It's really the other way around: God came as a human being to serve us. And we need to pay attention to his service and learn from the example God has set for us.
Are we going to trip along the way in his service? Of course we are. But if we just focus on us -- that is, we each believe "I'm entitled to my entitlements," then we're certainly going to get that although it's not what we believe we're entitled to.
Compare that to the example of Abraham who was still struggling to make meet -- and served his guests without even questioning why he had to do that. His reward: His long barren wife Sarah became pregnant.
Wonder what Martha got as her "reward"? Or what today's "me first" politicians and preachers will get in the end? Let's face it, we're all more like Martha than we are Mary.
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Saturday, July 21, 2007
Why should hairdressers have to pay royalties to SOCAN?
There's no question we need to stamp out piracy in the movies, music and theatrical arts. But I have to wonder whether this is trying to squat a fruitfly with a sledge hammer.
Incredibly the group that represents music composers in Canada, SOCAN, is demanding dentists and hairdressers pay a license fee; if they play CDs, or radio (whether off-the-air or satellite). What's next? We'll be facing criminal charges if we don't pay such fees to play our own radios in our private homes or driving in our cars?
This isn't the UK. We don't pay a government-mandated fee as a condition to use signals off the airwaves. And professionals aren't pirating anything when they play freely available music because radio and TV stations are already paying reverse payola back to the record labels.
SOCAN should just bugger off unless they are actually suggesting, seriously, we adopt the UK model. Problem is, they don't have the guts to say it because there would be a revolt in Canada against that even if it is the most practical way to save vital institutions like the CBC and the Canada Council.
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Incredibly the group that represents music composers in Canada, SOCAN, is demanding dentists and hairdressers pay a license fee; if they play CDs, or radio (whether off-the-air or satellite). What's next? We'll be facing criminal charges if we don't pay such fees to play our own radios in our private homes or driving in our cars?
This isn't the UK. We don't pay a government-mandated fee as a condition to use signals off the airwaves. And professionals aren't pirating anything when they play freely available music because radio and TV stations are already paying reverse payola back to the record labels.
SOCAN should just bugger off unless they are actually suggesting, seriously, we adopt the UK model. Problem is, they don't have the guts to say it because there would be a revolt in Canada against that even if it is the most practical way to save vital institutions like the CBC and the Canada Council.
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Friday, July 20, 2007
Rule of law restored ...
... in Pakistan. Maybe Karl Rove and Dick Cheney should pay attention.
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Congress saves public broadcasting, again
Just about the only independent media outlets left in the States are the member stations that make up PBS (on TV) and NPR (on radio). Little noticed by most of the MSM (naturally) but not the AP newswire is a vote on Wednesday night to nix Dubya's proposal to cancel this year's subsidy to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, about $420 million. It wasn't even close in the House: 357-72.
Some will argue cable and satellite fill the niche that community-owned TV used to. That may be true to some extent. But many people still don't have the income necessary to subscribe to cable or satellite and rely solely on off-air signals with old-fashioned "rabbit ears" for their entertainment and news fix. And the Big Five are all owned by conglomerates who serve Wall Street -- or Arab sheiks who secretly fund Al Qaeda.
And would cable have had the guts to give Ken Burns the chance to even produce such memorable mini-series as The Civil War and Baseball? In the case of the former, the original broadcast was in the fall of 1990, just when the First Gulf War was starting up. It got record ratings (40 million, an impossibility even for cable) and it contributed to much of the anxiety about whether it was proper to fight a war that was about oil as much as an illegal incursion into a sovereign state. Even "Storming" Norman Swartzkopf would later write that when he and his most senior lieutenants finally got to see it in their compound in Riyadh, just prior to the war, it was a wake-up call as to just how mad armed conflict can get. He's hardly a liberal but that says something about the power of alternative media.
If Burns' upcoming series about WW II (to be broadcast in September) was instead aired before Dubya's hugely illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003, would the latter have gotten away with it? I doubt it, but there would have been much more pressure, even from Fox, to get the UN on side; as happened during the first war.
As for so-called liberal bias, remember that among Republican voters (not Democrats mind you, but Republicans), remember this interesting stat: One who got most of their news from PBS or NPR was four times less likely to believe Iraq had WMD than if they listened to NBC, CBS or ABC or CNN; and six times less if they watched Fox.
It's not perfect, no more so than the CBC or BBC; but when I travel in the States, I tune into NPR for the hourly news simply because it covers both national and world news and without an agenda. I do make one exception, though: Paul Harvey and his morning "newscast" -- the guy may be quaint but nowhere near as wacky as Limbaugh or O'Reilly. And I actually learn something from the guy, not how to repeat talking points from the RNC.
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Some will argue cable and satellite fill the niche that community-owned TV used to. That may be true to some extent. But many people still don't have the income necessary to subscribe to cable or satellite and rely solely on off-air signals with old-fashioned "rabbit ears" for their entertainment and news fix. And the Big Five are all owned by conglomerates who serve Wall Street -- or Arab sheiks who secretly fund Al Qaeda.
And would cable have had the guts to give Ken Burns the chance to even produce such memorable mini-series as The Civil War and Baseball? In the case of the former, the original broadcast was in the fall of 1990, just when the First Gulf War was starting up. It got record ratings (40 million, an impossibility even for cable) and it contributed to much of the anxiety about whether it was proper to fight a war that was about oil as much as an illegal incursion into a sovereign state. Even "Storming" Norman Swartzkopf would later write that when he and his most senior lieutenants finally got to see it in their compound in Riyadh, just prior to the war, it was a wake-up call as to just how mad armed conflict can get. He's hardly a liberal but that says something about the power of alternative media.
If Burns' upcoming series about WW II (to be broadcast in September) was instead aired before Dubya's hugely illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003, would the latter have gotten away with it? I doubt it, but there would have been much more pressure, even from Fox, to get the UN on side; as happened during the first war.
As for so-called liberal bias, remember that among Republican voters (not Democrats mind you, but Republicans), remember this interesting stat: One who got most of their news from PBS or NPR was four times less likely to believe Iraq had WMD than if they listened to NBC, CBS or ABC or CNN; and six times less if they watched Fox.
It's not perfect, no more so than the CBC or BBC; but when I travel in the States, I tune into NPR for the hourly news simply because it covers both national and world news and without an agenda. I do make one exception, though: Paul Harvey and his morning "newscast" -- the guy may be quaint but nowhere near as wacky as Limbaugh or O'Reilly. And I actually learn something from the guy, not how to repeat talking points from the RNC.
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Thursday, July 19, 2007
The Brits pay £135.50 for WHAT?
It hasn't been a good few days at the BBC. First, controversy over a trailer for a special about Betty Windsor where it appears she's storming out of a photo shoot with Annie Leibowitz when in fact that didn't happen. Then last week, the broadcast regulator in the UK fined "Mother" a record £50,000 for faking a phone-in contest on the kids' show Blue Peter.
And as of late last night, the Beeb has suspended all phone-in contests indefinitely after it was revealed there were even more phony contests, including during some marquee fundraising events for legitimate charities like Comic Relief and Children in Need. The BBC Trust, which is supposed to montor how the license fees the people in Britain and Northern Ireland must pay to have a TV set in the first place are spent (presently the tax is £135.50 per household per year), has been forced into damage control; including forcing the BBC's 16,000 + employees to undergo "integrity" training.
Not that the CBC is perfect either, quite frankly its editorial standards have declined the last few years. But here in Canada all we can hope for is two ombudsmen (one English, one French) who monitor complaints about content only as a last resort; and when was the last time the CBC paid a fine to the CRTC? Maybe if we had a system of licences like they do in most of the EU the state broadcaster could actually be held into account since we could demand value for money.
Maybe then we could be spared such travesties as Gill Deacon and the pointless "Living in ..." regional shows.
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And as of late last night, the Beeb has suspended all phone-in contests indefinitely after it was revealed there were even more phony contests, including during some marquee fundraising events for legitimate charities like Comic Relief and Children in Need. The BBC Trust, which is supposed to montor how the license fees the people in Britain and Northern Ireland must pay to have a TV set in the first place are spent (presently the tax is £135.50 per household per year), has been forced into damage control; including forcing the BBC's 16,000 + employees to undergo "integrity" training.
Not that the CBC is perfect either, quite frankly its editorial standards have declined the last few years. But here in Canada all we can hope for is two ombudsmen (one English, one French) who monitor complaints about content only as a last resort; and when was the last time the CBC paid a fine to the CRTC? Maybe if we had a system of licences like they do in most of the EU the state broadcaster could actually be held into account since we could demand value for money.
Maybe then we could be spared such travesties as Gill Deacon and the pointless "Living in ..." regional shows.
Vote for this post at Progressive Bloggers.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
No deal for Peter Whitmore
I can't believe that prosecutors would actually offer a plea bargain to that man, a man who triggered Saskatchewan's first ever AMBER Alert.
He should be designated a dangerous offender which would mean a real life sentence. Instead, life means just seven lousy years.
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He should be designated a dangerous offender which would mean a real life sentence. Instead, life means just seven lousy years.
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Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Just when I thought work was weird enough ...
Just a slight beef with work today. I'm not complaining about the workload, if anything it's been a slow summer and we've had less than expected.
However, and for whatever reason, the particular business unit I'm in at work suddenly decided it needs its own toll free number. Or at least share the one that's used by the team that compiles lemon law complaints before sending them on to the legal department.
Which means memorizing a whole new number, new extension -- and, just possibly, a new fax number as well. And while we each now have a direct phone number also we really can't be using that either. After all, there's no individual in a team and we can't be seen being on customers' "favourites" lists.
Anything to make life more complicated. Oh, and we still don't actually have a manual for what we do -- we have to make one ourselves.
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However, and for whatever reason, the particular business unit I'm in at work suddenly decided it needs its own toll free number. Or at least share the one that's used by the team that compiles lemon law complaints before sending them on to the legal department.
Which means memorizing a whole new number, new extension -- and, just possibly, a new fax number as well. And while we each now have a direct phone number also we really can't be using that either. After all, there's no individual in a team and we can't be seen being on customers' "favourites" lists.
Anything to make life more complicated. Oh, and we still don't actually have a manual for what we do -- we have to make one ourselves.
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Monday, July 16, 2007
Ottawa settles with James Bay Cree
It's taken 32 years too long but it's finally happened -- and the Cree will get the money they were promised and then some as well as real self-government.
Now if they would only make an honourable offer to the Six Nations; or whoever's supposed to be in charge there -- whether it's the elected council or the Haudenasaunee.
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Now if they would only make an honourable offer to the Six Nations; or whoever's supposed to be in charge there -- whether it's the elected council or the Haudenasaunee.
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So if Pinochet and Stroessner did it, that makes it okay?
When Bill Clinton ran for US President, he insisted he'd only sign on to NAFTA if Canada and Mexico agreed to protocols on the environment and labour rights. Moreover, the EU regularly insists countries to which the grouping collectively gives Most Favoured Nation status must comply with basic human rights standards.
So why is it that Stephen Harper is against linking human rights to a free trade deal in Colombia? A double-taxation treaty which is pending with that country is one thing -- Canada after all does have that with a few dozen nation states. But apparently Harper is OK with 30,000 people just disappearing and about 3 million internally displaced refugees.
I guess that means he was also okay with Augusto Pinochet making people disappear in Chile during the 1970s and 80s as well. Or with what Alfredo Stroessner did in Paraguay.
Let's not forget the drug cartels still control a big chuck of Colombia too -- and they're likely in bed with al Qaeda. Guess Harper's fine with that as well.
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So why is it that Stephen Harper is against linking human rights to a free trade deal in Colombia? A double-taxation treaty which is pending with that country is one thing -- Canada after all does have that with a few dozen nation states. But apparently Harper is OK with 30,000 people just disappearing and about 3 million internally displaced refugees.
I guess that means he was also okay with Augusto Pinochet making people disappear in Chile during the 1970s and 80s as well. Or with what Alfredo Stroessner did in Paraguay.
Let's not forget the drug cartels still control a big chuck of Colombia too -- and they're likely in bed with al Qaeda. Guess Harper's fine with that as well.
Vote for this post at Progressive Bloggers.
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