Primum Non Nocere — The McCain Plan for Health Insecurity

The most important questions raised by the health care proposals of the presidential candidates concern their values and judgment. These will guide a new president through the tortuous, unpredictable process of leading health care change. The specifics of candidates' proposals matter. But more important is what health plans communicate about a prospective president's fundamental beliefs and character.

By this standard, John McCain emerges not as a maverick or centrist but as a radical social conservative firmly in the grip of the ideology that animates the domestic policies of President George W. Bush. The central purpose of President Bush's health policy, and John McCain's, is to reduce the role of insurance and make Americans pay a larger part of their health care bills out of pocket. Their embrace of market forces, fierce antagonism toward government, and determination to force individuals to have more "skin in the game" are overriding — all other goals are subsidiary. Indeed, the Republican commitment to market-oriented reforms is so strong that, to attain their vision, Bush and McCain seem willing to take huge risks with the efficiency, equity, and stability of our health care system. Specifically, the McCain plan would profoundly threaten the current system of employer-sponsored insurance on which more than three fifths of Americans depend, increase reliance on unregulated individual insurance markets (which are notoriously inefficient), and leave the number of uninsured Americans virtually unchanged. A side effect of the McCain plan would be to threaten access to adequate insurance for millions of America's sickest citizens.

Glenn Greenwald: Poor John McCain: Forced against his honor to run an ugly campaign

Time's Ana Marie Cox, in a Bloggingheads discussion with Ann Althouse, does an excellent job of expressing what is still, amazingly enough, the prevailing media view of John McCain: namely, that this deeply honorable and principled man is vehemently opposed to running an ugly, dirty campaign against Barack Obama, and that is happening despite McCain's deep opposition to such campaigns and the way it profoundly violates his code of honor.

Naomi Wolf: Dear Conservatives, Will You Help Save the Republic from Military Takeover?

By Naomi Wolf, AlterNet
Posted on October 18, 2008, Printed on October 18, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/103554/

Dear Conservative America:

I am reaching out with a warning to you that is as heartfelt as the one I have been bringing my fellow citizens for months. But you are the most important audience of all for this, because you hold the key to whether or not we can save our republic in time.

I have been arguing that we are seeing the classic building blocks being laid for a police state: My thesis in The End of America: A Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot is that we are seeing the classic 10 steps being set in place that always underlie a violent police state. My argument in its sequel, Give Me Liberty, is that we must rise up as tactically and effectively as patriots to stop this suppression of freedom.

Tomgram: Aziz Huq, Imperial Pretensions and the Financial Crunch

Don't trust me as a gambler. You'd probably make more by putting your money into credit-default swaps. Nonetheless, I'd like to make a small wager on who the single significant holdover from the Bush administration might be should an Obama presidency actually happen. Keep a close eye on Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. He was clearly sent into the Rumsfeld breach back at the end of 2006 to begin the clean-up of the Bush administration's foreign policy mess and -- my guess -- to prevent Dick Cheney and pals from attacking Iran. And this, with a little help from onrushing reality, he seems to have accomplished. He remains the singular adult in the Bush foreign policy playpen, a skilled bureaucratic maneuverer from his CIA days, who claims he plans to leave Washington in January but would never say "never" to an offer ahead of time.

Like Obama, he's plunked for an intensified Afghan War and, just last week, a key national security advisor to the candidate, former Navy Secretary Richard Danzig, praised Gates, suggesting he had been a splendid secretary of defense and adding that "he'd be an even better one in an Obama administration."

`Joe the Plumber,' Who Dislikes Obama Tax Plan, Owes Back Taxes

By Ryan J. Donmoyer

Oct. 16 (Bloomberg) -- ``Joe the plumber,'' the Toledo, Ohio, man whose complaints about Barack Obama's tax plan were featured in the final presidential debate, owes the state of Ohio almost $1,200 in back income taxes.

According to records on file with the Lucas County Court of Common Pleas, the state filed a tax lien against Samuel J. Wurzelbacher for $1,182.98 on Jan. 26, 2007, that is still active.

Defining ‘Victory’ in Iraq

It was supposed to be a presidential election about the war in Iraq, with the war’s most stalwart defender in the Senate squaring off against an early and vigorous dissenter. But a global economic disaster has a way of refocusing the public debate.

At bottom, Sen. John McCain, the GOP presidential nominee, argues for staying in Iraq and Sen. Barack Obama, his Democratic opponent, argues for leaving. Still, the varying ways that McCain and Obama have discussed Iraq have taken some curious turns.

A senior McCain adviser, Steve Schmidt, famously charged that “You never heard the word ‘victory’ from Sen. Obama” — which is half true. Obama doesn’t use the word “victory” to describe Iraq — but then, neither does Gen. David Petraeus, whom McCain has apotheosized.

Paulson tries again

Unlike the UK plan, the revamped American bail-out puts banks first and taxpayers second

Joseph Stiglitz
The Guardian
Thursday October 16 2008

Gordon Brown has won plaudits over recent days for inspiring the turnaround in Hank Paulson's thinking that saw him progress from his "cash for trash" plan - derided by almost every economist, and many respected financiers - to a capital injection approach. The international pressure brought to bear on America may indeed have contributed to Paulson's volte-face. But Paulson figured he could reshape the UK approach in a way that was even better for America's banks than his original cash strategy. The fact that US taxpayers might get trashed in the process is simply part of the collateral damage that has been a hallmark of the Bush administration.

Paul Krugman: Let’s Get Fiscal

The Dow is surging! No, it’s plunging! No, it’s surging! No, it’s ...

Nevermind. While the manic-depressive stock market is dominating the headlines, the more important story is the grim news coming in about the real economy. It’s now clear that rescuing the banks is just the beginning: the nonfinancial economy is also in desperate need of help.

And to provide that help, we’re going to have to put some prejudices aside. It’s politically fashionable to rant against government spending and demand fiscal responsibility. But right now, increased government spending is just what the doctor ordered, and concerns about the budget deficit should be put on hold.

The 10 Biggest Differences Between Obama and McCain That Will Affect Your Daily Life

By , AlterNet
Posted on October 17, 2008, Printed on October 18, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/103387/

When the polls open in 18 days, voters will be faced with a stark choice in presidential candidates -- a choice that ultimately comes down to one question: What do you want the next four to eight years of your life to look like? Because the next president will shape the issues that affect the way we live our day-to-day lives.

The future of Social Security, health care, education, income, employment, civil rights and democracy itself all hang in the balance. And the two candidates are worlds apart in their visions for the country.

The Guy Who Called It Right

By Robert Borosage

Created 10/16/2008 - 9:22am

Summary:

Nouriel Roubini is one of the few economists who warned about the housing bubble and predicted the financial collapse before it occurred. His alarms — dismissed as extreme by Wall Street nabobs and most economists — turned out to be right. Now he details the scope — and the limits of the global financial rescue plan announced this week.

Nouriel Roubini is one of the few economists who warned about the housing bubble and predicted the financial collapse before it occurred. His alarms — dismissed as extreme by Wall Street nabobs and most economists — turned out to be right. Now he details the scope — and the limits of the global financial rescue plan announced this week.

Looking Out for the Homeowner

Consumer Protection Looks More Like Common Sense

By Mary Kane 10/16/08 6:01 AM

Imagine applying for a mortgage in a few years and finding out it works like this: You are offered a standard 30-year fixed-rate loan. The only route to a different mortgage — a riskier one, say, with an adjustable interest rate — is to opt out.

You’d have to say “no,” the way some employees decline if they decide not to contribute to an employer-sponsored retirement savings account. Otherwise, you’re automatically enrolled.

The opt-out mortgage is one of many ideas now floating around to regulate the financial-services industry. With the financial landscape radically changed by government intervention and partial nationalization of the nation’s largest banks, it’s clear that the deregulation phase of financial services is over.

Are We Moving Ahead -- or Heading Back?

By Sara Robinson

Created 10/15/2008 - 4:07pm

Our fellow Americans, at long last, are getting it. Not only is the Age of Reagan over; it's becoming increasingly clear that the entire post-WWII order has come to the end of its run. The world as we have known it is passing away; and with it, so does our ability to put much faith in the future. Everywhere you go these days, the discussion ultimately comes down the underlying uncertainty: So...that happened. Now: what comes next?

In the futures biz, we call this a discontinuity -- the place where one long-standing set of trends comes crashing down (and with them, the power bases and institutions that were built on those once-solid assumptions); and a whole new future under a completely different set of rules and assumptions becomes possible. A lot of the debate that's being hashed out in blog comments and over dinner tables around the country has to do with whether this moment is an unraveling that will end with America as a backward, insular, second-rate nation; or a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to move forward toward a new and better way of life. We're increasingly aware that the choices we make now will set in place the trends and rules that govern the next era; and we feel the eyes of our grandchildren on us as we try to make the right ones.

Open Enrollment Eye-Opener

By Isaiah J. Poole
October 16th, 2008 - 10:39am ET

On the heels of an explosive political document that has been hitting millions of mailboxes of potential voters— third-quarter 401(k) statements showing how much the Wall Street meltdown has hurt individual retirement savings—another potential game-changer is beginning to brew in employee conference rooms and lunch halls: the annual open enrollment sessions for health insurance benefits.

When workers hear—as I did Tuesday—how much their health insurance premiums are about to rise or what kind of compromises in coverage they will have to accept to keep them from going even higher, a lot of them will be reminded just how hazardous the right-wing plans to remake health care embraced by Sen. John McCain—highlighted in this opinion-page ad in The New York Times on Tuesday— will be to their health.

Someone Actually Apologized!

By james.ledbetter

Created 10/15/2008 - 3:40pm

When Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke were trying to shove a bailout plan—any bailout plan—through Congress, there was a lot of mostly Republican rhetoric along the lines of "This is not the time for finger-pointing [1]" and "Let's not play the blame game."

If the GOP doesn't understand why Americans don't trust them on the economy, here's a hint: We want someone to blame. We want an explanation for why the systems in place failed miserably. We don't need public beheadings, but if neither Washington nor Wall Street will take responsibility for the greatest financial crisis in 70 years, how can anyone be assured that it won't happen again?

The lack of American accountability became stunningly clear today, when Hector Sants, the chief executive of Britain's Financial Services Authority [2]—the regulatory body that's sort of a cross between the United States' Securities and Exchange Commission and Federal Reserve Board—actually apologized for not preventing the meltdown that effectively led to the nationalization of Britain's banking sector.

After 30 years, EPA toughens lead emission standard

By Renee Schoof | McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — The amount of lead that can be emitted into the air in the United States has been dramatically reduced under a new rule the Environmental Protection Agency announced on Thursday to protect the health of millions of Americans — especially children — nationwide.

It was the first new rule on airborne lead in 30 years, and came in response to some 6,000 scientific studies since 1990 that show that lead is dangerous to the human body at much lower levels than previously known.

The studies have linked low levels of lead to damage to children’s nervous systems that can lead to IQ loss, poor academic achievement and permanent learning disabilities, EPA administrator Stephen Johnson said in announcing the new standard. In adults, it can cause increased blood pressure and decreased kidney funciton.

Tomgram: Mike Davis, Casino Capitalism, Obama, and Us

Recently, while traveling in the West, I had lunch at a modest-sized casino set in a wild, barren-looking, craggy landscape. On the hills above it spun giant, ivory white, modernistic windmills, looking for all the world like Martian invaders from War of the Worlds. I hadn't been inside a casino since the 1970s -- my mistake -- and the experience was eye-poppingly wild. Venturing into its vast room of one-armed bandits and other games was like suddenly finding oneself inside a giant pinball machine for the digital age, everything gaudily lit, blinking, pinging, flashing, accompanied, of course, by a soundscape to match.

It was (as it was undoubtedly meant to be) strangely exhilarating, riveting, totally distracting, and a curious reminder right now of just how distracting "casino capitalism" -- as Mike Davis calls it in today's post -- really has been. For years, with all the economic bells and whistles, all the mansions and yachts, all those arcane derivatives, all the high-tech glamour and glory, with Americans pouring into the stock market (or at least their pension plans and mutual funds doing it for them), you could almost not notice the increasingly barren, rocky world outside the American casino. You could almost not notice the shrinking of real value, of actual productivity in this country. These last weeks, Americans -- those who weren't already outside, at least -- have been rudely shoved into the real world to assess what their value (personal, national, global) actually is.

Harold Meyerson: Gods That Failed

In 1949, a number of famous writers, among them Arthur Koestler, André Gide, Richard Wright, Stephen Spender and Ignazio Silone, wrote essays explaining why they were no longer communists. The essays were collected in a volume entitled "The God That Failed."

Today, conservative intellectuals might want to consider writing a tome on the failure of their own beloved deity, unregulated capitalism. The fall of the financial system has been so fast and far-reaching that there's been no time to fully consider its implications for the reigning economic theology of the past 30 years. But with the most right-wing administration in modern American history scurrying to nationalize the banks, the question cannot be elided indefinitely.

James Bamford: “The Shadow Factory: The Ultra-Secret NSA from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America”

The Bush administration’s wiretapping program has come under new scrutiny this week. Two influential congressional committees have opened probes into allegations US intelligence spied on the phone calls of American military personnel, journalists and aid workers in Iraq. We speak to James Bamford about the NSA’s spying on Americans, the agency’s failings pre-9/11 and the ties between NSA and the nation’s telecommunications companies. [includes rush transcript]

Spanish judge to probe Franco era

A Spanish judge has launched a criminal investigation into the fate of tens of thousands of people who vanished during the civil war and Franco dictatorship.

Judge Baltasar Garzon - Spain's top investigating judge - has also ordered several mass graves to be opened.

One is believed to contain the remains of the poet Federico Garcia Lorca, who was murdered by fascist forces at the start of the war in the 1930s.

The $55 trillion question

By Pepe Escobar

WASHINGTON - Before this - thankfully - last United States presidential debate, Republican candidate Senator John McCain had promised "I'll whip [Barack] Obama's you-know-what". Well, he whipped nothing. He told Americans he was not President George W Bush. And then he presented himself as Joe the Plumber - a new working class heir to vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's Joe Six-Pack. And then he got "hurting and angry". And then he lost the plot. Independent voters duly took note - and awarded one more debate to Obama. Three to none. Game virtually over.

Obama - always cool and calculating, carefully hedging his bets - still refuses to stare America in the face and admit that the real economy will tank, and the resulting mass unemployment will be proportionally as devastating as during the 1930s.

The Return of Rove

John McCain has surrendered his campaign to the same political fearmonger who smeared him out of the race in 2000

MATT TAIBBI
Posted Oct 16, 2008 7:15 AM

Wayne Slater has known Karl Rove for 20 years. As the author of Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential, he's not easily shocked by the Republican strategist's Gila-monstroid tactics. But even he's been blown away by Rove's latest political comeback.

At the GOP convention in St. Paul, Minnesota, Slater watched Rove address a delegation from South Carolina on John McCain's behalf. That would be the same South Carolina where Rove helped torpedo McCain's campaign in 2000 by reportedly spreading rumors that the candidate's adopted Bangladeshi daughter was actually his illegitimate black love child. Addressing the convention delegates, though, Rove acted like McCain's long-lost friend.

Thomas Frank: My Friend Bill Ayers

Once wanted by the FBI, he's since become a model citizen.

"Waving the bloody shirt" was the phrase once used to describe the standard demagogic tactic of the late 19th century, when memories of the Civil War were still vivid and loyalists of both parties could be moved to "vote as they shot." As the years passed and the memories faded, the shirt got gorier, the waving more frantic.

In 1896 the Democrats chose William Jennings Bryan as their leader, a man who was born in 1860 and had thus missed the Civil War, but who seemed to threaten the consensus politics of the time. In response, Republican campaign masterminds organized a speaking tour of the Midwest by a handful of surviving Union generals. The veterans advanced through the battleground states in a special train adorned with patriotic bunting, pictures of their candidate, William McKinley, and a sign declaring, "We are Opposed to Anarchy and Repudiation."

New intelligence report says Pakistan is 'on the edge'

By Jonathan S. Landay and John Walcott | McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — A growing al Qaida-backed insurgency, combined with the Pakistani army's reluctance to launch an all-out crackdown, political infighting and energy and food shortages are plunging America's key ally in the war on terror deeper into turmoil and violence, says a soon-to-be completed U.S. intelligence assessment.

A U.S. official who participated in drafting the top secret National Intelligence Estimate said it portrays the situation in Pakistan as "very bad." Another official called the draft "very bleak," and said it describes Pakistan as being "on the edge."

Another bailout? Government pension insurer could be next, expert says

10/15/08

Jan Dennis, Business & Law Editor
217-333-0568; jdennis@illinois.edu

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Another multi-billion-dollar taxpayer bailout could lie ahead, this time to rescue a cash-strapped government program that insures pensions of 44 million American workers and retirees, a University of Illinois finance professor warns.

Jeffrey R. Brown says the troubled Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., which steps in when private-sector employers with under funded defined-benefit plans go bankrupt, was $14 billion short of the cash it will need to cover pensions based on the latest estimates released a year ago.

CIA Tactics Endorsed In Secret Memos

Waterboarding Got White House Nod

By Joby Warrick
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, October 15, 2008; A01

The Bush administration issued a pair of secret memos to the CIA in 2003 and 2004 that explicitly endorsed the agency's use of interrogation techniques such as waterboarding against al-Qaeda suspects -- documents prompted by worries among intelligence officials about a possible backlash if details of the program became public.

The classified memos, which have not been previously disclosed, were requested by then-CIA Director George J. Tenet more than a year after the start of the secret interrogations, according to four administration and intelligence officials familiar with the documents. Although Justice Department lawyers, beginning in 2002, had signed off on the agency's interrogation methods, senior CIA officials were troubled that White House policymakers had never endorsed the program in writing.

Hank Paulson and His Wall Street Cronies Move to Plan B

By Nomi Prins, The Nation
Posted on October 15, 2008, Printed on October 15, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/103004/

How do you stop a ship from sinking, and simultaneously rebuild it to prevent its future destruction? That was the question in the minds of the world's central bankers as they sat down over the weekend to figure out how to right the global financial Titanic.

European leaders came up with a plan to inject "unlimited short-term funds" into the system in addition to $2.3 trillion of guarantees and various emergency measures (pledged by Germany, Britain, France, The Netherlands, Spain, Portugal and Austria). This could be like dumping money into a black hole, since most of these funds will be given in the form of loans, which means banks must come up with adequate collateral to back them, which is in short supply these days. But it's more decisive than anything the Treasury or Federal Reserve has done so far.

Bush set to go with a whimper

By Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON - With only three months left in office, United States President George W Bush appears increasingly determined to calm the international waters he so vigorously churned up, especially during his first term.

In just the last several days, he has effectively rehabilitated a charter member of the "axis of evil" - North Korea - by agreeing to take it off the State Department's list of state sponsors of terrorism in exchange for Pyongyang's agreement to resume its dismantling of a key nuclear facility and cooperate with US and international inspectors.

Hedge Funds: How the Smart Money Looked Dumb

The ups and downs of the Dow are making Wall Street's so-called smart money look dopey. Hedge funds lost nearly $300 billion due to bad investments in the first nine months of the year, according to an analysis of return data by TIME.com. If the losses stand, it would be by far the worst year for these funds — which are unregulated and open only to high-net-worth investors — since their returns began being tracked in the mid-1970s. "It's not going to be a good year," says Peter Laurelli, vice president at HedgeFund.net. "We can be pretty sure of that."

Whistleblower: Oil watchdog agency 'cult of corruption'

HONOLULU, Hawaii (CNN) -- Bobby Maxwell kept a close eye on the oil industry for more than 20 years as a government auditor. But he said the federal agency he worked for is now a "cult of corruption" -- a claim backed up by a recent government report.

"I believe the management we were under was showing favoritism to the oil industry," Maxwell told CNN.

Maxwell is referring to a tiny agency within the Department of the Interior called the Minerals Management Service, which manages the nation's natural gas, oil and other mineral resources on federal lands.

Roubini Sees Worst Recession in 40 Years, Stock Drop

By Eric Martin and Rhonda Schaffler

Oct. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Nouriel Roubini, the professor who predicted the financial crisis in 2006, said the U.S. will suffer its worst recession in 40 years, driving the stock market lower after it rallied the most in seven decades yesterday.

``There are significant downside risks still to the market and the economy,'' Roubini, 50, a New York University professor of economics, said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. ``We're going to be surprised by the severity of the recession and the severity of the financial losses.''

Pentagon Challenge: Ask Iraqis How Many Have Died

by Robert Naiman

The U.S. military is planning a large polling operation in Iraq over the next three years to help "build robust and positive relations with the people of Iraq and to assist the Iraqi people in forming a new government," Walter Pincus reports in the Washington Post.

This provides an excellent opportunity to revisit an important question:

How many Iraqis have died since the U.S. invasion?

The $15 million-a-year initiative will supplement the military's $100 million-a-year strategic communications operation, which aims to produce content for Iraqi media that will "engage and inspire" the population, Pincus notes.

How America Fell

By Robert Parry
October 14, 2008

As the American people pick through the wreckage left by the Bush administration, many may wonder how the most powerful nation on earth got so far off track. An illustrative case study is the bogus story of Al Gore’s “Chinagate” scandal.

The story doesn’t explain all that’s gone wrong in the past eight years, but it reveals how aggressive right-wing operatives, aided and abetted by a lazy or complicit news media, can create an impression for millions of voters that is nearly the opposite of the truth.

So, in the razor-thin presidential election of 2000 – at the dawn of the George W. Bush era – a significant number of Americans went to the polls believing a right-wing canard, that Al Gore was implicated in a treacherous scheme to trade American nuclear secrets to China for campaign cash.

Fed’s $1.6 Trillon Bet

The $700-Billion Wall Street Bailout Was Only the Half of It

By Charles R. Morris 10/14/08 6:01 AM

Amid the clamor over the crisis on Wall Street, the U.S. Treasury’s $700 billion Troubled Asset Rescue Program, or “TARP,” bill and the evolving collapse of the global banking system, little attention has been paid to the extraordinary credit extensions at the Federal Reserve. But these are now without parallel in Fed history, including during the Great Depression.

In the last three weeks, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke, with the help of Treasury Sec. Henry Paulson Jr., has increased the Fed’s credit extensions by $650 billion — roughly the same amount as the TARP. Taken together with the Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac bailouts, new Fed credits in just the last month or so now amount to some $1.6 trillion. Here’s how they did it.

A Dangerous Plan for Health Care

By Roger Hickey
October 14th, 2008 - 11:12am ET

The global financial crash of the past few weeks has hammered home what should be common sense: A free market needs reasonable rules that safeguard the public interest. When you unshackle corporations and put the cops who would police them in handcuffs, ultimately everyone loses in the ensuing chaos.

As our Tuesday, October 14 op-ed ad in The New York Times points out, despite their spectacular “free market” economic failure, conservatives are still trying to use that recipe for disaster to reform an already failing health-care system.

Fact-Checking the Ayers Allegations: So Wrong, It’s “Pants on Fire” Wrong

By Alexander Lane, Politifact.com

For most of the election, Sen. John McCain ’s campaign has been somewhat subtle about trying to tie Sen. Barack Obama to the former ‘60s radical William Ayers.

No longer. A 90-second Web ad released Oct. 8, 2008, features sinister music, side-by-side photographs of Obama and Ayers, and a series of dubious allegations about their past connections, including this one:

“Ayers and Obama ran a radical education foundation together.”

Ayers was a founding member of the militant Vietnam-era anti-war group the Weathermen. He was investigated for his role in a series of domestic bombings, but the charges were dropped in 1974 due to prosecutorial misconduct. He is now an education professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and actively engaged in the city’s civic life.

The Fallacy of the 401(k)

By Marie Cocco, Washington Post Writers Group
Posted on October 14, 2008, Printed on October 14, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/102775/

WASHINGTON -- The essential fallacy of the 401(k) has been exposed. It took a historic market collapse -- one that threatens to impoverish workers already in retirement and those who are nearing it. But then, crushing hardship is often what's required to usher out an era of ideological illogic and unconscionable greed.

The advent of the 401(k) in the late 1970s and early 1980s was a leading indicator of what became a political mania for shifting the risk and responsibility for life's big challenges -- health care, an adequate income in retirement -- from employers and other broad-shouldered institutions to the narrower, weaker backs of individuals themselves.

My Depression -- or Ours?

By Tom Engelhardt, Tomdispatch.com
Posted on October 14, 2008, Printed on October 14, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/102855/

Among my somewhat over-the-hill crowd -- I'm 64 -- there's one thing friends have said to me repeatedly since the stock market started to tumble, the global economic system began to melt down, and Iceland went from bank haven to bankrupt. They say, "I'm just not looking. I don't want to know." And they're not referring to the world situation, they're talking about their pension plans, or 401(k)s, or IRAs, or whatever they put their money into, so much of which is melting away in plain sight even as Iceland freezes up.

I've said it myself. Think of it as a pragmatic acknowledgement of reality at an extreme moment, but also as a statement of denial and despair. The point is: Why look? The news is going to be worse than you think, and it's way too late anyway. This is what crosses your mind when the ground under you starts to crumble. Don't look, not yet, not when the life you know, the one you took for granted, is vanishing, and there isn't a damn thing you can do about it.

US Surrenders Power to Appoint World Bank President

by Heather Stewart / Larry Elliot

WASHINGTON - The US is to lose its power to appoint the president of the World Bank after the UK's development secretary, Douglas Alexander, brokered a deal to throw open the post to candidates from any country.

Backed by European governments and developing countries, Alexander overcame resistance from the US and Japan to secure a reform he described last night as "a significant step forward".

Washington has had the right to hand-pick the president of the World Bank since the institution was founded after the second world war, with Europe choosing the managing director of the International Monetary Fund.

Indirect approach is favored in the war on terror

The U.S.' elite armed forces are still carrying out operations, but they're also using a new tactic: teaching military allies how to fight for themselves.

By Peter Spiegel, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
October 13, 2008

MACDILL AIR FORCE BASE, FLA. -- Weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, a small team of Green Berets was quietly sent to the Philippine island of Basilan. There, one of the world's most virulent Islamic extremist groups, Abu Sayyaf, had established a dangerous haven and was seeking to extend its reach into the Philippine capital.

But rather than unleashing Hollywood-style raids, as might befit their reputation, the Green Berets proposed a time-consuming plan to help the Philippine military take on the extremist group itself. Seven years later, Abu Sayyaf has been pushed out of Basilan and terrorist attacks have dropped dramatically.

Collateral Damage

Is Health Care Reform Another Victim of Wall Street's Madness?

By Mike Lillis 10/13/08 6:00 AM

Health-care reform — an expensive and politically thorny proposition in any environment — could be particularly tough in the face of a plunging economy.

Yet to hear the candidates tell it, the next president will usher in an era of sweeping changes. Both Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama are pushing overhauls of the health-care system that purport to save families thousands of dollars while covering millions of the uninsured. Some estimates put the cost of their plans in the trillions of dollars. Neither candidate has said specifically how he would pay the tab.

Paul Krugman: Gordon Does Good

Has Gordon Brown, the British prime minister, saved the world financial system?

O.K., the question is premature — we still don’t know the exact shape of the planned financial rescues in Europe or for that matter the United States, let alone whether they’ll really work. What we do know, however, is that Mr. Brown and Alistair Darling, the chancellor of the Exchequer (equivalent to our Treasury secretary), have defined the character of the worldwide rescue effort, with other wealthy nations playing catch-up.

This is an unexpected turn of events. The British government is, after all, very much a junior partner when it comes to world economic affairs. It’s true that London is one of the world’s great financial centers, but the British economy is far smaller than the U.S. economy, and the Bank of England doesn’t have anything like the influence either of the Federal Reserve or of the European Central Bank. So you don’t expect to see Britain playing a leadership role.

Print media reported that Obama represented ACORN, but not that DOJ was a fellow plaintiff in the lawsuit

Summary: Numerous print media outlets reported that Sen. Barack Obama represented the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now in the 1990s in a lawsuit, but they did not report that the Department of Justice was also a plaintiff in the lawsuit with the League of Women Voters and others. The lawsuit sought to require the state of Illinois to implement federal law on voter registration.

In October 10 and 11 articles, numerous print media outlets, including the Associated Press, the Chicago Tribune, the Columbia (Missouri) Daily Tribune, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, and the Politico, reported that Sen. Barack Obama represented the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) in the 1990s in a lawsuit. But those articles did not note that the Department of Justice joined with ACORN as a plaintiff in the suit, which sought to force the State of Illinois to implement a federal voter registration law. By contrast, in an October 10 article, The New York Times reported: "While Mr. Obama did represent Acorn in a lawsuit in 1995, Acorn was on the same side as the Justice Department." The Times also noted that "other organizations, including the League of Women Voters," were plaintiffs in the lawsuit.

BornAliveTruth.org plays loose with the facts in targeting Obama

Head of anti-abortion group claims Obama 'supports infanticide'

Two weeks ago, BornAliveTruth.org (website), an anti-abortion group headed by Jill Stanek, launched a major attack on Sen. Barack Obama with a very personal and heart-wrenching television advertisement aimed at the voters in the toss-up states of New Mexico and Ohio. The ad, which according to Stanek cost the organization $338,000 to run -- in addition to what it is paying its public relations firm, CRC Public Relations -- was titled "The Gianna ad," and features Gianna Jesson, who is identified as an "Abortion Survivor."

Bush critic Paul Krugman wins economics Nobel

By GEOFF MULVIHILL and ELLEN SIMON, Associated Press Writers
8 minutes ago

Paul Krugman, whose relentless criticism of the Bush administration includes opposition to the $700 billion financial bailout, won the Nobel prize in economics Monday for his work on international trade patterns.

The Princeton University professor and New York Times columnist is the best-known American economist to win the prize in decades.

The Nobel committee commended Krugman's work on global trade, beginning with a 10-page paper in 1979 that knit together two fields of study, helping foster a better understanding of why countries produce similar products and why people move from the small towns to cities.

Matt Taibbi: The Return of Rove

Whatever his role in the campaign, Rove's unique position as both a campaign adviser and a media figure has created new opportunities for informational self-dealing of a type that would have seemed unimaginable a decade or so ago. Now the McCain camp can watch Rove say that Sarah Palin's nomination was "not a governing decision but a campaign decision" — and then have Schmidt tell Katie Couric that same night that Rove is "wrong" before going to whine that Palin has "been under vicious assault and attack from the angry left."

So long as there are reporters like Katie Couric out there stupid and desperate enough to let situations like this play out on their airwaves, the McCain camp can now create controversies out of thin air by arguing with itself on national television, turning premeditated, planted comments by the "independent journalist" Karl Rove into "attacks" from the "angry left."

Bringing Guantanamo Home

The lawlessness abroad was never very far from home.

By Dahlia Lithwick
Posted Saturday, Oct. 11, 2008, at 7:32 AM ET

What happens at Gitmo stays at Gitmo. That was always the hope. When the Bush administration fenced off a dusty little patch of lawlessness in Cuba, the idea was that breaking the law abroad would somehow preclude us from breaking it at home. But last week revealed, yet again, that the worst of Guantanamo was always destined to spill over into the United States. Gitmo's lawlessness is now our own.

The prison camp was created to construct a "legal black hole," a place where U.S. and international human rights law would go to die. The case of 17 Uighurs (pronounced WEE-gurs)—Chinese Muslims from western China's Xinjiang region—is one of the blackest chapters of the story. The Uighurs fled Chinese persecution (including forced abortion and banishment) and settled in Afghanistan, then moved on to Pakistan in 2001 to escape bombing raids. There they were turned over by local villagers to American authorities for bounty. They were transferred to Guantanamo more than six years ago but cleared for release in 2004. The U.S. government credibly fears they will be tortured if returned to China, and since no other country will take them, they have remained for all this time at Gitmo. Indeed, reports have it that some still remain in solitary confinement there.

Commentary: Daddy always warned us. . .

By Stan Tiner, Editor | Biloxi Sun Herald

God willing, Daddy will be 100 on Nov. 8, and as he approaches that significant milestone the nightmare of a 1929-like event is playing out again on the national stage.

The Great Depression was his defining moment, a catastrophic period that to some large degree set the tone for how he lived his life socially, fiscally and philosophically.

The Depression forced him out of his home in Tyro, Ark. (one less mouth to feed at home) and as a 21-year-old he and a friend hit the road on an odyssey across the heartland working in wheat fields and laying pipeline. They rode the rails, lived in hobo jungles, and sometimes were reduced to begging for meals.

Private sector loans, not Fannie or Freddie, triggered crisis

By David Goldstein and Kevin G. Hall | McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — As the economy worsens and Election Day approaches, a conservative campaign that blames the global financial crisis on a government push to make housing more affordable to lower-class Americans has taken off on talk radio and e-mail.

Commentators say that's what triggered the stock market meltdown and the freeze on credit. They've specifically targeted the mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which the federal government seized on Sept. 6, contending that lending to poor and minority Americans caused Fannie's and Freddie's financial problems.

Frank Rich: The Terrorist Barack Hussein Obama

If you think way back to the start of this marathon campaign, back when it seemed preposterous that any black man could be a serious presidential contender, then you remember the biggest fear about Barack Obama: a crazy person might take a shot at him.

Some voters told reporters that they didn’t want Obama to run, let alone win, should his very presence unleash the demons who have stalked America from Lincoln to King. After consultation with Congress, Michael Chertoff, the homeland security secretary, gave Obama a Secret Service detail earlier than any presidential candidate in our history — in May 2007, some eight months before the first Democratic primaries.