$70 million contract to Raytheon for inferior anti-RPG system

Front paged at Booman Tribune and ePluribus Media

Why does the Army not support its' own troops?

According to a NBC News report, the Army had awarded Raytheon a $70 million contract to develop an anti-rocket propelled grenade system, despite the fact that the system was clearly inferior to a competing system and nearly half of the technical team assigned to evaluate the anti-RPG systems were Raytheon employees.

Not only that, but the Raytheon system wasn't even tested under "live" conditions and won't be available until 2011, while the competing/better system (and the one preferred by a different Pentagon division) could be ready by next year.

Politics and cronyism over our troops' lives and safety...

The "better" system was produced by an Israeli firm, was extensively tested, and had a very high success rate - all which would be positives when it comes to saving the lives of our troops. RPGs, as many of us have heard, are easy to hide, easy to use and have killed nearly 200 of our troops in Afghanistan and Iraq:

OFT officials subjected Trophy to 30 tests and found that it is "more than 98 percent" effective at killing RPGs.

An official involved with those tests told NBC that Trophy "worked in every case. The only anomaly was that in one test, the Trophy round hit the RPG's tail instead of its head. But according to our test criteria, the system was 30 for 30."

---snip---

In an e-mail, a senior official writes: "Trophy is a system that is ready -- today... We need to get this capability into the hands of our warfighters ASAP because: (1) It will save lives!"

Officials also tell NBC News that according to the Pentagon's own method of measuring a weapons system's readiness, Trophy is "between a 7 and an 8" out of a possible score of 9. Raytheon's system is said to be a "3."

So what did the Army do to counter the overwhelming evidence that a non-Raytheon product was better, more accurate and of course, better to, you know, "support our troops"? Well, they cancelled the "shoot off rodeo", which was designed to test the accuracy of the systems in favor of a different selection process:

Last year, the Army planned to test competing RPG defense systems in what officials refer to as a "shoot-off rodeo." At the time, Raytheon's system was still on the drawing board, and the Army opted to cancel the test.

In a statement to NBC News, the Army explained that the cancellation was "primarily because of concerns related to cost, supportability, practicality and fairness." But Pentagon officials involved in past shoot-offs say money should not have been a factor since defense contractors, not the Army, normally shoulder the cost of system vs. system competitions.

Read that again. Raytheon's system wasn't even ready to go live, so instead of testing other systems in a selection process, the entire testing process was cancelled. And what happened with the "new selection process"? Well, the selection team was staffed with numerous Raytheon employees.

Army documents obtained by NBC News, however, reveal that nine of the 21 technical experts -- as well as all the administrative personnel -- were from Raytheon. The team ultimately concluded that of the seven RPG defense systems examined, Raytheon's was "the clear winner."

Raytheon's "Quick Kill" solution -- which the Army concedes will not be fielded before 2011 at the earliest -- won out over Trophy, the Israeli system championed by the Pentagon's Office of Force Transformation.

---snip---

The Army later told NBC News that, its own document notwithstanding, the technical team actually consisted of 30 people plus two administrative assistants and that a total of eight people were from Raytheon.

"That sure doesn't look like an objective panel to me," says Phil Coyle, a former principal adviser to the secretary of defense on weapons testing and evaluation. "It just doesn't pass the ho-ho test when you have that many people from one company on the selection panel and then that company is the one that's chosen."

And lest anyone think this is anything OTHER than playing politics with our troops' lives, even senior Pentagon officials are calling bullshit on the Raytheon selection:

"There are some in the Army who would be extremely concerned that if the Trophy system worked, then the Army would have no need to go forward with the Raytheon system and the program might be terminated," says Steven Schooner, who teaches procurement law at both George Washington University and the Army's Judge Advocate General's School.

Trophy's supporters inside the Pentagon are more blunt. As one senior official told NBC News, "This debate has nothing, zero, to do with capability or timeliness. It's about money and politics. You've got a gigantic program [FCS] and contractors with intertwined interests. Trophy was one of the most successful systems we've tested, and yet the Army has ensured that it won't be part of FCS and is now trying to prevent it from being included on the Strykers" that OFT planned to send to Iraq.

Just another sad chapter in the United States of Corporate `Murka under the Bu$hCo administration. Screw the people. Screw the troops. Safety - what safety? Just line your pockets while the gettin's good.

70% of Ground Zero workers have major health problems

Front paged at Booman Tribune and ePluribus Media. Recommended at Daily Kos

I'm in a truly foul mood. In this "all 9/11 propaganda all the time" world we are in now, especially as we are coming up on the 5th anniversary of the attacks, a major study to be released tomorrow by The Mount Sinai Medical Center will provide more proof that politics, warmongering, lies, propaganda, photo ops and flat out negligence by the Bush Administration, as well as NYC Mayor Bloomberg are more important than the extremely brave people who worked tirelessly at Ground Zero in the days and weeks after the attacks.

Not only that, but it really makes me wonder what kind of liability our own government has towards these families since we now know that the Bush Administration ordered the EPA to lie about the air quality at Ground Zero. And while we are all talking about the ABC propagandafest (and doing a great job of keeping the pressure on, I might add), there have been some big developments in recent days surrounding the people who spent countless hours at Ground Zero.

Now, I don't know if it is making even a peep outside of NYC, but there have been numerous stories here in the NY Daily News about Ground Zero workers over the past couple of days. And with all of the exploiting of what better not become a national holiday, complete with 9/11 blowout sales and price reductions, these heroes lives, and their health issues have been completely ignored. Which, frankly, is total bullshit, considering the fact that many of them put in way more hours and time than was required - just to help out their fellow Americans at a great time of need and sorrow.

The report which was conducted by Mount Sinai included nearly 12,000 workers over a nearly two year period, and will be released in full tomorrow in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives. According to the press release:

The findings are based upon medical examinations performed between July 2002 and April 2004 on 9,500 WTC responders. These responders were a highly diverse group and included members of the building trades, law enforcement officers, firefighters, utilities and telecommunications workers, transit workers, and many others. All received a comprehensive examination that included complete physical examination, mental health evaluation, pulmonary function tests, chest x-ray, blood tests and urinalysis. Overall, the monitoring program examined close to 12,000 responders during the 21-month period covered by the study; 9,500 of whom agreed to allow their results to be used in this report.

So we are talking about a wide sample of people here, as well as a wide array of tests. And the results, while predictable to those of us in the reality based community, are still very scary. Not only because of the findings to those who were down in Ground Zero over this period of time, but also for anyone else who lived or worked down by Ground Zero (including yours truly, who worked at the World Financial Center from May 2002 through July 2003). It discusses pulmonary abnormalities in workers which were twice the expected rate for the general population, and continued for months after the exposure.

The study published today focuses on respiratory health consequences, one of the earliest areas of concern to emerge. The study found that many responders were symptomatic, with high rates of pulmonary function abnormalities as long as two-and-a-half years after the disaster. The findings are particularly striking, in that the workers who served at the World Trade Center tended to be vigorous, healthy workers who held jobs in strenuous professions such as the building and utility trades before September 11. Specific findings included:

• Almost 70 percent of World Trade Center responders had a new or worsened respiratory symptom that developed during or after their time working at the WTC;



• Among the responders who were asymptomatic before 9/11, 61 percent developed respiratory symptoms while working at the WTC;



• Close to 60 percent still had a new or worsened respiratory symptom at the time of their examination;



• One third had abnormal pulmonary function tests, much higher than expected;



• Severe respiratory conditions including pneumonia were significantly more common in the six months after 9/11 than in six months prior.

But wait, it gets worse.

There was a diary posted earlier today by Ira R Allen (which got no comments and a lonely recommend from yours truly) about this study, but talks about the lack of health insurance for many of the Ground Zero workers.

According to the diary, as well as the NY Times article on the study, contains a startling quote from Dr. Robin Herbert, co-director of Mount Sinai's World Trade Center Worker and Volunteer Medical Screening Program:

Most of the ground zero workers in the study who reported trouble breathing while working there were still having those problems up to two and a half years later, an indication that the illnesses are becoming chronic and are not likely to improve over time. Some of them worked without face masks, or with flimsy ones. "There should no longer be any doubt about the health effects of the World Trade Center disaster," said Dr. Robin Herbert, co-director of Mount Sinai's World Trade Center Worker and Volunteer Medical Screening Program. "Our patients are sick, and they will need ongoing care for the rest of their lives."

Dr. Herbert called the findings, which will be published tomorrow in Environmental Health Perspectives, the journal of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, "very worrisome," especially because 40 percent of those who went to Mount Sinai for medical screening did not have health insurance, and will thus not get proper medical care. The Mount Sinai results found, as studies done by the New York City Fire Department also have, that those who showed up in the first hours and days after the twin towers collapsed have the worst medical problems. Seventy percent of the workers in the study arrived at the site between Sept. 11 and Sept. 13.

And what does NYC's top official, "Mayor Mike" have to say about this? Well, I'll give you a hint - it is the same up front truthiness that he exhibited when lying talking about the reasons for blocking the protests during the 2004 republicna convention:

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, speaking at a news conference at City Hall yesterday, questioned the conclusiveness of the study, saying that statistics could suggest a connection between events, but not prove a direct link.

"I don't believe that you can say specifically a particular problem came from this particular event," he said.

Yeah, right. Then please explain how over a dozen search dogs who were at Ground Zero have died between 9/11 and mid 2004. Or how so many "coincidental" cancer deaths have occurred for people who were down at Ground Zero. Or please explain the following quote about the toxic nature of the materials and debris from the World Trade Center:

The doctors said that the persistent nature of the respiratory symptoms raised troubling questions about the workers' long-term health. Dr. Philip J. Landrigan, a founder of the screening program at Mount Sinai and an author of the new study, said that the toxic nature of the trade center dust had led doctors to conclude that there would be serious health issues for years to come, especially for workers who were exposed to the heaviest concentrations in the early days after the terrorist attack.

"This was extremely toxic dust," Dr. Landrigan said, noting that some samples showed the dust to be as caustic as drain cleaner. The dust also contained innumerable tiny shards of glass, which could get lodged in the lungs, and a stew of toxic and carcinogenic substances, like asbestos and dioxin, that could potentially lead to cancer decades from now.

Oh I see. It is ok to play politics with Ground Zero and the horrific tragedy that occurred nearly five years ago. But when it comes to actually helping out those who are in need - just like the soldiers who have been sent to fight and die for a lie without proper armor or equipment (or a plan), just like those who were stranded in the Gulf Coast while a hurricane that the entire world saw coming demolished the entire region, just like the entire middle and lower class - then it is "tough shit, there is nothing to see here, please kindly move along while we steal your money, your pride and your life".

Just disgusting. Let's not let the stories of these workers and heroes fall by the wayside. Let's not forget how many more people's lives and health is at risk.

And let's not forget that it was the White House who lied about the air quality at Ground Zero, or that the mayor of NYC is denying the overwhelming evidence of the cause-effect relationship between Ground Zero and the health of the people who so bravely spent countless hours helping out their fellow Americans.

Republicans Flip/Flop on Immigration Legislation

Front paged at Booman Tribune

Remember that whole "illegal immigration is the biggest threat to our nation and we must round up all immigrants and throw them out, legal or not" mass hysteria from a few months ago? Well as Emily Litella used to say, "Never mind...."

As reported in today's NY Times the Republicans are not even discussing immigration reform as part of their "aggressive pre-election day agenda". Of course, this could have something to do with the fact that every poll is looking bleaker and bleaker for the republicans chances in November (although I'll believe it after the election). Or it could have something to do with the massive protests all around the country.

Or it could be because republicans are losers. (thx, buhdy)

But either way, it wasn't too long ago that all we heard was that illegal immigration was the worst thing since, well, gay marriage. It wasn't too long ago that Pat Buchannan was everywhere discussing how Bush should be impeached because of the illegal immigration issue. It wasn't too long ago that all we heard about was the Minutemen on the Arizona border, just waiting to "pick off one of them illegals", or that there was a push to make English the "national language". Or when talking meatsticks were stating how the immigration marches and rallys were a "perfect chance to arrest illegal immigrants".

Now, I don't really want to discuss the merits of immigration reform here, or whether this is a major issue for the US, or anything else related to the substance behind immigration reform laws.

What I want to discuss is that, once again, after working this country into a frenzy, while even Democrats were realizing that this is not an issue to be politicizing, and we had bills coming out of the House that pretty much threatened to deport anyone who wasn't white and spoke English, the republicans have now dropped this issue like a hot potato (or is it potatoe....)

What this really shows is two things: first, it shows that once again, Bush can't get one of his "pet projects" to be taken seriously enough by his own party. Regardless of whether his "guest worker program" was feasible, regardless of the fact that any serious plan would have to include stiff penalties for employers who hire illegal immigrants, the republican Congresscritters just don't want to do what Dear Leader says, lest it cost them their precious Congressional seat.

What it also shows is that the republicans are, once again doing what they do best -- playing politics with people's lives, while not accomplishing anything. And here is another instance, even complimented by juicy quotes from John Boehner and others in Congress that should be thrown back in each and every one of their faces over the next eight weeks. Take this one for starters:

As they prepare for a critical pre-election legislative stretch, Congressional Republican leaders have all but abandoned a broad overhaul of immigration laws and instead will concentrate on national security issues they believe play to their political strength.

With Congress reconvening Tuesday after an August break, Republicans in the House and Senate say they will focus on Pentagon and domestic security spending bills, port security legislation and measures that would authorize the administration's terror surveillance program and create military tribunals to try terror suspects.

"We Republicans believe that we have no choice in the war against terror and the only way to do it is to continue to take them head-on whether it is in Iraq or elsewhere," said Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, the majority leader.

A final decision on what do about immigration policy awaits a meeting this week of senior Republicans. But key lawmakers and aides who set the Congressional agenda say they now believe it would be politically risky to try to advance an immigration measure that would showcase party divisions and need to be completed in the 19 days Congress is scheduled to meet before breaking for the election.

Or this one from Cat Killer, MD:

In an appearance in Iowa last week, Mr. Frist said broad legislation addressing what to do about millions of illegal immigrants already in the United States might have to await the next Congress.

Nothing like passing the buck instead of trying to actually do the hard part of making legislation instead of just blowing hot air about the latest divisive issue and creating sound bytes and talking points.

But leave it to Mitch McConnell to drive home the point that republicans just don't care about doing anything other than taking potshots and "scoring points":

With the immigration measure seemingly stalled, Republicans say they will put most of their time and energy into security-oriented measures to drive home a theme that has served them well in the last two elections -- that they are better equipped to thwart terrorism than are Democrats.

"They'll wave the white flag in the war on terror," Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the No. 2 Republican in the Senate, said Sunday of the Democrats on the CBS News program "Face the Nation."

The opportunities for Democrats are everywhere. The republicans quotes that show their true intent. The republicans absolute and miserable failure on every issue. The rubber stamp of the war crimes and other illegal acts by Bush, Rice, Rumsfeld and of course, Cheney. They can't run from their record. They can't run ON their record. Their priorities - Terri Schiavo vs. the Gulf Coast.

And now, they can't even keep their own house in order long enough to deal with illegal immigration - an issue that they themselves made such a big deal about just a few short months ago.

Doesn't it figure....

Upcoming NIE on Iraq Likely to be Ugly

Front paged at Booman Tribune and ePluribus Media. Recommended at Daily Kos

Nearly six weeks ago, six Senate Democrats, including Harry Reid, Joe Biden and Edward Kennedy sent a letter to John Negroponte (Director of National Intelligence for those who aren't "in the know"...) urging an updated National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq. For starters, this was long overdue, considering the last one was in 2004, and wasn't too pretty, offering three possibilities in Iraq, ranging from "continued instability" (or "bad") to civil war ("worst").

Of course, since then things have gotten completely out of hand and we are now stuck in that "worst" scenario, even though many officials still have their heads in their asses the sand and deny the obvious. And just three days ago, Negroponte decided to draft an updated NIE.

This, in and of itself is pretty big news, but the report will likely be pretty scary as far as the content.

For starters, the NIE isn't really just a nonsense piece of BushCo neocon propaganda, as it is the judgment of the entire intelligence community and as a good example, the NIE on Iran indicates that they are around 10 years from having a nuclear bomb. While much, if not all of the NIE is pretty much classified, for obvious reasons, there have been pieces that were declassified in the past.

With respect to Iraq, the request from Democratic Senators asks some pointed questions in the area of Security, US force levels, Terrorism, Civil War and other areas, including the following:

Is Iraq in or descending into a civil war?

What factors will prevent or reverse deterioration of the sectarian situation?

Is Iraq succeeding in standing up effective security forces?

What factors will increase the chances of that occurring?

To what extent are militias providing security in Iraq?

To what extent has the Government of Iraq developed and implemented a credible plan to disarm and demobilize and reintegrate militias into government security forces?

To what extent is the Government of Iraq working to obtain a political commitment from political parties to ban militias?

What is the threat from violent extremist- related terrorism, including Al Qaeda, in and from Iraq?

What factors will address the terrorist threat?

Is Iraq succeeding in creating a stable and effective unity government?

What is the likelihood that changes to the constitution will be made to address concerns of the Sunni community?

What factors will increase the chances of that occurring?

Is Iraq succeeding in rebuilding its economy and creating economic prosperity for Iraqis?

What factors will increase the chances of that occurring?

According to press accounts, the 2004 NIE contained analysis on three possible scenarios for Iraq's stability through the end of 2005. What are the scenarios through 2007?

In what ways is the large-scale presence of multi-national forces helping or hindering Iraqis' chances of success?

All fair questions, if you ask me. And on this anniversary of 9/11, where we will no doubt see more puff pieces downplaying the complete mishandling of just about everything since January 2001 (and I don't care that all or some of this was "the grand plan"), we deserve answers.

Either way you look at this, it ain't too good. Take the lines being touted this past week that the threat to Iraq from foreign terrorist groups is receding as indicated by General John Abizaid:

Army Gen. John Abizaid, the top officer in Central Command, told Congress on Thursday that al Qaeda in Iraq's ranks had been "significantly depleted" since the June 7 death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Its members, he said, now total "less than 1,000."

That is far below earlier estimates, though several officials said Friday that not all within the intelligence community agree with Abizaid's number.

Over the past year, intelligence and military officials have said foreign fighters made up less than 10 percent of the roughly 20,000 insurgents in Iraq.

Well, ok - if that is true, then we are basically fighting against Iraqis who want us out - those who don't want a foreign force occupying their country. Oh, and stuck in the middle of a raging civil war, a civil war that we have no business being in the middle of, and no reason to be a referee in. That certainly isn't part of the "course that we should be staying". And it also means that the total bullshit line about Iraq being the "central front in the WarOnTerra^TM" is just that - total bullshit.

Or, take it the other way - there are more foreign terrorists in Iraq than we estimate. Then what? We know that they weren't there before we invaded, despite how loud some on the "right" want to scream it. And before anyone thinks that the capture of the five hundredth "number two man" would lead to more stability, we find today that 33 bullet riddled and tortured bodies were found today throughout Baghdad.

A short article on MSNBC.com gives a hint of what can possibly be expected from the upcoming NIE:

The contents of the report may have been foreshadowed in a recent series of closed-door briefings given to Congress by the Defense Intelligence Agency. The Pentagon's intelligence arm painted a scenario in which Iraq could dissolve into civil war if Iraqi security forces don't soon get their act together. One official familiar with the briefing, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitive subject matter, said that the picture it painted was dire, although another official--who requested anonymity for the same reason--insisted it was not entirely despairing, since Iraqi security forces were beginning to improve.

The question, of course, is whether this will be enough to smack the percentage of Americans who think that Iraq is still going well or isn't in a civil war or is helping keep us safer in the face.

And will it make those in Congress who are frantically running from Dear Leader in their quest to be a total shameless whore reelected actually stand up and get serious about Iraq - something that they should have done well over three years ago?

On Labor Day Weekend, We Mourn the American Worker...

Front paged at Booman Tribune and ePluribus Media

This weekend marks another Labor Day which, in addition to being the "celebrated" last weekend of summer, actually got its roots from the celebration of the labor movement. In fact, according to the US Department of Labor's own website:

The form that the observance and celebration of Labor Day should take were outlined in the first proposal of the holiday -- a street parade to exhibit to the public "the strength and esprit de corps of the trade and labor organizations" of the community, followed by a festival for the recreation and amusement of the workers and their families. This became the pattern for the celebrations of Labor Day. Speeches by prominent men and women were introduced later, as more emphasis was placed upon the economic and civic significance of the holiday.

Sadly however, in this day and age, it seems more and more appropriate to treat this Labor Day as somewhat of a funeral for the labor movement, and by and large, the American worker.

And quite ironically, as Bush once again gave a "long on nonsense, short on substance" speech where he touted how strong the economy is and how thankful we should be to have him grace us with his tremendous vision and "compassionate conservatism" that got him duly (and without any controversy) elected not once but twice to lead this great and free world.

America is the most innovative Nation in the world because our free enterprise system unleashes the talent and creativity of our people. American workers are vital to our Nation's economic prosperity, and they help us confront the competitive challenges of the global marketplace.

My Administration remains committed to fostering an environment where innovation succeeds and opportunity thrives. Since August 2003, our economy has created more than 5.7 million jobs, and manufacturing production has risen 5.6 percent in the last year. Our economic expansion is lifting the lives of millions of our citizens, and we will continue to work toward developing sound economic polices that keep our economy moving forward and create more jobs for American workers.

Each year on Labor Day, we recognize the dedicated men and women of our Nation's workforce. By working hard each day, these highly-skilled individuals build better lives for themselves and their families and make America stronger.

Now, pardon my language here, but what an obnoxious sneering self righteous lying sanctimonious piece of shit he is.

Because, quite frankly, there is little for the American workforce to be thankful for, or to celebrate. Not just this year, but over the past six years - as a result of the systematic dismantling of any workforce protections to the benefit of the almighty corporate profit.

Where to even begin? Well, I guess we can start with the fact that the "heralded" Bush tax cuts, which are frequently (and inaccurately) pointed to as helping the middle class and American worker greatly benefited the top echelon of individuals in this country. But don't trust me on this, you can go right to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities which goes into great detail on how much the ultra wealthy benefited from the tax cuts. Or we can see how the other highly touted (but bullshit) number, the unemployment rate is really way higher due to the fact that it doesn't count people that have given up looking for a job.

Not enough? OK, well maybe the labor force should be celebrating all those jobs created which Bush has talked about. Um, except for the fact that those numbers are bullshit as well. But at least the tax cuts are keeping everyone paying their fair share, right? Oops, sorry. While the ultra wealthy are cheating the IRS out of around $70 BILLION per year, the IRS has decided to roll out a program to privatize debt collection, which will mainly target middle to lower income families, all while cutting the number of estate tax auditors.

But but, I thought that the American worker has lots to be thankful for. Didn't I hear Bush say that over and over? And isn't the economy just humming along? Ahhhhh, but it is because corporate profits are at the highest share of GDP since the 1960s, while real wages have dropped 2% since 2003 - to the lowest share of GDP since the 1940's:

The median hourly wage for American workers has declined 2 percent since 2003, after factoring in inflation. The drop has been especially notable, economists say, because productivity -- the amount that an average worker produces in an hour and the basic wellspring of a nation's living standards -- has risen steadily over the same period.

As a result, wages and salaries now make up the lowest share of the nation's gross domestic product since the government began recording the data in 1947, while corporate profits have climbed to their highest share since the 1960's.

What else can we celebrate on this Labor Day weekend? Well, how about the fact that recent studies have shown that the middle class is rapidly shrinking in major metropolitan areas and that lower income families have to pay more for the same or similar basic services. Or the fact that Americans work the second longest number of hours per year, or that Americans are taking fewer and fewer vacations.

And lest we forget the all important benefits provided by employers:

Until the last year, stagnating wages were somewhat offset by the rising value of benefits, especially health insurance, which caused overall compensation for most Americans to continue increasing. Since last summer, however, the value of workers' benefits has also failed to keep pace with inflation, according to government data.

---snip---

Although the economy continues to add jobs, global trade, immigration, layoffs and technology -- as well as the insecurity caused by them -- appear to have eroded workers' bargaining power.

Trade unions are much weaker than they once were, while the buying power of the minimum wage is at a 50-year low. And health care is far more expensive than it was a decade ago, causing companies to spend more on benefits at the expense of wages.

So, please join me in a moment of silence as we mourn and remember the American worker on this Labor Day weekend.

The Threat from Toxic Chemicals and Deteriorating Railways

Front paged at Booman Tribune and ePluribus Media

Last night, ABC News ran a report on the very real threat of toxic chemical spills from railway transportation. And frankly, it is amazing that this has gotten such little attention, especially in this "post 9/11" world where, so I've been told millions of times, evil lib'ruls like me are just inviting terrorists to wreak havoc around every corner here in good old `Murka.

The report highlighted the aftermath of how a SC town is dealing with a toxic chemical spill from a train wreck nearly 2 years ago left 9 people dead, over 500 more injured and the town pretty much ruined. However, there are 170,000 miles of railway in the US, with 83 million tons of hazardous materials shipped via railway each year in nearly 2 million carloads. Over 40% of the nations tracks are in what's called a "dark area", which has no lights and no warning system in place.

And guess how much the Bush administration cares about railway safety? Well, three times as much money is spent EACH DAY in Iraq as was allocated for all of 2005 for train security.

I know this isn't the sexiest of topics to be diaring about, but the fact is that this ties right into the truth how weak the republicans are when it comes to national security, not to mention the fact that a new poll shows that 60% of Americans think that the illegal and immoral occupation of Iraq is making terrorism more likely.

Back in 2003, the GAO issued a report that indicated while strides are being made with respect to railway safety, there still is a long way to go in order to create and maintain a long term security plan. Of course, not enough has been done to make the situation better. According to the ABC News report:

Every year there are 1.7 million carloads carrying some of the deadliest chemical agents known to man, crisscrossing the nation--- a number that's rising.

---snip---

Last year alone, there were 846 accidents involving trains carrying deadly chemicals -- a number that's gone up over the last four years.

Thirty-six of those accidents involved the release of toxic chemicals into the air.

A number that has gone up over the last four years. Gee, I wonder what that coincides with....

In describing the 2005 derailment in South Carolina (I don't want to focus too much on it, but there are good articles here and here), where 120,000 pounds of chlorine was released into the air, I'll give you the following blurb:

They remember suddenly hearing a screeching, thunderous explosion of crunching metal. Two trains had crashed, leaving 16 cars derailed.

One car had a punctured tank of poisonous gas.

Adams remembers smelling smoke and immediately calling 911.

"I thought [the train] was gonna come through the wall behind me," she said.

Witnesses described a rolling yellow-green blanket of poison invading the town like something out of a science fiction movie.

"I thought my eyelashes had come off. If I breathed too deeply, it burned like, I guess, like drinking gas," said Adams, who was trapped in her building at the time.

Calls poured into 911 from the nearby plant and from houses, with people complaining of everything from "We can't breathe" to "He's got blood coming out of his eyes."

The accident was caused by a railroad switch that was left in the wrong position. This was the responsibility of Norfolk Southern, who happened to be responsible for over 100 accidents resulting from switches being in the wrong position over the past 4 years. And guess what else about Norfolk Southern? Well, since 2000, they have donated nearly $1.5 million to Republicans (nearly 70% of total donations).

Now, there was legislation passed in Washington DC which would have diverted railroad transportation of hazardous materials around (as opposed to through) the city, thereby avoiding passing right near the Capitol, the Supreme Court and however many other national landmarks (which probably weren't counted when it came to doling out homeland security dollars). But that was fought by CSX back in 2005 because diverting the chemicals would impact its profits. And it won an emergency stay and had an initial ruling reversed to its favor on appeal (I don't know where the case currently stands though).

Oh, and a few other tidbits about CSX Corporation: For starters, it has given Bush and other Congressional allies around $600,000. And guess who used to head up CSX Corporation? None other than Treasury Secretary John Snow himself.

Ah, but I digress.

So how bad is the situation? Well, even though the American Association for Railroads claims that they have a 99.997% percent safety rating, which I will say is pretty impressive, there are many things that are still severely lacking. For starters, the American Society of Civil Engineers rated the US railways a "C-" on its 2005 report card, indicating the following:

For the first time since World War II, limited rail capacity has created significant chokepoints and delays. This problem will increase as freight rail tonnage is expected to increase at least 50% by 2020. In addition, the use of rail trackage for intercity passenger and commuter rail service is increasingly being recognized as a worthwhile transportation investment. Congestion relief, improved safety, environmental and economic development benefits result from both freight and passenger market shifts to rail creating a rationale for public sector investment. The freight railroad industry needs to spend $175-$195 billion over the next 20 years to maintain existing infrastructure and expand for freight growth. Expansion of the railroad network to develop intercity corridor passenger rail service is estimated to cost approximately $60 billion over 20 years. All told, investment needs are $12-13 billion per year.

And there is a push to make stronger cars, as well as try to push Congress and chemical producers to use safer chemicals. However, the potential for major death and destruction can't be (but sadly is being) ignored. According to the Judge in the CSX case:

As Judge Sullivan observed: "One study [which was conducted by the Naval Research Lab] estimates that an attack on a single rail tank car of chlorine traveling through Washington, during a celebration or political event, could kill or seriously harm 100,000 people within an hour. The toxic plume resulting from such an attack could extend over 40 miles from the point of release, including a core area of about 4 miles by 14.5 miles, within which exposure could be deadly." Instead, however, of working with the city to minimize the catastrophic possibility, the feds and CSX are spending their time and energy in litigation defending CSX's balance sheet and U.S. government turf.

And it is not like this isn't on the radar of Congressional officials and homeland security analysts. According to Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) and homeland security analyst Randal Larson:

"It would not be difficult for terrorists to launch an attack with weapons no more sophisticated than terrorists are using in Iraq today -- a shoulder-fired missile or small bomb -- to rupture one or more or these rail cars and threaten a major section of a city," said homeland security analyst Randall Larsen.

---snip---

"The industry says that they can't afford to build in the additional protections for the public," said Markey. "The truth is that our country can't afford not to build in those extra protections. The damage would be in the billions if one of these incidents occurred in a densely populated area. Spending millions of dollars to protect against it will be viewed as a very small price."

While the Center for American Progress has a detailed report on how to increase railway security, Bush only feels the need to fund the nation's railway security program with $100 million for the entire year.

So while the republicans talk tough about fighting terrorism and about homeland security, here is another major but little discussed area where our homeland is at great risk and yet nothing serious is being done about it.

400+% interest on widespread predatory loans to military families

Front Paged at Booman Tribune and ePluribus Media

You. Have. Got. To. Be. Kidding. Me.

As if being sent halfway around the world to fight for a lie and greed of the neocon war criminals without proper armor or equipment, severe cuts in veterans benefits including treatment for PTSD as well as multiple extensions of tour duty to "stay a course" that no one can even define, there is this kick in the teeth to military families who are cash strapped.

A 90+ page Pentagon report released a few weeks ago (with surprise, surprise, little to no press) titled Report on Predatory Lending Practices Directed at Members of the Armed Forces and Their Dependents shines a truly ugly light on this wonderful capitalistic society we live in where, for the glory of a buck you can screw over our military in their greatest time of need.

The report contains numerous examples of these practices, and makes some recommendations as to how to address this disgusting situation. Additionally, it contains letters from the American Bar Association and the Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society urging action in this area.

According to the USA Today article (linked above), this is a widespread problem, as this predatory lending institutions have popped up near military bases all around the country (the report has maps of six different regions where there are a large number of these institutions.

As many as one in five members of the armed services are being preyed on by loan centers set up near military bases that can charge cash-strapped military families interest of 400% or more, a new Pentagon report has found.

---snip---

The report says "payday loan" stores (so named because their loans are often due on a borrower's next payday) have sprung up by the thousands around military bases and elsewhere in the past decade.

OK - so there are debt problems that would otherwise preclude people from joining the military and serving overseas. Of course, I can think of a large number of lies reasons why people wouldn't want to serve, but let's at least assume that debt is one of them. So instead of the Pentagon or military helping people pay down their debts or working out some arrangement with potential recruits (which may or may not even be feasible to begin with), we have people who are more than willing to step in.

For a huge fee. At a time in these people's lives when there are likely few other options.

Lenders typically charge $15 to $25 per $100 loan for two weeks, and most loans are extended for several weeks. The report says the average loan is $350 and has an annual interest rate of 390% to 780%. The average borrower, it says, pays back $834 for a $339 loan.

The report cites estimates 13% to 19% of servicemembers -- at least 175,000 people -- took out high-interest, short-term loans last year. It said nine out of 10 loans go to borrowers who take out five or more over a year.

And who are these people that are being targeted? Well, other than "just the military and military families", the report goes on to indicate the following:

Predatory lenders seek out young and financially inexperienced borrowers who have bank accounts and steady jobs, but also have little in savings, flawed credit or have hit their credit limit. These borrowers are less likely to weigh the predatory loan against other opportunities and are less likely to be concerned about the consequences of taking the loan.

Predatory lenders make loans based on access to assets (through checks, bank accounts, car titles, tax refunds, etc.) and guaranteed continued income, but not on the ability of the borrower to repay the loan without experiencing further financial problems.

Predatory lenders market to the military through their ubiquitous presence around military installations and/or through the use of terms to affiliate themselves with the military. Increasingly the Internet is used to promote loans to Service members.

Predatory products feature high fees/interest rates, with some requiring balloon payments, while others pack excessive charges into the product. The result of their efforts is to obfuscate the comparative cost of their product with other options available to the borrower.

Most of the predatory business models take advantage of borrower's inability to pay the loan in full when due and encourage extensions through refinancing and loan flipping. These refinances often include additional high fees and little or no payment of principal.

Predatory lenders attempt to work outside of established usury limits, either by attempting to obtain exemptions from federal and state statutes or by developing schemes designed to circumvent existing laws.

I am just speechless. But I guess when you have a "Commander in Chief" (and I put that in quotes since you can't seriously call Bush a commander or a chief) who is a military deserter, a Vice President who bravely had 5 deferments, and a slew of neocon "leaders" who care as much about the military as they do about the rest of We the People, then this shouldn't be surprising.

But it doesn't make it any less disgusting.

New Report: Global Warming Huge Threat to Int'l Economy

Front paged at Booman Tribune and ePluribus Media

Of course, my initial reaction to reading the press release by the World Bank regarding a new report about the threat global warming poses to its international projects, especially in third world countries, was "well, Duh!!!".

But then after reading through the details of the press release (unfortunately, the report is not yet available), I was even more astounded than I was after watching An Inconvenient Truth. According to the World Bank, the impact on the GDP of developing countries as well as the additional health, ecological and general economic impact could be staggering. The report even goes so far as to indicate that the economic impacts of global warming are already being felt, and could get much worse very quickly.

But there is still a question as to whether global warming even exists, right?

The report, titled Managing Climate Risk-Integrating Adaptation into World Bank Group Operations, was released to coincide with the Third Global Environment Facility Assembly these past few days in Cape Town, South Africa. And while the impact could be up to $400 million per year for World Bank projects and $1 billion overall, the impact on poor countries' ability to fight poverty and disease, increase biodiversity and make economic strides is even larger:

The report says that the consequences of such changes include decreased water availability and water quality in many arid and semiarid regions; an increased risk of floods and droughts in many regions; reduction in water regulation by snow and glaciers in mountain habitats; decreases in reliability of hydropower and biomass production in some regions; increased incidence of vector- and waterborne diseases such as malaria, dengue, and cholera; increased heat stress mortality; increased damages and deaths caused by extreme weather events; decreased agricultural productivity with almost any warming in the tropics and subtropics; adverse impacts on fisheries; and adverse effects on many ecological systems. Although climate change will bring some benefits to temperate and cold climates, losses will predominate in the developing world.

But of course, we know how much of a priority it really is for the US to help the poor in their time of need. Further, as a Reuters article quotes from the report:

Global warming is forecast to have a devastating effect on some developing countries as rising sea levels wreak havoc on small island states and more frequent and more severe droughts destroy crops on marginal agricultural land.

Poorer nations, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, where agriculture accounts for about 70 percent of employment, would be the hardest hit.

The World Bank said costs associated with global warming would eat into development aid and projects, forcing donors to reassess spending and infrastructure needed to help cut poverty.

"Several studies have suggested that in the absence of adaptation, the annual costs of climate change impacts in exposed developing countries could range from several percent to tens of percent of gross domestic product (GDP)," the bank said.

"Much of this damage would come not gradually and incrementally through the years but in the form of severe economic shocks," it added.

Several percent to tens of percent of GDP. And not in a slow and incremental manner. Considering that the US GDP is running an estimated increase in excess of $200 billion EACH QUARTER and considering how well the economy here is humming along (HA!!), imagine a quick and sharp drop of, oh say $100 billion to $300 billion EACH QUARTER and the impact it would have on our already "robust" economy. Now consider that much of the GDP increase here (per the report) is due to huge increases in corporate profits (increase in gross profits from production was over $225 billion for the first 2 quarters of 2006).

Not a pretty picture, if you ask me.

Two high level individuals at the Global Environmental Facility had some striking comments about the report, as well as the urgent need to do something now: First, Monique Barbut, Chief Executive Officer of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) had the following to say:

"Funding for adaptation to climate change is absolutely critical for developing countries. The best form of adaptation is mitigation, but we must also deal with the climate change that the planet is already signed up to. I'm delighted that this Assembly has provided the opportunity to bring financing for adaptation forward in the global environmental agenda, and towards the next climate change Conference of the Parties in Nairobi in November."

Additionally, Warren Evans, Environment Director at the World Bank had the following to say:

"Adaptation to climate risks needs to be treated as a major economic and social risk to national economies, not just as a long-term environment problem. By enhancing climate risk management, development institutions and their partner countries will be able to better address the growing risks from climate change and, at the same time, make current development investments more resilient to climate variability and extreme weather events,"

I hope you didn't think that the President of the World Bank would actually have anything to say about this. But we should know better, since he is probably busy with his PNAC buddies trying to drum up reasons for bombing Iran, which we know would take time away from actually helping countries help develop.

Not that this report contains anything that we haven't already thought to be true, but the figures and the wide-ranging impact of global warming around the, you know, globe, is even more staggering than many can wrap their heads around. And when international organizations which are charged with helping third world countries make economic strides have their projects at risk, it is even longer past the time where drastic actions need to be taken.

It is either than or write off entire segments of the world and countries - which is even more disgusting than ignoring the problems and impact in the first place.

While the pressholes overreacted to the latest non-story...

Front paged at Booman Tribune and ePluribus Media

Over the past two weeks or so, as the 24/7 "press" made sure to cover every second of the latest non story, including around 10,000,000 articles on the subject (just like the runaway bride, or any of the missing pretty white women stories), actual, you know, news happened that was more than worth reporting and letting the public know what may actually have an impact on their lives.

And since we have been subjected to every movement, every meal, every talking meatstick's opinion - all of which have amounted to absolutely nothing and an utter waste of the past 10-14 days, there certainly has been a lot of newsworthy events (and I don't mean more staged managed events meant to cover up the true mess that is still the Gulf Coast one year later.)

For example, on August 15 (around the same time that this latest clusterfuck of a news story surfaced), it was reported that Iraqi civilian deaths hit 3,400 in the first half of July alone. This made July the worst month on record, with an average of 110 civilians killed per day. And just yesterday, a car bomb and "sectarian violence" claimed the lives of at least 50 people, including 8 US soldiers. And that doesn't include several more "incidents" which left many more people dead and wounded.

Also in Iraq news, it was barely reported that Iraq has a major fuel crisis and has to double its funding for IMPORTING fuel, as a result of record oil and gasoline shortages.

But why stop there? We also had the tenuous ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon announced right before "all-Karr-all-the-time", and a renewed war of words between Israel, Syria and even the UN and Lebanon.

Remember Afghanistan? Well, things aren't going so swimmingly over there, not that you would know from the less than 62,000 overall articles on Google News. But alas, there were a few suicide bombers targeting NATO troops over there recently, including one earlier in the month which killed 21 civilians in addition to another one targeting NATO troops just yesterday.

How about that other country whose first three letters are "I, R, A"? Well, there has been some activity on their part in the area of nuclear capability. And while we are now hearing that Israel has appointed a top general to oversee a war with Iran, a House report released last week contained some eerily similar and vague language regarding Iran as similar reports did a few years earlier with respect to Iraq.

I know, I know. We only like to see deaths and destruction when it is in a movie or in a video game. We don't want to waste our beautiful minds on this type of stuff.

So fine, forget those pesky wars with the icky deaths that have all but disappeared from the news (well, never forget them, but let's move on...)

What about the huge ruling that declared Bush's NSA spying program unconstitutional? Well, instead of focusing on the fact that the actual spying program is not effective and is in fact, you know illegal and unconstitutional, we get the major focus by the "media" on the supposed "conflict of interest" of the Judge who ruled on the case.

We have news that the median hourly wage DROPPED a full 2% since 2003. The same article declared that:

As a result, wages and salaries now make up the lowest share of the nation's gross domestic product since the government began recording the data in 1947, while corporate profits have climbed to their highest share since the 1960's.

As the first of the potentially major hurricanes is about to hit the southern part of the US, we are hearing how the levees in New Orleans as "as strong as they were pre-Katrina" aren't we forgetting that the levees weren't strong enough pre-Katrina either? But that isn't good enough for the pressititutes - we are seeing everyone report "live from New Orleans for the anniversary of Katrina". We are seeing too much reporting of staged managed and scripted events in the Gulf Coast, with nary a peep about how little progress has actually been made over the past year in the Gulf Coast region.

So now the press has a gaping hole to fill - no mindless story of a kidnapped white teen, a story about a "killer" that had so many holes from the beginning that it made swiss cheese envious. How about taking the opportunity to actually do the job of actually reporting on important things that are going on in the country and the world. You know, things that effect us on a day to day basis. Things that impact our future. Things that effect our children and our livelihoods.

Wait, what's that? Fugitive polygamist Warren Jeffs was just arrested in Las Vegas? YES!!!! Finally something to fill the great news reporting void.

It should be a good next couple of weeks as this non-story gets beaten to death. I wonder how many more laws Bush will break over that time. How many deaths to Iraqi civilians or US troops will occur over that time. What other bad economic news will come out during that time.

Ah, who cares, right? We have our latest story to run 24/7. All is good again in presshole land.....

You're Right, Rummy - You Certainly Are NOT Santa Claus

Front paged at Booman Tribune. Recommended at My Left Wing

Even when you read his comments in print, the arrogance and smugness that makes you want to smack the taste out of his mouth oozes through.

And the latest comments from Herr Rumsfeld are just the latest straw on what is most certainly the strongest back in the history of camels. When talking about the most recent unplanned extension of duty for an Army brigade which was on the brink of returning home, he blurted out this gem:

"I'd love to be Santa Claus. I'm not," he said in an interview with reporters during a flight to Fairbanks.

If it turned out that by December, U.S. commanders in Iraq felt they needed an unscheduled infusion of troops, "our first choice obviously would be to have them be someone other than the people we just extended," Rumsfeld said. "But I'm not going to get into the promises business. That isn't my style."

Santa Claus? More like the Grim Reaper...

This, coming from a man who has the unmitigated gall to tell the troops to their face when confronted about the, you know, lack of basic and necessary armor or equipment told them that "You go to war with the Army you have. They're not the Army you might want or wish to have at a later time."

This is a man, who when authorizing torture of detainees who have not been charged with anything (and probably won't) said "I stand for 8-10 hours a day," Rummy scrawled. "Why is standing limited to four hours?"

This is a man who, when confronted about the lack of WMD in Iraq said, People say, 'Well, where's the smoking gun?' Well, we don't want to see a smoking gun from a weapon of mass destruction."

Oh, but Rummy had a few new gems this past Saturday as well, which are just sickening. Take the following quote, which came from an exchange where he said how the soldiers whose tour was just extended or their families shouldn't be angry at him:

"These people are all volunteers. They all signed up. They all are there doing what they're doing because they want to do it. They're proud of what they do. They do it very, very well."

All volunteers. All signed up. No harm, no foul, right. They get what they deserve signed up for, right?

Like these people, who include women well into their 50s, people who have been retired from the military for over 15 years, and even people who are disabled, but were called by the military to return to service back in 2004.

Or the Marines who were recalled after leaving the military. Including, as so eloquently posted by theophilus last week people who are in their early 60's.

The Army you have.....a hechuva job there, Rummy.

Another reason you are spot on, for the first time in oh, EVER about not being Santa Claus is that Santa Claus would give the troops the equipment and the armor they need to fight this fucking illegal war you rammed down the world's throat in the first place. But no, what do you, the Grim Reaper do? Allow the equipment used by the military in Iraq to, you know, actually work the way it is supposed to:

Three years after the invasion of Iraq, strains are beginning to appear in the U.S. Army's equipment arsenal, reducing its capacity to supply its troops with the best warfighting tools available. While the Army has managed to sustain a high level of readiness in Iraq despite equipment strains, readiness for non-deployed units and units outside of Iraq has already been reduced.

In order to sustain the current pace of military operations in Iraq without leaving the nation vulnerable to aggression in other places, the Department of Defense (DoD) must continuously repair, rebuild and replace equipment worn out or destroyed by the war effort, a process known as "reset." However, normal sustainment patterns have been threatened by the war in Iraq due to the high utilization rates and harsh conditions of the Iraqi environment. The Abrams tank, for example, is operating at six times its rate during peacetime, while medium and heavy trucks are operating at 10 times the typical peacetime rate. These equipment strains currently undermine the Army's ability to confront new challenges overseas or cope with disasters at home and threaten to impede operations in Iraq over the long term.

Oh, and one last reason why you are not Santa Claus. Santa Claus isn't real, and unfortunately, the fact that you are (still) Secretary of Defense and in charge of running the world's most powerful military into the ground - not only from a morale standpoint, but also ruining the equipment, not providing proper armor, stretching them too thin, instituting a "back door draft", authorizing torture (and was personally involved in torture cases at Guantanamo), and countless other comments or actions that have made our military less safe, as well as Americans around the world - is all too real.

This man isn't even fit to be a figment of someone's imagination, let alone the nightmare that he actually is for the hundreds of thousands of Americans who are serving in the military, let alone millions of other people around the world.

Is Rampant Institutional Insider Trading Back?

Front paged at Booman Tribune and ePluribus Media

Of course, there are some who know way more than I do about the stock markets who will probably make the (correct) point that it never really left. And I don't just mean in a "Martha Stewart" kind of way either.

But after reading a story in today's NY Times entitled Whispers of Mergers Set Off Suspicious Trading, it looks like a similar pattern to what happened back in the 1980's when all of the biggest insider trading scandals came to light.

And if that is the case, then what can we expect in terms of the little trust in the stock market, the quite possibly overinflated stock prices and one of the last economic indicators which aren't yet totally in the toilet?

The article cites a study conducted by a company called Measuredmarkets, Inc. which is an analytical research firm that analyzes trends and suspicious data with respect to companies' stock prices surrounding specific events (the link has a few of their recent case studies).

To make this a readable and not overly technical diary, I'll just keep to some of the information uncovered by Measuredmarkets with respect to mergers whose value was over $1 billion, and was over the most recent 12 month period. For starters, according to Christopher Thomas, President of Measuredmarkets:

The firm analyzed the price, the total number of shares traded and the number of individual trades in each stock during the weeks leading up to the announcement and looked for large deviations from trading patterns going back as far as four years.

Although any number of factors can lead to spikes in trading, deviations of the kind observed by Measuredmarkets are among the data used by regulators to spot insider trading. Of the 90 big mergers in the period, shares of 37 target companies exhibited abnormal trading in the days and weeks before the deals were disclosed.

Christopher K. Thomas, a former analyst and stockbroker who founded Measuredmarkets in 1997, said that his company's analysis led to the conclusion that the aberrant activities most likely involved insider trading.

---snip---

It is always possible that a company's stock moves because of developments in a particular industry or business sector, or because a prominent newsletter, columnist or blogger has written something that could prompt investors to take action. But in the companies that were analyzed, no such influences seemed to be at work.

---snip---

[I]n a handful of the mergers, significant progress toward a deal was being made on the days unusual trading occurred. For example, the day that four bidders were putting together buyout offers for Amegy Bancorp, a Houston bank company, trading in its stock quadrupled.

One of the biggest problems with insider trading cases is that, while it isn't as difficult to spot the suspicious trading activity, it is much more difficult to prove that insider trading has occurred. Witness Martha Stewart, who wasn't actually convicted of insider trading, as one of the latest and more high profile examples. Additionally, while the SEC isn't exactly turning a blind eye to this activity, it is focusing more on individual cases as opposed to "institutional cases" (of course, this also fits in line with the IRS focusing more on lower income level cases while allowing the ultra wealthy cheat the IRS out of $70 billion per year.

However, there is one case that is going on now, where Congress (even the Republicans) is a bit perturbed at the SEC for the perceived dragging of its feet in a recent case:

Grassley, R-Iowa, said that the SEC hasn't responded quickly enough to requests for documents and interviews and complained about the agency's practice of prohibiting employees from disclosing information about ongoing investigations, according to a copy of a letter he sent to SEC Chairman Christopher Cox. The letter was distributed to news organizations.

Gary Aguirre, a former SEC investigator, told a Congressional committee earlier this year that he was fired when he tried to interview John Mack, the current chief executive of Morgan, as part of a probe he was conducting into Pequot.

Aguirre alleged that Mack may have tipped Pequot to a pending deal and claimed that the SEC quashed his inquiry because the Morgan Stanley banker is politically well connected.

Now, to digress just a bit here - as a former Andersen guy, I have said for years now that the large brokerage houses and financial institutions have way more information and pull over the stock prices than an accounting firm ever could, certainly had the ability to artificially pump up prices and has access to more inside information than pretty much anyone. However, the recent investigations by Elliot Spitzer only serve to reinforce that this issue is not going away and seems to be getting worse.

And we do get the typical "stock answer" from the SEC here, which seems to be more of the "move along, nothing to see here" response:

The S.E.C. would not comment on the study but said that it had looked at Measuredmarkets' system and concluded that surveillance techniques of self-regulatory organizations like the New York Stock Exchange were more sophisticated.

Securities regulators, traders and academics agree that merger waves lead to more illicit trading on nonpublic information. In Britain, regulators have made insider trading a primary focus and have shifted their scrutiny to brokerage firms and institutional investors, rather than individuals, involved in mergers.

Like Measuredmarkets, the Financial Services Authority in British has found a pattern of stock trading ahead of mergers. In 2004, 29 percent of companies involved in mergers experienced abnormal trading before public announcements, according to a March 2006 study of large British companies subject to takeovers. In 2001, the comparable figure was 21 percent.

And even still, the article states that the regulators at the New York Stock Exchange have made more referrals to the SEC this year than last year, and last year there were more referrals than the prior year. While the article cites a number of cases and some detail regarding some specific recent cases, including Koch Insustries (bottom of page 3 and top of page 4), I'll leave you with a few choice blurbs:

Officials from the nation's top securities regulators met on Aug. 18 to discuss emerging trends in insider trading, said Joseph J. Cella, chief of the office of market surveillance at the S.E.C. "We are certainly cognizant of the uptick in merger-and-acquisition activity," he said.

The companies identified by Measuredmarkets represented many industries and received bids not only from corporate rivals, but also from private investor groups and management-led buyout teams.

---snip---

In each of the five cases, the abnormal trading occurred during periods of significant behind-the-scenes progress in the mergers, as outlined by the companies themselves in regulatory filings long after the deals were struck.

---snip---

In a July 7 speech, Hector Sants, managing director of wholesale and institutional markets at the F.S.A., described why his focus was shifting to institutions. "Our spotlight will shine in particular on relationships between investment banks and their clients," he said, "because we believe the risk of market abuse is highest where a client can be made an insider on a forthcoming deal."

The fast and furious pace of deals this year is increasing the opportunities for mischief. In each of the last three months, according to Thomson Financial, the value of announced mergers has exceeded $100 billion -- the longest stretch of such volume since 2000.

I couldn't help but notice the contrast in how the UK (witness the comments by Hector Sants) is looking at this as opposed to how the US is looking at this. Seems like one country is serious about doing something to counter the potential for illegalities, while the other is "aware of the situation".

But not enough to get serious about punishing the corporate and institutional wrongdoing. Because, you know, that would be harmful to the economy, while it is much easier to just go after the individuals. And we know how the "powers that be" here in the US feel about We the People vs. "We Your Corporate Overlords".

Hopefully, this won't lead to a repeat of 1987.

Preamble? What Preamble? It Doesn't Apply Anymore.

Front paged at Booman Tribune and ePluribus Media. Recommended at Daily Kos and My Left Wing

We are a few short weeks away from the anniversary of the US Consitution and you can bet that there will be much flag-waving hoopla and ironically, for the past few years has been "officially led" by Lynne Cheney who happens to be married to the one man who can boast that he violated two Articles of the Constitution at the same time.

Lately, I have been thinking a bit about the Constitution, and more specifically the preamble (thanks to the good folks at Schoolhouse Rock. And for those who know the words to the Preamble, you probably can share in my sadness of how every single word of the Preamble to one of the most important documents ever drafted has been repeatedly violated in every conceivable way by the war criminals and thieves that have run roughshod all over this once (and hopefully future) great country of ours.

For those who haven't clicked on the link above, or for those who don't know the powerful words of the Preamble, I have copied them below:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Back in 1987, I was in the 11th grade. To commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Constitution, my high school offered an elective class that a few of my friends and I took. It was part history, part journalism and part, well, fun. Not only did I get 3 credits for taking the class, but we also got to hang out with some of the cuter freshman and sophomore girls whose lockers were near the classroom. The end result of this class was to create a video where 5 of my friends and I were "journalists", each representing a part of the Preamble (mine was "promote justice"), where we got to "interview" some of the founders through a time travel link and talk about how each of our parts of the Preamble have held up over the years. There was video inserted with our voice over, as well as commentary and interviews.

Looking back, it was much cooler than we thought it was at the time....And reading the Preamble today, I think - what a great sentence, even if it may be a bit of a run-on sentence (that was for you grammarians out there). Powerful. Simple. All encompassing. And it held up pretty nicely for just under 215 of the close to 220 years since it was written.

Until now.

Since this could be the longest diary ever written if I give more than one or two examples for each of the seven parts of the Preamble, I'll try to be brief.

We the People of the United States

A recent poll from pollingreport.com goes into detail about how little We the People are being represented by this Congress. Take the following:

"Do you feel Congress is currently working on issues that are important to most Americans?"

Yes: 40%, No:53%, Unsure:7%

"Compared to recent Congresses, would you say THIS Congress has accomplished more, accomplished less, or accomplished about the same amount?"

More 7%, Less 41%, Same 47%, Unsure 5%

Asked of those who answered "Less": "Who do you think is most to blame for this: Republican leaders in Congress or Democratic leaders in Congress?"

Republican 58%, Democrat 13%, Both/neither/other 24%, Unsure 5%

Hell, a recent study by People for the American Way confirms what we already know about how voter suppression is still strong.

In Order to form a more perfect Union

A SUSA survey from last year indicates that more respondents in every single state polled think that this country is headed in the wrong direction. The weighted average was 66% felt the country was headed in the wrong direction. Those numbers are pretty constant for the past few years.

Household debt is increasing to record levels. The housing market bubble is about to pop in a number of regions. People have to work multiple jobs just to put food on the table.

Establish Justice

Well, for starters, we have a Justice Department that is led by someone whose own words rendered the Geneva Conventions as "quaint". We have a Justice Department that not only thinks it is ok to spy on Americans in the US without a warrant but scoffs at judicial decisions which render the illegal spying as, well, illegal. We have a Supreme Court who, for the first time in generations, wants to roll back the rights of individuals and have Justices who have ruled in favor of unauthorized strip searches of 10 year old girls. We have a Justice Department who thinks it is ok to hold US citizens indefinitely without charging them with a crime.

Promote Domestic Tranquility

Due to the warmongering and polarization of this administration and rubber stamp greedy Republican Congress, the past 6 years or so have been the most divisive years since quite possibly the Civil War - certainly since the Vietnam era. There are protests everywhere that Bush goes. There was a HUGE peace rally in NYC which I attended back in April. There are literally hundreds more every year. There is the "vilification" by the people on the right of anyone who dares to exercise their right of disagreement with the neocon warmongering policies. There is a movement to Constitutionalize the discrimination of gay marriage. The religious right (which certainly is neither) preaches hate, not tolerance. There is absolutely no dialogue in this country. Families and friendships are torn apart due to political beliefs, as some of us here have even experienced firsthand.

Provide for the common Defense

In this "all terror threat all the time" world that is being rammed down our throats, you would think that this would be the one area where things aren't a complete disaster. However, this may be one of the worst. According to a recent interview by Harpers of Michael Scheuer who just happens to be the former head of the CIA's bin Laden unit at the Counterterrorist Center, that isn't the case at all:

In the long run, we're not safer because we're still operating on the assumption that we're hated because of our freedoms, when in fact we're hated because of our actions in the Islamic world.

---snip---

From the standpoint of democracy, Saudi Arabia looks much worse than Iran. We use the term "Islamofascism"--but we're supporting it in Saudi Arabia, with Mubarak in Egypt, and even Jordan is a police state. We don't have a strategy because we don't have a clue about what motivates our enemies.

Promote the General Welfare

I have written many a diary about how this administration and rubber stamp Republican Congress have screwed over We the People in so many different ways, whether it be how lower income families pay more for basic services, or how the middle class is shrinking in many cities around the country, or how the ultra wealthy are cheating the IRS out of over $70 billion per year. I've written about numerous tax cuts for the wealthy and for cronies. The wage gap is increasing to obscene levels.

Secure the blessings of Liberty

Liberty is roughly defined as the ability to have personal freedom from oppression, or to have freedom of choice. However, we are in an era of "free speech zones", an era where politically motivated reasons are cited for blocking peaceful protests at the 2004 Republican Convention, and where people are getting kicked out of "staged events" because of the t-shirt they wear.

Need I mention the "liberty" that the people whose lives were ruined by Katrina or the illegal and immoral war in Iraq are being blessed with?

********

In a time where staged events are more important than actual reality, where photo ops get more press than the underlying events, where missing white girls or celebrity gossip gets way more airtime than death and destruction being wreaked on the world by the neocon war criminals, where the President can admit to impeachable offenses and not be called on it, it is long past the time to look back at the ideals that this country was founded on, and how far we have strayed from those ideals in recent years.

All of the flag waving and feel good photo ops won't undo the crimes perpetuated on this country and the world by those who are in charge. It won't bring back any of those who have died as a result of lies, neglect and greed. It won't help raise people out of the poverty level. But maybe, just maybe if we actually scratch below the shiny façade we can see how rotten the underlying foundation has become.

And maybe then, enough people will realize that we have to start rebuilding from the ground up.

More Bad News Regarding Katrina and the Gulf Coast

Front paged at Booman Tribune, ePluribus Media and My Left Wing. Recommended at Daily Kos

Waste. Fraud. Billions in no-bid deals. Promises for an open bid process reneged on. Businesses struggling to stay open or reopen.

These are just the latest (meaning released within the last day or so) bits of news that have been released, of course with little to no fanfare, as we approach the one-year "anniversary" of one of the worst things that this reverse-Midas administration has done. And we all know there is a list that is probably too long to measure all of the absolute disastrous, incompetent and dangerous decisions and actions that have been taken since the Supreme Court installed Dear Leader as our dictator, I mean, President.

And you can bet that none of this will even get a mention as compared to Bush's once-again staged photo op earlier this week with a lifelong Republican or the upcoming PR blitz that will no doubt exploit more of the people who have suffered because of Bush's dangerous incompetence.

For starters, an article in today's NY Times outlines a new Louisiana State University study with respect to the struggling businesses in New Orleans. According to the article, 60% of the businesses have yet to reopen, and those that have reopened are struggling mightily.

Even before the storm, New Orleans's economic ship was powered not by a couple of whales, but by a school of minnows. The city estimates that 95 percent of the 22,000 businesses here before Hurricane Katrina employed fewer than 100 workers (fewer than 25, in most cases). These included not just shops, but also the artists and manufacturers and wholesalers that supplied them, and the accountants and lawyers and cleaning companies that served them.

About 60 percent of the businesses within the city limits have probably not reopened, according to a recent study by Louisiana State University, which tried to call about 8,500 of the 10,000 businesses registered with the state. At about 5,000 of the businesses, the phone had been disconnected or was not answered after five calls.

The article has some heartwrenching stories about people who cannot afford the insurance, are struggling with sales and cannot count on a steady flow of electricity, water pressure or even safety. It talks about how, even if there is to be a return of business activity, that it will likely not be even close to the types of businesses which have thrived in the City for decades and made New Orleans the cultural mecca that it was.

Long term, more than 40 percent of those businesses are likely to disappear, said Timothy P. Ryan, an economist who is chancellor of the University of New Orleans. As residents return and the city rebuilds, new businesses will eventually open, but Dr. Ryan predicted that they would not be the same kind of businesses as their predecessors. "Many of them may be in Sheetrocking," he said.

So the fallout will be cultural as well as economic. Or as Dr. Ryan put it, if the city loses the quirky shops and the independent restaurants, "we'll lose part of the character and charm and culture of the city."

With respect to waste, fraud, cronyism and abuse in contracts given out by the Government, we have a report released yesterday by Rep. Henry Waxman and the Democrats on the House Committee on Government Reform, titled Waste, Fraud, and Abuse in Hurricane Katrina Contracts. This panel of six Democrats put this report together because (you guessed it), the rubber-stamp Republican Congress had resisted the investigation of such contracts, waste and fraud. The audit consisted of a review of nearly 500 reports which were prepared by the Defense Contract Audit Agency, the Government Accountability Office, numerous agency inspectors general as well as interviews with outside experts and investigative reporters.

In the 22 page report, there are a number of areas cited which will make your stomach turn. They include the following:

Full and Open Competition is the Exception, Not the Rule. As of June 30, 2006, over $10.6 billion has been awarded to private contractors for Gulf Coast recovery and reconstruction. Nearly all of this amount ($10.1 billion) was awarded in 1,237 contracts valued at $500,000 or more. Only 30% of these contracts were awarded with full and open competition.

Contract Mismanagement Is Widespread. Hurricane Katrina contracts have been accompanied by pervasive mismanagement. Mistakes were made in virtually every step of the contracting process: from pre-contract planning through contract award and oversight. Compounding this problem, there were not enough trained contract officials to oversee contract spending in the Gulf Coast.

The Costs to the Taxpayer Are Enormous. This report identifies 19 Katrina contracts collectively worth $8.75 billion that have been plagued by waste, fraud, abuse, or mismanagement. In the case of each of these 19 contracts, reports from the Government Accountability Office, Pentagon auditors, agency inspectors general, or other government investigators have linked the contracts to major problems in administration or performance.

Some of the waste and abuses include excessive charging for miles, double billings, payments for removal of ineligible debris, lack of oversight of subcontractors, overpayments for removal of partial loads, nearly 1,400 cases of reported criminal activity, including fraud and abuse which are currently under investigation and discuss the FEMA trailer fiasco, the Carnival Cruise debacle, temporary housing waste and a number of other areas.

The report also has an Appendix which highlights a number of contracts that are identified as "problem contracts". Much of these 19 contracts were no-bid contracts that totaled nearly $9 Billion, and not surprisingly have strong links or ties to Bu$hCo or other government links:

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has broken its promise to reopen four multimillion-dollar no-bid contracts for Hurricane Katrina work, including three that federal auditors say wasted significant amounts of money.

---snip---

R. David Paulison, acting FEMA director, pledged last fall to rebid the contracts, which were awarded to Shaw Group Inc., Bechtel Corp., CH2M Hill Inc., and Fluor Corp.

---snip---

Shaw Group's lobbyist, Joe Allbaugh, is a former FEMA director and a friend of President Bush. Riley Bechtel, Bechtel CEO, served on Bush's Export Council from 2003 to 2004, and CH2M Hill Inc. and Fluor Corp. have done extensive work for the government in the past.

And just to give another reminder of what the government and this administration's greedy grubby paws are playing politics with, below are some pictures that were taken by my friend who visited the Ninth Ward a few months ago:

Notice the sign "Thanks American but show us the money"...

"Youth opportunities" - pretty ironic...