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Bush Administration’s Antienvironmental Policies Hurt Polar Bears
Tweet Share on Facebook December 12, 2008 Comment (11)By Bonnie Erbe, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
There's not an animal in sight the Bush administration doesn't want to send off to extinction on the way out the door. Now it's the polar bear. Yes, let's just slaughter them all, why don't we?
With just more than a month left in office, Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne on Thursday made
permanent a rule that says the listing of polar bears will not be used to limit greenhouse gas emissions, a leading cause of global warming, and the primary reason for the loss of Arctic sea ice, the main habitat of polar bears.
These "special rules" announced by the Interior Department continue the Bush tradition of selling out science in the name of corporate environmental destruction. They are proposed to "reduce the influence of federal scientists" on endangered species decisions. Yes, let's ignore the scientists, because, after all, what do they know, compared with evangelicals anxiously awaiting the second coming of Christ, right? Kempthorne did so while making permanent a "special rule" to block steps that could protect threatened polar bears.
In case you were wondering, we're now down to 1.74 million square miles of sea ice. This is the second-lowest level on record. It is also 860,000 square miles below the annual average between 1979 and 2000. The ice is what's keeping not just polar bears but much of the Arctic ecosystem alive.
I guess the Obama administration should be thankful it will have so much to do when it takes office, undoing the ridiculous last-minute moves of the Bush administration.
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JFK and Barack Obama’s Centrist Transition to Liberalism
Tweet Share on Facebook December 12, 2008 Comment (1)By Robert Schlesinger, Thomas Jefferson Street blog.
Leave it to a better commentator and a smarter Schlesinger to team up to more eloquently make a point I hazarded last week about the perception that Barack Obama's cabinet choices are centrist rather than liberal. Liberalism is an ideology, I suggested, while pragmatism is not an ideology but rather how you apply it.
E.J. Dionne has a great column in today's Washington Post examining the supposed liberal disillusionment with Obama. He cites similar rumblings that emanated from the left in the lead-up to the Kennedy administration, quoting from the Journals of JFK aide Arthur Schlesinger Jr. (or as I was wont to call him, Dad).
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Is Jon Favreau for Real?
Tweet Share on Facebook December 11, 2008 Comment (65)By Bonnie Erbe, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
Is this for real?
According to thedailybeast.com, President-elect Obama's chief speechwriter was photographed groping, quite inappropriately I might add, a stand-up photo of secretary of state nominee Sen. Hillary Clinton:
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Rod Blagojevich, the Stupidest Governor in the Country, Puts Obama in a Bad Light
Tweet Share on Facebook December 11, 2008 Comment (44)By Michael Barone, Thomas Jefferson Street blog.
I'm a little late, thanks to jury duty and other matters, to weigh in on the incredibly juicy Rod Blagojevich story. Blagojevich was arrested Tuesday morning on the basis of a criminal complaint issued by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald. That Blagojevich has been under legal investigation and has been in danger of indictment has been widely understood by all serious political actors in Chicago and Illinois for some time: This wasn't entirely a surprise. "Our worst fears were realized," was the official reaction of state Attorney General Lisa Madigan, a critic of Blagojevich who has been contemplating challenging him in the 2010 Democratic primary for governor. But it was a surprise that Blagojevich made so many impolitic and indictable statements when he had every reason to believe that he was under surveillance. The always shrewd Jennifer Rubin is on to something when she asks whether Blagojevich is "just plain crazy." She is "intrigued by the mendacity, bordering on insanity. How does someone function in a high office with such a loose grip on reality?"
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Immigration Fraud Riddles Suspended Family Reunification Program
Tweet Share on Facebook December 11, 2008 Comment (4)By Bonnie Erbe, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich is not the only one committing a fascinating form of fraud. In a little-noticed move last week, the State Department suspended an immigration program, disqualifying certain would-be immigrants from entering the country. Why? They were committing fraud in massive percentages.
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Sabathia and the Damn Yankees Lead the Economic Way
Tweet Share on Facebook December 11, 2008 Comment (3)By John Aloysius Farrell, Thomas Jefferson Street blog.
The news is filled with tales of corruption and economic woe. A cold rain falls in the nation's capital. We must look, once more, to baseball for salvation.
More specifically, to the New York Yankees, who hope to ride C.C. Sabathia to the World Series, and so have given the mammoth left-hander a $161 million contract.
$161 million. Yeah, baby. That's what I'm talkin' 'bout.
Confidence. Panache. Muscle. Bucks. American virtues all. And too forgotten in this dreary December.
Phil Gramm had it right. The root causes of this recession—of any recession—are psychological. And the Yankees, god bless 'em, are defying the gloom 'n doom psychology of the day.
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Blagojevich Calls to Mind Clarence Darrow and Chicago Corruption
Tweet Share on Facebook December 10, 2008 Comment (2)By John Aloysius Farrell, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
Now that Illinois Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich has joined Chicago's long list of political rogues and rascals who have spent time in handcuffs, connoisseurs of the city's politics are having fun exchanging their favorite Second City tales.
Here's one that I've come across while researching my book on Clarence Darrow—who, as a young lawyer, represented a prime cast of Chicago's crooks and boodlers in the 1890s, long before he achieved saintly status for the courtroom heroics of his later years.
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Labor Killed Detroit? Not So Fast
Tweet Share on Facebook December 10, 2008 Comment (17)The New York Times has an interesting
op-ednews analysiscolumn on its front page today that breaks down the much-touted $73 per hour that the average auto worker allegedly pulls down. -
Feminists Didn’t Drive Women to Alcohol
Tweet Share on Facebook December 10, 2008 Comment (7)By Bonnie Erbe, Thomas Jefferson Street blog.
In an otherwise interesting and informative piece, New York magazine tries to blame the rising rate of drinking among women and especially among young girls on second wave feminism. There are only some half-million reasons for teens' and children's increased use of booze, but I would put feminism way down on the list. Why not blame the rise in the war on drugs? The government's 30-year war has failed in most areas, but it has succeeded in one thing: shifting addictive personalities from illegal drugs to legal alcohol, whether the addict is male or female.
Read this and let me know your thoughts in the comments section below:
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New Capitol Hill Access Site Helps Track D.C. Old Boys’ Network
Tweet Share on Facebook December 10, 2008 CommentBy Robert Schlesinger, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
For those of you who like to play along at home, a new website has come online, adding to the citizen-reporter's tool kit. The site is called Capitol Hill Access, and it gives a handy user's guide to the socio-business web that connects so many people in Washington, D.C.
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