Later On

I don’t. Take a look at What’s On My Food? for information about the pesticides you’re eating and perhaps feeding your family. From the site introduction:

Pesticides
…on our food, even after washing;
…in our bodies, for years;
…& in our environment, traveling many miles on wind, water and dust.

What’s On My Food? is a searchable database designed to make the public problem of pesticide exposure visible and more understandable.

How does this tool work? We link pesticide food residue data with the toxicology for each chemical, making this information easily searchable for the first time.pesticides are a public health problem requiring public engagement to solve.

Use the tool, share it with others: we built it to help move the public conversation about pesticides into an arena where you don’t have to be an expert to participate.

At Pesticide Action Network (PAN), we believe that pesticides are a public health problem requiring public engagement to solve. We want you to have the information you need to take action on pesticides. What’s On My Food? builds on PAN’s 27-year tradition of making pesticide science accessible.

The site has a list of common foods. Click one and see what yummy pesticides come with the food.

From an email MPP sent to me:

In Arizona, MPP’s campaign committee, the Arizona Medical Marijuana Policy Project (AMMPP), is working to pass a statewide medical marijuana initiative in November 2010.

The initiative would allow seriously ill patients who find relief from marijuana to use it with their doctors’ approval, much like the laws in the other 13 medical marijuana states do. The law would also permit qualifying patients or their caregivers to legally purchase marijuana from dispensaries, as they would any other medicine — so they need not obtain it from the criminal market. This cutting edge provision means that the state government is going to license a series of more than 120 dispensaries — ensuring safe access for Arizona patients.

In Nevada, MPP recently launched MPP of NV, a state chapter to educate the public on the effects of marijuana prohibition. We expect that this public education campaign will increase our chances of winning a statewide initiative campaign to tax and regulate marijuana like alcohol in November 2012.

And when that initiative passes, Nevada will have best marijuana law in the world — better even than the Netherlands, where marijuana is still technically illegal. But the Nevada law that MPP of NV will propose would formalize the legal status of marijuana by creating a system for the cultivation, distribution, and sale of marijuana to adults aged 21 and older.

Please visit AMMPP and MPP of NV for more information and to give directly to the campaigns, or www.mpp.org/donate to support these and other of MPP’s projects.

Yesterday I had a couple of posts about Wendell Potter, and this morning Mike Lillis of the Washington Independent has a story about Potter’s testimony:

This will shock only those who’ve never had to haggle with an insurance company, but a former employee of an insurance giant gave damning testimony yesterday against his former industry, telling lawmakers that companies like his go out of their way to avoid paying health claims even when they’re legitimate.

“I know from personal experience that members of Congress and the public have good reason to question the honesty and trustworthiness of the insurance industry,” Wendell Potter, Cigna’s former vice president for corporate communications, told members of the Senate Commerce Committee. He c0ntinued:

Insurers make promises they have no intention of keeping, they flout regulations designed to protect consumers, and they make it nearly impossible to understand — or even to obtain — information we need.

The deception, of course, is by design. Publicly traded companies don’t exist simply to make profits, they exist to make more profits today than they did yesterday. Why else would anyone invest in them? And in the case of private insurers, what easier way to pad the bottom line than to deny expensive claims by stonewalling confused patients?

Potter expands, somewhat technically, in his written testimony:

The top priority of for-profit companies is to drive up the value of their stock. Stocks fluctuate based on companies’ quarterly reports, which are discussed every three months in conference calls with investors and analysts. On these calls, Wall Street looks investors and analysts look for two key figures: earnings per share and the medical-loss ratio, or medical “benefit” ratio, as the industry now terms it. That is the ratio between what the company actually pays out in claims and what it has left over to cover sales, marketing, underwriting and other administrative expenses and, of course, profits.

To win the favor of powerful analysts, for-profit insurers must prove that they made more money during the previous quarter than a year earlier and that the portion of the premium going to medical costs is falling. Even very profitable companies can see sharp declines in stock prices moments after admitting they’ve failed to trim medical costs.

There are other schemes the companies use to bolster profits, Potter said. They often dump sick customers by locating some minor disqualifying technicality in their coverage application — the omission of a minor illness, for example.

Companies also have techniques for dropping entire policies for small businesses when coverage costs grow higher than expected. “All it takes is one illness or accident among employees at a small business to prompt an insurance company to hike the next year’s premiums so high that the employer has to cut benefits, shop for another carrier, or stop offering coverage altogether,” Potter said.

Continue reading. More at the link. Why on earth do Americans cling to health insurance companies instead of opting for a single-payer system? The “waiting time” argument doesn’t make much sense. Not only does the US have waiting times (a friend wants to see a dermatologist and the earliest appointment she can get is a month from now), but the waiting time if your policy has been dropped and you can’t afford the treatment is infinite (or until you die, at least).

ThinkProgress’s Ian Millhauser reports:

In an 8-1 decision today, the Supreme Court held that school officials violated the Constitution’s ban on unreasonable searches and seizures when they strip searched a 13 year-old honor student because they falsely suspected her of bringing ibuprofen to school.  Ibuprofen is the same drug used in the painkiller Advil. The Court reasoned that, because there was no evidence that a commonly used painkiller presented a danger to the student body and there was no evidence that the honor student was concealing drugs in her underwear, the school overreacted by strip searching the student. Although this decision puts school officials on notice that they cannot behave in such a manner in the future, the Court also held that the school officials in this case could not be held accountable for their actions because of a doctrine known as “qualified immunity” (which says that government officials are immune from liability when they violate the Constitution in novel ways that previously haven’t been addressed by the courts). Of the Court’s nine justices, only Clarence Thomas believed that the strip search in this case did not violate the Constitution.

Washington is filled with people who do not believe in accountability.

From the Center for American Progress:

Last week, the Chamber of Commerce announced that it will "vigorously oppose" a new consumer protection agency that President Obama proposed as part of his financial regulatory reform package. On Tuesday, the Chamber came out against another aspect of the administration’s reform agenda which would allow shareholders to vote on their company’s executive compensation practices, known as "say on pay." David Hirchsmann, president of the Chamber’s Center for Capital Markets Competitiveness, claimed that "say on pay" was simply a give away to "big labor." "Big labor unions are trying to achieve at the board table what they cannot achieve at the negotiating table, under the guise of shareholder protection," he said. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner explained the need for "say on pay," noting that the practice has "already become the norm for several of our major trading partners." In two of those countries — Great Britain and Australia — CEO pay "grew 2.4 percent and 25.3 percent, respectively, from 2002 through 2006, while pay in the United States soared 59.9 percent in the same period." At the same time, middle class incomes have stagnated. Some companies in the U.S., including Aflac Co., voluntarily undertake such votes already. Notably, "say on pay" votes are non-binding, leading some to say that they don’t go far enough toward reining in Wall Street excess. As Co-Director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research Dean Baker explained, "The current rules allow management insiders to make out like bandits at the expense of shareholders and other stakeholders. This is why clowns get paid tens of millions to run their companies into the ground in the US."

Obama’s refusal thus far to act on DADT is one of my big disappointments. It seems relatively simple—a change he could make with the stroke of a pen, and a change supported by the majority of Americans. Yet he hangs fire, even though the military has been so desperate for personnel that it has lowered its criteria and has enlisted gang members, white supremacists, and other inappropriate enlistees. From the Center for American Progress:

While campaigning for the White House, President Obama pledged to repeal the military’s "Don’t Ask Don’t Tell" (DADT) policy, which bars openly gay men and women from serving in the military. But since taking office, the Obama administration has yet to follow through on its promise and has repeatedly resisted calls to suspend DADT by executive order. The administration is seeking "Congressional action" to resolve the issue. As a consequence, the military has discharged more than 265 service members on the basis of the discriminatory and counterproductive policy since Obama took office. Despite the losses, when asked about DADT in March, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said that repealing DADT would have to be pushed "down the road a little bit." Last week, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) said that the Senate was waiting for "a legislative proposal from the White House on repeal so as to provide clear guidance on what the President would like to see and when." Seventy-seven members of the House recently sent Obama a letter urging him to "suspend" DADT. As part of an effort to build momentum from this call for action, the Center for American Progress published a report yesterday by Lawrence J. Korb, Sean Duggan, and Laura Conley that provides a practical outline for repealing DADT and opening the armed forces to men and women who are currently excluded.

HOW TO MOVE FORWARD: Korb, Duggan, and Conley have laid out a five-step solution to repealing DADT that starts with the Obama administration setting the agenda: 1) Sign an Executive Order banning further military separations based on DADT and send a legislative proposal on DADT repeal to Congress; 2) Form a presidential panel on how to implement the repeal; 3) Repeal DADT in Congress and change the Uniformed Code of Military Justice; 4) Change other necessary military guidelines to conform to the new policy; and 5) Follow-up to ensure that the armed forces implement the policy changes. The CAP report says that "careful examination of the laws outlining the president’s powers as commander in chief show that the executive branch has the authority to suspend homosexual conduct discharges without legislative action." This provision, commonly known as a "stop loss" order, grants the president authority to suspend the release of military members during any period of national emergency in which members of a reserve unit are serving on active duty. But because Congress originally passed the ban, an executive suspension will have to be followed up with legislative action that reverses DADT. CAP also recommends forming a DADT advisory panel modeled after the Gates Commission, which was established by President Nixon in 1969 and outlined a plan for transitioning the military to an all-volunteer structure. The commission’s charge should be to consider "how" to end DADT, not "whether" to make the change.

Read the rest of this entry »

I got this tiny brush because it was cute, and this morning I decided to try it. It worked up a fine lather from the Dovo shaving soap. It’s clearly not a silvertip: the bristles felt quite scrubby. The first pass was fine, and the second pass was adequate, but I had to return to the soap for enough lather for the third pass. Still, I got enough lather and had an exceptionally good shave, thanks to the Merkur Classic 1904 and the Swedish Gillette blade it held. Very smooth shave and finish, and Stetson Sierra was a fine finish.

Tomorrow I’ll use another small brush, though not so small as this Omega.

Mark Bittman has a recipe that sounds good (and see at the link for variations).

Greek-Style Nachos

• 4 pita pockets, white or whole wheat, cut into wedges
• About 1/2 cup olive oil
• Salt
• 4 ounces feta cheese
• 1/2 cup yogurt, preferably whole-milk
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh mint
• 1 lemon
• Freshly ground black pepper
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 1/2 pound ground lamb
• 1 tablespoon ground cumin
• 2 or 3 medium ripe tomatoes, chopped
• 1 medium cucumber, peeled and seeded if necessary, and chopped
• 1/2 cup kalamata olives, pitted and halved (optional).

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees Arrange pita wedges in one layer on baking sheets and brush or drizzle with a tablespoon or two of olive oil. Bake until they begin to color, turning once or twice, about 10 minutes. Sprinkle with salt, turn off oven and put chips back in to keep warm.

2. In a blender or food processor, combine feta, yogurt, 1/4 cup olive oil, mint and zest and juice of lemon; sprinkle with salt and pepper. Blend or process until smooth. (You can also mash mixture by hand, with a fork.)

3. Put two tablespoons of oil in a skillet over medium-high heat and cook onions until soft, about 5 minutes. Add lamb and cumin and sprinkle with salt and pepper; continue cooking until meat is cooked through, about 5 to 10 minutes more. Put chips on a serving plate and top with lamb, sauce, tomatoes, cucumbers and olives if you’re using them.

Yield: 4 servings.

Very interesting column in the San Francisco Chronicle:

In the year since I have been writing this column, readers have sent in many questions about organic foods. With the White House and the U.S. Department of Agriculture planting organic gardens, these questions have become more urgent.

Q: What is the difference between "100% organic" and "organic"?

A: Organic has a precise meaning under the USDA’s organic program. Certified 100% Organic means that all the ingredients in a product have been grown or raised according to the USDA’s organic standards, which are the rules for producing foods labeled organic. Certified Organic requires that 95 to 99 percent of the ingredients follow the rules.

What, exactly, are those rules? Summarizing what’s in hundreds of pages in the Federal Register:

– Plants cannot be grown with synthetic pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers, genetic modification, irradiation or sewage sludge.

– Animals must be raised exclusively on organic feed, have access to the outdoors, and cannot be given antimicrobial drugs or hormones.

– Producers will be inspected to make sure these practices are being followed to the letter.

Q: How do we know "organic" truly reflects our beliefs?

A: I am guessing this question refers to the spirit of organics. In the 1920s, the British botanist Albert Howard learned from observing farmers in India that human health depends on growing foods sustainably. Indian farmers taught him the importance of protecting soil nutrients through composted manure, crop rotation and appropriate cultivation, and using biological pest controls. Later, these methods were called "organic."

But USDA organic rules do not say a word about sustainability. This gap occurred as a result of the history of the organic standards (as I recount in "What to Eat"), but also as a result of the USDA’s inherent conflicts of interest. The USDA’s main job is to promote industrial agriculture. Organics, the USDA says, are just different, not better. Alas, the USDA has not always been a loving home for the organic program.

Q: Do food companies use the word "organic" in the same way they use "health"?

A: USDA organic rules are about the letter of the law, not its spirit. Food marketers, however, take advantage of public perceptions that "organic" implies spirit – sustainability and better nutrition. Companies that follow the rules can legitimately market highly processed foods as organic, taking advantage of their health aura to command higher prices.

No wonder so many big food companies have bought organic product lines (see links.sfgate.com/ZHKJ).Yes, organic junk food is free of synthetic pesticides, but the foods still have calories. As I like to put it, an organic junk food is still a junk food.

Q: Which is worse: eating nonorganic produce full of pesticides or not eating produce at all? …

Continue reading.

This could make me sick. Marion Nestle at Food Politics:

Even I cannot keep up with what the packers of Salmonella-contaminated foods are willing to do to sell their products.  Remember the recalled pistachios?  Turns out the recalled nuts were simply repacked and redistributed.   If you are a packer and don’t like your test results, find a lab that will give you the results you want.  If you don’t know what to do with recalled nuts, put them in new packages and ship them out.

What is it going to take to get the food safety system we need?  How much worse does it have to get?

ThinkProgress:

Last week, the House Armed Services Committee reinstated funding for the F-22, over the objections of the Pentagon and the White House, by eliminating funding for nuclear waste cleanup. (Rep. Barney Frank [D-MA] has introduced an amendment eliminating the money for the F-22.) Today, the Office of Management and Budget issued a Statement of Administrative Policy recommending a veto if the bill contains the F-22 funding:

F-22 Advance Procurement: The Administration strongly objects to the provisions in the bill authorizing $369 million in advanced procurement funds for F-22s in FY 2011. The collective judgment of the Service Chiefs and Secretaries of the military departments suggests that a final program of record of 187 F-22s is sufficient to meet operational requirements. If the final bill presented to the President contains this provision, the President’s senior advisors would recommend a veto.

This afternoon on MSNBC, VoteVets Chairman Jon Soltz debated Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-GA), who proclaimed, “We absolutely need 381 of these planes, and not 187.” Soltz called the claim “ridiculous,” and argued that military funds should be spent on troops on the ground:

It’s about how we spend our money. The Congressman cares about the Lockheed Martin stock price, and I care about the men and women who fight on the ground. And this weapon system does nothing for us.

Watch it:

Depressing:

Source: Mother Jones, June 22, 2009

As the Waxman-Markey Climate Bill nears a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives, environmental groups are "teetering at the edge of existential crisis," writes Josh Harkinson. "Almost all environmental groups agree that Waxman-Markey is far from ideal," but some are supporting it, while others "believe the bill is so deeply flawed it might actually make matters worse." Critics say the bill "lines the pockets of polluters with little to show for it. The most it would cut carbon emissions by 2020 is 17 percent below 1990 levels, nowhere near the 25 to 40 percent reduction sought by scientists and international climate negotiators." Other concerns are that the bill may decrease clean energy production, as it would overrule higher renewable mandates in states like California; it would strip the Environmental Protection Agency of its ability to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from coal plants; and it would auction just 15 percent of emissions permits, giving a whopping 50 percent "to the fossil fuel industry for free." Some environmentalists blame the United States Climate Action Partnership, "a coalition of industry and moderate environmental groups," for sticking with a "quietly hammered out" agreement developed during the Bush administration. Others criticize President Obama, "who spoke out in favor of auctioning off pollution permits during his campaign … but is now thought likely to sign whatever bill crosses his desk." Meanwhile, the industry front group Cooler Heads Coalition is planning efforts to oppose the bill, with "scientific skeptics and legislative critics," reports Greenwire.

This is the guy testifying to the Senate today. He writes:

I’m the former insurance industry insider now speaking out about how big for-profit insurers have hijacked our health care system and turned it into a giant ATM for Wall Street investors, and how the industry is using its massive wealth and influence to determine what is (and is not) included in the health care reform legislation members of Congress are now writing.

Although by most measures I had a great career in the insurance industry (four years at Humana and nearly 15 at CIGNA), in recent years I had grown increasingly uncomfortable serving as one of the industry’s top PR executives. In addition to my responsibilities at CIGNA, which included serving as the company’s chief spokesman to the media on all corporate and financial matters, I also served on a lot of trade association committees and industry-financed coalitions, many of which were essentially front groups for insurers. So I was in a unique position to see not only how Wall Street analysts and investors influence decisions insurance company executives make but also how the industry has carried out behind-the-scenes PR and lobbying campaigns to kill or weaken any health care reform efforts that threatened insurers’ profitability.

I also have seen how the industry’s practices — especially those of the for-profit insurers that are under constant pressure from Wall Street to meet their profit expectations — have contributed to the tragedy of nearly 50 million people being uninsured as well as to the growing number of Americans who, because insurers now require them to pay thousands of dollars out of their own pockets before their coverage kicks in — are underinsured. An estimated 25 million of us now fall into that category.

What I saw happening over the past few years was a steady movement away from the concept of insurance and toward "individual responsibility," a term used a lot by insurers and their ideological allies. This is playing out as a continuous shifting of the financial burden of health care costs away from insurers and employers and onto the backs of individuals. As a result, more and more sick people are not going to the doctor or picking up their prescriptions because of costs. If they are unfortunate enough to become seriously ill or injured, many people enrolled in these plans find themselves on the hook for such high medical bills that they are losing their homes to foreclosure or being forced into bankruptcy.

As an industry spokesman, I was expected to put a positive spin on this trend that the industry created and euphemistically refers to as "consumerism" and to promote so-called "consumer-driven" health plans. I ultimately reached the point of feeling like a huckster.

I thought I could live with being a well-paid huckster and hang in there a few more years until I could retire. I probably would have if I hadn’t made a completely spur-of-the-moment decision a couple of years ago that changed the direction of my life. While visiting my folks in northeast Tennessee where I grew up, I read in the local paper about a health "expedition" being held that weekend a few miles up U.S. 23 in Wise, Va. Doctors, nurses and other medical professionals were volunteering their time to provide free medical care to people who lived in the area. What intrigued me most was that Remote Area Medical, a non-profit group whose original mission was to provide free care to people in remote villages in South America, was organizing the expedition. I decided to check it out.

That 50-mile stretch of U.S. 23, which twists through the mountains where thousands of men have made their living working in the coalmines, turned out to be my "road to Damascus."

Nothing could have prepared me for what I saw when I reached the Wise County Fairgrounds, where the expedition was being held…

Continue reading.

This is pretty disgusting:

Source: Stars and Stripes, June 24, 2009

U.S. Army officials have barred a reporter with the military newspaper Stars and Stripes "from embedding with a unit of the 1st Cavalry Division that is attempting to secure the violent city of Mosul" in Iraq. In the refusal letter to Stars and Stripes reporter Heath Druzin, an Army public affairs officer wrote that "Mr. Druzin refused to highlight" good news about "Iraqi Army leaders, soldiers, national police and Iraqi police display[ing] commitment to partnership." The newspaper has "spent more than three weeks appealing Druzin’s banishment to senior commanders in Iraq as well as public affairs officers at the Pentagon, but had been repeatedly rebuffed." In his appeal of the decision, Stars and Stripes editorial director Terry Leonard wrote, "To deny Mr. Druzin an embed under the reasons stated … is a direct challenge to the editorial independence of this newspaper … an attempt at censorship and it is also an illegal prior restraint under federal law. … The military cannot tell us what stories to write or not write." The Army would only allow a different Stars and Stripes reporter to embed with a different military unit in a different Iraqi city, Kirkuk. The president of Military Reporters and Editors blasted the decision, writing to Army and Pentagon officials that barring Druzin "violates both the spirit and the letter of the embed guidelines that Military Reporters & Editors and many other journalists have worked so diligently to implement."

This is particularly pertinent as Jeff Sessions, an unreconstructed racist, attacks the Sotomayor nomination. Leonard Pitts, Jr., writes for McClatchy:

The modern GOP was created in 1965 with a stroke of Lyndon Johnson’s pen.

If that is an exaggeration, it is not much of one. When Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act, he made a prediction: In committing the unpardonable sin of guaranteeing the ballot to all citizens regardless of race, he said, he would cause his party to lose the South "for a generation."

And indeed Southern Democrats, who for a century had bombed schools, lynched innocents, perverted justice and terrorized millions in the name of intolerance, responded by leaving their ancestral party in droves. They formed the base of a new GOP, a reality acknowledged by Ronald Reagan when he opened his 1980 campaign at a segregationist fair in a town where three civil-rights workers were infamously martyred, by declaring, "I believe in states’ rights."

In embracing its new southern base, the Republican Party became the Repugnant Party on matters of race, a distinction it has done little to shed.

So some of us were disappointed but not surprised last week when Sherri Goforth, an aide to Tennessee state Sen. Diane Black, came under fire for an e-mail she sent out. It depicted the 44 U.S. presidents, showing the first 43 in dignified, statesmanlike poses. By contrast, the 44th, the first African American, is seen as a pair of cartoon spook eyes against a black backdrop. Goforth’s explanation: the e-mail, which went to GOP staffers, was sent "to the wrong list of people."

You may wish to let that one marinate for a moment.

And please, don’t bother reminding me of Democrat Robert Byrd’s onetime membership in the Ku Klux Klan; I make no argument that the Democrats are untainted by bigotry. Rather, my argument is that the GOP is consumed by it, riddled with it, that it has shown, sown, shaped and been shaped by it, to an abhorrent degree.

You think that’s unfair? Well, after Goforth’s e-mail, after "Barack the Magic Negro," and John McCain’s campaign worker blaming a fictional black man for a fictional mugging, and a party official in Texas renaming the executive mansion "the black house," and an official in Virginia claiming Obama’s presidency would see free drugs and "mandatory black liberation theology," and a Republican activist in South Carolina calling an escaped ape one of Michelle Obama’s "ancestors," it seems wholly fair to me. Indeed, overdue.

And keep in mind: All that is just from the last year or so. I could draw up a much longer list but space is limited, and there is a final point to make.

Which is that …

Continue reading.

Christopher Weaver in ProPublica:

In late March, we published an investigation [1] of the Center for AIDS Prevention [2], a Beverly Hills, Calif., charity that wages high-profile fundraising campaigns, spreads inaccurate health information and dodges questions about how it spends donations. Three months later, the group is still at it — despite the fact that authorities are aware of its activities. The case is a window into the fractured and often ineffective oversight of nonprofits.

The center’s 18-month advertising campaign has made it to the Web pages of the New York Times [3], Chicago Tribune [4] (PDF), Los Angeles Times [5] (PDF) and USA Today [6], and the print edition of the Wall Street Journal [7] (PDF), urging viewers to "Donate Now." The most recent series of ads appeared on the Web site of the LA Times [5] (PDF) between May 28 and June 9.

While the center invested heavily in soliciting the public’s money, its services appear to include little more than a Web site that long featured inaccurate information, such as the suggestion that birth control pills prevent the spread of HIV [8] (PDF), a claim that has since been revised. Until March, it promoted ineffective herbal remedies [9] (PDF) marketed by a now-defunct for-profit company with ties to the center’s director, Steve Neely.

The charity’s sparse financial [10] records [11] (PDF) show no expenses or revenues from donations, even though the center was fundraising with advertisements in a national newspaper during one financial reporting period. The group has not registered with state officials, a minimum requirement for fundraising, despite the high visibility of its campaigns.

The center, and Neely’s other activities, have sparked suspicions at city offices in Los Angeles, where the charity does business now, with the attorney general of Illinois, where it is incorporated, and with the federal Food and Drug Administration. The center and Neely have repeatedly dodged inquiries by these authorities and members of the public, who have complained to attorneys general in both states. But officials have often not followed up on their concerns, allowing the charity to continue raising money and revealing fault lines in the oversight of nonprofits…

Continue reading.

Here’s another example:

The Obama administration has denied a request made under the Freedom of Information Act for the names of all visitors to the White House visitors between January 20 and May. MSNBC.com investigative journalist Bill Dedman reports that the Obama administration, just like the Bush administration, "is arguing that the White House visitor logs are presidential records — not Secret Service agency records, which would be subject to the Freedom of Information Act." A spokesman for Obama, Ben LaBolt, said that the administration should be able to hold secret meetings "such as an elected official interviewing for an administration position or an ambassador coming for a discussion on issues that would affect international negotiations." However, Dedman notes that "these same arguments, made by the Bush administration, were rejected twice by a federal judge."

Very interesting idea. Click graphic to enlarge.

The story:

The state Air Resources Board wants your car to stay a little cooler in the summer sun.

Thursday, the air board is scheduled to vote on its “cool” car rules, which call for newfangled windows to be installed on new passenger vehicles starting with 2012 models. Compared with today’s standard windows, the technology would cut the inside temperature of a car parked in the sun by about 12 degrees, federal studies suggest.

Set to roll out in stages, the plan would be another small advance in the state’s war on global warming. By keeping vehicle interiors cooler, drivers should save fuel by running their air conditioners less. In addition, automakers may opt to install smaller air-conditioning units in new vehicles.

About 5.5 percent of the fuel burned in the nation’s passenger vehicles – 7 billion gallons a year – goes to staying cool.

The new windows would eventually deliver a roughly 1 percent cut in vehicle fuel consumption, air board staff estimate. The board is looking for every reduction it can get as it tries to cut climate-warming emissions back to 1990 levels by 2020, as required under a 2006 state law…

Continue reading.

Via Spencer Ackerman. Akbar Ganji is an Iranian journalist and dissident who was imprisoned in Tehran from 2000 to 2006 and whose writings are currently banned in Iran. He wrote the following article for Foreign Affairs:

The clerical regime’s tampering with the election was nothing less than an attempt to completely take over all aspects of the Iranian state.

Iran is a paradoxical nation. On the one hand, its political structure is a fundamentalist sultanism run by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and personified at least in the eyes of the outside world, by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. On the other hand, Iran is farther along the path to democracy than most countries in the Middle East. It has a sophisticated political culture: its intellectuals, women, and young people are highly literate, cosmopolitan, and committed to the ideals of democracy, human rights, and nonviolent social transformation. The majority of Iran’s population stands against the country’s fundamentalist regime.

As I explained in my essay "The Latter-Day Sultan" (November/December 2008), oppression has been the Iranian regime’s principal means of sustaining sultanism. The aftermath of the recent presidential election clearly demonstrates this point. The preponderant majority of Iranians voted against Khamenei by voting against Ahmadinejad, Khamenei’s factotum and mouthpiece. (See the preliminary analysis of the election published by Chatham House on June 21, 2009, here.) But Khamenei has refused to abide by their choice. In a colossal fraud, his loyalists have counted the people’s vote in favor of Ahmadinejad and then dubbed his victory a "divine miracle."

Rejecting the lies and the chicanery, hundreds of thousands of Iranians have turned to the streets in search of justice. Khamenei has responded with repression. His henchmen have stormed universities, attacking students and destroying public property. They have opened fire on innocent protesters and imprisoned reformists they suspect of having roused the people into action. Last Friday, Khamenei delivered a much-anticipated sermon in Tehran. Acknowledging "differences of opinion" among the presidential candidates, he said that "when it comes to serving the nation . . . the viewpoints of the president [Ahmadinejad] are closer to mine." He said allegations that the election had been rigged in Ahmadinejad’s favor — with 11 million votes artificially created — were lies manufactured by Iran’s enemies, the United States and Israel. Khamenei threatened his critics, claimed he was ready for martyrdom, and called on protesters to clear the streets, warning that if they did not, they would "be responsible for any violence that [might] ensue."

This is nothing less than an electoral coup, and its aim goes far beyond bringing victory to Ahmadinejad; …

Continue reading.

Another GOP adulterer:

South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford acknowledged Wednesday that he was carrying on an affair with a woman in Argentina when he disappeared from his office last week, only to resurface this morning.

Sanford said he would resign as chairman of the Republican Governors Association and asked for forgiveness from his wife and four sons.

He did not respond when asked if he would resign as governor.

He also did not identify the woman, but asked for privacy. He said that his wife had known about the affair for five months and that he had known the woman for eight years.

He described the affair has having begun innocently enough, via e-mail.

A McClatchy special correspondent visited the 14-story apartment building in Buenos Aires where the woman reportedly lives. The woman at first agreed to speak to a visitor, but declined after the visitor identified herself as a reporter.

The doorman at the building, shown a photograph of Sanford, said he did not recognize him. According to the doorman, the woman has two sons, one a teenager of driving age and the other younger.

At several points in his news conference, Sanford appeared to be on the verge of tears. He cited his religious beliefs several times and begged forgiveness from friends and associates.

He left it unclear whether he and his wife would separate. “I don’t know how you want to define that. I’m here and she’s there,” he said, referring to his vacation home on Sullivan’s Island. “I guess in a formal sense we are not.” …

Continue reading. And, from ThinkProgress, we see that the GOP maintains its hypocrisy on social issues:

While serving as a U.S. congressman, Sanford was incredibly critical of his colleagues’ marital misdeeds, including the affairs of former congressman Bob Livingston and President Bill Clinton:

“The bottom line, though, is I am sure there will be a lot of legalistic explanations pointing out that the president lied under oath. His situation was not under oath. The bottom line, though, is he still lied. He lied under a different oath, and that is the oath to his wife. So it’s got to be taken very, very seriously.” [Sanford on Livingston, CNN, 12/18/98]

“We ought to ask questions…rather than circle the wagons for one of our tribe.” [Sanford on how the GOP reacts to affairs, New York Post, 12/20/98]

“I think it would be much better for the country and for him personally (to resign). I come from the business side. If you had a chairman or president in the business world facing these allegations, he’d be gone.” [Sanford on Clinton, The Post and Courier, 9/12/98]

“The issue of lying is probably the biggest harm, if you will, to the system of Democratic government, representatives government, because it undermines trust. And if you undermine trust in our system, you undermine everything.” [Sanford on Clinton, CNN, 2/16/99]

Sanford has also been an opponent of same-sex marriage, saying in 2004, “As Jenny and I are the parents of four little boys, we’ve always taught our kids that marriage was something between a man and a woman.” [The Post and Courier, 2/11/04]

GOP: Party of No, Party of Hypocrites