Tag Archives: service

We’re Still at War: Photo of the Day for January 30, 2014

by jp19gkx Posted on January 30, 2014

Mother Jones

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Marines of the riot control team for Golf Battery, Battalion Landing Team, 2nd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit, attempt to subdue a role player wielding a weapon during the culminating event of the unit’s public disorder and non-lethal weapons employment training aboard Camp Hansen, Okinawa, Japan, Jan. 24, 2014. One of the secondary missions of Golf Battery is to serve as a non-lethal contingency force for the 31st MEU, useful in embassy security reinforcement, humanitarian operations and many other contingencies. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Sgt. Paul Robbins/Released)

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We’re Still at War: Photo of the Day for January 30, 2014

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White House Vows to Respond to Petition Demanding Deportation of Justin Bieber

by tf942pe Posted on January 29, 2014

Mother Jones

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You’ve all heard that embattled Canadian pop star Justin Bieber was recently arrested for alleged drag racing and drunk driving. Now the Obama White House has promised to weigh in on the incident and resulting backlash.

In late 2011, the White House launched its We the People initiative, an online system in which anyone can create an account and petition the government. If a petition reaches a certain number of signatures (currently set at 100,000) within a month of its posting, the Obama administration’s own rules require White House staff to respond.

A new petition, created on January 23, has reached that threshold. It’s titled, “Deport Justin Bieber and revoke his green card,” and it reads:

We the people of the United States feel that we are being wrongly represented in the world of pop culture. We would like to see the dangerous, reckless, destructive, and drug abusing, Justin Bieber deported and his green card revoked. He is not only threatening the safety of our people but he is also a terrible influence on our nations youth. We the people would like to remove Justin Bieber from our society.

(The petition is tagged under the issues of “criminal justice and law enforcement,” “human rights,” and “women’s issues.”)

The We the People page hosts a wide variety of petitions, including ones that focus on subjects such as AIDS prevention and mass shootings in America. But the White House also receives—and sometimes responds to—frivolous petitions, including one asking the Obama administration to build the Death Star and another calling for states to adopt Pokémon characters as state animals. (The latter was yanked from the government website.)

The usual White House rules indeed apply to the Bieber petition, Matt Lehrich, an assistant White House press secretary, confirms in an email to Mother Jones:

Every petition that crosses the threshold will be reviewed by the appropriate staff and receive a response. Response times vary based on total volume of petitions, subject matter, and a variety of other factors.

A previous White House petition called for the deportation of CNN host Piers Morgan because of his strong support for gun control in America. White House press secretary Jay Carney issued a response defending the First Amendment, and Morgan is still working in the United States.

We’ll see if the White House’s response has any impact on Bieber’s feelings about the Obama administration. As of the president’s reelection, things seemed pretty good:

But on a serious note, if you’d like to read about how Bieber’s case highlights the complexities of America’s deportation system, click here.

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White House Vows to Respond to Petition Demanding Deportation of Justin Bieber

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US-Funded Hospital in Afghanistan Has 3 Light Bulbs, Forces Staff to Wash Newborns in River Water

by ThedaStapleton Posted on January 29, 2014

Mother Jones

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A hospital in Afghanistan’s Parwan province, which cost US taxpayers almost $600,000, is so ill-equipped, hospital staff are washing newborn infants using untreated river water, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) reported on Wednesday. SIGAR’s visit, which was conducted in November 2013 (photos here), also found mold and mildew throughout the hospital; a lack of furniture and equipment; a serious risk for earthquake damage; and only enough electricity to operate three light bulbs in the entire facility.

In 2009, a local Afghan contractor, Shafi Hakimi Construction Company, was commissioned to build Salang Hospital as part of a Department of Defense-funded reconstruction program. When a US Forces-Afghanistan (USFOR-A) task force first inspected the hospital when it was under construction in 2012, they determined it had major problems and residents of Salang district wouldn’t have adequate healthcare until they were fixed. In November 2012, the contractor was paid in full. But when SIGAR inspected a year later, it found “the deficiencies identified by the task force had not been corrected.”

NBC News, which recently visited the facility, observed “desperate” hospital staff attempting to administer dental care to a 12-year-old girl—even though they only had access to six pieces of rusty dental equipment. As NBC described it: “The girl was shivering with fear, and began crying after the doctor gave her a shot in her gums. Another man held her still as Sarwy swiftly tilted her head back, opened her mouth and yanked out one of her teeth with a pair of pliers.”

Hospital staff told SIGAR that they are paying about $18 a month of their own money to a neighbor, in order to get enough electricity to operate the three light-bulbs in the hospital. Additionally, SIGAR found that the contractor built the hospital two stories high, instead of one, without authorization from US officials or further study. “The hospital does not serve the medical needs of the people of Salang district as intended and may be a danger to its patients and staff because of the potential for the structure’s collapse in an earthquake,” the report reads.

This account differs sharply with a press release put out by US Forces-Afghanistan yesterday, which argued that despite the SIGAR report, “the facility is currently providing improved medical services” and noted that, “local ministry officials are currently in the process of hiring a surgeon and other staff and have installed a solar power generation unit.” John Sopko, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, told NBC, “either no one from USFOR-A has actually visited this facility recently or USFOR-A is living in an alternate reality.”

Mother Jones has reached out to US Forces-Afghanistan to find out when they last visited the facility. According to a January 21 US Army document obtained by Mother Jones, US forces have been unable to conduct a physical re-inspection of the hospital since the SIGAR notified them of their findings on January 3, due to “reduced combat forces and threats in the area.” â&#128;&#139;

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US-Funded Hospital in Afghanistan Has 3 Light Bulbs, Forces Staff to Wash Newborns in River Water

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Obama Expected To Move Forward With Climate Plan in State of the Union

by Hermine73K Posted on January 28, 2014

Mother Jones

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This story was originally published in the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

Campaigners are looking to Barack Obama to expand his use of executive powers to deliver action on climate change in Tuesday night’s State of the Union address.

Obama unveiled a sweeping climate plan last June, after warning in last year’s State of the Union address that if Congress did not act on climate change, he would.

The president is expected to reaffirm his commitment to that plan in Tuesday night’s address, defending his decision to direct the Environmental Protection Agency to cut carbon dioxide emissions from power plants.

He is also expected to offer details on actions by other federal government agencies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, promote wind and solar energy, and prepare for a future under climate change.

“I am sure it will be part of his comments in the State of the Union,” Carol Browner, who served as White House climate adviser in Obama’s first term, told a conference call with reporters. “What we see is a real commitment to moving us forward.”

The core of Obama’s climate plan remains the EPA’s proposed rules for power plants, the largest single source of carbon dioxide emissions.

The agency plans to release the next set of proposed rules, which would limit emissions from existing plants, by June of this year.

Obama was widely expected to use the spotlight on Tuesday night to try to get the public behind the new power plant rules, that are at the core of his climate plan.

But Heather Zichal, another former Obama climate adviser, said she expected other federal government agencies to take up climate change.

Zichal said last week she expected the president to press for further tax credits and other incentives to promote renewable energy.

But campaigners will be looking for Obama to expand even more on his climate plan.

They are also unlikely to be happy with Obama’s continued promotion of oil and gas drilling, something they say is incompatible with action on climate change.

Obama was widely expected to talk up domestic oil production in the speech. “I expect we will hear a message that is consistent with the ‘all of the above’ message we have heard before,” Jason Bordoff, director of Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy, said.

Last year was the fourth hottest year on record, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency. Despite Obama’s directive to the EPA, US carbon dioxide emissions rose 2 percent in 2013, because power plants burned more coal.

Without additional measures, America will fail to meet its commitment to cut emissions by 17 percent from 2005 by 2020.

Campaigners said they were looking to Obama to promise action on rising methane emissions produced by the country’s shale boom.

Recent studies have shown the gas industry—from well site to power station—produces far more methane than earlier government estimates, and methane is 80 times more powerful at warming the atmosphere than carbon dioxide over a 20-year time frame.

There were also calls for Obama to use the speech to reject the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which will transport crude oil from the Alberta tar sands to refineries on the Texas coast.

“From our perspective, there is just no way, no how this tar sands oil gets out of the ground,” said Gene Karpinski, who heads the League of Conservation Voters.

A political action committee founded by the former hedge fund manager and Keystone opponent, Tom Steyer, has bought ads to air on the MSNBC cable network on Tuesday night, urging Obama to reject the project.

In Washington, protesters were planning to encircle Congress with a giant inflatable pipeline.

However, it is extremely unlikely the president will announce a decision on Keystone XL in his speech.

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Obama Expected To Move Forward With Climate Plan in State of the Union

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6 Things Obama Can Do on Climate Without Congress

by BobbyYrhvpdup Posted on January 28, 2014

Mother Jones

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When President Obama takes the stage this evening for his annual State of the Union address, a likely theme will be how the Oval Office can work toward its goals on everything from income inequality to the federal debt without relying on an obstinate, unproductive Congress. In his speech last year, Obama threatened to sidestep the legislative branch on actions to mitigate climate change, specifically, if Congress failed to provide its own solutions. This year, environmentalists are hoping to hear more details on what that plan could entail.

Some of the major goals of climate policy wonks, like putting a price on carbon pollution, can’t happen without the help of Congress, but that doesn’t mean the president’s hands are completely tied; last week, the Center for the New Energy Economy at Colorado State University released a report co-authored by former Colorado governor Bill Ritter that details 200 climate actions Obama could take without Congress.

So what options does the president have? Here are a few ideas:

1. Continue the crackdown on coal pollution: This month the Environmental Protection Agency released a new draft of rules that would strictly curtail emissions of carbon dioxide from new coal-fired power plants; a second set of rules that would apply to existing plants is expected later this year. Slashing greenhouse gas emissions from power plants, which account for roughly a third of country’s total GHG emissions, is a major pillar of the president’s climate platform, even though a lengthy review process and probable legal challenges from the coal industry mean the rules aren’t likely to take effect before the end of his term. But in the absence of a national price on carbon or other legislation, regulations like this are the most significant way the president can promote a transition away from our dirtiest power sources.

2. Fix fracking: Today, regulations for natural gas drilling companies are mainly applied by states, but the president has an opportunity to influence the industry’s practices when it shows up to drill on federal land. The Colorado State report calls on the Bureau of Land Management to apply stringent rules for fracking on public land, like full disclosure of what’s in the fracking chemical cocktail, zero tolerance for methane leaks from wells and pipes (a major, unregulated source of highly potent greenhouse gases), and more efficienct water-use practices. The president also needs to set a more concrete timeline for how long fracking, often described as a “bridge” fuel between coal and renewables, will continue to be a major source of domestic energy, said Bill Becker, the report’s co-author and executive director of the Presidential Climate Action Project.

“We recognize that natural gas is a logical transition fuel,” Becker added. “But we think that should be happening a lot faster than it’s happening now.”

Somehow, Becker said, the president needs to reconcile his “all of the above” energy plan with his stated goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020; working with the fracking industry to cut methane leaks is a great place to start.

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6 Things Obama Can Do on Climate Without Congress

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Quentin Tarantino Sues Gawker for Linking to Leaked Script: "This Time They Went Too Far"

by LayneI91ysavpze Posted on January 27, 2014

Mother Jones

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Oscar-winning writer/director Quentin Tarantino is suing Gawker Media. The filmmaker, who is famous for such films as Pulp Fiction and Inglourious Basterds, is taking legal action after his script for a future project (a Western flick called The Hateful Eight) leaked online. Tarantino became “very, very depressed” about this, so much so that he shelved the project. And last Thursday, Gawker‘s “Defamer” blog published a post titled, “â&#128;&#139;Here Is the Leaked Quentin Tarantino Hateful Eight Script.”

“For better or worse, the document is 146 pages of pure Tarantino. Enjoy!” the post reads, linking to a free download of Tarantino’s draft.

For that, the the 50-year-old director filed a copyright lawsuit against Gawker Media for allegedly promoting and disseminating unauthorized copies of the leaked document, the Hollywood Reporter reported on Monday. “Gawker Media has made a business of predatory journalism, violating people’s rights to make a buck,” Tarantino’s lawsuit, which was filed by attorneys Martin Singer and Evan Spiegel in California federal court, reads. “This time they went too far.”

As of posting, John Cook, editor of Gawker, has not responded to Mother Jones‘ request for comment.

The lawsuit also alleges that Gawker actively solicited readers to provide a copy of the screenplay with this blog post. Tarantino is seeking more than $1 million in damages and the defendants’ profits. Read the formal legal complaint here (via Deadline.com):

DV.load(“//www.documentcloud.org/documents/1009635-complaint-tarantino-v-gawker-media-et-al.js”,
width: 630,
height: 600,
sidebar: false,
container: “#DV-viewer-1009635-complaint-tarantino-v-gawker-media-et-al”
);

Complaint Tarantino v Gawker Media Et Al (PDF)

Complaint Tarantino v Gawker Media Et Al (Text)

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Quentin Tarantino Sues Gawker for Linking to Leaked Script: "This Time They Went Too Far"

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The Other "Moby Dick": Melville’s "Benito Cereno" Is an Analogy for American Empire

by Arterisa Posted on January 27, 2014

Mother Jones

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This story first appeared on the TomDispatch website.

A captain ready to drive himself and all around him to ruin in the hunt for a white whale. It’s a well-known story, and over the years, mad Ahab in Herman Melville’s most famous novel, Moby-Dick, has been used as an exemplar of unhinged American power, most recently of George W. Bush’s disastrous invasion of Iraq.

But what’s really frightening isn’t our Ahabs, the hawks who periodically want to bomb some poor country, be it Vietnam or Afghanistan, back to the Stone Age. The respectable types are the true “terror of our age,” as Noam Chomsky called them collectively nearly 50 years ago. The really scary characters are our soberest politicians, scholars, journalists, professionals, and managers, men and women (though mostly men) who imagine themselves as morally serious, and then enable the wars, devastate the planet, and rationalize the atrocities. They are a type that has been with us for a long time. More than a century and a half ago, Melville, who had a captain for every face of empire, found their perfect expression—for his moment and ours.

For the last six years, I’ve been researching the life of an American seal killer, a ship captain named Amasa Delano who, in the 1790s, was among the earliest New Englanders to sail into the South Pacific. Money was flush, seals were many, and Delano and his fellow ship captains established the first unofficial US colonies on islands off the coast of Chile. They operated under an informal council of captains, divvied up territory, enforced debt contracts, celebrated the Fourth of July, and set up ad hoc courts of law. When no bible was available, the collected works of William Shakespeare, found in the libraries of most ships, were used to swear oaths.

From his first expedition, Delano took hundreds of thousands of sealskins to China, where he traded them for spices, ceramics, and tea to bring back to Boston. During a second, failed voyage, however, an event took place that would make Amasa notorious—at least among the readers of the fiction of Herman Melville.

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The Other "Moby Dick": Melville’s "Benito Cereno" Is an Analogy for American Empire

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No, the Decline of Cinderella Marriages Probably Hasn’t Played a Big Role in Rising Income Inequality

by arielbangkok Posted on January 27, 2014

Mother Jones

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Tyler Cowen points me to a paper today about the rise in assortative mating. Basically, this means that we increasingly marry people who are similar to ourselves. High school grads tend to marry other high school grads, and college grads tend to marry other college grads. The authors of the paper conclude that this has implications for rising income inequality:

If matching in 2005 between husbands and wives had been random, instead of the pattern observed in the data, then the Gini coefficient would have fallen from the observed 0.43 to 0.34, so that income inequality would be smaller. Thus, assortative mating is important for income inequality. The high level of married female labor-force participation in 2005 is important for this result.

The table on the right is a standardized contingency table that compares 1960 to 2005. The diagonal numbers show the percentage of each educational class who are married to others of the same educational class, and in every case the numbers are higher in 2005. This does indeed suggest that assortative mating has contributed to increasing income inequality. However, I’d offer a few caveats:

Comparing observed GINI with a hypothetical world in which marriage patterns are completely random is a bit misleading. Marriage patterns weren’t random in 1960 either, and the past popularity of “Cinderella marriages” is more myth than reality. In fact, if you look at the red diagonals, you’ll notice that assortative mating has actually increased only modestly since 1960.
So why bother with a comparison to a random counterfactual? That’s a little complicated, but the authors mainly use it to figure out why 1960 is so different from 2005. As it turns out, they conclude that rising income inequality isn’t really due to a rise in assortative mating per se. It’s mostly due to the simple fact that more women work outside the home today. After all, who a man marries doesn’t affect his household income much if his wife doesn’t have an outside job. But when women with college degrees all start working, it causes a big increase in upper class household incomes regardless of whether assortative mating has increased.
This can get to sound like a broken record, but whenever you think about rising income inequality, you always need to keep in mind that over the past three decades it’s mostly been a phenomenon of the top one percent. It’s unlikely that either assortative mating or the rise of working women has had a huge impact at those income levels, and therefore it probably hasn’t had a huge impact on increasing income inequality either. (However, that’s an empirical question. I might be wrong about it.)

This is interesting data, which is why I’m presenting it here. And it almost certainly has an impact on changes of income distribution between, say, the top fifth and the middle fifth. But the real drivers of rising income inequality, which have driven up the incomes of the top one percent so stratospherically, almost certainly lie elsewhere.

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No, the Decline of Cinderella Marriages Probably Hasn’t Played a Big Role in Rising Income Inequality

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We’re Still at War: Photo of the Day for January 27, 2014

by BennieEsparza Posted on January 27, 2014

Mother Jones

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U.S. Marines with Alpha Company, 2nd Assault Amphibious Battalion, 2nd Marine Division, stage Assault Amphibious Vehicle P7A1’s before conducting another splash entry during a training exercise at Onslow Beach aboard Camp Lejeune, N.C., Jan. 9, 2014. The training exercise was conducted to practice beach raids for future ship to shore operations. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Christopher Mendoza/Released)

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We’re Still at War: Photo of the Day for January 27, 2014

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In Remarkable Turnaround, Republicans Officially Denounce NSA Phone Surveillance

by ESGMarie Posted on January 25, 2014

Mother Jones

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This is easily the most remarkable story of the year so far. As you read it, keep in mind that this is not about a resolution from some fringe libertarian group. It’s about a resolution from the Republican National Committee, the very embodiment of establishment conservatism:

In a jarring break from the George W. Bush era, the Republican National Committee voted Friday to adopt a resolution demanding an investigation into the National Security Agency’s spy programs.

According to the resolution, the NSA metadata program revealed by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden is deemed “an invasion into the personal lives of American citizens that violates the right of free speech and association afforded by the First Amendment of the United States Constitution.” In addition, “the mass collection and retention of personal data is in itself contrary to the right of privacy protected by the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution.”

….This is, to put it mildly, a new position for the Republican National Committee. When the New York Times revealed that the NSA had wiretapped American citizens without warrants in late 2005, the RNC used their 2006 winter meeting to strongly defend the program’s national security value.

….This time around, per Orrock’s resolution, the RNC is declaring that “unwarranted government surveillance is an intrusion on basic human rights that threatens the very foundations of a democratic society and this program represents a gross infringement of the freedom of association and the right to privacy and goes far beyond even the permissive limits set by the Patriot Act.”

I get that politics is politics, and the grass always looks browner when the other party occupies the Oval Office. And there are plenty of liberals who are less outraged by this program today than they were back when George Bush and Dick Cheney were in charge of it.

But holy cow! The RNC! Officially condemning a national security program that was designed by Republicans to fight terrorism! This is truly remarkable. We are indeed living in Bizarro world these days.

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In Remarkable Turnaround, Republicans Officially Denounce NSA Phone Surveillance

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