Sacramento for Democracy blogs

Austerity = Anarchy

Sun, 21 Aug 2011 23:42:02 +0000

Common sense, right? I guess notsomuch to our political "leadership." Two blogs that prove what we already know. One from the London Review of Books, and the other from MIT. The graph from the MIT blog shows a correlation between escalating food prices and social unrest

Austerity and Anarchy

Thomas Jones 10 August 2011

Austerity and Anarchy: Budget Cuts and Social Unrest in Europe 1919-2009

If you think you're Fred Flintstone and try to stop your pickup with your feet ... you just might be a redneck

Sat, 20 Aug 2011 22:04:07 +0000

Science Friday: Physicists embrace the splatter master | Checkers Optical Illusion Video | What is Dark Matter? Video

Fri, 19 Aug 2011 19:51:05 +0000

physicists embrace the splatter master

an intriguing article

Corporatism's Massive & Relentless Assault on the Hearts & Minds of America's Children

Fri, 19 Aug 2011 06:12:14 +0000

Try to wrap your mind around the following revelations from a provocative 2009 article by Henry A. Giroux entitled “Commodifying Kids: The Forgotten Crisis”:

Kids can recognize logos by eighteen months, and before reaching their second birthday, they're asking for products by brand name. By three or three and a half, experts say, children start to believe that brands communicate their personal qualities, for example, that they're cool, or strong, or smart. Even before starting school, the likelihood of having a television in their bedroom is 25 percent, and their viewing time is just over two hours a day. Upon arrival at the schoolhouse steps, the typical first grader can evoke 200 brands. And he or she has already accumulated an unprecedented number of possessions, beginning with an average of seventy new toys a year.

And this:

One measure of the corporate assault on kids can be seen in the reach, acceleration and effectiveness of a marketing and advertising juggernaut that attempts to turn kids into consumers and childhood into a saleable commodity. Every child, regardless of how young, is now a potential consumer ripe for being commodified and immersed in a commercial culture defined by brands. According to Lawrence Grossberg, children are introduced to the world of logos, advertising and the "mattering maps" of consumerism long before they can speak:

U.S. empire vs. U.S. republic

Thu, 18 Aug 2011 21:40:58 +0000

Bruce Fein

Dr. Mike Beitler interviews Bruce Fein. Bruce Fein is a constitutional scholar who served as the Associate Deputy Attorney General under President Reagan from 1981 to 1982. Bruce discusses War Powers Act, Renewal of the Patriot Act, and cutting national security/defense spending to balance the budget. He has the best summary of the history of the U.S. empire I've ever heard.
Source: Now Playing:Bruce Fein, Constitutional Scholar & Author

Why Patriot Act Serves Empire, Not Republic
Source: Patriot Act Serves Empire Not a Republic

Obama Institutes Indefinite Detention
Interview with Bruce Fein, former assistant deputy attorney general under President Ronald Reagan, conducted by Scott Harris.
Source: Obama Executive Order to Institutionalize Indefinite Detention

Peter Van Buren

Peter Van Buren, author of "We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the War for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People", talks about his book and his observations on Western-style nation building.
Source: TomCast for May 15, 2010: We Meant Well

Play Program or Download(below the fold)

Walton Family Foundation gives millions to ocean privatization efforts

Thu, 18 Aug 2011 18:04:42 +0000

The Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA), a national grassroots recreational fishing organization, on August 17 slammed the Walton Family Foundation's contribution of $36 million to ocean privatization efforts through "catch shares" programs and the creation of so-called "marine protected areas."

The foundation, set up by the family who founded Wal-Mart, announced this week "its efforts to help fund the demise of both the recreational and commercial fishing industry while also working to ensure that the next generation of sportsmen will have less access to coastal fish stocks than at any point in U.S. history," according to a news release from RFA.

In a August 16th news release from Wal-Mart corporate headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas, the Walton Family Foundation announced "investments" totaling more than $71.8 million awarded to various environmental initiatives in 2010. The foundation handed over $36 million alone to Marine Conservation grantees including Ocean Conservancy, Conservation International Foundation, Marine Stewardship Council, World Wildlife Fund and Environmental Defense Fund (EDF).

The five top grantees were: Conservation International, $18,640,917; the Nature Conservancy,$9,305,449; Environmental Defense Fund
$7,086,054; the Marine Stewardship Council, $4,500,000; and the Ocean Conservancy, $3,757,768 ((http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/walton-family-foundation-invests-718-million-in-environmental-initiatives-in-2010-127835788.html).

Torture in the US Prison System: The Endless Punishment of Leonard Peltier

Thu, 18 Aug 2011 00:47:08 +0000

Torture in the US Prison System: The Endless Punishment of Leonard Peltier

More than 20,000 inmates are caged in isolation in the United States at any one time. Originally designed as a temporary disciplinary action, solitary confinement has drifted into use as a long-term punishment. This act of inhumanity is a clear contradiction of the Eighth Amendment. During the Pelican Bay hunger strike that rippled into prisons across the country, a 66-year-old man with extreme medical needs, Leonard Peltier, was forced into "the hole" at Lewisburg Federal Penitentiary in Pennsylvania.

Nightmarish as it is, what follows is fact.

State and feds announce "aggressive schedule" for peripheral canal plan

Wed, 17 Aug 2011 00:54:01 +0000

State and federal officials announced in a joint statement on Thursday, August 11 that they have reached "two significant milestones toward assuring a sustainable water supply for California and a healthy Delta ecosystem."

Translation? The Brown and Obama administrations are aggressively forging ahead with one of the most widely-criticized environmental policies of the Arnold Schwarzenegger administration - the plan to build a peripheral canal to export more water to corporate agribusiness and southern California water agencies.

The U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI), the U.S. Department of Commerce, and the California Natural Resources Agency have agreed to a schedule for completing an effects analysis and a combined environmental impact statement/environmental impact report (EIR/EIS) as part of the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) by June 2012. They also agreed to considering a "suite of alternatives," including a controversial peripheral canal or tunnel, for evaluation in identifying a proposed project.

“This is an aggressive schedule that will allow us to move clearly forward with BDCP and take the guess work out of next steps,” said California Secretary for Natural Resources John Laird. “Meeting the dual goals of ecosystem restoration and water supply reliability demand a deep commitment from all parties involved.”

The Beginning of an Out Of Control Riot in Manchester

Fri, 12 Aug 2011 21:57:43 +0000

Luv the British humour

Science Friday: Anti-gravity-like Magic ... Srsly | Neil deGrasse Tyson: "We've Stopped Dreaming" | NASA Derived R&D Technology

Fri, 12 Aug 2011 21:43:46 +0000

Just to be clear, it's not anti-gravitational, it just seems that way

Why does the magnet fall so slowly? It's a combination of Faraday's and Lenz's Laws. The falling magnet isn't attracted to copper (non ferrous metal), but the movement through, or over, or near the copper (aluminum works also) induces a current which causes a change in the magnetic flux that reacts with the magnetic field of the the magnet itself. More