from The Real News
A big grassroots movement shaped this South American republic’s new policies.
Archive for July, 2012
Roots of Correa’s Ecuador
by n0madic, posted on Friday, July 20th, 2012 at 8:38 amThe planet vs. the fossil fuel industry: Bill McKibben explains why both can’t win
by n0madic, posted on Thursday, July 19th, 2012 at 10:01 pmfrom Viewpoint with Eliot Spitzer (Current TV)
Bill McKibben, environmentalist and founder of 350.org, joins “Viewpoint” host Eliot Sptizer to discuss “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math,” the Rolling Stone article he described on Twitter as “the most important thing I’ve written in many years.”
See also: “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math” by Bill McKibben, RollingStone.com, July 19, 2012 9:35 AM ET
“Three simple numbers that add up to global catastrophe – and that make clear who the real enemy is.”
PDA IL: John Laesch on austerity measures in Illinois
by n0madic, posted on Thursday, July 19th, 2012 at 9:51 amfrom PDA-IL
John Laesch of Northern Illinois Jobs With Justice (NIJWJ.org) speaks about austerity measures in Illinois.
Rain!
by Downtowner, posted on Thursday, July 19th, 2012 at 8:35 amIt rained last night. According to the rain gauge in my backyard it rained about 1 1/4″ and Tom Skilling said on Facebook that
Heaviest rain in nearly a year has fallen at Midway tonight! 2.02″ fell this evening amid 50 mph wind gusts. 1.50″ of that total came down in just 30 minutes! The last time that much rain fell at Midway was on July 23 last summer when 2.30″ fell.
Huge relief. We were all dancing around the house at midnight calling out to each other when we started to hear the drops fall on the roof (we’d been hearing thunder and seeing lightning for more than an hour prior to the actual rain). You can already see the grass starting to green up, and I’m sure my vegetables are loving this.
PDA IL: Dr. Quentin Young on the future of single payer and building a strong progressive movement.
by n0madic, posted on Wednesday, July 18th, 2012 at 9:26 pmfrom PDA-IL
National Coordinator of Physicians for a National Health Program and newest member of Progressive Democrats of America’s Advisory Board, speaks to PDA IL on the future of single payer and building a strong progressive movement.
Jeff Faux on the Hunger Games Economy, Obama, and Romney
by n0madic, posted on Wednesday, July 18th, 2012 at 4:50 pmfrom The Real New Network
Jeff Faux: The dreams of Wall Street and the military/industrial complex are not compatible with the dreams of the American middle class
Fun and Games at “NATO”
by Mike Barr, posted on Tuesday, July 17th, 2012 at 9:33 amMy grandfather lived almost 100 years. That was his goal but he missed it by about 7 months. He wanted to make it not so much because he was having a good time but because it was a goal he had set himself. His mind was sound but his body just couldn’t take it anymore. One of his legs was going gangrene from diabetes and it would have had to be amputated. It wasn’t practical to him to just stay alive and have pieces of himself cut off just to say he’d made it to 100. So my Mom and he agreed that he wouldn’t have the operation.
Gramps was a farmer and he’d spent his life working with nature, figuring how he could make his farm work, keep it going. He had to make hard decisions many times and when it came to spending money on an operation to cut off his leg so he could live a little longer it just didn’t add up.
I spent a good deal of time talking with my Gramps about politics and what was going on in the world and what was happening to America. One day not too long before he had to go live in a nursing home we were talking and I looked over to see tears rolling down his weathered face. I was startled because Gramps was a pretty tough old geezer even at his age. I always respected him and not to many people dared to fuck with him.
Gar Alperovitz’s Green Party Keynote: We Are Laying Groundwork for “Next Great Revolution”
by n0madic, posted on Monday, July 16th, 2012 at 8:15 pmfrom Democracy Now!
At the Green Party’s 2012 National Convention in Baltimore over the weekend, Massachusetts physician Jill Stein and anti-poverty campaigner Cheri Honkala were nominated the party’s presidential and vice-presidential contenders. We air the convention’s keynote address delivered by Gar Alperovitz, a professor of political economy at the University of Maryland and co-founder of the Democracy Collaborative. Alperovitz is the author of, “America Beyond Capitalism: Reclaiming Our Wealth, Our Liberty, and Our Democracy.” In his remarks, Alperovitz stressed the importance of third-party politics to challenge a corporate-run society. “Systems in history are defined above all by who controls the wealth,” Alperovitz says. “The top 400 people own more wealth now than the bottom 185 million Americans taken together. That is a medieval structure.”
For more from Gar Alperovitz, click here.
Aurora, My Home Town
by Mike Barr, posted on Saturday, July 14th, 2012 at 8:46 pmWhither is fled the visionary gleam?
Where is it now, the glory and the dream?*
Aurora, you once had such promise that it was thought by some that you would be the center of a great rail hub and lead the state. But alas, Chicago earned the broad shoulders and you are but a flickering secondary light now.
My home town’s downtown has been in decline for half a century and there seems to be no end in sight. Many will say that I am wrong. They may be right.
There are some businesses left downtown but they are mostly due to the industry of Aurora’s Hispanic community and I salute them. There is not one major retail store left. Carson’s left twenty years ago or more and now it’s building stands empty. A rather sad symbol of a time long past.
Organizer, Physician Jill Stein Poised to Win Green Party’s Presidential Nomination
by n0madic, posted on Friday, July 13th, 2012 at 11:38 amfrom Democracy Now!
As the corporate media covers every move made by Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney and Democratic incumbent Barack Obama, we go to Baltimore to cover the Green Party 2012 National Convention. “We need big solutions, you know, not solutions around the margins. We really need to end unemployment, we need to put 25 million people back to work with good paying jobs,” says presumptive presidential nominee Dr. Jill Stein, who is running on a platform called “the Green New Deal” that emphasizes economic justice, tough financial regulation, the repeal of Citizens United and a transition to a “green economy.” The Green Party expects to be on the 2012 ballot in at least 45 states and plans to spend approximately $1 million on its campaign. Stein is the party’s first candidate to independently qualify for federal matching funds, a milestone for this 11-year-old third party.
