January 31, 2012

Chris Christie, who decried cronyism in his campaign, recs dozens of cronies for Port Authority jobs

Governor Christie on Monday vigorously defended recommending 50 people — including dozens with ties to his administration — for Port Authority jobs, ranging from executives to a toll collector.

“I make no apologies about trying to put some people in place who are going to understand what the view of this administration is and execute … in a way that’s consistent with my policies,” he said at a news conference.

But Democrats blasted the governor for participating in a political spoils system that he has criticized while targeting waste at other agencies.

“This governor is ‘Do as I say, not as I do,’” said Democratic Party Chairman and Assemblyman John Wisniewski, D-Middlesex. ......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.northjersey.com/news/Christie_defends_Port_Authority_job_recommendations.html

January 31, 2012

Feb. 4 Day of Action: No Sanctions, No War Against Iran!

http://www.answercoalition.org/national/events/no-war-on-iran-actions-02-04-2012.html


Washington, DC
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12 noon
White House

Albany, NY
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 1pm
Wolf Road & Central Ave

Albuquerque, NM
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 1pm
Assemble at UNM Bookstore
Corner of Central and Cornell

Atlanta, GA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 4:30pm
CNN Center
Marietta and Centennial Olympic Park

Baltimore, MD
Friday, Feb. 3 at 5pm
McKelvin Square
Pratt & Light Street.

Blacksburg, VA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 2pm
Vigil in front of Main Street Post Office (North Main Street)

Boston, MA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 1pm
Rally and march starting at Boston Park St. Station
Tremont Street and Park Street

Buffalo, NY
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 3pm
Buffalo Niagara Square
Niagara Square

Chicago, IL
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12 noon
March and rally at Federal Plaza
50 W Adams (Adams and Dearborn)

Columbus, OH
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 4pm
OSU Campus
Corner of 15th and High St.

Columbus, OH
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 6:30pm
Corner of Goodale and High St.

Des Moines, IA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12 noon
Educational campaign and signing congressional postcards
Bring a dish to share; Iranian and American food
AFSC office/Friends Meeting House
42nd and Grand Ave

Des Moines, IA
Tuesday, Feb. 21 at 6pm
Candlelight vigil at Nollen Plaza
Across from Des Moines Civic Center

Detroit, MI
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 2pm
Grand Circus Park
Woodward Ave. at W. Adams St.

Green Bay, WI
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12pm
Green Bay Lambeau Field

Harrisburg, PA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12pm
Harrisburg State Capitol Steps
3rd Street Side, between North St. and Walnut St.

Honolulu, HI
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 7pm
Heart of Waikiki
Kalakaua Ave & Seaside Ave

Kochville, MI
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 2pm
Bay & Tittabawassee Road
Saginaw Township

Lethbridge, AB, Canada
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 2pm
City Hall
910 4th Avenue South

Los Angeles, CA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12 noon
Wilshire & Western Metro Stop
3790 Wilshire Blvd, LA 90010

Milwaukee, WI
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12 noon
East Capitol Dr. Bridge
Capitol Ave & Humbold Blvd.

Minneapolis, MN
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 3pm
Mayday Plaza
301 Cedar Ave. South (at 3rd Street)

Nashville, TN
Friday, Feb. 3 at 4pm
Peace vigil at Nashville Centennial Park
2500 West End Ave

Nashville, TN
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 2pm
Teach-in / Rally at Legislative Plaza
6th Ave. between Charlotte & Union

New Haven, CT
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 11am
Rally and speak-out on the steps of the Federal Bldg.
141 Church St

New York City, NY
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 1pm
Duffy Square
47th St. and 7th Ave.

Norfolk, VA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12 noon
Saint Paul Blvd. and City Hall Ave.

Philadelphia, PA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12pm
Philadelphia Independence Mall
5th and Market St.

Phoenix, AZ
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 1pm
Cesar Chavez Plaza
200 W Washington

Raleigh, NC
Friday, Feb. 3 at 4:30pm
Raleigh Federal Building
310 New Bern Ave.

Richmond, VA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12pm
Gather at Federal Courthouse
701 East Broad Street

San Francisco, CA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12 noon
Gather at Powell and Market for march and rally
(BART to Powell St. Station)

Saratoga Springs, NY
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12 noon
Near the Post Office
475 Broadway

Seattle, WA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 1:30pm
Rally and march starting at Westlake Park

Syracuse, NY
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 1:30pm
Fayette St. and Salina St.

Tampa, FL
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12 noon
March on MacDill Air Force Base CENTCOM
7115 S Boundary Blvd.

Truckee, CA
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 12pm
Donner Pass Rd/ and Hwy 89 in Truckee
11290 Donner Pass Rd

Tucson, AZ
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 6pm
Music and food at Tucson Unitarian Universalist Church
4831 E. 22nd Street

Vancouver, BC, Canada
Saturday, Feb. 4 at 3pm
U.S. Consulate in Vancouver
1075 West Pender at Thurlow

January 31, 2012

Don’t Cut Tysons Corner in Two

via the Next American City blog:





This piece originally ran on Greater Greater Washington.


Virginia’s Fairfax County is planning to turn Tysons Corner, a commercial suburb just outside the District of Columbia, into a dense, walkable, urban center. This transformation will include the creation of street grid and better bike and pedestrian facilities. But two major thoroughfares will weaken pedestrian circulation and divide the new Tysons in two.

Route 123 and Route 7 are major six-lane roads running through the heart of Tysons Corner. The Silver Line, a planned extension of the D.C. Metro, will run along portions of either road, meaning that many pedestrians will be entering Tysons along these arteries.

But the construction of the Silver Line through Tysons Corner isn’t the only work being done in the corridor. Fairfax County is currently widening Route 123 from six to eight lanes.

The creation of a grid of streets coupled with bike/pedestrian improvements is necessary to facilitate movement within an urban Tysons, particularly to and from the Metro stations. The widening of 123, however, moves Tysons Corner in the opposite direction. ..............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://americancity.org/buzz/entry/3299/

January 31, 2012

The Tea Party Plan to Save Scott Walker

from Mother Jones:



As soon as April, millions of Wisconsinites will vote on whether to oust Gov. Scott Walker—a rising Republican star and arguably the most polarizing governor in politics today—just two years into his first term in office. Walker's recall election is a referendum on his hard-line conservative agenda, including curbing collective bargaining rights for state workers and slashing education funding. For Walker himself it's a pivotal moment in his young political career.

The recall fight is also a crucial test for the tea party, the populist movement that helped elect Walker in 2010, vigorously defended him during last winter's protests over his anti-union "budget repair" bill, and has been organizing to prevent his ouster. The movement's support is flagging, its clout dwindling, its buzz mostly gone. But now, tea partiers at the state and national levels are rallying around Walker's recall defense, hoping a victory could bolster the movement in a critical election year. A defeat, on the other hand, would give ammo to liberals and conservatives alike who say the tea party is all but dead.

In recent months, the Tea Party Express, a national organization, and the Campaign to Defeat Barack Obama, a tea party-linked political action committee, have waded into the recall fight, blasting out more than a dozen emails to supporters and launching a $100,000 "money bomb" fundraiser to help defend Walker. They argue that the outcome has national implications for the 2012 presidential election; a Tea Party Express email to supporters in January announced that Wisconsin is "Ground Zero for the Battle Against Obama's Liberal Agenda."

The Campaign to Defeat Barack Obama says it has raked in small donations from supporters throughout the country, from Napa, Calif., to Nashua, NH. The group's director of grassroots outreach, Donald La Combe, wrote in an email to supporters that funds would go toward TV and radio ad campaigns as well as "war rooms" throughout Wisconsin to bolster Walker's support among voters. "We're going to win this fight, we're going to DEFEAT the RECALL, and we're going to stop Barack Obama from getting Wisconsin's 10 Electoral Votes," La Combe wrote. (Neither of the above groups responded to requests for comment.) ...............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://motherjones.com/politics/2012/01/scott-walker-recall-tea-party

January 31, 2012

How Male Global Elites Work Hard to Fix the Economy – In Their Favor

AlterNet / By Lynn Parramore

How Male Global Elites Work Hard to Fix the Economy – In Their Favor
On Sunday, 1 percenters left the World Economic Forum at Davos with bold plans to stay fat and happy while the world falls apart.

January 30, 2012 |


The pomp and the platitudes. The champagne and the canapés. In the tony ski resort of Davos, Switzerland, the gemütlich gathering of global leaders for the World Economic Forum seemed like business as usual…five days of hobnobbing and male-dominated, Euro-centric jaw-flapping on the economic state of the planet. A rich and rewarding experience for the rich and rewarded.

But what about this year’s theme? Billed as “The Great Transformation,” the WEF promised sessions on rethinking capitalism, reducing inequality and solving Europe's financial crisis. Founder Klaus Schwab opened the forum with a wise observation that capitalism needs to be fixed "to serve society." Was it possible that these leaders wanted change? Had they opened their ears to the 99 percent?

Guess it depends on which society and what you mean by fixed. Because in reality, the brochure should have read: "The Great Retrenchment: with sessions on denying capitalism's failures, staying rich despite inequality, and dumping Europe's financial crisis onto the backs of ordinary people."

The Song Remains the Same

In the midst of a crippling European debt crisis, some 2,500 business leaders, intellectuals and politicians strolled among the five-star hotels and plush conference rooms of the WEF. There was much talk about how economic turmoil in Europe could spread to the rest of the world. There was much networking. Much giddy tweeting (Inspiration! Youth! Social entrepreneurs!) and much partying among ice sculptures. ................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/economy/153941/how_male_global_elites_work_hard_to_fix_the_economy_%E2%80%93_in_their_favor/

January 31, 2012

The Scary Danger of Meat (Even For Those Who Don't Eat It)

AlterNet / By Martha Rosenberg

The Scary Danger of Meat (Even For Those Who Don't Eat It)
The government has rolled over once again for Big Meat and we may be in more danger from antibiotic-resistant superbugs.

January 30, 2012 |


So far, 2012 is bringing bad news for people who don't want "free antibiotics" in their food.

Antibiotics are routinely given to livestock on factory farms to make them gain weight with less feed and keep them from getting sick in confinement conditions. But the daily dosing, at the same time it lowers feed needs, lowers drug effectiveness and produces antibiotic resistant bacteria or super bugs that can be deadly to people.

This month, researchers found 230 out of 395 pork cuts bought in US stores were contaminated with a super bug called MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus). Worse--there were "no statistically significant differences" between "conventionally raised swine and swine raised without antibiotics," reported the researchers.

Why would meat labeled "raised without antibiotics" be as full of super bugs as conventional and factory farmed meat? It can be contaminated with MRSA at the farm, by slaughterhouse workers who carry MRSA or by other meat, if processing equipment is not "cleaned out between runs of certified organic and non-certified organic meats," say the researchers. A 2009 study of swine workers in Iowa and Illinois found that almost half carried MRSA. ....................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/food/153908/the_scary_danger_of_meat_%28even_for_those_who_don%27t_eat_it%29_/

January 31, 2012

San Francisco Chronicle: Building BART cars overseas adds insult to cost

BART is buying a sleek new fleet of 775 cars - with the first 200 costing about $5.1 million apiece when all is said and done.

The sky-high price for what amounts to a 70-foot-long railway car is sending some folks into sticker shock - especially because the cars are coming from outside the country.

"Taxpayers from the San Francisco Bay Area are paying for these railcars, and they should be built in the Bay Area," said Scott Haggerty, an Alameda County supervisor and member of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission.

The base price for each car is about $3.7 million - but that doesn't count the $850,000 apiece that BART will spend on a list of extras that includes sending inspectors to oversee the manufacturing and assembly of the cars. ..............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/01/29/BAVD1MVLMB.DTL

January 31, 2012

San Francisco Chronicle: Building BART cars overseas adds insult to cost

BART is buying a sleek new fleet of 775 cars - with the first 200 costing about $5.1 million apiece when all is said and done.

The sky-high price for what amounts to a 70-foot-long railway car is sending some folks into sticker shock - especially because the cars are coming from outside the country.

"Taxpayers from the San Francisco Bay Area are paying for these railcars, and they should be built in the Bay Area," said Scott Haggerty, an Alameda County supervisor and member of the Metropolitan Transportation Commission.

The base price for each car is about $3.7 million - but that doesn't count the $850,000 apiece that BART will spend on a list of extras that includes sending inspectors to oversee the manufacturing and assembly of the cars. ..............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/01/29/BAVD1MVLMB.DTL

January 31, 2012

Why the American dream could come to an end

from the Toronto Star:



By Bill Schiller
Foreign Affairs Reporter


It was a chill January day last year when Lucy Berrington and 400 other immigrants from around the world gathered in Boston’s famed Faneuil Hall — the nation’s “cradle of liberty” on the historic “Freedom Trail” — to take an oath and become citizens of the United States.

For many immigrants who come to America to seek a better life, it’s an almost sacred ceremony, “something like being born again,” says Berrington, 42, who came to the U.S. from Britain in 1997.

.......(snip).......

But, she adds candidly, “something seemed off.”

Standing beneath a painting of founding father Samuel Adams and other greats, Berrington was seized by the feeling that she and her new fellow Americans had come to the land of opportunity late.

“I felt I was arriving at the party as it was winding down.” .................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/1121755--foreclosures-and-job-loss-why-the-american-dream-is-dying

January 31, 2012

Boehnhead says the GOP will attach the Keystone pipeline to the infrastructure bill if necessary

House Republicans intend to use their upcoming highway and infrastructure bill to push for approval of the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline, Speaker John Boehner said Sunday.

“If it’s not enacted before we take up the American Energy and Infrastructure Jobs Act, it’ll be part of it,” Boehner said during an interview on ABC’s “This Week”.

The controversial pipeline has become a political flashpoint between Republicans and Democrats. Republicans demanded an expedited Obama Administration decision on the pipeline’s approval as part of a deal temporarily extending payroll tax cuts and unemployment benefits back in December. The administration rejected the approval earlier this month, setting off GOP criticism that President Obama’s political allies were preventing a project that could grow jobs.

House and Senate negotiators are now bargaining over a one-year payroll tax extension, and Boehner’s statement suggests Republicans are keen to avoid another bruising confrontation with Democrats over the pipeline issue. ................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://transportationnation.org/2012/01/29/boehner-keystone-xl-to-ride-on-gops-highway-bill/