Among the revelations from the NSA data mining scandal have been the identities of companies that aided and abetted the effort. Germany’s justice minister is calling for the EU to adopt tough rules on data protection and a ban on American companies found playing footsie with the National Security Agency.
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The Disaffected Lib: Is America Courting War with China?
Ever since it staged Operation Chimichanga, a dress-rehearsal of a stealth, first-strike attack to take out Chinese air defences, America has been treading gingerly along what may be the road to war. Chinese J-31 Stealth Fighter China has been busy responding with its own stealth fighters, anti-satellite space weaponry, an
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: The GOP War on Working Class America
Freshmen GOP – 2010 Paul Krugman recently questioned the sanity of Congressional Republicans who, he contends, have inflicted such a level of dysfunctionality on the federal government as to leave America ungovernable. Robert Reich, however, seems method in the madness of the “Party of No.” The real answer, I think,
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: What’s It Going to Be This Time?
The United States is bracing for another major terrorist attack. Embassies are shuttered, the nation is on high alert. Terrorist signals traffic is said to be higher than at any time since 9/11. Are Islamist extremists really preparing to attack? Are they, perhaps, simply rattling America’s chain? Should we even
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Geriatric Pipelines?
An analysis of the pipeline failure that spilled 200,000 gallons of Athabasca dilbit in Mayflower, Arizona concluded there was a manufacturing fault in the pipe. Here’s the thing. The pipe that failed was 70-years old. Who knows, maybe your great-grandfather had a hand in its construction? But this geriatric pipeline
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: He’s Crazy About the Schnitzel
In Colorado Springs, a bear loves the leftovers from the Edelweiss restaurant so much that he makes off with the entire dumpster.
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Could "America’s Quiet Environmental Revolution" Sound Last Call for Athabasca Bitumen?
A PostMedia article discusses what it calls America’s “quiet environmental revolution,” a nationwide, broadbased movement away from fossil fuels toward non-carbon alternatives. Even the most unlikely Americans are taking up the carbon-free challenge, often viewing it as a path to energy independence. Kentucky Republican congressman Thomas Massie, for instance, built
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: 130 Years of a Warming Planet
NASA has produced a short animation showing how our world has warmed since 1880. This is based on weather data gathered from 1,000 stations around the world. Blue is cold, red is hot. Notice the parts of Canada that are red.
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Waziristan on the Potomac
Congressional Republicans hold Loya Jirga What happens when the world’s most powerful nation becomes ungovernable? Often when authority becomes ineffective it gives rise to power vacuums that invite other actors, oligarchs or armed oligarchs, warlords, to intercede. Such is the fate of Waziristan and, to a much more subtle degree,
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Four Ex-EPA Administrators, All Republican, Call for Urgent Action to Arrest Climate Change
You’ll probably recognize some of their names – Willam D. Ruckelshaus, Lee Thomas, William K. Reilly and Christine Todd Whitman. Over the past 43 years, each of them served a Republican president as head of the Environmental Protection Agency. In an op-ed to the New York Times, they say that
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Sometimes a Simple Graph Says It All – We’re Getting More Pessimistic With Each Generation
The Brookings Institute has undertaken a survey of economic values in America. The study also revealed that progressivism is far from extinct in the Land of Free Enterprise Capitalism. Despite these negative views of the economy and financial well-being, most Americans (54%) nonetheless believe that capitalism is working at least
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Standing Up for Paul Bernardo
Yes, he did monstrous things, utterly heinous crimes. Yes he deserves to be imprisoned for the full, 25-year stretch if not for life itself. That said, why is Paul Bernardo still in solitary confinement? For 18 years, Bernardo has been housed 23 hours a day in a Kingston cell that’s
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Arms Race Update – Chinese Prepare for "Peoples’ War" in Cyberspace
It doesn’t take bullets, bombs and rockets to kill people and cripple nations. Our almost insane dependence on computers today creates all the vulnerability a determined, sophisticated enemy needs to take us down. Enter China. China’s military is preparing for war in cyberspace involving space attacks on satellites and the
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Sure, the Iron Curtain Fell, But What’s Going Up In Its Place?
When the Berlin Wall came down it quickly led to the liberation of eastern Europe and the demise of the Soviet Union. Western European leaders, egged on by the United States, pulled out all the stops to sign up eastern Europe into the E.U. and NATO. America sought to drive
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Krugman – Sexism and the Federal Reserve
Misogyny in the U.S. goes straight to the top, even right into the Federal Reserve. Paul Krugman shines a light on the sexist campaign going on to undermine the eminently qualified Janet Yellen’s shot at taking over the Federal Reserve when Ben Bernanke steps down as chairman. Last week, The
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: "This Is The Future. Get Used To It."
China has declared a “level 2” weather emergency, a warning normally reserved for typhoons. This time it’s for a massive and prolonged heat wave that has settled in over the south and east with cities seeing more than three weeks of continuous 35C plus temperatures. Is it climate change? No,
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Great, Just Great. Global Warming Might Make Cops (And Maybe You) Even More Trigger Happy.
A new study chronicles the link between warming and violence of all sorts at all levels from individuals to entire nations. And that goes for cops too. The Syrian conflict [triggered in part by severe drought] is just one recent example of the connection between climate and conflict, a field
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: Stopping Light or Stopping Time?
I don’t get it but apparently German scientists managed to stop, or I suppose “arrest”, light for one full minute. In light speed, that’s about 18-million kilometres. While light normally travels at just under 300 million metres per second in a vacuum, physicists managed to slow it down to just
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: That Cold Lake Bitumen Spill – It Just Keeps Rollin’ Along
The 10-week old Cold Lake bitumen spill is expected to stop – basically whenever it stops itself. The company, Canadian Natural Resources Ltd., says there’s nothing it can do to staunch the leak other than collect whatever bitumen it can from the surface and haul out the dead animals. On
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: A Look at How Extremists Have the Republican Party in a Death Grip
Two prominent Democrats have decided to dig into the rotting corpse of the Republican movement to get a look at what lurks inside. Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg and political strategist James Carville have announced what they plan to do about that pressing problem: namely, “The Republican Party Project,” which will
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