Chomsky: How the Young Are Indoctrinated to Obey. [AlterNet] – Forty years ago there was deep concern that the population was breaking free of apathy and obedience. Since then, many measures have been taken to restore discipline. Read more.
Curated Links
Opening Day 2012
How wonderful it was to find this essay from my nephew, Brady Cremeens, in my mailbox first thing this morning.
It’s marveling at a once head-bound slider snapping down for a strike as the batter bails out of the way.
It’s the whip-like crack of a wooden Louisville connecting with a 98 mph fastball.
It’s listening to your favorite broadcasters on a radio station that barely comes in.
Read the full article on Life, Death, and Feeny: The Optimism of Opening Day.
Play ball!
Monsanto Threatens to Sue Over GMO Labeling
Monsanto Threatens to Sue Vermont if Legislators Pass a Bill Requiring GMO Food to Be Labeled. [AlterNet] – The world’s most hated corporation is at it again, this time in Vermont. Despite overwhelming public support and support from a clear majority of Vermont’s Agriculture Committee, Vermont legislators are dragging their feet on a proposed GMO labeling bill. Why? Because Monsanto has threatened to sue the state if the bill passes. What it really comes down to this: Elected officials are abandoning the public interest and pubic will in the face of corporate intimidation.
Things We Can Do Now To Cope With A Warmer Climate
Nine low-tech steps for community resilience in a warming climate. [Kaid Benfield | Switchboard | NRDC] – Over the past 50 years, our average global temperature has increased at the fastest rate in recorded history. That is fact, not opinion. Scientists say that under current trends, average US temperatures could be 3 to 9 degrees higher by the end of the century.
There are many things we can and must do to reduce the warming trajectory, but turning this ship around is going to take time, even under the best scenarios.
Meanwhile, there are also measures we need to take right now inside our communities so that we are as prepared as possible for the warmer climate ahead.
Millions Join Spain’s General Strike
The Spanish People Strike Against Austerity and Attacks on Labor
Coming Soon to a Country Near You!
Spain Hobbled by General Strike. [NYTimes.com] – Heavy industry and large parts of the transportation network were disrupted on Thursday by Spain’s first general strike since the Popular Party of Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy came to power late last year.
The strike was called by Spain’s two main trade unions to protest a recent overhaul of labor rules that makes it less costly for employers to hire and fire workers. It came on the eve of Mr. Rajoy’s presentation of Spain’s 2012 budget, which is expected to contain about €20 billion, or $26 billion, in additional spending cuts and tax increases to help Spain meet deficit targets it agreed to with the European Commission.
Millions Join General Strike in Spain. [WSWS] – Yesterday’s general strike against new labour laws imposed by the right-wing Popular Party government was backed by millions.
The two main union federations, the Socialist Party (PSOE)-aligned General Workers Union (Union General de Trabajadores, UGT), and the Communist Party (PCE)-led Workers Commissions (Comisiones Obreras, CC.OO) estimated that the stoppages were supported by 77-80 percent of the workforce. Many more people, unemployed, school children, housewives and students used it as a vehicle to protest government cuts and austerity measures.
Mass stoppages took place in industry, transport and services. The walkout hit road, rail and air service with barely any domestic or European flights in operation.
Hedges on Homeland Battlefield Bill Lawsuit
Chris Hedges: The Polite Conference Rooms Where Liberties Are Saved and Lost. [Chris Hedges’ Columns | Truthdig] – The NDAA implodes our most cherished constitutional protections. It permits the military to function on U.S. soil as a civilian law enforcement agency. It authorizes the executive branch to order the military to selectively suspend due process and habeas corpus for citizens. The law can be used to detain people deemed threats to national security, including dissidents whose rights were once protected under the First Amendment, and hold them until what is termed “the end of the hostilities.” Even the name itself—the Homeland Battlefield Bill—suggests the totalitarian concept that endless war has to be waged within “the homeland” against internal enemies as well as foreign enemies.
Debt Without End Amen
Graduating into never-ending debt. [SocialistWorker.org] – Overwhelming student debt has become a source of worry and financial distress for many millions of people–and even worse for the one in five people with student loan debt who are classified as delinquent. And the problem will only get worse as a new generation of students and recent graduates, carrying a bigger loan burden than ever before, struggles to find work in an economy that, despite statistics showing job growth, still seems like the Great Recession, especially for young workers.
Welcome to the Global Spring
A new chapter is beginning – the Global Spring.
In Union Square, Occupy Is Blooming. [OccupyWallSt.org] – This spring, Occupiers are taking back public space to renew the visible face of our movement. In New York, despite constant police harassment, we are maintaining an Occupation in Union Square. Elsewhere, Occupy Oakland has announced a major civil disobedience action in response to assaults on peaceful Occupiers. Occupy London has announced a new home in solidarity with #OWS and on-going anti-austerity protests in the U.K.
Watch What You Say (or Tweet, or Post, or Text, or Buy)
“The NSA has become the largest, most covert, and potentially most intrusive intelligence agency ever.”
The NSA Is Building the Country’s Biggest Spy Center (Watch What You Say). [Threat Level | Wired.com] – Under construction by contractors with top-secret clearances, the blandly named Utah Data Center is being built for the National Security Agency. A project of immense secrecy, it is the final piece in a complex puzzle assembled over the past decade. Its purpose: to intercept, decipher, analyze, and store vast swaths of the world’s communications as they zap down from satellites and zip through the underground and undersea cables of international, foreign, and domestic networks.
Innocent Americans’ Data Will Now Be Kept Five Years
Americans’ private data to be kept 5 years. [UPI.com] – Attorney General Eric Holder signed guidelines Thursday that, among other things, expand from 180 days to five years the time the National Counterterrorism Center may keep private information about Americans not suspected of having ties to terrorism, The New York Times reported.
The guidelines also will allow the center to make more copies of entire databases and study them by using complex algorithms to search for patterns indicative of a threat, intelligence officials said.