US and Israel

Two scholars who have written about the US/Israel relationship published a book entitled The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy (date unknown). Their ideas have produced controversy. They say "Israel's military adventures (Gaza) would be far more difficult w/o American support". They also note that Israel is "the largest annual recipient of direct US economic and military assistance since 1976, and is the largest recipient in total since WWII, to the tune of well over $ 140 billion (in 2004 dollars). Israel receives about $ 3 billion in direct assistance each year, roughly one-fifth of the foreign aid budget, and worth about $ 500 a year for every Israeli".

(Source: "An American War" by Lou Dubose editor of The Washington Spectator for January 15, 2009).

Bush "Midnight Rules"

Every admin makes last minute rule changes before leaving office and it seems Bush did also. This source says those changes "dismantle environmental protections and workers' rights". Some of them are as follows;

+ "allow coal companies to dump rock and dirt from mountain top mines into valleys, streams

and rivers.

+ allow "mining, drilling, logging, damming, and road-building" w/o review by habitat managers.

+ allow for the dumping of "hundreds of thousands of tons of fecal waste into waterways w/o

permits from EPA".

+ allow for the "burning of hazardous waste as fuel".

+ allow uranium mining "near the Grand Canyon".

+ open 2 million acreas of fed land in the west to "oil shale mining and refining".

+ limit the number of "lead monitors" the EPA is required to have to check on lead in the air.

+ allows for the "rescind(ing of) collective bargaining rights of as many as 8600 fed workers

involved in 'national security'".

+ limits the Mine Safety and Health Admin and OSHA "in their ability to respond to workplace hazards".

(It would seem that there is no debate over the rules Bush has made; the debate is most likely over whether these changes are necessary to protect industry and/or national security. This source obviously comes down on the side of the environment and workers rights).

(Source: "Distantling Environmental Protections and Workers' Rights" by Lou Dubose editor of The Washington Spectator for January 1, 2009).

Filibuster, old and new

It use to be that a filibuster involved a senator taking the floor of the Senate and talking continuously in an effort to get a piece of legislation withdrawn from discussion. The record for this tactic still belongs to Strom Thurmond, the former senator from NC. In the 60's he talked for 24 hours and 18 minutes in a failed effort to stop a civil rights law. In preparation for that he "dehydrat(ed) himself in a steam room so he could drink water without urinating". This plan involved aides holding pails for the senator to relieve himself in, or senators "going to the diaper". It seems those days are over. Now a filibuster is "the minority leader announces he has the 41 votes required to block cloture on the unlimited debate allowed in the Senate, and the majority capitulates". "The modern filibuster allows the minority party to obstruct without coming off like obstructionists". If the Senate seats Al Franken from Minnosota and the two independents vote with the democrats the republicans still have 41 votes. During the past election democrats sought a 60 vote Senate in order to block any "filibuster". (As I am posting this I hear that President Obama has offered a cabinet position to a republican senator; that might be an attempt to achieve this "filibuster proof" Senate).

(Source: "Filibuster Bluster, or New Rules For the Senate?" by Lou Dubose editor of The Washington Spectator, February 1, 2009).

Crime and the Elderly

A professor of criminal justice from Radford U. in Virginia has proposed a reason for some crime; at least theft. He says the cause may be older people who "feel isolated" from family and friends who have moved away and may commit crimes because they are bored. "If they get caught, they will be communicating with someone-even if it's the police". He does note that there has not been an increase in crime for the age group over 50 for the last decade but many of these crimes are "never reported". Japan is experiencing a crime problem with older people as perpetrators. (Sounds crazy to me).

(Source: "Japan's Graying Criminals" by Michelle Diament in the AARP Bulletin for Jan/Feb 2009).

Public Works Programs

AARP Bulletin seems to be saying that President Obama should look to the ideas of FDR to solve our present economic crisis. They also note that the Eisenhower federal highway building program of the 1950's is also an example. During FDR's term the fed gov't took on a "massive public works projects" building "highways, bridges, airports, sidewalks, art projects" under the Works Progress Administration (WPA). New York's LaGuardia Airport, Chicago's subways system, parks and "rural electrification" were examples of the WPA. (Post office murals are a wonderful example of this approach. Check them out in Fort Lee, North Bergen, Ridgefield Park, and West New York to name just a few). Nick Taylor's American-Made: The Enduring Legacy of the WPA is a source. An idea from the Obama transition team is the creation of a Service and Conservation Corps "to mobilize 250,000 young and older Americans to work on renewable energy projects". (That sounds like the Civilian Conservation Corp of the FDR era). Some would challenge this plan as ineffective and some others as not putting enough attention to means of mass transit.

(Source: "A New Deal for Neighborhoods" by Jay Walljasper in the AARP Bulletin for Jan/Feb 2009.)

Civil War

Lincoln's Secretary of the Treasury was Salmon Chase; Lincoln gave him authority to "handle the finances" of the war. The war was costing $ 532 million a year while the entire budget per year was $ 55 million. The budget cost was covered by taxes and tariffs. Chase "devised the strategy for funding the war with new taxes and special bond sales and developed the national network of local banks" to sell the bonds.

(Source: "But who's handling the finances?" by the editors of AARP Bulletin for Jan/Feb 2009).

Racism in the US

Hollywood has given us a look at what racism might have looked like in this country in the late 1950's and early 1960's in the form of a movie; "The Express: the Ernie Davis story". Ernie Davis played football for Syracuse University during the 1959-62 seasons. He was the first black American to win the Heisman Trophy, college football's highest honor. The scenes of games at West Virginia University and University of Texas were nasty. (This may seem like a long time ago to most but I was in high school at the time. For those my age who remember that time and then think about the election of Barack Obama...it must seem like a dream come true.)

Purple Hearts

The Department of Defense has announced a new policy regarding the awarding of the Purple Heart. In the past it was only given to service members "wounded by enemy action". It was not given to those service members who died while being held as prisoners of war; there would have to have been proof "they had been wounded or killed by the enemy". The new policy now holds that any death while in captivity is "the result of enemy action". This policy will be retroactive to Dec 7th, 1941 and will effect 17,000 deceased US POW's.

(Source: "Thousands of deceased POW's could receive purple hearts" by the AP. Reported in The Virginian Pilot on October 7, 2008)

Rush Limbaugh

In an op-ed article by Leonard Pitts, a columnist for the Miami Herald, it is stated that Rush Limbaugh said of President Obama that "I hope he fails". The statement was made on Limbaugh's radio program a few days before the inauguration. Pitts goes on to call RL a "clown in a media circus". (Did RL actually say this?).

(Source: "What Limbaugh's comment says about Limbaugh" by Leonard Pitts in The Virginian Pilot on January 26, 2009).

Crime Report

The Preliminary Semiannual Crime Statistics for the first half of 2008 has been released by the FBI. Violent crimes are down nationally: murder by 4.4 %, aggrevated assault 4.1 %, forcible rape 3.3 % and robberies by 2.2 %. Property crimes are also down: motor vehicle theft by 12.6 %, larceny-theft by 1.2 % and burglaries by .8 %. Cities of 250,000 to 500,000 had the largest decrease in both catagories. Of the four major regions of the US only the northeast had an increase in property crimes. The FBI puts arson in a separate category, and that has declined by 5.6 %. Crime figures began being collected in 1929 by the International Association of Chiefs of Police and taken over by the FBI the next year. The info comes from the FBI; the AP.

(Source: "Region's 2008 crime rates are mixed bag, FBI data show". The Virginian Pilot on January 26, 2009).

Early American Civilization

Anthropologist Mike Moseley of the University of Florida reports that the Supe Valley Culture in Peru died out 3600 years ago due to a series of earthquakes and floods. It was a "maritime farming community that had been successful for over 2000 years". The coastal society in Peru was established 5800 years ago but came to ruin due to a "massive earthquake, or series of quakes...that caused floods and landslides" that washed away their homes and destroyed their food supply. "Then came El Nino, a periodic change in the winds and currents in the Pacific". It was noted that the Supe culture "built stone pyramids thousands of years before the better-known Mayans". Moseley's info was reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

(Source: "Quakes, weather drove people out, researchers say" by the AP. Reported in The Virginian Pilot on January 25, 2009).

Election law

Prior to the election in November, community groups were encouraging eligible voters to register and vote. The Record reported that 1 million NJ "eligible voters are not registered". State law-"Moter Voter Law"-requires that the Division of Motor Vehicle offices remind customers about voting; however the DMV is doing a poor job meeting this requirement. Despite the "intention of federal law" voting is not always made easier. The US Supreme Court "unheld an Indiana law that requires all voters to present a government-issued photo ID, such as a driver's license or passport" this "despite almost no evidence of voter fraud by impersonating someone else". (Interestingly enough, the first ones denied the right to vote in Indiana were a group of elderly nuns in South Bend; they were in their late 80's and early 90's without driver's licenses or passports. That case is Crawford v. Marion County Election Board 2008 and was decided by a vote of 6 to 3.

(Source: "Don't forget" The Record editorial on October2, 2008)

Election law NJ

To be eligible to vote in New Jersey the following are requirements: 1) be registered 21 days prior to election day, 2) be a US citizen, 3) be at least 18 years old by election day, 4) have lived in the county for 30 days prior to the election, 5) a person cannot vote if in "jail, on probation or parole", 6) when jail, probation or parole time is served a person may vote again (I believe the person would have to re-register), 7) a person can vote if "a pretrial detainee or free on bail pending an appeal".

(Source" "Felons who've served their time may vote again" by Ronald L. Rice democratic House member for the 28th district the NJ state senate. The Record on October 1, 2008)

Election day hazard

A study in the Journal of American Medical Association notes that there is an 18 % increase in auto accidents on election day. The study goes back to 1976 and finds that 24 "more people died in car crashes during voting hours on presidential election days than on other Tuesdays in October or November". It seems this pattern held true up to the 2004 election. Election of 2008?

(Source: "Voting can be hazardous" in The Record on October 1, 2008)

Child Online Protection Act of 1998

It appears the federal governments effort to "restrict pornography on the web" is over. The Supreme Court struck "down the law on free-speech grounds". The source also notes that the law had a ten year life span and was to end unless renewed; the "Supreme Court let the...law die quietly". (There seem to be two reasons the law died; I don't know which is correct). The SC said that parents should be responsible for "installing software filters on their computers". Lawyers for the Bush admin said that most parents have not done so. The court also ruled agaisnt a 1996 law that prohibited "indecency" of the Internet. Pres Clinton had signed the 1998 law. The COPA made "is a crime to put sexually explicit material on a Web site for commercial gain unless the sponsor used some means to keep out minors".

(Source: "High court lets anti-porn measure expire" by David G. Savage of the Los Angles Times. The Virginian Pilot on January 22, 2009).

Clean Air Act of 1970

In 1970 the Congress passed a re-newed Clean Air Act and it gave the EPA "power to set and enforce national standards" on "particulate matter, carbon monoxide and other pollutants". The law required catalytic converters on cars and scrubbers at new factories and is "widely credited with improving the nation's air quality". This study says the average life span for Americans increased by 3 years from 1978 to 2001 with "as much as 4.8 months of that" due to cleaner air. Researchers from Brigham Young University and Harvard School of Public Health published the study in the New England Journal of Medicine. They studied 51 US cities and found that those more committed to clean air-like Pittsburgh and Buffalo-saw a greater benefit from clean air; longer life expectancy. Since 2000 there has been a 11 % decrease in particulates, considered the "grit of polluted air". (Sounds like the Clean Air Act of 1970 has been a successful piece of legislation; again for those who think Congress is worthless).

(Source: "Cleaner Air, Longer Life" by Alicia Chang of the AP. The Virginian Pilot on January 22, 2009)

Obama Inauguration

The Rev. Joseph Lowery gave the benediction at the inaugural on Tuesday. He closed with this rhyme: "We ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get in back, when brown can stick around, when yellow will be mellow, then the red man can get ahead, man; and when white will embrace what is right. That all those who do justice and love mercy say Ahem". The President and the crowd loved it.

(Source: The Virginian Pilot on January 21, 2009).

Hobo's and the Great Depression

In the current economic conditions we are presently in, it seemed appropriate to post this info from American Heritage magazine. It is about those who rode freight trains in the 1930's. Hobo's were the upper crust of the wandering class and were considered an "established underclass". Many famous Americans were part of this culture: Jack London, Upton Sinclair, Zane Grey and John Steinbeck. Many hobo's were skilled workers like lumberjacks. A lower level of this class were Tramps who were most likely thugs or others on the outs with the law. Bums were the lowest level and were likely to be panhandlers. Freight trains gave the hobo a means of traveling around the country; some have estimated there were a million of these homeless on the road during this period. This source notes two books on the subject. Duffy Littlejohn's Hopping Freight Trains in America, and Errol Lincoln Uys' Riding the Rails: Teenagers on the move during the Great Depression. The historian John Toland refers to hobo's as "bindle stiffs", so named because the pack they carried was called a "bindle". Wikipedia notes that George and Lenny from Of Mice and Men were bindle stiffs. There is also a country band called Bindle Stiffs.

(Source: "Flipping The Meat Train" by Dale Wasserman. American Heritage Feb/Mar 2001).

Vietnam from the Left

This viewpoint on the Vietnam War is from the left so some will blow it off, however it might be worth considering. The three "elements that combined" to cause our loss in Vietnam were as follows: 1) "a strong nationalist movement" on the part of the Vietnamese, 2) "a massive antiwar movement at home", 3) and "the almost complete breakdown of the fighting capacity of the American soldier as a result of the experience of combat combined with GI rebellion" (I would assume that "fragging" of officers by enlisted men is part of this rebellion). The magazine had a three part series on the war in issues $ 29, 33 and 40 printed in 2003-05. The series can be viewed by going to www.isreview.org.

(Source: "Vietnam: From Quagmire to Defeat" by Joe Allen. International Socialist Review March/April 2005)

Sweatshops

In 2002 a class action lawsuit was brought by Al Meyerhoff on behalf of immigrant Saipan workers against some of America's biggest clothing retail stores. The lawsuit claimed a "pattern of long hours, low pay...in garment factories that produce more than $ 1 billion of clothing..." a year for stores in the US. 30,000 workers toiled in what Meyerhoff said was "indentured servitude". The out of court settlement was for $ 20 million, the companies did not have to admit wrongdoing but they agreed to change their ways. A fund was created to pay back wages and establish a monitoring agency for the plants in Saipan, which is a US commonwealth. The case was called Doe v. The Gap and involved 20 major US stores.

(Source: "Al Meyerhoff, 61, fought on behalf of sweatshop workers" by Valerie J. Nelson of the LA Times. Reprinted in The Record on December 24, 2008)

Student Rights

The US Supreme Court said this month that it would hear the case of a 13 year old eighth grade student who was strip searched by a principal and vice principal of her public school. In 2003 the search occurred due to the belief by the schools offficials that the girl had on her ibuprofen pills. Another student said the girl gave pills to her. The girl was required to strip to bra and underwear and then ordered to "pull her bra out to the side and shake it" and "pull out her underwear at the crotch and shake it". No pills were found. The school officials were looking for pills "with a potency of two Advil capsules". A trial judge ruled against the plaintiff and her parents while a panel of the US Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit affirmed that decision. However, the full Appeals court voted 6 to 5 that the case should be reheard. The Supreme Court will now decide the case of Stafford Unified School District v. Redding.

(Source: "Googled" 4th Amendment Supreme Court cases for this information. Site was The New York Times and it was written by Adam Liptak on January 16, 2009)

Inauguration

For information on the American Presidency visit the web site "American Presidency Project". One item of interest is a listing of the election results for all presidential elections. Of course, the site notes the oath taken by an incoming president. It is as follows: "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States" ( I wonder if the last occupant of this office took the same oath?). As to choice between "swear" or "affirm"; President Franklin Pierce in 1853 was the first to "affirm" and Herbert Hoover in 1929 also preferred "affirm". Why, I don't know. The oath is taken with a hand on a Bible but Theodore Roosevelt in 1901 "was the only one not using a Bible".

(Source: web site "American Presidency Project" and "Facts, Firsts and Lasts" in The Virginian Pilot on January 19,2009)

Holocaust Resistance

This post is an update of an earlier report on the movie "Defiance" and Jewish resistance to the Nazis in Poland. The movie was filmed near Vilnius, the site of the killing of 21,000 Jews by German troops in June of 1941. The survivors were relocated into "two prisonlike ghettoes". The Bielski brothers fought back and established a haven for 1200 people in a forest. They lived there for 3 years and build a "community" of workshops a library and theater. The Germans were never able to clear out the forest while escapees lived in "dugout tunnels". Tuvia Bielski and the 1200 survive the war; he goes to Israel and then NYC where he drives a taxi. He died in 1987.

(Source: "Craig breaks his bond(s)" by Mal Vincent. The Virginian Pilot on January 16,2009)

Elections

The state of Virginia is considering joining 26 other states that allow early voting. It would appear that states like Virginia presently allow the use of absentee ballots during a 45 day period prior to election day. However, in order to use the absentee ballot system a voter has to give one of 17 reasons for doing so. A new law would change that to allow anyone to vote absentee regardless of the reason. One of the early voting states is North Carolina and in the November election 60 % of the electorate voted.

(Source: "Bring Virginin's voting out of distant past" editorial in the Virginian Pilot on January 14, 2009)

Vietnam War and the Vatican

In 2003, prior to the US invasion of Iraq, the Vatican sent a career diplomat to Washington to attempt to convince George W. Bush not to attack that country. Cardinal Pio Laghi "...was trying to prevent what he said was a morally and legally unjustified US led invasion". Laghi also delivered a letter from Pope John Paul II urging Bush to "do everything to avert war". He said he might start the war but not know how to end it. The Cardinal died this week.

(Source: "Catholic diplomat who sought peace dies at 86" by Nicole Winfield of the AP. Obituary appeared in the Virginian Pilot on January 12, 2009).

Reynolds v. Simms 1964

In this Supreme Court case it was ruled that the state of Alabama discriminated against African American voters in the rural counties in the southern part of the state in favor of the urban counties in the north. South Alabama had "...many times the voting strength of the more urban north, allowing the old planter elite to control the Legislature". The issue here is "apportionment" or in this case "reapportionment". There were other cases that were part of the "one-person, one-vote" ruling. These cases improved the voting strength of blacks and urban voters. The case was argued by an Alabamian, Charles Morgan Jr., who died this week. Morgan also represented Muhammad Ali in his successful challenge to the draft during the Vietnam War.

(Source: "Lawyer fought Alabama's status quo on racial issues" by Roy Reed of New York Times; obituary reprinted in the Virginian Pilot on January 12, 2009.)

Holocaust Resistance

Ok, so its Hollywood, but it is based on a book by Nechama Tec entitled "Defiance: The Bielski Partisans". The issue is the degree to which European Jews resisted the extermination of the "final solution" by the Nazis. The story is set in Belarus during WWII and tells of the efforts of two brothers to "keep 1200 Jews alive until the war ended". The writer of this piece notes the "standard cliches of the Holocaust...that Europe's Jews were exterminated without offering any resistance, historians have gradually uncovered evidence to the contrary". The movie is called "Defiance".
(Source: "Brothers defy the odds" by Kenneth Turan of the LA Times. In The Record on January 2, 2009)

Korean War

A South Korea investigative commission-Truth and Reconciliation Commission-has "confirmed" that dozens of children were murdered by South Korean forces during the early days of the war there. South Korean leftists and "supposed sympathizers' were targeted for fear that they might aid the North Korean forces when they invaded. It is estimated that 100,000 were killed and buried at sea or in abandoned mine shafts. The information was found in "classified US files" kept secret for over 50 years. Survivors and family members are seeking an apology from the government and the US for its "direct and indirect...involvement in the killings". US records show that US officers were present at some of the killing sites. There might be 168 sites across the country.
(Source: "Children among executions in 1950 South Korea" by Charles J. Hanley and Jae-soon Chang of the AP. The Record on December 7, 2008)

Supreme Court

The US Supreme Court ruled in 2007, in the Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. case that an employee must challenge a pay discrimination issue within 180 of "the employer's initial decision to discriminate". The employee does not have to know the discrimination is taking place. The new congress will address this issue with the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. The court ruling was a 5 to 4 decision.
(Source: ACLU Online on January 9, 2009)

Sterilization

Between 1929 and 1974, the state of North Carolina conducted a practice of forced sterilization on poor inmates of state run training schools. The 7600 people sterilized in NC were both black and white. The program was "...under-the-radar program and based on the junk science of eugenics". Those sterilized were determined to be "feeble minded" by inaccurate "intelligence tests", or had "premarital sex". An investigation of the program was done by the Winston-Salem Journal. A few years ago the governor and a legislative committee recommended health care and educational benefits for those sterilized but as of this source nothing has been done. "At least one of the training schools made sterilization a condition of release".
(Source: "Help sterilization victims in N.C." by John Railey of the Winston Salem Journal. Op-ed column was in The Virginian Pilot on November 18, 2008).

Claiborne Pell

Former Rhode Island US Senator Claiborne Pell died this week. He is best known as the author of "Pell Grants"; monetary assistance to college age students in need. The legislation he sponsored was the Basic Educational Opportunity Grants which were passed in 1972. The "grants" awarded financial aid to "...more than 54 million low-and middle-income Americans", who were able to attend college because of the grants. (This post is for those who think Congress does nothing of value).
(Source: "Claiborne Pell, former senator" by Eric Tucker of the AP. The Record obituary section on January 2, 2009.)