This page uses no tables or cells of any kind. No absolute positioning either. I have a three column design as well, but is pretty unwieldy at resolutions of less than 1024x768. It works perfectly, just hard to read.
The new format will be in accord with the box model. Essentially, each entry will have it's own 'box.' it tales up only a tiny amount of bandwidth, and this site has no images to load..save for the few kb that the Blogger and Haloscan images use.
Well, enough of that. On to the pbs exclusive.
Ten Links o' the Day Time!
Hah. The Boston Globe has a pretty well researched op-ed on Colin Powell's Shrinking Credibility on Iraq. Curious. It cites the Carnegie Report along with the usual, 'this is what he said' vs. 'these are the facts.' at pbs, we just use the Powell's own words from 2001. He knew he was talking bs, not 'pbs' when he whored himself at the U.N. Sad that we keep revisiting the same lies.
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EPA Sued for Illegally Taking Direction from Chemical Industry Group
Quickie :) (there is more at link)
SEATTLE, Jan. 15 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Conservation and pesticide- watchdog groups today filed a lawsuit to stop the Environmental Protection Agency from giving illegal special access to a group of chemical corporations. Documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act and other sources reveal that the corporate insider group has met regularly with EPA officials in secret and has urged EPA to weaken endangered species protections from pesticides. The lawsuit was filed in federal district court in Seattle Washington.
The chemical companies are pushing EPA to weaken pesticide safeguards by cutting expert biologists in the US Fish and Wildlife Service and NOAA Fisheries out of consultations determining the effects of pesticides on wildlife. At the companies' urging, EPA has starting a rulemaking to reserve authority over such evaluations to itself.
"EPA is letting the pesticide industry have inside influence over the fate of endangered species poisoned by toxic pesticides," said Patti Goldman of Earthjustice, which brought the lawsuit on behalf of the conservation and watchdog groups.
Federal law prohibits the government from using and meeting in secret with such insider groups. Congress has established good government standards that prevent secret and one-sided advisory bodies of wealthy special interests. The Federal Advisory Committee Act prohibits the federal government from obtaining advice from committees comprised of only the regulated industry. That act also requires that the meetings of advisory groups be open to the public.
"EPA has an open door policy to the biggest chemical companies in America while excluding the rest of us," said Mike Senatore of Defenders of Wildlife. "That's not right. In America all voices are supposed to be heard, not just wealthy interests that make campaign contributions."
Regular readers know that the environment is my number one issue. Why? Because habitable planets are hard to find. Special considerations given to the Pesticide lobby..I'm shocked.
The U.S, needs to LEAD on environmental issues. If this is the kind of leadership we're going to show, spaceship Earth has a leaking airlock.
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SCIENCE!
New scientists reports today that a robotic scientist outperforms humans in lab.
Don't hang up your lab coat just yet. Here's a tease:
"An intelligent robot that could free genomics researchers from routine lab chores has proven as effective as a human scientist. The robot not only performs genetics experiments, it also decides which ones to do, interprets the results and comes up with new hypotheses.
"Fields such as genomics are crying out for better and more intelligent automation because they are generating data much faster than it can be analysed. Stephen Muggleton, a computer scientist at Imperial College London, UK, and a member of the team that developed the system, says that scientists in genomics are becoming overwhelmed. Data is increasing almost exponentially, he adds, making more automation inevitable."
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Sorry. Yoo-Essay Today makes it onto the list with some economic news. Factories suffer 41 months of layoffs
WASHINGTON ? Manufacturers still aren't producing the one item the economy needs most: jobs.
Despite recent sharp jumps in orders and shipments, factories shed 26,000 workers in December, the Labor Department said Friday. The December figures mark the 41st consecutive month of layoffs, and bring overall manufacturing job losses to 2.8 million since mid-2000.
The pace of layoffs has slowed since summer, but more than 500,000 factory jobs evaporated in 2003 alone. The figures are a disappointment for workers and many analysts, who had predicted the beleaguered manufacturing sector was turning the corner.
"The loss of 26,000 more manufacturing jobs in December shows that the manufacturing recovery is still in its infancy," said Jerry Jasinowski, president of the National Association of Manufacturers.
Much more at above link.
It appears that manufacturing is going bleed jobs into the foreseeable future. This is partly why I'm concerned about the duration and fragility of this 'recovery.' It's hard to see that a large percentage of these jobs lost are ever going to return to American workers.
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Daniel Gross is at least as enamored as I am concerning Bush's fundamental lack of fiduciary forthrightness. In this piece for Slate, he writes:
"Back in 1983, as part of a deal to save Social Security from impending demographic doom, Congress enacted legislation to essentially increase payroll taxes and reduce benefits. As a result, the government began to collect more Social Security payroll taxes than it paid out to beneficiaries each year. The theory was that the government would use these surpluses to pay down the national debt. That way, when baby boomers retire?and comparatively more people are collecting benefits while comparatively fewer people are working?the government would be in a better position to borrow the necessary funds to provide the promised benefits.
"So much for theory. The reality? For the first 15 years, every penny of the surplus was spent, first by Republican presidents and then by a Democratic president. According to figures provided by the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, the surpluses were relatively insignificant for much of this period. Between 1983 and 2001 a total of $667 billion in excess Social Security payroll taxes was spent?about $35 billion per year. It was only in fiscal 1999 and 2000, when the government ran so-called on-budget surpluses, that excess Social Security funds were actually used to retire debt.
"In the 2000 campaign, Vice President Al Gore said we should sequester the Social Security surpluses in a "lockbox" to prevent appropriators from spending them. Bush agreed in principle. But that commitment went out the window soon after the inauguration. In his first three budgets, Bush (who had the good fortune to take office at a time when the surpluses were growing rapidly) and Congress used $480 billion in excess Social Security payroll taxes to fund basic government operations?about $160 billion per year!"
There is, of course, much more at link. Including the IMF concerns we looked at here two days ago, and Treasury Secretary John 'Choo Choo" Snow's sanguine outlook that is long on rhetoric, but short on substance.
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You know, my astute readers, that U.S. debt isn't the only debt that is at record levels. Regular readers know that consumer debt levels in the US are also at record levels.
Nice synopsis of the situation:
"US consumer debt has reached staggering levels after more than doubling over the past 10 years. According to the most recent figures from the Federal Reserve Board, consumer debt hit $1.98 trillion in October 2003, up from $1.5 trillion three years ago. This figure, representing credit card and car loan debt, but excluding mortgages, translates into approximately $18,700 per US household.
"Outstanding consumer credit, including mortgage and other debt, reached $9.3 trillion in April 2003, representing an increase from $7 trillion in January 2000. The total credit card debt alone stands at $735 billion, with the household card debt of those who carry balances estimated to average $12,000.
"The levels of consumer debt have increased as millions of jobs have been destroyed. Unlike past recessions, consumers continued to borrow during the last downturn, which began in March 2001 and officially ended in November 2001. The prime lending rate set by the Federal Reserve is at an historic low, allowing mortgage rates to drop to their lowest recorded levels. The automobile companies, which have offered zero percent financing for the past two years, have begun doing the same for 2004."
In this part of the Northeast, there was another rosy forecast for the wildly inflated real estate market in the region. Essentially, the person..an independent EXPERT ANALYST stated that this boom was different than other booms. Of course that rationale has been used to describe earlier real estate collapses in the past, as well as the stock market bubble(s). I'll mine some quotes and write a small piece about the striking similarities. The consumer debt levels with the decline in real earning power over the last few decades should cause any rational person to lift a brow.
It's only a boom if followed by a bust. :)
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I haven't been in a job that paid overtime in my post-university life..yet. :) But it frosts my ass that the lackeys in the Bush Administration have to be pressed to enforce existing laws. WTF kind of 'public service' is that? The public's being 'serviced' alright. I would almost kill for OT pay, but it just ain't gonna happen.
On to the link and story.
Overtime Pay For Millions of Americans in Peril
NEW YORK -- An electronic technician with the U.S. Navy, John Garrity has two young children and another on the way. He often works extra hours to help make ends meet, but worries that under new overtime pay rules proposed by the Labor Department, he will lose about six thousand dollars a year.
"It's a pay cut and an attack on workers' rights," he said in an interview. "They're trying to roll the clock back. People fought and went to jail to have a 40-hour work week so they could spend more time with their families. The president just wants to pay back his corporate friends."
Overtime pay is very hard to get even if you are entitled to it. The fact that the Bush administration would rather take away this right than enforce this law is an obvious sign of their domination by corporate interests.
Jonathan Rees, a history professor at Colorado State University
On Wednesday, an international trade union criticized the United States for having ratified only two of eight global conventions on core workers' rights, calling that one of the "worst rates of ratification in the world."
....."Overtime pay is very hard to get even if you are entitled to it," says Jonathan Rees, a history professor at Colorado State University who has written extensively on labor issues.
"The fact that the Bush administration would rather take away this right than enforce this law is an obvious sign of their domination by corporate interests."
Compassionate Conservatism in action. Lovely.
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In a story where neither side gives a Shi'ite about the other:
Bush and Bremer Meet as Iraqi Shi'ites Demand Poll
Tens of thousands of Iraq's majority Shi'ite Muslims marched through Basra to chants of "No to America" on Thursday and an aide to the Shi'ites' spiritual leader warned of wider protests if the long-oppressed group's demand for elections was not met.
Bremer will also hold talks with U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Monday in an effort to convince the United Nations to send staff back to Iraq to help with the transition process.
A U.S. plan for a handover of power by July has run into stiff opposition from Iraq's top Shi'ite cleric Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, a Kurdish drive for autonomy in the north and a warning of bloodshed from a leader of the minority Turkmen.
Bremer's talks at the White House would cover "the political dynamic (in Iraq), the ongoing discussions with Sistani and the Kurds," said a U.S. official.
Sistani has objected to the U.S. plan for a transitional assembly to be selected by regional caucuses. The assembly will choose an interim government for sovereignty by the end of June. Full elections are due to follow next year.
U.S. SEEKS TO WIN OVER SISTANI
Bremer has said he respects Sistani but that there is not enough time to hold elections before a handover of sovereignty due to lack of electoral registers and polling laws.
U.S. officials say they are reviewing the planned regional caucuses to make the process as open as possible.
In Iraq's mainly Shi'ite south, tens of thousands protested in the country's British-controlled second city of Basra in support of Sistani's call for elections.
"If (Sistani) issues a fatwa (edict) all the Iraqi people will go out in protest marches and demonstrations against the (U.S.-led) coalition forces," an aide to the cleric, Ayatollah Mohammad Baqer al-Mohri, told Reuters in Kuwait.
This is going to show the American people that Dear Leader is 'engaged' in negotiations with who? The Iraqis? He's not in Iraq. Paul Bremer? He seems a much a puppet as Bush. The answer is: no one. Bush is going to do exactly what his polling numbers suggest.
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(radio interference) "I can't copy you. Rebroadcast, over."
"uh, copy that, Spirit. You are free to roam."
Six Wheels on Mars! Spirit Free to Roam
The Mars Exploration Rover was commanded by the click of a mouse button to exit down a lander petal at 12:21:30 a.m. Pacific Standard Time (PST). It was ordered to head in a north-northwest direction. The six-wheeled robot is now resting in the stark, rock strewn and geologically rich landscape that is Gusev Crater.
Driving range
"Data is streaming in," said Rob Manning, Entry, Descent and Landing Development Manager for the rover effort. "It looks like the egress went very well."
Controllers called it the most significant 10 feet (3 meter) drive in history. The drive took 78 seconds, ending with the back of the rover about 2.6 feet (80 centimeters) from the foot of the egress ramp.
The first image relayed from the rover on Mars, snapped from the backend of the robot, showed the left-behind lander hardware -- now a useless piece of space junk.
I'll say it one more time. This is exactly the kind of missions that we should be planning. Lots of unmanned, inexpensive missions. Just say no to Manned Spaceflight!
These are the missions that work. And should a rocket fail, you don't tie-up the program for months to years doing an investigation.
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Meanwhile, in Iraq:
Iraqi council endorses rollback of women's rights
First an observation. Pamela Constable writes in this piece that Iraqi women have had some of the 'most modern' legal protection in the Muslim world. Iraq was not a Muslim country in the sense that it had Sharia laws and courts. Iraq's government was secular, like our own. But different. You know what I mean. Read on to see how we're promoting women's rights in Iraq.
BAGHDAD -- For the past four decades, Iraqi women have had some of the most modern legal protections in the Muslim world, under a civil code that prohibits marriage below age 18, arbitrary divorce and male favoritism in child custody and property inheritance disputes.
Saddam Hussein's dictatorship did not touch those rights. But the U.S.-backed Iraqi Governing Council has voted to wipe them out, ordering in late December that family laws shall be "canceled" and such issues placed under the jurisdiction of Islamic legal doctrine, called sharia.
This week outraged Iraqi women -- including judges and Cabinet ministers -- denounced the decision in street protests and at conferences, saying it would set back their legal status by centuries and could unleash clashes among various Islamic strains that have differing rules for marriage, divorce and other family issues.
"This will send us home and shut the door, just like what happened to women in Afghanistan," said Amira Hassan Abdullah, a Kurdish lawyer. Some Islamic laws, she noted, allow men to divorce their wives on the spot.
"The old law wasn't perfect, but this one would make Iraq a jungle," she said. "Iraqi women will accept it over their dead bodies."
The order, narrowly approved by the 25-member council in a closed-door session Dec. 29, was made while Abdul Aziz Hakim, a conservative Shiite Muslim who heads the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, was chairing the council under a rotating leadership system. The order is being opposed by several liberal members as well as by senior women in the Iraqi government.
So, the U.S backed IGC has seen to turn the clock back on Iraq's women by several hundred years. Sharia law is fundamentalist Islamic law as practiced in such places as Afghanistan under the Taliban, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Libya. All shining examples of democracy. More about Sharia. This flatly sucks. We do not know what the fuck we are doing over there.
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I do not know if I made this clear enough, but all of the quoted articles have a lot more text for you to read. Thanks!
Those are tonight's ten. A bit on the sober side. Tomorrow - humor. I promise!!
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