Presence of wolves allows aspen recovery in Yellowstone

CORVALLIS, Ore. – The wolves are back, and for the first time in more than 50 years, young aspen trees are growing again in the northern range of Yellowstone National Park.

The findings of a new study, just published in Biological Conservation, show that a process called “the ecology of fear” is at work, a balance has been restored to an important natural ecosystem, and aspen trees are surviving elk browsing for the first time in decades.

The research, done by forestry researchers at Oregon State University, supports theories about “trophic cascades” of ecological damage that can be caused when key predators – in this case, wolves – are removed from an ecosystem, and show that recovery is possible when the predators are returned. The results are especially encouraging for the health of America’s first national park, but may also have implications for other areas of the West and other important predators.

Two bacteria better than one in cellulose-fed fuel cell

No currently known bacteria that allow termites and cows to digest cellulose, can power a microbial fuel cell and those bacteria that can produce electrical current cannot eat cellulose. But careful pairing of bacteria can create a fuel cell that consumes cellulose and produces electricity, according to a team of Penn State researchers.

"We have gotten microbial fuel cells to work with all kinds of biodegradable substances including glucose, wastewater and other organic wastes," says John M. Regan, assistant professor of environmental engineering. "But, cellulose is tricky. There is no known microbe that can degrade cellulose and reduce the anode.

Leahy issues subpoena for Rove

By Klaus Marre

July 26, 2007

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) Thursday issued a subpoena for top White House adviser Karl Rove to compel him to testify about the firing of several U.S. attorneys. “The evidence shows that senior White House political operatives were focused on the political impact of federal prosecutions and whether federal prosecutors were doing enough to bring partisan voter fraud and corruption cases,” Leahy said. “It is obvious that the reasons given for the firings of these prosecutors were contrived as part of a cover-up and that the stonewalling by the White House is part and parcel of that same effort.”

Dangers of a Cornered George Bush

By Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity & Dr. Justin Frank
July 27, 2007

Editor’s Note: As the nation and the world face 18 more months of George W. Bush’s presidency, a chilling prospect is that Bush – confronted with more defeats and reversals – might just “lose it” and undertake even more reckless military adventures.

In this special memorandum, the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) collaborated with psychiatrist Justin Frank, author of Bush on the Couch, to assess the potential dangers and possible countermeasures available to constrain Bush:

Recent events have put a great deal more pressure on President George W. Bush, who has shown little regard for the constitutional system bequeathed to us by the Founders. Having bragged about being commander in chief of the “first war of the 21st century,” one he began under false pretenses, success in Iraq is now a pipedream.

AP: New details on Tillman's death

By Martha Mendoza, AP National Writer

SAN FRANCISCO — Army medical examiners were suspicious about the close proximity of the three bullet holes in Pat Tillman's forehead and tried without success to get authorities to investigate whether the former NFL player's death amounted to a crime, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.

"The medical evidence did not match up with the, with the scenario as described," a doctor who examined Tillman's body after he was killed on the battlefield in Afghanistan in 2004 told investigators.

Do You Live in One of the World's 15 Greenest Cities?

By , Grist Magazine
Posted on July 27, 2007, Printed on July 28, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/57973/

This article is reprinted by permission from Grist. For more environmental news and humor sign up for Grist's free email service.

These metropolises aren't literally the greenest places on earth -- they're not necessarily dense with foliage, for one, and some still have a long way to go down the path to sustainability. But all of the cities on this list deserve recognition for making impressive strides toward eco-friendliness, helping their many millions of residents live better, greener lives.

Ted Rall: Poor And Uneducated, Like We Thought

Debunking the Military Debunkers

SAN DIEGO--"The typical recruit in the all-volunteer force is wealthier, more educated and more rural than the average 18- to 24-year-old citizen is," claimed the authors of an oft-cited 2005 "comprehensive study" of the U.S. military commissioned by the Heritage Foundation.

"A pillar of conventional wisdom about the U.S. military is that the quality of volunteers has been degraded after the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq," said the conservative think tank. "Some insist that minorities and the underprivileged are over-represented in the military. Others accuse the U.S. Army of accepting unqualified enlistees in a futile attempt to meet its recruiting goals in the midst of an unpopular war." These myths, insisted Heritage and its media allies, were propagated by antiwar liberals out to demoralize the country by attacking its troops.

TPM: As Bad As Bush

By Josh Marshall

(ed.note: This is a post I was working on a few days ago but had set aside. But with attention fixing again today on the Post's editorial page's egregious record of distortions on Iraq, I thought I'd pull it out of Movable Type oblivion.)

The Iraq fiasco provides few opportunities for mirth. But one is watching Fred Hiatt, czar of the Washington Post editorial page, try to kick up enough dust to wriggle out of his own position on the war.

A necessary preliminary to this discussion is to realize that there is probably no editorial page in the United States that has advocated more influentially on behalf of the Iraq catastrophe at every stage in the unfolding disaster -- from the Iraq Liberation Act, the the WMD and al Qaeda bamboozlement, to the lauching of the war, to the longstanding denial of what was happening on the ground to the continuing refusal to brook any real change of course in policy. Other papers have been more hawkish, certainly. But because of its location in the nation's capital and even more because of its reputation as a non-conservative paper, the Post's fatuous and frequently mendacious editorializing has without doubt had a greater role in pushing the public debate into the war camp than any other editorial page in the nation.

A war of words

Dilip Hiro

July 26, 2007 11:00 AM

http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/dilip_hiro/2007/07/a_war_of_words.html

The Bush administration has so far been careful to ensure that any formal American-Iranian dialogue is restricted to the question of security in Iraq and does not spill over into the issue of Iran's nuclear programme. However, US policy makers have been considering both subjects simultaneously before reaching important decisions.

It is worth noting that during the run-up to the second Iranian-American dialogue in Baghdad on July 24, Washington notched up its list of Iranian acts aimed at undermining the presence of the American and British troops in Iraq. It alleged that the previous pattern of Iranian military and other aid to the Shia militias was being extended to Sunni jihadists of different hues, including individual cells of al-Qaida. The claim was based on the evidence that some caches discovered in Sunni-majority areas contained Iranian-made weapons, ignoring the fact that these caches also included arms manufactured in Bulgaria.

Nanowaste needs attention of EPA, industry and investors

Better toxicity data and private-sector outreach strategy required to manage potential risks

WASHINGTON, DC – The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) must make key decisions about how to apply the two major end-of-life statutes to nanotechnology waste in order to ensure adequate oversight for these technologies, concludes a new report from the Wilson Center’s Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies. However, the report notes that the Agency lacks much of the data on human health and eco-toxicity that form the basis for such determinations, creating some tough challenges ahead in EPA’s decision-making process.

In addition, firms that manufacture nanomaterials, investors, and insurers should consider the new kinds of liabilities and environmental risks that may emerge as a result of the release and disposal of waste nanomaterials into the environment. The report, Where Does the Nano Go" End-of Life Regulation of Nanotechnologies, written by environmental law experts Linda Breggin and John Pendergrass of the Environmental Law Institute, was commissioned by the Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies, an initiative of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and The Pew Charitable Trusts. The report is available online at: www.nanotechproject.org/132.

T-shirt furor becomes fight for free speech

By Mark Lisheron
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Friday, July 20, 2007

Vincent Greene, an Austin artist, and Dan Frazier, an Arizona T-shirt vendor, have never met, but they have a lot in common.

Both used the slogan "Bush Lied, They Died" for their work. Both have infuriated people by incorporating the names of Americans who have died in the Iraq war into their work. And both could face prosecution for continuing to use those names.

Diesel pollution 'clogs arteries'

Diesel fumes appear to combine with artery-clogging fats to raise the risk of heart disease, research suggests.

Scientists found the two act in concert to switch on genes that cause potentially dangerous inflammation of the blood vessels.

They hope their work will lead to a simple blood test enabling doctors to evaluate the impact of air pollution on a person's health.

Isikoff, Hosenball: New Documents Contradict Gonzales Testimony

Newsweek | Michael Isikoff, Mark Hosenball | July 26, 2007 10:20 AM

---

A letter last year from the nation's top intelligence official raises new questions about the credibility of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales's account of a ferocious dispute within the administration over domestic surveillance activities authorized by President Bush.

The letter by director of national intelligence at the time, John Negroponte, as well as public testimony by CIA Director Michael Hayden, seems to contradict sworn testimony by Gonzales this week about a crucial intelligence briefing for congressional leaders on activities in the White House Situation Room on March 10, 2004. The letter specifically lists the March 10 meeting as one of a number of "briefings" about the "Terrorist Surveillance Program."

Death of a Salesman

Submitted by Rick Perlstein on July 24, 2007 - 12:38pm.

By way of Steve Benen at Crooks & Liars, Steven Thomma of the McClatchy newspapers made an important observation yesterday, more important than he knows:

President Bush now has what he asked for — time to sell the people and the Congress on the Iraq war.

But an extra 60 days from Congress, the addition of the talented Ed Gillespie to run the White House communications strategy, and a newly ramped-up sales pitch cannot change the underlying fact: George Bush is a poor salesman.

Experts question U.S. strategy in Pakistan

Posted on Wed, Jul. 25, 2007

Experts question U.S. strategy in Pakistan

Jonathan S. Landay | McClatchy Newspapers
last updated: July 25, 2007 06:53:21 AM

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration's strategy for pursuing al-Qaida in Pakistan's tribal region could stoke support for the Islamic militants who are protecting the terrorist network's leaders and battling Pakistan's U.S.-backed military regime, some U.S. diplomatic and defense officials and experts warn.

President Bush is under pressure to act following the release last week of a new intelligence assessment that said Osama bin Laden's network has re-established itself and is plotting attacks on the United States from the mountainous tribal region that borders Afghanistan.

Alarm at US right to highly personal data

Religion and sex life among passenger details to be passed on to officials

Jamie Doward, home affairs editor
Sunday July 22, 2007
The Observer

Highly sensitive information about the religious beliefs, political opinions and even the sex life of Britons travelling to the United States is to be made available to US authorities when the European Commission agrees to a new system of checking passengers.

The EC is in the final stages of agreeing a new Passenger Name Record system with the US which will allow American officials to access detailed biographical information about passengers entering international airports.

Bush's Latest Executive Order: Feel the Heat Yet?

By Stephen Pizzo

Created Jul 24 2007 - 9:20am

On July 17th President Bush signed another executive order. It should have made the front page and been the lead story on every newscast, but wasn't. In fact, unless you read the so-called “alternative” press, you probably still don't know a thing about it. Yet it could land your ass in jail and/or get your financial assets frozen or seized.

President Bush's latest order builds atop earlier “national security” executive orders Bush signed in the wake of 9/11. Here's the new order – with my annotations.

Rights Groups Dismiss Bush’s Rules for Secret Prisons

by Aaron Glantz

SAN FRANCISCO - Human rights organizations are reacting coldly to President George W. Bush’s executive order forbidding the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from torturing, humiliating, or abusing detainees in its once-secret interrogation program.

“It’s incredibly vague to the point of being useless as a way to stop torture,” said Shayana Kadidal, an attorney at the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights, who represents detainees held at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The Key To Good Health That No One Is Talking About: Money

By Brydie Ragan, YES! Magazine
Posted on July 25, 2007, Printed on July 25, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/57529/

Research now tells us that lower socio-economic status may be more harmful to health than risky personal habits...

I recently saw a billboard for an employment service that said, "If you think cigarette smoking is bad for your health, try a dead-end job." This warning may not just be an advertising quip: public health research now tells us that lower socio-economic status may be more harmful to health than risky personal habits, such as smoking or eating junk food.

What to Say to Those Who Think Nuclear Power Will Save Us

By Rebecca Solnit, Orion Magazine
Posted on July 25, 2007, Printed on July 25, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/57530/

Chances are good, gentle reader, that you are going to have to sit next to someone in the coming year who will assert that nuclear power is the solution to climate change. What will you tell them?

There's so much to say. You could be sitting next to someone who hasn't really considered the evidence yet. Or you could be sitting next to scientist and Gaia theorist James Lovelock, a supporter of Environmentalists for Nuclear Energy™, which quotes him saying, "We have no time to experiment with visionary energy sources; civilisation is in imminent danger and has to use nuclear -- the one safe, available, energy source -- now or suffer the pain soon to be inflicted by our outraged planet."

The Myth of America's Rags-to-Riches Presidents

By Jonathan Zimmerman, Christian Science Monitor
Posted on July 25, 2007, Printed on July 25, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/57241/

Rudy Giuliani received $11 million last year in speaking fees alone. John McCain is worth between $20 million and $32 million, most of it earned the old-fashioned way: He married into it. John Edwards, a former trial lawyer, has assets of about $62 million. But they're all paupers compared to Mitt Romney, founder of a private equity firm, whose personal fortune is somewhere between $190 million and $250 million.

So what else is new?

Are Voter Registration Drives Being Put Out of Business?

By Steven Rosenfeld, AlterNet
Posted on July 25, 2007, Printed on July 25, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/57815/

In 2004, Floridians overwhelmingly voted to raise their state minimum wage after low-income advocates collected ballot petition signatures, registered thousands of new voters and turned out the vote. The following spring, Florida's Republican-majority Legislature reacted. It passed a law that so severely regulated voter registration drives that, before the 2006 primary, Florida's League of Women Voters stopped registering voters for the first time in its history. The league feared mistakes on just 14 voter registration forms could result in penalties equal to its entire $70,000 budget.

Existing Home Sales Drop for 4th Month

Wednesday July 25, 7:06 pm ET
By Martin Crutsinger, AP Economics Writer Existing Home Sales Fall by Bigger-Than-Expected Amount in June As Housing Woes Continue WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sales of existing homes fell in June for a fourth consecutive month, further evidence that housing troubles are far from over. The National Association of Realtors reported Wednesday that sales of existing homes dropped by 3.8 percent in June to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.75 million units.

That is the slowest sales pace since November 2002 and the decline was about twice what had been expected.

An Overdue Pay Raise

By Isaiah J. Poole on July 23, 2007 - 6:35pm.

With all of the talk about the conservative obstructionism in Congress that is keeping important bills from becoming law, Tuesday brings something worth celebrating: The federal minimum wage, which had been frozen at $5.15 an hour for almost 10 years, increases 70 cents an hour, to $5.85 cents an hour.

The minimum wage increase is the one item on the Democrats' change agenda that has actually become law since the party took control of Congress last year. It came at what some activists consider too high a price, since it was attached to a measure authorizing continued funding for the Iraq war as well as a package of business tax cuts. Nonetheless, for more than 5.3 million workers, the increase is real, and real important as the first step in a broader effort to improve conditions for working people in America.

Gonzales Contradicts Prior Statements, Confirms Existence Of Other Spying Programs

In his testimony today before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was asked by Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) to address inaccuracies in his 2006 testimony in relation to the Bush administration’s warrantless wiretapping program. “There has not been any serious disagreement about the program that the president has confirmed,” Gonzales said at the time.

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) recalled that former Deputy Attorney General James Comey testified to a much different version of events. Comey said he had refused to sign on to an extension of the program “amid concerns about its legality and oversight.”

U.S. Is Seen in Iraq Until at Least ’09

By MICHAEL R. GORDON

Published: July 24, 2007

BAGHDAD, July 23 — While Washington is mired in political debate over the future of Iraq, the American command here has prepared a detailed plan that foresees a significant American role for the next two years.

The classified plan, which represents the coordinated strategy of the top American commander and the American ambassador, calls for restoring security in local areas, including Baghdad, by the summer of 2008. “Sustainable security” is to be established on a nationwide basis by the summer of 2009, according to American officials familiar with the document.

"The Only Moral Abortion Is My Abortion"

By choice joyce
Mon Jul 23, 2007 at 09:08:38 AM EST

We are pleased to welcome guest front pager Joyce Arthur, a Canadian abortion rights activist and the publisher of Pro-Choice Press, Canada's only national prochoice publication. It's a long post, but worth the read. -- FC

The following has proved to be one of the most popular articles I've ever written. Although I wrote it in 2000, it could have been written yesterday. This phenonemon continues unabated at abortion clinics throughout the nation. -- choice joyce

When the Anti-Choice Choose

Abortion is a highly personal decision that many women are sure they'll never have to think about until they're suddenly faced with an unexpected pregnancy. But this can happen to anyone, including women who are strongly anti-choice. So what does an anti-choice woman do when she experiences an unwanted pregnancy herself? Often, she will grin and bear it, so to speak, but frequently, she opts for the solution she would deny to other women - abortion. In the spring of 2000, I collected the following anecdotes directly from abortion doctors and other clinic staff in North America, Australia, and Europe.

The stories are presented in the providers' own words, with minor editing for grammar, clarity, and brevity. Names have been omitted to protect privacy.

New Executive Order Could Lead to Endless Chain of Repression

July 20, 2007
By Matthew Rothschild

Bush has done it again: issued an Executive Order that gives him unprecedented power.

On May 9, he designated himself, and not Congress or the Supreme Court, as the insurer of the Constitution in the event of a national emergency.

And on July 17, he issued another Executive Order giving the Secretary of the Treasury the authority to freeze the assets of any person opposing Bush’s Iraq policy who may have committed an act of violence, or even posed “a significant risk of committing” such an act, or “assisted, sponsored, or provided financial, material, logistical, or technical support” for others committing such acts.

Democrats struggle with online questions

By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press Writer
Mon Jul 23, 7:58 PM ET

CHARLESTON, S.C. - Democratic presidential hopefuls struggled Monday night to answer questions posed by young, Internet-savvy voters who challenged traditional political labels and the candidates' own place in a broken political system.

"Wassup?" came the first question, from a voter named Zach, after another, named Chris, opened the CNN-YouTube debate with a challenge to the entire eight-candidate field: "Can you as politicians ... actually answer questions rather than beat around the bush?"

Do We Torture?

By Dan Froomkin

Special to washingtonpost.com
Monday, July 23, 2007; 2:06 PM

The White House's Friday afternoon rollout of its new policy on torture was a marvel of loopholes and obfuscation regarding what should be a crystal-clear moral issue.

"We don't torture" ought to be one of our nation's credos. As it happens, it is President Bush's stock response when asked to describe U.S. policy. But this latest official razzle-dazzle still leaves unclear what Bush and his aides mean when they use the word.

Humans 'affect global rainfall'

Human-induced climate change has affected global rainfall patterns over the 20th Century, a study suggests.

Researchers said changes to the climate had led to an increase in annual average rainfall in the mid-latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere.

Five Ways Bush's Era of Repression Has Stolen Your Liberties Since 9/11

By Matthew Rothschild, The New Press
Posted on July 24, 2007, Printed on July 24, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/57689/

The following is an excerpt of Matthew Rothschild's "You Have No Rights: Stories of America in an Age of Repression" (The New Press, 2007).

To those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty, my message is this: Your tactics only aid terrorists. ... They give ammunition to America's enemies, and pause to America's friends.
-- former attorney general John Ashcroft

You're either with us or against us. -- George W. Bush

Today's America is a much less free place than the America of 2000. Following the attacks of September 11, 2001, the Bush administration has, by word and by deed, erected an edifice of repression here in the United States.

How Our Fossil Fuel Dependence Is Jeopardizing Our Healthcare System

By Dan Bednarz, Orion Magazine
Posted on July 24, 2007, Printed on July 24, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/57525/

The scale and subtlety of our country's dependency on oil and natural gas cannot be overstated. Nowhere is this truer than in our medical system.

Petrochemicals are used to manufacture analgesics, antihistamines, antibiotics, antibacterials, rectal suppositories, cough syrups, lubricants, creams, ointments, salves, and many gels. Processed plastics made with oil are used in heart valves and other esoteric medical equipment.

Americablog: Edwards' video is brilliant

by John Aravosis (DC) · 7/23/2007 08:12:00 PM ET

...I had no idea the "Hair" video was from Edwards, or what it actually showed...

(open link for YouTube video)--Dictynna

Iraq: The Way to Go

By Peter W. Galbraith

Editor's note: Peter Galbraith will answer questions about his article "Iraq: The Way to Go" until July 27. Please submit questions to web@nybooks.com with "Question for Peter Galbraith" in the subject line by July 27 and Mr. Galbraith will post his responses to selected questions on nybooks.com on August 6.

1.

On May 30, the Coalition held a ceremony in the Kurdistan town of Erbil to mark its handover of security in Iraq's three Kurdish provinces from the Coalition to the Iraqi government. General Benjamin Mixon, the US commander for northern Iraq, praised the Iraqi government for overseeing all aspects of the handover. And he drew attention to the "benchmark" now achieved: with the handover, he said, Iraqis now controlled security in seven of Iraq's eighteen provinces.

In fact, nothing was handed over. The only Coalition force in Kurdistan is the peshmerga, a disciplined army that fought alongside the Americans in the 2003 campaign to oust Saddam Hussein and is loyal to the Kurdistan government in Erbil. The peshmerga provided security in the three Kurdish provinces before the handover and after. The Iraqi army has not been on Kurdistan's territory since 1996 and is effectively prohibited from being there. Nor did the Iraqi flag fly at the ceremony. It is banned in Kurdistan.

TPM Muckraker: Today's Must Read

By Spencer Ackerman - July 23, 2007, 9:24 AM

Last month, TPMmuckraker reported on an Army reserve intelligence officer who filed a sworn declaration in D.C. Circuit court alleging systemic problems with the way the Pentagon certifies that detainees at Guantanamo Bay are enemy combatants. The officer, Stephen Abraham, claims that the process, known as a Combatant Status Review Tribunal, is weighted -- by design and in execution -- to declare practically everyone at Gitmo an enemy combatant, no matter how dubious the evidence is.

Today Abraham, a lawyer in civilian life, gets treated to a long New York Times profile. A life-long conservative who says he cried when President Nixon resigned, Abraham became, in the eyes of several legal observers, the whistleblower whose account to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals convinced the Supreme Court to take up the question of enemy combatants' habeas corpus rights.

Science chief: cut birthrate to save Earth

New museum head says lower population would cut CO2 at a fraction of renewable energy cost

Robin McKie, science editor
Sunday July 22, 2007
The Observer

The new head of the Science Museum has an uncompromising view about how global warming should be dealt with: get rid of a few billion people. Chris Rapley, who takes up his post on September 1, is not afraid of offending. 'I am not advocating genocide,' said Rapley. 'What I am saying is that if we invest in ways to reduce the birthrate - by improving contraception, education and healthcare - we will stop the world's population reaching its current estimated limit of between eight and 10 billion.

PAUL KRUGMAN: The French Connections

There was a time when everyone thought that the Europeans and the Japanese were better at business than we were. In the early 1990s airport bookstores were full of volumes with samurai warriors on their covers, promising to teach you the secrets of Japanese business success. Lester Thurow’s 1992 book, “Head to Head: The Coming Economic Battle Among Japan, Europe and America,” which spent more than six months on the Times best-seller list, predicted that Europe would win.

Then it all changed, and American despondency turned into triumphalism. Partly this was because the Clinton boom contrasted so sharply with Europe’s slow growth and Japan’s decade-long slump. Above all, however, our new confidence reflected the rise of the Internet. Jacques Chirac complained that the Internet was an “Anglo-Saxon network,” and he had a point — France, like most of Europe except Scandinavia, lagged far behind the U.S. when it came to getting online.

U.S. dropped Enron-like fraud probe

Prosecutor who built case against Virginia insurer was replaced.

By Marisa Taylor - Mcclatchy Washington Bureau
Published 12:00 am PDT Monday, July 23, 2007

Two years into a fraud investigation, veteran federal prosecutor David Maguire told colleagues he'd uncovered one of the biggest cases of his career.

Maguire described crimes "far worse" than those of Arthur Andersen, the accounting giant that collapsed in the wake of the Enron scandal. Among those in his sights: executives from a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway, the investment empire overseen by billionaire Warren Buffett.

The Energy Solution That Dare Not Speak Its Name: Gas Rationing

By Raymond J. Learsy, HuffingtonPost.com
Posted on July 23, 2007, Printed on July 23, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/57501/

Quite incredibly, over a span of two weeks during the Aspen Ideas Festival and the Aspen Energy Conference, wherein the themes of global warming and oil dependency were discussed again and again in various forums by formidable personages of government, the press, industry, think tanks and environmental groups, the issue this post focuses on was not brought up by a single panelist.

Speakers of exceptional standing, achievement and competence -- President Clinton, John Doerr, Thomas L. Friedman, and panelists such as Gary Hart spoke eloquently on the dangers of energy dependence and most especially and passionately on the existential crisis of encroaching climate change.

Daily Kos: The Political "Me" Movement: A Piefight In D-Minor

by Hunter

Sat Jul 21, 2007 at 06:00:42 PM PDT

In which I insult libertarians and libertarianism for no good reason...

I know many among us -- among Democrats, that is -- are attempting to woo small-L libertarians into our big tent, primarily because they are so disaffected with the Republican party that they are finally willing to contemplate living with such horrors as modest environmental protections, a drive for energy efficiency, and seat belts. But let me come clean on something from a personal standpoint, and if it results in a one-thread piefight then it can be on my conscience and mine alone. Consider this my public confessional.

There are many political -isms that I am distinctly not a fan of, and I am wary of all of them; in general, any word that ends in -ism tends to have a long and boisterous tail -- the kind of tail that, on the rear end of a dog, scatters papers and knocks over lamps, and on the rear end of a government, sometimes scatters rights and knocks over nations. I have chosen to adopt two socially moderate -isms as my own, progressivism and liberalism, and rejected outright most others on both sides of the right-left divide. I believe Marxism, for example, to have been based on almost comically poor reading of actual human nature -- Marx rivals Freud for brilliant, insightful, and truly ingenious misdiagnoses of the collective psyche -- and I consider conservatism to be a thin veneer of morality overlaid on top of a deep-seated and primal bigotry against the onknown other. Conservativism as a unified movement can only exist in the presence of a perceived and very human enemy, in the form of some ethic group, or religious premise, or "threatening" social tribe.

Analysis: GOP senators nervous about war

By DAVID ESPO, AP Special Correspondent
Sat Jul 21, 12:15 PM ET

WASHINGTON - Senate Republicans are growing increasingly nervous defending the war in Iraq, and Democrats more confident in their attempts to end it.

More than a year before the 2008 elections, it is a political role reversal that bodes ill for President Bush's war strategy, not to mention his recent statement that Congress' role should merely be "funding the troops."

C.I.A. Allowed to Resume Interrogations

By MARK MAZZETTI

Published: July 20, 2007

WASHINGTON, July 20 — After months of behind the scenes wrangling, the White House said Friday that it had given the Central Intelligence Agency approval to resume its use of some harsh interrogation methods in questioning terrorism suspects in secret prisons overseas.

With the new authorization, administration officials said the C.I.A. could now proceed with an interrogation program that has been in limbo since the Supreme Court ruled last year that all prisoners in American captivity be treated in accordance with Geneva Convention prohibitions against humiliating and degrading treatment of detainees.

FRANK RICH: I Did Have Sexual Relations With That Woman

It's not just the resurgence of Al Qaeda that is taking us back full circle to the fateful first summer of the Bush presidency. It’s the hot sweat emanating from Washington. Once again the capital is titillated by a scandal featuring a member of Congress, a woman who is not his wife and a rumor of crime. Gary Condit, the former Democratic congressman from California, has passed the torch of below-the-Beltway sleaziness to David Vitter, an incumbent (as of Friday) Republican senator from Louisiana.

Mr. Vitter briefly faced the press to explain his “very serious sin,” accompanied by a wife who might double for the former Mrs. Jim McGreevey. He had no choice once snoops hired by the avenging pornographer Larry Flynt unearthed his number in the voluminous phone records of the so-called D.C. Madam, now the subject of a still-young criminal investigation. Newspapers back home also linked the senator to a defunct New Orleans brothel, a charge Mr. Vitter denies. That brothel’s former madam, while insisting he had been a client, was one of his few defenders last week. “Just because people visit a whorehouse doesn’t make them a bad person,” she helpfully told the Baton Rouge paper, The Advocate.

DeFazio asks, but he's denied access

Classified info - The congressman wanted to see government plans for after a terror attack

Friday, July 20, 2007

JEFF KOSSEFF

The Oregonian Staff

WASHINGTON -- Oregonians called Peter DeFazio's office, worried there was a conspiracy buried in the classified portion of a White House plan for operating the government after a terrorist attack.

As a member of the U.S. House on the Homeland Security Committee, DeFazio, D-Ore., is permitted to enter a secure "bubbleroom" in the Capitol and examine classified material. So he asked the White House to see the secret documents.

King George W.: James Madison's Nightmare

By Robert Scheer, Truthdig. Posted July 18, 2007.

In 1795, James Madison wrote of war's far-reaching and corrosive effect on public liberty. He could well have been warning us about our own King George, just the sort of imperial president that Madison and other founders of our nation feared most.

George W. Bush is the imperial president that James Madison and other founders of this great republic warned us about. He lied the nation into precisely the "foreign entanglements" that George Washington feared would destroy the experiment in representative government, and he has championed a spurious notion of security over individual liberty, thus eschewing the alarms of Thomas Jefferson as to the deprivation of the inalienable rights of free citizens. But most important, he has used the sledgehammer of war to obliterate the separation of powers that James Madison enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.

With the "war on terror," Bush has asserted the right of the president to wage war anywhere and for any length of time, at his whim, because the "terrorists" will always provide a convenient shadowy target. Just the "continual warfare" that Madison warned of in justifying the primary role of Congress in initiating and continuing to finance a war -- the very issue now at stake in Bush's battle with Congress.

Elizabeth Edwards Interview: "The Candidate Who's Best for Women in This Race is My Husband"

By Ruth Conniff, The Progressive
Posted on July 21, 2007, Printed on July 22, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/57463/

Eizabeth Edwards is one of those rare creatures in politics -- a real human being. As she campaigns for her husband, John Edwards, she is winning audiences with her warm, straight-shooting style. She keeps a frenetic schedule, even after the bad news about her breast cancer returning. In May, she spoke to reporters in Madison, Wisconsin, before delivering a speech to a bipartisan group of women in politics. Looking sharp and relaxed in a black pantsuit, she paused to comment wryly to a photographer crouched in front of her, "That is the worst possible angle for a woman, you know. You may take those pictures, but you may not run them."