Local Problems

post from ThinkProgress on 23 October 2011 03:00:02 PM. © ThinkProgress

Mitch McConnell says that halting teacher and firefighter layoffs might be nice but it’s a “local” problem so the federal government shouldn’t do it.

Local government is a local problem. But the problem with local government employment is that it costs money. At the moment for localities to raise funds to pay teachers and firemen is quite costly. Households and small firms are in a fragile state, and taxing then at higher rates to support public service could be very damaging. The federal government, by contrast, can currently borrow money at negative seven-year real rates. When you borrow money, normally you pay inflation. Medium term federal borrowing can currently be done at a negative interest rate. That means it’s very very very cheap for the federal government to borrow money. Consequently, where “local” problems are being caused by lack of money, it makes a ton of sense for the federal government to step in and take advantage of its access to free money.

Read The Full Article:
http://thinkprogress.org/yglesias/2011/10/23/350917/local-problems/

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CBS, ABC Joke About Global Warming’s Effect
on Coffee. When Will The Media Start Talking Seriously About Food Security

post from ThinkProgress on 23 October 2011 03:00:02 PM. © ThinkProgress

Back in March I wrote about Pe ak Arabica Coffee: Top coffee scientist warns, ?Coffee production is under threat from global warming.? I ran this chart:

Arabica

Seven months later, Big Media grabbed the story when Starbucks started talking up the threat. Good Morning America and the CBS Early Show both did segments on it.

Characteristically, though, both networks treated the story mostly as a source for levity. And you’d be hard-pressed to find them given equal time to the far more consequential, far more serious, impact of climate change on global food prices and supply (see “Oxfam Predicts Climate Change will Help Double Food Prices by 2030: ?We Are Turning Abundance into Scarc ity?).

Here are the two network videos and an excellent print story on “Food price volatility – causes and consequences”:

CBS:

ABC:

Funny stuff, Americans might lose their coffee thanks to climate change.

But hey, at least the story was about Americans so the networks covered it. The food insecurity story is only a few orders of magnitude more consequential, indeed it may be the most important story of our time, as I’ve noted many times (see “How extreme weather could create a global food crisis“).

Within a decade or so, that’ll be painfully obvious to all. It already is to many. Here, for instance, is an excerpt from “Food price volatility – causes and consequences,” a terrific piece by Alertnet, “a free humanitarian news service run by Thomson Reuters Foundation covering crises worldwide”:

In the past four years, global prices of staples such as maize and wheat have twice hit record levels, driving hundreds of thousands of the world’s most vulnerable people further towards hunger and poverty.
It is the poorest people in the poorest countries who are most affected by the high price of staple foods.
Recent responses to high prices have increasingly tended to focus on reducing price volatility -0 sharp fluctuations in food prices.
G20 countries in their June 2011 ministerial declaration recommended measure such as building grain reserves, a global market information system and regulating financial transactions in commodities markets….
Biofuels
Maximo Torero, director of the International Food Policy Research Institute’s (IFPRI’s) Markets, Trade and Institutions Division, highlights some “non-traditional” causes of price volatility: the increasing use of food crops to produce biofuels, extreme weather events, and an increased volume of trading in commodity futures markets.
He also notes that price volatility is common in agriculture because of seasonal variations.
The surge in demand for biofuel since 2006 caused a decline in aggregate grain and oilseed stocks that made markets and governments much more sensitive to routine disturbances, according to Wright.
“The increasing diversion of food crops like maize and soya to produce ethanol has been the new shock to the market that has kept stocks and supplies of food staples extra low. With low stocks otherwise – minor disturbances become major price movers, he said.
In the USA, the amount of maize being diverted to ethanol production has increased rapidly – from less than 5 percent of total maize production in 1995 to more than 35 percent by 2010, according to the Earth Policy Institute. This year it will rise again.
“To put the magnitude of these reductions into perspective, a drought or pest infestation that reduced US maize output by 30 percent in a given year would be viewed as a production catastrophe,” said Wright.

See “The Corn Ultimatum: How long can Americans keep burning one sixth the world?s corn supply in our cars?”

Weather events/climate change
Sudden weather events like the drought in Russia in 2010, which destroyed wheat crops and in part triggered the spike in wheat prices that year, are another major factor, said George Rapsomanikis, an economist with FAO’s Market and Trade Division.
Wright believes that oil prices and government policy on biofuels, not just in the USA and Europe but also in Africa and Latin America, will continue to be major determinants of food price behaviour in the future.
Low stocks of staples “made markets unusually sensitive to subsequent shocks such as high petroleum prices, the Australian drought [in 2006] and other regional production problems,” Wright said in a recent paper.
IFPRI – through simulated projections for the period 2010 to 2050 linking climate variability and food supplies – has shown that the rise in the price of staples could range from more than 20 percent for rice in the optimistic scenario (with high income and low population growth) to 50.4 percent for maize in the pessimistic scenario (low income and high population growth).

So the problem is a deadly serious one.

Yet, the most I’ve ever seen on any network this year is an ABC evening News from August 16 on extreme weather and its connection to global warming. I can’t find the video online, but here’s the key part of the transcript:

HEIDI CULLEN (Climatologist): When you crank up the heat, when you globally warm the planet, you’re going to see more extreme events.
AVILA: How is this for extreme? The arctic sea ice is at its smallest ever. While globally, July was the seventh warmest ever. Making the drought in Texas easier to explain. 75 percent of America’s second largest state, bone dry. Kemp, Texas’ water tanks ran dry for days and farmers all across the southern tier are suffering. Crops from corn to soybeans are dying on the vine. And soon prices on vegetables and beef are expected to climb.
GERALD NELSON (International Food Policy Research Institute): Every farmer in the world will be affected by climate change one way or the other.
SAWYER: So, Jim, you say soon the prices will begin to rise. How soon?
AVILA: Well, hit hardest is corn and soybean. That’s all the way from breakfast cereal to steaks. And that could start happening as soon as fall, certainly six months by now.

It’s the story of the century — and arguably the best major network on TV for climate coverage has only a couple of soundbites on it. Hard to believe some people think the media coverage isn’t part of the problem.

Read The Full Article:
http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/10/23/345071/cbs-abc-joke-about-global-warming
s-effect-on-coffee-when-will-the-media-start-talking-seriously-about-food-security/

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Financiers Double Down on Greed

post from They gave us a republic... - Front Page on 23 October 2011 03:00:00 PM. © They gave us a republic... - Front Page

By @KYYellowDog

Many years ago, back when banks and Wall Street were tightly regulated and their profits were large but not obscene, Molly Ivins wrote: "Bankers have hearts the size of carroway seeds, and bankers as a group are dumb."

Deregulation and the ensuing astronomical profits have made them even more stupid.

Jim Hightower on Wall Street's enduring cluelessness:

Astonishingly, some Wall Streeters continue to be clueless about what the Occupy Wall Street movement is protesting. Yoo-hoo, Streeters: Note that the movement's name has the term "Wall Street" in it.
While there is a plethora of particular issues being raised by the protesters -- from the corrupting power of corporate money in our elections to the demise of middle-class wages -- the unifying theme is that each one adds to the rising tide of economic inequality that's enriching the most privileged few by knocking down America's workaday majority. And, Mr. and Ms. Streeter, guess who is the most powerful perpetrators of this greed-fueled disparity: Yes, you.
Perhaps an example would help you grasp the obvious. Even as the protest was spreading in mid-October to hundreds of cities, tone-deaf executives at Bank of America announced three moves:
One, to goose up their own extravagant pay, they're socking financially stressed debit-card users with a new $5 a month fee.
Second, they're dumping 30,000 of the bank's worker bees onto America's already swollen unemployment rolls. Goodbye, and good luck finding another job.
Third, two top executives who are departing the bank are being handed golden parachutes totaling $11 million.
In the midst of this, Steve Bartlett opened his mouth. A former Congress-critter who was promoted to be Wall Street's top Washington lobbyist, he is a perfect symbol of the infuriating corrupt coziness between financial elites and lawmakers. Yet Bartlett blithely says, "We (don't) see ourselves as the target (of the protests)."
After all, he explains, Wall Street "has to be well capitalized and well financed for the economy to recover."
Golly, Steve, I think we capitalized you extremely well. What part of the public's multitrillion-dollar bailout of the Street's elite did you not see? We the People see every glaring dime of it. And we also see that rather than helping our economy recover, you're now lobbying Congress to kill Wall Street reforms so banksters can grab even more at our expense.
Yet the most befuddled Wall Streeter of all is -- big surprise -- the richest guy.
In assessing the spreading public protest against the rampaging greed of today's corporate and financial elite, John Paulson turns out to be as confused as a goat on Astroturf. Oh, he gets it that the people's anger is directed at hedge fund profiteers like him, but he claims that riff-raff like us are simply confused on the virtue of accumulated wealth.
While it's true that he raked in nearly $5 billion in personal pay last year (the largest single haul in Wall Street history), and while it's true that his riches flow not from advances to benefit humanity, but from rigged Wall Street casino games, he asserts that it's the amassing of wealth itself that serves the public good.
It's unfair, Paulson scolds, that protesters demonstrated in front of his 28,000-square-foot, $15 million mansion on New York's Upper East Side, targeting him as an exemplar of plutocratic excess. Don't they know that billionaires like him pay taxes, "providing huge benefits to everyone in our city?" Besides, he points out that he's not merely a billionaire, but one of those "job creators," as Republican leaders prefer to call corporate chieftains these days.
Paulson brags that his hedge fund "has created over 100 high-paying jobs in New York City since its formation." Wow -- 100 jobs in a city of over 8 million people. Thanks, John, our economy wouldn't be the same without you!
When it comes down to it, all that the Paulson-clique really wants is a little love -- a small show of gratitude for all that the richest 1 percent is doing for us 99 percent of Americans by making themselves ever-richer.
"Instead of vilifying our most successful businesses," he wrote recently in a plaintive press release, "we should be supporting them and encouraging them."
See, protesters, you're gonna make John cry. You should be ashamed -- except that he does have $15 billion in net worth to dry those tears.

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheyGaveUsARepublic-FrontPage/~3/yL3zMTuqCmk/finan
ciers-double-down-on-greed

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At Iowa Faith Forum, Republican Presidential
Candidates Try to Out-Fundie Each Other, Fail to Impress

post from Firedoglake on 23 October 2011 02:50:10 PM. © Firedoglake

So how did they all do? "I don't see anyone galvanizing people like they did for Mike Huckabee," said Steve Scheffler, president of the event's sponsor and a leading social conservative activist in Iowa. "And I'd be lying if I told you that can change in[...]

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Cool But Spooky

post from Talking Points Memo on 23 October 2011 02:00:37 PM. © Talking Points Memo

Developers at Virginia Tech has developed a system that can wipe data from Android-based smartphones based on the location of the user. [...]

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Police arrest 130 OWS supporters in Chicago

post from US Politics | AMERICAblog News on 23 October 2011 02:00:13 PM. © US Politics | AMERICAblog News

Heaven forbid the police ever arrest the people that actually caused the economic recession. That might make too much sense. Besides, who would then be around to buy corporate sponsored naming rights for public places like subway stations or public bike programs?

Apparently it's a lot more convenient to give corporate crooks and swindlers a free ride with tax breaks and no charges, so they can then turn around and dish out millions to slap their names all over public places. Anyone want to talk about how less corrupt the US is compared to other parts of the world?

Anti-Wall Street demonstrators of the Occupy Chicago movement stood their ground in a downtown park in noisy but peaceful defiance of police orders to clear out, prompting 130 arrests early Sunday, authorities said.

Occupy Chicago spokesman Joshua Kaunert vowed after the arrests that protests would continue in the Midwest city.

"We're not going anywhere. There are still plenty of us," Kaunert told The Associated Press after the arrests, which took police more than an hour to complete.

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upporters-in.html

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'Just Scrap The Cap' Video A Creative Way to
Raise Awareness on Social Security Fix

post from Crooks and Liars on 23 October 2011 02:00:00 PM. © Crooks and Liars

The Economic Opportunity Institute and Social Security Works released a new video this week that features two senior citizens rapping "Scrap the Cap," a reference to the easiest and most logical solution to the long-term funding of Social Security. The organizations are quick to point out that talk of a 'crisis' in Social Security is nonsense since the program currently has a $2.6 trillion surplus, and that scrapping the cap on taxable income for Social Security is a good fix for the long-term projections of a funding shortage. Currently, everyone paying into Social Security only pays taxes on the first $106,800 of their income and nothing on any income above that, effectively meaning that wealthier citizens pay no Social Security taxes on most of their income. Eliminating this cap would make the program solvent for a much longer time period.

Anyone who supports "Scrapping the Cap," can take action on the web site related to the video.

The lyrics of the song:

The real old school in the house
Give it up for the geezers
Had our golden years all planned out
Small pension, golf cart and a Florida house
But congress put a hit on Social Security
Mugged us of our dignity despite our maturity
Tax we paid with every check we earned
Time to collect we the ones gettin burned
There?s nothing we can do if we can?t get paid
?cept eat cat food, and drink haterade
Listen up cuz while we drop some knowledge
We raised our little boy, put him through college
Only safety net is our next of kin
Look out son, cause we?re movin in (what!?)
We?re movin in (what!?)
We?re movin in (what!?)
Pull out the couch cause we?re movin in (what!?)
No arguin (what!?)
No arguin (what!?)
Pull out the couch cause we?re movin in
Name?s Spinal Twist, check my orthopedic kicks
?cause I stoop farther south than the St. Lunatics.
I?m still getting play and it?s all thanks to Pfizer,
Keepin me stiffer than my Yankees cap visor
My station wagon windows are dark with tint
I subscribe to vibe and I get the large print
They call me Martini got substance abuse
?cause I?m always playin gin and sippin on juice
Our son wants to know if we can pay the rent,
But without benefits we ain?t got 50 cent,
We don?t pack a nine, we?re just strapped for funds
But we?re still game killers for our bachelor son
[interlude]
Social Security payments are far from erratic
?it?s broke and failin? don?t believe that static
This crisis is a fiction there would be no debate
If we all pitched in at the same tax rate
There?s a cap on how much millionaires pay
Even though we all work like every single day
These are the facts but they?re provin? thin
So pull out the couch ?cause we?re movin in
We?re movin in (what!?)
We?re movin in (what!?)
Pull out the couch cause we?re movin in (what!?)
No arguin (what!?)
No arguin (what!?)
Pull out the couch ?cause we?re movin in
Alright now younginz, you?re our last resort
?cause sooner or later, we?ll be needin support
If you don?t want roommates just learn this rap
It?s only one line, shout SCRAP THE CAP
Scrap the cap
Scrap the cap
Throw your hands up
Just scrap the cap
Scrap the cap
Scrap the cap
Throw your hands up
Just scrap the cap

Read The Full Article:
http://crooksandliars.com/kenneth-quinnell/just-scrap-cap-video-creative-way

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I Am Not the State

I am not the government. I am not the state. I am not capitalism.I am the 99%.[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/firedoglake/fdl/~3/JtkQXNHIB7Y/

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I Am Not The State

I am not the government. I am not the state. I am not capitalism.I am the 99%.[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/firedoglake/fdl/~3/JtkQXNHIB7Y/

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Who am I (52)

There?s more! You?ll find a collection of previously published Who Am I teaser images in our Who Am I Gallery. How many can you identify? Occasional Planet?s ?Who Am I? features people who have made important contributions to liberal thought, progressive politics, human rights, enlightened education, and ?small-d? democratic principles?both in the US and internationally. [...]Related posts:

Read The Full Article:
http://www.occasionalplanet.org/who-am-i-52/

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