[Illustration by ALEX FINE] DAILY NEWS: Federal records show that more than a billion dollars from President Obama’s $787 billion economic-stimulus program has been targeted for Philadelphia. But the typical job created here is just as likely to require a lab coat as a hard hat, as much of the money has gone for university research projects. Meanwhile, city government, which has been financially ravaged by the recession, has gotten relatively little help from the stimulus program, and then mostly in indirect ways, like payments to citizens that bump tax revenues, or money to accelerate already-planned capital projects. In the […]
WORTH REPEATING: How To Make Dick Cheney STFU
HARRY SHEARER: As is well known by now, [Dick Cheney] uses the case of the failed Detroit underpants bomb attempt to accuse President Obama of “pretending that the United States is not at war,” thereby making us less safe. He can engage in this kind of rhetoric safe in two comforting assumptions: that the Republican base, and a certain percentage of independents, will eat this stuff up, and that the Democrats, in and out of power, will continue to not know how to respond. The latter is because they, willingly or not, allowed themselves to be co-opted into the “war […]
BLAZE ON: Cali Pot Legalization On The Ballot For 2010; Ex-Seattle Police Chief Says ‘Legalize It”
ALTERNET: The Tax & Regulate Cannabis 2010 campaign has just achieved a major victory in its efforts to legalize marijuana for all adults in California — they have gathered the signatures necessary for inclusion on the state’s November ballot. “This is the next step to sane cannabis policies and the end to the hypocrisy and unjust prohibition of cannabis,” pot entrepreneur Richard Lee told me Monday morning. He is the co-proponent and a major sponsor of the Tax Cannabis initiative and the force — and money — behind Oaksterdam, the successful marijuana-friendly section of Oakland. This win means that Californians will be […]
WORTH REPEATING: Of War And Peace
BARACK OBAMA: I do not bring with me today a definitive solution to the problems of war. What I do know is that meeting these challenges will require the same vision, hard work, and persistence of those men and women who acted so boldly decades ago. And it will require us to think in new ways about the notions of just war and the imperatives of a just peace. We must begin by acknowledging the hard truth: We will not eradicate violent conflict in our lifetimes. There will be times when nations — acting individually or in concert — will […]
END RUN: White House Threatens To Bypass Congress and Make Global Warming The EPA’s Bitch
WASHINGTON POST: The Obama administration moved closer Monday to issuing regulations on greenhouse gases, a step that would enable it to limit emissions across the economy even if Congress does not pass climate legislation. The move, which coincided with the first day of the international climate summit in Copenhagen, seemed timed to reassure delegates there that the United States is committed to reducing its emissions even if domestic legislation remains bogged down. But it provoked condemnation from key Republicans and from U.S. business groups, which vowed to tie up any regulations in litigation. In Monday’s much-anticipated announcement, the Environmental Protection […]
MATT TAIBBI: Obama’s Big Sellout
ROLLING STONE: In “Obama’s Big Sellout,” Matt Taibbi argues that President Obama has packed his economic team with Wall Street insiders intent on turning the bailout into an all-out giveaway. Rather than keeping his progressive campaign advisers on board, Taibbi says Obama gave key economic positions in the White House to the very people who caused the economic crisis in the first place. Taibbi also points to the ties Obama’s appointees have to one main in particular: Bob Rubin, the former Goldman Sachs co-chairman who served as Treasury secretary under Bill Clinton. Click above for Taibbi’s video breakdown of his […]
POTUS Orders More Cowbell For The Endless War
ASSOCIATED PRESS: After months of debate, President Barack Obama will spell out a costly Afghanistan war expansion to a skeptical public Tuesday night, coupling an infusion of as many as 35,000 more troops with a vow that there will be no endless U.S. commitment. His first orders have already been made: at least one group of Marines who will be in place by Christmas. Obama has said that he prefers “not to hand off anything to the next president” and that his strategy will “put us on a path toward ending the war.” But he doesn’t plan to give any […]
DAILY NEWS: An Obamacare Explainer
DAILY NEWS:The U.S. House already has passed a sweeping health-care bill, and the Senate narrowly voted Nov. 21 to open debate on its own measure, crafted by Majority Leader Harry Reid. If the Senate approves a bill and the two houses of Congress work out an agreeable plan, we could have the most significant new domestic program enacted since Social Security. “I think we’ll see a bill passed, and there’s a pretty good chance of including a public [insurance option,” said Pennsylvania’s newly Democratic Sen. Arlen Specter. “We have to take one step at a time.” The battle will be […]
HOT DOCUMENT: Season’s Greetings From POTUS
jonathan — Tomorrow, Thanksgiving Day, Americans across the country will sit down together, count our blessings, and give thanks for our families and our loved ones. American families reflect the diversity of this great nation. No two are exactly alike, but there is a common thread they each share. Our families are bound together through times of joy and times of grief. They shape us, support us, instill the values that guide us as individuals, and make possible all that we achieve. So tomorrow, I’ll be giving thanks for my family — for all the wisdom, support, and love they […]
HERSH: Military At War With The White House
THE HERALD SUN: The army is “in a war against the White House — and they feel they have [President] Obama boxed in,” Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Seymour Hersh told several hundred people in Duke University’s Page Auditorium on Tuesday night. “They think he’s weak and the wrong color. Yes, there’s racism in the Pentagon. We may not like to think that, but it’s true and we all know it.” In a speech on Obama’s foreign policy, Hersh, who uncovered the My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War and torture at Abu Ghraib prison during the Iraqi war, said many military […]
HELP WANTED: Dope Fiend With Word Power
[Artwork by JAMES THORTON] GUARDIAN: An alternative newspaper in Denver, Colorado, Westword, is seeking a marijuana critic. More than 120 people have applied for the job to review the drugs legally available in the state’s medical dispensaries. One condition: the critic must have a medical ailment that allows him or her to buy and use marijuana at one of Colorado’s 100 dispensaries. And the pay, unlike the job, is not expected to be high. There are already several online reviewers of cannabis, such as marijuanareviews.com and weedmaps.com. MORE WESTWORD: All those journalistic scoops are just so much smoke compared to […]
INHALE TO THE CHIEF: DOJ Instructs Prosecutors To Stop Wasting Time And Money Busting People In Compliance With State Medical Marijuana Laws
[Artwork by REUBENSLP] ASSOCIATED PRESS: The Obama administration will not seek to arrest medical marijuana users and suppliers as long as they conform to state laws, under new policy guidelines to be sent to federal prosecutors Monday. Two Justice Department officials described the new policy to The Associated Press, saying prosecutors will be told it is not a good use of their time to arrest people who use or provide medical marijuana in strict compliance with state laws. The new policy is a significant departure from the Bush administration, which insisted it would continue to enforce federal anti-pot laws regardless […]
MEDICAL MARIJUANA: High Anxiety
NEW YORK TIMES: “I’m so totally paranoid I can’t stand myself,” said the distributor, who runs a nonprofit group here that grows and sells marijuana for medicinal purposes and who insisted on meeting in the privacy of a hotel room. It was not meant to be this way. New Mexico’s new medical marijuana law was intended to provide safe, aboveboard access to the drug for hundreds of residents with chronic pain and other debilitating conditions. By licensing nonprofit distributors, New Mexico hoped to improve upon the free-for-all distribution systems in some states like California and Colorado, where hundreds of for-profit […]