I saw this picture in a Meteor Blades diary on dkos and had to comment on it:

Here is a comment made at the end of the post:

[The Time magazine cover photo is of Robert Rubin, Alan Greenspan and Larry Summers from February 15, 1999, right after Gramm-Leach-Bliley repeal of Glass-Steagall was signed. h/t to Paul Krugman for the reminder.]

Remember how good the economy was doing at the end of the 1990s?  Remember how little growth the economy and families in the U.S. experienced in the next decade as the Bushies ran the country into the ground?  The efforts of these three men, among others to be sure, was to stave off a global economic meltdown for a little while.  Their solutions were temporary and actually made the fundamentals worse than before their tinkering.

What’s the point?  Two of these men – Robert Rubin and Larry Summers – are part of President Obama’s economic team.  Does anybody seriously expect the changes necessary for long-term economic recovery will be made with two of the three Marketeers Mouseketeers back in decision-making positions of power?  Think again.

I realized during the Bush years that the President doesn’t matter so much on most issues that matter to people on a day-to-day basis.  It’s the people they put in power around them that matter.  Think that doesn’t make sense?  Think about Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, and dozens of others.  They were around for Nixon’s failed presidency.  What did you expect would happen if the architects of that epic failure were put back in positions of power?

Now think of Obama.  Robert Gates is a holdover from the Bush “administration” – in the Department of War.  Has our approach been significantly altered abroad?  In Iraq, the answer is a tentative yes, but that has more to do with Iraqis exerting control than any desire in the Obama administration or the too-powerful War Industry to leave the 2nd largest proven-oil reserve area without direct control.  In Afghanistan, a surge has been proposed.  So no change there.  Economic policy?  Ben Bernanke, Greenspan’s replacement and the man who stood by while the global economy went down the toilet, has been selected by Obama to serve another term as Fed Chairman.  Two of the clowns in the picture are an integral part of Obama’s team.  Their failed economic ideology gets another chance.

The reforms necessary for full economic recovery will not take place with Rubin and Summers in charge of anything important.  They’re devout believers in the false “Free Market” religion.  It has failed every time it’s been implemented according to leading “Free-Marketeer” dogmatists.  It will fail again – count on it.

I received from Tal Rabin an announcement of the Second Women in Theory Workshop, which will take place at Princeton on June 19-23, 2010.

To apply please go [here]

The format will be similar to the WIT 2008 workshop.

Here is a video about the 2008 workshop:

Obama’s Bullshit-Meter Off The Charts:
“I did not run for office to be helping out a bunch of fat cat bankers on Wall Street”

Zero Hedge
December 13, 2009

Obama goes back to his Wall Street-bashing rhetoric in today’s 60 Minutes on CBS, after he has already doomed this country to tens of trillions in excess debt to make sure that Wall Street not only thrives, but prospers, courtesy of Bernanke’s vertical bond curve and the daily destruction of the dollar. With statements such as “I did not run for office to be helping out a bunch of fat cat bankers on Wall Street” which the WSJ disclosed will be uttered by Obama shortly, only the most clueless viewers will find empathy with Obama’s latest message of banker “anti-hope.”

You say “Some people on Wall Street still don’t get it”… The problem, Mr. President, is that more and more people on Main Street, do get it. They now realize just whose agenda you have at heart. And said Main Street expects nothing but merely more theatrics during your upcoming meeting with Wall Street “fat cats” tomorrow.

Obama’s sellout to Wall Street creates ‘permanent bailout’

Obama turns to Big Bankers for campaign cash

WSWS
October 21, 2009

Behind all the rhetoric about “change,” this is Obama’s most important constituency. In his run for the presidency in 2008, he captured the lion’s share of donations from Wall Street, taking in $15 million from securities and investment firms, $3 million from commercial banks, and $6 million from other financial institutions.

The last time the Big Bankers came to the White House, it was so pro-forma that Larry Summers fell asleep. Today, President Obama will call them on the carpet to try to head off a PR disaster when Wall Street bonus payments start leaking to the press later in the week.

President Obama, who lashed out Sunday at “fat cat bankers” who “still don’t get it,” plans to gather the heads of major banks at the White House on Monday to urge them to make more loans and to accept the necessity of greater regulation.

That we have arrived at such a public penance ritual is really a tribute to the cocoon that both bankers and politicians live in. For a big banker a $20 million yearly cash bonus is a “droit de seigneur”, and not to be questioned by the “little people” or their political representatives. For the politicians, it’s easier to blame the bankers than their foolish and greedy constituents who took out mortgages on liar loans, they knew they couldn’t afford. But perhaps the consumer has learned a lesson.

A poll of 7,500 Americans in November, conducted for Alix Partners, a business consulting firm, found that people expected to save 15 percent of their income when the recession ended. That is about three times the current savings rate, as reflected in government figures. Asked what their largest personal financial concern was, 18 percent cited lowering their debt, more than any other choice.

Now of course we have a huge advertising machine in the U.S. that will try mightily to make sure this new frugality doesn’t occur. If it did, you could subtract two percentage points off an already anemic GDP.

Politically Incorrect News for the Politically Incorrect Reader

Some items you may or may not have read…

Item #1- President Obama gives himself a B-plus grade. Looks like Obama believes in his own hype. Giving himself a B-plus for accomplishing nothing? Narcissist-in-chief.

Item #2- Recession Is Over, White House Adviser Says. Larry Summers, the same guy who cost Harvard $1.8 billion, says job growth begins next spring. Didn’t Obama promise job growth back in February?

Item #3- Matthews Frets Over ‘Idiots’ in America ‘Riling’ Up ‘White Tribalism,’ Shows anti-Obama Protesters. Chris Matthews is nothing more that a race-baiter who is trying to cover for Obama’s failures by bring race into the matter. Matthews loves his boyfriend Obama. Time for Chrissy to come out of the closet

Item #4- Rezko Buddy Plans Iraqi Parliament Run. The Chicago Way travels worldwide. Tony Rezko is Obama’s buddy and the one who helped Obama secure a sweet real estate deal. I’m sure there is no corruption happening…none at all.

Item #5- The Zinning of America: Why the Left-wing controls the “telling” of our history. The reason is because they want to change the truth! These are the same liberals who have tricked Americans into believing they are the party of Civil Rights when their history tells you a different story. That’s how liberal education works. If it doesn’t fit your agenda, change it, distort it, make it fictional history.

  Barack Obama’s top economic adviser, Larry Summers, has given us some good news on the economy. He stated that “everybody agrees that the recession is over” and we would see job growth beginning sometime in the Summer. This is certainly would be good news if it were true. However, contrary to Summers’s claim that everybody agrees the recession is over, not all of the administration’s economic advisers see it quite the same way.

  When asked about the economy and whether or not the recession is over, another of Obama’s top economic advisers, Christina Romer, said “Of course not. For the people on Main Street and throughout this country, they are still suffering, the unemployment rate is still 10 percent.”

  The similarities to the global warming alarmists’ argument are striking, for years we have been told that everybody agrees that global warming is real. According to the alarmists, the debate is over and it is man’s fault the earth is heating even though there are many people who are much more realistic about man’s role in warming the planet, which records show is not warming at all, and has actually been cooling for the last decade. Climategate has shown us that the books have been cooked, the CRU and the IPCC coined the phrase ”hide the decline” in order to keep the truth about global warming from the people.

  As in the global warming argument, the message coming out of Washington is mixed and confusing. Is it any wonder why people are still nervous about the economy? When there are such contrasting opinions coming from the administration it leaves Americans wondering if anybody in this administration has any idea what the hell they are talking about.

  On one hand we have Larry Summers– the same man who tried to claim the recession was ending because less people are googling the term “economic depression” than before–  trying to carry the president’s water and push an opinion that the administration wants the people to believe about the economy, while on the other hand we have  Christina Romer confirming what most Americans believe is the truth– that there has been no change in the economy despite the president’s feeble attempt to stimulate the economy.

  It cannot instill confidence with the American people in this administration when they hear two vastly differing opinions coming from the same administration.

  You would think that if this administration was competent in the least, they would at least get on the same page with their message on the economy, but they can’t even do that.

  If this mixed message is any indication of how this administration operates, how can the American people be expected to believe anything that this administration says going forward? They are caught between telling the American people the truth about the economy and trying to make the president’s policies look good.

 In the end the American people will judge the economy on how they are doing, not on how the administration claims they are doing. The American people will be the judge on the recession and so far  Christina Romer has a more realistic analysis than does Larry Summers, the man whose job it appears to be is trying to make the president look good.

 Larry Summers is trying to “hide the decline.”

Washington (CNN) — Unemployment will go down in the coming year, but that doesn’t mean U.S. economic woes are over, leading economic figures said Sunday.

Appearing on the NBC program “Meet the Press,” former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan and Christina Romer, chairman of the White House Council on Economic Advisers, both made qualified predictions for economic growth and decreasing unemployment.

“I feel (it’s) very likely it will be coming down,” Romer said of the unemployment rate, but warned some “bumps” are likely in the coming year.

Greenspan noted upcoming boosts to employment, such as more than 700,000 people working in 2010 to conduct the federal census.

Unemployment “is going to be lower,” Greenspan said, mostly due to people returning to the labor force.

Greenspan distinguished between a technical end to the recession — which would be consecutive quarters of economic growth, likely happening now — and a comprehensive reversal of the downturn marked by renewed job growth.

To Romer, declaring the recession truly over means a drop in the unemployment rate from the current 10 percent level to the normal level before the downturn of about 5 percent.

“The recession took a long time coming; it’s going to take a long time” coming out of it, Romer said.

Another of President Barack Obama’s advisers, National Economic Council director Lawrence Summers, told CNN’s “State of the Union” that “it will take time” for the economic recovery to bring down the unemployment rate.

Economic recoveries typically begin with growth in gross domestic product, which has started, Summers said.

“Most professional forecasters expect job growth by spring and I think that’s a reasonable judgment in an uncertain world,” said the former Treasury secretary. Helping spur job creation will be the Obama administration’s $787 billion stimulus package, according to Summers.

“The number of projects under the program… is going to be about twice as great over the next six months as it was over the last six months,” Summers said.

However, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, an unsuccessful candidate for the Republican presidential nomination last year, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that the stimulus program has failed to create jobs as promised and should be overhauled.

The nation’s real economic threat is runaway spending that is creating “excessive and massive deficits” and “threatens our long-term viability,” Romney said. He urged immediate steps to “rein in” government spending.

On “FOX News Sunday,” Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Republican Sen. Judd Gregg of New Hampshire agreed on the need to set up a bipartisan congressional task force to advise the government on how to lower the federal deficit. McCaskill also plugged Obama’s push to help small businesses get credit, starting with a meeting the president will have Monday with bank executives.

At the same time, the Obama administration wants to increase regulations on Wall Street firms and financial institutions to help protect consumers from excessive risk-taking that helped spawn the economic crisis last year. The House passed a bill Friday calling for tougher regulation of financial markets, but the measure is expected to face opposition in the Senate.

Summers told CNN that Wall Street should not be resisting Democratic efforts to impose new regulations.

“It was irresponsible risk-taking that brought the economy to the brink of collapse,” he said.

“For firms that have benefited from taxpayer support to be complaining about the government burdening them is, frankly, a bit rich,” Summers said.

After receiving so much public help, “now the financial community’s got to think about its obligations to the country,” he said.

Updated: 2:03 p.m.

Washington (CNN) – A top economic adviser to the White House said Sunday that the economy is beginning to show signs of a turnaround but cautioned that it could be some time before the unemployment situation begins to improve.

“It will take time,” for the national unemployment rate to drop, Lawrence Summers, the Director of the National Economic Council, said Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union.

“A year ago, the question was: would we have a depression? Today, everyone agrees that the recession is over and the questions are around how fast we’ll recover.”

Summers explained that economic recoveries typically begin with growth in gross domestic product. “We’ve seen that start to happen,” Summers told CNN Chief National Correspondent John King, adding that the economy then begins to create jobs on a net basis. “Most professional forecasters expect job growth by spring and I think that’s a reasonable judgment in an uncertain world,” Summers told King.

The former treasury secretary added that even once the economy begins to create jobs, it takes time to reduce the national unemployment rate “because when you start to create jobs, more and more people start looking for work because they’re encouraged.”

“But on the key measure” of job creation, Summers said, “we’re a lot closer than we were a year ago and the signs that are the first signs that things are turning . . . we’re now seeing progress.”

But, Summers quickly added that more needed to be done to improve the jobs outlook as the national unemployment rate sat at 10 percent.

Early indications of an economic turnaround were “not nearly enough, not nearly enough.”

“We’ve got to do a lot more,” Summers said Sunday, adding that “there’s no more important issue facing the country than job growth.”

Summers also told King that the administration’s $787 billion stimulus package will continue to play a role in the economic turnaround.

“The number of projects under the program… is going to be about twice as great over the next six months as it was over the last six months,” Summers said.

Larry Summers took issue Sunday with complaints from Wall Street about Democratic plans for more financial regulation.

Washington (CNN) – A top economic adviser to President Obama said Sunday that Wall Street should not be resisting Democratic efforts to impose new financial regulations in the wake of last year’s financial crisis.

“It was irresponsible risk-taking that brought the economy to the brink of collapse,” Lawrence Summers, the Director of Obama’s National Economic Council, said about Wall Street Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union. “It was their irresponsiblilty in many cases that brought the economy to collapse. And, frankly … it wasn’t the first time.

Watch: Summers slams Wall Street

“And they don’t get, in some cases, that they wouldn’t be where they are today — and they certainly wouldn’t be paying the bonuses they’re paying today — if their government hadn’t taken extraordinary actions. Extraordinary actions, not frankly with the motivation of helping them, but with the motivation of helping the economy but of which they were nonetheless the beneficiary.”

Summers also told CNN Chief National Correspondent John King that it was “wrong” for Wall Street to be “complaining about serious regulation directed at making sure this never happens again.”

“For firms that have benefited from taxpayer support to be complaining about the government burdening them is, frankly, a bit rich,” Summers also said Sunday.

After receiving so much help from the public in the form of support from the federal government in the past year, Summers said “now the financial community’s got to think about its obligations to the country.”

Summers identified preventing another near-collapse of the entire financial system, improving the flow of credit, preventing foreclosures, and improving lending to small businesses as areas the president might discuss with the heads of some of the nation’s largest banks in a meeting set for Monday.

“The president is going to focus on what the bankers can do for their country, what obligations they should feel,” Summers told King.

Matt Taibbi, In a Rolling Stone piece, (his dad is a long time New York NBC reporter ) calls out President Obama for his sell out to the Wall Street..…it’s his keyboard…..but he seems to be echoing the speech Paul Volcker gave in London this week…..that is that…… no innovation was used in making the economy better in the last year…that insiders from the Wall Street gang was placed in charge of the fix……

The piece is long and listened to Taibbi on the POTUS radio one afternoon…and found him convincing…but then I took some time to think over his argument (and Volcker)……..And I realized that there was a few things missing from the reality of his argument…..

Both Taibbi and Volcker expected President Obama, a rookie president, who got at huge problem dumped in his lap, to act in a way that would completely change the system….To deal with the systemic issues, instead of solving the crisis….

A little more than a year ago things were, to put it mildly…..Off the hook….And scary…I never knew how scared these gown white guys with money where until I saw a wonderful PBS special about the crisis….These people where scared s*#tless…..

To expect a President to NOT rely on people who he knew personally , (Geithner and Summers) and the existing Federal Reserve Chair, is out of the question…….Obama did consult Volcker, who stood next to him at the momentous economic press conference the President held upon taking office…but the fact is (as I point out in earlier post) Volcker got named to a committee and then got the door slammed in his face…….

Obama ’s biggest worry wasn’t really how the damn problem started…he wasn’t an economist…his problem was stopping the whole world economy from going down the drain…..And he did exactly what he has done in the Afghan campaign …he went to his subordinates for counsel and action…..And in that they did their job….They made the patient better…..

There is no doubt in my mind, that both Taibbi and Volcker are correct…this whole thing could happen again…tomorrow…..Because there are systemic problems in how the American and world financial systems operate…but Obama isn’t really thinking about that these days….

The fact is the economy is getting better…the banks are ponying up to the Treasury, and paying back their loans….never mind, that for returning the money this fast, they expect the powers to be to let then get their crazy astronomical bonuses, this year….never mind, that the same people who drove us into these problems are still operating at the nations banks, hedge funds, and investments firms……

The fact is Barack Obama is a politician… he promises people one thing…then moves down the rope line, and promises the next group of people something else…..

And while these guys complain, Obama is making decision’s on sending 30,000 more U.S. troops, and 5,000 NATO troops, in harm’s way, while also keeping an eye on a huge Healthcare bill, and making a trip every month out of the country, to hang with the leaders of the worlds most powerful countries, on his own airline, Air Force One….

If there is anything he thinks about, in the economic realm, it’s employment…not structural problems in Wall Street..

….let’m make money …there is another half a billion dollar presidential election campaign starting in a year from now……

……And where do you think some of that money will come from? …….

Ah, yes……..

Update:….more on the piece from the progressives over at mydd.com……

David Rosenberg was Chief Economist for Merrill Lynch for many years, but I think their big corporate/institutional clients got tired of his consistently bearish warnings on the U.S. economy and so he left in the upheaval of 2009 for a smaller firm in Toronto. Many of us who valued his advice for keeping our money safe when the markets were tumbling, continue to follow him. (You can get his commentaries without being a client of the firm). Here are his thoughts on 2010.

The defining characteristic of this asset deflation and credit contraction has been the implosion of the largest balance sheet in the world — the U.S. household sector. Even with the bear market rally in equities and the tenuous recovery in housing in 2009, the reality is that household net worth has contracted nearly 20% over the past year-and-a-half, or an epic $12 trillion of lost net worth, a degree of trauma we have never seen before. As households begin to assess the shock and what it means for their retirement needs, the impact of this shocking loss of wealth on consumer spending patterns in the future is likely going to be very significant. Frugality is the new fashion and likely to stay that way for years as attitudes toward discretionary spending, homeownership and credit undergo a secular shift towards prudence and conservatism.

As the Wall Street Journal points out this morning, the recent stock market rally has not really affected the balance sheet of the average household.

With $12 trillion in net worth lost in the past two years, thanks to stock and house-price declines, consumers likely will save some income to pay down debt.

That consumer caution will make life harder for businesses, keeping them slow to spend and hire—another good reason for consumers to save.

I have been trying to communicate that we are entering a new world order for a while. I am still worried that Gethner and Summers believe there job is to get us back to 1999 or 2005–a mall driven consumer frenzy. But it’s not going to happen.

What’s Plan B?

It’s a known fact that finance is a male-dominated industry.  There’s Buffett, and Soros, and Madoff, and the banker on Deal or No Deal: all men.  In the sausagefest of finance, the only female presence is the wife, the mistress, or the diversity-hire (who, even if she is competent, will be forever tarnished by the suggestion of affirmative action).

Of course, this goes beyond finance — there are far more male CEOs, politicians, movie producers, and leaders not only in the United States, but in the rest of the world.  There are no women in the Forbes 50 richest Americans who made her money outside of inheritance.  Even though women make up half of the world’s population, most of the power is held by men.

Social scientists have long theorized about the existing power gap between men and women.  Some explanations are cultural.  Some are steered in tradition.  And some resort to “biological differences.”  That is, women build consensus; men build tall buildings to showcase their phallic power.

My theory is simple: it’s partly biological, and partly environmental.

I believe that men are more powerful because they pee standing up.

Think about it.  From a very young age, men are trained to pee into a urinal.  They are brought up in a world with literally no walls: there is very little privacy between them.  And if you head into a stall, everyone knows what kind of business is going on.  The result?  Reduced inhibitions from a world with no boundaries, and greater camaraderie with your fellow man.

Meanwhile, there are metaphoric and physical walls that separate women from each other.  The physical act of releasing waste is incredibly private.  Outside of her feet, you don’t tend to see other women in the act of peeing.  I even cringe when I write “releasing waste” — because unlike men, most women don’t feel as comfortable talking about these things.  At least not with strangers.

So, from this theory, men are more comfortable in their own skin, more sociable with strangers, and more likely to take risks.  Women are walled in, siloed, and discomfited by others knowing all of their business.  It’s no wonder why men enjoy finance: they’re used to whipping ‘em out and measuring ‘em, whereas women don’t/can’t really do that.

Of course, like any good theory, there are its notable exceptions.  I’m guessing that Oprah would have no qualms about peeing in front of other women.  And there are incredibly awkward yet successful men who don’t fit the mold.  In 2006, I got rejected by then-college-president Larry Summers when I asked if I could “lei” him at a campus BBQ/luau — I was holding a lei of flowers… He just turned around and walked away.

Doesn’t seem like a guy who’s comfortable in his own skin… Perhaps some of these things, we simply have to blame on inherent biological differences.

1          Emissions trading doesn’t work and won’t get us to 350 ppm.
2          The Kyoto Protocol has resulted in a net increase in emissions.
3          Emissions trading has created pollution hotspots.
4          “The economic logic of dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable, and we should face up to it [….] countries in Africa are vastly UNDER polluted” ~ Larry Summers, while serving as Chief Economist of the World Bank. Summers is now Obama’s chief economic advisor.
5          The sulfur dioxide market is often held up as a successful model for the carbon market. What is not disclosed is that it led to pollution hotspots(areas of increased emissions) in majority people-of-color and low-income communities.
6          Chevron Facility, El Segundo(near Los Angeles), an example of one amongst many facilities that saw an increase in emissions from the S02 market.
7          Unocal Facility, Wilmington (near Long Beach, CA), an example of one amongst many facilitates that saw an increase in emissions from the S02 market.
8          Carbon trading privatizes the atmosphere, our global commons
9          “Trade in CO2 emissions is equated with the transfer of similar rights such as copyrights, patents, licensing rights and commercial and industrial trademarks.” ~ US Department of Energy
10        “If we put a price on every square inch of air, there are some of us who won’t be able to afford to breathe.” ~ José Bravo, Just Transition Alliance.
11        IMAGE: Carbon Market Daily – your future, marketized.
12        Carbon trading puts corporate profits before reducing emissions
13        “Finally, the legacy of cap-and-trade is not going to be a greener world. It’s going to be the world’s largest new stock market, trading exclusively in a stock called carbon credits, where the mega-profits will be made by speculators, hedge funds, and the same financial and investment houses that just finished crashing the global economy.” -Edmonton Sun
14        RWE, a German power company, got €5 billion in windfall profits in the 2005-07 period, without lowering emissions using carbon markets as an excuse to raise electricity prices despite getting carbon permits for free.
15        The proposed Australian emissions trading scheme will hand $16 billion dollars to big polluting companies.
16        According to the NY Times: “billions of dollars in special interest favors” were added to the ACES climate bill in order to win enough votes for it to pass the House of Representatives.
17       Trade in the carbon market provides a new source of funding for companies that produce large quantities of greenhouse gasses.
18       Companies can pass the cost of carbon credits onto consumers, allowing them to pollute at the same profit margin.
Reckless, mega-corporations with bad environmental and human rights records support carbon trading…
19        AES Corporation supports carbon trading
20        Alcoa supports carbon trading
21        Alstom supports carbon trading
22        Boston Scientific Corporation supports carbon trading
23        Chrysler supports carbon trading
24        Duke Energy supports carbon trading
25        Dupont supports carbon trading
26        Exelon supports carbon trading
27        Florida Power and Light supports carbon trading
28        Ford supports carbon trading
29         General Electric supports carbon trading
30        General Motors supports carbon trading
31        John Deere supports carbon trading
32        Johnson and Johnson supports carbon trading
33        NRG supports carbon trading
34        Pepsi supports carbon trading
35        PG&E supports carbon trading
36        PNM Resources supports carbon trading
37        BP supports carbon trading
38        Caterpillar supports carbon trading
39        ConocoPhillips supports carbon trading
40        Dow Chemical supports carbon trading
41        Rio Tinto supports carbon trading
42        Shell Oil supports carbon trading
43        Siemens supports carbon trading
(American International Group (AIG) and Lehman Brothers supported carbon trading too)
44        It perpetuates rich countries’ dominance over poor countries.
45        Carbon markets are fundamentally undemocratic
46        Basic policy decisions (how do we manage waste? protect forests? produce energy?) are moved out of the domain of public decision-making and into private hands by creating a system where private firms become the initiators of projects and policies.
47        Carbon trading encourages change at a glacial pace instead of the rapid transition from fossil fuels that is needed.
48        Carbon trading promotes “solutions” which are most profitable, not those which are most protective of the environment or social needs.
49        Carbon trading does nothing to regulate the host of other toxins released in the burning of fossil fuels
50        Since carbon markets rely on the price of carbon emissions to act as a regulator, volatility in these prices could have disastrous consequences for the public and the climate.
51        Volatile prices can result in sharp increases in power bills, hurting utilities customers
52        The American Clean Energy and Security act passed by the US House allows traders to “bank” carbon permits, a form of financial speculation that can create artificial scarcity and push up prices.
53        Carbon markets are like the Whack-a-Mole game; a victory against a proposed dirty coal plant in one location merely pushes the pollution elsewhere.
54        The process is dangerously complex and opaque. It disempowers citizens from being engaged in fighting climate change
55        “The more I look at Congress’ legislation to address climate change with a cap-and-trade program, the more it looks like a Rube Goldberg device – one of those amusing contraptions that employ all manner of moving parts in a complicated, convoluted process that performs a simple task.” -Marshall Saunders, Philadelphia Inquirer.
56        Corruptibility breeding comfort: the loopholes and political pork embedded in the carbon trading system have soothed major polluters into broad-based support.
57        “Cap and trade…is almost perfectly designed for the buying and selling of political support through the granting of valuable emissions permits to favor specific industries and even specific Congressional districts. That is precisely what is taking place now in the House Energy and Commerce Committee…” – New York Times (05/17/09)
58        Carbon markets hold carbon credits in reserve as a safety valve. If carbon prices get too high, the market is flooded with these reserve credits, preventing any chances of emission reductions.
59        The UN body which approves carbon market transactions is severely under-staffed, undermining their ability to police these transactions.
60        Auctioning of carbon credits has rarely happened, nearly all credits have been given away for free.
61        “If you didn’t auction the permits, it would represent the largest corporate welfare program that has ever been enacted in the history of the United States.” Peter Richard Orszag Director of the Office of Management and Budget under President Obama, former Director of the Congressional Budget Office.
62        The American Clean Energy and Security act gives $126 billion in free allowances to heavy industry
63        The American Clean Energy and Security act gives $35 billion in free allowance to carbon capture and storage technologies
64        The American Clean Energy and Security act gives $378 billion in free allowances to electric utilities
65        The American Clean Energy and Security act gives $66 billion in free allowances to natural gas utilities
66        The American Clean Energy and Security act only requires 15% of pollution permits to be sold. The rest are given away.
67        The American Clean Energy and Security act gives $17 billion in free allowances to oil refiners
68        Carbon trading pushes pollution overseas into poorer countries with lower emissions caps.
69        Most “cap and trade” proposals (such as Kyoto’s “Clean Development Mechanism”, aka “CDM”) allow richer countries to exceed emissions caps by purchasing “offsets” generated by a project in poorer country which theoretically lowers carbon emissions there. But, it’s nearly impossible to prove that most offset projects would not have happened anyway without carbon financing.
70        “Carbon Offsets: an imaginary commodity created by deducting what you hope happens from what you guess would have happened.” -Dan Welch, writing in Ethical Consumer.
71        A German study reported that 86% of offset-funded projects certified by the UN were likely to have been carried out anyway, not contributing to any additional protection of the climate.
72        Emission reductions units, the currency of the carbon trading system, rarely represent actual emission reductions.
73        Ratings company IDEAcarbon reports that actual emissions reductions from offset projects are 30% less than promised.
74        Offsets encourage the fossil fuel economy instead of restricting it, allowing polluters to carry on polluting.
75        International offsets will drive carbon prices down by 89% under The American Clean Energy and Security act according to the EPA.
76        The American Clean Energy and Security act  gives nearly 5 times more money to polluters than to clean energy companies/organizations.
77        “The ACES bill would allow the use of up to 2 billion offsets each year, up to three-quarters of them from international sources. The use of these offsets would allow U.S. polluters to boost emissions by nearly two-fifths by 2012 and would not force cutbacks below today’s levels until 2027.” -San Francisco Chronicle
78        Australia’s proposed carbon trading scheme will do nothing to stop a major expansion of coal mining in New South Wales and other states, despite coal being the major source of Australian (and global) emissions.
79        Australia’s proposed carbon trading scheme would permit the expansion of the Mt. Piper power station and other coal-fired power stations.
80        The voluntary carbon offset market – which promises consumers “carbon neutrality” – helps normalize and justify the much larger corporate/government offset plunder, and perpetuates a consumer guilt paradigm that stifles genuine collective action.
81        Carbon offsets are like the buying of indulgences in the Catholic Church.
82        It makes as much sense as paying a couple to stay faithful to each other so that you can keep cheating on your partner.
83        We can’t buy our way out of real change.
84        “freecarbonoffsets.com” – Because no price is too low for feeling good about offsetting responsibility!
85        It encourages the same magical thinking as is putting trash in an landfill and believing it has somehow vanished from the Earth!
86        Many offset projects actively undermine communities living a sustainable, low-carbon lifestyle, promote human rights abuses or encourage environmental racism.
87        Carbon trading breaches the Treaty of Waitangi, New Zealand’s “founding” document between indigenous peoples and colonists signed in 1851.
88        “Farming communities are more threatened now by the so-called solutions to climate change promoted by corporate interests, G8 countries, the World Trade Organization and the World Bank, than by climate change in itself.” -Via Campesina
89        Under the Kyoto Protocol, the Jepirachi wind project received financing as a Clean Development Mechanism to construct a windmill farm in Colombia. The land being developed belongs to the indigenous Wayuu people, who did not want it. Over 200 Wayuu are alleged to have been killed in the ensuing land struggle. To add insult to injury, the windmills primarily provide power to the largest open-pit coal mine in the world!
90        One of the first carbon offset projects involved planting trees in Mount Elgon National Park, Uganda by Dutch coal utilities. 6000 members of the Bagisu tribe, which lived in the area for centuries, had been forcibly displaced from the Park.
91        Plantar is seeking Clean Development Mechanism funding to plant 23,130 hectares of land in monoculture eucalyptus plantations in Brazil. Much of this land is publicly owned and used communally by peasants. The tree plantations will expropriate communal lands and put them in private hands.
92        South Africa’s proposed $15 million Clean Development Mechanism pilot: Generating methane at the environmentally-racist Bisasar Road dump, situated in the apartheid-era black residential suburb of Durban. This will increase pollution and could keep the facility open for an extra 15 years.
93        Sajida Khan (1952-2007), famed environmental campaigner of Durban, South Africa, lost her life to cancer while fighting to close the dump, which is a hotbed for illness.
94        The Chinese government evicted 7,500 people to build the Xiaoxi Dam. In the EU this would be illegal, as it fails to meet World Commission on Dams guidelines. Still, EU companies are able to offset their emissions financing this dam.
95        Many offsets are straight up scams.
96        “A French chemical company (Rhodia) operating in South Korea is anticipating $1 billion in carbon offset credits for investing $15 million in equipment to destroy nitrous oxide byproducts, using 1970s technology” -Wall St. Journal (05/23/08)
97        South Africa’s largest Clean Development Mechanism huckster is the apartheid-era coal/gas-to-oil corporation is SASOL, who attempted in 2008 to scam the United Nations CDM panel into granting it offset credits for a pipeline it had planned well before the CDM panel even began its work!
98        In 2009, Head of the Papua New Guinea Office of Climate Change, Theo Yasause, was removed after fake carbon certificates with his signature valued at $100 million were given to landowners to get them to sign over the rights to their forests.
99        Oil companies in Nigeria are poised to make huge sums of money by selling carbon credits for stopping gas flaring, despite the fact that gas flaring is supposed to be illegal in the first place.
100      SRF, an Indian company that produces refrigeration gases in Rajasthan, made £300 million from selling carbon offset credits, after spending only £1.4 million on equipment to reduce its emissions. The money earned was used to build more polluting chemical factories, thus raising emissions.
101      The 2 top offset auditors for the UN have been suspended for repeatedly approving faulty offset projects.
102      Offset money often goes to fossil fuel polluters.
103      Even new coal plants can receive carbon market funding under the Clean Development Mechanism, which finances so-called “supercritical technology” at India’s coal plants.
104      It will support the construction of one of the world’s top 50 greenhouse gas emitting projects – the $4 billion Tata Ultra Mega coal plants in Mundra, India.
105      “In an absurd contradiction the World Bank facilitates these false, market-based approaches to climate change while at the same time it is promoting, on a far greater scale, the continued exploration for, and extraction and burning of fossil fuels – many of which are to ensure increased emissions of the North.” Marcelo Calazans, Federation of Organizations for Social and Educational Assistance, Brazil
106      Carbon financing justified World Bank funding of the Allain Duhangan hydropower plant in Himachal Pradesh, India – one of the most controversial dam projects in the world.
107      The World Bank supported a 3,500 hectare tree plantation in the states of Orissa and Andhra Pradesh, India.
108      Many not-so-clean, sustainable, and “green” projects are getting carbon financing as offsets – leading to increased fossil fuel pollution in rich countries, “offset” with environmental destruction in poorer ones.
109      “The reduction targets that are currently under discussion for a post-2012 climate agreement are not strong enough to create a balance between supply and demand, and either forest based carbon credits reduce the price of carbon or, if the sale of forest based credits were restricted, insufficient funds would be generated to make a significant dent in deforestation rates.” – Forests and the European Resource Network
110      Carbon markets are encouraging development of genetically engineered tree plantations for carbon sinks.
111      Dams receive Clean Development Mechanism financing despite being a major source of methane emissions. Massive amounts of methane are released as organic matter decomposes under water.
112      It is estimated that 40-80 million people have been displaced by hydroelectric dams. More than a few of these dams were financed via Clean Development Mechanisms.
113      The Grand Inga dam in the Democratic Republic of Congo will destroy a vast natural habitat and aggravate the external debt, while bringing no benefits for local people. Still, it is eligible for Clean Development Mechanism financing.
114      REDD, and more broadly, “forest offsets”, are nothing more than an attempt to sweeten “business as usual” environmental practices in developing countries with a few payouts to their governments.
115      “Research is increasingly showing that attributing a price to forest carbon will not be enough to save the forests or protect the climate and may lead to massive land grabs.” -FERN (Forests and the European Resource Network)
116      Reuters has reported that organized crime syndicates are eyeing the REDD forest carbon credit industry as a potentially lucrative new opportunity for fraud.
117      With REDD, “Companies would then buy cheap credits and continue doing business as usual rather than cutting their own emissions.”- Economist Magazine
118      Carbon takes millions of years to become stored in fossil fuels again. More vegetation is not equal to leaving carbon in the ground.
119      Forest offsets are largely frauds, because it is nearly impossible to accurately calculate the carbon-sequestering abilities of a forest with any degree of certainty.
120      REDD projects will be almost impossible to verify because of leakage (i.e., protecting forests in one area just leads to deforestation in an adjacent area) and non-permanence (i.e., forests certified as “protected” one day could be destroyed another) issues.
121      The UNFCCC definition of forests includes plantations (and even clearcuts, which are “temporarily unstocked areas”). Thus a country could create large “temporarily unstocked areas” by clearcutting forests before replacing them with monocultures, without causing any deforestation, according to UNFCCC.
122      REDD frameworks do not recognize indigenous rights and encourage encroachments upon indigenous lands and cultures.
123      Commodifying forest carbon is inherently inequitable, since it discriminates against people, and especially women, who previously had free access to the forest resources they need to raise and care for their families, but cannot afford to buy forest products or alternatives.
124      REDD compensation payments to governments may create a disincentive for government authorities to resolve long-standing land disputes in forest areas.
125      REDD pilot projects have already exacerbated eviction, fraud, conflict, corruption, coercion, and militarization.
126      In one case illustrating the deceptive practices companies use to gain control of forests for offset credits, a tribal representative in Papua New Guinea told newspaper Sydney Morning Herald he had been coerced into signing a memorandum of understanding that gave company Nupan power over his land, saying, ‘I couldn’t do anything … So I just went ahead and signed it.”
127      Indigenous Peoples could lose their land or other forms of collateral and/or have to reimburse carbon traders with money if a REDD project fails.
128      REDD could cause conflict over resources, forced relocation, and displacement.
129      REDD could criminalize indigenous livelihoods and blame Indigenous Peoples for climate change.
130      REDD could marginalize the landless.
131      REDD could privilege “Carbon Rights” over Human Rights.
132      REDD could repeat the mistakes of Clean Development Mechanism projects and encourage projects in areas of armed conflict.
133      The UNEP-funded Mau forest project in Kenya has added yet another case to the list of carbon offset projects triggering serious human rights violations: the Mau forest was made ‘ready’ for this carbon offset project by forceful and violent eviction of its inhabitants, including the Indigenous Ogiek People.
134      Industrial-scale trash burning is one of the fastest-growing energy sources being marketed as “green energy”.
135      By capturing methane and using it as fuel to produce electricity, landfill owners in the US can receive an income for selling carbon credits in the voluntary market. The investment pays off by itself, so the carbon offset revenue is a windfall profit.
136      By subsidizing incineration and landfills, carbon credits encourage increased waste of valuable resources.
137      Both the Senate and House cap and trade bills will provide massive incentives for biomass and waste incinerators.
138      Incinerators burn valuable resources. Over 90% of materials used to fuel incinerators could be recycled or composted.
139      Incinerators are one of the leading causes of dioxins and other toxic air emissions, and other predominantly sited in working class, Indigenous and people of color communities.
140      Incinerators emit more CO2 per kWh than coal plants
141      Waste incineration is amongst the largest categories of carbon offset projects. Here’s some of the worst of the worst:
142      Cixi City, Zhejian Province, China
143      Incineration of municipal solid waste and sewage sludge in Shaoxing City, People’s Republic of China
144      Linyi City, Shandong Province, China
145      Municipal Solid Waste Processing in the city of Chandigarh, India
146      PT Navigat Organic Energy Indonesia Integrated Solid Waste Management (GALFAD) Project in Bali, Indonesia
147      SESL 6 MW Municipal Solid Waste based Power Project Vijaywada & Guntur, India
148      Sidoarjo, Java, Indonesia
149      The Timarpur-Okhla Waste Management Company Pvt Ltd’s project at Delhi, India
150      The UN oversees over 1000 offset programs under the guise of the “Clean Development Mechanism.” Many CDM projects have proven to be total failures.
151      Coal bed methane extraction is the leading benefactor of the voluntary offset market in the US.
152      Coal bed methane extraction is a method by which methane within a coal seam is separated and removed for use as natural gas; through the Clean Development Mechanism, 12,799,507 carbon credits have been granted for coal bed methane projects.
153      The average project removes over 6 million gallons of water a year from coal bed aquifers, lowering the water table and often drying wells.
154      The whole scheme subsidizes and promotes the dirtiest fossil fuel out there: Coal!
155      Coal bed methane extraction requires extensive infrastructure, including roads, wells, pipelines, containment ponds, and compressor stations. Such projects generate unaccounted for “life cycle emissions” which significantly decrease the “emissions savings” of this form of energy production.
156      Water quality of the area surrounding the extraction site is threatened by highly saline water that is pumped out of the coal seams as well as the chemicals used to coax methane out of the coal bed.
157      While preventing methane from entering the atmosphere is a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, CO2 is released when it is burned.
158      “The potential size and scope of a structured carbon emissions market in the U.S. is unequivocally vast. It is certainly possible that the emissions market could overtake all other commodity markets.”  Bart Chilton, Commissioner, U.S. Commodities Futures Trading Commission
159      US climate legislation would allow the use of 2 billion tons worth of carbon offsets by American industries in the US / year – equivalent to 1/3 of all US emissions.
160      Taking into account this offset allowance, gross emissions in the US could actually increase by 1/6 over the next 10 years, especially with the meager 17% reductions planned by the legislation
161      Capitalism is at the heart of the climate crisis. We cannot count on it for providing solutions to the problem it has fueled – climate change.
162      Carbon offsets allow environmental value to be negotiable, when science tells us the exact measures necessary to protect our future.
163      The profit motive of carbon trading requires growth. Growth spurs unnecessary energy use, which results in more emissions, which cannot be canceled out in the columns of their balance sheets.
164      Carbon trading is based on an ideological belief in the omnipotence of the market.
165      NRG Energy built a 1,700mw coal plant in Texas. The Environmental Defense Fund was against it, but dropped its opposition when NRG agreed to offset half of its emissions.
166      Time after time, privatization has been a disaster in the Global South when services such as water, education and health care were privatized. This time, the effects of leaving important things to the market cannot be undone!
167      Carbon trading is a complex, artificially-created market subject to the same failures as the subprime housing market.
168      “Subprime carbon” are risky carbon offset credits based on uncompleted offset projects that may ultimately fail to reduce greenhouse gases and, like subprime mortgages, could collapse in value.
169      “The global economic downturn and a growing trade in sovereign emissions rights are combining to create a ‘perfect storm’ that threatens to derail already sluggish efforts to cut greenhouse gases in poor countries.” -Reuters (06/05/09)
170      Subprime carbon can cause more than just an economic collapse. This time, it will be more than homes getting foreclosed on.
171      The entire process is a corporate-driven conflict of interest: Private firms propose the projects and the methodologies to evaluate them. The system is tweaked in favor of private enterprise rather than the public interest, since the system is run by the private sector.
173      SGS, the world’s largest auditor of clean-energy projects was suspended by United Nations inspectors in September 2009 because it was unable to prove its staff had properly vetted projects that were then approved for the EU’s carbon trading scheme.
172      The suspension of SGS wasn’t the first for carbon market “watchdogs” – Norway’s Det Norske Veritas was penalized in November 2008 for similar infractions.
174      Anyone remember Enron and Arthur Anderson?
175      Just look at the history of the idea of carbon markets!
176      “Enron immediately embarked on a massive lobbying effort to develop a trading system for carbon dioxide[...]Between 1994 and 1996, the Enron Foundation donated $1-million to [leading carbon trading advocate] the Nature Conservancy [...]Lay and other individuals associated with Enron donated $1.5-million to environmental groups seeking international controls on carbon dioxide.” Financial Post (May 30, 2009)
177      “[I]t is not an exaggeration to brand the mechanisms of the Kyoto Protocol as ‘Made in the USA.’ . . . The sensitivity of the Protocol to the market was largely instigated by the negotiating positions of the USA.”  -Michael Zammit Cutajar, former Executive Secretary, UNFCCC, 2004
178      Deals with Devils: The Environmental Defense Fund created the “Environmental Resources Trust” to promote carbon trading. The ERT is chaired by Clayland Boyden Gray, Bush’s ambassador to the EU, a longtime opponent of global warming treaties and environmentalists. -nonprofitwatch.org
179      Kyoto “would do more to promote Enron’s business than will almost any other regulatory initiative.” ~ Ken Lay, former CEO of Enron, sent in a 1998 letter to Bill Clinton
180      It encourages a revolving door between NGO’s and the energy market, and thus a reliance on energy industry “experts” influenced by the business culture and priorities of the fossil fuel industry.
181      The UN body which approves carbon market transactions relies heavily on third-party verifiers whose wages are ultimately paid by the very corporations seeking approval. This conflict-of-interest  creates pressure for the transactions to be approved.
182      Carbon trading undermines, replaces and even outlaws other regulations.
183      A leaked government memo in the UK showed that the government was thinking of dropping renewable energy targets, as they were “interfering” with the carbon market.
184      A simple, non-negotiable cap on emissions would be much more effective.
185      Carbon trading would strip the EPA of its authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act.
186      It discourages enacting new GHG-reducing laws because legally-mandated greenhouse gas reductions are ineligible for financial benefits of the Clean Development Mechanisms.
187      It rewards corporations whose governments lack emissions reduction laws. Companies should not be able to receive funds for emissions reduction while they simultaneously are lobbying/bribing against GHG regulations.
188      When carbon permits are auctioned, governments often use the income to aid research and development for status quo fossil fuel polluters as well as subsidizing dubious  solutions
189      The promised expansion of carbon financing keeps the geoengineering industry dreaming about large-scale intentional manipulation of the earth by fertilizing the ocean, shooting sulphates into the stratosphere or putting mirrors in space.
190      When revenue from permit give-a-ways and subsidies to fossil fuel industry research are added together, status quo polluters  get about 80% of the income generated from the  The American Clean Energy and Security act.
191      The bill encourages encourage genetically modified, fossil-fuel-fertilizer-intensive, pesticide-drenched “no-till” farming, instead of organic farming.
192      In the  The American Clean Energy and Security act  almost none of the proceeds from the meager 15% of permits auctioned sold goes to creating “green jobs” – indeed nearly 6 times as much goes to subsidizing research into clean coal.
193      It promotes “clean” coal by providing incentives for carbon capture and sequestration technology. Even if CCS worked, it ignores the devastating impacts of coal from cradle to grave lifecycle impacts.
194      Carbon trading promotes the expansion of biofuels. Biofuels rarely reduce carbon emissions, result in deforestation, and force people to compete with machines for food..
195      Ethanol plants pollute water. They generate 13 liters of wastewater for every liter of ethanol produced.
196      Bio-diesel from palm oil has led to increased planting in clear cut areas. This reduces the amount of carbon tied up in biomass, which means a net increase in atmospheric CO2.
197      Biofuel crops could  put an unbearable strain on the global water supply: Replacing 50 percent of the fossil fuels used annually with biofuels would require up to 12,000 extra cubic kilometers of water a year- the total annual flow down the world’s rivers is 14,000 cubic kilometers.
198      Converting rainforests, peatlands, savannahs or grasslands to grow fuel crops releases CO2, in some cases a staggering 420 times more CO2 than from burning fossil fuel.
199      Ethanol is directly linked to the Gulf of Mexico dead zone. If farmers produced enough corn to meet the congressional goal of producing 15 billion gallons of ethanol by 2022, nitrogen runoff into the Gulf would increase by 10% to 19%.
200      Growing plants for fuel will accelerate already unacceptable levels of topsoil erosion, soil carbon and nutrient depletion, soil compaction, water retention, water depletion, water pollution, air pollution, eutrophication, destruction of fisheries, siltation of dams and waterways, salination, loss of biodiversity, and damage to human health.
201      The biofuels craze could starve people: The surge in ethanol production will translate into higher prices for both processed and staple foods around the world.
202      The expansion of palm oil production is one of the leading causes of rainforest destruction in south-east Asia.
203      High volume production of biofuels will favor industrial-style, high-volume, high-capital, low-labor agriculture that will force more people off farms and out of small villages into mega-cities.
204      Using fertilizer on biofuel crops will emit enough nitrous oxide (as a heat-trapping gas, more than 296 times more powerful than CO2) to wipe out all the carbon savings biofuels produce.
205      Carbon trading promotes the use of nuclear energy as a no-emission technology. Which it’s not.
206      Demand would greatly outstrip supply–In fact, the current global capability is to produce 8 reactors per year.
207      Nukes are too expensive–Nuclear power is now so expensive that if we tried to use it as a climate change mitigation strategy, we would blow through our resources and be left with no options whatsoever.
208      New nukes take too long–Even the industry’s Nuclear Energy Institute predicts only about 4 new reactors in the US by 2020
209      Renewables and efficiency are faster, cheaper, safer and cleaner than nuclear power–In short, energy efficiency programs are beginning to work.
210      “Exelon, the nation’s largest nuclear power company, stands to rake in roughly an extra $1 billion to $1.5 billion a year if the House (cap and trade) climate change bill passes, according to the company’s own estimates.” -Huffington Post
211      Emissions free? Not even close– Every nuclear facility of any kind, emits radioactive elements into our air and water on a daily basis, even when everything goes right.
212      It takes too many nukes– It would take 1500-2,000 new nuclear reactors or more by mid-century, 300-400 in the U.S. alone, to make any kind of meaningful reduction in carbon emissions—by meaningful, I mean even a 20% reduction.
213      Not suited for warming climates–Reactors require large amounts of water for cooling. As climate change heats our water, nuclear power stations will close more and more frequently. Several nuke plants have already had to shutdown during unprecedented heat waves.
214      Nukes are unsafe–The reality is that reactor design—at least for those planned by nuclear utilities—has progressed remarkably little since the 1960s. But not a single reactor being seriously proposed anywhere in the world even claims to be an “”inherently safe”" design—not that any such thing exists at all.
215      Nukes aren’t carbon free–It’s true that nuclear reactors themselves emit only small amounts of carbon. In fact, the mining, milling, processing, enrichment and fuel fabrication of uranium, not to mention the construction of enormous reactors made of concrete, steel, and the millions of gallons of gasoline involved, leaves a fairly significant carbon footprint.
216      The US Department of Energy states there are “millions of gallons of radioactive waste” as well as “thousands of tons of spent nuclear fuel and material” and also “huge quantities of contaminated soil and water” produced by nuclear facilities that require storage. And yet there is still no permanent place to store them in the US.
217 – 259         Under the proposed carbon trading bill in the United States congress,  43 proposed coal plants will be grandfathered in as a compromise to the big polluters who largely drafted the bill. These new plants will add more than 150 MILLION tons of C02 to the atmosphere every year for decades to come, and continue our addiction to fossil fuels.
260      Coal mining in Happy Valley, on New Zealand’s South Island, is set to proceed despite their Kyoto commitments – a massive climate crime.
261      In order to pass a carbon trading bill in the United States, experts expect that negotiating a “deal with the devil” to allow Offshore Drilling will be required.
262      Due to it’s lower C02 content, natural gas use is increasing rather than decreasing under carbon trading schemes. But by ignoring the “lifecycle” impacts of natural gas, carbon trading wreaks havoc on communities worldwide and continues our reliance on fossil fuels.
263      LNG has lifecycle emissions approaching that of coal.
264      Emissions generated by the importation of LNG aren’t considered as part of the emissions cap  so that LNG imports are strongly encouraged by carbon trading.
265      There are 29 approved or proposed “liquefied” natural gas (LNG) importation terminals planned in the US.
266      Agricultural industries aren’t included in the emissions cap under The American Clean Energy and Security act, even though they are responsible for 8% of greenhouse gas emissions in the US.
267      Carbon trading largely fails to address the largest single energy consumer in the world, the US Department of Defense – upward estimates put oil use by the DoD as high as the country
 of Indonesia (population 235 million).”
268      There are alternative policies.
269      “Ladies and gentlemen, I have the answer! Incredible as it might seem, I have stumbled across the single technology which will save us from runaway climate change! From the goodness of my heart I offer it to you for free. No patents, no small print, no hidden clauses. Already this technology, a radical new kind of carbon capture and storage, is causing a stir among scientists. It is cheap, it is efficient and it can be deployed straightaway. It is called… leaving fossil fuels in the ground.” George Monbiot, Columnist with the Guardian UK”
270      An Energy Efficiency Portfolio Standard that reduces energy demand by 50% in 20-30 years, across the transportation, heating and electricity energy sectors.
271      A Clean Energy Portfolio Standard that meets the demands of the other 50% with wind, solar and ocean power (some small-scale micro-hyrdo or closed-loop geothermal) within the same time frame.
272      Creating a “Superfund for Workers” job retraining program to make this transition possible, targeting the urban and rural communities who are most in need.
273      Implement a zero-cut policy on our National Forests to keep forest carbon intact.
274      Remove all subsidies from fossil fuels, nuclear power, biomass/incineration, biofuels, and eliminate at least half of the military budget and shift the savings  to energy demand reduction and clean energy initiatives.
275      Set a national “zero waste” policy, starting with the 75% national recycling/composting target (a goal endorsed by unions as well as climate activists).
276      Shift farm subsidies from industrial agri-business to locally oriented sustainable food systems.
277      The Rodale Institute has found that if all corn and soybeans in the US were grown organically up to 560 billion pounds of carbon could be sequestered annually from the atmosphere.
278      The USDA can promote agricultural practices that sequester carbon into the soil, creating carbon sinks not tied to offsets.
279      Use the millions of dollars the Forest Service spends to subsidize logging to fund real ecosystem restoration, creating carbon sinks not tied to offsets.
280      Grassroots alternatives provide solutions that nurture communities not corporations.
281      Local currencies and time banks re-localize economics and create a system of exchange based on community and mutual aid rather than unsustainable consumption and social inequality.
282      Organizing skill-shares and sharing tools and other resources can help build community self-sufficiency.
283      “Bike culture” – community rides, car-free days, maintenance skill building, and bike sharing programs have created community-based alternatives to automobile-domination in cities worldwide.
284      Cohousing, resident-developed neighborhoods centered around a common house, dramatically reduces resource consumption while building a new model of social interaction.
285      Permaculture – a method of agriculture and community design that uses a model based on natural ecosystems to relocalize and integrate sustainable food production into human settlements.
286      Reduce our consumption of meat. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization found that meat production is responsible for 18% of all human induced greenhouse gases.
287      Support for struggles of resistance to resource colonialism, from Appalachia to Iraq, supports the creation of alternatives by taking on the government and business interests fueling climate change.
288      “Transition Towns”, of which there are currently 227 official initiatives, are attempts to address climate change and peak oil by increasing resilience and reducing carbon emissions as a community.
289      Direct resistance to fossil fuels correctly identifies the root cause of climate chaos.
290      Anti-natural gas imperialism in Bolivia [image]
291      Protesting the Asian Development Bank’s role in dirty energy development in Thailand [image]
292      Protesting coal in Bangladesh [image]
293      Anti-coal billboard alteration in Australia [image]
294      Coal port kayak blockade in Australia [image]
295      Protesting natural gas expansion in Irkutsk [image]
296      Anti- “mountaintop removal” coal mining in Appalachia US [image]
297      Rising Tide Coal plant blockade in Appalachia US [image]
298      Airport shut down in the UK [image]
299      Ken Saro-Wiwa was martyred fighting big oil in Nigeria [image]
300      Indigenous resistance to coal in the US southwest [image]
301      Anti-oil resistance in Thailand [image]
302      Blockading natural gas expansion in the US [image]
303      The oil enforcement agency fighting highway expansion. [image]
304      Opposition to Carbon Trading is mounting.
305      “The only defense of this monstrous absurdity that I have heard is ‘well, you are right, it’s no good, but the train has left the station.’ If the train has left, it had better be derailed soon or the planet, and all of us, will be in deep do-do.”" ~ Dr. James Hansen, head of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Regarded as one of a handful of top global experts on climate change and the scientist most responsible for the development of the 350ppm target.
306      “If we hold up banners saying climate change kills and we want more government action, the very power groups driving the destruction will cheer and might give us even more carbon finance or agrofuels. The time for marching for ‘global action on climate change’ without denouncing the false solutions and the drivers of climate change is over.” -Simone Lovera, activist with Friends of the Earth Paraguay and the Global Forest Coalition
307      Art exposing the carbon market fraud. [image]
308      Cap’n Trade interrupting the speech of the Danish climate minister. [image]
309      Indigenous resistance to REDD at the UN. [image]
310      Taking action against crony environmental groups like Environmental Defense. [image]
311      Anti-offset office occupation by the “Red Herrings for Carbon Trading” [image]
312      Sweeping the coal under the rug at the Carbon Neutral Company, UK [image]
313      Interrupting the first US carbon market conference with a presentation of a Deed to the Sky [image]
314      Speaking truth to power at the UNFCCC [image]
315      Anti-carbon trading banner hang targets the New York city UN meetings. [image]
316      Dancing against forest offsets in Bali [image]
317      Protesting research on genetically engineered “carbon sucking” trees. [image]
318      Protests drove Occidental Petroleum out of Ecuador
319      All-female anti-liquefied natural gas action in US  29 declarations of social movements against carbon trading:
320      Mount Tamalpais Declaration, 2000
321      Mount Kenya Declaration on the Global Crisis and Africa’s Responsibility 31 May 2009
322      IV Continental Summit Indigenous peoples Abya Yala:: Mama Quta Titikaka Declaration 31 May 2009
323      Bali Declaration: 10 December 2007
324      People’s Protocol on Climate Change, 15 December 2008
325      Report of Asia Summit on Climate Change and Indigenous Peoples , 5 June 2009
326      14th Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC Poznan Policy Positions International Youth Delegation Policy Positions: December 2008
327      World Social Forum Climate Justice Assembly Declaration 1 February 2009 Belem
328      Milan Declaration of the 6th International Indigenous Peoples Forum on Climate Change 30 November 2003
329      Hague Declaration of the Second International Forum of Indigenous and Local Communities on Climate Change 12 November 2000
330      The Durban Declaration on Carbon Trading , 10 October 2004
331      Biochar Declaration 2009 :‘Biochar’, a new big threat to people, land, and ecosystems
332      Nairobi Declaration, Africa Peoples Movement on Climate Change (A-PMCC) 30 August 2009
333      The California Environmental Justice Movement’s Declaration Against the Use of Carbon Trading Schemes to Address Climate Change, 19 February 2008
334      Bali Principles of Climate Justice 29 August 2002
335      Quito Declaration 4 May 2000
336      Plataforma Boliviana Frente al Cambio Climático INTERNATIONAL CLIMATE JUSTICE TRIBUNAL 14 October 2009
337      The better world we seek is not Geo-engineered! A Civil Society Statement against Ocean Fertilization. 10 March 2009
338      Declaration of Women in Asia on Climate Change 29 September 2009
339      Indigenous Environmental Network Report Calls For The Rejection Of REDD 02 October 2009
340      Delhi Climate Justice Declaration 1 Nov 2002
341      The Anchorage Declaration 24 April 2009 – Indigenous People’s Global Summit on Climate Change
342      The Albuquerque Declaration November 1, 1998
343      Oilwatch POSITION ON VOLUNTARY CARBON MARKET 2008
344      CONFEDERACION DE NACIONALIDADES INDIGENAS DE LA AMAZONIA ECUATORIANA “C O N F E N I A E” 3 August 2009
345      Lyon Declaration of the First International Forum of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities on Climate Change 6 September 2000
346      The Bonn Declaration Third International Forum of Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities on Climate Change July 14 15, 2001
347      INTERNATIONAL INDIAN TREATY COUNCIL 34th ANNUAL CONFERENCE, Resolution on the Protection of the Environment and biodiversity: Climate Change, Mining, Oil, Water and Natural Resources 22 June 2008
348      Via Campesina position on UNFCCC 5 December 2008
349      Because you care about your children and their children.
350      Because nearly 100 people, from 6 continents and 13 countries, cared enough about the climate and human rights to volunteer time and contribute reasons to make this project possible: HUGE Thanks to everyone!

For more information, visit:  http://www.wihrg.com and http://www.350reasons.org/

Sources: Rising Tide North America, GAIA, Carbon Trade Watch and WIH Resource Group

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Fall Of The Republic documents how an offshore corporate cartel is bankrupting the US economy by design. Leaders are now declaring that world government has arrived and that the dollar will be replaced by a new global currency.

President Obama has brazenly violated Article 1 Section 9 of the US Constitution by seating himself at the head of United Nations’ Security Council, thus becoming the first US president to chair the world body.

A scientific dictatorship is in its final stages of completion, and laws protecting basic human rights are being abolished worldwide; an iron curtain of high-tech tyranny is now descending over the planet.

A worldwide regime controlled by an unelected corporate elite is implementing a planetary carbon tax system that will dominate all human activity and establish a system of neo-feudal slavery.

The image makers have carefully packaged Obama as the world’s savior; he is the Trojan Horse manufactured to pacify the people just long enough for the globalists to complete their master plan.

This film reveals the architecture of the New World Order and what the power elite have in store for humanity. More importantly it communicates how We The People can retake control of our government, turn the criminal tide and bring the tyrants to justice.
A film by Alex Jones.

He may have been fired for many reasons, but Summers off-the-cuff Remarks at NBER Conference on Diversifying the Science & Engineering Workforce had a lot to do with it:

1.  The first is what I call the high-powered job hypothesis-Summers notes that high positions demand high commitment.  Science could be analogous to other professions like law.   He appeals to a longitudinal study that suggests that fewer women may agree to, or be willing to, devote such time and energy to their jobs over their careers as do men.  Changing the nature of these professions to higher female ratios may change some of the fundamental ways we arrange our society:   

“…is our society right to expect that level of effort from people who hold the most prominent jobs?”

Perhaps…though the subtext might be:  are some members of our society right to expect that the guiding ideas of diversity and equality won’t come with a host of other problems…?

***Charles Murray takes it a few steps further, asserting that our social sciences are leading us to become more like Europe (less dynamic and less idealistic in our pursuit of Aristotelian happiness)  He also argues that there is a sea-change going on in the social science that will come to support his thinking. This could be a few steps too far…

2.  The second is what I would call different availability of aptitude at the high end-The bell curve argument that there are more genius and idiot men.  When you get to MIT, 3 and more standard deviations above the mean…means a lot. 

3.  The third is what I would call different socialization and patterns of discrimination in a search-If discrimination is such an important factor in there being a lack of women scientists, then economic theory holds that there are going to be:

“…very substantial opportunities for a limited number of people who were not prepared to discriminate to assemble remarkable departments of high quality people at relatively limited cost simply by the act of their not discriminating.”

So if the theory holds…where are the science departments scooping up all women scientists at low cost…who’ve been rejected elsewhere due to discrimination?

————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————

I believe there is quite arguably discrimination against women in the sciences, and they have a harder road to reach success.  But there is also substance here…and clearly politics was a factor in Summers’ firing as well;  the women’s groups who viewed his ideas as an attack on their belief appealed to public sentiment in the worst kind of way.  

Will social science ever be enough to address such an issue…or is it possibly changing to adapt to the demands people require of it?

On This Site:  Charles Murray Lecture At AEI: The Happiness Of People

Addition:  I always get an email or two that suggests I’ve joined the ranks of those who don’t fully understand the problem and seek to oppress women.  I don’t think I’ve done such a thing, and if women are going broaden and deepen feminism, they may well have to answer to arguments like these.  

It’s not like there aren’t women in the sciences either, Vera Rubin, Lisa Randall and Lise Meitner come to mind, but this debate is clearly not just about science.  It’s also about feminism, the social sciences, money, politics, public opinion etc…

Other things on his plate-worldeconomicforum

I have been thinking a lot about Larry Summers and the fucking mess he has made of our economy.  I didn’t really know much about him at all except for the fact that he was a misogynistic pig.  Last night I saw a news article about the horrendous error he made while at Harvard and was wondering WTF would Obama pick such a baffoon.  Amy Siskind has a marvelous post about Summers and that pig Rick Warren so I’ll let her tell you about it:

It’s not been a particularly good week for two well known misogynists:  Rick Warren and Larry Summers.  Nor has it been a particularly good few months for President Obama.

Obama had little concern for poking women in the eye with his early associations as he became president.  I suppose he figured that 56% of women voted for him in 2008 and he could take their vote for granted going forward.  WRONG!

President Obama’s Inauguration was presided over by Rick Warren, well known for his belief that women are second class citizens put on the earth to serve their husbands. The New Agenda issued a press release also noting that Warren encouraged battered wives to stay in their abusive relationships.  Hundreds of viewers wrote to our blog about their personal experiences at the hand of Rick Warren and his church – treating women like objects under the control of their husbands.  If only they could make a better meal, keep their home cleaner, or be a better wife – then they wouldn’t “deserve” the beating that their husbands gave them.

Warren is back in the news this past weekend for his ties with a Ugandan pastor who is helping to spearhead legislation which, if enacted, would result in the execution of HIV-positive gay men. Would Warren condemn this killing? NO.

Larry Summers, Obama’s pick for Director of the National Economic Council, also made news this Sunday.  Putting Summers into this role  was Obama’s end around strategy after women’s group such as The New Agenda spoke out when Obama contemplated appointing Summers to Treasury Secretary, a post that would require senate confirmation.   Director of the NEC did not require senate confirmation so Summers was able to skate in despite his comments while at Harvard that girls are genetically inferior to boys in math and science.

This past Sunday, a Boston Globe article cited that Summers ignored warnings about investments while at Harvard, costing the University’s endowment $1.8 billion.  This should hardly be a surprise to anyone.  The New Agenda has been speaking out about Summers inability to work with others – especially women – for over a year now.

I wrote in The Daily Beast last December that Summers ignored warnings from Brooksley Born on the derivatives market:

The implosion of the derivatives market and the subsequent collapse of many of our prominent financial institutions could have been averted. Back in 1998, there was a clear and unequivocal warning. A woman by the name of Brooksley Born, then chairwoman of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission, warned Alan Greenspan, Robert Rubin, and Larry Summers of the risks inherent in not regulating derivatives.

Michael Greenberger, a senior director at the commission at the time, noted: “Brooksley was this woman who was not playing tennis with these guys and not having lunch with these guys. There was a little bit of the feeling that this woman was not of Wall Street.”

Summers, then deputy to Rubin, took it from there: “In early 1998, Mr. Rubin’s deputy, Lawrence H. Summers, called Ms. Born and chastised her for taking steps he said would lead to a financial crisis,” The New York Times reports.

More recently, Summers has also been featured all over the press for not heeding warnings by Iris Mack who also while at Harvard Management Co spoke out about the lack of understanding there of the risk inherent in derivative products held in Harvard’s portfolio. Summer’s reaction: fire her.

Not only does Summers have a track record of being unsuccessful, he also has ties to the Wall Street firms that he is meant to watch over through policies and stimulus monies. In April, I wrote a piece about how Summers had received over $8 million in compensation from these firms for 2008:

For 2008, Larry was paid over $5 million from DE Shaw, one of the largest hedge funds in the world. DE Shaw has multiple strategies that they run – and many of these strategies intersect with markets in which Larry can have major impact. For example, the derivatives market which Larry and gang are seeking to regulate.

Larry also received $2.7 million from Wall Street banks during 2008 that were recipients of government bailout money. For one speech alone, Larry Summers was paid $135,000 by Goldman Sachs! Now, does Goldman Sachs ring a bell for anyone? Yes, not only has Goldman received billions of dollars of TARP funds, Goldman was also the single biggest beneficiary of money that was drained out of AIG.

There’s an old adage on Wall Street: you roll with dogs, you get fleas. Well President Obama must be pretty darn itchy right about now.

You can read her entire post here.  And if you’re wondering what Noam Chomsky thinks about it I’ll tell you.

I am a huge Noam Chomsky fan.  I’ve read a lot of his books and find him to be almost physic.  I found this interview he did with Amy Goodman in April and I can’t stop thinking about it.  I am not a huge Democracy Now but he’s spot on here:

AMY GOODMAN: Do you think President Obama is any different than President Bush when it comes to the economy? And if you were in the Congress, would you have voted for the bailouts and the stimulus packages?

NOAM CHOMSKY: He’s different. I mean, first of all, there’s a rhetorical difference. But we have to distinguish the first and the second Bush terms. They were different. I mean, the first Bush term was so arrogant and abrasive and militaristic and dismissive of everyone that they offended, they antagonized even allies, close allies, and US prestige in the world plummeted to zero. Now, the second Bush administration was more—moved more toward the center in that respect, not entirely, but more, so some of the worst offenders, like Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and others, were thrown out. I mean, they couldn’t throw out Dick Cheney, because he was the administration, so they couldn’t get rid of him. He stayed, but the others, a lot of them, left. And they moved towards a somewhat more normal position.

And Obama is carrying that forward. He’s a centrist Democrat. He never really pretended to be anything else. And he’s moving towards a kind of a centrist position. He’s very popular in Europe, not so much because of him, but because he’s not Bush. So there is the kind of rhetoric that the European leaders and, in fact, the European population tend to accept. In fact, you know, even in the Middle East, where you’d think people would know better, they accept the illusions. And they are illusions, because there’s nothing to back them up. So, yes, he is different from Bush.

Same—on the economy, well, you know, the current Obama-Geithner plan is not very different from the Bush-Paulson plan. I mean, somewhat different, but circumstances have changed. So, of course, it’s somewhat different. But it’s still based on the principle that we have to—somehow, the taxpayer has to rescue the institutions intact. They have to remain intact, including the people who, you know, destroyed the economy. In fact, they are the ones who Obama picked to fix it up.

AMY GOODMAN: Explain.

NOAM CHOMSKY: Like Larry Summers, for example, who is now his chief economic adviser. I mean, he was Secretary of Treasury under Bill Clinton. His great achievement was to prevent Congress from regulating derivatives, exotic financial instruments. Well, that’s one of the main factors that led to the crisis.

His kind of senior adviser, one of the first, was Robert Rubin, who was Secretary of Treasury right before Summers. His main achievement—many achievements, like what he did to Indonesia and the third world, but here, his main achievement was to lead the way to revoke the Glass-Steagall legislation from the New Deal, which protected commercial banks from risky investments. It broke down those barriers. Immediately after having done this, he left the government, joined Citigroup as a director, and they began to make huge profits, including him, from picking up insurance companies and so on and making very risky loans, relying on the “too big to fail” doctrine, meaning if we get in trouble, the taxpayer will bail us out, which is just what’s happening, taxpayers now pouring tens of billions of dollars into rescuing Citigroup.

Well, these are the advisers who were supposed to fix up the system. Tim Geithner was right in the middle of this. He was head of the New York Federal Reserve, so, yes, he was supervising these actions. Now, you know, you can argue about whether they’re doing the right thing or the wrong thing, but are these the people who should be fixing up the system?

Actually, the business press just had some interesting things to say about this. Bloomberg News, you know, main business press, had an article in which they reviewed the records of the people who Obama invited to his economic summit. I think it must have been last November or December. They just reviewed the record. I think there were a couple dozen of them. People on the—you know, people like, say, Stiglitz, Krugman, they were never even allowed close to it, let alone anyone from the left or labor and so on, given token representation. So they went through the records, and they concluded that these people should not be invited to fix up the economy. Most of them should be getting subpoenas because of their record of accounting fraud, malpractice and so on, and helping bring about the current crisis.

She went on to ask Chomsky why Obama surrounds himself with these people.  Remember he told us to judge him by these people.  So, far I see him as a homophobe/mysogynist.  Right?  Here’s his response:

NOAM CHOMSKY: Because those are his beliefs. I mean, his support comes from the—his constituency is basically the financial institutions. Just take a look at the funding for his campaign. I mean, the final figures haven’t come out, but we have preliminary figures, and it seems to be mostly financial institutions. I mean, the financial institutions preferred him to McCain. They are the main funders for both—you know, I mean, core funders for both parties, but considerably more to Obama than McCain.

You can learn a lot from campaign contributions. In fact, one of the best predictors of policy around is Thomas Ferguson’s investment theory of politics, as he calls it—very outstanding political economist—which essentially—I mean, to say it in a sentence, he describes elections as occasions in which groups of investors coalesce and invest to control the state. And he takes a look at the formation of campaign contributors, and it gives you a surprisingly good prediction of what policies are going to be. It goes back a century, New Deal and so on. So, yeah, it can predict pretty well what Obama is going to do. There’s nothing surprising about this. It’s the norm in what’s called political democracy.

AMY GOODMAN: Would you have let Citibank, would you have let Citigroup, would do have let the AIG fail?

NOAM CHOMSKY: Well, there are other possibilities. So, the government could just take over the viable parts. And parts of them are functioning; parts are dysfunctional, like the toxic—what they call the toxic asset parts, you know, the financial manipulations.

Well, one thing you could do, which has been suggested by a number of economists like Dean Baker, just take over the good parts, essentially nationalize them, put them under public control. And “nationalize” means public control, at least if you have a democracy. Not here, but if you had a functioning democracy, it would mean let them be under public control, and the parts that are responsible for the huge losses, just let them go off by themselves. In fact, that would be the way of taking care of the AIG bonuses that everyone’s screaming about. In fact, as Baker pointed out, just spin off the parts that were involved in financial manipulations and caused the crisis, let them go bankrupt and let the executives try to get the bonuses from a bankrupt firm, OK, with no legislation necessary. That’s what should be done with Citigroup.

And in fact, it’s interesting, it’s kind of happening. You know, after the breakdown of Glass-Steagall, they did bring in—they made use of it, under Rubin’s direction, among others, to take—bring in insurance companies and other risky investors. Now they’re divesting them. And they’re going in the direction of becoming, you know, commercial bank.

Now, incidentally, this is not the first time this has happened. Paul Volcker is on the news today, you know, saying, “Let’s slow down,” and so on. Well, he’s the one who, under Reagan, who helped bail out Citigroup last time they crashed. At that time they were Citibank. They had followed World Bank and IMF instructions and lent huge amounts of money to Latin America and were assured by the World Bank that it’s all fine, you know, markets will take care of it, etc. Well, in a crash, Paul Volcker came in. He raised interest rates very sharply. Third world countries, whose payments are tied to US interest rates, couldn’t pay their debts. The IMF moved in, took care of it, and essentially recapitalized Citibank. That’s the way the system works: you make risky loans, you make a lot of money, and if you get into trouble, we’re here to bail you out, namely the taxpayer.

So, Mr. Ready On Day One has basically hired and put in charge the very people who caused the freaking collapse.  He’s paying back the people that put him into office and screwing the taxpayers.  Gee, this really sounds like change you can believe in.  Obama is a fraud and should be impeached.  His administration consists of career politicians and Chicgo crime lords with a very tiny percentage of people who have actually held a real job.  It’s never too early to start impeachment proceedings.

The Politically Incorrect News for the Politically Incorrect Reader

Some things you may or may not have read…

Item #1- Would anyone take advise from an economic adviser who cost Harard $1.8 billion dollars? Obama does. Larry Summers is on Obama’s economic council and was President of Harvard and under his management, the university lost $1.8 billion. Hmm…wonder why the stimulus plan didn’t work?

Item #2- Obama’s hand of friendship continues to get slapped back in his face. Russia is building an arms plant in Venezuela. Obama gave up the missle-shield in Poland and gets Russia arming his pal Hugo Chavez. America got screwed with this weenie-in-chief.

Item #3- Congressional Budget Office bitch slaps Senate health care bill. Reports says Senate health care bill would raise premiums 10 to 13 percent or $2,000 on family policies compared to what the cost otherwise would be if Congress were simply to do nothing.

Item #4- Supreme Court overturns decision on detainee photos. The communist-lefty group ACLU is pissed.

Item #5- Can Progressives read? Obama was supposed to “restore” America’s image but things are not looking to good overseas. Unless you count are allies hating us and our enemies are too. Ever imagine the day you would hear America looks weak and uncertain? That’s what Obama has brought us.