Sunday News shows

Here's a song that I wrote a couple years ago and still play regularly. I think it is appropriate for the news shows today:

WHAT SHALL I WORRY ABOUT TODAY
By Mark Donham

What shall I worry about today, ID theft or gettin' blown away?
Global warming or football scores? How about never ending wars?

I wake up, 6 am, turn on the news,
Today, just like yesterday, I got the too much bad news blues
Too much bad news, blows my fuse

On the couch at my therapist, she advises that I find bliss
I ask how, she says, "good luck," and I get a bill for 200 bucks

Do I need a gun or should I run, deep into a cave
But Osama may be in there, or even a bear,
Is there anywhere left to be saved, to be safe,
Dangerous caves!

What shall I worry about today
Worry about worryin' too much, I'd say
I'm gonna take me a walk outside
Might as well, ain't no place to hide
and nows the time, while I'm still alive.

McLaughlin Group this evening

The most interesting thing in my opinion about their show tonight was Mort Zuckerman, not my most favorite commentor, saying what few will say - that our economy is still on the edge of a great precipice. He also said that it seemed inevitable that interest rates would be going up, and that was probably going to push the economy off the edge. 

Although I don't agree with Zuckerman about much, I do pretty much agree with him about this. The only other side of the coin is that people will move money out of the stock market into CDs which will bring more return. That isn't necessarily a bad thing. But like all penny pitching games, those on the bottom of the ladder will lose.

Crazy things going on/Radiation and Libya

So radioactivity from the Japan nuclear mess is raining down on us from. Oh yeah, that's just in addition to the "natural" radiation we are being exposed to all the time, right? And it's not dangerous. Well, I'm not so sure. 

There are different kinds of radiation. For example there are alpha, beta, and gamma rays. Each of those kinds of radiation has their own characteristics. For example, some penetrate matter and others don't. And the elements don't throw off exactly the same kind of particles and they throw them off at widely varying rates. They also have widely varying "half-lives" which is the time it takes for them to throw off enough particles to be to half of it's previous state.

Once a radiation particle gets in you, it stays as long as it is in existence, throwing off particles. A radiation particle can get in you through the air you breathe, the food you eat, or even through a cut or wound. Once it is in you, even if itsn't a particle that can penetrate a body from the outside, it can still damage parts of cells. 

And the "risk" (I hate using that word, it's such a system word) is cumulative. Once you have been exposed to radiation, it doesn't just disappear. So while the governments say, "there's no immediate danger," that may be true, but there is danger down the road, and they aren't talking about that.

And Obama's escapade into Libya has bogged down. They are having to defend against charges that they have killed civilians, and it hasn't slowed down Khaddafi's army in the long run. What's Obama going to do now?

Sunday News Shows

Meet the Press stole the show today. Not only did it start with an interview with Secs. Clinton and Gates, but had a round table with some heavy hitting reporters, including Ted Koppel, Bob Woodward, Tom Ricks, and Savannah Guthrie. 

Gates made the headline when he responded to David Gregory's question whether or not Libya was in the U.S.'s "vital interests" and he said no, that it wasn't a "vital interest" but that we did have an interest in it just the same. Sec. Clinton jumped in and they both did give what I thought was some insight into what is driving this. 

What I heard them say was that we had gone to NATO and asked for help in Afghanistan and had gotten some help. Now some of the NATO countries, particularly France and Britain had more significant interest in Libya and came to NATO asking for help, and the U.S. was sort of obligated to help them. I wonder if Obama will say that in his speech tomorrow?

Ted Koppel said that the question that hasn't been answered is "why Libya?" He rattled off a list of situations either ongoing or in the recent past where large numbers of people were killed in political violence in countries where we did nothing. So, there has to be a reason why all of a sudden we chose Libya to use this kind of military force, but Obama hasn't stated that yet. 

Woodward said that ultimately presidential election politics are playing a major role in Obama's decisionmaking. Ricks said that the military really isn't into doing this in Libya, and Savanah Guthrie said that she thought that the overall political upheaval in the middle east and Obama trying to somewhat stay relevant in all of that is driving what he is doing. They all made a lot of good points, and no one said that Obama was right on and that everything was going to turn out groovy. 

But the funniest part of Meet the Press was when Savanah Guthrie, the only female on the panel, shocked the males by supposedly quoting Pres. Obama saying in a meeting discussing Libya that the situation was a "turd sandwich." When Bob Woodward's turn came to comment, he couldn't even say the word "turd" on the air, instead refering to the "T sandwich." Funny, the boys got out machoed by Guthrie. 

Kristi says that a "tea sandwich" is a small sandwich that is served with tea. There's a big difference between a turd sandwich and a T sandwich. Not sure what Woodward was trying to say there. 

Several of the commentators said that Obama had violated the consitution by failing to properly consult with congress. Dennis Kuchinich was interviewed and said that Obama may get a primary challenge from the left. But no one believed that Obama would get impeached for this. 

Obama uses major speeches to his advantage. He has an important one tomorrow. We'll see if he can turn the slide of public support for his actions in Libya around. If I am any test, I am going to be very hard to convince.

McCracken County Fiscal Court zoning commission approves coal terminal and coal to jet fuel facility

Kristi attended the McCracken County, Kentucky, fiscal court zoning commission hearing tonight where they were considering an application for a zoning change for some rural land in the Ohio River bottoms west of Paducah. Right across from Harrah's casino and hotel complex in Metropolis, Illinois.

The zoning change was from residential to heavy industrial. Yeah, that's a big change. They want to approve a new barge to rail coal terminal on the Ohio River so that they can receive coal for a new yet to be built coal to jet fuel facility that will be built nearby. 

The neighborhood where the zoning change is being considered is pretty well united against it. The city of Metropolis is against it, and the casino is against it. It will create a handful of jobs, and there isn't proper infrastructure in the neighborhood to support this kind of industry without a lot of investment. Yet, governments are strapped at the moment. 

But the bureaucrats in the McCracken County government couldn't see the forest for the trees and instead chose to throw out the baby with the bathwater and approved the zoning change. This happened in front of a room full of neighbors which opposed it. Nervy and not smart. 

If you go to the Paducah - McCracken County website, the home page is a map of the region, with Paducah in the middle. By definition, that includes about as much of southern Illinois as it does western Kentucky. Working together would be advantageous, and we would all benefit if Paducah and McCracken county gave respect to the region as a whole. 

But obviously they don't. How could they go against one of the largest employers in the immediate area for something that is speculative and if it does come to fruition, would mean little in terms of regional employment compared with losing Harrahs? Why put the county into a position where it may be responsible for expensive major upgrades of roads and other utilities to serve these new heavy industry neighbors?

I'm sure this controversy is far from over. There will likely be lawsuits, and seems unlikely to me that the folks that want to do this will find the financing. It just isn't a friendly environment for this kind of facility. But the fact that their own fiscal court would do this to their own people on the flimsiest of reasons and a in the face of a large roomful of opposition kind of blows my mind. It shows that they aren't thinking right.

Obama has lost me on this one

OK, I accept that I'm nobody and I can't do anything but write in a blog that less than a multitude read. But for the record, I don't get what Obama is doing in Libya. 

First, with all the talk about budget cutting, how much is this costing? And why Libya now? Why not Bahrain or Yemen or even Ivory Coast? "Civilians" are being killed there. 

There must be a lot of behind the scenes things that are going on which the average person like me doesn't know about, and that makes it a little difficult to make judgments about what is going on, but from my vantage point, this action in Libya is going to end up with unintended consequences that aren't good. 

Obama should have consulted with congress and the public more before getting us into another war. And what is so ironic is that it is only weeks after his Sec. of Defense said that we should have our head examined to get into another war in that part of the world.

No doubt Khaddafi is a jerk and a killer. But the world runs on such thugs unfortunately. I do not think Obama has explained why this has to be done now so quickly that the public and congress can't be more fully briefed. This is a military action where we are taking lives and destroying properties in another country. That means they will feel justified now in striking back at us, and no doubt they will try. I don't think Obama has thought this out well, and that is disappointing. He promised he would talk to other countries, but it doesn't appear that he tried talking to Khaddafi.

His statements of a couple weeks ago when he first said that Khaddafi has to go, which I have already written I thought were premature, boxed him into a corner where in order to maintain his macho and that of the US got to be on the line, which is unfortunate. A war shouldn't be fought over a "mano to mano" type of conflict.

Paducah Dept. of Energy Citizen's Advisory Board meeting continued

Please see the immediately previous entry for the beginning of this story:

After the boring presentation about the DOE's upcoming budget cuts, which basically is going to give DOE a convenient excuse for not being able to get much "clean-up" done at the site, the research dude, Mr Ted Grossardt (who uses "Dr." as a title), one of the three listed leaders of this research on it's website, http://www.uky.edu/krcee/project23.html (and who was present at my "mugging") got up to make his presentation about the preliminary findings.

I will say this about their research. They sure know how to spend money. And let's not forget, this money came from one of those infamous "earmarks" by non-other than now "earmark" killer U.S. Sen. Minority leader Mitch McConnell. This is public money - not private money - funnelled through DOE.

This so-called research team has equipment up the wazoo. They have computers, software, recording devices, and these remote controls that they can hand out to people and have them push buttons with numbers that purportedly signify their level of support or opposition to scenarios presented by the "researchers." 

Their fancy computers and software supposedly then average them all out and come up with some kind of average level of support or opposition to the scenarios by that particular group of individuals. 

This is what they did with a handful of people - mostly handpicked - from our region. Oh, they took that information and created these colorful graphs, charts, and even 3-D images that supposedly indicated how these groups felt about the particular scenarios that they proposed. God only knows how many hours, paid for by the public, went into these graphics. 

The problems are, though, that the results are totally dependent on what the scenarios are that you are proposing. If they propose that you get shot by a rifle or a pistol, you can give your preference and they claim they could measure the preferences of a group to those two scenarios, but in the end, you are still going to get shot. 

With this particular "study," not only are the source of the creation of the scenarios being kept secret, but they are all very narrow and are obviously designed to lead to a certain result. 

But a bigger problem which renders the study totally scientifically bogus is that their samples are way too small and not particularly random. Even the study leader Ormslee sent an email out to his "secret" committee admitting that the samples were too small. Grossardt admitted as much in his presentation. 

After he finished, they had a public comment period. I was second in line, and when I got my turn, I got up and I told my story about how I went to their meeting in May, 2010, participated in good faith, was physically confronted, had the police called on me, lied to about them sending me the "visualizations," and how they still were keeping the names of the advisory committee that created the scenarios secret and would not release the video tapes of the meeting which I attended. 

At one point, the chair of the CAB tried to cut me off, but I curtly told her that I was going to finish, and I did. The last point I made was that according to the University of Kentucky's office of research integrity, the purpose of the research related to how the researchers used the visualizations, and that saying that they were "measuring" the public's preferences to the future use of the gaseous diffusion plant site was just an excuse to experiment with these computerized images. 

I believe that this is a DOE funded study of how they can manipulate "public opinion." It is a mind control experiment in the guise of a scientific study. They are seeing if they can create these computerized images of the future and then get people to push certain buttons on their remote controls right after looking at these images. 

I ended my statement by saying that DOE had experimented on the Paducah community before, which they have. Back when Hazel O'Leary was Sec. of Energy under Pres. Clinton, before 911, there was a push to open up the DOE and lots of information was released about things that DOE had done in the past. Among other things they had done, revealed by documents obtained by the Louisville Courier Journal, they had purposefully released UF6 gas on our region to see what it would do in the environment, among other things. I pointed out to the CAB that once again DOE is experimenting on our community. 

I went back to my seat to pick up my laptop and head out, but by then, another speaker had taken the mic. Out of respect, I sat and listened to him make his statement, and I left. 

As I drove home, I thought, what an absurdity that this ridiculous, meaningless, non-transparent, manipulative so-called "study" is getting well funded while actual on-the-ground clean-up of the environment is being significantly cut. But that's DOE for you. It shows what their real priorities are.

Paducah Dept. of Energy Citizen's Advisory Board meeting

Last night I attended the monthly meeting of the U.S. Dept. of Energy Citizen's Advisory Board (or CAB as it is commonly known) for the Paducah site. What D.O.E. does at Paducah is try to "clean-up" the highly polluted Paducah gaseous diffusion plant site. (PGDP) In fact, DOE and contractors have spent over 2 billion dollars, (yes, with a "B") in the last two decades or so attempting to "clean-up" the site. Unfortunately, the worst problems at the site, which are numerous, are yet to be addressed. 

This was only the second meeting of the CAB that I had attended since I and 6 others quit the CAB in August of 2003 in protest over continued lies by DOE officials about the George W. Bush administration plans to significantly change (and weaken) the cleanup efforts at the PGDP and the CAB's inability to have any meaningful input into the process. http://www.paducahsun.com/component/content/article/183-archive/114067-

I had been a loyal and active member of the CAB for 8 years. In fact, for 6 of those 8 years I was elected Chairman. But I felt like now that the CAB does not accurately represent the community anymore, and is not "fairly balanced" in terms of points of view represented, which is a requirement of the Federal Advisory Committee Act, or FACA. Purportedly, the CAB is chartered under FACA.

I went this time because one of the team members of the so-called "research team" that tried to have me arrested for wanting to keep a document that they gave me at a public meeting was giving a presentation on the study they did supposedly measuring public opinion about what to do with the gaseous diffusion plant site after it closes. A description of the events of that night are on this blog at http://www.ruralthoughts.net/?q=node/409. I wanted to tell my story.

After sitting through a boring hour of DOE officials basically telling the CAB a one-two punch about their woes over coming budget cuts, plus how the CAB wasn't really going to have any input into it at all, my eyes were glazing over. But I was determined to stick around long enough to have my say. It sounded all way too familiar. The thing that really is awful is they try to make it seem like they want your opinion, when in reality, it's the last thing they want. 

I came last night because I wanted to respond to the research dude's presentation and tell everyone what happened to me when I tried to participate. 

to be continued.......

Media reporting contradictory information on Japan nuke issue simultaneously

This morning, at the very same time, NBC was reporting that the Japanese authorities were both dumping water from helicopters (with a video that even Matt Lauer had to comment looked pretty ineffectual) and using water cannons (designed for "crowd control" (oh really?)) to try and cool either the reactors or the spent fuel facility (the one thing both outlets agreed on was that they didn't really know what exactly the water was going on), NPR, on Morning Edition, was reporting that those very efforts had already failed and been abandoned.

Yet, when Diane Rehm came on immediately after morning edition, she went back to talking about the helicopter efforts. It's no wonder people have no faith in the information they are getting. It's one of the biggest problems with radiation exposure - you can't see it and to measure it you need instruments that most people don't have.

At this point, what the world could do for communities in Japan is to provide them with accurately calibrated radiation measuring devices - so-called "Geiger Counters." I don't see the world rushing to provide that, and short of that, there is going to be uncertainty and panic, whether justified or not.

My heart goes out to the "ordinary" Japanese citizens who are suffering

I know what it is like to not trust information, especially about environmental problems, from my government. The U.S. government, particularly agencies such as EPA, Forest Service, TVA, NRC, DOE, all regularly fudge the truth, particularly if it involves environmental damage that their agencies have been involved in. 

So to have the US government not trust information being put out by the Japanese government about the radiation levels in the environment in Japan is pretty amazing in my mind. It means that things must be really really bad.

My heart goes out to the citizens of Japan who are trying to cope with this hell on earth. It is the arrogant corporations and their governmental co-conspirators who think they know better than everyone and nature that have messed up the environment time and time again. But this one is on the verge of becoming a global nightmare. Yet, the denials continue. At least more and more people are beginning to learn and are questioning these people instead of just buying their propoganda without question, and that is a good thing.

Let's hope that these people can deliver and get these nukes under control before the releases get worse and more and more people suffer. But let's hold some people accountable. That's the only way that things will change.

Nuclear energy shows it's teeth

The nuclear quagmire unfolding in Japan should bring some realism into the discussion about whether or not the world should be expanding nuclear energy across the globe. The issue has to be the consequences of something going wrong, and the alternatives. 

So many of the nuclear industry people that I have met over the years, and there has been a number, especially when I was chair of the Citizens Advisory Board for the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion plant, the nation's only operating uranium enrichment. That facility, which is run by two coal large coal fired power plants on the Ohio River, (which, in combination with most of the other plants in the nuclear fuel cycle, which are essential for the operation of nuclear power plants, and which most are run by coal) runs counter to the oft repeated BS by the nuclear industry and a bunch of ill-informed reporters that nuclear power doesn't result in the release of carbon into the air. In fact, nuclear power does produce a significant amount of carbon releases.

And while that should be added into the discussion about nuclear power rather than, as many reporters and lobbyists from the industry have tried to say, that nuclear power don't emit greenhouse gasses, the issue before us today is whether or not the risk of global catastrophe for being able to be totally electrified at every second of every day when there are alternatives to being almost as electrified without the risk of global consequences. Hopefully saner minds will prevail.

It is disappointing that the administration came out with a statement, delivered by, of all interests, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, an agency that has no credibility amongst folks that know, that the situation in Japan didn't matter - they were pressing ahead with more nuke plants in the US. 

Obama is developing a problematic pattern. He speaks too soon. He shouldn't have allowed these comments about nuclear power to be made when the situation was still unfolding. He shouldn't have made the comments about Libya when he knew he wasn't going to do anything and the situation was still fluid. It boxes him in. And not into a good box, either. 

Yesterday, many pundits, including pro nuclear pundits, said that the next 24 hours were critical. Well, that 24 hours have passed and one can only say that things are worse. So what are these pundits saying now? We'll see.

Meet the Press today and other press reports on Japan nuke problems

Chuck Todd sat in today for David Gregory. He certainly didn't rock any boats. I thought that GE's influence over NBC was clear in their pick of a nuclear "expert" to comment on MTP. They picked a guy from the NEI, the nuclear industry lobbying group, as their sole interview about the nuclear issues in Japan at the moment, which are substantial. 

I feel pretty sure,although I don't know and it's just a guess, that General Electric, which owns NBC and also produced the reactors which are having the trouble now, influenced NBC to use the NEI rep for their interview on MTP. Todd did say that the guy was "industry" but didn't go anymore into why their interview on the nuclear situation in Japan was so one sided.

NPR on All Things Considered took an even more reserved view of the nuclear situation in Japan, elevating the other problems, such as the lack of housing and food, which no doubt are very urgent. But it seemed obvious to me that they were holding back, probably because of the threat that republicans are posing to their funding. They simply don't want to be seen as being "too liberal" and reporting that the nuke problems in Japan may be more worse than better plays into that perception, even if it is true.

The thing that is true, and which has been reported in some media, is that no one really knows what is going on, because it's too dang radioactive around the fuel cores in the compromised reactors to send a person in there to see. All they do is "measure" the radiation and extrapolate the situation from that. But we know from past history that we can't rely on the reports from the plants about what is going on there.

Wisconsin republicans prove that it wasn't about the money - it was about union busting

According to national news reports, along with some information on madison.com, the republicans in the Wisconsin legislature used some very questionable parliamentary moves to attempt to pass the union busting bill without the democrats present.

The manuevers that took place were based on some kind of republican determination that they took all financial aspects out of the bill and thus, didn't need the super quorum to pass the bill. How they came to that determination is mystifying, because they cut public employees' pay and did some other things that involve the state budget. 

Also, some folks are questioning whether or not hastily called meetings of the legislature violated the open meetings act of the state. In any case, undoubtedly there will be court challenges.

The one thing that this action makes perfectly clear is that for the republicans, this was not about balancing the budget. The whole legal basis for the bill passing is that it was not about the state's finances at all. This was a union busting vendetta by the republicans and it has and will backfire.

Illinois abolishes death penalty

Yesterday Gov. Quinn signed the bill abolishing the death penalty in Illinois. This is my home state, and I thought I should comment about it. I am pleased that Quinn took the step and signed the bill. He had sat on it for many weeks. It had been reported that he was not anti-death penalty, and he stated upon signing it that it was the most difficult decision he had ever made in his life. 

Quinn signing the bill has improved my opinion of him. While Illinois is not at all the first state to outlaw the death penalty, it is a major midwestern state, which do differ in their regional mores than coastal states such as California, Massachusettes, Vermont, or Oregon. In that regard, it is significant.

One of the ironies of this is that this will be the legacy of former Gov. George Ryan, who showed a lot of courage and vision to confront this issue when a college class from Northwestern University started independently researching death row cases in Illinois only to eventually discover that a couple dozen of the inmates scheduled for execution were innocent. 

There's no doubt that innocent people have been executed by state governments in the US. That is intolerable in a society that is supposed to stress fairness, equality, and due process. But so often the least common denominator political winds of the moment trump our higher aspirations. This time, it didn't happen.

Quinn made a very thoughtful statement in which he said that after studying and consulting on the issue, he had concluded that the system was not good enough to guarantee that the execution of an innocent man remained a possibility, which was ultimately the deciding factor in his signing the ban into law.

Although it has been a long time ago, when I was a senior in HS (1970) I participated on a debate team. The subject that year was the death penalty, and I opposed the death penalty. I can still remember writing dozens of note cards with quotes from all kinds of sources which opposed the death penalty, even back then. 

Some of the findings that I remember quite well are that studies have shown that the death penalty does not work as a deterrent, which is one of the proponents' main arguments. It is also very expensive to administer. There is a whole litany of arguments on both sides, but I think Quinn made the right decision, and I'm happy that he did.

One more killing of innocents in Afghanistan - kids

Apparently we killed a number, I think 8 or so, kids in Afghanistan by some kind of mistaken air strike. NBC Nightly News reported tonight that Gen. Petraeus has issued some kind of public apology for the mistake.

This is far from the first time that this has happened. In the Iraq war, some organizations claim that well over 100,000 civilians died from our assault. We have repeatedly killed innocent people in Afghanistan. It has been in the news that Karzi has complained repeatedly that these unjustified and "mistaken" killings in Afghanistan have caused us to lose our support.

What is worse is that our citizens are allowing this to just go on as if it means nothing or amounts to nothing. How can the killing of innocent people be nothing? We all share blame for this, and it's time that we came to grips with the true costs of what is being done. We need to be promoting peace and not war. Our defense spending should be for defense - period.

government shutdown?

All the mainstream pundits are predicting a 2 week continuing resolution to keep the government afloat. Then what? Another 2 week resolution? And then another? 

And these resolutions will only be put into place if the democrats agree to the house republicans as far as what the cuts will be. I'm not denying that there could be a few short term resolutions to avoid what is commonly known as a "government shutdown." But, ultimately, I don't think the democrats in the senate will accept the severity of the immediate cuts the republicans will be demanding. And I don't think many of the republicans in the house are ready to accept much of anything but the severe budget cuts they are proposing.

So I still can't help but think we are headed for a government "shutdown," whatever that means.

Sunday News Shows and Obama's statement about public workers short, sweet, and positive

Obama made a short statement today about the Wisconsin situation. He said that public workers shouldn't be demonized. I agree with him. 

The only thing I want to say about the Sunday News Shows is that David Gregory blew his chance to really question hard Gov. Walker from Wisconsin about some of the "secret" provisions that are in the bill that have nothing to do with the budget, like the no-bid contracts for private interests buying large public interests like power plants. 

As tough as Gregory got was to give a soft question about his statement that he considered but rejected planting disrupters into the peaceful but large pro - union protest crowd in Madison. It was a milktoast interview and was at least 10 days behind the times. Shame on you David Gregory. You never should have gotten that job anyway.

Our war being pushed to the back pages

Kristi pointed out to me recently that, in the context of the all of the world news, that news about our war in Afghanistan is getting minimized. The list of those killed published regularly in the USA Today is just a couple inches of small print on one of the back pages.

If it is such an insignificant thing, why did long time Sec. of Defense Gates, who has served both parties through both Iraq and Afghanistan, make a speech at West Point this week in which he said that if we get into any more such wars we should have our heads examined. 

Apparently in military circles, it raised some eyebrows. But in the mainstream press, it barely got a mention. Hear no evil, see, no evil, speak no evil.

Wisconsin Gov. Walker Imploding

Talk about snatching defeat from the jaws of victory! Governor Walker of Wisconsin, the whippersnapper who was going to "take on" the unions on behalf of all the poor people of the state of Wisconsin and rescue their economy now finds himself on the verge of being disgraced and struggling to regain any semblance of credibility.

First, he's their governor, and he gets snookered by a reporter pretending to be a billionaire. Well, not just a billionaire, but one of the infamous Koch brothers. They are as "conservative" as you get. But it isn't bad enough that he was snookered on taking a fake call, but he confided in this guy and admitted some things, such as, that he discussed planting troublemakers in the crowd with his fellow republican politicians. The thought of it is so troubling that the Madison chief of police wants to know more. 

But that's not even all. Buried deep in this bill to strip away the union powers from public employees is a section which allows the state to sell property to private interests with no bids. It just so happens that some of the properties are within the Koch Brothers' interests, although, of course, they deny everything. But the fact is they donated the maximum allowed under Wisconsin law to Walker's campaign. Walker's response seems to be that what he said isn't anything new - that he has been saying it all along. Oh, that's reassuring. 

The latest news tonight is that he has ordered the state police to go to the homes of these state senators. As Onslo, on the classic BBC comedy, "Keeping Up Appearances" would say, "oh nice." 

Walker is a phoney and he is being dishonest with the people. He has an agenda and his trying to window dress it with crocodile tears about the deficit. He's nothing more than a political opportunist. I feel confident that the good people of Wisconsin will see through him.

But, a cornered animal is a dangerous one, and it still looks likely to me that he will get the bill passed. It is going to be heartbreaking, but the union folks are going to have to do a lot of community outreach and education and through the ballet box have it reversed. One thing I have said more than once and I know is true is that whatever a legislature does, it can be undone.

Lots going on

Besides trying to do work around our place doing landscape and garden type things that need to be done before it gets too hot, I am trying to keep up with what is going on around the world. 

I can't believe how Quaddafi was rambling today. He sounded crazier than usual. I guess he drove his people crazy to the point where they are taking up arms against him. I mean, the reports that he has hired mercenaries from other countries to defend him is just about unbelievable. But, then again, the dude seems wacko. It wasn't that long ago that the Talk of the Town section of the New Yorker magazine reported that he always travelled with a good looking blonde nurse. Not that i care, just found it interesting.

The one thing that can't be ignored is the oil prices. If you think you can barely afford gas now, just wait until there are uprisings in Saudi Arabia. Gas might go to $150/barrell and gas might cost us $5 or more a gallon. Ouch. Any hopes of an economic "recovery" will be swallowed up by such fuel price increases. And why should we be supporting oppression just to have cheaper oil? It is a total contradiction in what we supposedly stand for. And, it might force us to actually find better energy sources.

The standoffs with the republicans' push to eliminate public employee unions continues, now in multiple states. The unions and their supporters are putting up a good fight, but the republicans hold the power and don't seem to be backing down. I worry about what might happen if these legislatures actually get these laws passed doing away with the unions. 

The unions big mistake, in my opinion, was when all the unions nationally didn't turn out for a nation wide strike when Ronald Reagan was breaking the air traffic controllers union. Organized labor has never recovered from that. I want organized labor to succeed, but they have a steep hill to climb. They are climbing very diligently as we speak.

I just have to comment about the situation with the so-called Pakistan diplomat that shot a couple Pakistani's and the US is trying to play it's get out of jail free card on his behalf.

I had written about a week or more ago that according to the original news report that the state department was saying that the guy was only a contractor and not a diplomat. Then, all of a sudden, he is a diplomat and Obama himself is speaking up on his behalf. But yesterday and today, all of a sudden, he is a contractor again. Wow, what goes around comes around these days. I don't think he is going to be getting out of jail anytime soon, and we need to know more about where our taxpayer money is going when it gets appropriated to agencies like the CIA.