Clinton's Foreign Policy Built Around
Non-Proliferation

post from Taylor Marsh on 22 April 2008 09:47:47 AM. © Taylor Marsh

Clinton’s Foreign Policy Built Around Non-ProliferationThe minute it was out of her mouth I knew what would happen. But she hasn’t flinched. An "umbrella of deterrence" is making people feel she’s ready to push the button, with[...]

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Military Veteran Suicide Epidemic has been
covered up

post from American Street on 22 April 2008 09:47:00 AM. © American Street

Between 6,000 and 12,000 suicide attempts per year apparently are being hushed up by the VA’s head of mental health.After demanding that he be fired for his obvious coverup, I ask you to consider why he feels it necessary to hide the facts. What’s causing this epidemic? Who else has any interest in covering it [...]

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http://www.reachm.com/amstreet/archives/2008/04/22/military-veteran-suicide-epide
mic-has-been-covered-up/

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Bush: Im thrilled to be anywhere with high
ratings.

post from Think Progress on 22 April 2008 09:45:00 AM. © Think Progress

In a videotaped visit to NBC?s ?Deal or No Deal? gameshow, President Bush last night joked that, ?I’m thrilled to be anywhere with high ratings these days.? He made the guest appearance to offer a good luck message to decorated Iraq war veteran Army Captain Joseph Kobes who competed on the game show. Bush?s visit was met with thunderous applause from the crowd and left Kobes on the verge of tears. Watch it:

Screenshot

Bush now stands at 28 percent approval. USA Today writes, “Bush has had dismal ratings through most of his second term. His approval rating hasn’t reached as high as 50% since May 2005. He has been steadily below 40% since September 2006.”

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Question of the Day - Earth Day Edition

post from My Left Wing - Front Page on 22 April 2008 09:35:56 AM. © My Left Wing - Front Page

So, how did I get so lucky as to have the QOTD on Earth Day? Timing, my friends. Plus, I have two QOTDs this week (I think) as I'm responsible for Friday's Video Fun. So forgive me if the quality is half of the usual. I've got to split up my creative questioning skills to cover both.

Anyway, today's question is about Earth Day itself, not really about the wisdom or necessity for environmentalism. Follow me into the subterranean depths below the surface for more!!!

Earth Day has been around (at least according to Wikipedia) since 1970. Now, I was an aware teenager, hanging out here in hippy filled Southern California in 1970. I knew what was up. Now, I may be older and forgetting things, and allegedly 20 million people did lots of good things back 38 years ago, but I don't remember Earth Day, 1970. I don't recall environmental awareness being taught to us. I don't recall anything more than the normal level of counter-culture insistence that "this was important."

I dunno, maybe I was (and still am) clueless. Maybe I have selective memory. But I remember the war and the protests, I remember the music and the drugs and girls.....I just don't remember Earth Day 1.

For me Earth Day didn't start showing up on my radar until the 90s. Then, it seemed it was embraced by everyone. Everybody knew that pollution was bad, environmentalism was good. To have a day to celebrate, educate and participate seems like an excellent idea.

Now, in my jaded 50s, I'm not so sure. 5 years ago, when the rest of the country was worried about Osama Bin Laden, my staff and I were making what we thought was a big splash, doing a huge Earth Day celebration as part of a city-wide program. We showed how we used bio-diesel (we even gave demonstrations drinking it, yecch!), had displays on hybrids, hydrogen vehicles, electric vehicles, we had those guys from Segway set up a small course and give free rides...popcorn, ice cream, a caricaturist, vendor donated prizes and a Wheel of Prizes where you couldn't lose.

And nobody mentioned it. The biggest display of the day. Nobody from Marketing took pictures. No articles in City publications. It was almost like they were all embarrassed.

But now, in 2008, it is the big thing. Los Angeles is closing off 4 blocks of the busiest part of downtown for an Earth Day function. Corporation and Government are immersed in making sure we know that today is Earth Day and we should be buying these products, and doing these things and I kind of feel that it has all been coopted. God knows how much money and goods (probably non-recyclable) has been spent in making sure that the populace knows that government "cares" and "is concerned."

So what about you? Do you still do "Earth Day." Has it become just another Corpra-Gov event? Does your business or employer do any Earth Day things? Do you even care?

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http://www.myleftwing.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=21630

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Musings Over Morning Coffee

post from Daily Kos on 22 April 2008 09:29:20 AM. © Daily Kos

Kos will have a Pennsylvania prediction thread later this morning, but since I come from a state that's already voted, I will spare you the arrogance of demanding the primary be over already (that will come after the votes are counted).

I still find myself firmly in the camp of "Democratic voting? Good!" as thousands of new voters get motivated to register Democratic, turning states ever bluer. I see the lazy media dragging out their "Democratic fratricide" and "unnamed Democratic officials worry about primary" themes and stories. But having been around for a while, I can tell you there's an infinite number of Democratic officials worried about something, and they are always willing to speak to the press about it. They usually live in DC, conveniently for the newspapers, and they don't know squat about what's going on outside the beltway (think George Will lecturing the country about the evils of elitism, or David Broder on the appeal of Mike Bloomberg, Joe Lieberman, and other third party centrists).

One thing seems quite evident prior to getting the vote totals: while Obama has a floor, McCain and Cinton have ceilings, and they've already hit them. This isn't just my idea. Two of the sharper professional analysts have come to live in the same neighborhood. While noting that things can always change in the general election, check out Charlie Cook writing about Obama's chemisty:

This unusual combination created the equivalent in Democratic politics of nitroglycerin. It has already overpowered all but Clinton and is pushing its beneficiary closer and closer to the nomination, despite the inherent advantages that she began with. Obama’s chemistry experiment seems to defy all the normal rules of nomination politics. Could it continue working for him in a general election? That’s a 50-50 proposition, but it certainly would contribute to one of the oddest configurations that the two major parties have offered voters in our lifetimes.

More blunt about Bush's most ardent courtier, Stu Rothenberg says it all in the headline:

For McCain, This Could Be as Good As It's Going to Get

Cook and Rothenberg, seasoned professionals, know enough to look to November for the real story and not waste time on the crap that ABC tried to peddle at their debate (just check polling on national priorities to know what questions to ask, fellas... it's really not that hard). Meanwhile, in the WaPo Dan Balz writes about Beyond Pa., a Weakened Clinton, which is why beyond today there's really no race any more. For that reason, there will be no North Carolina debate.

The North Carolina Democratic Party said Monday that the forum in that state, scheduled for next Sunday night, had been canceled. Mr. Obama had not committed to the date. The cancellation comes as a disappointment for CBS, which had offered the candidates prime air time after the newsmagazine "60 Minutes" for the debate. Katie Couric, the anchor of the "CBS Evening News," would have moderated the debate.

The cancellation was because of political considerations by both candidates, said Paul Friedman, a senior vice president at CBS News.

Hmmm. There was a terrific debate at Yearly Kos moderated by Joan McCarter and Matt Bai, far more substantive than the one on ABC, and the CBS debate has been canceled. Welcome to the future of media (and see you at Netroots Nation).

In the meantime, given that it's primary day in PA, let's simply advise you to ignore the leaked exit polls early in the day, and settle in for a day of politics and democracy (small d). It's been a long time coming, but the end of the Bush era is in sight. And it will be covered, substantively, on the internets.

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Earth Day, Open Thread

post from MyDD on 22 April 2008 09:24:28 AM. © MyDD

The day otherwise known as the day of the Pennsylvania Primary has finally arrived. I love how Google always reminds me when the holidays happen. Tags: Earth Day (all tags) [...]

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Earth Day

post from MyDD on 22 April 2008 09:24:28 AM. © MyDD

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New York Times on MS-01: "In a Red State, a Blue
Dog Has Republicans Worried"

Today is the big day. With all the build up nationally for the what has seemed like eternal wait for the Pennsylvania primary, the New York Times took time to devote an article to the MS-01 race. It is great to see national attention from the gold standard in journalism.

Republicans? longstanding sway in this in this red corner of Mississippi could be tested here Tuesday in a special Congressional election in which a down-home Democrat is given fair odds of winning.

The seat had been considered a lock for President Bush?s party: a Republican, Roger Wicker, held it for 14 years before resigning to fill a Senate vacancy late last year; Mr. Bush won 62 percent of the vote here in 2004; and the Congressional district has some of the most conservative voters in the nation. Its placid unofficial capital, Tupelo, is home to the Christian conservative minister Donald Wildmon of the American Family Association.

But the Republicans? hold is being unexpectedly tested by a self-described ?Mississippi Democrat,? a gregarious local courthouse official whose positions on social issues ? guns, abortion, same-sex marriage ? are indistinguishable from those of the other party. Democrats are hoping to add the candidate, Travis Childers, 50, to the raft of conservative ?Blue Dog? Democrats elected in the 2006 midterm elections, due partly to economic appeals and doubts about the war.

If anything, those pitches have been sharpened in the campaign of Mr. Childers, a veteran of grass-roots politics in a state where many local officials are still Democrats, despite the Republicans? solid grip on national elections here.

Up and down the rolling hills, black-soil prairies and small towns of this upstate district stretching north to Tennessee, Mr. Childers makes frequent appeals to what he calls ?working folks? struggling in a weak economy, and expresses his opposition to a war policy he says is ?not working.?

He has been bolstered by his conservative positions, his network of contacts and the more tenuous connection to the district of his Republican opponent, Greg Davis. Mr. Davis is mayor of a Memphis suburb, Southaven, which many here consider barely part of Mississippi.

In an appearance in the university town of Oxford, Mr. Childers quoted Franklin D. Roosevelt and, as he often does, told the students that he was forced to support his family, as a teenager, after his father died.

?True conservatism was going to work full time when you?re 16,? Mr. Childers said, echoing that theme as he campaigned outside a retirement home in the old brick downtown here.

To read the rest of the article follow this link;

New York Times: MS-01

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-in-red-state.html

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The Fabulous Life Of John McCain

As John McCain lives in the lap of luxury, the aging Senator and GOP presidential hopeful tells the American people that the problems with our economy are psychological and that all we, the unwashed masses, need to do is skip a vacation and maybe take on second job and our economy will get back on [...]

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http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/04/22/the-fabulous-life-of-john-mccain/

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Worst Earth Day Post Ever

I got nothin'. I blog about the environment 365 days a year. Why make a big deal out of one? Does that mean everyone can ignore the Earth the other 364?

OK, I do have one little thing. Have you seen the cover of TIME magazine's environment issue? Doesn't it look like they're putting up one of those cell phone towers made up to look like a tree? Wouldn't it have fit the image much better and been more 21st-century to have them putting up a wind power generator?

And for the most creative skewering of President Bush's inaction on global warming I've ever seen, you have to read The Fat Bush Theory.

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http://thegreenmiles.blogspot.com/2008/04/worst-earth-day-post-ever.html