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Some late-breaking stuff I’ll have to attend to tomorrow.
• Attorney General Eric Holder gave his speech today trying to justify the targeted assassination of suspected terrorists, including US citizens living abroad, like Anwar al-Awlaki. More on that later.
• Seventy Congressional Democrats have demanded that the CFTC crack down on oil speculation which has distorted the market and raised gas prices. Brad Plumer takes a look at the case for speculation, but I also think he soft-sells it a little bit, and I think it can be summed up by one of the analysts he consults, who simply says that speculation will be difficult to stop because of the power of the financial industry.
• Congressional Dems are also still hounding Ed DeMarco to reduce principal on GSE-backed mortgages. I expect the pressure to increase on DeMarco, as this is a missing link in the economic recovery agenda.
• After a series of decent economic reports, the Fed has put on hold the possibility of instituting another round of quantitative easing.
• Great piece over the weekend from a so-called “bad teacher” in a public high school in Brooklyn. Some needed perspective here for the education debates.
• Apparently some people are deluded enough to believe in an Obama second-term agenda – for real this time – that nicely matches all the things they want. This is a recipe for not getting any of them.
• 14,000 protesters converged in Moscow to demonstrate against Vladimir Putin’s victory in the Russian Presidential elections. Putin had supporters of his own in the streets, but they were paid to be there.
• John Kasich turned down federal disaster relief for his state after a spate of tornadoes.
• Seeking to hide from protesters, the G-8 summit has moved to Camp David from Chicago.
• Thousands of protesters descend on Sacramento to demand more higher education funding in California.
• Rush Limbaugh keeps losing advertisers after his week of misogyny against Sandra Fluke. The latest: AOL, the parent company of the Huffington Post.
• We’ll find out tomorrow who will win the primary in Ohio between Marcy Kaptur and Dennis Kucinich. If Kucinich loses, I’ve heard he may even shop around to other states looking for a seat.
• The 1% – doing just fine, no need to worry.
• America Public Media’s The Story looks at the case of June Clarkson and Theresa Edwards, the foreclosure fraud investigators fired by the Florida Attorney General’s office.
• Interesting WaPo article on how to rethink food safety with constrained resources.
• George Will called the Presidential election eight months early, said that Republicans need to move on and protect Congress rather than engage in a fool’s errand for the White House. The elongated Presidential primary is certainly not helping the GOP brand.
• President Obama will hold a press conference tomorrow.
• The Syrian army continues to chase down rebels who fled from Homs, attacking them with heavy weaponry. John McCain called for war, again.
• Meet Joe Biden’s new hire: a former lobbyist. On a related note, “lobbyist” is about the only job description for former members of Congress.
• Bill Press and Stephanie Miller get the simulcast treatment from Current TV, which is building out their progressive-leaning weekly lineup.
• The Afghan peace talks are not going well, despite the offer to transfer Afghan detainees from Bagram.
• A public option in Oregon? Maybe after the Presidential bid ends, Rick Santorum could move there, because apparently his private insurance coverage is terrible.
• Just a tar sands pipeline catching fire after a spill, nothing to see here….
• From beyond the grave, Andrew Breitbart unleashes a bombshell – President Obama once saw a play about Saul Alinsky. What hurts most about this is that there was an Alinsky play showing in Chicago in 1998 – when I lived there – and I never saw it. I’m a terrible radical.
• There’s a brand-new law enforcement position in the Los Angeles area: porn watcher/compliance monitor of the new condom rules. That’s going to be a high-demand position, I assume.
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About FDL News Desk
Pretty lucky he isn’t POTUS or else he might have sent American warplanes to bomb the Syrians instead of bombing the Libyans.
Say hello to the new guy, same as the old guy. The 2012 elections sure will be interesting.
The Geography of Government Benefits
Excellent data resource, showing–county by county–the share of Americans’ income that comes from government benefit programs. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Veterans Benefits, Unemployment Insurance, and all the aid programs (see the left-hand side-bar for US totals by benefits category).
CA hospitals are having to shift from filling beds and billing for everything delivered to each patient, to billing on the basis of patient outcomes. What a concept! LINK.
So, the US military will continue to supply air to that bloated gas bag Limbaugh. I’m sure female (and hopefully many male) troops will be as appalled and repulsed as the rest of us.
Pentagon says military will still air Limbaugh LINK.
Update: Female Vets are already raising their voices in objection.
• Seeking to hide from protesters, the G-8 summit has moved to Camp David from Chicago.
That is stunning news…! I’m sure the recent passage of HR 347 will lock down Camp David, from all the ‘unwashed masses’…!
EFCA! Back on the table!! Just as soon as Dawn Johnsen is renominated!!!
Now that the G-8 has been moved to Camp David, the Chicago cops are going to return for a refund all of the crowd control shit they bought using funds from the hard-pressed Chicago city budget, right?
Since when are Bill Press and Stephanie Miller progressives? Miller’s lesbianism notwithstanding, they’re both rightwing fascist Democraps.
No, sorry, allan, but all that shit will be needed for the NATO Summit protests which will still be undertaken in Chicago as scheduled. Come to think of it, since the NATO-G8 protest was a twofer, maybe they’ll return half. Ya think?
The Lakota are halting Keystone XL Pipeline trucks. LINK.
So how many teachers and firemen lose their jobs in Simi Valley so they can create a Morals Squad where a team of bureaucrats sit and watch porn footage all day
If the government decides to hold the G-8 meeting in a secure area, we probably shouldn’t be hosting it at all. In fact we should probably not be part of the G-8 industrialized democracies.
from Weather Underground blog of Dr. Jeff Masters:
“This year’s unusually mild winter has led to ocean temperatures across the Gulf of Mexico that are approximately 1°C above average–among the top ten warmest values on record for this time of year, going back to the 1800s. (Averaged over the month of February, the highest sea surface temperatures on record in the Gulf between 20 – 30°N, 85 – 95°W occurred in 2002, when the waters were 1.34°C above average).
Friday’s tornado outbreak was fueled, in part, by high instability created by unusually warm, moist air flowing north from the Gulf of Mexico due to the high water temperatures there. This exceptionally warm air set record high temperatures at 28 airports in Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Georgia the afternoon of the tornado outbreak”
http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/article.html
Interesting. Click on the Unemployment Insurance tab to see which states are “doing it wrong”.
As a progressive, anti-war, civil libertarian Obama brings to my mind the observation Dorothy Parker is said to have made about Oakland, “There’s no there there.”
BTW, love Oakland and with any luck I will be moving there in a few months.
OT Is anyone else getting the Google message that myfiredoglake/firedoglake.com is hosting malware and recommending not accessing firedoglake.com ? In reading the details they give I feel safe in just being careful to not follow any links to myfdl. I sent a note to Brian also but am just curious if it is only Chrome that is doing this and also the why.
That was Gertrude Stein, BobTin.
Because Google visits websites to see if they are “safe” Since Chrome is a Google product the warning comes up. There is no warning when you use IE. The warning was triggered because of a bad picture file used in a MyFDL post.
There are some nice little trout streams in the neighborhood. I suppose they will be closed, too.
That’s a positively horrible call by the military(not surprising though since it is incredibly reactionary regarding the female half of the gender rather than proactive-see their horrible numbers on assault and harassment). Then again, Rush is a hypocrite for even wanting to be broadcast on a military network considering the Pentagon spends his hard earned tax dollars on funding birth control(a variety of birth control are required to be on Navy hospital and ship formularies) for it’s sailors and marines. Maybe someone should let him know so that Rush can call the Sec of Def a pimp.
I hope it gets fixed with Google soon. It is a put off for Chrome users and a lot of folks are now using Chrome.
Speaking of my previous post- I visit MSN and what do I see? Marines facing lawsuits over rape and assaults.
(shaking head)
People interested on getting Limbaugh off the air might want to target Rep. Speir.
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/46637869/ns/today-today_people/
FDL is safe and yes it is annoying but think of it like this, if the warning didn’t come up and your computer gets infected that would be worse no?
Several people were arrested at Pine Ridge, but they did hold the trucks up for six hours.
I also noticed the Texas/South did not “do” unemployment payments – did not seem to affect overall numbers since folks just went directly to welfare.
But outside the top of the top folks, bias against women is SOP in the military.
Toss in right wing lets get our war on folks and Rush fits like a glove.
LOL
:-)
“Apparently some people are deluded enough to believe in an Obama second-term agenda” – at least the article notes how careful Obama is to only imply good things – he never promises anything.
Indeed he does the Koch/Peterson/Simpson-Bowles thing about cut backs being needed more often than he makes any promises of specific improvements via the government and his new laws or policies.