26 Dems

Monday, August 9, 2010

COUNTDOWN TO ZERO TUCSON OPENING, AUGUST 20, EL Con Century 20 Theaters

Demand Zero

COUNTDOWN TO ZERO traces the history of the atomic bomb from its origins to the present state of global affairs: nine nations possess nuclear weapons capabilities with others racing to join them, with the world held in a delicate balance that could be shattered by an act of terrorism, failed diplomacy, or a simple accident. Written and directed by acclaimed documentarian Lucy Walker (Devil’s Playground, Blindsight), the film features an array of important international statesmen, including Jimmy Carter, Mikhail Gorbachev, Pervez Musharraf and Tony Blair. Magnolia Pictures is releasing the film in North America; HISTORY™ has North American broadcast rights. The film was produced by Academy Award® winner and 2009 nominee Lawrence Bender (Inglourious Basterds, An Inconvenient Truth) and developed, financed and executive produced by Participant Media, together with World Security Institute.

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Saturday, August 7, 2010

FDR's Grandson Debunks "Mythology of Fear" About Social Security

By karoli
Crooks and Liars
Saturday Aug 07, 2010

The Best Story You'll Read Today

26Dems Editorial Comment:

This is my tribute to Estelle Manorek, mother of my dear friend Andrea D'Alessandro, Democratic candidate for the Arizona House of Representatives from LD 30 who passed away today.

Andrea's mom never had a chance to go to high school, yet she instilled in her daughter the values of democracy, education, patriotism, optimism, joy of learning and the importance of hard work and dedication to high achievement.

Andrea is a strong person who will never flinch from bullies. Her mom will always be behind her 100% reminding all of us of why we must work very hard to elect all of our true champions for education this November.

My heartfelt condolences to you, Andrea,

Sandra Spangler

Send condolence messages to: Andrea for Arizona, PO BOX 945, Green Valley, AZ 85622

WATCH THE VIDEO

READ the Article. that appeared at NJ.com February 18, 2009

Reposted from Blog For Arizona
By David Safier
February 20, 2009

The headline promises a whole lot, but I'll tell you what. If you read a better story today, send it to me, because I want to read it too.

The story is about a 90 year old woman named Estelle Manorek who lives in New Jersey. She had never gone to high school, until this week.

You have to watch the video. You can also read the article that goes with it.

The local angle is, she's Andrea Dalessandro's mother. If you don't know Andrea, she ran -- and ran, and ran -- for LD-30 state rep last election and lost in a "safe Republican district," pulling more votes than anyone imagined was possible for a Dem in LD-30.

Financial circumstances prevented Estelle from attending high school, not lack of ability. According to Andrea, "My mother graduated first in her 8th grade class at St. Anthony's School in Jersey City, NJ." Her skills and interests? "She's bilingual, a voracious reader and opera fan. She went to the Metropolitan Opera House once with me and was able to discuss libretto with other attendees."

The next time anyone knocks our public education system, think about the fact that it would be virtually impossible for a woman like Estelle not to attend high school today. When she was high school age in the 1930s, only about 30-40% of the kids attended high school. Today it's in the 80% range.

If anyone says to you, "Back then, kids knew how to behave in school, unlike today," ask them if today's high school kids would be better behaved if 50% of them weren't in school. We have never attempted to educate as many people as we do today. Never. We have this idealistic vision of universal education, and naturally we're having all kinds of problems trying to achieve it.

Anyone want to go back to the days when Estelle Manorek didn't go to school?

KUAT Democratic Senate Candidate Debate

HORIZON 8 KAET THIRD Debate Democratic U.S. Senate Candidates

Ending the Nuclear Threat

by Robert Dodge
Common Dreams
August 6, 2010

Sixty five years ago this week, the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were destroyed in a flash. Instantly the nuclear bombs that caused those flashes killed over 200 thousand people with scores of thousands more dying in the subsequent days and years resulting from those bombs. A flash that forever changed our world in ways we still struggle with today.

Today we live in a world with over 23,000 nuclear bombs wired to destroy life many times over. These weapons have the combined firepower of over 130,000 Hiroshimas. Their use either by accident, miscalculation or intention would result in the greatest public health threat to our communities, nation and world.

The threat is real. In fact, last month the city of Los Angeles held the largest disaster preparedness exercise in its history, simulating the detonation of a 10 kiloton device in L.A. This exercise involved more than 88 city or town jurisdictions and 200 special districts. In my own community 65 miles to the north, our hospitals were also involved in this drill with decontamination and triage centers set up.

Such an explosion would result in 130,000 blast-related injuries, 122,000 burn injuries, 66,000 blast and burn injuries, 49,000 severe burn injuries requiring extensive hospitalization and 23,000 injuries to the head, thorax, abdomen and extremities. These tremendous numbers would be impossible to care for in the already stressed medical facilities of L.A. County which has only 13 trauma care centers with 7,500 beds. In the entire U.S. there are only 1500 burn beds with 300 – 500 available on any given day.

Should such an event happen, as a physician, I would be expected to give care – yet there would be precious little I would be able to do to help. Even if every surviving emergency responder performed exactly as they were trained, the loss of life and human suffering, the effect on the environment and economy would be enormous and likely insurmountable.

The fact that such an event has not happened is not a result of complex deterrence systems. Such systems are known to fail – witness the recent BP oil spill with all it’s fail safe measures. No, the fact that a nuclear explosion has not occurred is due more to sheer luck. How long are we willing to rely on luck to hold out?

Faced with the magnitude of the destructive power of these weapons it is easy to become paralyzed. The very existence of these weapons with massive global stockpiles is itself a symptom of fear. This misguided thinking has resulted in well intended though dangerous calls to spend billions of dollars to modernize our nuclear weapons stockpiles, and to build protective defense shields that would be easily overcome and would provide no defense against our greatest vulnerability--that of a nuclear device smuggled into our country. These calls further hamper our greatest efforts to eliminate these weapons.

Einstein said it best, “the unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our thinking and thus we drift toward unparalleled catastrophe.” We must change our thinking, reverse the drift.

Indeed, a nuclear explosion of any size represents the greatest public health threat. As physicians who deal with public health threats from TB, cholera, AIDS to polio and whooping cough, we know the only rational goal must be prevention. We must prevent what we cannot cure.

Fortunately, we are at a time of unprecedented opportunity to create a world free of nuclear weapons. Governments around the world are realizing the will of the people. The urgent need for action is now. We must make our voices heard. Do not assume that someone else will take care of things.

Next month the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee is scheduled to vote on the New Strategic Arms Reduction (Treaty) Committee signed by the U.S. and Russia. Thereafter the entire Senate must ratify the treaty with 67 votes needed. In the months ahead the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty will be considered which would globally ban all nuclear tests. At 65 years, it is time to mandatorily retire nuclear weapons. This is not a partisan issue, it is a survival issue.

Robert Dodge, M.D., is co-chair of Citizens for Peaceful Resolutions (www.c-p-r.net), and Physicians for Social Responsibility Los Angeles, Board Member, ( www.psrla.org).

What Social Security Report Says vs. What They Tell You It Says

By Dave Johnson
Fellow, Campaign for American's Future
Huffington Post
August 5, 2010

This post originally appeared at Campaign for America's Future (CAF) at their Blog for OurFuture. I am a Fellow with CAF.

The Social Security and Medicare Boards of Trustees today released their report on the Status of the Social Security and Medicare Programs. Here is what it says:

Social Security Just Fine Until At Least 2037

The summary of the report says, "The financial outlook for Social Security is little changed from last year. The short term outlook is worsened by a deeper recession than was projected last year, but the overall 75-year outlook is nevertheless somewhat improved..." and is otherwise fine until at least 2037 with no changes.

It is just fine forever, in fact, if we do something simple like raise the "cap" on earnings that are taxed to pay for the program. (That's right, when you make more than a certain income level you stop paying the tax!) Compare that to the the military budget. We spend more than $1 trillion on military and related programs each year -- more than every other country combined -- and unlike Social Security that is completely "unfunded," and adds to the deficit.

Medicare Outlook Improved Substantially

The report also says, "The outlook for Medicare has improved substantially because of program changes made in the [Health Care Reform Bill]"

Those Are The Facts

Those are the simple facts: everything is fine. Everything will be fine. There are some things that should be changed to make them even more OK than they are. They are good programs that demonstrate that government works.

So What's The Problem?

The Social Security program collects money via the "payroll tax." Much, much more money -- trillions -- has been collected than needed to be paid out to cover the coming retirement of the "baby boomers," and the extra -- the "trust fund" -- was invested in US Treasury Bonds.

Under Reagan and then both Bushes that money was borrowed from the trust fund and used to give huge tax cuts to the wealthy. (Clinton was paying it back but Bush II cut taxes again for the wealthy.) Now those boomers are beginning to retire, and the trust fund money that was borrowed and given out to the rich is needed back to cover their retirement. The obvious solution is to get the money from where the money went. But those who it went to are trying to stop the obvious from happening. They say we should cut benefits, make us retire at 70, anything to keep them from paying back what is owed to the retirees.

Oh, and there is another conservative complaint about Social Security. Social Security is very successful and popular, and is a constant, living proof that government of the people, by the people and for the people works and works really well. Among a certain crowd, that just can't be allowed to stand.

So now, let the anti-tax, anti-government conservative bamboozlement begin.

Let The Bamboozlement Begin

The anti-government conservatives are using several approaches to undermine public confidence in the program (and therefore government). MoveOn.org has a "Top 5 Social Security Myths" page up that is worth looking at.

Myth: Social Security is going broke.
Myth: We have to raise the retirement age because people are living longer.
Myth: Benefit cuts are the only way to fix Social Security.
Myth: The Social Security Trust Fund has been raided and is full of IOUs.
Myth: Social Security adds to the deficit.

Please go to the website to learn the truth about these myths. And please answer with those facts when you hear people spreading these myths.

Let's see how the conservatives are doing at spreading myths today, and how the mainstream media covers it:

Continue reading here.

Monday, July 26, 2010

Facts, Not Fear

By John Dougherty,
Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate, Arizona
Posted: July 21, 2010 11:13 AM

On the road to the November election, Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer continues to see an illegal alien under every bush. This is the path she has chosen and this is the path from which she will not stray.

Brewer announced she is granting $10 million in federal stimulus funds to Arizona law enforcers so they can fight crime caused by illegal immigrants.

In this overheated political environment, this seems like a prudent move. Trouble is, it's well established that border crime and the apprehensions of illegals have been on a steady decline. These are facts Brewer hopes you ignore.

Thanks to leaders like Brewer, the police state ossifying along the border will continue to grow. Adding insult to injury, much of the $10 million will be spent on SUVs.

That money would have been better used to lure alternative-energy businesses, to help residents convert to sustainable energy sources, to help school districts facing teacher layoffs.

The Washington Post is in the midst of a blockbuster series that attempts to quantify the unbridled growth of our security apparatus. This series illustrates that billions of dollars are being wasted in the name of security -- including border security-- with a burgeoning expansion of law enforcement, an alphabet soup of spy agencies, too many private contractors to count.

More than 850,000 people now have top-secret security clearance. That's more than the populations of five U.S. states -- Alaska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming and Vermont.

We throw ever more of our dwindling resources at the Security Industrial Complex, which has become a self-perpetuating machine. The larger it grows, the more it demands, and politicians like Brewer obediently feed it. Redundancies beget redundancies -- more money for more gadgets, more gas-guzzlers, more National Guard troops to militarize the border -- and still the root causes of our problems remain unaddressed.

Continue reading here.

6 Reasons Nuclear Energy Advocate Stewart Brand Is Wrong

By Harvey Wasserman
Alternet
July 25, 2010

Nuclear energy is a Dark Age technology, defined by unsustainable costs, inefficiencies, eco-destruction, radiation releases and much more.

Stewart Brand has become a poster boy for a "nuclear renaissance" that has just suffered a quiet but stunning defeat. Despite $645 million spent in lobbying over the past decade, the reactor industry has thus far failed to gouge out major new taxpayer funding for new commercial reactors.

In an exceedingly complex series of twists and turns, no legislation now pending in Congress contains firm commitments to the tens of billions reactor builders have been demanding. They could still come by the end of the session. But the radioactive cake walk many expected the industry to take through the budget process has thus far failed to happen.

The full story is excruciatingly complicated. But the core reasons are simple: atomic power can't compete, and makes global warming worse.

In support of this failed 20th Century technology, the industry has enlisted a 20th Century retro-hero, Stewart Brand. Back in the 1960s Brand published the Whole Earth Catalog. Four decades later, that cachet has brought him media access for his advocacy of corporate technologies like genetically modified foods and geo-engineering.....and, of course, nuclear energy.

In response to a cover interview in Marin County's Pacific Sun, I wrote the following to explain why Stewart is wrong wrong wrong:

Stewart Brand now seems to equate "science" with a tragic and dangerous corporate agenda. The technologies for which he argues--nuclear power, "clean" coal, genetically modified crops, etc.--can be very profitable for big corporations, but carry huge risks for the rest of us. In too many instances, tangible damage has already been done, and more is clearly threatened.

If there is a warning light for what Stewart advocates, it is the Deepwater Horizon disaster, which much of the oil industry said (like Three Mile Island and Chernobyl) was "impossible." Then it happened. The $75 million liability limit protecting BP should be ample warning that any technology with a legal liability limit (like nuclear power) cannot be tolerated.

Continue reading here.

Sunday, July 25, 2010

No to Oligarchy

by Bernie Sanders, U.S. Senator VT (I)
Commondreams
July 24, 2010

The American people are hurting. As a result of the greed, recklessness and illegal behavior on Wall Street, millions of Americans have lost their jobs, homes, life savings and their ability to get a higher education. Today, some 22 percent of our children live in poverty, and millions more have become dependent on food stamps for their food.

And while the Great Wall Street Recession has devastated the middle class, the truth is that working families have been experiencing a decline for decades. During the Bush years alone, from 2000-2008, median family income dropped by nearly $2,200 and millions lost their health insurance. Today, because of stagnating wages and higher costs for basic necessities, the average two-wage-earner family has less disposable income than a one-wage-earner family did a generation ago. The average American today is underpaid, overworked and stressed out as to what the future will bring for his or her children. For many, the American dream has become a nightmare.

But, not everybody is hurting. While the middle class disappears and poverty increases the wealthiest people in our country are not only doing extremely well, they are using their wealth and political power to protect and expand their very privileged status at the expense of everyone else. This upper-crust of extremely wealthy families are hell-bent on destroying the democratic vision of a strong middle-class which has made the United States the envy of the world. In its place they are determined to create an oligarchy in which a small number of families control the economic and political life of our country.

The 400 richest families in America, who saw their wealth increase by some $400 billion during the Bush years, have now accumulated $1.27 trillion in wealth. Four hundred families! During the last 15 years, while these enormously rich people became much richer their effective tax rates were slashed almost in half. While the highest paid 400 Americans had an average income of $345 million in 2007, as a result of Bush tax policy they now pay an effective tax rate of 16.6 percent, the lowest on record.

Last year, the top 25 hedge fund managers made a combined $25 billion but because of tax policy their lobbyists helped write, they pay a lower effective tax rate than many teachers, nurses, and police officers. As a result of tax havens in the Cayman Islands, Bermuda and elsewhere, the wealthy and large corporations are evading some $100 billion a year in U.S. taxes. Warren Buffett, one of the richest people on earth, has often commented that he pays a lower effective tax rate than his secretary.

But it's not just wealthy individuals who grotesquely manipulate the system for their benefit. It's the multi-national corporations they own and control. In 2009, Exxon Mobil, the most profitable corporation in history made $19 billion in profits and not only paid no federal income tax -- they actually received a $156 million refund from the government. In 2005, one out of every four large corporations in the United States paid no federal income taxes while earning $1.1 trillion in revenue.

Continue reading here.