August 5, 2012

Witch hunt against Kansas City-area Planned Parenthood coming to an end?

More Charges Against Kansas City Planned Parenthood Dismissed


A witch hunt that began with former Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline is drawing closer to an eventual conclusion, as another 26 charges against a Planned Parenthood clinic in Overland Park, Kansas have been dismissed by a district judge.

Via The Associated Press:



The charges were part of over 100 that were filed against the clinic by then-state Attorney General Phill Kline, who was determined to find the clinic guilty of a crime in order to shut it down. Remaining charges involve accusations that the clinic violated a Kansas law regarding abortions after viability, which the clinic denies. ...................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/hot-news-views/more-charges-against-kansas-city-planned-parenthood-dismissed

August 4, 2012

Conservative Christians in Georgia fear Satan is at hand

By Greg Bluestein
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution


It began with a wave of Georgia communities approving Sunday alcohol sales over the past year. That's when the Georgia Christian Coalition first began worrying the state was on the cusp of a cultural shift.

Then last Tuesday's vote may have confirmed it. A narrow majority of the state's Republican voters voiced support what was once unthinkable: Casino gambling.

"One of us is out of step. Either it's the Christian Coalition or the folks that do the voting," said Jerry Luquire, the group's president. He's resigned to the belief that he's on the losing side of that equation. "The public had a chance to speak. And the results speak for themselves."

The non-binding vote has left social conservatives and analysts puzzling over whether the surprising GOP show of support for casino gambling to fund education was a sign of a lasting shift or a fleeting blip on the radar. Far from the blowout that many expected, a slim majority of Republican voters answered "yes" to the question. .................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.ajc.com/news/conservatives-fear-gambling-vote-1490992.html

August 4, 2012

China, India Continue High Speed Rail Expansion Plans

China, India Continue HSR Expansion Plans
Aug 4th, 2012 | Posted by Robert Cruickshank




High speed rail is a crucial piece of having a modern, 21st century transportation system, reducing reliance on burning fossil fuels and bringing metropolitan areas closer together to spur more economic activity. As California blazes ahead with its high speed rail plan, other countries are pushing forward with their own HSR expansions, particularly China and India.

India is moving ahead with several new lines:



Those are significant time savings for India’s popular railways, and would be the basis of a national system connecting India’s major and growing cities. Of course, there’ll need to be new investments in electricity generation infrastructure – last week’s massive blackouts in India indicated serious problems with power that will have to be resolved for Indian HSR to succeed. But that work will have to be done anyway and there’s every reason to believe HSR will succeed there. ..............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.cahsrblog.com/2012/08/china-india-continue-hsr-expansion-plans/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=china-india-continue-hsr-expansion-plans&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

August 4, 2012

China, India Continue High Speed Rail Expansion Plans

China, India Continue HSR Expansion Plans
Aug 4th, 2012 | Posted by Robert Cruickshank




High speed rail is a crucial piece of having a modern, 21st century transportation system, reducing reliance on burning fossil fuels and bringing metropolitan areas closer together to spur more economic activity. As California blazes ahead with its high speed rail plan, other countries are pushing forward with their own HSR expansions, particularly China and India.

India is moving ahead with several new lines:



Those are significant time savings for India’s popular railways, and would be the basis of a national system connecting India’s major and growing cities. Of course, there’ll need to be new investments in electricity generation infrastructure – last week’s massive blackouts in India indicated serious problems with power that will have to be resolved for Indian HSR to succeed. But that work will have to be done anyway and there’s every reason to believe HSR will succeed there. ..............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.cahsrblog.com/2012/08/china-india-continue-hsr-expansion-plans/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=china-india-continue-hsr-expansion-plans&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

August 4, 2012

Going Underground

(Bloomberg) London’s Underground railway carried a record number of passengers on Aug. 2, as Olympic spectators joined commuters and tourists to test the city’s subway system.

A record 4.31 million passengers traveled on the Underground that day, according to a statement from Transport for London. The previous busiest day for the Tube network was Dec. 9, 2011, when it carried 4.17 million passengers.

As many as 1 million extra visitors have been expected each day during the games. Travelers have been “avoiding peak hours and traveling at less busy times,” according to the statement from TfL. While the Central Line, one of two subway lines to the Olympic Park, was suspended yesterday morning following signal failures, TfL expects that passenger numbers for yesterday will have been “even higher,” according to spokesman Stephen Taylor. .................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-08-04/olympics-draw-record-number-of-passengers-to-london-transport.html

August 4, 2012

New Urban Ag Law Paves the Way for Growers in San Francisco

from Civil Eats:


New Urban Ag Law Paves the Way for Growers in San Francisco

August 2nd, 2012
By Antonio Roman-Alcalá


Last month urban agriculture advocates in San Francisco got another piece of legislation to celebrate. City government once again came out to support the growing of food within this dense city, this time by mandating that an “urban agriculture program” be organized. The program will help coordinate existing programs within and between city agencies that touch food production (including the Recreation and Parks Department’s community gardens, the Department of the Environment’s urban orchard work, and the Public Utilities Commission’s water-saving education efforts), as well as look into new ways to expand and improve urban agriculture opportunities (including an audit of city-owned rooftops with potential for gardens or beekeeping; the development of incentives for private landowners to lease undeveloped land to urban ag projects; and–perhaps most importantly–the creation of materials resource centers, where urban agriculturists of all sorts can find the compost, mulch, and materials needed to successfully grow more food).

As a co-coordinator for the SF Urban Agriculture Alliance, a grassroots volunteer group supporting local urban agriculture projects and their respective goals, I am happy that we not only achieved the passage of such legislation, but achieved a more difficult goal: funding for the program. In these days of austerity and endless cuts, our members’ advocacy, and the support of particular city Supervisors (in particular, David Chiu, the legislation’s sponsor, and John Avalos, chair of the Budget committee) were crucial to ensuring that the program would not just exist on paper. The budgeting process is a complex and mystifying beast, but we tamed it, and came out with $120,000 for implementation of the program in the coming fiscal year.

Although the legislation isn’t perfect (there is the possibility that the funding will largely end up going to an urban-ag-ignorant bureaucrat, paid $100,000 a year to be ineffectual), it helps us with what we need to be more successful–as individual backyard growers, as community and communal farmers, and as a city government–in growing local food for local people. And being part of the political process–warts and all–gives us more experience, and thus more efficacy to achieve the changes we hope to see.

Once the strategic plan is completed by the City Administrator’s office (by December 2012), an evaluation will determine whether this program is best housed in a particular city agency, or an NGO. My personal view is that almost every potential city agency has more liabilities than assets to manage such a program, and that an NGO with widespread, true community connections and urban agriculture experience would be better suited for the job. Unfortunately, since the demise of the San Francisco League of Urban Gardeners (SLUG), no such NGO has emerged. So for the urban agriculture movement in San Francisco, our work is far from over. We must remain committed to holding the city accountable in accomplishing their stated goals (such as, among other important issues, supporting urban agriculture), whether from the outside or (should an NGO take on the program eventually) the inside. .........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://civileats.com/2012/08/02/new-urban-ag-law-paves-the-way-for-growers-in-san-francisco/

August 4, 2012

Hedge-Fund Chief’s Son Held in Death at Yellowstone Club

(Bloomberg) A New York teenager out for a late- night drive in an all-terrain vehicle was charged with negligent vehicular homicide under the influence of alcohol after a crash that killed his passenger and prep-school roommate at the luxury Yellowstone Club resort in Montana.

James Sinclair Welch, 19, son of Welch Capital Partners LLC founder Leighton Welch of Bronxville, was arrested about 11:50 p.m., Aug. 2, by the Montana Highway Patrol, according to state court documents. The victim, Parker Regan, 19, of Mendham, New Jersey, was a son of R. Christopher Regan, a founding partner of The Chartis Group, a health-care consultancy.

The accident occurred at the Yellowstone Club, a private ski and golf resort near Big Sky, Montana. Members include Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates, Tour de France cycling champion Greg LeMond and Cliff Asness, co-founder of the hedge fund AQR Capital Management LLC in Greenwich, Connecticut.

Welch was driving a 2012 Polaris Ranger Crew, a four-wheel- drive vehicle, and told police he was making a left turn on Andesite Ridge Road when Regan “fell out,” according to an affidavit by Trooper Joshua Brown and a citation he issued. ...............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-08-04/hedge-fund-chief-s-son-held-in-death-at-yellowtone-club.html

August 4, 2012

Changing the World One Block at a Time

from OnTheCommons.org:



Changing the World One Block at a Time
The neighborhood is a powerful—but often overlooked—tool for social improvement

July 29, 2012 | by Jay Walljasper


The first Tuesday in August is a red-letter evening in many towns and cities— National Night Out . This year August 7 is the occasion for tens of thousands of people across the U.S. to renew their commitment to stopping crime by looking out for one another. It’s also a celebration of community and all that we share as neighbors.

Up to 30 million people take to the streets and parks, with no one calling the cops. Indeed, local police departments helped organize this evening of block parties, neighborhood festivals and music performances. The idea is that when people step out of their homes to meet the neighbors, communities are safer. People who know one another are more likely to work together to prevent crime in their community.

For most people, neighborhoods are a form of the commons that is most familiar. Nearly every one of us lives in one, and they are important to our lives whether we realize it or not. If your home is burglarized while you’re away, it’s your neighbor who calls the police. Even more likely, your neighbor’s presence strolling down the sidewalk or keeping on her porch light discourages hoods from breaking in at all.

That’s why police want to mobilize the power of the commons for fight crime. Spending many years out on the streets, they have come to understand that government and the private sector can only do so much to assure public safety. A lot depends on people themselves, working together in informal but powerful ways to protect their community from violence, theft and vandalism. ...................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://onthecommons.org/magazine/changing-world-one-block-time

August 4, 2012

Keiser Report: Superstition Trading

Published on Aug 4, 2012 by RussiaToday

In this episode, Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert discuss artificial superstition, increasing the inflation target to 100% and suicide watch for the too big to fail banks. They also discuss HSBC's misselling of interest rate swaps and drug cartel money laundering. In the second half, Max interviews author and blogger, James Howard Kunstler of Kunstler.com

August 4, 2012

Matt Taibbi: When Did Sandy Weill Change His Mind About Too Big To Fail? And Why?

from Rolling Stone:



When Did Sandy Weill Change His Mind About Too Big To Fail? And Why?
POSTED: August 3, 11:30 AM ET


There were a great many fascinating moments in the now-legendary Squawk Box interview of former Citigroup chairman Sandy Weill, in which the creator of the Too-Big-To-Fail model told an astonished Andrew Ross Sorkin that it was time to break up the Too-Big-To-Fail banks. But one moment in particular flew under the radar:



For the moment we can ignore the fact that Weill throughout the interview kept patting himself on the back for his "good thing" of an idea. (Although, if close attention is paid, one does get the impression that Weill sincerely believes he came up with the "break up the banks" idea on his own, and it’s almost like he’s preparing to take credit for it if it happens; this is just one of the many layers of delicious comedy that can be peeled back through careful re-examination of this interview). We can just call all that background noise for now.

Instead, let’s just focus on the "when" question Sorkin raised. Because interestingly enough, Weill addressed this very issue at the close of the year Sorkin mentioned, 2009.

It was back then that Weill’s former co-C.E.O. at Citi, John Reed, paved the way for Weill’s future conversion by issuing his own mea culpa on the issue of Too-Big-To-Fail. Reed wrote a letter to the New York Times on October 22, 2009 calling for the same division of commercial banks and investment banks, saying the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, which had kept those companies separate, was a mistake. ................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/when-did-sandy-weill-change-his-mind-about-too-big-to-fail-and-why-20120803#ixzz22XMBWX5S