History, Evolution, and the Darwin Debate
Thought Crime in Washington
by PETER VAN BUREN
Here’s the First Amendment, in full: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
http://www.counterpunch.org/2011/11/28/no-free-speech-at-mr-jeffersons-library/
CLIMATE AND CAPITALISM
An online journal focusing on capitalism, climate change, and the
ecosocialist alternative.
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http://climateandcapitalism.com
Follow C&C on Facebook: http://tinyurl.com/5teq6xm
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November 28, 2011 Read the rest of this entry »
Published on Monday, November 28, 2011 by CommonDreams.org
Occupy Wall Street is All Over The Media: But for How Long?
by Danny Schechter
One of the oldest patterns of media coverage can be summed up this way:
First, they ignore you. Then, they ridicule you. Then, they realize you are a story and fall in love. So they build you up at first but then, all at once, tear you down Read the rest of this entry »
Published on Monday, November 28, 2011 by The Nation
The Democratic Promise of Occupy Wall Street
by William Greider
Regular politics in Washington now resembles an ecological dead zone where truth perishes in a polluted environment. Democrats and Republicans shadowbox over their concocted fiscal crisis, neither willing to tell voters the truth, both eager to avoid blame for the damage they are doing to the country. Read the rest of this entry »
Published on Sunday, November 27, 2011 by the Boston Globe
The Uprising of 2012?
by Kara Miller
Around the world, this has been the year of uprisings – spurred in large part by financial concerns.
Read the rest of this entry »
Published on Monday, November 28, 2011 by the American Civil Liberties Union
Senators Demand the Military Lock Up American Citizens in a “Battlefield” They Define as Being Right Outside Your Window
by Chris Anders Read the rest of this entry »
Published on Monday, November 28, 2011 by the Electronic Frontier Foundation
Cablegate One Year Later: How WikiLeaks Has Influenced Foreign Policy, Journalism, and the First Amendment
by Trevor Timm
One year ago today, WikiLeaks started publishing a trove of over 250,000 leaked U.S. State Department cables, which have since formed the basis of reporting for newspapers around the globe. The publication has given the public a window into the inner workings of government at an unprecedented scale, and in the process, has transformed journalism in the digital age. Read the rest of this entry »
Published on Monday, November 28, 2011 by Agence France Presse
On the US political stage, skepticism and denial of climate change are as popular as ever, and experts say that world talks which opened Monday in Durban, South Africa are unlikely to turn the tide.
Read the rest of this entry »
As the OWS surges forward, the question of 9/11, beside the Wall Street question, creeps to the fore and it is essential to stay open, but cautiously aware of the known facts. There is a kind of pseudo-consensus among up-and-up left groups that don’t want to be too controversial to accept the basic cover story. But that tactic is too far gone to survive at this point. You have a choice, lose your public, or face the facts (and lose another public): and those facts show overwhelming evidence of some kind of high level covert action behind 9/11. yeah, yeah, I don’t like it either, but denial won’t wash anymore. If the leftist busibodies now functioning can’t handle the ton of bricks falling on one’s head here they are suspect, or hopelessly stupid, or brainwashed, or all of the above. To try and excommunicate supporters of social change because they can figure out the obvious from 9/11 websites/books, e.g. David Griffin’s completely transparent studies.
From there, without issuing any dogmas, the left needs to face up to the criminal conspiracy at work in the American government. That’s the problem. You make enemies with a super-enemy here. You risk losing your funding, I guess.
It should be the job of the left to do that. So do it.
Here’s an Amazon search string:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=david+griffin+9%2F11
I have no expertise on this question, no special insights, no preconceived ideas: simple reading skills to have read the known literature. It is overwhelming. Self-styled leftist leaders are simply unaware of the facts of the case, but time has run out here. Trying to excommunicate dissent here is both impossible, and a little ridiculous.
Meanwhile the OWS should embrace the full spectrum of opinion here, that’s all anyone can ask.
Cognitive Infiltration: An Obama Appointee’s Plan to Undermine the 9/11 Conspiracy Theory [Paperback]
David Ray Griffin
This book discusses something we suspect is more general: a liberal/left ‘cognitive infiltration’ (a little less organized) on the issue of 9/11.
In any case, if an Obama appointee thinks this way out loud, gosh knows what is said in private.
Naomi Wolf’s ‘Shocking Truth’ About the ‘Occupy Crackdowns’ Offers Anything but the Truth
I find this controversy over the DHS behind the OWS crackdowns both frustrating and sad. I have addressed this question twice here, chiding Alternet for its somewhat pompous attacks as soon as the ‘conspiracy theory’ button gets pressed.
I linked to the original article without comment, then watched the Alternet/Daily Kos barrage against the idea. I have no real hard position here, but I have to wonder how Alternet is so sure that the DHS is not involved here. It is puzzling, until you suspect, and I could be wrong, that this is the standard ‘no no no’ to conspiracy thinking so-called by self-styled leftist leadership. Chomsky was perhaps the original Pope here, and perhaps everyone else has made this almost second nature, a bad habit.
Look: I don’t know what’s involved here, but to jump on any effort to consider the issue is suspicious. What’s Alternet’s game here???
Again, I don’t have any real facts here. I think it is so totally likely that power elites are acting behind the scences that, to deny this, is a real headscratcher: are those in denial here on the level?
I think it is wrong for Alternet to divide the left here. Who knows? Their facts are no better than Naomi Klein’s. And facts about covert actions are often garbled. So we should welcome Alternet’s skepticism, but ask why it is so partial: it arises in the kneejerk reaction to ‘conspiracy theories’ on the left.
And that, I think, is the real issue. But the left needs to be realistic and to do some study on the issues. It is completely natural for students of the JFK and 9/11 legacies to fall into skeptical paranoia. To try and manipulate this is both hopeless and suspect. What’s the game of those trying?
The left needs to face reality: the Pandora’s Box on ‘conspiracy theories’ re: 9/11 is completely open. Attempts to control leftist opinion here have backfired and made leftists look like idiots. It takes about an hour to read the evidence involved. So stop playing the public for stupid.
So do the reading, and stop trying to excommunicate leftists with common sense, and simple reading skills.
Meanwhile, the narrower issue of the DHS and Occupy crackdowns, remains open.
Revolutions per second…
Comparisons of the OWS are apt, whatever the nature of the analogy. The far left models of Leninist revolution are misleadind, and should be put to one side. Analogies to the French (or American) Revolution are equally up in the air, but they can focus attention on the real turning points in the emergence of modern freedom. The Bolshevik phase seems to have gone in reverse gear.
We are talking about starting points: where things go after that is another question. We cannot, and would not, clone a revolutionary sequence, only a new starting point.
These passionate words of British poet William Wordsworth celebrating his jubilation at the unfolding French Revolution of 1789 in his masterpiece ‘Prelude’ have a parallel in the euphoria of hope and aspiration that the ongoing Occupy Wall Street campaign in the USA and West has generated all over, even among the curious people overseas, whosoever cherish to see a radical shift in the way they are governed.
http://www.orissadiary.com/ShowOriyaColumn.asp?id=30433 Read the rest of this entry »
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/27/occupy-wall-street-and-homeless-evictions-cities_n_1111094.html: Occupy Wall Street And Homelessness: Millions Spent To Evict Camps, While Cutting Shelter Funds
Comment from Richard on Horgan post
Submitted on 2011/11/26 at 3:24 pm
Westerners are a bit naive here and don’t understand the milieu of “Buddhism”; it’s a tough and very difficult search. The irony is that Buddhists are the best critics of “Buddhism:”http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/thanissaro/customs.html
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/thai/kee/dynamic.html
Comment from Dov Henis
Dov Henis
universe-life.com/
henisdov@netvision.net.il
46.116.37.82 Submitted on 2011/11/22 at 11:04 am
(It is culture that modifies genetics, not vice versa…)
Pavlov’s Smile: RNAs Are Earth’s Primal Organisms
Culture>genes>addiction (2 July 2009)http://universe-life.com/2011/09/24/pavlovs-smile/
Why Pavlov smiled in 2008?
Pavlov demonstrated effecting placebo phenomena in multi celled organisms by manipulation of their drives-reactions. Now placebo and imagination phenomena are demonstrated also in Earth’s smallest, base organisms, in the genes and genomes of multi-celled organisms, in our primal 1st stratum and 2nd stratum base organisms.
A very good reason to smile.
Now an interesting chain is exposed to our view, the Genes-Virtual Reality Chain, a most intriguing cultural evolution chain extending from the genesis of our genes to nowadays, throughout life, a virtual reality existence, and by virtual reality phenomena, exploitations and manipulations.Dov Henis (comments from 22nd century)
http://universe-life.com
Life Genesis From Aromaticity/H-Bonding
http://universe-life.com/2011/09/30/earthlife-genesis-from-aromaticityh-bonding/
(It is culture that modifies genetics, not vice versa…)
Pavlov’s Smile: RNAs Are Earth’s Primal Organisms
Culture>genes>addiction (2 July 2009)http://universe-life.com/2011/09/24/pavlovs-smile/
Why Pavlov smiled in 2008?
Pavlov demonstrated effecting placebo phenomena in multi celled organisms by manipulation of their drives-reactions. Now placebo and imagination phenomena are demonstrated also in Earth’s smallest, base organisms, in the genes and genomes of multi-celled organisms, in our primal 1st stratum and 2nd stratum base organisms.
A very good reason to smile.
Now an interesting chain is exposed to our view, the Genes-Virtual Reality Chain, a most intriguing cultural evolution chain extending from the genesis of our genes to nowadays, throughout life, a virtual reality existence, and by virtual reality phenomena, exploitations and manipulations.Dov Henis (comments from 22nd century)
http://universe-life.com
Life Genesis From Aromaticity/H-Bonding
http://universe-life.com/2011/09/30/earthlife-genesis-from-aromaticityh-bonding/
henisdov@netvision.net.il
Dov Henishttp://universe-life.com/
1
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2063486/Alien-skull-Peru-Mystery-giant-headed-mummy-city-Andahuaylillas.html:
Is this an alien skull? Mystery of giant-headed mummy found in PeruSkull has soft spot, found in infants, yet also two large molars, found in older humans
Three anthropologists agree: ‘It is not a human being’
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/11/11/super-strong-mighty-mouse-created-by-swiss-scientists/
The Wipeout Gene By BIJAL P. TRIVEDI – SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN
Added: Saturday, 26 November 2011 at 8:51 PM
http://richarddawkins.net/articles/644012-the-wipeout-gene
Outside Tapachula, Chiapas, Mexico—10 miles from Guatemala. To reach the cages, we follow the main highway out of town, driving past soy, cocoa, banana and lustrous dark-green mango plantations thriving in the rich volcanic soil. Past the tiny village of Rio Florido the road degenerates into an undulating dirt tract. We bump along on waves of baked mud until we reach a security checkpoint, guard at the ready. A sign posted on the barbed wire–enclosed compound pictures a mosquito flanked by a man and woman: Estos mosquitos genéticamente modificados requieren un manejo especial, it reads. We play by the rules.
Inside, cashew trees frame a cluster of gauzy mesh cages perched on a platform. The cages hold thousands of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes—the local species, smaller and quieter than the typical buzzing specimens found in the U.S. At 7 a.m., the scene looks ethereal: rays of sunlight filter through layers of mesh creating a glowing, yellow hue. Inside the cages, however, genetically modified mosquitoes are waging a death match against the locals, an attempted genocide-by-mating that has the potential to wipe out dengue fever, one of the world’s most troublesome, aggressive diseases.
Throughout a swath of subtropical and tropical countries, four closely related dengue viruses infect about 100 million people annually, causing a spectrum of illness—from flu-like aches to internal hemorrhaging, shock and death. No vaccine or cure exists. As with other mosquito-borne diseases, the primary public health strategy is to prevent people from being bitten. To that end, authorities attempt to rid neighborhoods of standing water where the insects breed, spray with insecticides, and distribute bed nets and other low-tech mosquito blockers. They pursue containment, not conquest.
Anthony James, however, is mounting an offensive. James, a molecular biologist at the University of California, Irvine, and his colleagues have added genes to A. aegypti that block the development of flight muscles in females. When a genetically modified male mosquito mates with a wild female, he passes his engineered genes to the offspring. The females—the biters—don’t survive long. When they emerge from the pupal stage, they sit motionless on the water. They won’t fly, mate or spread disease. The male progeny, in contrast, will live to spread their filicidal seed. In time, the absence of female offspring should lead to a population crash, which James’s collaborator has already demonstrated in the controlled environment of an indoor laboratory in Colorado. Now he has brought his bugs south.
The technology marks the first time scientists have genetically engineered an organism to specifically wipe out a native population to block disease transmission. If the modified mosquitoes triumph, then releasing them in dengue-endemic zones worldwide could prevent tens of millions of people from suffering. Yet opponents of the plan warn of unintended consequences—even if mosquitoes are the intended victims.
Report tracks explosion of religious lobbying in Washington By DAN GILGOFF – CNN
Added: Sunday, 27 November 2011 at 10:54 AM
Lobbying and advocacy by religious groups in Washington have exploded in recent decades, increasing fivefold since 1970 to become a nearly $400 million industry, a new Pew report finds.
http://richarddawkins.net/articles/644024-report-tracks-explosion-of-religious-lobbying-in-washington
More than 200 groups are doing faith-related lobbying and advocacy in the nation’s capital, compared to fewer than 40 in 1970, according to the report. Put together, the groups employ at least 1,000 people.
The report, released Monday by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion and Public Life, found that religious groups spend $390 million a year to influence U.S. domestic and foreign policy.
“About one-in-five religious advocacy organizations in Washington have a Roman Catholic perspective (19%) and a similar proportion is evangelical Protestant in outlook (18%), while 12% are Jewish and 8% are mainline Protestant,” according to the report, called “Lobbying for the Faithful: Religious Advocacy Groups in Washington, D.C.”
“But many smaller U.S. religious groups, including Baha’is, Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs, also have established advocacy organizations in the Washington area,” the report said.
Muslim medical students boycotting lectures on evolution… because it ‘clashes with the Koran’
Evidence Supports Ban On Growth Promotion Use of Antibiotics in FarmingScienceDaily (Nov. 15, 2011) — In a review study, researchers from Tufts University School of Medicine zero in on the controversial, non-therapeutic use of antibiotics in food animals and fish farming as a cause of antibiotic resistance. They report that the preponderance of evidence argues for stricter regulation of the practice. Stuart Levy, an expert in antibiotic resistance, notes that a guiding tenet of public health, the precautionary principle, requires that steps be taken to avoid harm.
NASA Launches Most Capable and Robust Rover to MarsScienceDaily (Nov. 26, 2011) — NASA began a historic voyage to Mars with the Nov. 26 launch of the Mars Science Laboratory, which carries a car-sized rover named Curiosity. Liftoff from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station aboard an Atlas V rocket occurred at 10:02 a.m. EST (7:02 a.m. PST).
Washington Post publishes ultraleft African-American attack on OWS
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-blacks-arent-embracing-occupy-wall-street/2011/11/16/gIQAwc3FwN_story.html
Why African Americans aren’t embracing Occupy Wall Street
By Stacey Patton, Published: November 25
http://www.marxmail.org/msg97988.html
Published on Sunday, November 27, 2011 by The Independent/UK
Rich Nations Accused of Climate-Change ‘Bullying’
by Jonathan Owen
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/11/27-0
Published on Sunday, November 27, 2011 by CommonDreams.org
Occupy Thanksgiving
by Julie Matthaei
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/11/27-0
Published on Sunday, November 27, 2011 by The Huffington Post
by Jeffrey D. Sachs
The wonder of our world is that scientific knowledge is now so powerful that we can save millions of children, mothers, and fathers from killer diseases each year at little cost. The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria has mobilized that knowledge over the past decade to save more than 7 million lives and to protect the health of hundreds of millions more. Yet now the Global Fund is under mortal threat because of budget cuts approved by President Obama and the Congress.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/11/27-1
Published on Saturday, November 26, 2011 by EricMargolis.com
Looking Back on the Road to Folly
by Eric Margolis
In October, 2002, I wrote an analysis of the impending Iraq War for “American Conservative” entitled “The Road to Folly.”
I observed, “A war that fails to achieve clear political objectives is merely an exercise in violence and futility.” Having covered 14 conflicts as a war correspondent and the Mideast, I’ve seen a lot of violence and futility.
The White House launched a thunderous, utterly shameless propaganda campaign about phony threats to America and the world from President Saddam Hussein’s non-existent weapons of mass destruction.
On cue, US forces invaded Iraq in March, 2003.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/11/26-3
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