alt.newz.flux-all

Deep Solar Minimum: Goodbye Global Warming
Finance Reform Battle Delayed...Again
Neocons Launch War of Words Against Obama
FedEx vs. UPS on Unionization
NYISO CEO: Smarter, Greener, More Efficient Grid Key To Economic Change - North American Windpower
ECB To Nuke Europe
Howard Zinn: You Can&rsquo;t Be Neutral on a Moving Train (2004)
VTJP Palestine/Israel NewsLinks 6 February, 2010 U.S Vows To Bury Goldstone Report In UN
Military Resistance 8B2 7 February, 2010: Take Your Pick
VTJP Palestine/Israel NewsLinks 7 February, 2010: Irish Herald: &ldquo;Four Israelis Who Assassinated Hamas Leader Carried Irish Passports&rdquo;
CounterCurrents Newsletter 7 February, 2010: A Must Read by David Korten
URUK Net 7 February, 2010: U.S.-Supported Night Raids Bring Terror to Afghanistan
URUK Net 6 February, 2010 Part 2: Torture feared in arrest of Iraqi blogger
URUK Net 6 February, 2010: Annals of Liberation: Obama Surge Driving Thousands From Their Homes
Christmas Day Crotch Bomber Tied to Israel, FBI By Jeff Gates
ICH 6 February, 2010: Weekend Edition: Please, Mr. President, Stop Talking Nonsense
Viva Palestina News Update 6 February, 2010
Global Research 4 February, 2010: The Haitian Disaster and the Threat of War Selected Articles January 29 - 4 February, 2010
Anti-Empire Report By William Blum - Zinn, Haiti, Aristide, and ideology
Letter to Haiti by M. Nourbese Philip
The Sword and the Shield: Surround Russia and China with Mobile &ldquo;Missile Defense&rdquo; Systems By Bruce Gagnon

Deep Solar Minimum: Goodbye Global Warming

Posted: 27 Apr 2010 10:18 PM PDT

Bcc: contributors ____________ http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/Articles_2009/Solar_Minimum.pdf Deepest Solar Minimum in Nearly a Century: Goodbye Global

Finance Reform Battle Delayed...Again

Posted: 27 Apr 2010 10:02 PM PDT

The financial reform battle—that is, to even start the full debate in the Senate—continues on here on Capitol Hill. For the third time in as many days, Senate GOPers defeated a vote to start debating financial reform legislation, a bill that would try to end future taxpayer bailouts, create a new consumer protection agency to guard against predatory lenders and dangerous products, and shed light on the opaque, $450 trillion over-the-counter derivatives market. The vote was 56-42, with centrist Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) again voting with Republicans. Majority Leader Harry Reid ultimately voted against the bill, too, a maneuver that allows him to schedule another vote which could happen as early as Thursday morning.

The losing vote wasn't entirely surprising, as Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), a top Democratic negotiator on financial reform, said earlier Wednesday morning that his party still didn't have the votes to begin the debate. Remarks on Wednesday by Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) suggest the gulf between the two parties remains gaping and it could take several more days before an agreement is finally reached. "Are we close to wrapping up a comprehensive deal? No, we're not close to that," Shelby told MSNBC.

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Neocons Launch War of Words Against Obama

Posted: 27 Apr 2010 09:44 PM PDT

The neocons have a new beef with President Barack Obama: he's reportedly dropping the phrase "Islamist extremism" and replacing it with "violent extremism." On Thursday, the Committee on the Present Danger—which in its heyday was a collection of Cold War hawks who opposed détente with the Soviet Union—sent a letter to Obama, deputy national security adviser John Brennan, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declaring that "this action contradicts the accepted military intelligence doctrine to properly identify, define, and know your enemy."

The letter added:

the CPD believes that militant Islamic regimes and movements represent a serious threat to the United States and other free nations. If we are to meet this challenge, we must understand the beliefs and motivations of those who have dedicated themselves to what they call a “jihad” against “infidels” based on their reading of the Koran.

The CPD missive was signed by former Secretary of State George Shultz and former CIA chief R. James Woolsey, the two chairmen of CPD, plus 64 other members of the group. These include the usual suspects of conservative hawkdom: Morrie Amitay, Frank Gaffney, Clifford May, Andrew McCarthy, Joshua Muravchik, Daniel Pipes, Danielle Pletka, Norman Podhoretz, Randy Scheunemann, and Victoria Toensing. Former Reagan Attorney General Edwin Meese III and former Reagan National Security Adviser Roebrt McFarlane also joined in.

The CPD letter echoes an angry note that Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), an honorary CPD chairman, sent Brennan earlier in the month. Lieberman complained that the term "Islamist extremism" does not

appear in two critical national security documents released by the Administration in 2010: the Department of Homeland Security's Quadrennial Homeland Security Review Report and the Department of Defense's Quadrennial Defense Review Report—both of which guide our government's numerous and costly policies and programs that have as their major purpose protecting the American people from terrorism inspired by violent Islamist extremist ideology and carries out by violent Islamist terrorists.

Lieberman complained that "the failure to identify our enemy for what it is—violent Islamist extremism—is offensive."And he argued that "any reluctance to describe our enemies as exactly what they are—violent Islamist extremists—disrespects the non-violent Muslim majority and compromises our ability to defeat the extremists."

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FedEx vs. UPS on Unionization

Posted: 27 Apr 2010 09:23 PM PDT

The Washington Post's Harold Meyerson has a great column today on the battle between UPS and FedEx, the parcel carriers, over whether FedEx should be governed by the same labor laws as its competitor. As it stands, FedEx, which started as an air transport company but has since expanded to ground service, falls under the Railway Labor Act (RLA), while UPS, which started as a ground service, falls under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). In practice, that makes it very hard for FedEx workers to unionize. Meyerson explains:

Drivers at UPS, FedEx's main rival, and at other, smaller delivery companies can and have voted to form their own Teamster locals in myriad cities across the land, as the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) permits. Under the RLA, however, the rules for forming unions are very different: The entire nationwide workforce must vote in a single election, and the union must obtain a majority not just of the workers voting but of voters and non-voters combined. (If a comparable rule held for presidential elections, requiring the winner to obtain a majority of the adult population of the United States, it's not clear that this nation would have had a president since—well, ever.)

It seems obvious that two companies that directly compete in the same business should be governed by the same labor rules. That's why the House passed a bill in March that would bring FedEx under the NLRA. But Sen. Lamar Alexander, a Republican who represents Tennessee, the home state of FedEx CEO and GOP donor Fred Smith, has pledged to kill the measure. And that gets us to what is perhaps the most interesting part of this story: the battle on Capitol Hill between FedEx lobbyists on one side and the Teamsters and UPS lobbyists on the other. This story gets at the heart of how Washington really works. Most legislative battles aren't fought between disinterested parties looking for a common-sense solution—they're fought between powerful interest groups with money at stake. FedEx vs. UPS + the Teamsters is just another variation of Wall Street vs. Big Hollywood.

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NYISO CEO: Smarter, Greener, More Efficient Grid Key To Economic Change - North American Windpower

Posted: 27 Apr 2010 09:12 PM PDT

NYISO CEO: Smarter, Greener, More Efficient Grid Key To Economic Change
North American Windpower
New York state's "45 x 15" energy strategy aims to increase renewable power production and have it account for 30% of New York's total electricity supply, ...

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ECB To Nuke Europe

Posted: 27 Apr 2010 09:09 PM PDT

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard reports that the European Central Bank will probably exercise the "nuclear option" to directly monetize the government debt of Greece, Spain, Italy, etc. This is not good news for Europeans or anyone else, except for states and their bankers, militaries, and other enemies of mankind. Arrogant and foolish central bankers, in the mold of Greenspan and Bernanke, are wrecking the world economy, with the help of fractional reserves, as Keynes applauds from the Underworld. (Thanks to Bill Sardi)