Four More Years Of War.

The ever-accumulating case against the war in Afghanistan was bolstered this week by WikiLeaks's dissemination of over 70,000 previously secret reports documenting in vivid and unvarnished detail the brutality and futility of the American mission there. But even as the public's patience with the war in Afghanistan is growing shorter, the timeline for an American troop withdrawal appears to be growing longer. There are increasingly clear signs that President Obama's vow to start withdrawing American troops less than a year from now will be fulfilled through a technicality if at all, and that the real timeline for significant troop withdrawal -- barring a change in course -- now extends at least to 2014, if not far beyond.Link

It's not looking good.

Rep. Charles Rangel hoped a public policy center bearing his name would be his final legacy — and now, in disastrous fashion, it almost certainly will be. Rangel’s obsessive drive to win public and private funding for the institution at the City College of New York is at the center of a 13-count allegation that he broke House ethics rules and federal statutes governing behavior by public officials. The 41-page document offers a sweeping indictment of Rangel, painting the portrait of a legislator who abused his office to burnish his name, repeatedly failed to accurately account for his own income and assets and did not abide by the very tax laws he oversaw as the top Democrat on the powerful Ways and Means Committee.Link

Scott Horton Interviews Julian Assange.

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The rise and fall of Rand Paul..

Rand Paul and I are trying to remember why Harlan, Kentucky, might be famous. That's where Paul is driving me, on a coiling back road through the low green mountains of the state's southeastern corner, in his big black GMC Yukon festooned with RON PAUL 2008 and RAND PAUL 2010 stickers. Something about Harlan has lodged itself in my brain the way a shard of barbecue gets stuck in one's teeth, and I've asked Paul for help. "I don't know," he says in an elusive accent that's not quite southern and not quite not-southern. The town of Hazard is nearby, he notes: "It's famous for, like, The Dukes of Hazzard.".Link

Peter Shiff Million Dollar Money Bomb NOW!

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Nothing better to do.......Go on the View.

3,000 chemical barrels into China river.

BEIJING (AFP) – Authorities were scrambling on Thursday to recover 3,000 barrels full of hazardous chemicals that were washed into a major river in northeastern China by recent flooding. A total of 7,000 barrels were swept into the Songhua river in Jilin province on Wednesday following heavy rains, but most were empty, according to reports.However 2,500 barrels containing 510 tonnes of combustible, colourless chemicals and 500 loaded with solvents were washed into the river from two chemical plants near the city of Jilin, state-run Xinhua news agency said. At least 400 barrels had been recovered on Thursday, city officials told Xinhua.Link

1M gallons of oil may be in Mich. river.

EPA says 1 million gallons of oil may have spilled in Mich. river, governor criticizes cleanup. Federal officials now estimate that more than 1 million gallons of oil may have spilled into a major river in southern Michigan, and the governor is sharply criticizing clean-up efforts as "wholly inadequate." The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released the update Wednesday night, shortly after Gov. Jennifer Granholm lambasted attempts to contain the oil flowing down the Kalamazoo River. She warned of a "tragedy of historic proportions" if the oil reaches Lake Michigan, which is still at least 80 miles downstream from where oil has been seen.Link

The ‘new normal’..........

From the point of view of civil libertarians, the Obama administration has been an exercise in frustration, with every hopeful sign followed by failures to live up to its own promises. The ACLU has just issued a report (pdf), titled "Establishing a New Normal: National Security, Civil Liberties, and Human Rights Under the Obama Administration," which focuses on this pattern of inconsistency. "The administration has displayed a decidedly mixed record," explains ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romaro, "resulting, on a range of issues, in the very real danger that the Obama administration will institutionalize some of the most troublesome policies of the previous administration -- in essence, creating a troubling 'new normal.'".Link

Lost in Race

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$8.7B in Iraqi funds......missing.

BAGHDAD – A U.S. audit has found that the Pentagon cannot account for over 95 percent of $9.1 billion in Iraq reconstruction money, spotlighting Iraqi complaints that there is little to show for the massive funds pumped into their cash-strapped, war-ravaged nation. The $8.7 billion in question was Iraqi money managed by the Pentagon, not part of the $53 billion that Congress has allocated for rebuilding. It's cash that Iraq, which relies on volatile oil revenues to fuel its spending, can ill afford to lose. "Iraq should take legal action to get back this huge amount of money," said Sabah al-Saedi, chairman of the Parliamentary Integrity Committee. The money "should be spent for rebuilding the country and providing services for this poor nation."Link

I enjoy crushing bastards.

The leak of 90,000 secret military files has emboldened critics of the war in Afghanistan, who raised fresh questions Tuesday about the viability of the increasingly unpopular US-led campaign. Meanwhile, the activist who still has another 15,000 documents that he plans to release -- after editing out names if there is "a reasonable chance of harm occurring to the innocent" -- is relishing the spotlight, bragging to a German magazine that he enjoys "crushing bastards." "In a SPIEGEL interview, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, 39, discusses his decision to publish the Afghanistan war logs, the difficult balance between the public interest and the need for state secrets and why he believes people who wage war are more dangerous than him,".Link

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Evidence of War Crimes in Afghan Docs.

(CBS/AP) WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said Monday he believes there is evidence of war crimes in the thousands of pages of leaked U.S. military documents relating to the war in Afghanistan. The remarks came after WikiLeaks, a whistle-blowing group, posted some 91,000 classified U.S. military records over the past six years about the war online, including unreported incidents of Afghan civilian killings and covert operations against Taliban figures. The White House, Britain and Pakistan have all condemned the release of the documents, one of the largest unauthorized disclosures in military history.Link

"Every man got to legalize it, and don't criticize it," Reggae legend Peter Tosh sang in 1976. While US support for marijuana legalization may never hit the "every man" level -- at least not publicly, that is -- two recent national polls definitely show that it is growing higher and higher. "Americans are evenly divided over whether marijuana should be legalized in the United States, but most expect it to happen within the next decade," a Rasmussen Reports press release states.Link

Get US troops out of Pakistan......

Two US lawmakers -- a Republican and a Democrat -- proposed a bill this week demanding the withdrawal of all US troops in Pakistan, where they are conducting covert operations against militants. "We have known that US forces have been operating in secret inside the territories of Pakistan without congressional approval," Democratic Representative Dennis Kucinich said Friday, pointing to reports the United States was stepping up its presence there. He said the House of Representatives was expected to take up the resolution next week. The measure was introduced late Thursday.Link

Tribute to Escher in Barcelona

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This is our Foreign Policy.

"unusually uncertain"

WASHINGTON – Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress Wednesday the economic outlook remains "unusually uncertain," and the central bank is ready to take new steps to keep the recovery alive if the economy worsens. Testifying before the Senate Banking Committee, Bernanke also said record low interest rates are still needed to bolster the economy. He repeated a pledge to keep them there for an "extended period." Bernanke downplayed the odds that the economy will slide back into a "double-dip" recession. But he acknowledged the economy is fragile.Link

The Financial Overhaul Bill.

President Barack Obama today signs into law the biggest overhaul of the U.S. financial-regulatory system since the Great Depression, calling it “the strongest consumer financial protections in history.” In excerpts of Obama’s remarks released by the White House ahead of a signing ceremony, the president praised the law’s creation of a consumer protection bureau that will write and enforce rules for banks on credit card and mortgage lending. “These protections will be enforced by a new consumer watchdog with just one job: looking out for people -- not big banks, not lenders, not investment houses,” he said according to the prepared remarks. “That’s not just good for consumers; that’s good for the economy.”.Link

Thanks B.P.

Feds Let BP Keep Cap Closed for Another Day.

(NEW ORLEANS) — The federal government Monday allowed BP to keep the cap shut tight on its busted Gulf of Mexico oil well for another day despite a seep in the sea floor after the company promised to watch closely for signs of new leaks underground, settling for the moment a rift between BP and the government. The Obama administration's point man for the spill, retired Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, said early Monday that government scientists had gotten the answers they wanted about how BP is monitoring the seabed around the mile-deep well, which has stopped gushing oil into the water since the experimental cap was closed Thursday.Link

How Legal Pot Could Harm the Cartels.

So far, no modern country has ever legalized marijuana production—not even the Netherlands. Yet with heavy drug-related violence plaguing the U.S.-Mexican border, some analysts and policymakers now say that America should legalize weed in order to reduce the power of Mexico’s drug cartels. Marijuana carries the least amount of overhead cost for many of the cartels and provides some of their cash flow for buying guns and influence. Estimates vary, but analysts say pot accounts for somewhere in the range of 20 to 50 percent of the cartels’ profits. But that could soon change with competition from El Norte: California has a proposition set for the November ballot—on which voters are roughly split—that would legalize the drug’s domestic production and sale. If the measure passes, says a recent analysis by the RAND Corporation, California could become a major supplier of the drug to the rest of the U.S. That, according to George W. Grayson, a professor of government at William & Mary, “would hurt the cartels badly.” RAND estimates that it could reduce the drug’s pretax price by more than 80 percent.Link

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Washington once again caved to Wall Street.

The US Senate voted Thursday to send President Barack Obama the most sweeping rewrite of Wall Street rules since the Great Depression of the 1930s, handing him a historic political win. The bill passed 60-39. However, a top Democratic senator who voted "no" is arguing that "Washington once again caved to Wall Street." Lawmakers voted 60-38 to end a year of often bitter partisan debate on the 2,300-page measure and set the stage for a final passage ballot expected shortly after a last procedural test at 2:00 pm. (1800 GMT).Link

Lets hope this is true.

BP engineers Thursday stopped oil flowing into the Gulf of Mexico for the first time since April as they shut all valves on a new cap placed on top of a fractured wellhead, a BP official said. "It is good to see no oil going into the Gulf of Mexico," said senior vice president Kent Wells, but he cautioned: "We are just starting the test." He said the oil flow stopped as the last of three valves on a huge capping stack was shut at around 2:25 (1925 GMT) Thursday, but engineers were keeping a close eye on the operation to see whether any oil began leaking again.Link

Sarah Palin likes government too.

(CNN) -- During a speech at an event called "Freedom Fest," former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin warned Tea Party activists that while government spending was a bad thing, conservatives should not go too far and start calling for reductions in the military budget. While Palin told the crowd in Norfolk, Virginia, "Something has to be done urgently to stop the out-of-control Obama-Reid-Pelosi spending machine," she also told them, "We must make sure, however, that we do nothing to undermine the effectiveness of our military." Palin's speech touched on a historic problem for the conservative movement. Ever since conservatives embraced a hawkish stance toward national security policy in the early Cold War in the late 1940s and started to challenge Democrats for not being tough enough, national security has always been the poison pill for anti-government conservatism.Link

Undercover Karaoke with Jewel from Jewel

Please be capped.....

Trashing Obama's Economic Team.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke “is a math teacher, he’s not a central banker,” former White House Budget Director David Stockman scoffs. “He is so caught up in his equations that I think he’s extremely dangerous—the worst Fed chairman we’ve ever had.” In the flat, dry accents of the Michigan farm boy he once was, Stockman tells me: “How can he believe that stimulating more credit creation and more borrowing can possibly solve the problem of a housing sector that’s drowning in debt and a federal government that’s on the edge of insolvency?.Link

It read: "President Ron Paul 2012."

Des Moines, Iowa (CNN) -- When Rep. Ron Paul walked into Hy-Vee Hall last month, a single blue sign with a simple message was placed near the escalator that took him upstairs to a fundraiser attended by 300 Republican activists. It read: "President Ron Paul 2012." The sign was symbolic in many ways: Even as Iowa Republicans are focused on midterm elections, the 2012 presidential contest is not far from their minds. And it was just three years ago that Paul did not receive an invitation to participate in a presidential candidate forum held in this very building.Link

Fed to GSEs – Put it on the Balance Sheet!

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30 new episodes.

REVIEWniverse has exclusively learned from an anonymous source that Mike Judge is currently outlining 30 new episodes of his iconic animated comedy Beavis and Butt-Head for its native network. The source conceded that plans for actual broadcast are not yet cemented, or even a given, but confirmed that the King of the Hill/Office Space/Idiocracy maestro is definitely in the midst of writing new B and B material with the hopes of a full-throttle return. Even better news for fans is that, should this come to pass, Judge plans on retaining the show's original ghetto-tech aesthetic, right down to the faded color palatte. The source also reveals that the Extract director intends on keeping B and B's format identical to its original sketch-videos-sketch incarnation, but with more contemporary music clips for the cartoon slacker-duo to skewer.Link

The Rules for Shooting Back?

When are U.S. forces in Afghanistan allowed to shoot back when they come under attack? An episode last month illustrates the quandary American troops face. In early June, on the southern edge of Kandahar city, a small Army convoy drove into a nighttime ambush.Link

A 2012 run?.....

Des Moines, Iowa (CNN) -- When Rep. Ron Paul walked into Hy-Vee Hall last month, a single blue sign with a simple message was placed near the escalator that took him upstairs to a fundraiser attended by 300 Republican activists. It read: "President Ron Paul 2012." The sign was symbolic in many ways: Even as Iowa Republicans are focused on midterm elections, the 2012 presidential contest is not far from their minds. And it was just three years ago that Paul did not receive an invitation to participate in a presidential candidate forum held in this very building.Link

Wish You Weren't Here

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It gets worse.

More than 27,000 abandoned oil and gas wells lurk in the hard rock beneath the Gulf of Mexico, an environmental minefield that has been ignored for decades. No one — not industry, not government — is checking to see if they are leaking, an Associated Press investigation shows. The oldest of these wells were abandoned in the late 1940s, raising the prospect that many deteriorating sealing jobs are already failing. The AP investigation uncovered particular concern with 3,500 of the neglected wells — those characterized in federal government records as "temporarily abandoned.".Link

So Sick.

A herd of Idiots.

The BP/Government police state.

Last week, I interviewed Mother Jones' Mac McClelland, who has been covering the BP oil spill in the Gulf since the first day it happened. She detailed how local police and federal officials work with BP to harass, impede, interrogate and even detain journalists who are covering the impact of the spill and the clean-up efforts. She documented one incident which was particularly chilling of an activist who -- after being told by a local police officer to stop filming a BP facility because "BP didn't want him filming" -- was then pulled over after he left by that officer so he could be interrogated by a BP security official. McClelland also described how BP has virtually bought entire Police Departments which now do its bidding: "One parish has 57 extra shifts per week that they are devoting entirely to, basically, BP security detail, and BP is paying the sheriff's office.".Link

Does Israel Make Us Safer?

Israel just announced it has loosened Gaza blockade rules to allow in consumer goods and Turkey is demanding an apology for the flotilla raid. As Obama and Netanyahu await tomorrow's meeting, historian Thaddeus Russell argues that it's time to ask if the country makes Americans safer—even if the answer makes everyone very uncomfortable. When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits the White House Tuesday, President Obama will have the chance to be the first American president since the founding of Israel to ask The Question.Link

I want Nutmeg.

Afghan aid and Dubai villas.

You already might have heard that it costs the United States $1 million for each solider per year in Afghanistan, to cover the cost of the soldiers' benefits, troop transports and other material. What you might not have heard is that your hard earned taxpayer dollars are also being used to buy well-connected Afghans posh villas in Dubai. Der Spiegel remarks curtly, "Amid concerns that the money could be the result of corruption, American politicians have temporarily cut off aid to the Afghan government." The German daily adds.Link

Steele Crazy After All These Years

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