President Obama Speaks on Innovation and Manufacturing (Video/Transcript)

Remarks by the President at Applied Materials, Inc. - Austin, TX

THE PRESIDENT:  Hello, Austin!  How you doing?  (Applause.) Well, it is wonderful to see all of you here today.  First of all, give Nicole an outstanding round of applause for the great job that she did.  (Applause.) 

It is wonderful to be here at Applied Materials.  I want to thank Mike and everybody who helped out hosting us and a wonderful tour of the facility.  It was incredible.  Rick was showing me some of your “clean rooms” where you are building the equipment that makes the chips that is basically powering everything that you guys are taking pictures with right now.  (Laughter.)  Smartphones, computers, iPads, laptops.  And it is just remarkable to see.  Every time I walk through these kinds of facilities I'm thinking, this is just magic.  I don't know how they do it.

Somebody was explaining to me that -- I guess one of the wafers was being cleaned, and he said, this would be the equivalent -- it was Alex who told me this -- Alex is around here somewhere -- the equivalent of if you were mowing the South Lawn but every blade of grass was exactly cut at the same height within a single human hair.  That's how precise things are.  That sounds pretty precise to me.  And if that's, by the way, the precision that you operate on, if that’s how you define a clean room, then Sasha and Malia are going to have to step up their game at home.  (Laughter.)  Because it is not that clean.  (Laughter.) 

I want to thank your Mayor, Lee Leffingwell, who’s doing a great job.  (Applause.)  Lee is doing outstanding work every day and helping to bring the Austin community together.  Congressman Lloyd Doggett is here.  (Applause.)  They’ve been great hosts.  We actually have a special guest -- the Mayor of San Antonio in the house -- my friend, Julian Castro is here.  (Applause.) 

Now, I’ve spent the day in Austin talking with folks about what we can do to reignite the true engine of America’s economic growth -- a thriving, rising middle class and a dynamic, cutting-edge economy.  That’s our priority.  That should be Washington’s top priority.  (Applause.)  And I see three things that we need to focus on to do it. 

Number one, we've got to make America a magnet for good jobs.  Number two, we've got to help people earn the skills they need to do those jobs.  Number three, we've got to make sure people’s hard work is rewarded so that they can make a decent living doing those jobs. 

And if you watch the news, sometimes you may think that there’s just doom and gloom out there.  But the truth is there’s incredible stuff going on all across America and right here in Austin that I think can be good models for the rest of America to follow. 

This morning I visited Manor New Tech High School, where students are learning high-tech skills that companies like Applied are looking for right now.  They are getting excited, working with math and science and technology and engineering.  And it's a hands-on high school where subjects are integrated, and kids are building things and conducting experiments at very early ages.  And it's sparking their imagination in ways that may lead them to start up the next Applied, or come here and work at Applied. 

And then I joined a few local families for lunch to talk about how we can make sure that hard work pays off with wages you can live on and raise a family, with health care that you can count on, and the chance to put away some money for retirement.  And we also had good barbeque -- (laughter) -- which is necessary for economic growth.  (Laughter.)  Some good barbeque once in a while.  And then I came to Applied Materials to talk about what we can do to make America a magnet for new jobs in manufacturing.

After shedding jobs for a decade, our manufacturers have added now about 500,000 new manufacturing jobs over the past three years.  (Applause.)  That’s good news.  Caterpillar is bringing jobs back from Japan, and Ford is bringing jobs back from Mexico.  And after placing plants in other countries like China, Intel is opening its most advanced plant right here at home.  This year, Apple started making Macs in America again.  (Applause.) 

So there are some good trend lines there, but we've got to do everything we can to strengthen that trend.  We've got to do everything we can to help the kind of high-tech manufacturing that you're doing right here at Applied.  And we want to make sure it takes root here in Austin and all across the country.  And that means, first of all, creating more centers of high-tech manufacturing.

Last year, we launched our first manufacturing innovation institute in Youngstown, Ohio, to develop new technologies and equip workers with the skills required to master 3-D printing techniques.  And in my State of the Union address, I called on Congress to set up 15 more of these manufacturing hubs all across America, and I said that my administration was going to go ahead and move forward with three new hubs on our own, even without congressional action. 

Well, today, we're launching a competition for those hubs.  We are looking for businesses and universities that are willing to partner together to help their region -- help turn their region into global centers of high-tech jobs.  Because we want the next revolution in manufacturing to be “Made in America.”  (Applause.)  We’re going to do that.   

The truth is, over the past couple decades, too many communities have been hit hard when plants closed down and jobs dried up.  The economy obviously is changing all the time.  Nobody knows that better than folks here at Applied.  I was talking to somebody who’s -- after showing me the wafer and some chips, and then they showed me a smartphone, they pointed to the smartphone and they said, 40 years ago, there’d be about $3 billion just trying to get this much computing power in this little thing, except it would fill up a whole room. 

And so the economy is dynamic.  Technology is constantly changing.  That means we’ve got to adapt as well.  And even as we’re working to reverse the trend of communities that have been hard hit with old manufacturing leaving, we’ve got to propose partnerships with local leaders in manufacturing communities to help attract new investment in the infrastructure and the research that will attract new jobs and new businesses, so that communities that have been knocked down can get back up and get back on their feet. 

And we should help our workers get the training they need to compete for the industries of tomorrow.  No job in America should go unfilled just because we don’t have anybody with the right skills.  (Applause.)  And that’s a priority.  Now, some of your colleagues that I met, some of them have advanced degrees.  Some of them came to apply basically right out of high school.  But all of you, whether it was, in some cases, through a university education, in some cases the military, in some cases just on-the-job training -- all of you have specialized skills that are exactly what we need to continue to grow our economy.  But we’ve got a whole bunch of folks out there who don’t have those skills, either because the education system failed them or because their skills have been rendered obsolete.

And that’s why I want to rethink how our high school kids are prepared.  I want to make sure that we’re training two million Americans at our community colleges for skills that will lead directly to a job.  (Applause.)  And that’s also why we’ve got to make sure that college is affordable and people aren’t burdened by a mountain of debt so that they can continue to upgrade their skills as well.

Now, if we want to manufacture the best products, we’ve also got to invest in and cultivate the best ideas.  Innovation, ingenuity -- that’s the constant of the American economy.  That’s one of the constants of our character.  It’s what keeps America on the cutting-edge. 

And just before I came here, I visited the Capital Factory, which, as some of you know, is a place that helps start-ups take off.  And everywhere you turn, somebody has got a new idea.  They’re all thinking big.  They’re taking risks.  It’s exciting.

There was a young woman who is in a wheelchair and physically disabled but is just incredibly inspired to make sure that she’s not in any way confined by that situation.  And she’s basically designed and is now manufacturing a car that people in wheelchairs can just drive their wheelchair right into the car and start driving.

And then you had a young man who had a 3-D camera -- it was about this big -- and basically from filming either a static image or in the round, can basically download that immediately and create a 3-D image, and then use that for 3-D manufacturing  -- 3-D printing and manufacturing.  And what currently costs about $80,000 costs about $3,000 -- the technology that he’s developed.  So they're doing amazing stuff.

And one of the things we’re doing to fuel more inventiveness like this, to fuel more private sector innovation and discovery, is to make the vast amounts of America’s data open and easy to access for the first time in history.  So talented entrepreneurs are doing some pretty amazing things with data that's already being collected by government.

So over at the Capital Factory, I met with folks behind the start-up called StormPulse, which uses government data on weather to help businesses anticipate disruptions in service.  And then you’ve got a Virginia company called OPower that’s used government data on trends in energy use to save its customers $200 million on their energy bills.  There’s an app called iTriage, founded by a pair of ER doctors that uses data from the Department of Health and Human Services to help users understand medical symptoms and find local doctors and health care providers. 

And today I’m announcing that we’re making even more government data available, and we’re making it easier for people to find and to use.  And that’s going to help launch more start-ups.  It’s going to help launch more businesses.  Some of them undoubtedly will be using this data powered by chips that essentially started right here at Applied Materials.  (Applause.)

It’s going to help more entrepreneurs come up with products and services that we haven’t even imagined yet.         

This kind of innovation and ingenuity has the potential to transform the way we do almost everything.  One-third of jobs in Austin are now supported by the tech sector.  And we should do all we can to encourage this kind of innovation economy all across America, in ways that produce new jobs and new opportunities for the middle class.

And we’re poised for a time of progress -- if we’re willing to seize it.  Not even five years after the worst economic crisis in our lifetimes, our jobs market, our housing market are steadily healing.  Our deficits are falling at the fastest rate in decades.  The American auto industry has made a comeback.  It’s thriving.  American energy is booming.  But we’ve got to keep moving forward, and we’ve got to make sure that Washington is not administering self-inflicted wounds when we’re making progress.

So Mike and I were talking about the fact that if we can reform our tax system to eliminate some of these loopholes potentially we could lower some rates.  That would make our businesses more competitive.

Basic research, you’ll hear people talk about how government is not going to do anything for us.  Well, we all understand that the private sector powers and drives our economy.  On the other hand, most of the private sector right now has a lot of trouble financing basic research.  And that basic research is the foundation for everything that's done at this company, and everything that's done for most of your customers.  And we can't afford to fall behind when it comes to basic research.  So there’s some key things that we can do that shouldn't be ideological.  They're not Democratic ideas or Republican ideas or independent ideas.  They're just good ideas that allow the government to help create the foundation, the platform, the environment in which companies like Applied Materials can thrive. And that's what we've got to constantly champion.

And when you're talking to your members of Congress or you're talking to elected officials, you've got to remind them we don't want government to do everything for us, but it's got a role to play on infrastructure, basic research -- making sure that we've got a tax system that's fair, making sure that we've got some basic stability in our budget so people aren't always guessing what's going to happen around the corner.

Think about how this company was built.  Back in 1967, when Applied Materials was just getting off the ground, there were five employees.  They worked out of this small industrial unit in California.  And I suppose they had a “clean room” in there, but I don't know what it looked like.  (Laughter.)  But what they lacked in size, they made up with ingenuity and imagination and risk-taking.  And over the years, as you grew to become a leader in high-tech manufacturing, that ingenuity never faltered.  Whether you’ve been with this company for decades -- as I know some of you have -- or just for a year, you’re all focused on the future.  Every day you're pushing the limits of technology a little bit further.

And you're not alone, because somewhere over at the Capital Factory, there’s an entrepreneur mapping out a new product on a whiteboard that may be the next big thing.  Somewhere over at Manor New Tech High School, there’s a kid scribbling down an idea for a new invention that one day may turn into an entirely new industry.  That’s America.

And when you look out across this room, what you also notice is there's talent drawn from every segment of our society.  We don't care what you look like, where you come from, what your last name is.  We just want to make sure we're all working together to create a better future for our kids. 

That's America. We innovate.  We adapt.  We move forward.  That's what Austin is all about.  That's what's going on in this city.  (Applause.)  And that's what I want to keep on promoting as your President of the United States of America. 

Thank you, everybody.  God bless you.  God bless America.

Al-Nakba Episode 1 (Palestinian 'catastrophe' of 1948) (video)

A series on the Palestinian 'catastrophe' of 1948 that led to dispossession and a conflict that endures to this day.

Source: Al Jazeera

“The Nakba did not begin in 1948. Its origins lie over two centuries ago….”

So begins this four-part series on the ‘nakba’, meaning the ‘catastrophe’, about the history of the Palestinian exodus that led to the first Arab-Israeli War in 1948 and the establishment of the state of Israel.

This sweeping history starts back in 1799 with Napoleon’s attempted advance into Palestine to check British expansion and his appeal to the Jews of the world to reclaim their land in league with France.

The narrative moves through the 19th century and into the 20th century with the British Mandate in Palestine and comes right up to date in the 21st century and the ongoing ‘nakba’ on the ground.

Arab, Israeli and Western intellectuals, historians and eye-witnesses provide the central narrative which is accompanied by archive material and documents, many only recently released for the first time.

 Episode 1 - Al- Nakba  

For the Palestinians, 1948 marks the 'Nakba' or the 'catastrophe', when hundreds of thousands were forced out of their homes.

But for Israelis, the same year marks the creation of their own state.

The tragedy in Palestine is not just a local one; it is a tragedy for the world, because it is an injustice that is a menace to the world's peace.
Arnold Toynbee, British historian

This series attempts to present an understanding of the events of the past that are still shaping the present.

This story starts in 1799, outside the walls of Acre in Ottoman-controlled Palestine, when an army under Napoleon Bonaparte besieged the city. It was all part of a campaign to defeat the Ottomans and establish a French presence in the region.

In search of allies, Napoleon issued a letter offering Palestine as a homeland to the Jews under French protection.  He called on the Jews to ‘rise up’ against what he called their oppressors.
Napoleon’s appeal was widely publicised. But he was ultimately defeated. In Acre today, the only memory of him is a statue atop a hill overlooking the city.

Yet Napoleon’s project for a Jewish homeland in the region under a colonial protectorate did not die, 40  years later, the plan was revived but by the British. 

Dow Jones Industrial Average hit 15000 and who is getting richer?

The Dow Jones Industrial Average hit 15056.20 for the first time and unemployment rate continued at 7.50 percent. Although the unemployment rate dropped lower again, it continues to be still higher than it should be after such a sharp increase of the Dow Jones.

Moreover, real wage growth continues to be stagnant.

So there is no reason to celebrate. In contrary, we should wonder, who is benefits from this high record of the Dow Jones and who is getting richer?

Special series The Secret of the Seven Sisters - Episode 3 & 4 (Video)

Episode 3 - The Dancing Bear

 

Source:Al Jazeera
 In the Caucasus, the US and Russia are vying for control of the region. The great oil game is in full swing. Whoever controls the Caucasus and its roads, controls the transport of oil from the Caspian Sea.

Tbilisi, Erevan and Baku - the three capitals of the Caucasus. The oil from Baku in Azerbaijan is a strategic priority for all the major companies.

From the fortunes of the Nobel family to the Russian revolution, to World War II, oil from the Caucasus and the Caspian has played a central role. Lenin fixated on conquering the Azeri capital Baku for its oil, as did Stalin and Hitler.

On his birthday in 1941, Adolf Hitler received a chocolate and cream birthday cake, representing a map. He chose the slice with Baku on it.

On June 22nd 1941, the armies of the Third Reich invaded Russia. The crucial battle of Stalingrad was the key to the road to the Caucasus and Baku’s oil, and would decide the outcome of the war.

Stalin told his troops: "Fighting for one’s oil is fighting for one’s freedom."

After World War II, President Nikita Krushchev would build the Soviet empire and its Red Army with revenues from the USSR’s new-found oil reserves.

Decades later, oil would bring that empire to its knees, when Saudi Arabia and the US would conspire to open up the oil taps, flood the markets, and bring the price of oil down to $13 per barrel. Russian oligarchs would take up the oil mantle, only to be put in their place by their president, Vladimir Putin, who knows that oil is power.

The US and Putin‘s Russia would prop up despots, and exploit regional conflicts to maintain a grip on the oil fields of the Caucusus and the Caspian.

But they would not have counted on the rise of a new, strong and hungry China, with an almost limitless appetite for oil and energy. Today, the US, Russia and China contest the control of the former USSR’s fossil fuel reserves, and the supply routes. A three-handed match, with the world as spectators, between three ferocious beasts – The American eagle, the Russian bear, and the Chinese dragon.

Episode 4 - A Time for Lies

 

Peak oil – the point in time at which the highest rate of oil extraction has been reached, and after which world production will start decline. Many geologists and the International Energy Agency say the world's crude oil output reached its peak in 2006.

But while there may be less oil coming out of the ground, the demand for it is definitely on the rise.

The final episode of this series explores what happens when oil becomes more and more inaccessible, while at the same time, new powers like China and India try to fulfill their growing energy needs.

And countries like Iran, while suffering international sanctions, have welcomed these new oil buyers, who put business ahead of lectures on human rights and nuclear ambitions.
At the same time, oil-producing countries have had enough with the Seven Sisters controlling their oil assets. Nationalisation of oil reserves around the world has ushered in a new generation of oil companies all vying for a slice of the oil pie.

These are the new Seven Sisters.

Saudi Arabia's Saudi Aramco, the largest and most sophisticated oil company in the world; Russia's Gazprom, a company that Russia's President Vladimir Putin wrested away from the oligarchs; The China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), which, along with its subsidiary, Petrochina, is the world's secnd largest company in terms of market value; The National Iranian Oil Company, which has a monopoly on exploration, extraction, transportation and exportation of crude oil in Iran – OPEC's second largest oil producer after Saudi Arabia; Venezuela's PDVSA, a company the late president Hugo Chavez dismantled and rebuilt into his country's economic engine and part of his diplomatic arsenal; Brazil's Petrobras, a leader in deep water oil production, that pumps out 2 million barrels of crude oil a day; and Malaysia's Petronas - Asia's most profitable company in 2012.

Mainly state-owned, the new Seven Sisters control a third of the world's oil and gas production, and more than a third of the world's reserves. The old Seven Sisters, by comparison, produce a tenth of the world's oil, and control only three percent of the reserves.
The balance has shifted.

President Barack Obama Weekly Address May 4, 2013 (Video/Transcript)

Remarks of President Barack Obama Weekly Address Mexico City, Mexico May 4, 2013

Hi, everybody.  Today, I’m speaking to you from the road – a trip to Mexico and Costa Rica.

I’m here because Latin America represents an incredible opportunity for the United States, especially when it comes to my top priority as President: creating good, middle-class jobs.
On Friday, we learned that our businesses created another 176,000 jobs last month.  That’s 2.2 million new jobs over the past year, and 6.8 million new jobs over the past 38 months.
But as I've said before, I won’t be satisfied until everyone who wants a job can find one. So I’m going to keep doing everything I can and going everywhere I need to go to help our businesses create jobs.

Now, one of the best ways to grow our economy is to sell more goods and services Made in America to the rest of the world.  That includes our neighbors to the south.

Right now, over 40 percent of our exports go to the Americas.  And those exports are growing faster than our trade with the rest of the world.  That’s why I visited Latin America this week – to work with leaders to deepen our economic ties and expand trade between our nations.
In Mexico, I also talked about immigration reform, because that’s an important issue that affects both our countries.

The truth is, right now, our border with Mexico is more secure than it’s been in years.  We’ve put more boots on that border than at any time in our history, and illegal crossings are down by nearly 80 percent from their peak in 2000.  But we’ve got more to do – not just to secure the border but to fix an immigration system that is badly broken.

In recent weeks, we’ve seen a commonsense immigration reform bill introduced in the Senate.  This bill is a compromise, which means that nobody got everything they wanted – including me.  But it’s largely consistent with the principles I’ve laid out from the beginning.

It would continue to strengthen security at our borders and hold employers more accountable if they knowingly hire undocumented workers.

It would provide a pathway to earned citizenship for the 11 million individuals who are already in this country illegally.

And it would modernize our legal immigration system so that we’re able to reunite families and attract the highly-skilled entrepreneurs and engineers who will help create good paying jobs and grow our economy.

These are all commonsense steps that the majority of Americans support.  So there’s no reason that immigration reform can’t become a reality this year.

In the meantime, I’ll keep working with our neighbors on our common security and our common prosperity.  Millions of Americans earn a living right now because of the trade between our nations.  And after this week, I’m as confident as ever that we can build on our shared heritage and values to open more markets for American businesses and create more jobs for American workers.

Thanks and have a great weekend.

G.W. Bush spins Iraq Decision to go to War (Video/Transcript)

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Transcript:
I live in western Massachusetts, just outside the city of north Hampton. Among the charms, north Hampton, Massachusetts, has an elegant public library, called the Forbes library. Not just a centerpiece of downtown, it turns out it has national significance.
Forbes library isn't named for a U.S. President. There’s never been a president Forbes, it's actually named after some rich guy judge that donated the library, but it contains the Presidential library and museum of former President Calvin Coolidge. That's tucked away somewhere inside the place I used to check out DVDs when I couldn't afford rental fees at block buster.

The papers memorabilia is tucked away inside that building. It’s a public library in north Hampton. Calvin Coolidge is the last U.S. president not to have a free standing named after him presidential library. Since Coolidge, all other American presidents we've had, even Nixon, they have an edifice built somewhere in their honor. The tourist brochure from the national archives about all the presidential libraries includes this kind of creepy map that seems like the disembodied heads loom over regions of the country. Look at poor Arizona.

They have nothing to do with Nixon, but he looms over the state like a death's head. this map showed all the different places you could go in the country as a member of the public to explore the modern presidents and the things they have preserve and this is what's happening there today, when people from here on out go to the George W. Bush Presidential library to play the decision points game. This is what happens. Watch.

 George W. Bush made many tough decisions as president. Now you'll get a flavor for what that's like. Take a look at the list of scenarios in front of you. First, you will select which one you want to tackle. The majority of the theater chose the threat of Saddam Hussein. President Bush had to make a choice, one, seek another U.N. resolution, two, lead an international coalition to remove Saddam, three, accept Saddam Hussein will remain in power. You are about to get expert advice. You’ll have to weigh conflicting points of view. Okay, we're ready to start. Work fast, the clock is ticking.

With a literal drum beat, actual drum beat to war coming out of the speakers in the theater, you get advice from members of the intelligent community, while and this is what's happening there today, when people from here on out go to the George W. Bush presidential library to play the decision points game. This is what happens. Watch.
With a literal drum beat, actual drum beat to war coming out of the speakers in the theater, you get advice from members of the intelligent community, while you're getting those briefings, and you get interrupted by ominous breaking news developments.
If we act to depose him, other countries could use our actions to wage unjustified wars in the future.

Chemical warheads.

This is the first really solid evidence.

After you deal with all the breaking news interruptions about new weapons that weren't disclosed before being discovered and get advice from your fake actor experts, it's finally time to make this decision. They do set up three options to choose from, right? You can seek a new U.N. resolution that makes sense. You can invade, of course, they don't say invade, they say, lead an international coalition, which means invade. If you want to not invade, what's the label for not invading? That choice is labeled take no action. That’s the neutral presentation of options here. You can lead, or you can do nothing. If you choose to do nothing, well, president bush's former white house chief of staff then appears on screen and obviously expresses his disappointment in you.

Times up. It’s time to make a decision. You were asked how to address the threat of Saddam Hussein. You had three options. The people in the theater today decided to take no action and accept that Saddam Hussein will remain in power.

Accept, way to go, wusses. He doesn't stop there, though, with his disapproving, almost disbelieving lack, he then has president bush to come on screen and say the correct answer is you should have invaded. when I first read descriptions of this, I thought they'd meant you'd get historical footage of George W. Bush from his presidency, documenting the history how the bush presidency handled the issue at the time, but as you can see, this is president bush now, this is contemporary George w. Bush taped recently still making the case today that invading Iraq is the right answer.

My first choice was to use diplomacy rather than putting American troops into harm's way.

First choice, diplomacy. he goes on to explain the U.N. resolutions passed. then he launches right into this explanation for why invading Iraq was the right thing to do, because smoking gun was going to be a mushroom cloud, because Saddam's weapons of mass destruction, Saddam being linked to terrorist groups. Seriously.

The stakes were too high to trust the dictator's word against the weight of evidence and the consensus of the world. Saddam posed too big a risk to ignore he had used weapons of mass destruction in the past, showed every sign of continuing to pursue such weapons, and supported international terrorist organizations. The world was made safer by his removal. With his departure, 25 million Iraqis have the chance to live in freedom and build a free society. The new democracy in Iraq can be a valuable ally in the heart of the Middle East and a beacon of hope to reformers around the world.

Imagine at the bill Clinton presidential library, an interactive exhibit designed to prove that he did not have actual relations with that woman. Imagine an interactive meet tricky dick hologram at the Nixon library, showing ways he really isn't a crook. You know, the weight of evidence did not show that we had to invade Iraq. There was no consensus of the world that we had to invade Iraq. When we invaded Iraq, look at this, every country in the map that is shaded blue here, every country here on this map shaded in blue was against us invading Iraq.

Does it seem like there was a world consensus we should invade Iraq? The head of the U.N. at the time said he considered that invasion to be illegal. The consensus of the world was George w. Bush had to lead an international coalition to invade Iraq?

Are you serious? These little kids, who as of today are going to our nation's newest presidential library to learn the unvarnished history about this presidency, are being told Saddam Hussein showed every sign of continuing to pursue weapons of mass destruction. The case to invade Iraq was not mistaken. The case to invade Iraq was cooked up. It was a hoax perpetrated on the American people, and they are still cooking it up right now, ten years to the day after the mission accomplished speech, as if the last ten years has never happened. This is what kids are being taught that part of our nation's history. I kind of think this is a national scandal.

President Barack Obama Weekly Address April 27, 2013 (Video/Transcript)

Remarks of President Barack Obama

Weekly Address

The White House

April 27, 2013

Hi, everybody.  Our top priority as a nation must be growing the economy, creating good jobs, and rebuilding opportunity for the middle class.

But two months ago, Congress allowed a series of automatic budget cuts to fall across the federal government that would do the opposite.  In Washington-speak, these cuts were called the “sequester.”  It was a bad idea then.  And as the country saw this week, it’s a bad idea now.

Because of these reckless cuts, there are parents whose kids just got kicked out of Head Start programs scrambling for a solution.  There are seniors who depend on programs like Meals on Wheels to live independently looking for help.  There are military communities – families that have already sacrificed enough – coping under new strains.  All because of these cuts.

This week, the sequester hurt travelers, who were stuck for hours in airports and on planes, and rightly frustrated by it.  And, maybe because they fly home each weekend, the Members of Congress who insisted these cuts take hold finally realized that they actually apply to them too.

Republicans claimed victory when the sequester first took effect, and now they’ve decided it was a bad idea all along.  Well, first, they should look at their own budget.  If the cuts they propose were applied across the board, the FAA would suffer cuts three times deeper.

So Congress passed a temporary fix.  A Band-Aid.  But these cuts are scheduled to keep falling across other parts of the government that provide vital services for the American people.  And we can’t just keep putting Band-Aids on every cut.  It’s not a responsible way to govern.  There is only one way to truly fix the sequester: by replacing it before it causes further damage.

A couple weeks ago, I put forward a budget that replaces the next several years of these dumb cuts with smarter cuts; reforms our tax code to close wasteful special interest loopholes; and invests in things like education, research, and manufacturing that will create new jobs right now.

So I hope Members of Congress will find the same sense of urgency and bipartisan cooperation to help the families still in the crosshairs of these cuts.  They may not feel the pain felt by kids kicked off Head Start, or the 750,000 Americans projected to lose their jobs because of these cuts, or the long-term unemployed who will be further hurt by them.  But that pain is real.
The American people worked too hard, for too long, rebuilding from one economic crisis just to see your elected officials keep causing more.  Our economy is growing.  Our deficits are shrinking.  We’re creating jobs on a consistent basis.  But we need to do more to help middle-class families get ahead, and give more folks a chance to earn their way into the middle class.  And we can, if we work together.  That’s what you expect.  That’s what I’m going to work every single day to help deliver. 

Thank you.

Australia & Gun Control's Aftermath (video)

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Indecision Political Humor,The Daily Show on Facebook

John Oliver learns it's pointless for America to study the Australian gun control experience because the situations are just too similar. 

Does only the United States has real people?

Is the United States the only real country?

 

Remarks by President Obama at Dedication of the George W. Bush Presidential Library

Bush Presidential Center

Dallas, Texas

PRESIDENT OBAMA:  Thank you so much.  (Applause.)  Thank you.  Please be seated.  To President Bush and Mrs. Bush; to President Clinton and now-former Secretary Clinton; to President George H.W. Bush and Mrs. Bush; to President and Mrs. Carter; to current and former world leaders and all the distinguished guests here today -- Michelle and I are honored to be with you to mark this historic occasion.

This is a Texas-sized party.  And that’s worthy of what we’re here to do today:  honor the life and legacy of the 43rd President of the United States, George W. Bush.

When all the living former Presidents are together, it’s also a special day for our democracy.  We’ve been called “the world’s most exclusive club” -- and we do have a pretty nice clubhouse.  But the truth is, our club is more like a support group.  The last time we all got together was just before I took office.  And I needed that.  Because as each of these leaders will tell you, no matter how much you may think you’re ready to assume the office of the presidency, it’s impossible to truly understand the nature of the job until it’s yours, until you’re sitting at that desk.

And that’s why every President gains a greater appreciation for all those who served before him; for the leaders from both parties who have taken on the momentous challenges and felt the enormous weight of a nation on their shoulders.  And for me, that appreciation very much extends to President Bush.

The first thing I found in that desk the day I took office was a letter from George, and one that demonstrated his compassion and generosity.  For he knew that I would come to learn what he had learned -- that being President, above all, is a humbling job.  There are moments where you make mistakes.  There are times where you wish you could turn back the clock.  And what I know is true about President Bush, and I hope my successor will say about me, is that we love this country and we do our best.

Now, in the past, President Bush has said it’s impossible to pass judgment on his presidency while he’s still alive.  So maybe this is a little bit premature.  But even now, there are certain things that we know for certain.

We know about the son who was raised by two strong, loving parents in Midland, famously inheriting, as he says, “my daddy’s eyes and my mother’s mouth.”  (Laughter.)  The young boy who once came home after a trip to a museum and proudly presented his horrified mother with a small dinosaur tailbone he had smuggled home in his pocket.  (Laughter.)  I’ll bet that went over great with Barbara.

We know about the young man who met the love of his life at a dinner party, ditching his plans to go to bed early and instead talking with the brilliant and charming Laura Welch late into the night.

We know about the father who raised two remarkable, caring, beautiful daughters, even after they tried to discourage him from running for President, saying, “Dad, you’re not as cool as you think you are.”  (Laughter.)  Mr. President, I can relate.  (Laughter.)  And now we see President Bush the grandfather, just beginning to spoil his brand-new granddaughter.

So we know President Bush the man.  And what President Clinton said is absolutely true -- to know the man is to like the man, because he’s comfortable in his own skin.  He knows who he is.  He doesn’t put on any pretenses.  He takes his job seriously, but he doesn’t take himself too seriously.  He is a good man.

But we also know something about George Bush the leader.  As we walk through this library, obviously we’re reminded of the incredible strength and resolve that came through that bullhorn as he stood amid the rubble and the ruins of Ground Zero, promising to deliver justice to those who had sought to destroy our way of life.

We remember the compassion that he showed by leading the global fight against HIV/AIDS and malaria, helping to save millions of lives and reminding people in some of the poorest corners of the globe that America cares and that we’re here to help.

We remember his commitment to reaching across the aisle to unlikely allies like Ted Kennedy, because he believed that we had to reform our schools in ways that help every child learn, not just some; that we have to repair a broken immigration system; and that this progress is only possible when we do it together.

Seven years ago, President Bush restarted an important conversation by speaking with the American people about our history as a nation of laws and a nation of immigrants.  And even though comprehensive immigration reform has taken a little longer than any of us expected, I am hopeful that this year, with the help of Speaker Boehner and some of the senators and members of Congress who are here today, that we bring it home -- for our families, and our economy, and our security, and for this incredible country that we love.  And if we do that, it will be in large part thanks to the hard work of President George W. Bush.  (Applause.)

And finally, a President bears no greater decision and no more solemn burden than serving as Commander-in-Chief of the greatest military that the world has ever known.  As President Bush himself has said, “America must and will keep its word to the men and women who have given us so much."  So even as we Americans may at times disagree on matters of foreign policy, we share a profound respect and reverence for the men and women of our military and their families.  And we are united in our determination to comfort the families of the fallen and to care for those who wear the uniform of the United States.  (Applause.)

On the flight back from Russia, after negotiating with Nikita Khrushchev at the height of the Cold War, President Kennedy's secretary found a small slip of paper on which the President had written a favorite saying:  "I know there is a God.  And I see a storm coming.  If he has a place for me, I believe I am ready."

No one can be completely ready for this office.  But America needs leaders who are willing to face the storm head on, even as they pray for God's strength and wisdom so that they can do what they believe is right.  And that’s what the leaders with whom I share this stage have all done.  That’s what President George W. Bush chose to do.  That’s why I'm honored to be part of today's celebration.

Mr. President, for your service, for your courage, for your sense of humor, and, most of all, for your love of country, thank you very much.  From all the citizens of the United States of America, God bless you.  And God bless these United States.  (Applause.)

Human infections with the emerging avian influenza A H7N9 virus from wet market poultry: clinical analysis and characterisation of viral genome

Source: The Lancet, Early Online Publication, 25 April 2013

Audio Link

Summary

Background

Human infection with avian influenza A H7N9 virus emerged in eastern China in February, 2013, and has been associated with exposure to poultry. We report the clinical and microbiological features of patients infected with influenza A H7N9 virus and compare genomic features of the human virus with those of the virus in market poultry in Zhejiang, China.

Methods

Between March 7 and April 8, 2013, we included hospital inpatients if they had new-onset respiratory symptoms, unexplained radiographic infiltrate, and laboratory-confirmed H7N9 virus infection. We recorded histories and results of haematological, biochemical, radiological, and microbiological investigations. We took throat and sputum samples, used RT-PCR to detect M, H7, and N9 genes, and cultured samples in Madin-Darby canine kidney cells. We tested for co-infections and monitored serum concentrations of six cytokines and chemokines. We collected cloacal swabs from 86 birds from epidemiologically linked wet markets and inoculated embryonated chicken eggs with the samples. We identified and subtyped isolates by RT-PCR sequencing. RNA extraction, complementary DNA synthesis, and PCR sequencing were done for one human and one chicken isolate. We characterised and phylogenetically analysed the eight gene segments of the viruses in the patient's and the chicken's isolates, and constructed phylogenetic trees of H, N, PB2, and NS genes.

Findings

We identified four patients (mean age 56 years), all of whom had contact with poultry 3—8 days before disease onset. They presented with fever and rapidly progressive pneumonia that did not respond to antibiotics. Patients were leucopenic and lymphopenic, and had impaired liver or renal function, substantially increased serum cytokine or chemokine concentrations, and disseminated intravascular coagulation with disease progression. Two patients died. Sputum specimens were more likely to test positive for the H7N9 virus than were samples from throat swabs. The viral isolate from the patient was closely similar to that from an epidemiologically linked market chicken. All viral gene segments were of avian origin. The H7 of the isolated viruses was closest to that of the H7N3 virus from domestic ducks in Zhejiang, whereas the N9 was closest to that of the wild bird H7N9 virus in South Korea. We noted Gln226Leu and Gly186Val substitutions in human virus H7 (associated with increased affinity for α-2,6-linked sialic acid receptors) and the PB2 Asp701Asn mutation (associated with mammalian adaptation). Ser31Asn mutation, which is associated with adamantane resistance, was noted in viral M2.

Interpretation

Cross species poultry-to-person transmission of this new reassortant H7N9 virus is associated with severe pneumonia and multiorgan dysfunction in human beings. Monitoring of the viral evolution and further study of disease pathogenesis will improve disease management, epidemic control, and pandemic preparedness.

Funding

Larry Chi-Kin Yung, National Key Program for Infectious Diseases of China.

America's War Games

How the Obama administration is redefining the US military's strategic priorities with far-reaching consequences.

Source: Al Jazeera

 

The United States' military expenditures today account for about 40 percent of the world total. In 2012, the US spent some $682bn on its military - an amount more than what was spent by the next 13 countries combined.

Now that the war in Iraq is over and the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan will be complete in 2014, the stage might therefore appear to be set for a decrease in US defence spending. Even in Washington DC, many have argued that the defence budget can be cut substantially and the resulting "peace dividend" could be diverted to more pressing domestic concerns, such as dealing with the nation's continuing economic problems.

You can't do anything about it [because] there's too much political support.

Chuck Spinney, a defence analyst

However, a battle to ward off cuts to the Pentagon's budget has begun and the way things are going, it seems likely that the US will have the smallest drawdown or reduction of the military budget after a period of conflict since World War II - in comparative terms, smaller than after Vietnam, Korea and the end of the Cold War. 

The Pentagon's joint chiefs of staff have appeared before Congress warning of dire results from the impacts of sequestration, a requirement to reduce defence spending by $500bn over 10 years that grew out of a 2011 budget deal between President Obama and Congress. In March, sequestration led to a $41bn cut in 2013 defence spending.

Pentagon officials, defence companies, politicians and conservative commentators argue that defence cuts will be devastating for the military and the economy. Others point out that after sequestration, the Pentagon's base defence budget, which does not include additional funds for the war in Afghanistan - will remain above the Cold War average, and close to the highest level since World War II.

Chuck Spinney, who worked as an analyst in the US secretary of defence's office for 26 years, believes it is difficult for the United States to reap the benefits of a peace dividend because of the workings of the military-industrial complex that President Dwight Eisenhower warned about in his final 1961 address.

"It's what in Washington we call an iron triangle," Spinney says, " you have an alliance between the private sector, the defence contractors, the executive branch, in this case the Pentagon, and the legislative branch."

Everyone benefits from expensive procurement projects - the Pentagon gets weapons, defence companies get to make profits, and politicians get re-elected by funding armaments that generate jobs for constituents and campaign contributions from defence companies.

The result, according to Spinney, is a defence budget "that is packed to the gills with weapons we don't need, with weapons that are underestimated in their future costs".

The Pentagon and defence contractors low-ball costs and exaggerate performance in the early stages of a project to "turn on the money spigot". Then the companies engage in "political engineering," they spread the contracts and employment for a weapon around to as many Congressional districts as possible. They do that, Spinney says, so that once cost-overruns and performance problems become apparent, "you can't do anything about it [because] there's too much political support".

The F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is a textbook case of a Pentagon procurement project that reveals why it is difficult to cut the defence budget. Three versions of the F-35 are being built for the Air Force, Navy and Marines by Lockheed Martin, the largest defence contractor in the US. The F-35 is the most expensive military weapons programme in US history, bigger than the Manhattan Project that produced nuclear weapons.

The F-35 was sold as a programme that would cost $226bn for about 2,900 aircrafts. It is now seven years behind schedule, and the price has increased almost 100 percent to $400bn for only 2,400 fighters. At least another $1 trillion will be required for operations and maintenance of the F-35 over its lifetime.

Pierre Sprey, an aircraft engineer and analyst who was one of Defense Secretary Robert McNamara's 'whizz kids' in the 1960s, believes that the project should be cancelled or "there will be so little money left over for anything that's needed, it'll be unbelievable. They'll be cutting people, pilots, training, everything just to pay for this thing."

 

There will be so little money left over for anything that's needed, it'll be unbelievable.

Pierre Sprey, an aircraft engineer and analyst

Sprey played a key role in the design and procurement of the F-16 fighter and the A-10 ground support plane, two mainstays of the current US Air Force fleet.

Mike Rein, the F-35 spokesman for Lockheed, says that the company saw the period from 2012 and into 2013 as "a step of great progress for the programme and [something which is] certainly going in the right direction". He points to the tests of the F-35 that were completed in 2012. Sprey argues that "they're re-testing stuff they already failed. So this isn't progress. This is like every day that you're flying, you're finding new problems. And you're slipping the schedule worse and worse."

The F-35 was supposed to be operational by 2012, but critics say it is unlikely to be deployed before 2017 at the earliest.

Despite a litany of engineering and performance problems, Congress continues to support the programme. Lockheed has spread jobs and contracts to 47 states and Puerto Rico, according to its website.

The company also seems to have an international political engineering strategy - eight countries besides the US are involved in the aircraft's development program - including Britain, Italy, Canada, Australia and Turkey. Meanwhile, Israel, Singapore and Japan have plans to buy the fighter.

According to Spinney, that "makes it even more difficult to cut the programme because now you're creating an international incident of some kind. That's no accident. It was done deliberately."

Pork barrel deal-making that goes on in Congress over weapons projects also makes it hard to secure a peace dividend.

According to William Hartung of the Center for International Policy, "there will be a sort of log rolling process where you know, ‘I'll support your weapons system if you support my weapons system.' And so once that horse trading goes on, then it's much harder to cut anything."

Two years ago, the US army announced that it could save close to $2.8bn by pausing production of the Abrams M1 tank. Ray Odierno, the army chief of staff, said the M1 fleet was in good shape and no more tanks were needed. The Pentagon does not see much use for the M1 in confronting 21st century threats like terrorism and piracy. However, Congress did not go along. Over the last two years, it has provided $355bn to keep the M1 production line rolling at the Joint Systems Manufacturing Center in Lima, Ohio.

General Dynamics, which operates the tank plant, spent $22m on lobbying Congress over the past two years, and about $2m on campaign contributions. According to the David Berger, the mayor of Lima, General Dynamics also put together a study claiming that it would be more cost-effective to keep the tank plant open now than to reopen the plant in the future if it was needed.

The company would not send us the cost study, and declined our request for an interview.
Hartung says that Pentagon contractors have "for years used the jobs argument to revive weapons systems that have been cancelled. To push for things that even the Pentagon itself has not wanted." For months, a study has been circulating in Washington, underwritten by the Aerospace Industries Association, a major defence industry trade group. It claims that a million jobs would be lost as a result of sequestration cuts to defence spending.

Hartung, who has analysed the study, says it exaggerates the potential job loss number by a factor of three, and that many of those jobs will be replaced. He points out that spending on education, health care, and infrastructure "can create 1.5 to 2 times as many jobs. So the economy would be much better off spending on things other than the Pentagon."

Several recent reports examining ways to cut Pentagon spending call for changes in the US nuclear weapons posture. They claim that it would produce hundreds of billions of dollars of savings in coming decades, and the Obama administration is reportedly considering nuclear weapons cuts. But they will be difficult to achieve.

The economy would be much better off spending on things other than the Pentagon.

William Hartung, the Center for International Policy

"People are still mired in Cold War thinking and they feel like the more nuclear weapons we have the better," Hartung says. "And in addition to that the nuclear weapons industry has some of the biggest strongest companies in the military industrial complex."

Lockheed Martin builds submarines, launches ballistic missiles, and runs the nuclear weapons laboratories; General Dynamics builds nuclear subs; and Northrop Grumman, Boeing and Lockheed Martin are all hoping to build the next nuclear bomber.

Chuck Hagel, the new US secretary of defence, was a member of a US Nuclear Policy Commission sponsored by the anti-nuclear arms group Global Zero. Headed by a former vice chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, the commission called for shrinking the number of US nuclear warheads from 5,000 to 900. Commission members also thought there was little risk in eliminating ballistic missiles from the US nuclear delivery triad of submarines, bombers and missiles.

At his confirmation hearing, Hagel was attacked by senators whose states have a stake in the nuclear weapons business, and subsequently criticised by the staff of conservative think tanks like the Heritage Foundation. Steve Bucci, the head of the Center for Foreign Policy Studies at Heritage, believes that any change in America's nuclear posture would be "a very foolish thing to do".

Along with two other think tanks, Heritage has launched a campaign called Defending Defence to ward off cuts to the US defence budget. A major reason is the potential threat they see from China, which Bucci says "cannot be underestimated. They are trying to make themselves a world power, not just a regional power."

In his view, the US needs to keep defence spending high, in case the Chinese become "more aggressive and hostile".

Concerns about China were reflected in the Obama administration's announcement last year that it is re-positioning US military resources to the Asia-Pacific region after the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is estimated that China spends about one-fifth to one-quarter as much on its military as the US. Spinney and others see warnings about China and the administration's so-called Asia-Pacific "pivot" as a way to bolster defence spending in the face of pressure for cuts.

"We need a threat," Spinney says, "Al-Qaeda has sort of run out of strength and we have to have a new threat to justify continued spending." Spinney believes that there is little chance of a peace dividend after the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. "We are going to pivot to Asia and increase the defence budget," he says.

There are signs he could be right.

This month, President Obama released a 2014 federal budget proposal that called for $526.6bn in funding for the department of defense. It was widely expected that the defence total would be at least $50bn less.

The White House and the Pentagon chose to ignore the statutory requirement for a $50bn reduction mandated by sequestration. They apparently hope that sequestration can be overturned, and defence budget cuts already agreed to, reversed. Instead of laying the groundwork for a peace dividend by putting the Pentagon on a glide path to smaller budgets, the administration's proposal projects increases in America's base defence budget over the next five years.

Get Money out of Politics: Stop lobbyist bribery, End secret money & Empower voters.

Source: The American Anti-Corruption Act by United Republic

1

Stop politicians from taking bribes

Prohibit members of Congress from soliciting and receiving contributions from any industry or entity they regulate, including those industries’ lobbyists. Prohibit all fundraising during Congressional working hours.

Members of Congress who sit on powerful committees get extraordinary amounts of money from special interests regulated by those committees. Politicians routinely host fundraisers, and invite lobbyists to contribute to their campaigns. The result is a Congress made up of politicians dependent on those special interests to raise the money necessary to win reelection. Politicians are forced to create laws that are favorable to those interests, often at the expense of the public interest.

2

Limit super PAC contributions and “coordination”

Require SuperPACs to abide by the same contribution limits as other political committees. Toughen rules regarding SuperPACs’ and other groups’ coordination with political campaigns and political parties.

The Supreme Court's Citizens United and subsequent court cases ruled that SuperPACs have the right to raise and spend unlimited money influencing elections, so long as the SuperPACs do not coordinate with the candidate campaigns. Since Citizens United, we've seen tremendous coordination between campaigns and their SuperPACs, making a mockery of the "independence" that the courts thought would exist. SuperPACs have become extensions of the campaigns, and allow mega-donors to exert undue influence on election outcomes.

3

Prevent job offers as bribes

Close the “revolving door” where elected representatives and their staff sell their legislative power in exchange for high-paying jobs when they leave office. Create a “cooling off” period on private employment that will last 5 years for all Congress members and all senior staff (currently 2 years in the Senate, 1 year in the House, and 1 year for senior staff.)

Today, politicians routinely move straight from Congress to lucrative lobbying jobs on K Street, in order to influence their former colleagues and friends. Senior staffers who work for congressmen do the same thing. This corrupts policymaking in two ways: members and their staff anticipate high-paying jobs with lobbying firms, and routinely do favors to their future employers while still in Congress; and once out of congress they enjoy undue access and influence to members of Congress. The biggest spenders hire these influencers, and win policy as a result.

4

Call all people who lobby, lobbyists

Significantly expand the definition of and register all lobbyists to prevent influencers from skirting the rules.

Today, the definition of who is a lobbyist—and who is not—is weak. The result: members of congress and their staff end up working as “historical advisors” (for all intents and purposes as lobbyists) to skirt the law while receiving big money to influence policy. Lawmakers are not subject to accountability since the public does not know all the people they meet with who try to sway them on policy decisions.

5

Limit lobbyist donations

Limit the amount that lobbyists and their clients can contribute to federal candidates, political parties, and political committees to $500 per year and limit lobbyist fundraising for political campaigns. Federal contractors are already banned from contributing to campaigns: extend that ban to lobbyists, high-level executives, government relations employees, and PACs of federal government contractors.

Lobbyists currently must abide by the same contribution limits to electoral campaigns as everyone else: $2500 per election. Lobbyists "bundle" these $2500 contributions with other lobbyists, and individuals working for special interests that seek to influence politicians. This adds up to serious money and political favors in return.

6

End secret money

Mandate full transparency of all political money. Require any organization that spends $10,000 or more on advertisements to elect or defeat federal candidates to file a disclosure report online with the Federal Election Commission within 24 hours. List each of the donors who gave $10,000 or more to the organization to run such ads. This includes all PACs, 501c nonprofits, or other groups that engage in electioneering.

Elections are being flooded with secret money funneled through "501c" organizations that are not required to disclose the names of donors. 501c's either spend money directly to influence elections, or make unlimited contributions to SuperPACs. This allows secret political donors to flood elections with money and, thus, influence outcomes.

7

Empower all voters with a tax rebate

Build up the influence voters by creating a biennial $100 Tax Rebate that they can use to make qualified contributions to federal candidates, political parties, and political committees. Flooding elections with small-donor contributions that will offset the huge spenders. Candidates and political groups will only be eligible for these funds if they agree to a set of contribution limits: they will only accept money from small donors (giving $500 or less a year), other groups abiding by the limits, and the Tax Rebates themselves.

Nearly $6 billion was spent on the 2012 elections, and the vast majority came from big special interest donors. In 2008, less than 0.1 percent of Americans contributed $2,300 or more. Politicians are dependent on this tiny percentage of the population. To change this, we need to dramatically increase the number of small donors to politics, so that politicians become dependent on everyday Americans and not moneyed interests. That's how we get politicians who actually fight for the general public.

8

Disclose “bundling”

Require federal candidates to disclose the names of individuals who “bundle” contributions for the member of Congress or candidate, regardless of whether such individuals are registered lobbyists.

9

Enforce the rules

Strengthen the Federal Election Commission’s independence and strengthen the House and Senate ethics enforcement processes. Provide federal prosecutors the additional tools necessary to combat corruption, and prohibit lobbyists who fail to properly register and disclose their activities from engaging in federal lobbying activities for a period of two years.

Federal agencies routinely fail to enforce the anti-corruption rules that already exist because their leadership are appointed by those they are supposed to regulate. The result is an elections system where even lax rules can be skirted or broken with impunity.

Corruption, American Style

Bribery gets all the bad press, but lobbying is the real danger, because it affects everybody--whether they want it to or not.

 by Michael Maiello

 Source:Forbes Magazine
Con men, swindlers and cheaters pay bribes. Sophisticates hire lobbyists because lobbyists get better, more lasting results while only rarely landing in the slammer. We know intuitively that bribery and lobbying are related, and there are reams of academic papers that try to draw the line between legitimate issue advocacy and corruption. President Barack Obama isn't buying it. As he swore in his new staff, he banned them from future employment lobbying the White House, "for as long as I'm president."

Economists and sociologists don't tend to spend a lot of time arguing in favor of illegal activities like bribing bureaucrats, so their efforts tend to come down in defense of the K Street bandits. The common argument is that bribery happens in developing economies where the rule of law is questionable, while lobbying is a more civilized activity that brings economic benefits.

Bard Harstad of the Kellogg School of Management and Jakob Svensson of Stockholm University have approached the problem as one between developing and developed economies. But let's set aside the debate over third- and first-world corruption. Narco states, oligarchies, religious and secular dictatorships are ruled by graft because power and influence are traded in secret.

What's telling about the Harstad and Svensson paper is that in an open society like the U.S., our brightest minds are unable to draw meaningful distinctions between handing someone an envelope full of cash and flooding a senator's campaign war chest, except to point out that lobbying is far more effective. A briber wants a to circumvent the law. A lobbyist wants to change it.

The fact that laws affect everyone supposedly makes lobbying more legitimate, since the lobbyist isn't typically asking for special treatment the way a briber does. But maybe that's the problem. Someone who pays a bribe might be rich, powerful and dangerous, but they're also uniquely vulnerable. They open themselves to extortion by the corrupt official they're using, for example. Harstad and Svensson write: "Promises by individual bureaucrats not to ask (or extort) bribes in the future are not credible, since such contracts cannot be written when corruption is illegal and because firms deal with different officials over time."

The lobbyist takes no such risk. The lobbyist's goal is to make the government official depend on them for financing and support in elections. A bribe works once. Cajoling or inducing a congressional representative to help get a law changed is the gift that keeps on giving.

In his book Knowledge and Decisions, economist Thomas Sowell defends lobbyists as people who have acquired a great deal of technical knowledge so that they're better informed than the general public about whatever issue they care about most. They then become, as Sowell describes, a powerful force in government because "reform through democratic legislation requires either 'public consensus or a powerful minority lobby.'" Sowell defends this influence since it comes from knowledge fairly gained and deployed. But the power of the lobbyist is far greater than the power of the briber. A powerful lobbyist can get laws changed even if there's no public consensus to do so, and yet those laws still apply to everyone.

Former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich, now a professor at the University of California at Berkeley, doesn't make a distinction between the two activities. When asked by e-mail, "What's the real difference between me bribing a customs agent so that I can bring a banned substance into the country or me contributing money to a senator and then cajoling him into making the substance legal for import?" Reich answered, "Frankly, I don't see much difference. A bribe is a bribe. People authorized only to act in the public interest may not use their office for private gain. Period."

In the recently published Creative Capitalism, a discussion of corporate philanthropy and social responsibility, Reich argues that the only thing corporations can do to make life better for the people around them is to "refrain from flooding Washington and any other seat of government with so many lobbyists and campaign contributions so as to stymie democracy."
Bribery is easily regulated because we all know it's a crime. Somebody is trying to break a rule. Getting rules changed, on the other hand, is part of the democratic system and our feelings about lobbyists depends on who they're lobbying for. The novel Thank You For Smoking is a funny book because it's about the misadventures of an unlikable tobacco lobbyist. Make the main character a lobbyist for furry little baby seals and it's somehow less amusing.

When Obama first entered politics, he took money from lobbyists. He gradually changed his mind and when he ran in both the primary and general elections in 2008 he said he wouldn't take money from lobbyists. But he meant only federally registered lobbyists. He had certainly taken money from interest groups that operated at the state level and he had taken money from people who lobbied for only one company, trade or interest group (such people are, in the Byzantine regulatory world of registered lobbyists, not technically lobbyists).

Obama's recent declaration that nobody on the White House staff is allowed to work on regulations or contracts that touch on areas where they had previously worked as lobbyists caused a minor kerfuffle because, of course, a couple of his staff picks do have some lobbying experience and, of course, they're best qualified to work in the areas where they worked as lobbyists. William J. Lynn III, who Obama wants to have working at the Pentagon, had been a lobbyist for Raytheon (nyse: RTN - news - people ). William Corr, who Obama wants at Health and Human Services, had lobbied for Tobacco Free Kids.

The only way to remove lobbyists and their corruptive influence is for companies and interest groups to voluntarily disarm and work on building a public consensus in support of their causes or to elect and appoint people who are entirely incorruptible. Obviously these will never happen. But perhaps those living in rich, Westernized nations should be grateful that political corruption occurs in the twilight world of lobbyists, where they can at least catch a glimpse of the action, rather than the midnight black deals struck daily in the poorer sections of the world.

NRA spends record money on lobbying this year

Pro-gun group ratchets up influence spending as debate rages

By Dave Levinthalemail

As gun control debates raged in Congress early this year, the National Rifle Association increased its federal government lobbying expenditures to record levels, new filings with the U.S. Senate indicate.

The NRA and affiliated National Rifle Association of America Institute for Legislative Action together spent at least $800,000 lobbying the federal government during the first quarter — more than any year covering the same period, according to federal records.

Such aggressive advocacy preceded a major legislative victory Wednesday for gun advocates, as the U.S. Senate defeated a proposal to expand background checks on guy buyers.

And it came as gun control advocates  — from President Barack Obama and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg to former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and the families of children killed last year in Newtown, Conn. — pressured lawmakers to pass laws limiting purchases of firearms.
The NRA groups' first-quarter lobbying expenditures have been steadily increasing in recent years, but never cracked the $700,000 mark.

During the first three months of 2012, they spent $695,000. That follows $675,000 in 2011 and $615,000 in 2010.

This year, the NRA's lobbying efforts were exclusively directed at the House and Senate, according to federal disclosures. The group lobbied on numerous U.S. House and Senate bills proposed by federal legislators.

Among them:

• H.R. 751, the Protect America's Schools Act of 2013
• H.R. 274, the Mental Health First Act of 2013
• H.R. 329, the Strengthening Background Checks Act of 2013
• H.R. 575, the Second Amendment Protection Act of 2013
• S. 54, the Stop Illegal Trafficking in Firearms Act of 2013
• S. 374, the Fix Gun Checks Act of 2013
• S. 146, the School and Campus Safety Enhancements Act of 2013
• S. 174, the Ammunition Background Check Act of 2013
• S. 480, the NICS Reporting Improvement Act of 2013
• H.R. 138 and S. 33, the Large Capacity Ammunition Feeding Device Act
• H.R. 142 and S. 35, the Stop Online Ammunition Sales Act of 2013
• H.R. 437 and S. 150, the Assault Weapons Ban of 2013
•  

The NRA itself spent $700,000 lobbying the federal government during the first quarter, federal records show. Wayne LaPierre, the NRA's chief executive, was among 12 in-house NRA officials to lobby during the year's first three months.

Several contract lobbying firms, including Crossroads Strategies, Prime Policy Group, FTI Government Affairs and Shockey Scofield Solutions, combined to spend at least another $100,000 lobbying on behalf of the NRA or National Rifle Association of America Institute for Legislative Action from January through March.

Companies, unions and special interest groups that lobby the federal government have until Monday to submit mandatory first quarter lobbying disclosure reports to Congress.
The NRA and its affiliate spent nearly $3 million on federal-level lobbying in 2012 — more than it has during any previous year, according to data maintained by the Center for Responsive Politics, but spending during this year's first quarter puts it on pace to exceed that mark.

 

Monsanto controls your diet

The chemical company's influence extends across all three branches of government -- and affects our daily lives

By Jill Richardson
This article originally appeared on AlterNet.  

Forty percent of the crops grown in the United States contain their genes. They produce the world’s top selling herbicide. Several of their factories are now toxic Superfund sites. They spend millions lobbying the government each year. It’s time we take a closer look at who’s controlling our food, poisoning our land, and influencing all three branches of government. To do that, the watchdog group Food and Water Watch recently published a corporate profile of Monsanto.

Patty Lovera, Food and Water Watch assistant director, says they decided to focus on Monsanto because they felt a need to “put together a piece where people can see all of the aspects of this company.”

“It really strikes us when we talk about how clear it is that this is a chemical company that wanted to expand its reach,” she says. “A chemical company that started buying up seed companies.” She feels it’s important “for food activists to understand all of the ties between the seeds and the chemicals.”

Monsanto the Chemical Company

Monsanto was founded as a chemical company in 1901, named for the maiden name of its founder’s wife. Its first product was the artificial sweetener saccharin. The company’s own telling of its history emphasizes its agricultural products, skipping forward from its founding to 1945, when it began manufacturing agrochemicals like the herbicide 2,4-D.

Prior to its entry into the agricultural market, Monsanto produced some harmless – even beneficial! – products like aspirin. It also made plastics, synthetic rubber, caffeine, and vanillin, an artificial vanilla flavoring. On the not-so-harmless side, it began producing toxic PCBs in the 1930s.

According to the new report, a whopping 99 percent of all PCBs, polychlorinated biphenyls, used in the U.S. were produced at a single Monsanto plant in Sauget, IL. The plant churned out toxic PCBs from the 1930s until they were banned in 1976. Used as coolants and lubricants in electronics, PCBs are carcinogenic and harmful to the liver, endocrine system, immune system, reproductive system, developmental system, skin, eye, and brain.

Even after the initial 1982 cleanup of this plant, Sauget is still home to two Superfund sites. (A Superfund site is defined by the EPA as “an uncontrolled or abandoned place where hazardous waste is located, possibly affecting local ecosystems or people.”) This is just one of several Monsanto facilities that became Superfund sites.

Monsanto’s Shift to Agriculture

Despite its modern-day emphasis on agriculture, Monsanto did not even create an agricultural division within the company until 1960. It soon began churning out new pesticides, each colorfully named under a rugged Western theme: Lasso, Roundup, Warrant, Lariat, Bullet, Harness, etc.

Left out of Monsanto’s version of its historical highlights is an herbicide called Agent Orange. The defoliant, a mix of herbicides 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T, was used extensively during the war in Vietnam. The nearly 19 million gallons sprayed in that country between 1962 and 1971 were contaminated with dioxin, a carcinogen so potent that it is measured and regulated at concentrations of parts per trillion. Dioxin was created as a byproduct of Agent Orange’s manufacturing process, and both American veterans and Vietnamese people suffered health problems from the herbicide’s use.

Monsanto’s fortunes changed forever in 1982, when it genetically engineered a plant cell. The team responsible, led by Ernest Jaworski, consisted of Robb Fraley, Stephen Rogers, and Robert Horsch. Today, Fraley is Monsanto’s executive vice president and chief technology officer. Horsch also rose to the level of vice president at Monsanto, but he left after 25 years to join the Gates Foundation. There, he works on increasing crop yields in Sub-Saharan Africa. Together, the team received the National Medal of Technology from President Clinton in 1998.
The company did not shift its focus from chemicals to genetically engineered seeds overnight. In fact, it was another 12 years before it commercialized the first genetically engineered product, recombinant bovine growth hormone (rbGH), a controversial hormone used to make dairy cows produce more milk. And it was not until 1996 that it first brought genetically engineered seeds, Roundup Ready soybeans, onto the market.

By 2000, the company had undergone such a sea change from its founding a century before that it claims it is almost a different company. In Monsanto’s telling of its own history, it emphasizes a split between the “original” Monsanto Company and the Monsanto Company of today. In 2000, the Monsanto Company entered a merger and changed its name to Pharmacia.
The newly formed Pharmacia then spun off its agricultural division as an independent company named Monsanto Company.

Do the mergers and spinoffs excuse Monsanto for the sins of the past committed by the company bearing the same name? Lovera does not think so. “I’m sure there’s some liability issues they have to deal with – their various production plants that are now superfund sites,” she responds. “So I’m sure there was legal thinking about which balance sheet you put those liabilities on” when the company split. She adds that the notion that today’s Monsanto is not the same as the historical Monsanto that made PCBs is “a nice PR bullet for them.”

But, she adds, “even taking that at face value, that they are an agriculture company now, they are still producing seeds that are made to be used with chemicals they produce.” For example, Roundup herbicide alone made up more than a quarter of their sales in 2011. The proportion of their business devoted to chemicals is by no means insignificant.

Monsanto’s pesticide product line includes a number of chemicals named as Bad Actors by Pesticide Action Network. They include Alachlor (a carcinogen, water contaminant, developmental/reproductive toxin, and a suspected endocrine disruptor), Acetochlor (a carcinogen and suspected endocrine disruptor), Atrazine (a carcinogen and suspected endocrine disruptor), Clopyralid (high acute toxicity), Dicamba (developmental/reproductive toxin), and Thiodicarb (a carcinogen and cholinesterase inhibitor).

Roundup: The Benign Herbicide?

Defenders of Monsanto might reply to the charge that Roundup is no Agent Orange. In fact, the herbicide is viewed as so benign and yet effective that its inventor, John E. Franz, won the National Medal of Technology. Glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, kills everything green and growing, but according to Monsanto, it only affects a metabolic pathway in plants, so it does not harm animals. It’s also said to break down quickly in the soil, leaving few traces on the environment after its done its job.

Asked about the harmlessness of Roundup, Lovera replies, “That’s the PR behind Roundup – how benign it was and you can drink it and there’s nothing to worry about here. There are people who dispute that.” For example there is an accusation that Roundup causes birth defects. “We don’t buy the benign theory,” continues Lovera, “But what’s really interesting is that we aren’t going to be having this conversation pretty soon because Roundup isn’t working anymore.”

Lovera is referring to “Roundup-resistant weeds,” weeds that have evolved in the past decade and a half to survive being sprayed by Roundup. Nearly all soybeans grown in the United States is Monsanto’s genetically engineered Roundup Ready variety, as are 80 percent of cotton and 73 percent of corn. Farmers spray entire fields with Roundup, killing only the weeds while the Roundup Ready crops survive. With such heavy use of Roundup on America’s farmfields, any weed – maybe one in a million – with an ability to survive in that environment would survive and pass on its genes in its seeds.

By 1998, just two years after the introduction of Roundup Ready soybeans, scientists documented the first Roundup-resistant weed. A second was found in 2000, and three more popped up in 2004. To date, there are 24 different weedsthat have evolved resistance to Roundup worldwide. And once they invade a farmer’s field, it doesn’t matter if his crops are Roundup-resistant, because Roundup won’t work anymore. Either the weeds get to stay, or the farmer needs to find a new chemical, pull the weeds by hand, or find some other way to deal with the problem.

“We’ve wasted Roundup by overusing it,” says Lovera. She and other food activists worry about the harsher chemicals that farmers are switching to, and the genetically engineered crops companies like Monsanto are developing to use with them.

Currently, there are genetically engineered crops waiting for government approval that are made to tolerate the herbicides 2,4-D, Dicamba and Isoxaflutole. (These are not all from Monsanto – some are from their competitors.) None of these chemicals are as “benign” as Roundup. Isoxaflutole is, in fact, a carcinogen. Let’s spray that on our food!

Corporate Control of Seeds

No discussion of Monsanto is complete without a mention of the immense amount of control it exerts on the seed industry.

“What it boils down to is between them buying seed companies outright, their incredible aggressive legal maneuvering, their patenting of everything, and their enforcement of those patents, they really have locked up a huge part of the seed supply,” notes Lovera. “So they just exercise an unprecedented control over the entire seed sector. Monsanto products constitute 40 percent of all crop acres in the country.”

Monsanto began buying seed companies as far back as 1982. (One can see an infographic of seed industry consolidation here.) Some of Monsanto’s most significant purchases were Asgrow (soybeans), Delta and Pine Land (cotton), DeKalb (corn), and Seminis (vegetables). One that deserves special mention is their purchase of Holden’s Foundation Seeds in 1997.

George Naylor, an Iowa farmer who grows corn and soybeans, calls Holden’s “The independent source of germplasm for corn.” Small seed companies could buy inbred lines from Holden’s to cross them and produce their own hybrids. Large seed companies like Pioneer did their own breeding, but small operations relied on Holden’s or Iowa State University. But Iowa State got out of the game and Monsanto bought Holden’s.

Monsanto’s tactics for squashing its competition are perhaps unrivaled. They use their power to get seed dealers to not to stock many of their competitors products, for example. When licensing their patented genetically engineered traits to seed companies, they restrict the seed companies’ ability to combine Monsanto’s traits with those of their competitors. And, famously, farmers who plant Monsanto’s patented seeds sign contracts prohibiting them from saving and replanting their seeds. Yet, to date, U.S. antitrust laws have not clamped down on these practices.

With the concentrated control of the seed industry, farmers already complain of lack of options. For example, Naylor says he’s had a hard time finding non-genetically engineered soybean seeds. Most corn seeds are now pre-treated with pesticides, so farmers wishing to find untreated seeds will have a tough time finding any. Once a company or a handful of companies control an entire market, then they can choose what to sell and at what price to sell it.

Furthermore, if our crops are too genetically homogenous, then they are vulnerable to a single disease or pest that can wipe them out. When farmers grow genetically diverse crops, then there is a greater chance that one variety or another will have resistance to new diseases. In that way, growing genetically diverse crops is like having insurance, or like diversifying your risk within your stock portfolio.

Food and Water Watch Recommendations

At the end of its report, Food and Water Watch lists several recommendations. “There are a lot of ways that government policy could address the Monsanto hold on the food supply,” explains Lovera. “The most important thing is that it’s time to stop approval of genetically engineered crops to stop this arms race of the next crop and the next chemical.”

She also calls Monsanto “the poster child for the need for antitrust enforcement” – something that the Justice Department has yet to successfully deliver up. In fact, last November the government ended a three-year antitrust investigation of Monsanto.

A third recommendation Lovera hopes becomes a reality is mandatory labeling of genetically engineered foods. “If we had that label and we put that information in consumers’ hands, they could do more to avoid this company in their day-to-day lives,” she says.

In the meantime, all consumers can do to avoid genetically engineered foods is to buy organic for the handful of crops that are genetically engineered: corn, soybeans, canola, cotton, papaya, sugar beets, and alfalfa.