Friday, July 25, 2008
Parsing The Pickens Plan
photo by vergel tolentino
CNN Money has a good article today that evaluates T. Boone Pickens' plan for moving the country to windpower, solar and natural gas vehicles, and Al Gore's challenge to move to non-carbon fuels over the next 10 years.
Wind power: A Reality Check
Plans are afoot to prod the nation into using much more renewable energy. Can it be done, and what's the cost?
By Steve Hargreaves, CNNMoney.com staff writer
Last Updated: July 24, 2008: 11:04 AM EDT
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- High-profile personalities have been telling the nation to ditch that dirty fossil fuel and turn to renewable energy.
T. Boone Pickens, the billionaire oilman, has been hitting the airwaves, pitching a plan to use wind to replace all the natural gas that's used to produce electricity, then using that saved natural gas to fuel cars.
In addition to weaning the nation from foreign oil, Pickens' plan is not entirely altruistic. He's investing hundreds of millions of dollars on a giant wind farm in the Texas panhandle, and his hedge fund, BP Capital, is said to own stakes in several companies that equip cars to run on natural gas. If his energy efforts pan out, he could get even richer in the process.
Then there's Al Gore. The former U.S. vice president and Nobel Prize winner said last week that electricity generation should be completely fossil-fuel free in 10 years.
The question is, are these plans realistic or just dreams?
Edgar Mitchell, Apollo 14 Astronaut, Says Aliens Are Among Us
From the Huffington Post and the New York Times today:
Edgar Mitchell, the sixth man to walk on the moon, appeared on a British radio show to say that he was “privileged enough to be in on the fact that we’ve been visited on this planet and the U.F.O. phenomena is real.”
Listen to this YouTube Audio. This is startling.
Edgar Mitchell, the sixth man to walk on the moon, appeared on a British radio show to say that he was “privileged enough to be in on the fact that we’ve been visited on this planet and the U.F.O. phenomena is real.”
Listen to this YouTube Audio. This is startling.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Obama's Interview with Face the Nation Today
Huffington Post has the short and long versions of Obama's interview on this morning's Face the Nation on CBS with journalist Lara Logan.
Logan was the first journalist to lkand an interview with Obama while he is on his pre-convention oversaes trip to Afghanistan, Irag, Kuwait, Jordan, Israel, Germany, France and England this week.
She also made news last month on Comedy Central's Daily Show, on which she told host John Stewart some very juicy behind the scenes stories behind how the US news media has dumbed down war reporting from Afghanistan and Iraq.
Logan was the first journalist to lkand an interview with Obama while he is on his pre-convention oversaes trip to Afghanistan, Irag, Kuwait, Jordan, Israel, Germany, France and England this week.
She also made news last month on Comedy Central's Daily Show, on which she told host John Stewart some very juicy behind the scenes stories behind how the US news media has dumbed down war reporting from Afghanistan and Iraq.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
FISA Bill Vote May Happen Tomorrow! Call Congress!
Here's a letter I got from Caroline Fredrickson, Director of the ACLU's Washington, D.C. Legislative Office today. It is urgent. Please read this and call your Congressperson now, then Steny Hoyer's office and Nancy Pelosi's office. 202-224-3121. Please call now!
Dear ACLU Supporter,
Despite the outrage coming from a broad coalition of concerned citizens, by tomorrow night the House of Representatives will vote on whether or not to gut the Constitution and give immunity to phone companies who broke the law and spied on Americans.
We have to act now. Even if you’ve emailed, called or visited your members of Congress about FISA, we need you to contact them again today.
Congress is moving so fast and so secretively that we only got a copy of this bill this morning. I can tell you it’s horrible. It contains vacuum cleaner style surveillance that sweeps up the phone calls and emails of Americans. And it’s blatantly unconstitutional.
The bottom line is that this is legislation that benefits a few of our country’s largest corporations while taking away basic rights from the rest of us. And it is unacceptable.
I’m going to spend the rest of the day on the phone calling Capitol Hill trying to stop this bill. I hope you will spend whatever time you can to make the voice of freedom heard in Congress -- make calls, ask your friends and family to call -- please do whatever you can.
Put Congress on notice that the American people don’t want a "compromise" that sells out our rights. Act now. We’re hearing the vote is tomorrow, so we could have less than 24 hours.
Believe me, no matter what happens, the ACLU will continue fighting this -- if necessary, in the courts.
Thank you for all you have done through this fight. Your dedication has truly inspired me and all of us at the ACLU. Now, let's hit the phones!
Thank you,
Caroline Fredrickson, Director
ACLU Washington Legislative Office
Dear ACLU Supporter,
Despite the outrage coming from a broad coalition of concerned citizens, by tomorrow night the House of Representatives will vote on whether or not to gut the Constitution and give immunity to phone companies who broke the law and spied on Americans.
We have to act now. Even if you’ve emailed, called or visited your members of Congress about FISA, we need you to contact them again today.
Congress is moving so fast and so secretively that we only got a copy of this bill this morning. I can tell you it’s horrible. It contains vacuum cleaner style surveillance that sweeps up the phone calls and emails of Americans. And it’s blatantly unconstitutional.
The bottom line is that this is legislation that benefits a few of our country’s largest corporations while taking away basic rights from the rest of us. And it is unacceptable.
I’m going to spend the rest of the day on the phone calling Capitol Hill trying to stop this bill. I hope you will spend whatever time you can to make the voice of freedom heard in Congress -- make calls, ask your friends and family to call -- please do whatever you can.
Put Congress on notice that the American people don’t want a "compromise" that sells out our rights. Act now. We’re hearing the vote is tomorrow, so we could have less than 24 hours.
Believe me, no matter what happens, the ACLU will continue fighting this -- if necessary, in the courts.
Thank you for all you have done through this fight. Your dedication has truly inspired me and all of us at the ACLU. Now, let's hit the phones!
Thank you,
Caroline Fredrickson, Director
ACLU Washington Legislative Office
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
About Those Torture Memos...
Yesterday, I watched a little of the current Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, chaired by Sen. Carl Levin (D) of Michigan, which is exploring how various forms of torture became a "legal" means of extracting information from detainees at Guantanamo Bay. By "legal" I mean it was condoned by Department of Defense officials, from Donald Rumsfeld on down, in contravention of the U.S. Constitution, of the U.S. Military's Code of Conduct, and of the Geneva Accords.
In the docket was the former chief legal counsel for the DoD, one William "Jim" Haynes, who had an unbelievably blank memory for one of the most senior lawyers in the United States government. This man was in charge of 10,000 other lawyers at the DoD. Yes, that is correct, by his own testimony. 10,000. I heard him say it. But it was clear from his own muddled testimony -- and by the printed record of his own memos submitted as evidence -- that Haynes chose to ignore the advice of most of those 10,000 lawyers, and he approved the torturing of prisoners. Then he blamed it on low-level officers at Gitmo. A true gutless wonder of the Universe.
What most amazed me was this: when he was answering questions put to him by Sen. Levin, he just couldn't recall a darn thing about anything. As soon as Sen. Lindsey Graham (R) of South Carolina -- who one might think would be more friendly, but who sounded just as skeptical as Levin did -- started to cajole Haynes' memory banks with a little Southern charm, well, Mr. Haynes chirped up little details that only a moment earlier had eluded him.
This man contradicted himself in testimony numerous times in just the brief 30 minutes I watched this hearing on C-Span. I can't imagine what the rest of the hearing was like.
A few moments after Sen. Graham finished, Sen. Claire McCaskill (D) of Missouri whapped Haynes sideways with several angry verbal two-by-fours , and you could hear all the air escaping the room as if sucked out into the vacuum of space by a hole the size of a pea made by a micrometeorite bulleting through a steel fuselage.
It was fascinating.
If you don't know what this latest Bush Administration scandal is about -- so maddening that retelling it nearly caused Keith Olbermann to blow a blood vessel in his temple tonight, let me make it simple:
It's about Gitmo, Abu Ghraib, Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan, extreme rendition, civil liberties, waterboarding, Habeas Corpus, three Supreme Court rulings, the Military Commissions Act, John Ashcroft, Alberto Gonzales and illegal military tribunals.
It's about using torture on completely innocent people around the world who were turned over to the CIA for money by their neighbors who didn't like them, and then these hapless prisoners were kept in isolation, without charges, abused, sometimes raped, sometimes even killed, by our government, all in the name of "protecting Americans," using our taxpayer money, and with our tacit consent, since U.S. citizens had (presumably) elected these same dangerous clowns. An in turn these Bozo's have bloodied our Constitution for political gain in front of God and the whole freakin' planet.
And remember, most of the hundreds of prisoners held at Guantanamo have been released without charge, and without recourse for the abuses inflicted on them and their families. By our government. And to this day, not one person held at Guantanamo Bay has ever been convicted of an act of terrorism.
So, it's also about getting this story out before the election, so the public will have a little more guilt on their conscience, and think twice before electing yet another Bush-ite Republican to the White House -- yet another clown who thinks that perpetual war and terror threats and oil company war profiteers makes for sound foreign policy.
And perhaps of equal importance for some member of Congress, it's about cleaning up our house now, before the Europeans start indicting our past and present elected and appointed officials for War Crimes. Don't think it can't happen. I'm believing more and more that it will. And not just for this mess.
* * *
IT WAS TOP DOWN, STUPID
The Bush Administration's "Bad Apples" Theory Goes Sour
By Phillipe Sands
Posted Wednesday, June 18, 2008, at 1:19 PM ET
Slate.com
When the Abu Ghraib scandal hit in the summer of 2004, two of the administration's most senior lawyers—White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales and the Defense Department's General Counsel Jim Haynes—stood before the world's media and laid out the official explanation for newly aggressive interrogation within the U.S. military: It was the result of a bottom-up request from an aggressive combatant commander at Guantanamo; it was implemented within the law and on the basis of careful legal advice; and it produced useful and important results. These new techniques had been essential in getting vital security information from men they labeled "the worst of the worst."
A memo Gonzales and Haynes made public that day sketched out this move to military cruelty. Written by Haynes and signed by Donald Rumsfeld on Dec. 2, 2002, the document discarded a military prohibition on cruelty promulgated by President Lincoln as long ago as 1863. Haynes' memo recommended 15 new techniques, including nudity and forced grooming, humiliation and deception, dogs, sleep deprivation, and stress positions like standing for up to four hours. Three other techniques—including water-boarding—were not given blanket approval, although their future use in individual cases was not rejected, either. Rumsfeld approved the memo, scribbling next to his signature authorizing these techniques the observation, "However, I stand for 8-10 hours a day. Why is standing limited to 4 hours?"
Four years after that memo became public, Congress has moved to examine the accuracy of the administration's account of the circumstances under which it was prepared. The author of the Rumsfeld memo became the subject of extensive questioning Tuesday before the Senate armed services committee. Many will say it is too little and too late. I disagree. Congress has a vital role to play in establishing accountability for the American torture policy, although yesterday's faltering efforts to jog Jim Haynes' memory hardly inspire confidence that it can do so.
Read the whole story here.
In the docket was the former chief legal counsel for the DoD, one William "Jim" Haynes, who had an unbelievably blank memory for one of the most senior lawyers in the United States government. This man was in charge of 10,000 other lawyers at the DoD. Yes, that is correct, by his own testimony. 10,000. I heard him say it. But it was clear from his own muddled testimony -- and by the printed record of his own memos submitted as evidence -- that Haynes chose to ignore the advice of most of those 10,000 lawyers, and he approved the torturing of prisoners. Then he blamed it on low-level officers at Gitmo. A true gutless wonder of the Universe.
What most amazed me was this: when he was answering questions put to him by Sen. Levin, he just couldn't recall a darn thing about anything. As soon as Sen. Lindsey Graham (R) of South Carolina -- who one might think would be more friendly, but who sounded just as skeptical as Levin did -- started to cajole Haynes' memory banks with a little Southern charm, well, Mr. Haynes chirped up little details that only a moment earlier had eluded him.
This man contradicted himself in testimony numerous times in just the brief 30 minutes I watched this hearing on C-Span. I can't imagine what the rest of the hearing was like.
A few moments after Sen. Graham finished, Sen. Claire McCaskill (D) of Missouri whapped Haynes sideways with several angry verbal two-by-fours , and you could hear all the air escaping the room as if sucked out into the vacuum of space by a hole the size of a pea made by a micrometeorite bulleting through a steel fuselage.
It was fascinating.
If you don't know what this latest Bush Administration scandal is about -- so maddening that retelling it nearly caused Keith Olbermann to blow a blood vessel in his temple tonight, let me make it simple:
It's about Gitmo, Abu Ghraib, Bagram Air Force Base in Afghanistan, extreme rendition, civil liberties, waterboarding, Habeas Corpus, three Supreme Court rulings, the Military Commissions Act, John Ashcroft, Alberto Gonzales and illegal military tribunals.
It's about using torture on completely innocent people around the world who were turned over to the CIA for money by their neighbors who didn't like them, and then these hapless prisoners were kept in isolation, without charges, abused, sometimes raped, sometimes even killed, by our government, all in the name of "protecting Americans," using our taxpayer money, and with our tacit consent, since U.S. citizens had (presumably) elected these same dangerous clowns. An in turn these Bozo's have bloodied our Constitution for political gain in front of God and the whole freakin' planet.
And remember, most of the hundreds of prisoners held at Guantanamo have been released without charge, and without recourse for the abuses inflicted on them and their families. By our government. And to this day, not one person held at Guantanamo Bay has ever been convicted of an act of terrorism.
So, it's also about getting this story out before the election, so the public will have a little more guilt on their conscience, and think twice before electing yet another Bush-ite Republican to the White House -- yet another clown who thinks that perpetual war and terror threats and oil company war profiteers makes for sound foreign policy.
And perhaps of equal importance for some member of Congress, it's about cleaning up our house now, before the Europeans start indicting our past and present elected and appointed officials for War Crimes. Don't think it can't happen. I'm believing more and more that it will. And not just for this mess.
IT WAS TOP DOWN, STUPID
The Bush Administration's "Bad Apples" Theory Goes Sour
By Phillipe Sands
Posted Wednesday, June 18, 2008, at 1:19 PM ET
Slate.com
When the Abu Ghraib scandal hit in the summer of 2004, two of the administration's most senior lawyers—White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales and the Defense Department's General Counsel Jim Haynes—stood before the world's media and laid out the official explanation for newly aggressive interrogation within the U.S. military: It was the result of a bottom-up request from an aggressive combatant commander at Guantanamo; it was implemented within the law and on the basis of careful legal advice; and it produced useful and important results. These new techniques had been essential in getting vital security information from men they labeled "the worst of the worst."
A memo Gonzales and Haynes made public that day sketched out this move to military cruelty. Written by Haynes and signed by Donald Rumsfeld on Dec. 2, 2002, the document discarded a military prohibition on cruelty promulgated by President Lincoln as long ago as 1863. Haynes' memo recommended 15 new techniques, including nudity and forced grooming, humiliation and deception, dogs, sleep deprivation, and stress positions like standing for up to four hours. Three other techniques—including water-boarding—were not given blanket approval, although their future use in individual cases was not rejected, either. Rumsfeld approved the memo, scribbling next to his signature authorizing these techniques the observation, "However, I stand for 8-10 hours a day. Why is standing limited to 4 hours?"
Four years after that memo became public, Congress has moved to examine the accuracy of the administration's account of the circumstances under which it was prepared. The author of the Rumsfeld memo became the subject of extensive questioning Tuesday before the Senate armed services committee. Many will say it is too little and too late. I disagree. Congress has a vital role to play in establishing accountability for the American torture policy, although yesterday's faltering efforts to jog Jim Haynes' memory hardly inspire confidence that it can do so.
Read the whole story here.
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