California Gays Headed to the Supremes
It’ll be up to the US Supreme Court to decide the validity of California’s ban on gay marriage. A US Federal appeals court has ruled the ban violates the US…
The Mound of Sound
Happy Birthday Charlie
Charles Dickens turns 200 today – or he would have were he still alive. With my admittedly plebeian tastes in literature, Dickens and Twain are a complete banquet. “You only…
Disaster Capitalism Goes Celestial
Eco-sleight of hand may reach stratospheric proportions if Bill Gates and other members of his Club of Billionaires succeed in pushing geo-engineering as the solution to anthropogenic climate change. The…
EU Climate Chief Wants a Fresh Take on Growth
It’s going to happen. We don’t have any other choice. Growth, the crack cocaine of post-war industrialism in the Western World, has (pardon the pun) outgrown its social, economic and…
Summing Up Republicans In One Paragraph
The Miami Herald’s Leonard Pitts has captured the sorry face of today’s Republican party and he did it in just a few lines: Under Reagan, optimism about the future was…
How to Put Planned Parenthood Out of the Abortion Business
The fundie Right doesn’t hesitate to condemn Planned Parenthood for providing abortion services. Slate’s William Saletan offers a brilliant idea on how to put Planned Parenthood out of the abortion…
Russia, China Veto SC Resolution on Syria
Steve Harper’s latest moral mood swing is all about China. He can’t wait to get supertankers full of Athabasca bitumen sailing the vast Pacific to waiting refineries in the People’s…
Afghanistan Down. Iran Next?
Some time in the next two years the United States will pack up its guns and leave Afghanistan. Like Vietnam, and to some extent Iraq, it will be able to…
No Ho Like a Rich Ho
If you’re going to struggle with a hooker so bad she winds up needing surgery, and if you’re busted for forceable confinement of the woman, and if you’re going to…
The Myth of Free Market Capitalism
Criticize supposed “free market” capitalism these days and that makes you a flag-burning, god-hating, Socialist to some. There are some very wealthy capitalists who spread a bit of their wealth…
U.S. to Wrap Up Afghan Combat Mission in 2013
By mid-2013 Afghan security or, arguably its civil war, will again be the responsibility of Afghans. U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has announced that he hopes America’s combat mission will…
Republicans Just Cannot Help Themselves
They’re complete boneheads, the lot of them. The real contest between Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney at times seems to be which of them can talk without jamming a foot…
European Youth Reeling
We’re flooded with stories about Greece and the Euro and the European Union leaders and their deals. Blah, blah, blah. What these stories almost always overlook are the real victims,…
Pentagon Ups the Ante on Iran
Count the carriers. One US Navy fleet aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf is routine. Now there are two, the Lincoln and the Vinson. A third is scheduled to deploy…
It May Not Sound Like Much, But…
A welcome advance in boosting disaster risk reduction and preparedness in poorer countries has arrived in the form of a new data service being provided by the World Meteorological Organization.…
Americans Foresee Return of Taliban Rule
When the West stops playing whack-a-mole in Afghanistan, the Talibs, with the backing of Pakistan, are poised to return to power. That is the conclusion of a secret US military…
The Grinch That Failed to Steal Florida
Newt Gingrich warned Floridians that, if he won their state primary, he would be the Republican nominee for president. That was apparently enough to bring an end to the Gingrich…
Welcome to the Snake Pit
By snake pit I mean the Florida everglades, a former refuge for a wide variety of small mammals now being overrun by introduced pythons. Sightings of prey species such as…
Canada’s Made-by-Harper Structural Deficit
To hear Steve Harper tell it, Canada’s finances are a mess. He ought to know, he created the mess. Yes, the federal government has a “structural deficit” that won’t simply…
I’ll Get On To That Right Away
A UN report examining population increase concludes that, by 2030, just 18 years from now, we’ll need 50% more food, 45% more energy and 30% more water to meet humanity’s…