Government Shutdown
Avoided for Now
Puget Sound Liberals Weekly Newsletter #255
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Table of Contents *Featured
Articles Opportunities Petitions Communication to Our Members Publication of Our Next Newsletter Will be 4/29/2011 Commentaries from Our Members David Blair: Biggest Tax Break Ever - Unbelievable Amelia Kroeger: Government Of, By and For Richest 1%. Liberals and Democrats Links to the Beef State and Local Links to the Beef David Blair: See What Students and Teachers Are Facing Don Smith: Bob Hasegawa Discusses Budget Reforms Sarajane Siegfriedt: Status of Legislative Reforms Craig Salins: Aiding Awareness to Overturn
Citizens United Nation and World Links to the Beef Featured Advocacy Group: Resist Gaddhafi May be Replaced by One of His Sons Our Liberal Spirit If It Sounds Too Good To Be True, It Probably Isn’t True. Our
Political Priorities ·
Fair Clean
Elections and Open Government ·
Fair Taxes and
Competent Spending ·
Investment for
Productivity ·
Quality
Health, Education, Jobs, Income ·
Environmental
Protection and Energy Independence ·
Security and
Equal Rights ·
Justice and
Peace Everywhere ·
International
Cooperation and Leadership Conservatives oppose all of these Let’s End Our National Nightmare Let’s
Restore Our American Dream More on Conservative opposition to our
American Dream Washington State’s 5 Major Needs ·
Federal
Funding for Health and Education · Substituting
a Progressive Income Tax · Replacing
Conservative Legislators Quote of the Week If it sounds too good t
be true it probably isn’t true.
Many Sources
Thursday,
April 21 at 7 PM at The Community Hall, Lower Brick
Building, Phinney Neighborhood Association, Seattle - Discussion of what’s next after defeat of initiative 1098,
sponsored by Economic Opportunity Institute.
Opportunities
From
Our Basic Values to What President Obama Should Do
Basic Training: Our
Liberal Boot Camp
Commentaries That Have
Addressed Major Issues
Petitions
I
support legislation that would protect worker rights.
Tell
Honeywell’s CEO to stop locking out union workers.
Tell
President Obama, Hillary Clinton and Robert Gates to end the torturing of
Bradley Manning.
Would you like to start your own
online petition?
Dear
MoveOn member, How would you like to send an email to all 5 million MoveOn
members, inviting them to join you in fighting for a cause you feel
passionately about? This could be your chance. We're launching a new website
where you can start your own online petition—and to kick things off,
we're thinking about holding a contest to find the one that's most popular with
MoveOn members.
The
prize? Your petition would be seen by millions of people, and hundreds of
thousands would join your campaign. Plus, we'd fly you to Washington, D.C. to
meet with some of the nation's top progressive organizers and plan your
campaign strategy.
To
help get ready, we're taking a quick survey. If this website was available
today, do you have an idea for a petition you'd like to create? Just click
to let us know:
·
No, I don't think I'd start a petition right now.
Thanks!
–Anna, Julia, Michael, Wes, and the rest of the team
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Communication
To Our Members
Our next newsletter
will be published in two weeks, on April 29, 2011.
I am surprised that Gaddhafi is still
alive. I still predict that he cannot survive as long as people are able to
peacefully protest in significant parts of the country. I believe that pressure provided by
peaceful protestors and by their protectors will lead to the crumbling of
Gaddhafi’s support.
Commentaries
From Our Members
David Blair: Biggest Corporate Tax Dodger -
Unbelievable
Hi, it's crazy, but the New York Times reported that
while GE made over $14.2 billion in profits last year, they didn't pay any
federal tax. In fact, they got $3.2 billion in taxes back, from all of us
taxpayers. I can tell you, as I sit down to do my taxes now, that really had me
steamed. And the tax loopholes
that GE spent millions lobbying for keep their profits and jobs overseas, while
they cut health care and retirement benefits for American workers. That had me
absolutely sick.
The worst part is, GE's CEO, Jeff Immelt, was appointed chair of President
Obama's Jobs Council—to advise the President on things like American
workers and corporate tax. It's just perverse. That's why I signed a petition
to get America's Chief Executive Tax Dodger, Jeff Immelt, off the President's
Job Council. Can you join me at this
link? Thanks, David Blair
Amelia Kroeger: Government of, by and for Richest
1%.
Amelia
Kroeger notes the following commentary by Joe
Stiglitz
Americans have been watching protests against oppressive regimes that
concentrate massive wealth in the hands of an elite few. Yet in our own
democracy, 1 percent of the people take nearly a quarter of the nation’s
income—an inequality even the wealthy will come to regret.
THE FAT AND
THE FURIOUS The top 1 percent may have the best
houses, educations, and lifestyles, says the author, but “their fate is bound
up with how the other 99 percent live.” It’s no use pretending that what has
obviously happened has not in fact happened. The upper 1 percent of Americans
are now taking in nearly a quarter of the nation’s income every year. In terms
of wealth rather than income, the top 1 percent control 40 percent. Their lot
in life has improved considerably. Twenty-five years ago, the corresponding
figures were 12 percent and 33 percent.
One
response might be to celebrate the ingenuity and drive that brought good
fortune to these people, and to contend that a rising tide lifts all boats.
That response would be misguided. While the top 1 percent have seen their
incomes rise 18 percent over the past decade, those in the middle have actually
seen their incomes fall. For men with only high-school degrees, the decline has
been precipitous—12 percent in the last quarter-century alone. All the
growth in recent decades—and more—has gone to those at the top.
In terms of
income equality, America lags behind any country in the old, ossified Europe
that President George W. Bush used to deride. Among our closest counterparts
are Russia with its oligarchs and Iran. While many of the old centers of
inequality in Latin America, such as Brazil, have been striving in recent
years, rather successfully, to improve the plight of the poor and reduce gaps
in income, America has allowed inequality to grow.
Economists
long ago tried to justify the vast inequalities that seemed so troubling in the
mid-19th century—inequalities that are but a pale shadow of what we are
seeing in America today. The justification they came up with was called “marginal-productivity
theory.” In a nutshell, this theory associated higher incomes with higher
productivity and a greater contribution to society. It is a theory that has
always been cherished by the rich. Evidence for its validity, however, remains
thin. The corporate executives who helped bring on the recession of the past
three years—whose contribution to our society, and to their own
companies, has been massively negative—went on to receive large bonuses.
In some cases, companies were so embarrassed about calling such rewards
“performance bonuses” that they felt compelled to change the name to “retention
bonuses” (even if the only thing being retained was bad performance).
Those who
have contributed great positive innovations to our society, from the pioneers
of genetic understanding to the pioneers of the Information Age, have received
a pittance compared with those responsible for the financial innovations that
brought our global economy to the brink of ruin.
Some people
look at income inequality and shrug their shoulders. So what if this person
gains and that person loses? What matters, they argue, is not how the pie is
divided but the size of the pie. That argument is fundamentally wrong. An
economy in which most citizens are doing worse year after year—an
economy like America’s—is not likely to do well over the long haul. There
are several reasons for this.
First,
growing inequality is the flip side of something else: shrinking opportunity.
Whenever we diminish equality of opportunity, it means that we are not using
some of our most valuable assets—our people—in the most productive
way possible. Second, many of the distortions that lead to
inequality—such as those associated with monopoly power and preferential
tax treatment for special interests—undermine the efficiency of the
economy. This new inequality goes on to create new distortions, undermining
efficiency even further. To give just one example, far too many of our most
talented young people, seeing the astronomical rewards, have gone into finance rather
than into fields that would lead to a more productive and healthy economy.
Third, and
perhaps most important, a modern economy requires “collective action”—it
needs government to invest in infrastructure, education, and technology. The
United States and the world have benefited greatly from government-sponsored
research that led to the Internet, to advances in public health, and so on. But
America has long suffered from an under-investment in infrastructure (look at
the condition of our highways and bridges, our railroads and airports), in
basic research, and in education at all levels. Further cutbacks in these areas
lie ahead.
None of
this should come as a surprise—it is simply what happens when a society’s
wealth distribution becomes lopsided. The more divided a society becomes in
terms of wealth, the more reluctant the wealthy become to spend money on common
needs. The rich don’t need to rely on government for parks or education or
medical care or personal security—they can buy all these things for
themselves. In the process, they become more distant from ordinary people,
losing whatever empathy they may once have had. They also worry about strong
government—one that could use its powers to adjust the balance, take some
of their wealth, and invest it for the common good. The top 1 percent may
complain about the kind of government we have in America, but in truth they
like it just fine: too gridlocked to re-distribute, too divided to do anything
but lower taxes. For
more.
Liberals
and Democrats
A Liberal Vision
It
is important that Liberals describe our vision, even if some of it is unlikely
to be realized:
1. No peaceful
demonstrators will be harmed.
Throughout the world, people could peacefully demonstrate without fear of being
killed, injured or imprisoned.
2. All
dictators who abuse their citizens will be replaced. To eliminate the harming of peaceful demonstrators,
those who abuse them will be rendered unable to abuse them.
3. All groups
such as al Qaeda that commit acts of violence against unarmed groups will be
eliminated. Just as dictators that
commit acts of violence against unarmed groups will be rendered unable to do
so, so also will vengeful groups be rendered unable to do so.
4. No woman
will be raped or subject to violence for refusing to submit to limitations on
their sexual activities. Women
will not be pressured to put themselves at risk to obtaining AIDs. Women will be free to decide their sexual activities.
Women will not be pressured to become prostitutes.
5. No racist
hate groups will be allowed to commit acts of hatred against racial minorities. Racist hate groups will be identified and monitored
to prevent them from acting to harm racial minorities.
6. All land
mines will explode without harming anyone. All those who would explode car
bombs or suicide bombs will be killed when their bombs explode as there are
prepared for use. People will no
longer be harmed by land mines, car bombs or suicide bombs.
7. All Jewish
settlers in the West Bank and Jerusalem are pressured to leave. Jewish settlers in the West Bank and Jerusalem are
committing illegal acts that stimulate violence against Israel by Palestinians
that are harmed by the settlements. Both Palestinians and Israeli’s will
benefit from the removal of these settlers.
8. All those
who prepare to commit acts of violence against either Israel or Palestinians
would be killed. Especially if the
Jewish settlers are removed from Palestinian lands, there is no justification
for acts of violence against Israel or against Palestinians.
9. Israel will
not be allowed to prohibit Palestinians from entering Israel. To prohibit Palestinians from entering Israel is to
create a religious state which contains first and second class citizens. Just
as American refused to allow Utah to exist as a religious state, Israel must
not be allowed to exist as a religious state.
10.President
Obama would express a vision of economic recovery which repudiates Wall Street
speculators and favors unionization - a return to the golden era from 1948-1973
with a few racial and gender reforms.
President Obama’s major failure has been to imagine that our recovered economy
could include Wall Street speculators who would act to create speculative bubbles
that would collapse to destroy the recovery.
11.Our Supreme
Court would recognize that corporations should not have the same civil rights
as people and that spending money is not an expression of speech. For our government to be of, by and for the people,
corporations must be denied most civil rights that are granted to people,
including the freedom of expression by spending money.
Fixing Our Government
Newsweek
has suggested a number of fixes that can improve our government. Some have
received much attention and others little attention. Some correct situations
that made sense when they were adopted, but no longer do so.
Break up big banks: This reform has been hard fought and failed
Consolidate regulators: This reform has also been hard fought and largely
failed
Streamline entrepreneurial paper work: This seem like an obviously helpful and easy reform
Startup ombudsman: Like the previous one, this seems like an obviously
helpful and easy reform
Introduce medical malpractices health
courts: This seems like an obvious
reform but has bogged down ideologically
Neutralize frivolous patent claims: This hasn’t been discussed much and should be an easy
reform
Ban foreign intellectual property
pirates: This should also be an easy
reform
Provide healthier school lunches: An obvious and easy reform
Modernize shipping requirements: An obvious reform opposed by vested interest
Increase visa cap for highly skilled
workers: This is needed, but opposed
by American workers
Adopt merit based civil service: Needed Reform
Flexible teacher hiring: Needed, but controversial reform
360 degree education accountability: Needed, but controversial reform
Eliminate seniority hierarchy in
education: Needed, but controversial
reform
Give preferences to wireless
technologies: Federal bandwidth
should be allocated rationally
Real pension accounting: Need honesty in accounting
Let U.S. firms compete: foreign corrupt practices act should be reformed
Ease import-export documentation: Reform is needed
More tourist visa waver: Reform to make it easier for tourists to visit here
End mortgage deductions: Reform so that only modest home mortgages are covered
Here’s the Beef
Conservatives
attack academic freedom.
600
legal scholars attack torture of Bradley Manning.
Make
Pence lies about planned parenthood.
Donald
Trump changes his views to woo Tea Party Conservatives.
Even
though Conservative Wisconsin chief justice won, Wisconsin Conservatives are
still vulnerable.
State and
Local
David Blair: See What Students and Teachers Are Facing
Midge Livingston is my daughter
and she is in a district that normally is a very rich district. I can't
imagine what can happen in districts that are not as rich as Mukilteo.
This is a problem for the education of all kids in the state. David Blair
Dear friends and family, Washington State’s economic problems are growing and
will impact my job and the quality of education for the students
in our community and I want to share some information with you and ask you
for a favor.
The Information: The
Mukilteo School District is looking for ways to cut an additional 3 million
dollars from the budget for 2011-2012. They are looking at anything that is not
"basic education" which is one teacher in a class with 30 students
(or 150 at high school). Teacher-librarians (ME and my colleagues) support the
entire school with direct instruction and collaboration related to
reading, research, classroom projects and technology. This web site
summarizes some of the ways that teacher-librarians make a difference in the
learning for our students; please take a look if you have time.
The Request: Let your
friends and neighbors know that school librarian jobs are at
risk in the Mukilteo School District and invite them to talk to anyone that
could help change the outcome (building principals, district administration,
and school board members). Visit the WEA
petition to our state legislators asking them to suspend state mandated
testing at the high school level to relieve the cuts to K-4 education that will
be the end of school librarians in Mukilteo. Call or email if you have
questions or suggestions! Thank you! Midge
Livingston
Don Smith: Bob Hasegawa Discusses Budget Reforms
Sunday
afternoon I attended the King County Dems’ Legislative Action Committee meeting
in Renton, where Rep. Bob Hasegawa was the guest speaker. He is awesome: a
strong progressive and an unpretentious, nice guy. The meeting was
riveting, for political junkies like me anyway, and well attended. I
guess the attendees all felt like fellow comrades in arms. The battle is to
deal with the fallout from Tim Eyman’s anti-tax initiatives that passed last
year and to figure out how to stop the voters from supporting such destructive
initiatives that are against their own self-interest.
Hasegawa
lamented the lack of leadership by Democrats in Olympia, especially with regard
to raising revenue. Missing In Action and Gone South were words that came up
with respect to some issues at least. Hasegawa also expressed dissatisfaction
with President Obama’s leadership on some issues. (Who isn’t dissatisfied?) Governor
Gregoire has talked like a Republican in her opposition to raising revenue,
citing last fall’s votes on tax measures as her reason. Policies she’s pushing
would have a disproportionate impact on the poor and on communities of color.
For example, she wants to allow colleges to raise tuition. To offset it she wants
to start up corporate scholarship programs, funded by a 50% tax write-off
— which would further decrease available state funds.
Hasegawa
said we need a long-term strategy to build up both a progressive marketing
machine and political power. The strategy needs to be both inside
and outside the legislature/Democratic Party. But if we propose something
(a referendum, for example) that’s been poorly designed we’ll get trounced and
set ourselves back. We need to lay the groundwork.
It
appears that the WEA has given up on revenue (presumably because the voters are
just so opposed to taxes). If the major beneficiaries of tax revenue have
given up on revenue, we’re in trouble.
Someone
asked “How do we get through the voter’ blinders about taxes?” One part of the
solution is to drive a wedge between small and big business. Most of the tax
write-offs benefit Big Business. Small businesses should actually support us on
this.
During
the meeting, we reviewed the high priority bills that Dems are interested in
this year in Olympia. A lot of good ones didn’t make it out of
committees. Senator Kline heroically sponsored a joint Senate memorial to
overturn Citizens’ United. But it failed to be reported out of committee,
because not enough committee members were in the room. Big Pharma was
able to kill a pharmaceutical bill 24 to 25, by pressuring a wavering
Republican. Johnson & Johnson lobbied hard against a toxics bill.
Senate Bill 5506 is bad news for Workers’ Comp.
On
the good news front, it appears that Trans Alta, the governor, and the
electrical worker’s union IBEW have come to a compromise on a schedule for
shutting down the Trans Alta coal plants in phases, ending in 2020 instead of
2015.
There
are six Democrats in the state Senate who regularly vote with Republicans to
squash progressive legislation, especially on fiscal matters. They
“hold the key to everything.” Many bills in the Senate are decided by a couple
of votes. I was wondering if the Left in Washington State needs someone or some
people to be attack dogs — willing to say impolite things that others
can’t easily say. Can groups like WA Liberals, or FUSE, or others
on the left apply pressure on these Dems to do the right thing? Can LDs
kick out centrist Dems or would those Dems just be replaced with even worse
Republicans?
Speaker
Frank Chopp spoke at an earlier LAC meeting. I was impressed by his smarts and
his desire to do progressive things. Hasegawa also spoke highly of him. Chopp
suggested that all Dems cancel their Seattle Times subscriptions, something
I’ve suggested too. Hasegawa said that Chopp is powerful but he’s not a miracle
worker: if the Democratic caucuses strongly support something, Chopp can’t
overrule them. Sarajane Siegfriedt mentioned that Chopp once said, “They’ll take
away the Disability Lifeline OVER MY DEAD BODY!” This year, due to the
budget shortfall and the inability to raise revenue, we may see a dead body.
Even
some Republican legislators see the need for Basic Health. But some
of them really do think government is evil, Hasegawa said. The blue-green
Working Family caucus of progressive Democrats was quite effective last
session. It has morphed somewhat since last year. The State Bank is
actually a bipartisan issue: some Republicans support it. Of course the
private banks oppose it, and so does the State Treasurer. The GOP is holding
legislators to strict party discipline and insisting they oppose it.
$57
million was spent on state-wide initiative campaigns last year — four
times the previous record. Senate Bill 5021 (The Disclose
Act) would enhance election spending disclosure to promote transparency.
The bill is very much alive and deserves support. It’s not as good as a
constitutional amendment overturning the Citizens’ United ruling, but it’s a step
in the right (left) direction.
During
the question and answer period, someone mentioned that some GOP governors want
states to declare bankruptcy, so that states can renege on funding employee
pension plans. Hasegawa said that the state legislators would NOT allow
that to happen here. If the state declared bankruptcy, it could not borrow any
money.
David
Spring presented a resolution calling on the legislature to
end tax breaks for corporations with more than $1 billion in yearly
profit. Such corporations would include Boeing and Microsoft. The
funds would be applied to public education, in accordance with the state
constitution’s dictum that the “paramount duty” of the legislature is to support
education. Everyone at the meeting agreed with the intent of
the resolution, but some people said that it wasn’t timely and that it was
politically infeasible (Boeing!). Also, someone questioned whether all
the funds should go to education, since Basic Health and other social services
need funding too. The resolution passed (by 13 to 7, I believe). The LAC
can only recommend resolutions to the King County Central Committee.
David
Spring’s resolution says “House Ways and Means Chairman Ross Hunter recently
stated that a delay in the June payment to public schools is a ‘forgone
conclusion — unless something more attractive comes up’,” due to the
budget shortfall. That means that about $500 million may be cut from
education, according to David Spring. That’s about equal to the tax giveaways
to Boeing ($300 million per year) and Microsoft ($200 million per year).
“The paramount duty of the legislature is NOT providing hundreds of millions of
dollars in tax exemptions for the richest corporations in the history of our
planet.” Also: “school funding in our State has already been cut by more
than $2 billion in the past two years while not a single penny has been cut in
tax breaks for wealth corporations.” All very true. If the people only knew and
understood.
Even
if bills don’t become law, there can be value in bringing them up for votes,
since it raises peoples’ awareness of the issues and since it can force
legislators to cast votes on controversial measures.
Hasegawa
suggested changing the Voter’s Guide pamphlet to be more informative about the
cost of tax breaks (“tax preferences”).
Conservatives
are winning the war to destroy government, by cutting taxes for the rich and
slashing state budgets. The voters are voting against their own self-interest,
because conservatives control the agenda through clever marketing, through
corporate money, through better media access, and through weak Democratic
leadership. Hasegawa mentioned that the Democratic Party has a wonderful
platform. The problem is that it’s often ignored by the legislators. Don Smith
Sarajane Siegfriedt: Status of Legislative Reforms
Dear Dave, Here is a link to the King County Democrats Legislative
Action Committee's Bill Status Chart, updated as of Saturday. We
hope you will print it out and use it. The next legislative cutoff date for
bills to clear policy committees is March 25th. The list is only 3 pages,
because so many of our priority bills died at the cutoff.
These include:
·
Rep.
Mary Lou Dickerson's HB 1550 and Sen. Prentice's SB 5598 to legalize, regulate
and tax marijuana
·
Rep.
Billig and Sen. White's HB 1271/ SB 5194 limiting the use of fertilizer
containing phosphorous
·
Sen.
Nelson's 5231 regarding making children's products safe from toxic chemicals
(also Rep. Dickerson's HB 1319)
·
Sen.
Kline's SB 5234 creating a medicine return program (also HB 1370, Rep. Van De
Wege)
·
Sen.
Kline's SB 5236 reforming the 3-strikes law for certain low-level offenders
·
Rep.
Kelly's campaign finance disclosure HB 1732
·
Rep.
Reykdahl's HB 1668 and Sen. Nelson's SB 5297 that would have strengthened the
citizen initiative process
·
Sen.
Nelson's Clean Water Jobs Act SB 5604 (also Rep. Ormsby's HB 1735).
We thank all these champions of our Democratic values and the lobbyists who
worked hard behind the scenes for our coalition partners. We sincerely hope to
see them back next year. Please continue to advocate for our priorities and
budget issues. Our budget represents our Democratic values, even in the Great
Recession. Sarajane Siegfriedt and Craig
Salins, co-chairs, King County Democrats Legislative Action Committee
Craig Salins: Building
Awareness to Overturn Citizens United
Riki Ott - one of the
co-founders of MoveToAmend.org - will likely be in Washington state the week of
May 16th (through May 20 or so, yet to be confirmed). We're working with
several groups - MoveToAmend/Olympia, our Spokane group, and others around the
state - hoping to arrange
presentations by her in
several locations, including Tacoma, and elsewhere. The Olympia event will
likely be May 16th. I believe she's already scheduled in Bellingham,
later in the week. We'll support that event (and others) in any way
we can. Riki's visit is yet another opportunity to build awareness of a
combined campaign to overturn the Citizens United ruling, likely
through nationwide citizen pressure for a constitutional amendment on corporate
power and corporate personhood.
As background:
Riki is most knowledgeable about environmental damage and health dangers
from oil, fighting court battles against corporations (BP and Exxon, for
example) and the whole topic of corporate personhood. She's from Cordova,
Alaska - and witnessed the Exxon Valdez oil spill firsthand. She became
an activist in the corporate battle that ensued. She is just recently
back from the Gulf, where she’s been helping the people who have been damaged
by the oil spill to win some of their battles. There is a very good video
she put out about the Alaska Oil Spill. Here is the trailer for it: http://www.blackwavethefilm.com/videos.
And - her bio is here: http://www.rikiott.com/
If you have ideas about Riki's visit - and a possible opportunity for her to speak, please let me know. We have an informal team working to coordinate her itinerary. And - we'll certainly announce any and all events, as it shapes up. Craig Salins
Here’s the Beef
Nation
and World
Featured Advocacy Group
-------------------------------------- Resist --------------------------------------------
RESIST
funds activist organizing and education work within movements for social
change. RESIST began in 1967 with
a "call to resist illegitimate authority" in support of draft
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it is like to move forward and beat the odds.
As a foundation, RESIST is unique because we are
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RESIST is more than a foundation. We're also a
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Gaddhafi May be Replaced by One of His Sons
Moammar
Gaddhafi’s son Seif al-Islam may be attempting to persuade his father to leave
Libya with Seif in control. Seif has some times been as abusive as his father
and has sometimes posed as a reformer, such that it is difficult to know which
he would do if his father were to leave. But he would surely have less
credibility among his father’s supporters, and would thus be easier to remove
from power. Let’s hope he succeeds in persuading his father to leave. For
more.
Here’s the Beef
Our
Liberal Spirit
If IT Sounds Too Good to be True, It Probably Isn’t True.
It apparently isn’t true that
Gaddhafi’s son is trying to get Gaddhafi to resign. It also wasn’t true that Conservative Wisconsin Chief
Justice was defeated. We have to be careful not to let wishful thinking entice
us into believing reports that aren’t true. Nevertheless, there may still be enough evidence in both
reports that what we want will eventually happen.
Book Reviews – See our list of books for liberals
Michael Karpin, 2006, The Bomb in
the Basement. How Israel Went Nuclear and What That Means for the World
Michael
Karpin’s book described how our U.S. ignored Israel’s creation of nuclear bombs
to the detriment of nuclear non-proliferation.