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hue's JournalThe Biggest Liberal Protest Of 2013 In 35 Photos & Video
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/06/28/2207851/moral-monday-protest/RALEIGH, North Carolina — To little national fanfare, the largest liberal protest of 2013 took place on Monday this week in North Carolina, with thousands in attendance and hundreds getting arrested.
For weeks, faith leaders in the Tar Heel State have gathered every Monday to give voice to women, the poor, and other groups under attack by the Republican-held legislature. (To learn more about how Republicans won back the North Carolina statehouse for the first time since the Civil War, read Ian Millhiser’s recent piece “How One Millionaire Is Turning North Carolina Into A Tea Party Utopia”.)
This week’s Moral Monday protest, which is being organized by the North Carolina NAACP with support from groups like the Advancement Project and the AFL-CIO, was the largest to date with more than 3,000 people in attendance.
Before the protest kicked off, it began in what many say is the most segregated place in American society: church pews.
But that wasn’t the case this Monday as approximately 250 people — closely split between black and white — filled the pews at Pullen Baptist Church to sing songs and pray together before the evening protest. Though the event was organized by the state NAACP, along with the Advancement Project, the majority of participants were white, and most were past or nearing retirement (if they could afford to do so).
Texas Senate blowup threatens lt. gov.'s future
Source: JournalNews AP
AUSTIN, Texas —
With the crowd in the Texas Senate gallery chanting at deafening levels, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst stood at the podium with his hands in his pockets as his fellow Republicans pleaded and shouted for order.
The protesters refused to settle down as Dewhurst scrambled to the Senate floor and desperately tried to beat a midnight deadline to save one of his top priorities: legislation limiting abortions. He failed, amid one of the wildest scenes in the Texas Legislature in recent memory.
The bill will get another chance next week now that the governor has called another special legislative session, but Dewhurst's political future may not be so easily saved.
Damage left by the raucous scene of an out-of-control Senate — broadcast live on the Internet — has made Dewhurst a target for blame among rivals within his own party who wonder why the presiding officer of the chamber let it happen.
Read more: http://www.journal-news.com/news/ap/legislative/texas-senate-blowup-threatens-lt-govs-future/nYYhN/
Kathleen Vinehout for Governor
I think Kathleen Vinehout could/should begin being more visible & increase Her name recognition.
http://www.youtube.com/user/KathleenVinehout
RAPE IN THE FIELDS
Lowell Bergman investigates the hidden reality of rape on the job for immigrant women working in America’s fields, farms and factories
Author: FRONTLINE
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/rape-in-the-fields/?fb_action_ids=10151451428960988&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map={%2210151451428960988%22%3A114781378731749}&action_type_map={%2210151451428960988%22%3A%22og.recommends%22}&action_ref_map=[]
NC Becomes 1st State to Drop Federal Jobless Funds
Source: abc NEWS
With changes to its unemployment law taking effect this weekend, North Carolina not only is cutting benefits for those who file new claims, it will become the first state disqualified from a federal compensation program for the long-term jobless.
State officials adopted the package of benefit cuts and increased taxes for businesses in February, a plan designed to accelerate repayment of a $2.5 billion federal debt. Like many states, North Carolina had racked up the debt by borrowing from Washington after its unemployment fund was drained by jobless benefits during the Great Recession.
The changes go into effect Sunday for North Carolina, which has the country's fifth-worst jobless rate. The cuts on those who make unemployment claims on or after that day will disqualify the state from receiving federally funded Emergency Unemployment Compensation. That money kicks in after the state's period of unemployment compensation — now shortened from up to six months to no more than five — runs out. The EUC program is available to long-term jobless in all states. But keeping the money flowing includes a requirement that states can't cut average weekly benefits.
Because North Carolina leaders cut average weekly benefits for new claims, about 170,000 workers whose state benefits expire this year will lose more than $700 million in EUC payments, the U.S. Labor Department said.
Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/nc-1st-state-drop-federal-jobless-funds-19516993#.Uc2PH9iKJw8
The ALEC template is becoming actualized in North Carolina...
Cantor on immigration vote: ‘I can’t tell you what’s in that big Senate bill’
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/news/cantor-immigration-vote-t-tell-big-senate-bill-233320198.htmlA bill that would overhaul the nation's immigration system passed with bipartisan support in the Senate Thursday, but some of the top Republican leaders in the House say they haven’t bothered to find out what’s in it.
In an exclusive interview with Yahoo News Thursday evening, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said he’s not aware of the details in the Senate version of the immigration bill and reiterated that the House would move ahead with its own approach.
“I can’t tell you what’s in that big Senate bill, and the well over 1,000 or 1,500 pages that it may be, and that’s my concern,” Cantor told Yahoo News. “I don’t know if you could ask a lot of the senators what’s in that bill. And that’s my concern.”
The Senate bill is comprehensive, combining mandates for border security and a pathway to legal status for immigrants living in the United States unlawfully. House Republican leaders have signaled that they will take a piecemeal approach to immigration reform instead, a move that could make it difficult for the chambers to reconcile the two versions.
Illinois GOP official resigns after calling former Miss America 'street walker'
Source: Chicago Tribune
A Downstate Illinois GOP county chairman resigned today after likening former Miss America Erika Harold, who’s challenging a sitting Republican congressman in next year’s primary election, to a “street walker” whose “pimps” were Democrats and moderate Republicans.
Jim Allen of Farmersville, the chairman of the Montgomery County GOP, sent the resignation letter today to new Illinois Republican Chairman Jack Dorgan. Dorgan called Allen’s remarks “offensive and inappropriate.”
Allen, who supports freshman Republican U.S. Rep. Rodney Davis of Taylorville, made his remarks in an e-mail to a supporter of Harold. She is the 2003 Miss America from Urbana and a former Chicago attorney.
In the e-mail, which was later posted online, Allen referred to Harold as a “little queen” and the “love child” of the Democratic National Committee. Allen also wrote that after losing the 2014 March primary Harold would end up back in Chicago --- though he used a derogatory spelling --- “working for some law firm that needs to meet their quota for minority hires.” Harold is African American.
Read more: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/clout/chi-illinois-gop-official-resigns-after-calling-former-miss-usa-street-walker-20130620,0,2327817.story
Violence against women causes "global health epidemic", says WHO report
Source: Reuters
(Reuters) - More than a third of all women worldwide are victims of physical or sexual violence, posing a global health problem of epidemic proportions, a World Health Organization report said on Thursday.
The vast majority of women are attacked or abused by their husbands or boyfriends, and common health problems they suffer include broken bones, bruises, pregnancy complications, depression and other mental illnesses, the report said.
"This is an everyday reality for many, many women," Charlotte Watts, a health policy expert at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and one of the report's authors, told Reuters in an interview.
She said she was shocked by pictures this week showing celebrity chef Nigella Lawson being grabbed by the throat by her art collector husband Charles Saatchi. He has since been cautioned by police for assaulting her.
"We don't know the details of what is going there, but it does illustrate this happens to all women - it's not just poor women, or women in a certain country. This really is a global issue," Watts said.
The report, co-authored by Watts and Claudia Garcia-Moreno of the WHO, found that almost two fifths (38 percent) of all women murder victims were murdered by intimate partners, and 42 percent of women who have been victims of physical or sexual violence by a partner have injuries as a result.
Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/06/20/us-women-violence-idUSBRE95J0LE20130620
The Enemies Within: The 20 Most Dangerous Conservatives And Their Organizations
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/06/09/the-enemies-within-the-20-most-dangerous-conservatives-and-their-organizations/America has enemies. Not just abroad, but within our shores as well. And our domestic enemies, as it turns out, are MORE dangerous and destructive than the terrorists could ever hope to be. Because while the terrorists want to destroy us, the following people and their organizations are doing far more damage.
1. Roger Ailes: The President of Fox News keeps the right-wing mouth piece biased and unbalanced. He literally proposed a right-wing news network as a propaganda tool to use during the Nixon Administration. And now, Fox News makes every effort to slander Democrats, lie to the public, and support conservative groups, activists and politicians at all costs.
Want to tell Ailes what you think of him? Feel free to contact Fox News Channel by mail, phone, or email.
FOX News Channel
1211 Avenue of the Americas, 2nd Floor, New York, NY 10036
Phone: 212-301-3000
Web: www.foxnews.com
2. The Koch Brothers: Yes, there is more than one Koch brother, but rather than jotting down the same paragraph twice, it makes more sense to combine the two. Charles and David Koch are the owners of Koch Industries, a private oil and chemicals company. They have spent big money in elections and have pretty much bought and paid for all of Republicans that sit on the energy committee. They also have ties to The John Birch Society, of which their father was a founding member, and several other conservative think tanks and organizations including, Americans For Prosperity which David Koch leads as chairman, the Heritage Foundation, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), and the Cato Institute. They helped create and fund the Tea Party and have been very influential in the watering down of environmental laws and the destruction of unions. If you really want to see the scope of their influence look at what is happening in Wisconsin and in the U.S. House of Representatives.
I know you must be dying to contact Koch Industries to give them your opinion, so here’s how you can do that.
‘Every PlantAnd Tree Died’: Huge Alberta Pipeline Spill Raises Safety Questions As Keystone Decision
Looms
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/06/18/2167151/every-plant-and-tree-died-huge-alberta-pipeline-spill-raises-safety-questions-as-keystone-decision-looms/
As the Obama administration’s decision regarding whether to approve the controversial Keystone XL pipeline draws nearer, the latest disaster is raising serious concerns about the safety of Canada’s rapidly expanding pipeline network.
A massive toxic waste spill from an oil and gas operation in northern Alberta is being called one of the largest recent environmental disasters in North America. First reported on June 1, the Texas-based Apache Corp. didn’t reveal the size of the spill until June 12, which is said to cover more than 1,000 acres.
Members of the Dene Tha First Nation tribe are outraged that it took several days before they were informed that 9.5 million liters of salt and heavy-metal-laced wastewater had leaked onto wetlands they use for hunting and trapping.
“Every plant and tree died” in the area touched by the spill, said James Ahnassay, chief of the Dene Tha.
As the Globe and Mail reports, the Apache disaster is not an anomaly:
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