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This is just inspiring! You have to watch it! ...bw
Don't Get Caught in a Bad Hotel
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-79pX1IOqPU
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SEIZE BP!
[While this is a good beginning to a fight to put safety first--for workers and the planet--we must recognize that the whole thrust of capitalism is to get the job done quicker and cheaper, workers and the world be damned!
It is workers who are intimately aware of the dangers of production and the ways those dangers could be eliminated. And, if, say, a particular mine, factory, industry can't be made to be safe, then it should be abandoned. Those workers effected should simply be "retired" with full pay and benefits. They have already been subjected to the toxins, dangers, etc., on the job.
Basically, safety must be under worker's control. Workers must have first dibs on profits to insure safety first.
It not only means nationalizing industry--but internationalizing industry--and placing it under the control and operation of the workers themselves. Governmental controls of safety regulations are notoriously ineffectual because the politicians themselves are the corporation's paid defenders. It only makes sense that corporate profits should be utilized--under the worker's control--to put safety first or stop production altogether. Safety first has to be interpreted as "safety before profits and profits for safety first!" We can only hope it is not too late! ...bw]
SEIZE BP!
The government of the United States must seize BP and freeze its assets, and place those funds in trust to begin providing immediate relief to the working people throughout the Gulf states whose jobs, communities, homes and businesses are being harmed or destroyed by the criminally negligent actions of the CEO, Board of Directors and senior management of BP.
Take action now! Sign the Seize BP petition to demand the seizure of BP!
200,000 gallons of oil a day, or more, are gushing into the Gulf of Mexico with the flow of oil growing. The poisonous devastation to human beings, wildlife, natural habitat and fragile ecosystems will go on for decades. It constitutes an act of environmental violence, the consequences of which will be catastrophic.
BP's Unmitigated Greed
This was a manufactured disaster. It was neither an "Act of God" nor Nature that caused this devastation, but rather the unmitigated greed of Big Oil's most powerful executives in their reckless search for ever-greater profits.
Under BP's CEO Tony Hayward's aggressive leadership, BP made a record $5.6 billion in pure profits just in the first three months of 2010. BP made $163 billion in profits from 2001-09. It has a long history of safety violations and slap-on-the-wrist fines.
BP's Materially False and Misleading Statements
BP filed a 52-page exploration plan and environmental impact analysis with the U.S. Department of the Interior's Minerals Management Service for the Deepwater Horizon well, dated February 2009, which repeatedly assured the government that it was "unlikely that an accidental surface or subsurface oil spill would occur from the proposed activities." In the filing, BP stated over and over that it was unlikely for an accident to occur that would lead to a giant crude oil spill causing serious damage to beaches, mammals and fisheries and that as such it did not require a response plan for such an event.
BP's executives are thus either guilty of making materially false statements to the government to obtain the license, of consciously misleading a government that was all too ready to be misled, and/or they are guilty of criminal negligence. At a bare minimum, their representations constitute gross negligence. Whichever the case, BP must be held accountable for its criminal actions that have harmed so many.
Protecting BP's Super-Profits
BP executives are banking that they can ride out the storm of bad publicity and still come out far ahead in terms of the billions in profit that BP will pocket. In 1990, in response to the Exxon Valdez disaster, Congress passed and President Bush signed into law the Oil Pollution Act, which immunizes oil companies for the damages they cause beyond immediate cleanup costs.
Under the Oil Pollution Act, oil companies are responsible for oil removal and cleanup costs for massive spills, and their liability for all other forms of damages is capped at $75 million-a pittance for a company that made $5.6 billion in profits in just the last three months, and is expected to make $23 billion in pure profit this year. Some in Congress suggest the cap should be set at $10 billion, still less than the potential cost of this devastation-but why should the oil companies have any immunity from responsibility for the damage they cause?
The Oil Pollution Act is an outrage, and it will be used by BP to keep on doing business as usual.
People are up in arms because thousands of workers who have lost their jobs and livelihoods as a result of BP's actions have to wait in line to compete for lower wage and hazardous clean-up jobs from BP. BP's multi-millionaire executives are not asked to sacrifice one penny while working people have to plead for clean-up jobs.
Take Action Now
It is imperative that the government seize BP's assets now for their criminal negligence and begin providing immediate relief for the immense suffering and harm they have caused.
Seize BP Petition button*: http://www.seizebp.org/
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Neil Young - Ohio - Live at Massey Hall
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV0rAwk4lFE&feature=player_embedded#
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Bay Area United Against War Newsletter
Table of Contents:
A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS
B. SPECIAL APPEALS, VIDEOS AND ONGOING CAMPAIGNS
C. ARTICLES IN FULL
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A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS
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M.O.R.E. Public Transit Organizing Meeting
Thursday, May 13, 2010, 6:00 pm
Centro Del Pueblo
474 Valencia St., SF (2nd fl. auditorium)
http://www.MOREpublictransit.net
Last week the M.O.R.E. Public Transit Coalition held its first public action on the steps of City Hall. The broad Coalition showed the strength unity can have when facing strong attacks by the media, politicians, and the Mayor who all want to solve the economic crisis of MUNI and the City on the backs of low-income and working families, youth, seniors, and the disabled. We now take the fight to the Board of Supervisors.
Unlike the Mayor's puppets on the MTA Board who voted to dismantle MUNI, the Board of Supervisors can vote to stop all the cuts and hikes by rejecting the proposed MTA budget.
The Mayor and his puppets are bitterly opposed to the rejection and are trying to put the blame on the Drivers, but not once have they mentioned the costly work orders charged by various City departments that amount to over $60 million! The City claims there is no money, but instead of taking from those who have benefited the most from this crisis, the rich and their corporate institutions, they target the poor and working people. MUNI should be a right and accessible to all!
WE DEMAND:
* NO Cuts! NO Hikes!
* Chop from the Top, Tax the Rich!
* Fund Public Transit-Not War and Bank Bailouts!
* Riders and Drivers Unite for More Transit!
www.MOREpublictransit.net
For more info call: 415.821.6545
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Two SF Bay Area events commemorate International Conscientious Objectors' Day and Berkeley C.O. and War Resisters' Day
* FILM SCREENING OF "SOLDIERS OF CONSCIENCE"
Friday, May 14, 2010 at 7:30 PM, Judah L. Magnes Museum at 2121 Allston Way, Berkeley CA (map)
* PEACE FLAG RAISING CEREMONY
Saturday, May 15, 2010 at 11:00 AM, Civic Center flagpole at 2180 Milvia Street, Berkeley CA (map)
This Friday, the Berkeley Arts Festival and Courage to Resist presents Berkeley C.O. and War Resisters' Film Night featuring "Soldiers of Conscience", a film by Berkeley directors Gary Weimberg and Catherine Ryan. Discussion of current GI resistance following the screening. Event starts at 7:30 PM, Judah L. Magnes Museum at 2121 Allston Way, Berkeley CA. Free admission.
Then Saturday morning, celebrate the 4th Annual Berkeley C.O. and War Resisters' Day on International Conscientious Objectors' Day. After a few words, we'll raise a Peace Flag at 11:00 AM, Civic Center flagpole at 2180 Milvia Street. Afterwards, a second Peace Flag will be raised at Civic Center Park, 2151 MLK, Jr. Way, Berkeley. With war resisters from World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars. Sponsored by City of Berkeley Peace and Justice Commission. Endorsed by War Resisters League-West and Courage to Resist. Free event.
For more information, email bob@couragetoresist.org , or phone Courage to Resist at 510-488-3559
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Crucial Vote At City Hall -- KEEP THE ARBORETUM FREE!
Supervisors Hearing on the Arboretum Entrance Fee
Wednesday May 19th
10:00 AM (arrive 9:30)
Supervisor Chamber, Room 250 City Hall
(Polk and Grove Streets)
It is Possible to Defeat The Fee Proposal At This Special Hearing With Your Help. The effort to keep the Strybing Arboretum free is entering the critical phase in City Hall. This coming Wednesday, three members of the Supervisors' Budget Committee (Sups Avalos, Mirkarimi and Eslbernd) will hear the Mayor's ordinance to institute fees. During the meeting, the public can express their views to the Supervisors, please come to urge them to reject the fee ordinance.
The ground has been prepared for success - over 6,000 people have signed a petition, an analysis has clearly discredited the financial assumptions behind the non-resident plan, surveys on the ground have shown how dramatically a fee would reduce attendance and many of you have spoken publicly and sent letters to your Supervisors. Members of the campaign to keep the Arboretum free have met with Supervisors to express the public's overwhelming desire for a free and also that sustainable alternatives are being ignored by the Recreation and Park Department (RPD) in order to push for the fee.
But the S.F. Botanical Society and the RPD have also mounted a sustained and hard campaign for the fee. RPD has tried to tie the fee to other services to force the Supervisors' hand while the Society has been paying professional lobbyists $10,000/month to call on Supervisors to press their position. The challenge is there and our work is clear - we need to keep momentum going and your participation is key.
Our success depends on making a strong push at this special meeting about the Arboretum. If at all possible, please take time out of your schedule to come to this hearing.
If you haven't done so already, please click below to send letters to the Supervisors as frequently as you can to express your opposition to the fee plan. Calling their offices directly seems to have the strongest impact.
http://www.keeparboretumfree.org/email-board-supervisors-budget-committee
ONCE GATED-OFF, THE 70-YEAR HERITAGE OF A FREE GARDEN WILL BE LOST FOREVER, PLEASE ACT TO SAVE THIS VITAL PUBLIC REFUGE - THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR HELP.
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INVITATION TO A NATIONAL CONFERENCE TO BRING THE TROOPS HOME NOW!
United National Peace Conference
July 23 - 25, 2010, Albany , NY
Unac2010@aol.com
UNAC, P.O. Box 21675
Cleveland, OH 44121
518-227-6947
www.nationalpeaceconference.org
Greetings:
Twenty co-sponsoring national organizations urge you to attend this conference scheduled for Albany , New York July 23-25, 2010. They are After Downing Street, Arab American Union Members Council, Bailout the People Movement, Black Agenda Report, Campaign for Peace and Democracy, Campus Antiwar Network, Code Pink, International Action Center, Iraq Veterans Against the War, National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations, National Lawyers Guild, Peace Action, Peace of the Action, Progressive Democrats of America, The Fellowship of Reconciliation, U.S. Labor Against the War, Veterans for Peace, Voices for Creative Nonviolence, Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, and World Can't Wait.
The purpose of the conference is to plan united actions in the months ahead in support of demands for the immediate withdrawal of U.S. military forces and contractors from Afghanistan and Iraq , and money for human needs, not for wars, occupations, and bail-outs. The peace movement is strongest and most effective when plans for united actions are made by the whole range of antiwar and social justice organizations meeting together and deciding together dates and places for national mobilizations.
Each person attending the conference will have voice and vote. Attendees will have the opportunity to amend the action proposal submitted by conference co-sponsors, add demands, and submit resolutions for consideration by the conference.
Keynoters will be NOAM CHOMSKY, internationally renowned political activist, author, and critic of U.S. foreign and domestic policies, MIT Professor Emeritus of Linguistics; and DONNA DEWITT, President, South Carolina AFL-CIO; Co-Chair, South Carolina Progressive Network; Steering Committee, U.S. Labor Against the War; Administrative Body, National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations.
The conference's website is www.nationalpeaceconference.org and you will find there details regarding other speakers, workshops, registration, hotel and travel information, and how to submit amendments, demands, and resolutions. The action proposal has also been published on the website.
Please write us at UNAC2010@aol.com for further information or call 518-227-6947. We can fill orders for copies of the conference brochure. Tables for display and sale of materials can be reserved.
We look forward to seeing you in Albany on July 23-25.
In peace,
Jerry Gordon
Secretary, National Peace Conference
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B. SPECIAL APPEALS, VIDEOS AND ONGOING CAMPAIGNS
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Rachel Carson's Warnings in "The Sea Around Us":
"It is a curious situation that the sea, from which life first arose, should now be threatened by the activities of one form of that life. But the sea, though changed in a sinister way, will continue to exist; the threat is rather to life itself. . ." http://www.savethesea.org/quotes
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Operation Small Axe - Trailer
http://www.blockreportradio.com/news-mainmenu-26/820-us-school-district-to-begin-microchipping-students.html
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[Mumia's Birthday was April 24...bw]
Birthday Message of Thanks to the Movement
By Mumia Abu-Jamal
It may surprise you that for years I did not celebrate a birthday. Now, that's partly because of the everydayness, sameness of prison. It's also because I really didn't remember the day. And I was often surprised by a card from my mother, or from my children, or my wife. They surprised me that they remembered. Of course, that was years ago. But the freedom movement has grown. So has the significance of that movement; for the movement has kept me alive and engaged in struggle. For that, I thank you all. That's because movements can make social change. Some years ago, many years ago, the anthropologist Margaret Meade said, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." Here's the magic, it's that we were there. I thank you for all you have done and all you intend to do. I love you all. On the Move! Build the movement! From Death Row, this is Mumia Abu-Jamal.
-Prisonradio.org, April 24, 2010
http://www.prisonradio.org/audio/mumia/2010MAJ/04Apr10/April24thMessage2010fromMumia.mp3
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Shame on Arizona
Arizona Governor Jan Brewer just signed a law that will authorize officers to pull over, question, and detain anyone they have a "reasonable suspicion" to believe is in this country without proper documentation. It's legalized racial profiling, and it's an affront on all of our civil rights, especially Latinos. It's completely unacceptable.
Join us in letting Arizona's leaders know how we feel, and that there will be consequences. A state that dehumanizes its own people does not deserve our economic support
"As long as racial profiling is legal in Arizona, I will do what I can to not visit the state and to avoid spending dollars there."
Sign Petition Here:
http://presente.org/campaigns/shame?populate=1
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Please sign the petition to stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal and
and forward it to all your lists.
"Mumia Abu-Jamal and The Global Abolition of the Death Penalty"
http://www.petitiononline.com/Mumialaw/petition.html
(A Life In the Balance - The Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal, at 34, Amnesty Int'l, 2000; www. Amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/001/2000.)
[Note: This petition is approved by Mumia Abu-Jamal and his lead attorney, Robert R. Bryan, San Francisco (E-mail: MumiaLegalDefense@gmail.com; Website: www.MumiaLegalDefense.org).]
Committee To Save Mumia Abu-Jamal
P.O. Box 2012
New York, NY 10159-2012
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Donations for Mumia's Legal Defense in the U.S. Our legal effort is the front line of the battle for Mumia's freedom and life. His legal defense needs help. The costs are substantial for our litigation in the U.S. Supreme Court and at the state level. To help, please make your checks payable to the National Lawyers Guild Foundation indicate "Mumia" on the bottom left). All donations are tax deductible under the Internal Revenue Code, section 501c)3), and should be mailed to:
It is outrageous and a violation of human rights that Mumia remains in prison and on death row. His life hangs in the balance. My career has been marked by successfully representing people facing death in murder cases. I will not rest until we win Mumia's case. Justice requires no less.
With best wishes,
Robert R. Bryan
Lead counsel for Mumia Abu-Jamal
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Collateral Murder
[COLD-BLOODED, OUTRIGHT MURDER OF UNARMED CIVILIANS--AND THEY LAUGH ABOUT IT AS THEY SHOOT! THIS IS A BLOOD-CURTLING, VIOLENT AND BRUTAL VIDEO THAT SHOULD BE VIEWED BY EVERYONE! IT EXPOSES, AS MARTIN LUTHER KING SAID, "THE BIGGEST PURVEYORS OF VIOLENCE IN THE WORLD," THE U.S. BI-PARTISAN GOVERNMENT AND THE MILITARY THEY COMMAND. --BW]
Overview
5th April 2010 10:44 EST WikiLeaks has released a classified US military video depicting the indiscriminate slaying of over a dozen people in the Iraqi suburb of New Baghdad -- including two Reuters news staff.
Reuters has been trying to obtain the video through the Freedom of Information Act, without success since the time of the attack. The video, shot from an Apache helicopter gun-site, clearly shows the unprovoked slaying of a wounded Reuters employee and his rescuers. Two young children involved in the rescue were also seriously wounded.
http://www.collateralmurder.com/
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San Francisco City and County Tramples on Civil Liberties
A Letter to Antiwar Activists
Dear Activists:
On Saturday, March 20, the San Francisco City and County Recreation and Parks Department's Park Rangers patrolled a large public antiwar demonstration, shutting down the distribution of Socialist Viewpoint magazine. The rally in Civic Center Plaza was held in protest of the illegal and immoral U.S. wars against Iraq and Afghanistan, and to commemorate the 7th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. The Park Rangers went table-to-table examining each one. They photographed the Socialist Viewpoint table and the person attending it-me. My sister, Debbie and I, had set up the table. We had a sign on the table that asked for a donation of $1.25 for the magazine. The Park Rangers demanded that I "pack it up" and go, because selling or even asking for donations for newspapers or magazines is no longer permitted without the purchase of a new and expensive "vendors license." Their rationale for this denial of free speech is that the distribution of newspapers, magazines, T-shirts-and even food-would make the political protest a "festival" and not a political protest demonstration!
This City's action is clearly a violation of the First Amendment to the Constitution-the right to free speech and freedom of the press-and can't be tolerated.
While they are firing teachers and other San Francisco workers, closing schools, cutting back healthcare access, cutting services to the disabled and elderly, it is outrageous that the Mayor and City Government chose to spend thousands of dollars to police tables at an antiwar rally-a protest demonstration by the people!
We can't let this become the norm. It is so fundamentally anti-democratic. The costs of the permits for the rally, the march, the amplified sound, is already prohibitive. Protest is not a privilege we should have to pay for. It's a basic right in this country and we should reclaim it!
Personally, I experienced a deep feeling of alienation as the crisply-uniformed Park Ranger told me I had to "pack it up"-especially when I knew that they were being paid by the City to do this at this demonstration!
I hope you will join this protest of the violation of the right to distribute and, therefore, the right to read Socialist Viewpoint, by writing or emailing the City officials who are listed below.1
In solidarity,
Bonnie Weinstein, Editorial Board Member, Socialist Viewpoint
www.socialistviewpoint.org
60 - 29th Street, #429
San Francisco, CA 94110
415-824-8730
1 Mayor Gavin Newsom
City Hall, Room 200
1 Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Place
San Francisco, CA 94102
gavin.newsom@sfgov.org
Board of Supervisors
City Hall
1 Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Place, Room 244
San Francisco, Ca 94102-4689
Board.of.supervisors@sfgov.org
San Francisco Recreation & Parks Department Park Rangers
McLaren Lodge & Annex
501 Stanyan Street
San Francisco, CA 94117
Park.patrol@sfgov.org
San Francisco Recreation and Park Commission
501 Stanyan Street
San Francisco, CA 94117
recpark.commission@sfgov.org
Chief of Police George Gascón
850 Bryant Street, #525
San Francisco, CA 94103
(I could not find an email address for him.).
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FREE LYNNE STEWART NOW!
Lynne Stewart in Jail!
Mail tax free contributions payable to National Lawyers Guild Foundation. Write in memo box: "Lynne Stewart Defense." Mail to: Lynne Stewart Defense, P.O. Box 10328, Oakland, CA 94610.
SEND RESOLUTIONS AND STATEMENTS OF SUPPORT TO DEFENSE ATTORNEY JOSHUA L. DRATEL, ESQ. FAX: 212) 571 3792 AND EMAIL: jdratel@aol.com
SEND PROTESTS TO ATTORNEY GENERAL ERIC HOLDER:
U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20530-0001
Department of Justice Main Switchboard - 202-514-2000
AskDOJ@usdoj.gov
Office of the Attorney General Public Comment Line - 202-353-1555
To send Lynne a letter, write:
Lynne Stewart
53504-054
MCC-NY
150 Park Row
New York, NY 10007
Lynne Stewart speaks in support of Mumia Abu-Jamal
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOQ5_VKRf5k&feature=related
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On June 30, an innocent man will be given a second chance.
In 1991, Troy Davis was sentenced to death for allegedly killing a police officer in Savannah, Georgia. There was no physical evidence tying him to the crime, and seven out of nine witnesses recanted or contradicted their testimony.
He was sentenced to death for a crime he didn't commit. But it's not too late to change Troy's fate.
We just learned today that Troy has been granted an evidentiary hearing -- an opportunity to right this wrong. Help give him a second chance by telling your friends to pledge their support for Troy:
http://www.iamtroy.com/
Troy Davis may just be one man, but his situation represents an injustice experienced by thousands. And suffering this kind of injustice, by even one man, is one person too many.
Thanks to you and 35,000 other NAACP members and supporters who spoke out last August, the U.S. Supreme Court is granting Troy Davis his day in court--and a chance to make his case after 19 years on death row.
This hearing is the first step.
We appreciate your continued support of Troy. If you have not yet done so, please visit our website, sign the petition, then tell your friends to do the same.
http://www.iamtroy.com
I will be in touch soon to let you know how else you can help.
Sincerely,
Benjamin Todd Jealous
President and CEO
NAACP
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Short Video About Al-Awda's Work
The following link is to a short video which provides an overview of Al-Awda's work since the founding of our organization in 2000. This video was first shown on Saturday May 23, 2009 at the fundraising banquet of the 7th Annual Int'l Al-Awda Convention in Anaheim California. It was produced from footage collected over the past nine years.
Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTiAkbB5uC0&eurl
Support Al-Awda, a Great Organization and Cause!
Al-Awda, The Palestine Right to Return Coalition, depends on your financial support to carry out its work.
To submit your tax-deductible donation to support our work, go to
http://www.al-awda.org/donate.html and follow the simple instructions.
Thank you for your generosity!
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KEVIN COOPER IS INNOCENT!
FLASHPOINTS Interview with Innocent San Quentin Death Row Inmate
Kevin Cooper -- Aired Monday, May 18,2009
http://www.flashpoints.net/#GOOGLE_SEARCH_ENGINE
To learn more about Kevin Cooper go to:
savekevincooper.org
LINKS
San Francisco Chronicle article on the recent ruling:
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/05/13/BAM517J8T3.DTL
Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling and dissent:
http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2009/05/11/05-99004o.pdf
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COURAGE TO RESIST!
Support the troops who refuse to fight!
http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/
Donate:
http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/content/view/21/57/
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C. ARTICLES IN FULL
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1) Florida Suit Poses a Challenge to Health Care Law
By KEVIN SACK
May 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/11/health/policy/11lawsuit.html?ref=health
2) Hundreds of Union Janitors Fired Under Pressure From Feds
by: David Bacon, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed
Friday 07 May 2010
http://www.truthout.org/hundreds-union-janitors-fired-under-pressure-from-feds59210
3) Texas Officer Is Acquitted in Shooting
By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr.
May 11, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/12/us/12houston.html?ref=us
4) Phoenix Counts Big Boycott Cost
By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD
May 11, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/12/us/12phoenix.html?ref=us
5) In Greek Debt Crisis, Some See Parallels to U.S.
By DAVID LEONHARDT
May 11, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/12/business/economy/12leonhardt.html?ref=business
6) Venezuela Offshore Rig Sinks
By SIMON ROMERO
May 13, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/14/world/americas/14venez.html?hp
7) U.S. Clears a Test of Bioengineered Trees
By ANDREW POLLACK
May 12, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/13/business/energy-environment/13tree.html?ref=us
8) New York Minorities More Likely to Be Frisked
By AL BAKER
May 12, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/13/nyregion/13frisk.html?ref=nyregion
9) Food-stamp tally nears 40 million, sets record
WASHINGTON
Fri May 7, 2010 1:28pm EDT
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6465E220100507
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1) Florida Suit Poses a Challenge to Health Care Law
By KEVIN SACK
May 10, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/11/health/policy/11lawsuit.html?ref=health
As they constructed the requirement that Americans have health insurance, Democrats in Congress took pains to make their bill as constitutionally impregnable as possible.
But despite the health care law's elaborate scaffolding, attorneys general and governors from 20 states, all but one of them Republicans, have now joined as confident litigants in a bid to topple its central pillar. In the process, they hope to present the Supreme Court with a landmark opportunity to define the limits of federal authority, perhaps for generations.
In the seven weeks since the legislation passed, at least a dozen lawsuits have been filed in federal courts to challenge it, according to the Justice Department. But the case that could carry the most weight, and may be on the fastest track in the most advantageous venue, is the one filed in Pensacola, Fla., by state officials, just minutes after President Obama signed the bill.
Some legal scholars, including some who normally lean to the left, believe the states have identified the law's weak spot and devised a credible theory for eviscerating it.
The power of their argument lies in questioning whether Congress can regulate inactivity - in this case by levying a tax penalty on those who do not obtain health insurance. If so, they ask, what would theoretically prevent the government from mandating all manner of acts in the national interest, say regular exercise or buying an American car?
Other experts, however, dismiss the Florida lawsuit as a politically motivated lark at taxpayer expense, and argue that the insurance mandate falls comfortably within Supreme Court precedents. The states, they say, may not even withstand a challenge to their standing to bring the suit, since they are only indirectly affected by the mandate.
The focus of the litigation is the 16-word clause in Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution that allows Congress to regulate interstate commerce, a provision the court has interpreted broadly but not without boundaries. The lead plaintiff, Attorney General Bill McCollum of Florida, who is running for the Republican nomination for governor, argues that the new law's historic reach presents the courts with fresh circumstances.
"In the last 50 years or so," Mr. McCollum said, "other than Brown v. Board, I think the constitutional precedents here will have a greater impact on more people than maybe anything else the court has decided."
Jonathan Turley, who teaches at George Washington University Law School, said that if forced to bet, he would predict that the courts would uphold the health care law. But Mr. Turley said that the federal government's case was far from open-and-shut, and that he found the arguments against the mandate compelling.
"There are few cases in the history of the court system that have a more significant assertion of authority by the government," said Mr. Turley, a civil libertarian who acknowledged being strange bedfellows with the conservative theorists behind the lawsuit. "This case, more than any other, may give the court sticker shock in terms of its impact on federalism."
Mr. McCollum, 65, said he first became fixated on the constitutionality of the mandate last September, after reading a column in The Wall Street Journal by two Washington lawyers, David B. Rivkin Jr. and Lee A. Casey, of the white-shoe firm Baker Hostetler. Mr. McCollum had worked for the firm after retiring from the House of Representatives in 2001, but said he had never collaborated with the men and knew them only well enough to say hello in the hallway.
Mr. Rivkin, 53, and Mr. Casey, 52, who have worked together since meeting in the Reagan Justice Department, had been warning in columns since the early 1990s that a health insurance mandate would extend Congress's power to regulating Americans "merely because you exist."
The lawsuit grew out of regular conference calls among a group of attorneys general who were threatening to challenge the so-called Cornhusker Kickback, a provision favoring a single state, Nebraska, that ultimately was dropped from the bill.
The complaint initially was filed by attorneys general from 13 states, with Mr. McCollum's name listed first, like John Hancock's. Seven other states have since committed to join, some after bitter disagreements between governors and attorneys general from opposing parties. Virginia, which pre-emptively enacted a law intended to nullify a federal insurance mandate, has filed a separate lawsuit.
The states have hired Mr. Rivkin and Mr. Casey as outside counsel under a contract that restricts their fees to $50,000 this year. The lawyers agreed to reduce their hourly rate to $250, from $950, a practice Mr. Rivkin said was standard for public-sector clients.
Four of the attorneys general named as plaintiffs are running for governor. Attorney General Henry McMaster of South Carolina, who faces a competitive Republican primary for governor in June, is broadcasting a television advertisement about the litigation in which he vows to "protect the sovereignty of South Carolina." Mr. McCollum's campaign Web site features a petition in support of his lawsuit to "stop Obamacare."
The Justice Department said it would "vigorously defend" the cases. "We are confident that this statute is constitutional and that we will prevail," said Tracy Schmaler, a department spokeswoman.
Congressional bill writers took steps to immunize the law against constitutional challenge. They asserted in the text that the insurance mandate "substantially affects interstate commerce," the Supreme Court's standard for regulation under the Commerce Clause. They labeled the penalty on those who do not obtain coverage an "excise tax," because such taxes enjoy substantial constitutional protection. Supportive analyses by prominent law professors were read into the Congressional Record.
Nonetheless, there is a broad assumption that the health care law will earn Supreme Court review, although it could take two years or more to get there. The judge in Pensacola, Roger Vinson, has scheduled oral arguments for Sept. 14 on the Justice Department's anticipated motion to dismiss the case. With no real facts to try, those legal arguments would effectively serve as a trial.
The lawsuit could have been filed anywhere. But several lawyers involved said they wanted the first review to rest with the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, a generally conservative bench that handles cases from Florida.
The state's Northern District includes a courthouse in Tallahassee, six blocks from Mr. McCollum's office. But Mr. McCollum instead filed the case 200 miles away in Pensacola, bypassing a Tallahassee judge who was named by President Bill Clinton and ensuring that the judge would be a Republican appointee.
"We thought with the judges, we'd do as well there as anywhere else," Mr. McMaster said. "But it's the strength of the case we're counting on."
The suit lodges three related claims against the health law.
It challenges the federal government's vast expansion of Medicaid as "an unprecedented encroachment on the sovereignty of states." The Justice Department plans to counter that states do not have to participate in Medicaid, according to sources familiar with its thinking. But the states argue that their health care systems have grown so dependent on Medicaid that withdrawing would be catastrophic.
A second count attacks the tax penalty on the uninsured, saying it is an illegal direct tax, and not an allowable excise tax on goods or services.
But the central challenge concerns the Supreme Court's interpretation of the Commerce Clause, as expressed in four decisions handed down over 63 years. If the court interprets the clause broadly, as it did in two seminal cases on the subject, the health insurance mandate is likely to survive.
In those two cases, Wickard v. Filburn in 1942 and Gonzales v. Raich in 2005, the court ruled that Congress's regulatory authority was so extensive that it could even prevent growers from cultivating crops for personal use because of the cumulative impact on the market.
But twice in the last 15 years, the court has invalidated laws that used the Commerce Clause to justify the regulation of noneconomic activity, like restrictions on carrying guns near schools. The constitutionality of the individual mandate, therefore, may rest on whether the justices can be convinced that decisions not to obtain insurance substantially affect interstate commerce.
Lawyers for the government will contend that, because of the cost-shifting nature of health insurance, people who do not obtain coverage inevitably affect the pricing and availability of policies for everyone else. That, they will argue, is enough to satisfy the Supreme Court's test.
But to Mr. Rivkin, the acceptance of that argument would herald an era without limits.
"Every decision you can make as a human being has an economic footprint - whether to procreate, whether to marry," he said. "To say that is enough for your behavior to be regulated transforms the Commerce Clause into an infinitely capacious font of power, whose exercise is only restricted by the Bill of Rights."
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2) Hundreds of Union Janitors Fired Under Pressure From Feds
by: David Bacon, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed
Friday 07 May 2010
http://www.truthout.org/hundreds-union-janitors-fired-under-pressure-from-feds59210
San Francisco, California - Federal immigration authorities have pressured one of San Francisco's major building service companies, ABM, into firing hundreds of its own workers. Some 475 janitors have been told that unless they can show legal immigration status, they will lose their jobs in the near future.
ABM has been a union company for decades, and many of the workers have been there for years. "They've been working in the buildings downtown for 15, 20, some as many as 27 years," said Olga Miranda, president of Service Employees Local 87. "They've built homes. They've provided for their families. They've sent their kids to college. They're not new workers. They didn't just get here a year ago."
Nevertheless, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) division of the Department of Homeland Security has told ABM that they have flagged the personnel records of those workers. Weeks ago, ICE agents sifted through Social Security records and the I-9 immigration forms all workers have to fill out when they apply for jobs. They then told ABM that the company had to fire 475 workers who were accused of lacking legal immigration status.
ABM is one of the largest building service companies in the country, and it appears that union janitorial companies are the targets of the Obama administration's immigration enforcement program. "Homeland Security is going after employers that are union," Miranda charged. "They're going after employers that give benefits and are paying above the average."
Last October, 1,200 janitors working for ABM were fired in similar circumstances in Minneapolis. In November, over 100 janitors working for Seattle Building Maintenance lost their jobs. Minneapolis janitors belong to SEIU Local 26, Seattle janitors to Local 6 and San Francisco janitors to Local 87.
President Obama said sanctions enforcement targets employers "who are using illegal workers in order to drive down wages - and oftentimes mistreat those workers." An ICE Worksite Enforcement Advisory claimed, "unscrupulous employers are likely to pay illegal workers substandard wages or force them to endure intolerable working conditions."
Curing intolerable conditions by firing or deporting workers who endure them doesn't help the workers or change the conditions, however. And despite Obama's contention that sanctions enforcement will punish those employers who exploit immigrants, employers are rewarded for cooperating with ICE by being immunized from prosecution. Javier Murillo, president of SEIU Local 26, said, "The promise made during the audit is that if the company cooperates and complies, they won't be fined. So this kind of enforcement really only hurts workers."
ICE Director John Morton said the agency is auditing the records of 1,654 companies nationwide. "What kind of economic recovery goes with firing thousands of workers?" Miranda asked. "Why don't they target employers who are not paying taxes, who are not obeying safety or labor laws?"
The San Francisco janitors are now faced with an agonizing dilemma. Should they turn themselves in to Homeland Security, which might charge them with providing a bad Social Security number to their employer, and even hold them for deportation? For workers with families, homes and deep roots in a community, it's not possible to just walk away and disappear. "I have a lot of members who are single mothers whose children were born here," Miranda said. "I have a member whose child has leukemia. What are they supposed to do? Leave their children here and go back to Mexico and wait? And wait for what?"
Miranda's question reflects not just the dilemma facing individual workers, but of 12 million undocumented people living in the United States. Since 2005, successive congress members, senators and administrations have dangled the prospect of gaining legal status in front of those who lack it. In exchange, their various schemes for immigration reform have proposed huge new guest worker programs, and a big increase in exactly the kind of enforcement now directed at 475 San Francisco janitors.
While the potential criminalization of undocumented people in Arizona continues to draw headlines, the actual punishment of workers because of their immigration status has become an increasingly bitter fact of life across the country.
President Obama, condemning Arizona's law that would make being undocumented a state crime, said it would "undermine basic notions of fairness that we cherish as Americans." But then he announced his support for legislation with guest worker programs and increased enforcement.
The country is no closer to legalization of the undocumented than it was ten years ago. But the enforcement provisions of the comprehensive immigration reform bills debated in Congress over the last five years have already been implemented on the ground. The Bush administration conducted a high-profile series of raids in which it sent heavily-armed agents into meatpacking plants and factories, held workers for deportation and sent hundreds to federal prison for using bad Social Security numbers.
After Barack Obama was elected president, immigration authorities said they'd follow a softer policy, using an electronic system to find undocumented people in workplaces. People working with bad Social Security numbers would be fired.
Ironically the Bush administration proposed a regulation that would have required employers to fire any worker who provided an employer with a Social Security number that didn't match the SSA database. That regulation was then stopped in court by unions, the ACLU and the National Immigration Law Center. The Obama administration, however, is implementing what amounts to the same requirement, with the same consequence of thousands of fired workers.
Union leaders like Miranda see a conflict between the rhetoric used by the president and other Washington, DC, politicians and lobbyists in condemning the Arizona law, and the immigration proposals they make in Congress. "There's a huge contradiction here," she said. "You can't tell one state that what they're doing is criminalizing people, and at the same time go after employers paying more than a living wage and the workers who have fought for that wage."
Renee Saucedo, attorney for La Raza Centro Legal and former director of the San Francisco Day Labor Program, is even more critical. "Those bills in Congress, which are presented as ones that will help some people get legal status, will actually make things much worse," she charged. "We'll see many more firings like the janitors here, and more punishments for people who are just working and trying to support their families."
Increasingly, however, the Washington proposals have even less promise of legalization, and more emphasis on punishment. The newest Democratic Party scheme virtually abandons the legalization program promised by the "bipartisan" Schumer/Graham proposal, saying that heavy enforcement at the border and in the workplace must come before any consideration of giving 12 million people legal status.
"We have to look at the whole picture," Saucedo urged. "So long as we have trade agreements like NAFTA that create poverty in countries like Mexico, people will continue to come here, no matter how many walls we build. Instead of turning people into guest workers, as these bills in Washington would do, while firing and even jailing those who don't have papers, we need to help people get legal status, and repeal the laws that are making work a crime."
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3) Texas Officer Is Acquitted in Shooting
By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr.
May 11, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/12/us/12houston.html?ref=us
HOUSTON - A jury on Tuesday acquitted a white police officer accused of shooting a young black man in a case that attracted widespread attention in Texas because the victim's family accused the police of racial profiling.
A defense lawyer for the officer, Sgt. Jeffrey Cotton, a 39-year-old veteran in the Bellaire Police Department, had argued that the sergeant felt his life was in danger when he shot Robert Tolan, a 23-year-old waiter, in the driveway of the young man's family home. The jury agreed that the shooting was justified.
"We are very happy with the verdict," said the defense lawyer, Paul Amman. "We believe we presented a good case, and Jeff was never guilty of these charges."
Sergeant Cotton and another officer forced Mr. Tolan and his cousin to lie face down on the ground at gunpoint after the young men had gotten out of their car in front of Mr. Tolan's house. The officers mistakenly believed that the car had been stolen and that Mr. Tolan had a weapon. Mr. Tolan survived the shooting, though a bullet punctured his lung and lodged in his liver.
Mr. Tolan, the son of Bobby Tolan, a former Major League Baseball player, watched stone-faced as the verdict was read and then left the court with the rest of his family, declining requests to be interviewed.
Outside the courtroom, Sergeant Cotton said: "I'm glad it's over. I just want to go back to work."
The Tolan family has also sued Sergeant Cotton, charging him with racial discrimination. That suit is pending.
The shooting created a storm of controversy last year, as black leaders and lawyers for the Tolan family said Sergeant Cotton's actions were part of a pattern of discrimination in Bellaire, an affluent town largely surrounded by Houston.
The Bellaire Police Department has been accused of stopping black and Hispanic motorists that pass through the city more often than it stops whites, an accusation the city strongly denies.
During closing arguments on Tuesday, the prosecutor, Clint Greenwood, argued that Sergeant Cotton had given three versions of the shooting, once saying he saw something shiny in Mr. Tolan's hand and then later retracting that statement.
"An unarmed kid was shot by the Bellaire police, and you know what? He wasn't doing anything illegal," Mr. Greenwood told the jury. "It's a tragedy of errors, not a comedy of errors, a tragedy."
Rachel Marcus and Daniel Cadis contributed reporting.
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4) Phoenix Counts Big Boycott Cost
By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD
May 11, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/12/us/12phoenix.html?ref=us
Boycotts threatened or carried out over Arizona's new immigration enforcement law could cost the Phoenix metropolitan area $90 million in hotel and convention business over five years, Mayor Phil Gordon said Tuesday.
The figure, which does not include incidental spending in restaurants and shops, was calculated after four organizations canceled conventions or conferences and a dozen others said they would abandon visits if the law was not repealed, he said.
The fallout comes as the state, heavily dependent on tourism, struggles to right its economy. "I don't think there ever would be a good time not to have $90 million," said Mr. Gordon, a Democrat who opposes both the law and the boycotts.
The law, scheduled to take effect in July, greatly expands the power of the local police to check the immigration status of people they suspect are in the country illegally and makes it a state crime, paralleling federal law, to not carry immigration papers.
Several major civil rights groups have urged people to avoid the state in protest.
Paul Senseman, a spokesman for Gov. Jan Brewer, a Republican, who signed the law on April 23, called boycotting the state "thoughtless and harmful" and said it was a distraction from the underlying issue of the federal government's failure to control immigration and the border.
"An economic boycott of Arizona just adds to the massive economic burden Arizonans have sustained for years due to the federal government's failure to secure our borders," Mr. Senseman said.
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5) In Greek Debt Crisis, Some See Parallels to U.S.
By DAVID LEONHARDT
May 11, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/12/business/economy/12leonhardt.html?ref=business
It's easy to look at the protesters and the politicians in Greece - and at the other European countries with huge debts - and wonder why they don't get it. They have been enjoying more generous government benefits than they can afford. No mass rally and no bailout fund will change that. Only benefit cuts or tax increases can.
Yet in the back of your mind comes a nagging question: how different, really, is the United States?
The numbers on our federal debt are becoming frighteningly familiar. The debt is projected to equal 140 percent of gross domestic product within two decades. Add in the budget troubles of state governments, and the true shortfall grows even larger. Greece's debt, by comparison, equals about 115 percent of its G.D.P. today.
The United States will probably not face the same kind of crisis as Greece, for all sorts of reasons. But the basic problem is the same. Both countries have a bigger government than they're paying for. And politicians, spendthrift as some may be, are not the main source of the problem.
We, the people, are.
We have not figured out the kind of government we want. We're in favor of Medicare, Social Security, good schools, wide highways, a strong military - and low taxes. Dealing with this disconnect will be the central economic issue of the next decade, in Europe, Japan and this country.
Many people, including some who claim to be outraged by the deficit, still haven't acknowledged the disconnect. Just last weekend, Tea Party members helped deny Senator Robert Bennett, the Utah Republican, his party's nomination for his re-election campaign, in part because he had co-sponsored a health reform plan with a Democratic senator. Economists generally think the plan would have done more to reduce Medicare spending than the bill that passed. So, whatever its intentions, the Tea Party effectively punished Mr. Bennett for not being a big enough fan of big government.
Or consider the different fates of two parts of President Obama's agenda. Mr. Obama has unrealistically said that taxes do not need to rise on households making less than $250,000, and this position has come to be seen as an ironclad vow. He has also called for billions of dollars in sensible cuts to agribusiness subsidies, tax loopholes and the like. The news media and Congress have largely ignored these proposals.
The message seems clear: woe unto the politician - in Washington, Athens or London - who tries to go beyond platitudes and show some actual fiscal restraint.
This situation obviously can't continue, as Robert Greenstein, perhaps the leading liberal budget expert, points out. Mr. Greenstein's politics make him sympathetic to the worry that all the deficit talk will become an excuse to pull back on stimulus spending while unemployment remains high or to gut social programs. But he also knows the numbers well enough to understand that our Greece moment, whether it takes the form of a crisis or not, is coming.
"Most of the public thinks, 'If only the darn politicians could get their act together to cut waste, fraud and abuse, and to make tax avoidance go away and so on,' " Mr. Greenstein, head of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, says. "But the bottom line is, there really is no avoiding the hard choices."
For Greece and possibly other European countries, change will come from the outside. The countries lending the money for the Greek bailout - chiefly Germany - are demanding big cuts to the welfare state. Greek citizens will soon have a harder time retiring in their 40s.
Here in the United States, we're likely to have the chance to solve our problems before our lenders demand it. Those lenders continue see the American economy as a safe haven, thanks to our history of strong economic growth and political flexibility.
It is even possible that future growth will make the current deficit projections look too pessimistic. That sometimes happens when the economy is weak. In the wake of the early 1990s recession, for example, almost no one imagined that the budget would show a surplus by the end of the decade.
But the main issue isn't the near-term deficit - the one created by the recession, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bush tax cuts and the Obama stimulus. The main issue is the long-term deficit.
As societies become richer, citizens tend to want better schools, better medical care and other government services. This country is following that pattern, but without paying the necessary taxes. That combination has us on a course to Greece-like debt.
As a rough estimate, the government will need to find spending cuts and tax increases equal to 7 to 10 percent of G.D.P. The longer we wait, the bigger the cuts will need to be (because of the accumulating interest costs).
Seven percent of G.D.P. is about $1 trillion today. In concrete terms, Medicare's entire budget is about $450 billion. The combined budgets of the Education, Energy, Homeland Security, Justice, Labor, State, Transportation and Veterans Affairs Departments are less than $600 billion.
This is why fixing the budget through spending cuts alone, as Congressional Republicans say they favor, would be so hard. Representative Paul Ryan of Wisconsin has a plan for doing so, and it includes big cuts to Social Security and the end of Medicare for anyone now under 55 years old. Other Republicans have generally refused to endorse the Ryan plan. Until that changes or until the party becomes open to new taxes, its deficit strategy will remain unclear.
Democrats have more of a strategy - raising taxes on the rich and using health reform to reduce the growth of Medicare spending - but it is not nearly sufficient.
What would be? A plan that included a little bit of everything, and then some: say, raising the retirement age; reducing the huge deductions for mortgage interest and health insurance; closing corporate tax loopholes; cutting pensions of some public workers, as Republican governors favor; scrapping wasteful military and space projects; doing more to hold down Medicare spending growth.
Much of this may be unpleasant. But by no means will it doom us to reduced living standards or even slow economic growth. We can still afford to spend more on Medicare - even more per person - than we do today, and more on education, the military and other areas, too. We just can't afford the unrealistic promises that the government has made. We need to make choices.
"It's not a matter of whether we have the resources to solve our problems," as Alan Krueger, the chief economist at the Treasury Department, says. "It's a matter of political will."
For now at least, our elected officials are hardly the only ones who lack that will.
E-mail: leonhardt@nytimes.com
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6) Venezuela Offshore Rig Sinks
By SIMON ROMERO
May 13, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/14/world/americas/14venez.html?hp
LIMA, Peru - An offshore natural gas exploration rig leased to Venezuela's national oil company sank off the coast of northeastern Venezuela and forced the rig to evacuate all 95 of its workers, President Hugo Chávez announced early Thursday.
In an attempt to calm nerves after the explosion of an offshore drilling rig last month in the Gulf of Mexico, Venezuelan energy officials said that the sunken natural gas rig posed no environment threat and that no workers had died. The cause of the sinking was unclear.
Mr. Chávez, who made the initial announcement about the sunken rig via his account on Twitter, the social networking site, also said that two Venezuelan Navy patrols were sent to the waters by the rig, which is owned by Aban Singapore, a wholly owned subsidiary of Aban Offshore, India's largest oil rig company.
"You know this platform is semisubmergible," Mr. Chávez told his followers on Twitter. "At midnight it listed, took on water, ceased operations and they evacuated," he said.
The sinking of the rig, called Aban Pearl, is a setback to Venezuela's efforts to upgrade its energy industry with the help of foreign oil companies. Just hours before the sinking, Mr. Chávez had celebrated on Wednesday the signing of major new oil contracts with companies, including the Chevron Corporation of the United States, calling them "vital for our socialist project." Senior officials in Venezuela had recently been celebrating the Aban Pearl rig in particular. The planning minister, Jorge Giordani, last week called the rig "a motive for pride of national engineering." The rig was drilling for gas in the Mariscal Sucre gas exploration project off the coast of Sucre, a state in northeastern Venezuela in waters near Trinidad and Tobago.
An official at Aban told the BBC that the Pearl was on contract to a Venezuelan state-owned firm and was being used to drill for natural gas. The rig could be used to drill up to 1,250 feet, according to the company's Web site, and is one of 20 ships and rigs Aban owns.
Officials at the firm could not be reached for comment Thursday.
Vikas Bajaj contributed reporting from Mumbai, India.
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7) U.S. Clears a Test of Bioengineered Trees
By ANDREW POLLACK
May 12, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/13/business/energy-environment/13tree.html?ref=us
Federal regulators gave clearance Wednesday for a large and controversial field test of genetically engineered trees planned for seven states stretching from Florida to Texas.
The test is meant to see if the trees, eucalyptuses with a foreign gene meant to help them withstand cold weather, can become a new source of wood for pulp and paper, and for biofuels, in the Southern timber belt. Eucalyptus trees generally cannot now be grown north of Florida because of occasional freezing spells.
The Agriculture Department, in an environmental assessment issued Wednesday, said no environmental problems would be caused by the field trial, which could involve more than 200,000 genetically modified eucalyptus trees on 28 sites covering about 300 acres.
The permit would be issued to ArborGen, a biotechnology company owned by three big forest products companies: International Paper and MeadWestvaco of the United States, and Rubicon of New Zealand.
The Agriculture Department would have to grant separate approval for the trees to be grown commercially, clearance that ArborGen is already seeking.
Although two genetically engineered fruit trees - virus-resistant papaya and plum trees - are already approved for commercial planting in the United States, no forest trees have yet received that clearance in this country.
Genetically engineered trees have the potential to arouse even more controversy than genetically modified crops like corn or soybeans, which are made using the same techniques. That is partly because many people have an emotional attachment to forests that they do not have to cornfields.
Moreover, because trees live longer than annual crops and generally can spread their pollen farther, there are concerns that any unintended environmental effects may spread and persist longer in a woodland environment than in crop fields.
The Agriculture Department said Wednesday that it had received comments opposing the field trial from 12,462 people or organizations, compared with only 45 supporters of the trial. But a vast majority of the opposing comments were nearly identical form letters, it said.
Critics say that the eucalyptus trees, even without foreign genes, may become invasive. They also said the trees were heavy users of water, could spread fires faster and could harbor a fungus that sickens people.
"They've been a disaster everywhere they've been planted," said Anne Petermann, coordinator of a coalition called the Stop GE Trees Campaign.
The Sierra Club, in a comment submitted in February, wrote, "ArborGen's plans to grow 260,000 artificially developed, highly experimental, alien, genetically engineered cloned trees in extensive field trials raises many troubling ecological questions about the short-term and long-term environmental impacts and risks that these trees pose in the United States."
The Agriculture Department said it had found those possibilities to be unlikely.
"The species of eucalyptus in this permit has difficulty establishing without human intervention, even in warmer climates," the department said in its initial environmental assessment, dismissing concerns that the genetically engineered trees would spread like a weed. It said other impacts would be limited because each experimental plot would be no larger than 20 acres and isolated from the others.
ArborGen, based in Summerville, S.C., had previously received permission to grow the trees on the 28 sites. But on only two of those sites, covering 7.6 acres, had it received permission to let the trees flower.
The new permit would allow more trees to be planted at the 28 sites and to allow flowering on 27 of the sites. While flowering would normally mean the possibility of reproduction, the trees in the trial have also been engineered to produce no pollen.
ArborGen argues that because they grow so fast, eucalyptus trees would minimize the amount of forest land needed for commercial plantations.
"You are able to produce more wood off fewer acres of land," Barbara Wells, the company's president, said in an interview. "It's very positive from that standpoint."
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8) New York Minorities More Likely to Be Frisked
By AL BAKER
May 12, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/13/nyregion/13frisk.html?ref=nyregion
Blacks and Latinos were nine times as likely as whites to be stopped by the police in New York City in 2009, but, once stopped, were no more likely to be arrested.
The more than 575,000 stops of people in the city, a record number of what are known in police parlance as "stop and frisks," yielded 762 guns.
Of the reasons listed by the police for conducting the stops, one of those least commonly cited was the claim that the person fit the description of a suspect. The most common reason listed by the police was a category known as "furtive movements."
Under Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly, the New York Police Department's use of such street stops has more than quintupled, fueling not only an intense debate about the effectiveness and propriety of the tactic, but also litigation intended to force the department to reveal more information about the encounters.
The Center for Constitutional Rights, which got the data on stop and frisks after it first sued the city over the issue after the 1999 killing of Amadou Diallo, said its analysis of the 2009 data showed again what it argued was the racially driven use of the tactic against minorities and its relatively modest achievements in fighting crime.
The center, a nonprofit civil and human rights organization financed by donors and foundations, and other critics of the tactic like to note that a gun buyback program conducted by the police at several Bronx churches one day in January yielded 1,186 guns.
Police officials, for their part, vigorously praise the stop-and-frisk policy as a cornerstone of their efforts to suppress crime. The stops led to 34,000 arrests and the seizing of more than 6,000 weapons other than guns, according to the center's analysis.
The police officials argue that the widespread use of the tactic has forced criminals to keep their guns at home and allowed the department to bank thousands of names in a database for detectives to mine in fighting future crimes.
Besides better reporting, the surge in the number of stops, they said, is also a byproduct of flooding high-crime areas with more officers, a strategy for a force with a shrinking headcount.
"These are not unconstitutional," Paul J. Browne, the Police Department's chief spokesman, said of the stops. "We are saving lives, and we are preventing crime."
According to the analysis of the 2009 raw data by the Center for Constitutional Rights, nearly 490,000 blacks and Latinos were stopped by the police on the streets last year, compared with 53,000 whites.
But once stopped, the arrest rates were virtually the same. Whites were arrested in slightly more than 6 percent of the stops, blacks in slightly fewer than 6 percent. About 1.7 percent of whites who were stopped were found to have a weapon, while 1.1 percent of blacks were found with one.
Given that, some experts who have studied stop-and-frisk data over the last several years say that what prompts an officer's suspicion for a stop, and the discretion used, are important.
In examining the stated reasons for the stops, as checked off by police officers on department forms, the center found that about 15 percent of the stops last year cited "fits a relevant description." Officers can check off more than one reason, but in nearly half the stops, the category called "furtive movements" was cited. Nearly 30 percent of stops cited a category called "casing a victim or location"; nearly 19 percent cited a catchall category of "other."
"These stats suggest that racial disparities in who gets stopped has more to do with officer bias and discretion than with crime rates, which is what the Police Department argues," said Darius Charney, a lawyer with the Center for Constitutional Rights.
Mr. Browne, the department spokesman, said stop-and-frisk data was "examined in great detail," in 2007 by the RAND Corporation, "which found no racial profiling." He said the stops mirrored crime - that while a large percentage of the stops involved blacks, an even larger percentage of violent crimes involved suspects described as black by their victims.
The work by the Center for Constitutional Rights is the latest in a series of examinations of the police tactic defined by a Supreme Court decision from decades ago, Terry v. Ohio, which permitted officers to detain someone briefly based on "reasonable suspicion," a threshold lower than the probable cause necessary for a formal arrest.
The issue exploded in New York after Mr. Diallo's killing, when those who protested the shooting contended there was a pattern of racial profiling in stop and frisks. A study in 1999 by Eliot Spitzer, then the state's attorney general, found that blacks and Hispanics were disproportionately stopped in relation to their involvement in crime and their share of the city's population.
In 2001, the city enacted a law requiring the police to provide quarterly reports about the raw data to the City Council and settled a lawsuit, also brought by the constitutional rights group, requiring that plaintiffs be given more valuable raw data.
Reporting by the police has recently become more regular. On April 30, Mr. Browne said that in 2010 there were 149,299 stops through March 31, about 13 percent fewer than in the first quarter of 2009. So far, he said, the stops yielded 186 guns.
As the numbers come out, analysts and academics pore over them to gauge effectiveness.
In March, researchers from the Center on Race, Crime and Justice at John Jay College of Criminal Justice said that more data and "increased public discussion of this controversial policing practice" were essential.
"If the public does not have access to the data, in a format that allows the experts to identify important trends, then it harms the public discourse," said Donna Lieberman, the executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, which successfully sued to get the raw data. "And that is precisely the situation that we are in."
Particularly vexing to Jeffrey A. Fagan, a professor of law at Columbia University who studied the issue for Mr. Spitzer, is that few can say what happens once the "11 or 12 percent" of street stops that lead to an arrest or summons get to court.
"Are these cases that stand up?" he said. "Do they result in convictions?"
Professor Fagan said it was impossible to tell what dent in crime the tactic had made. Christopher T. Dunn of the civil liberties group said there was no proof it had. Crime has gone down steadily since 1991, but, he said, "stop and frisk exploded in 2004."
But Heather Mac Donald, a research fellow at the Manhattan Institute who has spoken to police officials about the tactic, said there was no question it had an effect on crime. She said that great disparities existed in who committed crime in New York and that the police fought crime where it was highest, in mostly minority neighborhoods.
"Where are they supposed to go?" she asked.
Ms. Mac Donald echoed Mr. Browne, who said the police were confident the tactic was stopping crime before it occurred.
Mr. Browne took issue with the constitutional rights group's conclusions about the numbers of arrests or gun seizures the street stops yield, saying, "762 guns can do a lot of damage." He said taking guns from people in the street was different from accepting their surrender from "moms and grandmothers."
And he laid out the logic of the stops: More police are sent to higher crime areas, where criminals and victims live; more suspicious activity is associated with that crime, so there are more opportunities for officers to observe suspicious behavior as a result.
John A. Eterno, a former city police captain who worked to computerize the department's stop-and-frisk data before he retired in 2004, said the tactic could be effective in pushing down crime. But Dr. Eterno, now an associate dean of criminal justice at Molloy College, said retired commanders had spoken of the pressures to reflect their use of stop and frisk in CompStat, the department's computerized crime-tracking system.
"My take is that this has become more like a 'throw a wide net and see what you can find' kind of thing," he said. "I don't see it as targeted enforcement, especially when you see numbers that we are talking about."
The Center for Constitutional Rights also studied poststop outcomes.
It found that officers frisked more people in 2009 than a year earlier but that the rate of frisks for blacks and Latinos was much higher than it was for whites. It found that the police used force in 24 percent of stops - drawing a weapon, say, or throwing people to the ground. The police used force in 19 percent of the stops involving whites but in 27 percent of stops against Latinos and in 25 percent of those involving blacks.
Mr. Charney of the Center for Constitutional Rights said the disparities in the use of force, compared with the numbers of arrests and summonses and of weapons and contraband seized, was something that "the police have not really explained to the public."
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9) Food-stamp tally nears 40 million, sets record
WASHINGTON
Fri May 7, 2010 1:28pm EDT
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6465E220100507
(Reuters) - Nearly 40 million Americans received food stamps -- the latest in an ever-higher string of record enrollment that dates from December 2008 and the U.S. recession, according to a government update.
U.S.
Food stamps are the primary federal anti-hunger program, helping poor people buy food. Enrollment is highest during times of economic distress. The jobless rate was 9.9 percent, the government said on Friday.
The Agriculture Department said 39.68 million people, or 1 in 8 Americans, were enrolled for food stamps during February, an increase of 260,000 from January. USDA updated its figures on Wednesday.
"This is the highest share of the U.S. population on SNAP/food stamps," said the anti-hunger group Food Research and Action Center, using the new name for food stamps, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). "Research suggests that one in three eligible people are not receiving ... benefits."
Enrollment has set a record each month since reaching 31.78 million in December 2008. USDA estimates enrollment will average 40.5 million people this fiscal year, which ends Sept 30, at a cost of up to $59 billion. For fiscal 2011, average enrollment is forecast for 43.3 million people.
(Reporting by Charles Abbott; Editing by John Picinich
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