Tuesday, April 5, 2011
Over One Hundred Thousand Protest Military Rule in Egypt
On Friday, tens of thousands took to the streets all over Egypt to demonstrate against recent political developments and call for a continuation of the revolution.
An estimated 100,000 protesters assembled in Tahrir Square, the heart of the Egyptian revolution. In Alexandria, more than 10,000 people marched through the city centre. Demonstrations also took place in many parts of the port city of Suez.
Did a Quran Burning Really Cause Afghan Violence?
Many blame a Florida pastor's desecration for dozens of deaths in Afghanistan. Is it more complicated than that?
A little more than two weeks ago, Florida pastor Terry Jones orchestrated a bizarre mock-trial against the Quran in his Gainesville church. At its conclusion, Jones set fire to the holy book.
In a different era, the episode would probably have been little more than an afterthought. And, to be sure, it's just one example among many acts of fringe Islamaphobia in a post-9/11 America. However -- driven in large part by the power of the Internet -- video of the burning has triggered days of mass protests across Afghanistan.
Thus far, at least 20 people -- including several United Nations officials -- have been killed. The reports of violence have triggered a strong U.S. response. Gen. David Petraeus said Sunday that Jones' actions have compromised U.S. operations in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, Senate leaders on both sides of the aisle have suggested that formal action be taken against Jones.
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2011/04/04/afghan_quran_burning_protests_taliban
Koch-Funded Climate Skeptic's Own Data Confirms Warming
This week, a climate hearing was held in the US House of Reps. Six 'experts' on climate were brought in, but only three were scientists.
And it turns out that one of the GOP's star witnesses -- a scientist who's been vocal in his skepticism of global temperature records, the physicist Richard Muller, of University of California, Berkeley, didn't quite help them disprove climate change.
Quite the opposite, in fact.
Glaciers Melting Faster than Originally Thought
A team of scientists from Aberystwyth University, the University of Exeter and Stockholm University, led by Welsh scientist and Professor Neil Glasser, have released at study published in Nature Geoscience showing that the glaciers of Patagonia in South America are melting at a much faster rate than originally thought.
http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-04-glaciers-faster-thought.html
Huckabee Hearts Secrecy
In 2007, during Huckabee's campaign for the GOP presidential nomination, the issue of the eradicated hard drives surfaced briefly, but it was never fully examined, and key questions remain. Why had Huckabee gone to such great lengths to wipe out his own records? What ever happened to a backup collection that was provided to a Huckabee aide?
Huckabee is now considering another presidential run, and if he does enter the race, he would do so as a frontrunner. Which would make the case of the missing records all the more significant. These records would shed light on Huckabee's governorship—and could provide insight into how a President Huckabee might run the country.
Meanwhile, observers of Arkansas' political scene—including one of Huckabee's former GOP allies—say the episode is characteristic of a politician who was distrustful and secretive by nature.
http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/04/huckabee-arkansas-destroyed-records
Poll: Americans Wrongly Estimate $178 Billion In Fed. Budget Goes To Public Broadcasting
In a CNN poll of American adults released Friday, the median guess on what percentage of the federal budget goes to public broadcasting was 5%. With a $3.55 trillion budget last year, that would put funding for the CBP at approximately $178 billion.
In reality though, that's not even close.
The CPB received about $420 million last year from the federal government, making it roughly one one-hundredth of one percent, of the overall budget. That means that the median response was about 424 times higher than the actual amount of federal funding that went to public broadcasting last year.
2,000 Protesters March On Koch Industries’ D.C. Office
Though they don’t want you to know about it, the billionaire Koch brothers are bankrolling a massive campaign to roll back progressive achievements, and today, labor, civil rights, and climate activists turned out at dozens of rallies across the country to demonstrate against the Koch’s secretive influence in American politics and to stand up for labor and civil rights.
In Washington, D.C. today an estimated 2,000 protesters marched on Koch Industries’ Washington D.C. offices and attempted to give Charles and David Koch an invitation to come out and speak with the protesters. Not surprisingly, the building’s doors were locked and no one was allowed inside.
http://thinkprogress.org/2011/04/04/2000-protesters-march-on-koch-industries-d-c-office
Monday, April 4, 2011
Pakistan Sufi Shrine Suicide Attack Kills 41
Suicide attackers have killed at least 41 people and wounded many more at a shrine in Pakistan, police say. The explosions struck near the Sakhi Sarwar shrine in Punjab, as Sufi Muslim devotees gathered for an annual three-day festival.
Sufis, a minority Muslim group who follow mystical beliefs, are regarded as heretical by hardliners. A Taliban fighter told reporters his group carried out the attack, the third on Sufi shrines in a year.
After Suspending Top Republicans, Fox News Gives Trump His Own Regular Segment
Billionaire Donald Trump plans to run for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination in 2012, and he’s been hitting up the Fox News Channel quite a lot to promote his ambitions.
But after the network recently suspended two major Republican contributors for outlining their presidential ambitions, who could have guessed that Fox would actually give Trump his own regular segment?
Though he’s not a paid contributor, “Mondays with Trump” is now apparently slated to become a regular segment on “Fox and Friends” — a move that strikes some media critics as “surprising.”
The Koch Brothers Are Getting Nervous - Technorati Politics
Charles and David Koch seem less confident these days. The brothers – who inherited money from their dad and grew it into America’s largest collection of dirty industries – have decided they need to fight back. That’s not surprising. Since Koch-sponsored secret meetings were revealed, secret planning with Supreme Court Justices was exposed, and secret funding of right wing groups became apparent, Americans have begun to wonder just how much influence these guys have purchased.
America has now heard of the Koch Brothers.
But that’s not all. A Google search of “Boycott Koch” reveals “about 907,000” pages. Many of these sites include a list of brands owned by the Kochs. Just type the word “boycott” into a Facebook search and Koch Industries pops up first. There appears to be a growing interest shunning Koch brands.
http://technorati.com/politics/article/the-koch-brothers-are-getting-nervous
Negotiation 101 for Dems: The Right Policies Are the Right Politics
Bloggers always wonder why Democrats couldn’t get anything done even when they had a solid majority in the House and 60 votes in the Senate, while Republicans get everything they want even when they are in the minority.
Take the current budget negotiations, for example.
A few weeks ago the Congress passed and the President signed yet another round of massive tax cuts for the wealthy, thereby greatly increasing the deficits. Now these same geniuses are engaged in cuts-only budget negotiations with military spending largely off the table.
http://truthout.com/negotiation-101-dems-right-policies-are-right-politics/1301468400
Senate Republicans Call for Complete Repeal of Wall Street Reform
Senate Republicans are introducing legislation to repeal the Wall Street reform law in its entirety, breaking with House Republicans who have opted for a go-slow approach to rolling back the regulatory overhaul.
Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) announced Friday he will introduce legislation to repeal the Dodd-Frank financial reform law and said the bill has 18 co-sponsors, including the entire Senate Republican leadership.
"We must repeal the Democrats’ takeover of the financial markets that favors Wall Street corporations, over-regulates small businesses with massive new bureaucracy and hurts consumers,” said DeMint in a statement.
“This financial takeover will strangle our economy and move jobs overseas unless it is repealed." The bill has attracted a variety of Republican co-sponsors, ranging from the most senior members of the caucus to fiscally conservative freshmen.
The Truth About Climate Change, Still Inconvenient
So the joke begins like this: An economist, a lawyer and a professor of marketing walk into a room. What’s the punch line? They were three of the five “expert witnesses” Republicans called for last week’s Congressional hearing on climate science.
But the joke actually ended up being on the Republicans, when one of the two actual scientists they invited to testify went off script.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/04/opinion/04krugman.html?_r=2&ref=columnists
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Hidden in a Cave: First Ever Portrait of Jesus Found in 1 of 70 Ancient Books?
The image is eerily familiar: a bearded young man with flowing curly hair. After lying for nearly 2,000 years hidden in a cave in the Holy Land, the fine detail is difficult to determine.
But in a certain light it is not difficult to interpret the marks around the figure’s brow as a crown of thorns. The extraordinary picture of one of the recently discovered hoard of up to 70 lead codices – booklets – found in a cave in the hills overlooking the Sea of Galilee is one reason Bible historians are clamouring to get their hands on the ancient artefacts.
If genuine, this could be the first-ever portrait of Jesus Christ, possibly even created in the lifetime of those who knew him.
Though it should be noted that early depictions of Christ where as a beardless youth more in the guise of Apollo. Images of Christ as a bearded philosopher did not come until later.
Are Government Microwave Mind-Control Tests Causing TV Presenters' Brains to Melt Down?
A bizarre spate of television presenters dissolving into on-air gibberish has sparked claims that the U.S. military could be to blame. In four high-profile cases, the latest involving fast-talking Judge Judy, the presenters have started off speaking properly but have then descended into undecipherable nonsense - looking confused and unstable.
The frequency of the 'attacks' - and the fact that recorded examples of the mental meltdowns have been popular on websites - has led to conspiracy theorists pointing the finger at shadowy government experiments.
5 Republican Presidents that Make Barack Obama Look Like Rush Limbaugh
Ever since they first appeared early in 2009, the Tea Party has had it out for Barack Obama, and the Democrats. This obviously independent group of freethinkers insisted that the President’s policies on government spending, taxation and regulation of industries were breaches of power heretofore unseen.
It was because of the aforementioned reasons that the Tea Partiers overwhelmingly backed the Republican party.
They were the party that understood the value of balancing budgets and job creation (despite the last Republican administration having the worst track record on the economy in the past 80 years), as well as (coincidentally!) agreeing with them on issues of abortion, gay rights, illegal immigration, and pretty much anything else.
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