Mn-prog-events Mailing List: Progressive Calendar 04.08.09

[David Shove (shove001]

            P R O G R E S S I V E   C A L E N D A R    04.08.09

1. Mental health cuts 4.08 11am
2. Bridge vigil       4.08 5pm
3. War Dance/film     4.08 5:30pm
4. Immigrant rights   4.08 6pm
5. Amnesty Intl       4.08 7:30pm

6. Eagan peace vigil  4.09 4:30pm
7. Northtown vigil    4.09 5pm
8. King Corn/film     4.09 5:30pm
9. Dakota liberation  4.09 6pm
10. Pak/Afghan panel  4.09 7pm
11. Full moon walk    4.09 7pm

12. Normon Solomon - The Dems and the Afghan war: meet the New Escalators
13. Dean Baker     - Hands off Social Security
14. William Blum   - Some thoughts about socialism
15. Nassar Karimi  - Chavez: 'Capitalism needs to go down'
16. Joe Byrne      - Scientists find active 'super-thermite' in WTC dust
17, ed             - Rush snorts  (poem)

--------1 of 17--------

From: Andy Driscoll <andy [at] driscollgroup.com>
Subject: Mental health cuts 4.08 11am

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 8 11:00AM
  MENTAL HEALTH CUTS: What Could Happen?
SOMALI CHILDREN AND AUTISM: What's Going On Here?

Mental health advocates and service providers cringe at what budget cuts
portend for their charges - as if the stigma of mental illness isn't
enough to create political antipathy. Anyone who gets around these cities
can see the fruits of mental illness in a wide variety of societal
outcasts - rage, drug use, homelessness, and crimes for which their mental
illness is no defense.

Also, on Tuesday, March 31, the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH)
released a lengthy study on the baffling and disproportionate rates of
autism among Somali children born in the US. Can there be any doubt that
environmental degradation throughout our life systems is ravaging the
immune systems of our children. Asthma, autism, ADD and who knows what
else are found in clusters across the Metro, but especially in core areas
of our cities where immigrants are proving to be the clearest bellwether
for the epidemic proportions of children's maladies. What is happening to
these babies among Somali families?

GUESTS:
MENTAL HEALTH BUDGETS AND THEIR IMPACTS:
 STATE SEN. LINDA BERGLIN, Chair of the Senate Health and Human
Services Budget Division of Finance
 SUE ABDERHOLDEN, Executive Director, NAMI (National Alliance on
Mental Illness MN)
 JOAN WHITE, Program Officer for PEOPLE, INC., a mental health
delivery organization with homes and services provided to hundreds of
mentally ill residents.
SOMALI CHILDREN AND AUTISM:
 IDIL ABDULL - Parent Advocate and Co-founder, Somali-American Autism
Foundation
 ANNE HARRINGTON - Autism Consultant and Advocate; former Coordinator
of Early Childhood Special Education Autism program for Minneapolis
Public Schools; Mother of child with autism
 SARAH THORSON, Supervisor, Minnesota Children with Special Health
Needs,MINNESOTA DEPT. OF HEALTH
 ABDI AYNTE - BBC America reporter; former Twin Cities reporter
covering the Somali autism issue.
AND YOU! CALL IN - 612-341-0980


--------2 of 17--------

From: Women Against Military Madness <wamm [at] mtn.org>
Subject: Bridge vigil 4.08 5pm

Peace Bridge Vigil: "Out of Afghanistan"
Wednesday, April 8, 5:00 to 6:00 p.m. Lake Street/Marshall Avenue Bridge,
Spanning the Mississippi River between Minneapolis and St. Paul.

The U.S. [ie Obama & Co -ed] has plans to send an additional 21,000 troops
to Afghanistan. Join the weekly Peace Bridge vigil against the occupation
of Iraq for a special focus to call for the U.S. to get out of
Afghanistan. FFI: Call WAMM, 612-827-5364.


--------3 of 17-------

From: Women Against Military Madness <wamm [at] mtn.org>
Subject: War Dance/film 4.08 5:30pm

War Dance" Film on Public Health and War

Wednesday, April 8, 5:30 p.m. University of Minnesota, Mayo Memorial
Auditorium, 425 Delaware Street Southeast, Minneapolis. "War Dance"
follows the story of children in a refugee camp in the war-torn country of
Uganda as they find that music and dance provide a salve for their souls
as they compete in a national music contest. Free and open to the public.
Sponsored by: the University of Minnesota School of Public Health,
Minnesota Public Health Association and City Pages. Co-Sponsored by: Human
Rights Center and WAMM. FFI: Visit www.sph.umn.edu/filmfest09 .


--------4 of 17--------

Date: Sun, 5 Apr 2009 16:59:14 -0500
From: "[ISO-8859-1] Marco Dávila" <maidaca85 [at] gmail.com>
Subject: Immigrant rights 4.08 6pm

My name is Marco Davila, and I am a member of the Minnesota Immigrant
Rights Action Coalition (MIRAc).  We are a coalition of organizations and
community members who work towards promoting and defending the rights of
immigrants here in the state of Minnesota.  We are currently working on
campaigns such as calling for a moratorium on raids and deportations of
undocumented immigrants, and supporting the community of Postville, Iowa
which was devastated after a large workplace raid last year.  If you would
like to find out more about our organization, please take a look at our
website: http://mirac1.wordpress.com/.

Since 2006, MIRAc has been involved in organizing a march to commemorate
May 1st and to demand rights for immigrant workers.  Perhaps some of you
were involved in this work in the past.  In 2006, there was a huge upsurge
in the immigrant rights movement, and millions of people took to the
streets to oppose the reactionary Sensenbrenner bill.  They showed the
power that people and communities hold when they mobilize together.

We would like this year's demonstration to draw a large number of people
and generate a significant amount of publicity.  We believe that the best
way to do this is by building a broad coalition of local organizations and
community members who can work together to make to make this march a
success.  So far, about ten groups have officially endorsed the event.
However, we are looking for more participation in the planning and
organizing process, especially from workers and trade unionists.

We have already begun our efforts to organize a march on May 1st.  We have
held a few meetings and have come up with a basic proposal for a march and
a rally, but we still have a long ways to go and a lot of work to do if we
want this to be a successful demonstration.

Our basic working proposal is as follows:  On May 1st, 2009, we will hold
a peaceful march starting at 4:00 pm at the corner of Lake Street and
13thAve. in Minneapolis.

We will then march to Nicollet and 29th Street, where we will hold a rally
from roughly 5:00 pm - 8:00 pm.  We have not yet set a program for the
rally, but we hope to include speakers from local organizations,
music/spoken word, and perhaps some open workshops.  There will also be
space for different organizations to have a table at the rally.  Groups
that want to have a table at the rally will be expected to contribute a
minimum of $50 towards expenses.  We will be using the money to offset
some of the costs of the march, including flyers, equipment, and other
fees.

MIRAc has also decided on some central slogans for the demonstration. Our
proposal is that the main slogan would be: "United on International
Workers' Day Since 1886/Unidos Desde 1886 en el Dia Internacional de los
Trabajadores." The four central demands that MIRAc has proposed are:
"Stop the Raids and Deportations/Alto a las Redadas y Deportaciones,"
"Immediate and Unconditional Legalization for All/ Legalizacion
Incondicional e Inmediata para Todos," "Pass the Employee Free Choice
Act/Si al Employee Free Choice Act,"Ô and "Drivers Licenses for
All/Licencias de Conducir para Todos."

I would like to personally invite you to attend our next May Day planning
meeting.  We welcome the participation of organizations, unions, and
individual community members.  It is only by involving the broader
community that our efforts to mobilize a large number of people can be
successful.

The next meeting will be held on:
April 8th, 2009 at 6:00 pm
Waite House
2529 13th Ave. S.
Minneapolis, MN 55404

Please feel free to contact me if you would like more information, if you
have any questions, or if you would like to discuss the proposal in more
detail.  You can send me an email or call me on my cell phone (see contact
info below).  Thank you for your time, and I hope to see you at our next
meeting!

In solidarity,
(Marco Davila) Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Coaltion
(maidaca85 [at] gmail.com) (612-702-5637)


--------5 of 17--------

From: Gabe Ormsby <gabeo [at] bitstream.net>
Subject: Amnesty Intl 4.08 7:30pm

AIUSA Group 640 (Saint Paul) meets Wednesday, April 8th, at 7:30 p.m. Mad
Hatter Teahouse, 943 West 7th Street, Saint Paul.

From shove001 [at] tc.umn.edu Wed Apr  8 01:28:39 2009
Date: Wed, 12 Nov 2008 11:54:49 -0600 (CST)
From: David Shove <shove001 [at] tc.umn.edu>
To: David Shove <shove001 [at] tc.umn.edu>
Subject: Thursday vigils 4:30pm- (fwd)


--------6 of 17--------

From: Greg and Sue Skog <family4peace [at] msn.com>
Subject: Eagan peace vigil 4.09 4:30pm

CANDLELIGHT PEACE VIGIL EVERY THURSDAY from 4:30-5:30pm on the Northwest
corner of Pilot Knob Road and Yankee Doodle Road in Eagan. We have signs
and candles. Say "NO to war!" The weekly vigil is sponsored by: Friends
south of the river speaking out against war.


--------7 of 17--------

From: EKalamboki [at] aol.com
Subject: Northtown vigil 4.09 5pm

NORTHTOWN Peace Vigil every Thursday 5-6pm, at the intersection of Co. Hwy
10 and University Ave NE (SE corner across from Denny's), in Blaine.

Communities situated near the Northtown Mall include: Blaine, Mounds View,
New Brighton, Roseville, Shoreview, Arden Hills, Spring Lake Park,
Fridley, and Coon Rapids.  We'll have extra signs.

For more information people can contact Evangelos Kalambokidis by phone or
email: (763)574-9615, ekalamboki [at] aol.com.


--------8 of 17--------

From: Lydia Howell <lydiahowell [at] visi.com>
From: Ginny Zawistowski <ginny.zawistowski [at] GMAIL.COM>
Subject: King Corn/film 4.09 5:30pm

The U of MN School of Public Health is hosting a film festival next week
(April 6 to 11) that is free and open to the public:
http://www.sph.umn.edu/filmfest09/

Of particular interest to this list might be the screening of King
Corn on Thursday, April 9th - if you can't make it the the Hamline
screening this week, here's another opportunity!

The screenings are at 5:30 pm each evening (except Friday April 11th -
the Family Fun Day events start at 10:30 am) at Mayo Memorial
Auditorium on the East Bank Campus (check out the website for
directions, parking info).


--------9 of 17--------

From: Eric Angell <eric-angell [at] riseup.net>
Subject: Dakota liberation 4.09 6pm

http://tc.indymedia.org/2009/apr/discussion-dakota-liberation-activistscholar-waziyatawin-st-kates

Waziyatawin (Angela Wilson), Ph.D., will discuss "What Does Justice Look
Like?" Thursday, April 9, 6 p.m. in Rauenhorst Hall, Coeur de Catherine on
the College's St. Paul campus. The event is free and open to the public.

A Wahpetunwan Dakota from the Pezihutazizi Otunwe (Yellow Medicine
Village) in southwestern Minnesota, she is an historian who studies how
settler societies have impacted Indigenous societies and how Indigenous
nations can recover their traditional values.

She currently holds the Canadian Research Chair in Indigenous Peoples in
the University of Victoria's Indigenous Governance Program in British
Columbia, Canada.

Her books include:
   - *What Does Justice Look Like? The Struggle for Liberation in Dakota
   Homeland* (2008);
   - *In the Footsteps of Our Ancestors* (2006) which won the 2007
   Independent Publisher's Silver Book Award for Adult Multicultural
   Non-fiction;
   - *Remember This!: Dakota Decolonization and the Eli Taylor Narratives*;
   - *Indigenizing the Academy: Transforming Scholarship and Empowering
   Communities*; and
   - *For Indigenous Eyes Only: A Decolonization Handbook*.

She received her Ph.D. in American history from Cornell University in 2000
and was on faculty in the Arizona State University's history department in
Phoenix for seven years.

There will be a reception from 5-6 p.m. prior to her presentation and a
book-signing will follow the question and answer period at 7:30 p.m.

The event is sponsored by the College of St. Catherine's Multicultural and
International Programs and Services (MIPS) office and Centers of Excellence.
For more information contact the MIPS office at 651-690-6784.

To order Waziyatawin's books from local publisher Living Justice Press,
visit http://www.livingjusticepress.org

For St. Kate's maps/directions:
http://minerva.stkate.edu/aboutus.nsf/pages/our_locations


--------10 of 17--------

From: "Smith, Lucia Wilkes" <Lucia.Smith [at] allina.com>
Subject: Pak/Afghan panel 4.09 7pm

This event is sponsored by "Eden Prairie Reads," which is the Public
Library, the City of E.P. and maybe a few other community groups.
Lucia

Pakistan & Afghanistan Panel Presentation -
April 9, 7:00 - 8:30 pm

Local Perspectives on Pakistan & Afghanistan Panel Presentation
Thursday, April 9
7:00 - 8:30 pm

Eden Prairie Library
565 Prairie Center Drive (by Eden Prairie Shopping Mall) Eden Prairie, MN
952-847-5375

Hear from community members Yusuf WazirZada, Ruth Aldrich, Faryal Khan,
Sumayya Hasmi and Shehla Mushtaq as they discuss their experiences of
growing up or working in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and their own responses
to the book, THREE CUPS OF TEA.  This will be a great chance to learn more
about Central Asia from a variety of perspectives, background and ages.


--------11 of 17--------

From: Sue Ann <mart1408 [at] umn.edu>
Subject: Full moon walk 4.09 7pm
, Thursday, April 9

Coldwater Full Moon Walk
Thursday, April 9, 2009
7 pm at Coldwater Spring
A Sacred Time & a Sacred Place
Passover & Maunday Thursday

Directions: From Hwy 55/Hiawatha in south Minneapolis, turn East (toward
the Mississippi) at 54th Street, take an immediate right (South) ˝-mile
past the parking meters, through the cul-de-sac and the gates. Follow the
curvy road left & then right down to the pond, next to the great willow
tree.

Sunset 7:51 pm - Moonrise 8:28 pm
www.friendsofcoldwater.org   info [at] friendsofcoldwater.org


--------12 of 17--------

The Democrats and the Afghan War
Meet the New Escalators
By NORMAN SOLOMON
April 6, 2009
CounterPunch

Top Democrats and many prominent supporters - with vocal agreement,
tactical quibbles or total silence - are assisting the escalation of the
U.S. war effort in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The predictable results will
include much more killing and destruction. Back home, on the political
front, the escalation will drive deep wedges into the Democratic Party.

The party has a large anti-war base, and that base will grow wider and
stronger among voters as the realities of the Obama war program become
more evident. The current backing or acceptance of the escalation from
liberal think tanks and some online activist groups will not be able to
prevent the growth of opposition among key voting blocs.

[I left the Dems over 10 years ago. If you're still in, you should leave
NOW - don't wait another year or two to "see what OBomber will do". Enuf
of this cheap hope that does nothing but make the evil grow. -ed]

In their eagerness to help the Obama presidency, many of its prominent
liberal supporters - whatever their private views on the escalation - are
willing to function as enablers of the expanded warfare. Many assume that
opposition would undermine the administration and play into the hands of
Republicans. But in the long run, going along with the escalation is not
helping Obama; by putting off the days of reckoning, the acceptance of the
escalation may actually help Obama destroy his own presidency.

Ideally, in 2009, Democratic lawmakers would see as role models the
senators who opposed the Vietnam War - first Wayne Morse and Ernest
Gruening, and then (years later) others including Eugene McCarthy and
Robert Kennedy. Earlier and stronger opposition from elected officials
could have saved countless lives. The dreams of the Great Society might
not have been crushed. And Richard Nixon might never have become
president.

Now, everyone has the potential to help challenge the escalation of the
Afghanistan-Pakistan war - on a collision course with heightened
disaster.

Over the weekend, the Sunday Times of London reported that U.S. drone
attacks along the Afghan-Pakistani border on Saturday killed "foreign
militants" and "women and children" - while Pakistani officials asserted
that "American drone attacks on the border . . . are causing a massive
humanitarian emergency". The newspaper says that "as many as 1 million
people have fled their homes in the Tribal Areas to escape attacks by the
unmanned spy planes as well as bombings by the Pakistani army".

This is standard catastrophic impact of a counterinsurgency war. In short,
as former Kennedy administration official William Polk spells out in his
recent book "Violent Politics," the key elements are in place for the U.S.
war in Afghanistan to fail on its own terms while heightening the death
and misery on a large scale.

Citing UN poverty data, a recent essay by Tom Hayden points out that in
Afghanistan and Pakistan "the levels of suffering are among the most
extreme in the world, and from suffering, from having nothing to live for,
comes the will to die for a cause". While the Washington spin machine
touts development aid, the humanitarian effort adds up to a few pennies
for each dollar going to the U.S. war effort.

A report from the Carnegie Endowment began this year with the stark
conclusion that "the only meaningful way to halt the insurgency's momentum
is to start withdrawing troops. The presence of foreign troops is the most
important element driving the resurgence of the Taliban". Hayden made the
same point when he wrote that "military occupation, particularly a surge
of U.S. troops into the Pashtun region in southern Afghanistan and
Pakistan, is the surest way to inflame nationalist resistance and greater
support for the Taliban".

Over the weekend, in his pitch for more NATO support, President Obama
tried to make the U.S. war goals seem circumscribed: "I want everybody to
understand that our focus is to defeat Al Qaeda". But there's no evidence
that Al Qaeda has a significant foothold in Afghanistan. That group long
since decamped to Pakistan.

In any event, the claim that a massive war is necessary to fight terrorism
is hardly new. Lest we forget: After George W. Bush could no longer cling
to his claims about WMDs in Iraq, he settled on the anti-terrorist
rationale for continuing the Iraq occupation.

Even among allies, the anti-terrorism rationale is not flying for a troop
buildup in Afghanistan. After Obama's latest appeal to the leaders of
NATO
countries, as the New York Times reported Sunday, "his calls for a more
lasting European troop increase for Afghanistan were politely brushed
aside".

Europe will provide no more than 5,000 new troops, and most of them just
for the Afghan pre-election period till late summer. In the words of the
Times: "Mr. Obama is raising the number of American troops this year to
about 68,000 from the current 38,000, which will significantly Americanize
the war".

For those already concerned about Obama's re-election prospects, such war
realities may seem faraway and relatively abstract. But escalation will
fracture his base inside the Democratic Party. If the president insists on
leading a party of war, then activists will educate, agitate and organize
to transform it into a party for peace. [Don't wait - start now. -ed]

The mirage of wise counterinsurgency has been re-conjured by the Obama
White House, echoing the "best and brightest*" from Democratic
administrations of the 1960s. But the party affiliation of the U.S.
president will make no difference to people far away who mourn the loss of
loved ones. And, whether in Afghanistan, Pakistan or the United States,
the president will be held to the astute standard that Barack Obama laid
out as he addressed unfriendly foreign leaders in his inaugural speech:
"People will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy".

Norman Solomon is the author of Made Love, Got War.
 [*The bossed and the blight-assed -ed]


--------13 of 17--------

This is Not the Time to Touch Entitlements in the Name of Fiscal
Responsibility
Hands Off Social Security
By DEAN BAKER
April 7, 2009
CounterPunch

As a result of incredible economic mismanagement and the greed and
incompetence of the financial industry, the country is in the worst
downturn since the Great Depression. In this collapse we have seen the
most massive intergenerational transfer in the history of the world.

Americans have lost more than $15 trillion in housing and stock wealth,
with the great bulk of the losses being incurred by people age 45 and
older. This is effectively a transfer to younger workers and those yet to
enter the labor force, because they will be able to buy into the stock
market and buy homes at close to half the price they would have paid just
two years ago.

What do our elites, ranging from editorial boards to former Commerce
secretary Pete Peterson, plan in response to this situation? At the same
time that they are handing trillions of dollars to the bankers who wrecked
the economy, they are proposing to cut Social Security in the name of
fiscal responsibility.

This plan is even more outrageous because workers have already paid for
their Social Security benefits. The Congressional Budget Office projects
that Social Security, by drawing down its trust fund, will be able to pay
benefits until the year 2049 with no changes whatsoever.

In effect, the cutters are proposing that the government default on the
bonds held by the Social Security trust fund: U.S. government bonds that
were purchased with money raised through the designated Social Security
tax.

It is truly incredible, and unbelievably galling, that anyone in a
position of responsibility would suggest defaulting on the government
bonds held by the Social Security trust fund at the precise moment that
the government is honoring trillions of dollars of bonds issued by private
banks.

While the government has no legal or moral obligations to pay off the
banks' debts to wealthy investors (who presumably understood the risks
they were taking), the Social Security bonds carry the full faith and
credit of the U.S. government.

It is understandable that people are angry. We have a government and an
elite that never stop looking for ways to take money from ordinary workers
and redistribute it upward to the richest people in the country.

[This is capitalism - ugly, mean, lying, cold, evil. How
gullible/dumb/masochistic do we have to be to keep it around while it
skwers us? Eat the rich. - ed]

Dean Baker is the co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy
Research (CEPR). He is the author of Plunder and Blunder: The Rise and
Fall of the Bubble Economy.


--------14 of 17--------

Some Thoughts about Socialism
by William Blum
Dissident Voice
April 5th, 2009

History is littered with post-crisis regulations. If there are undue
restrictions on the operations of businesses, they may view it to be their
job to get around them, and you sow the seeds of the next crisis.

- Liz Ann Sonders, chief investment analyst, CharlesSchwab & Co., a
leading US provider of investment services.1

And so it goes. Corporations, whether financial or not, strive to maximize
profit as inevitably as water seeks its own level. We've been trying to
"regulate" them since the 19th century. Or is it the 18th? Nothing helps
for long. You close one loophole and the slime oozes out of another hole.
Wall Street has not only an army of lawyers and accountants, but a horde
of mathematicians with advanced degrees searching for the perfect
equations to separate people from their money. After all the stimulus
money has come and gone, after all the speeches by our leaders condemning
greed and swearing to reforms, after the last congressional hearing
deploring the corporate executives to their faces, the boys of Wall
Street, shrugging off a few bruises, will resume churning out their
assortment of financial entities, documents, and packages that go by names
like hedge funds, derivatives, collateralized debt obligations, index
funds, credit default swaps, structured investment vehicles, subprime
mortgages, and many other pieces of paper with exotic names, for which, it
must be kept in mind, there had been no public need or strident demand.
Speculation, bonuses, and scotch will flow again, and the boys will be all
the wiser, perhaps shaken a bit that they're so reviled, but knowing
better now what to flaunt and what to disguise.

This is another reminder that communism or socialism have almost always
been given just one chance to work, if that much, while capitalism has
been given numerous chances to do so following its perennial fiascos.
Ralph Nader has observed: "Capitalism will never fail because socialism
will always be there to bail it out".

In the West, one of the most unfortunate results of the Cold War was that
70 years of anti-communist education and media stamped in people's minds a
lasting association between socialism and what the Soviet Union called
communism. Socialism meant a dictatorship, it meant Stalinist repression,
a suffocating "command economy," no freedom of enterprise, no freedom to
change jobs, few avenues for personal expression, and other similar truths
and untruths. This is a set of beliefs clung to even amongst many
Americans opposed to US foreign policy. No matter how bad the economy is,
Americans think, the only alternative available is something called
"communism," and they know how awful that is.

Adding to the purposeful confusion, the conservatives in England, for 30
years following the end of World War 2, filled the minds of the public
with the idea that the Labour Party was socialist, and when recession hit
(as it does regularly in capitalist countries) the public was then told,
and believed, that "socialism had failed".

Yet, ever since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, polls taken
in Russia have shown a nostalgia for the old system. In the latest
example, Russia Now, a Moscow publication that appears as a supplement in
the Washington Post, asked Russians: "What socio-economic system do you
favor?" The results were: "State planning and distribution": 58% - "Based
on private property and market relations": 28% - "Hard to say": 14%.2

In 1994, Mark Brzezinski (son of Zbigniew) was a Fulbright Scholar
teaching in Warsaw. He has written: "I asked my students to define
democracy. Expecting a discussion on individual liberties and
authentically elected institutions, I was surprised to hear my students
respond that to them, democracy means a government obligation to maintain
a certain standard of living and to provide health care, education and
housing for all. In other words, socialism".3

Many Americans cannot go along with the notion of a planned, centralized
society. To some extent it's the terminology that bothers them because
they were raised to equate a planned society with the worst excesses of
Stalinism. Okay, let's forget the scary labels; let's describe it as
people sitting down to discuss a particular serious societal problem, what
the available options there are to solve the problem, and what
institutions and forces in the society have the best access, experience,
and assets to deliver those options. So, the idea is to prepare these
institutions and forces to deal with the problem in a highly organized,
rational manner without having to worry about which corporation's profits
might be adversely affected, without relying on "the magic of the
marketplace". Now it happens that all this is usually called "planning"
and if the organization and planning stem from a government body it can be
called "centralized". There's no reason to assume that this has to result
in some kind of very authoritarian regime. All of us over a certain age -
individually and collectively - have learned a lot about such things from
the past. We know the warning signs; that's why the Bush administration's
authoritarianism was so early and so strongly condemned.

The overwhelming majority of people in the United States work for a
salary. They don't need to be motivated by the quest for profit. It's not
in our genes. Virtually everybody, if given the choice, would prefer to
work at jobs where the main motivations are to produce goods and services
that improve the quality of life of the society, to help others, and to
provide themselves with meaningful and satisfying work. It's not natural
to be primarily motivated by trying to win or steal "customers" from other
people, no holds barred, survival of the fittest or the most ruthless.

A major war can be the supreme test of a nation, a time when it's put
under the greatest stress. In World War 2, the US government commandeered
the auto manufacturers to make tanks and jeeps instead of private cars.
When a pressing need for an atom bomb was seen, Washington did not ask for
bids from the private sector; it created the Manhattan Project to do it
itself, with no concern for balance sheets or profit and loss statements.
Women and blacks were given skilled factory jobs they had been
traditionally denied. Hollywood was enlisted to make propaganda films.
Indeed, much of the nation's activities, including farming, manufacturing,
mining, communications, labor, education, and cultural undertakings were
in some fashion brought under new and significant government control, with
the war effort coming before private profit. In peacetime, we can think of
socialism as putting people before profit, with all the basics guaranteed
- health care, all education, decent housing, food, jobs. Those who swear
by free enterprise argue that the "socialism" of World War 2 was
instituted only because of the exigencies of the war. That's true, but it
doesn't alter the key point that it had been immediately recognized by the
government that the wasteful and inefficient capitalist system, always in
need of proper financial care and feeding, was no way to run a country
trying to win a war.

It's also no way to run a society of human beings with human needs. Most
Americans agree with this but are not consciously aware that they hold
such a belief. In 1987, nearly half of 1,004 Americans surveyed by the
Hearst press believed Karl Marx's aphorism: "From each according to his
ability, to each according to his need" was to be found in the US
Constitution.4

Along these lines, I've written an essay entitled: "The United States
invades, bombs, and kills for it, but do Americans really believe in free
enterprise?"5

I cannot describe in detail what every nut and bolt of my socialist system
would look like. That might appear rather pretentious on my part; most of
it would evolve through trial and error anyway; the important thing is
that the foundation  - the crucial factors in making the important
decisions - would rest on people's welfare and the common good coming
before profit. Humankind's desperate need to halt environmental
degradation regularly runs smack into the profit motive, as does the
American health-care system. It's more than a matter of ideology; it's a
matter of the quality of life, sustainability, and survival.


--------15 of 17-------

Venezuelan leader: 'Capitalism needs to go down'
By NASSER KARIMI
AP

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez ridiculed the G-20
summit's attempts to deal with the global financial meltdown, saying that
the "values of capitalism are in crisis" and capitalism "has to end."

Speaking to Venezuelan state television late Thursday, Chavez said the
United States and Britain are "the most guilty" for the financial crisis
sweeping the globe because of the financial model "they've been imposing
for years."

"It's impossible that capitalism can regulate the monster that is the
world financial system, it's impossible," Chavez said. "Capitalism needs
to go down. It has to end. And we must take a transitional road to a new
model that we call socialism."

The Venezuelan leader's comments came during a trip to Iran. In recent
years, Chavez and Iran's hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - both
well-known for their anti-U.S. rhetoric - have boosted economic and
political ties.

During Thursday's summit in London, leaders from the Group of 20
industrial and developing countries promised $1.1 trillion for lending to
poorer countries. They also vowed major efforts to clean up banks'
tattered balance sheets, get credit flowing again, shut down global tax
havens and tighten regula tion over hedge funds and other financial
high-flyers in the U.S. and elsewhere.

Chavez belittled the summit's efforts and said the International Monetary
Fund must be eliminated.

Chavez's own economic program to institute socialism in Venezuela could
slow as his country's oil-dependent economy suffers from falling crude
prices. Inflation there has soared above 30 percent, eroding Venezuelans'
salaries.

In his decade in power, Chavez has boosted state control over the economy
and spent heavily on social programs meant to increase his popularity.
[Might is not be possible he is doing it because it is right and humane?
The AP prefers to see him as a manipulator. -ed]

Chavez also said Thursday that he will travel to Japan in the coming days
to meet with the prime minister as well as business leaders and
intellectuals.

Copyright (C) 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.


--------16 of 17-------

Scientists find active 'super-thermite' in WTC dust
Filed by Joe Byrne
04/04/2009 @ 10:36 pm

A team of nine scientists have unearthed startling data from dust gathered
in the days and weeks after the World Trade Center towers collapsed on
9/11. They discovered that scattered throughout the dust samples were red
and gray chips of 'active thermitic material', or an un-reacted
pyrotechnic explosive.

Thermite is used in steel welding, fireworks shows, and hand grenades. It
is the combination of a metal powder and a metal oxide which produce a
reaction known for extremely high temperatures focused in a very small
area for a short period of time. The 'active thermitic material'
discovered in the World Trade Center dust was a combination of elemental
aluminum and iron oxide, and is a form of thermite known as
'nano-structured super-thermite'.

"These observations reminded us of nano-thermite fabricated at the
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and elsewhere; available papers
describe this material as an intimate mixture of UFG[Ultra- fine grain]
aluminum and iron oxide in nano-thermite composites to form pyrotechnics
or explosives. Commercially available thermite behaves as an incendiary
when ignited, but when the ingredients are ultra-fine grain and are
intimately mixed, this 'nano-thermite' reacts very rapidly, even
explosively, and is sometimes referred to as 'super-thermite'," the
report explains.

The full article in The Open Chemical Physics Journal can be found here.

Some of the authors of the paper have lost their jobs at universities and
chemistry labs for their outspoken breakdown of what happened at the World
Trade Center on 9/11. Kevin Ryan lost his job as a lab director after
writing a letter to the National Institute for Standards and
Technology(NIST was conducting an investigation into 9/11 at the time)
challenging the common theory that burning jet fuel weakened the steel
supports holding up the 110-story skyscrapers. Ryan claims that the owner
of his laboratory subsidiary "was the company that certified the steel
components used in the construction of the WTC buildings," according to
the South Bend Tribune. Dr. Steven E. Jones, a physicist at Brigham Young
University, presented a paper in 2005 discussing alternative theories to
the commonly accepted 'jet fuel' reasoning. In September 2006 he was
placed on paid administrative leave and his paper was removed from the BYU
database.

Jones has told Visibility911.com, "In short, the paper explodes the
official story that 'no evidence' exists for explosive/pyrotechnic
materials in the WTC buildings."

Parts of the report mention other studies being conducted by the
scientists that will come out soon.


--------17 of 17--------

 Rush Limbaugh peers in
 the mirror and snorts, Hot damn,
 I'm too big to fail!


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