n2doc
n2doc's JournalRepublicans for more war, more tax cuts for the rich, and more starving
By Lisa Mascaro
May 10, 2012, 11:44 a.m.
WASHINGTON -- House Republicans approved a sweeping package of budget cuts to food stamps, Meals on Wheels and other domestic programs -- while sparing the Pentagon -- in an election-year showcase of party priorities.
Democrats overwhelmingly opposed the legislation, which is expected to stall in the Senate, but House Speaker John A. Boehner's decision to call a vote gives the GOP an opportunity to highlight its agenda and attack President Obama's efforts to reduce the deficit. The bill was approved on party lines, 218-199.
The legislation is "literally taking food out of the mouth of babies” while continuing tax breaks for the wealthy, said Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), the minority leader. The cuts would replace across-the-board reductions to both defense and non-security programs that had been agreed to as part of last summer's debt-ceiling deal with the White House.
Republicans countered they were tackling the nation's deficit problems while preventing steep military cuts that Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta has said would be devastating.
more
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-house-republicans-pass-sweeping-domestic-cuts-spare-pentagon-20120510,0,1596901.story
And Now a Few Words on the Wisconsin Senate Circus
By Charles P. Pierce
at 4:56PM
While most of the attention rightfully has fallen upon the efforts to get rid of Scott Walker, the goggle-eyed homunculus hired by Koch Industries to manage its midwest subsidiary formerly known as the state of Wisconsin, there are some signs that the various energetic gnomes at work in the Republican base who just tossed out the safest seat in the Senate in Indiana may be working to screw their own party further a little north of there. The undead spirits of Christine O'Donnell and Sharron Angle are walking the banks of the Fox River, howling for blood and hors d'oeuvres.
As it happens, there are three candidates running in the Republican primary to replace retiring Senator Herb Kohl, a Democrat. (The Democratic candidate, Rep. Tammy Baldwin, is running unopposed.) One of them is Tommy Thompson, a former governor, a former Cabinet official under Ronald Reagan, very briefly once a presidential candidate, and, for many years, the face of Republican politics in the state. Another candidate is Jeff Fitzgerald, the current speaker of the Wisconsin State Assembly, who is making the run despite having the Walker anchor tied to his ankles. (His older brother, Scott, is majority leader of the state senate and is facing a recall election of his own.) The third candidate is a former congressman named Mark Neumann and, boy howdy, are you going to love this guy. He makes Richard Mourdock, the guy who defenestrated Lugar in Indiana, look like Emma Goldman.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but Neumann, who was a foot soldier in the Gingrich revolution way back in the day, is completely batshit on the subject of gay people. Gay people make him feel icky, and Neumann is certain they make Jesus feel the same way. In 1997, he gave a speech to the local Christian Coalition and told them that he wouldn't even hire gay people to work in his office....
Now watch where you step because we're about to lower the bar here a tad, but, as modern Republicans go, Tommy Thompson is close to as good as you're going to get. His welfare reforms in Wisconsin, while not the greatest thing that ever happened to the state's poor people, at least contained committments to education and job-training, as opposed to the chuck-em-off-the-rolls theory put into practice by many of his fellows. And he has put together a plan for a high-speed rail system connecting all the hubs in the midwest from Cincinnati to St. Louis, and north all the way to Minneapolis, that has the strong support of former Massachusetts governor Michael Dukakis, who cares more about trains than any man I've ever met. He is honorable, decent, and, in my experience, almost amiable. He also is the only one of the three that polling data says would beat Baldwin straight up. Mark Fitzgerald is a nebbish, and Mark Neumann is a nutcase.
So, naturally, fresh off their triumph in Indiana, those fine folks at the Club For Growth have launched an ad blitz in Wisconsin in favor of... the nutcase!
Read more: http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/wisconsin-senate-race-2012-8732680
Partisanship Is Not a Bipartisan Problem
By ANDREW ROSENTHAL
...
I take issue, however, with the fact that Mr. Lugar laid the blame for dysfunction in Washington equally on the Democrats and the Republicans. “Partisans at both ends of the political spectrum are dominating the political debate in our country,” Mr. Lugar said.
There is plenty wrong with the Democratic Party, but monolithic adherence to liberal orthodoxy is not one of them. On the contrary the old Will Rogers joke “I belong to no organized party. I am a Democrat,” still resonates. Just for example, thirty-four House Democrats voted against the Democratic president’s signature health care legislation. The far left is not dominating the political debate in the slightest; it hardly has a voice at all. What passes as American liberalism today is awfully similar to the Republican platform of the Eisenhower area (something Rachel Maddow has noted.)
As Thomas Mann of the Brookings Institution and Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute wrote in a much-discussed Op-Ed for the Washington Post, “the Republicans are the problem.” Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, famously said his party’s “number one goal” was to keep Mr. Obama from winning a second term. Yet the roots of blind partisanship go much farther back – to Newt Gingrich and Grover Norquist.
Mr. Gingrich, Mr. Mann and Mr. Ornstein argue, had a single-minded devotion to attaining a Republican majority in the House by “convincing voters that the institution was so corrupt that anyone would be better than the incumbents, especially those in the Democratic majority.” Mr. Norquist created the “no-tax pledge,” which precludes any sane discussion of how to achieve deficit reduction, and which has inspired copy-cat pledges “on issues such as climate change, that create additional litmus tests that box in moderates and make cross-party coalitions nearly impossible.”
rest of article
http://takingnote.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/10/partisanship-is-not-a-bipartisan-problem/
Revealed: How multi-million dollar NASA moon rock heist was an inside job
By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
PUBLISHED: 05:08 EST, 9 May 2012
A new British documentary is set to reveal the incredible story behind the multi-million dollar moon rock heist at NASA - and how it was an inside job.
In July 2002 'physics genius' Thad Roberts and three accomplices pulled off perhaps the greatest ever theft in NASA history at the Johnson Space Centre, Houston, Texas.
Using their NASA IDs Roberts, and one female partner in crime, slipped into the centre at night stealing a 600lb safe containing moon rocks from every Apollo mission.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2141728/Revealed-How-multi-million-dollar-NASA-moon-rock-heist-inside-job-conducted-physics-geniuses.html
Open access publishing should not favour those with deep pockets
The leading model of open access publishing discriminates against academics unable to pay publication charges
by John Bynner, Harvey Goldstein
The present academic publishing system obstructs the free communication of research findings. By erecting paywalls, commercial publishers prevent scientists from downloading research papers unless they pay substantial fees. Libraries similarly pay huge amounts (up to £1m or more per annum) to give their readers access to online journals.
There is general agreement that free and open access to scientific knowledge is desirable. The way this might be achieved has come to the fore in recent debates about the future of scientific and scholarly journals.
The announcement by the UK government's universities and science minister, David Willetts, of free access to all publicly funded research findings, Jimmy Wales's appointment as a government adviser and Dame Janet Finch's working group set up to advise on open access, all reflect the importance of this issue. Nevertheless, we have a real concern that the process of opening up academic publication may exclude some key interests as a result of the methods used to achieve it.
Our concern lies with the major proposed alternative to the current system. Under this arrangement, authors are expected to pay when they submit papers for publication in online journals: the so called "article processing cost" (APC). The fee can amount to anything between £1,000 and £2,000 per article, depending on the reputation of the journal. Although the fees may sometimes be waived, eligibility for exemption is decided by the publisher and such concessions have no permanent status and can always be withdrawn or modified.
more
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/blog/2012/may/09/open-access-publishing-deep-pockets
Village People's policeman lays down the law on his right to royalties
Victor Willis wins landmark legal case to reclaim part-ownership of dozens of the group's songs
Sean Michaels
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 9 May 2012 09.31 EDT
Victor Willis, the original policeman in the Village People, has won a landmark copyright case, reclaiming partial ownership of dozens of the band's songs. A California judge has allowed him to terminate a decades-old publishing deal, which gives him the right to expanded royalties for hits such as YMCA and Macho Man.
"To say this decision will send shock waves through the record industry … is an understatement," Willis's publicist, Linda Smythe, told the Hollywood Reporter. This case marks a major precedent for the music industry, because it will allow songwriters to claim back the rights to their old songs.
It all goes back to the 1978 amendments to the US Copyright Act. According to that law, songwriters have the right to unilaterally terminate their copyright deals with labels and publishers, 35 years after the contracts are inked, provided they give due notice to labels and publishers. It is under that law, which takes effect next year, that Willis is relcaiming his rights to the Village People's hits.
Many artists who were making music in the late 70s, including Bob Dylan, Tom Waits and the Eagles, have begun filing notices of termination, telling their publishers and labels that they want out. And the famously litigious Willis was no different, terminating his agreement with Scorpio Music and Can't Stop Productions, which administer the Village People's publishing rights.
more
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2012/may/09/village-people-policeman-royalties#start-of-comments
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