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http://www.abcnews.go.com/PollingUnit/story?id=3834625&page=1
POLL: Support for Civil Unions Rises, Yet Sharp Divisions Remain
On Key Social Issues, Partisan Divisions Loom Large
ANALYSIS by GARY LANGER
Nov. 8, 2007-
A record number of Americans in the latest ABC News/Washington Post pollsupport civil unions for gay couples, and most continue to favor legalabortion -- while behind those majority views sharp political andideological divisions rage on.
Overall, 55 percent favor allowing homosexual couples to form legallyrecognized civil unions, giving them the same rights as married couples inareas such as health insurance, inheritance and pension coverage. That's upfrom 45 percent in an ABC/Post poll in 2006; the previous high was 51percent in 2004.
Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani's support for gay civilunions (and legal abortion) has been disconcerting to core groups within hisparty. Conservative Republicans and evangelical white Protestants opposecivil unions by more than 2-1, and Republicans overall oppose them by 58-39percent. Yet some are willing to overlook the issue, notably televangelistPat Robertson, who endorsed Giuliani yesterday.
Similarly, while 55 percent of Americans support legal abortion -- steadythe last five years, and almost exactly the 12-year average in ABC/Postpolls -- that ranges from 78 percent of liberal Democrats to a low of 31percent of conservative Republicans.
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http://www.baywindows.com/index.php?ch=news&sc=glbt&sc2=news&sc3=&id=52117
Study shows more gays coming out
by Lisa Keen
contributing writer
Thursday Nov 8, 2007
The number of same-sex couples identifying their relationship as such inU.S. Census surveys has increased five-fold since the information was firstcollected, according to a study out this month.
That study shows that Massachusetts ranks third among the states in terms ofthe highest number of same-sex couple households per 1000 households. NewHampshire and Maine rank sixth and seventh, respectively, and Rhode Islandis 10th. Vermont held onto the number one slot for the third year in a row.
Among the 50 most populous cities, Boston ranks seventh in terms of thehighest number of same-sex couple households per 1000 households. No otherNew England city ranked among the top 10. San Francisco and Seattle held thefirst and second positions.
In 1990, the Census Bureau counted 145,130 same-sex couple householdsthroughout the United States. The latest estimate, based on a 2006 samplingof the population, puts that number at 779,867.
The numbers were analyzed in a report released Nov. 2 by Gary Gates, asenior research fellow at the Williams Institute, a research center at UCLAfor sexual orientation, law, and policy studies.
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VA system issues memo on treating trans vets
by Ethan Jacobs
staff reporter
Thursday Nov 8, 2007
With little to no fanfare the Veteran Affairs (VA) Boston Healthcare Systemissued a patient care memorandum to its staff in September detailingguidelines for providing care to transgender patients. Advocates describethe memo as a landmark achievement in transgender healthcare and say it isthe first known case of a VA system demonstrating in writing its commitmentto creating an inclusive and welcoming environment for transgender veterans.
"The thing is there are other facilities that are doing what is in thispolicy," said Monica Helms, president of the Transgender American VeteransAssociation (TAVA). "The difference is these other places don't have awritten policy, so it's almost like the doctors that are there who treattransgender individuals, they decided this is how they're going to do it,and the only difference is Boston decided to put it down on paper."
She said she knows of about a dozen other VA hospitals and healthcaresystems that provide inclusive healthcare for transgender patients, but TAVAhas been pushing for them to put that policy in writing, and the Boston VAsystem is the first they know of to do so.
Diego Sanchez, former co-chair of the Massachusetts Transgender PoliticalCoalition (MTPC), praised the memo's author, VA clinical psychologist Dr.Jillian Shipherd, for her commitment to ensuring that transgender patientsreceive adequate healthcare throughout the entire VA Boston HealthcareSystem. About 10 years ago when he was serving as director of JRI Health'sTransHealth Education and Development Program, Sanchez said Shipherdcontacted him and asked him to do staff trainings at the Jamaica Plain VAhospital. Sanchez and Holly Ryan, now co-chair of MTPC, did a series oftrainings for the staff focused on three areas: General trans healthcare andbarriers to care, HIV prevention for trans patients and mental health andsubstance abuse issues in the trans community. By about 2000 Sanchez said hebegan receiving positive feedback from trans patients about the treatmentthey received at the VA, particularly after the VA added an option forpatients to identify as transgender on medical forms and began the practiceof referring to patients according to their chosen name and gender pronoun.
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Suicide of transgender youth in Holland raises questions
by Todd A. Heywood
Originally printed 11/08/2007 (Issue 1545 - Between The Lines News)
Capitol Correspondent
HOLLAND -
The October 29 suicide of 16-year-old transgender Ian Benson has the LBGTcommunity asking hard questions.
"As parents, this is one of our worst fears," said Collette Beighley,Triangle Foundations West Michigan operative. "Our worst fear is that someof our kids will end up like Matthew Shepard, but sometimes we have toremember the pain is so intense that they take their own lives."
Beighley knew Benson, and her daughter called Benson her best friend.Beighley organized a memorial vigil for Benson last week, but the questionsabout why Benson took his life remain. Benson was well liked and his familyaccepted him for who he was. In fact, his mother started a national group tosupport families dealing with transgender children. Something that did notexist before.
"All I can say is that the Trevor Project statistics are startling,"Beighley said. The Trevor Project estimates that one out of two transgenderswill attempt to take their lives, with many succeeding. "Supportive parentshave a lot to worry about. They have to worry about not only the externalforces but the internal conflicts that arise for these kids."
Dr. Julie Nemecek knows the internal conflicts all too well. A year ago, asshe was struggling to keep her job at Spring Arbor University and transitioninto a woman, it almost became too overwhelming. She talks of sitting in herliving room with a gun in hand, suicide note written. She stopped herselfbecause she thought of her family and what her suicide would do to them.
"What is terribly difficult is to explain how your mind works differently,"said Nemecek. "Not even why, but how."
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http://www.thegaymilitarytimes.com/071106Steinman.html
A New Look at the Zogby / Palm Center Data on Gays in the Military
By RADM Alan M. Steinman, USPHS / USCG (Ret)
Last December, the Michael D. Palm Center and Zogby International publishedthe results of a poll of Iraq and Afghanistan War veterans concerning gaysin the military. The poll was extremely significant because it was the firsttime a scientifically valid opinion survey of current military combat troopswas conducted on this issue. The entire study can be found on the PalmCenter website:
http://www.palmcenter.org/publications/dadt/dont_ask_dont_tell_isnt_working_survey_reveals_shift_in_military_attitudes
When looking at the opinions of these troops, it is important to rememberthat the entire basis of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell (DADT) law was founded onthe assumption that the known presence of gay troops would be so distastefuland disruptive to straight service members that unit morale and unitcohesion would suffer, and therefore combat readiness would be degraded. ThePalm Center / Zogby Poll didn't query stateside military members or thosewho served in the military a decade or more ago; the poll focusedexclusively on troops who were either in combat in these two current wars ordirectly involved in support roles for the combat troops.
A brief summary of the demographics of the poll respondents is as follows:
*545 U.S. Military personnel who have served in Iraq or Afghanistan (or incombat support roles directly supporting those operations).
*65% active duty; 16% veterans; 6% mobilized Reserve/Guard; 13%non-mobilized Reserve/Guard
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Dems take humorous swipe at Romney
By PHILIP ELLIOTT
Posted on Fri, Nov. 09, 2007
Democrats are taking a humorous swipe at Republican Mitt Romney's attempt toturn his supporters' discards into campaign cash.
The Democratic National Committee planned to launch an online auction Fridayto sell goods symbolizing the past policy positions they say Romney hasdumped.
The presidential candidate and former Massachusetts governor this week askedsupporters to sell off old items to benefit his presidential bid.
Romney Campaign Manager Beth Myers sent an e-mail to supporters and askedthem to sell their old belongings on "Mitt Market," an online auction site."Do you have items lying around that you don't use?" the campaign asked onits site. "From bicycles that the kids have outgrown to old electronics orbaseball cards, your stuff may be someone else's treasure."
Democrats then turned the tables with a tongue-in-cheek stunt.
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http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/338915_pastor09.html
Pastor accused of child rape ruled with an iron hand
Allegations shatter small congregation in South Kitsap
Friday, November 9, 2007
Last updated 5:35 a.m. PT
By CLAUDIA ROWE
P-I REPORTER
PORT ORCHARD -- Church leaders in South Kitsap County are a genial group.Despite theological differences, they meet monthly for lunch, hobnobbingabout charity events or ways to improve their ministry. Over the years, theyoccasionally extended invitations to Pastor Robbin Leeroy Harper, asking himto join their circle. But the mild-looking church leader rebuffed everyoverture.
Pastor Robb, as he is known to adherents, led a congregation of 60, who metseveral times a week on the quiet, rural road where Harper had founded TheChurch. There, in a gated compound, he preached a non-denominational --though strict -- interpretation of the Bible and kept largely to himself.
Many in South Kitsap believe they now know why.
Eight days ago, Harper was charged with multiple counts of child rapestretching back at least to 1994, after five young women -- all of themone-time members of the congregation -- accused the married father of fourof years of sexual abuse within the church compound.
"When you're up to no good, you tend to hide," said Jamie Greening, pastorat First Baptist Church in Port Orchard. "Even the most theologicallyseparatist types remain involved in their communities. But this group waspretty much completely behind doors. The word that I would use is fringe,very fringe."
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http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-6010.html
Canadians mark 40 years of gay rights activism
9th November 2007 11:22
On November 7, 1967, the Supreme Court of Canada rejected the appeal ofGeorge Everett Klippert, who had been condemned to indefinite imprisonmentfor consensual sexual relations with other men.
The next day, Tommy Douglas, the first leader of Canada's New DemocraticParty, rose in the House of Commons and called for homosexuality to bedecriminalised.
Since then, the NDP has led the pack in defense of lesbian, gay, bisexualand transgender rights.
New Democrats succeeded in banning discrimination based on sexualorientation, tirelessly worked for equal marriage and are fighting today forinternational LGBT rights and for an end to discrimination based on genderidentity.
As proof of its firm resolve to stand up for full equality and human rights,the NDP marked this important anniversary by unanimously adopting acomprehensive range of policies on LGBT rights during its Federal Council inWinnipeg last weekend.
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http://www.pinknews.co.uk/news/articles/2005-6014.html
Maltese press question MEP over gay club visits
9th November 2007 12:28
PinkNews.co.uk staff writer
A leading newspaper in Malta has questioned the gay-hostile voting record ofone of the country's Member of the European Parliament in light ofrevelations that he is a regular at Brussels gay bars.
LGBT activists are angry that David Casa, 38, voted against motions in theparliament that condemned homophobic violence and discrimination.
Newspaper Il Torca reported in September: "Many homosexuals commented withthis newspaper that David Casa was seen a number of times in gay clubs inBrussels."
Reporters contacted Mr Casa about these allegations and were told that heonly goes to gay establishments for "politically-related events."
"Whenever I am invited from groups and organisations who fightdiscrimination of every kind, yes I attend," he told Il Torca.
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http://www.edgeboston.com/index.php?ch=columnists&sc=ryan_shattuck&id=50354
An Open Letter to Homophobia
by Ryan Shattuck
EDGE Boston Contributor
Sunday Nov 4, 2007
I'm embarrassed to admit this, but I happen to be friends with Homophobia.Well, by 'friends' I mean 'acquaintances.' And by 'acquaintances' I mean 'wehappen to share the same carpool to work.' Needless to say, I've had a fewissues with Homophobia over the years, and I finally built up the courage toget a few things off my chest by writing Homophobia a letter, as follows.
Dear Homophobia,
I've been meaning to write you a letter for quite some time now. I'm goingto be frank with you - this isn't a friendly letter to swap recipes or toask how the kids are doing (speaking of which, your emailed pictures of your3-year-old son from last Halloween are interesting to, what's the word I'mlooking for, nobody).
Rather, I have a bone to pick with you. A rather large, gay-hating bone thesize of at least Fred Phelps.
You've had a long illustrious career, Homophobia. You've accomplished morein just one lifetime than most people do in, well, an entire lifetime.You'veinfluenced fake-politicians ranging from Rick Santorum to David Vitter.You'vemotivated fake-celebrities ranging from Isaiah Washington to Ann Coulter.You've inspired fake-religious leaders ranging from most religious leadersto... that about covers it.
I got it. Great. You've had a long productive career. I'm impressed. AntiQueer-Loving Larry Miller is impressed. We're all impressed.
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http://www.pridesource.com/article.shtml?article=27821
BTL Editorial: We need more heros
Between The Lines Newspaper
From issue number 1545
Originally printed 11/08/2007
Next week the LGBT community will commemorate the National Transgender Dayof Remembrance to honor the "T" people who have lost their lives.Unfortunately, one more soul was added to that list last week when IanBenson, a Holland transgender teenager, committed suicide.
It is unlikely that Benson wanted to become a martyr. But it is hard to notsee a connection between how ostracized trans people are in this world andBenson's final, desperate act. All those who knew and loved Benson for theperson he truly was, including his supportive parents, describe him asbright, engaged and aware of his identity and the world around him. Perhapsthat realization was just too painful, and for that to be true we must allshare a piece of the responsibility for this tragic loss.
The world is tough for trans people. Many are invisible even within the LGBTcommunity. Others suffer indignities for simply having the courage to showtheir real selves to the harsh glare of public scrutiny. Our society isvested in the dual gender roles - boys and girls - nothing in between, andfor some the threat that trans people pose causes them to literally see red.Too often it is the color of the blood they shed in their attacks.
That is why it is so important for us to appreciate and honor the life storyof a heroine like Dr. Kathryn Wright. In the early 1990s, she saw theweakest in Detroit - teenagers who had contracted HIV/AIDS - and withoutjudging them, she reached out to help. She heard terrifying stories, we aresure, about risky behaviors that resulted in infection, and she just lovedthem. She healed them, spiritually and physically.
One of Dr. Wright's early transgender patients was murdered, and she stillgrieves her.
We need more heros like Dr. Wright.
Perhaps the next time we encounter someone who is completely different,maybe even threatening, we respond with compassion. We resist our lesserselves who want to tease or harm that person who is so strange. We insteadlook for our better selves in their faces, and see the common qualities weall share as human beings.
It would be wonderful if someday the Transgender Day of Remembrance had tobe cancelled because there was no more violence or discrimination against"T" folks. We suspect that if that day ever comes, the world will look verydifferent than it did to Ian Benson.
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http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2007711060317
MY TURN: There's little left to debate about same-sex marriage
By Ron Bernard-Rivera
November 6, 2007
The Free Press seems to think that just because only two people out of ahundred spoke against gay marriage, it means that the debate is unbalancedand that a boycott is responsible for the low turnout. There might beanother explanation for teh low number of anti-marriage people willing tospeak out now.
Back in the year 2000, the anti-marriage people argued very passionatelythat civil unions were simply gay marriage by another name. They said thatif we allowed civil unions in Vermont, the sacred institution of marriagewould be at risk. They claimed that the fabric of society would be utterlydestroyed. They even said that the foundation of civilization itself wouldcrumble. They said that if we allowed civil unions, it was a slippery slopeand there would be no way to stop polygamy. They told us that peoplemarrying animals would soon follow.
Since no one can honestly point to any of these predictions actually comingtrue, then these people may be a little slow to show their faces and repeatthe same tired talking points now that everyone has seen the truth. Therewere no negative side effects from civil unions.
The only thing left for this crowd to argue is that they believe that gaysand lesbians are immoral. Denying marriage to gays because they are immoralwithout having a morality test for straight people is a little one-sided.Isn't it strange to believe that murderers, rapists, thieves, and thugs aremoral enough to be married because they are straight, but honest, loving,gays and lesbians are not? Don't people believe that they should treat theirneighbors as they want to be treated and don't they realize that they havegay and lesbian neighbors?
We should treat everyone equally in Vermont. If it is too much of a stretchto give marriage to gays and lesbians, let's have only civil unions foreveryone. Then everyone will experience the reason why civil unions aren'tgood enough. When unequal civil unions are substituted for marriage, I thinkthat most Vermonters will be surprised to find out that their rights stop atthe border. When they go to any other state, they will have to figure out ifthey are married, civil union partners, or completely unrelated in thatstate. They will have to pray that nothing bad happens to them in anotherstate because without marriage, hospitals don't have to treat your spouse asa next of kin.
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http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/110607a.html
The War on Medical Marijuana
By Patrick McCartney and Martin A. Lee
November 6, 2007
Editor's Note: Eleven years ago, California voters passed Prop 215, theCompassionate Use Act, permitting the use of marijuana to treat medicalconditions. But state and local officials are still collaborating withfederal law enforcement in a war on medical marijuana:
On the morning of Jan. 13, 2004, Tehama County prosecutor Lynn Stromunexpectedly announced that the state of California was dropping chargesagainst Cynthia Blake and David Davidson for possessing and growing cannabiswith the intent to distribute.
While the two medical marijuana patients waited in the courtroom, Strom andthe defense attorneys disappeared inside the judge's chambers to discuss themotion to dismiss.
Moments later, more than a dozen sheriff's deputies pounced on the haplesscouple, handcuffed them, and shoved them into an unmarked police car waitingoutside the courthouse in the Sacramento Valley town of Corning.
They were already en route to jail in Sacramento when Strom informed theirlawyers that the state was bowing out because the Feds were taking over thecase.
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http://www.pridesource.com/digestarticle.shtml?article=27808
Author, activist shares experiences with Jackson audience
by Todd A. Heywood
Originally printed 11/08/2007
Capitol Correspondent
JACKSON -
Marc Adams was allowed to watch only one television program as a child,Jerry Falwell's Old Time Gospel Hour. And even then, he said, he was allowedonly to watch the first half hour. The second half was Falwell's preaching,something his fundamentalist Baptist minister father thought was tooliberal.
By accident, one night Adams had a chance to catch some of the forbiddenfruit of Falwell's "liberal" sermon and the television minister was railingagainst the evils of homosexuality. "Jerry started talking about it as asin, and if you really believed God was all powerful, God could certainlychange someone's behavior from homosexual to heterosexual," Adams told agathering of 30 people in Jackson last Friday. "I heard hope. I could changemy life and become straight."
That message had a lasting impact on Adams. He decided then and there thathe would attend Falwell's Liberty University. He said he knew his parentswanted him to go to a religious university, it was expected of him and hisclassmates of the Christian high school they attended. But when he announcedhis plans to attend Liberty the response was not good.
"That didn't fly. I could have come out to them and had a better receptionat that point," Adams said with a laugh. "They told me if I wanted to go tothat place, they would not be paying for any of that."
But he was determined to go there. So determined in fact that he completedhigh school at age 16 and enrolled in Liberty. He got a job and found aboyfriend. The relationship lasted only six months, and afterwards, Adamssaid, he realized he had been sidetracked from his plan to become straight.
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http://www.beliefnet.com/story/144/story_14449_1.html
'He's Bringing Great Sadness to Our Home'
Operation Rescue founder Randall Terry talks about his gay son.
Interview by Paul O'Donnell
Longtime anti-abortion activist Randall Terry in recent years has campaignedagainst gay marriage and homosexuality. So it was of some embarrassment tohim when his son Jamiel published an article in the May issue of Outmagazine revealing that he is gay. Terry responded by writing an op-ed,sharply criticizing his son and saying, "He is no longer welcome in myhome."
On Thursday, both Jamiel and Randall Terry gave extraordinary interviews toBeliefnet editor Paul O'Donnell. In his interview, Jamiel explains that hewrote the article because "I wanted my father to see I'm not going to hell,"but says that he still loves his father. Below, Randall says that Jamiel is"bringing great sadness to our home and embarrassment to our family."
How did you find out about Jamiel's article?
Four weeks ago he told me they had contacted him, and he was entertainingthe idea.
He told me he approached them with an email.
Yeah, but that's not what he told me. I found that out yesterday.
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http://www.gaypeopleschronicle.com/stories07/november/1109074.htm
State turns down $1.25 million for HIV education
Avalanche of e-mails may change agency's mind, though
by Anthony Glassman
November 9, 2007
Columbus--State residents are inundating the Ohio Department of Educationwith phone calls and e-mails after the agency indicated that it would notapply for $1.25 million in federal grant money earmarked for the state.
By not applying, Ohio joins only Utah in rejecting the Centers for DiseaseControl, Division of Adolescent and School Health grants, which would bepaid out as $250,000 a year for half a decade.
Ohio did not apply for the grant seven years ago, when the state was in themidst of an abstinence-only sex education frenzy. This year, however, sawthe inauguration of Gov. Ted Strickland, who has already rejectedabstinence-only funding.
If the state doesn't apply for the DASH money by November 21, they will notbe able to apply again for another five years.
The fate of that earmark is far from sealed, says Earl Pike, executivedirector of the AIDS Taskforce of Greater Cleveland.
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http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/11/09/BAQCT7E9P.DTL&nl=top
New strategy for attacking AIDS focuses on cell's distress signal
Sabin Russell, Chronicle Medical Writer
Friday, November 9, 2007
(11-08) 18:47 PST SAN FRANCISCO -- San Francisco researchers have come upwith a new strategy for a potential AIDS vaccine: creating one that attacksa newly discovered distress signal displayed by cells infected with HIV.
Efforts to design vaccines that identify and kill HIV itself have beenrepeatedly stymied by the ability of the AIDS virus to mutate quickly. Assoon as the vaccine-assisted immune system learns to attack the virus orcells infected with it, new forms of the microbe emerge that the body'sdefenses do not recognize.
But the distress signal - actually small proteins churned up to the surfaceof cells infected with HIV - is unchanging.
In theory, a vaccine might be crafted to destroy cells that display thissignal - killing at the same time the hidden HIV quietly duplicating itselfinside them.
"For a vaccine against an infectious agent, this is a completely newstrategy," said Dr. Douglas Nixon, a UCSF immunologist.
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Nigeria loses out on Commonwealth Games
9th November 2007 13:03
Tony Grew
Glasgow will host the 2014 Commonwealth Games, it was announced today.
Scotland's largest city beat a bid from the Nigerian city of Abuja by 47votes to 24 at a meeting of the Games voting nations in Sri Lanka.
Gay activists in Nigeria had questioned whether that country should beallowed to host the Games because of its "systematic persecution of lesbianand gay Nigerians."
First Minister of Scotland Alex Salmond told the BBC: "We will make thesegames the greatest sporting event our country has ever seen.
"They will be our chance to show the whole world the very best of Scotland."
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Discrimination against gay athletes on sports agenda
9th November 2007 11:05
At a recent sports conference in Reykjavik, Iceland, hundreds of leadingmedia professionals, academics, and officials met to discuss controversialissues in the sports world.
Among those topics, which included changes to the current doping policy, wasaddressing the discrimination against the growing number of gay athletes.
"Play the Game" is an independent institution which aims to strengthen thebasic ethical values of sport and encourage democracy, transparency andfreedom of expression in world sport.
Over the past 10 years, the conference has achieved a unique status as "theonly platform in international sport where qualified critics andhigh-ranking sports officials engage in unrestricted and constructivedebates about the main challenges to modern sport," according to the forumwebsite.
Canadian Roger LeBlanc, a leading researcher in the field of gay athletes,addressed a growing concern, which he referred to as "the conspiracy tosilence gay athletes."
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Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay Launch Radical
Homosexual Rights Document
By Samantha Singson
(NEW YORK - C-FAM) At a meeting at UN headquarters this week, acoalition of NGOs and the governments of Argentina, Brazil and Uruguayhosted the New York launch of a document which seeks to advance homosexualrights at the national and international levels. Boris Dittrich, advocacydirector for the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender program at HumanRights Watch and moderator of the event stated that this document was the"Magna Carta for human rights in the areas of sexual orientation and genderidentity."
Called the Yogyakarta Principles , the document lists human rights thatalready exist in binding international law such as the right to life andfreedom from torture, and reinterprets each one to include homosexualrights. Based on the tenet of non-discrimination, the Principles assert thatnations are legally bound to change their constitutions and penal codes toincorporate homosexual rights, including rights to same-sex unions and gayadoption.
According to the Principles, "Sexual orientation is understood to referto each person's capacity for profound emotional, affectional [sic] andsexual attraction to, and intimate and sexual relations with, individuals ofa different gender or the same gender or more than one gender." Thedocument states that "gender identity is understood to refer to eachperson's deeply felt internal and individual experience of gender, which may or maynot correspond with the sex assigned at birth."
Panelist Mary Robinson, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rightsand signatory to the Yogyakarta Principles, praised the document foraddressing a "deficit in the human rights system" that does not adequatelyaddress discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity,which she argues are "core human rights issues."
Though she was not present at the meeting, a letter from current UNHigh Commissioner on Human Rights Louise Arbour was distributed at themeeting in support of the Yogyakarta Principles. Arbour reiterates heroffice's commitment to promoting and protecting sexual orientation andgender identity and states that "Excluding lesbian, gay, bisexual,transgender and intersex persons from equal protection violatesinternational human rights law as well as the common standards of humanitythat define us all."
Pro-family UN experts note that not a single UN human rights treatymentions sexual orientation and furthermore, UN member states haverepeatedly rejected attempts by Brazil and the EU to pass resolutionspromoting broad homosexual rights.
The panelists strongly encouraged government delegations to use theYogyakarta Principles throughout the UN system and as a guide for all futureprograms and work. Dittrich praised the government of the Netherlands foralready using the Principles to help determine development aid. To helpmore countries follow the Netherlands example, the organizers announced thatan activist guide on the Yogyakarta Principles would be published in theupcoming weeks.
The event was organized by several prominent homosexual rights groupssuch as the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC),the International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA) and Human Rights Watch.
For more news visit us at www.c-fam.org
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http://www.advocate.com/news_detail_ektid50335.asp
World's Largest Gay Church to Break Ground for New Chapel
November 09, 2007
The Cathedral of Hope and the grassroots organization Hope for Peace &Justice will break ground on the Philip Johnson-designed Interfaith PeaceChapel this coming Sunday in a special service.
The 175-seat chapel is meant to serve as a bold statement of theDallas-based organizations' commitment to peace and interfaith dialogue andcooperation. The building will be open to congregations of various faiths aswell as seekers of peace who claim no particular faith group. It will alsoserve to provide sharp contrast to the George W. Bush Library, to be built ashort distance away on the campus of Southern Methodist University.
The Cathedral of Hope is the world's largest liberal Christian church with aprimary outreach to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people. Itslocal and national church ministries, outreach programs, pastoralcounseling, Web site (www.cathedralofhope.com), and television media touchthousands of lives each day. Hope for Peace & Justice empowers progressivepeople of faith to be champions for peace and justice. The organizationseeks to give voice to principles such as the creation of a culture of peacerather than war; equal rights for all people, not just the majority; andeducation as a means of societal transformation rather than economicseparation.
The groundbreaking is timed to coincide with the 20th anniversary of theReverend Michael Piazza's installation as the church's senior pastor.Piazza, who now serves as dean of the cathedral as well as president of Hopefor Peace & Justice, was senior pastor for 16 years before retiring in 2003.A special reception will be held in his honor after the service.
The service will take place Sunday, November 11, at 3 p.m. The Cathedral ofHope is located at 5910 Cedar Springs Road in Dallas. The service is freeand open to all. (The Advocate)
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ExpressGayNews.com
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/annearundel/bal-ronan1109,0,1584761,print.story?coll=bal_sports_motorracing_promo
Physician convicted of Mid sex tapes
Court martial finds Academy doctor betrayed trust
By Josh Mitchell
Sun reporter
9:28 PM EST, November 9, 2007
WASHINGTON
A Navy physician was sentenced Friday to nearly four years in the brig after a military jury found that he had secretly recorded Naval Academy midshipmen having sex in his Annapolis home.
The jury also dismissed Cmdr. Kevin J. Ronan from the Navy and stripped him of his government pension.
The 10-day general court-martial at the Washington Navy Yard concluded with Ronan, who turns 42 today, being escorted in handcuffs through a cold rain into a van. He declined to talk to reporters.
Before sentencing, Ronan told jurors it was a "privilege" to wear his Navy uniform and that he never dishonored it during his 16 years in the military. But he expressed regret at buying the surveillance equipment that was used to tape the midshipmen.
"A crime occurred in my house with equipment I knowingly provided," Ronan said. "I take responsibility for that and the people that were hurt by that."
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ExpressGayNews.com
http://psychcentral.com/news/2007/11/08/born-to-be-gay/1504.html
Born To Be Gay
By: Rick Nauert, Ph.D.
Senior News Editor
Reviewed by: John M. Grohol, Psy.D.
on November 8, 2007
Thursday, Nov. 8 (Psych Central) -- For years scientists have debated if sexual orientation is determined by nature or nurture. New evidence suggests enetics is a significant factor for whether an individual is homosexual or heterosexual.
The findings emanate from a Canadian study of the brains of healthy, right-handed, 18- to 35-year-old homosexual and heterosexual men using structural Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI).
The research, conducted by Dr. Sandra Witelson, a neuroscientist at McMaster niversity was a follow-up of a ten-year old study that demonstrated there is a higher proportion of left-handers in the homosexual population than in the general population - a result replicated in subsequent studies which is now accepted as fact.
Handedness is a sign of how the brain is organized to represent different aspects of intelligence. Language, for example, is usually on the left - music on the right.
In other research, Witelson and research associate Debra Kigar, had found that left-handers have a larger region of the posterior corpus callosum - the thick band of nerve fibres connecting the two hemispheres of the brain - than right handers.
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ExpressGayNews.com
http://expressgaynews.com/print.cfm?content_id=4182
Gay columnist stirring up Latino mainstream
Author of Nuevo Herald columns featured at Miami Book Fair
By JW ARNOLD
Nov. 08, 2007
Gay Miami journalist Daniel Shoer Roth, author of a newly published collection of columns, will be one of the influential authors featured at the Miami Book Fair International this weekend at Miami Dade College.
Roth has collected a series of his most thought-provoking columns from Miami's el Nuevo Herald in a bilingual volume titled "Stories of Truth and Hope," which was published in collaboration with the Dade Human Services Coalition. In the spirit of Roth's column "En Foco," which takes a raw look at the social and economic issues facing his community, the book hopes to inspire a sense of hope and fuel civic activism.
The author is the first to admit his own unique background colors his perspective. "I'm a gay Latino Jew," he says, "Throughout the book, you see a special sensitivity to minorities. I grew up Jewish in a very Catholic society and gay in a very machista country. This book is definitely the result of feeling discriminated against, but it takes a positive route and, hopefully, will foster tolerance for any issue, including gay issues."
A native of Venezuela, Roth came to the U.S. in 1997 to study journalism and Latin American and Caribbean studies at New York University's graduate school. An internship with el Nuevo Herald landed him a full-time position as a reporter in 1999. Eight years later, he is a full-time columnist exploring the contentious issues in Miami's conservative Hispanic culture.
One of the difficult topics Roth tackled early was the struggle of young gay hildren.
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/11/110907seat.htm
Goodyear Ordered To Pay $4.4M In Discrimination Suit
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: November 9 2007 - 5:00 pm ET
(Seattle, Washington) A jury in Seattle, Washington has ordered Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company to pay a woman $4.4 million after finding the company demoted and then fired her after she complained of discrimination because of her sexuality.
Melissa Sheffield went to court alleging that Goodyear had retaliated against her after she complained her boss had made disparaging remarks about her sexuality.
She testified that the boss had made slurs about gays and lesbians and when she confronted him he said he knew she was a lesbian and did not want to work with gay people.
Sheffield also said she heard that the boss carried a gun to work, a violation of Goodyear policy, and she asked him about it.
He confirmed he was armed and when she told him that was not permissible, he said if she made him mad he would "pull it out and urinate all over [her]."
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/11/110907hiv.htm
Scientists: 'Fossil DNA' In Cells Possible Key To AIDS Vaccine
by The Canadian Press
Posted: November 9, 2007 - 5:00 pm ET
(Toronto, Ontario) Canadian and U.S. scientists have identified a potential new ``Trojan Horse'' method for creating a vaccine against AIDS, even as repeated efforts by researchers to prevent HIV infection using traditional immunization approaches continue to fail.
Instead of trying to directly target the rapidly mutating human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the scientists suggest a vaccine could take aim at what's known as fossil DNA _ genetic material from ancient viruses that has inserted itself into every human cell over our evolutionary history.
In a study published Friday in the journal PLoS Pathogens, the researchers say it appears that HIV reactivates this usually dormant DNA - called human endogenous retroviruses, or HERVs - by disrupting the normal controls that keep it in check.
The study found that in some HIV-positive individuals, infection-fighting T cells are able to target HERV-enabled cells, said co-principal author Brad Jones, a PhD candidate in immunology at the University of Toronto.
Jones said a huge stumbling block for scientists and drug companies seeking an effective vaccine is that HIV is like a moving target - it exists in many variations and constantly mutates.
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/11/110907enda.htm
Kennedy To Introduce ENDA In Senate
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: November 9, 2007 - 5:00 pm ET
(Washington) Senator Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) says he will introduce a Senate version of the the Employment Non-Discrimination Act in the current session.
"I'm working with leadership to move this bill forward as quickly as possible," Kennedy said in a statement.
The Massachusetts Democrat has a long history of advocating for LGBT civil rights. Most recently he guided the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Act to passage.
The Employment Non-Discrimination Act passed the House on Wednesday (story) but without protections for the transgendered.
"Although the bill is narrower than many of us had hoped, the House action is still a main step in the long journey toward full civil rights for every American."
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365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/11/111007allen.htm
Florida Republican Guilty In Washroom Sex Case
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: November 10, 2007 - 7:30 am ET
(Tampa, Florida) State Rep. Bob Allen (R) has been convicted of offering an undercover male police officer cash for sex.
Allen, a longtime foe of LGBT rights in Florida, will be sentenced next Thursday. He could be facing 60 days in the county jail and a $500. fine. Republicans in the legislature said the conviction will allow them to move forward with plans to remove Allen from office.
Following the verdict his attorney accused the prosecution of misconduct and said he will seek a new trial.
Allen was busted in July during a sting at a men's washroom at Veteran's Memorial Park in Titusville, Florida.
In taped statements made by Allen to police following his arrest and released by the force Allen admits to soliciting the male officer but claims that it was the result of being nervous by the high number of black men in the park.
"I certainly wasn't there to have sex with anybody and certainly wasn't there to exchange money for it," Allen told officers.
Of the arresting officer Allen said in the tape, "This was a pretty stocky black guy, and there was nothing but other black guys around in the park."
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The New York Times
http://theboard.blogs.nytimes.com/
Gay Rights, the Transgendered, and Accepting Partial Progress
By The Editorial Board
November 9, 2007, 3:09 pm
This week brought a civil rights breakthrough. The House of Representatives passed the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which would protect gay people against workplace discrimination. (Related Editorial: An Overdue Step for Equal Justice, Nov. 9.)
The vote was 235-184. (Check how your representative voted here.)
Senator Edward Kennedy is laying plans to get the bill to the Senate floor early next year.
Not everyone, however, is happy with the vote - and that includes many people who strongly favor gay rights.
The "nay" votes included 35 Republicans - despite the efforts of Chris Shays of Connecticut and Deborah Pryce of Ohio to persuade their G.O.P. colleagues to vote in favor - but also some of the House's most pro-gay-rights members, like Rep. Jerrold Nadler of New York.
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The New York Times
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/11/09/dobsons-choice/index.html?ref=opinion
Dobson's Choice
By Tobin Harshaw
November 9, 2007, 4:56 pm
Tags: the campaign, the religious right
In terms of campaign '08, this week has been the week of the great religious-right fallout.
"Dr. James Dobson, who has largely been made irrelevant to the 2008 Republican presidential race, has apparently found his man, and according to an adviser, is ready to change the landscape of the Republican nomination race," reports The American Spectator's Prowler.
"Sources close to Dobson say that within the next ten days he is coordinating an endorsement plan with the presidential campaign of former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee."
Kyle E. Moore, at Comments from Left Field, weighs in in a perceptive and uncharacteristically) calm manner:
Among the many different underlying stories within the GOP primary elections, one of the most significant has been the behavior of the Religious Right, often seen as one of the Republican party's most potent political power centers. In a largely unimpressive field where most of the leading candidates have more than their fair share of obstacles to appeasing the socially conservative base, the fate of who would gain the attention of the country's most powerful Christian leaders, or if anyone gets anything at all, has been a question mark plaguing the campaigns.
more . . . . .
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To Form a More Perfect Union: Marriage Equality News
Information, news, and discussion about the legal recognition of same-sexcouples and their families, including marriages, domestic partnerships,civil unions, adoptions, foster children and similar issues.
http://samesexmarriage.typepad.com/weblog/
Go to the website, above, for the following articles:
A federal judge has rejected a lawsuit aimed at blocking New Jersey'sDivision of Civil Rights from investigating a civil rights complaint by twolesbian couples that they were told they could not have civil unionceremonies at the pavilion on Ocean Grove's boardwalk. The pavilion is ownedby the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association, a Methodist organization but itis regularly rented out for public functions including weddings. Theassociation told the couples that the pavilion is a religious structure andthe denomination rejects same-sex union ceremonies.The state Division ofCivil Rights began an investigation after the two couples filed formalcomplaints. (story)
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Over 200 people turned up at a candlit vigil on Thursday night outside theIrish Dáil [Parliament Building] to protest at the lack of equality for samesex couples in this country. The event was organised by the LGBT section ofthe Labour Party, who re-introduced a Civil Unions Bill in the Dáil lastweek. The Labour Bill, which sought to introduce a form of civil partnershipfor same sex couples that provided equal rights and responsibilities tomarried couples, was voted down by 66 votes to 59 followiing an argumentthat it was unconstitutional. Instead the Minister for Justice, Equality andLaw Reform, Brian Lenehan set a deadline of March 31st for the heads of theGovernment's own Bill to be introduced.
--
Marriage For Freedom to Marry is the gay and non-gay partnership working towin marriage equality nationwide. Headed by Evan Wolfson, one of America'sleading civil rights advocates and lawyers, Freedom to Marry brings newresources and a renewed context of urgency and opportunity to this socialjustice movement. Freedom to Marry brings the work of its partnerorganizations into a larger whole, a shared civil rights campaign thatfosters heightened outreach to non-gay allies. The first part of the programmay be heard as an MP3 file by clicking download. Freedom to Marryencourages dialogue with Americans thinking through the need to enddiscrimination in marriage, provides support to targeted state and localefforts, and promotes fairness for all families, including same-sex couplesand the children raised by gay parents. By working to secure equal access tocivil marriage licenses from the government, we help reinforce our country'shistoric commitment to freedom, the pursuit of happiness, and equal justicefor all.
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[Send your comments about articles to rays.list@comcast.net]
#####
Saturday, November 10, 2007
NATIONAL & WORLD DIGEST November 10, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
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NYTimes.com
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Ordaining-Women-Synagogue.html?pagewanted=print
Synagogue's Hospitality Rankles Church
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 6:20 a.m. ET
November 10, 2007
ST. LOUIS (AP) -- The Archdiocese of St. Louis and a Jewish Reform congregation are on the same side when it comes to advocating for immigrants and the poor, often finding common ground in a zeal for social justice. But when the Central Reform Congregation offered its synagogue for Sunday's ordination of two women in a ceremony disavowed by the Roman Catholic church, it drew the ire of church officials and a pledge to never again partner with the congregation.
Two women who profess to be Roman Catholic -- Rose Marie Dunn Hudson, 67, of Festus, and Elsie Hainz McGrath, 69, of St. Louis -- are to be ordained by a former nun as part of Roman Catholic Womenpriests, a small movement that began in 2002 independently from the Roman Catholic Church.
The Reform congregation's rabbi, Susan Talve, informed her friend and colleague, the Rev. Vincent Heier, who directs the archdiocese office for ecumenical and interreligious affairs, of the decision.
Heier told her it was unacceptable.
''It's not appropriate to invite this group, to aid and abet a group like this, which undercuts our theology and teaching,''' Heier said he told Talve.
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WashingtonPost.com
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/10/AR2007111000261_pf.html
Synagogue's Hospitality Rankles Church
By CHERYL WITTENAUER
The Associated Press
Saturday, November 10, 2007; 6:20 AM
ST. LOUIS -- The Archdiocese of St. Louis and a Jewish Reform congregation are on the same side when it comes to advocating for immigrants and the poor, often finding common ground in a zeal for social justice. But when the Central Reform Congregation offered its synagogue for Sunday's ordination of two women in a ceremony disavowed by the Roman Catholic church, it drew the ire of church officials and a pledge to never again partner with the congregation.
Two women who profess to be Roman Catholic _ Rose Marie Dunn Hudson, 67, of Festus, and Elsie Hainz McGrath, 69, of St. Louis _ are to be ordained by a former nun as part of Roman Catholic Womenpriests, a small movement that began in 2002 independently from the Roman Catholic Church.
The Reform congregation's rabbi, Susan Talve, informed her friend and colleague, the Rev. Vincent Heier, who directs the archdiocese office for ecumenical and interreligious affairs, of the decision.
Heier told her it was unacceptable.
"It's not appropriate to invite this group, to aid and abet a group like this, which undercuts our theology and teaching,'" Heier said he told Talve.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/washington/10cable.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
F.C.C. Planning Rules to Open Cable Market
By STEPHEN LABATON
November 10, 2007
WASHINGTON, Nov. 9 - The Federal Communications Commission is preparing to impose significant new regulations to open the cable television market to independent programmers and rival video services after determining that cable companies have become too dominant in the industry, senior commission officials said.
The finding, under a law that gives the commission expanded powers over the cable television industry if it becomes too big, is expected to be announced this month. It is a major departure for the agency and the industry, which was deregulated by an act of Congress in 1996.
Officials say the finding could lead to more diverse programs; consumer groups say it could also lead to lower rates.
Heavily promoted by those groups and by the commission's Republican chairman, Kevin J. Martin, the decision would be a notable exception to the broad deregulatory policies of the Bush administration. Officials in various gencies have relaxed industry regulations and have chosen not to challenge big corporate mergers.
"The finding will provide the commission with additional authority to assure that there is opportunity for additional voices," Mr. Martin said Friday in an interview. "It is important that we continue to do all we can to make sure that consumers have more opportunities in terms of their programming and that people who have access to the platform assure there are diverse voices."
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/opinion/10collins.html?ref=opinion
Rudy and Bernie: B.F.F.'s
By GAIL COLLINS
Op-Ed Columnist
November 10, 2007
The past seven years have given us some helpful hints on what we want to avoid in the next president. I'm starting to make a list.
Quality to avoid No. 1: Loyalty.
Whenever you read that a candidate "values loyalty above all else" - run for the hills. Loyalty is a terribly important consideration if you're choosing a pet, but not a cabinet member.
How about if this time we try for a president who would recruit gifted people who can accomplish great things, as opposed to a room full of dopes who will never write tell-all memoirs?
Loyalty is on our mind today because of the indictment of Bernard Kerik, the really, really loyal former New York City police commissioner. Rudy Giuliani, who was entirely responsible for Kerik's meteoric rise from mayoral chauffeur, has not seemed to draw any great lessons from his protégé's pectacular fall. Giuliani did say that he made a "mistake in not clearing him effectively enough," which sounds as if he is kicking himself for not sending a second squad of detectives out to interview Kerik's neighbors. In fact, the lapse in the "clearing" procedure involved Giuliani ignoring the city investigations commissioner when he arrived with the news that Kerik was involved with a company suspected of having ties to organized crime.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/opinion/10herbert.html?ref=opinion
Recession? What Recession?
By BOB HERBERT
Op-Ed Columnist
November 10, 2007
If it looks like a recession and feels like a recession ...
"Quite frankly," said Senator Charles Schumer, peering over his glasses at the Fed chairman, Ben Bernanke, "I think we are at a moment of economic crisis, stemming from four key areas: falling housing prices, lack of confidence in creditworthiness, the weak dollar and high oil prices."
He asked Mr. Bernanke, at a Congressional hearing Thursday, if we were headed toward a recession.
An aide handed the chairman his dancing shoes, and Mr. Bernanke executed a flawless version of the Washington waffle. He said: "Our forecast is for moderate, but positive, growth going forward." He said: "Economists are extremely bad at predicting turning points, and we don't pretend to be any better." He said: "We have not calculated the probability of recession, and I wouldn't want to offer that today."
With all due respect to the chairman, he would see the recession that so many others are feeling if he would only open his eyes. While Mr. Bernanke and others are waiting for the official diagnosis (a decline in the gross domestic product for two successive quarters), the disease is spreading and has been spreading for some time.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/opinion/10sat2.html?ref=opinion
Hope for the Everglades
Editorial
November 10, 2007
Seven years ago, Congress and the Clinton administration set in motion the most ambitious environmental initiative on the planet: an $8 billion, 40-year project to restore South Florida's ecosystem and, in particular, the Everglades, which had been punished by a half-century of uncontrolled development and starved of fresh water.
It was a 50-50 deal, and so far Florida has lived up to its share of the bargain, contributing more than $2 billion already. The federal response, crippled by an inattentive president and a divided, ineffectual Congress, has been pathetic - a mere $363 million - putting the whole enterprise way behind schedule.
Now, at last, comes some good news. Overriding a rare veto by President Bush, Congress this week approved a $22 billion water resources bill that has been hanging around for seven years. Like all big infrastructure bills, this one includes a little something for every member of Congress. But in addition to the pork, the bill also contains several necessary projects. Among them are coastal restoration in Louisiana and two big wetlands restoration projects in the Everglades.
For the Everglades, three tasks lie ahead. The first is to get the money. This water bill merely authorizes the necessary funds, which Congress must then appropriate. The second is to make sure that the Army Corps of Engineers, which is essentially running the Everglades project, spends it wisely and expeditiously. The water bill's biggest shortcoming is the absence of far-reaching reforms of the corps' operations that were proposed by Senator Russell Feingold but rejected by the House. The reforms sought to impose discipline on a notoriously dysfunctional agency.
The third task is to sustain the momentum. The departure of the Clinton administration and the retirement of Senator Bob Graham cost the Everglades many of its champions, and this is the kind of project that can fall by the wayside in time of war and massive deficits.
more . . . . .
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/opinion/10kayeintro.html?ref=opinion
Guantánamo by the Numbers
By DAVID BOWKER and DAVID KAYE
Op-Ed Contributors
November 10, 2007
SIX years ago this Tuesday, President Bush granted American armed forces sweeping authority to detain and interrogate foreign members of Al Qaeda and their supporters and to use military commissions to try them. By doing so, the president set in motion the creation of military commissions and the detention camp in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
The Bush administration may legitimately claim certain benefits from the Guantánamo system. Some dangerous men are held there, and valuable intelligence has probably been gathered, perhaps even some that has enabled the government to disrupt terrorist activities.
But the costs have been high. Guantánamo has come to be seen worldwide as a stain on America's reputation. The military commissions have failed to deliver justice, stymied by the federal courts' refusal to permit the president to create a system at odds with United States courts-martial and the international law of war.
Meanwhile, the number of detainees at Guantánamo has steadily dropped to a little over 300, from its peak of more than 700, no more than 80 of whom are likely to face any kind of American prosecution. Not a single defendant has gone to trial, and only one has pleaded guilty.
Today, most American leaders acknowledge the need for a new approach. The president himself has expressed a desire to see the detention camp closed. But he has only a little more than a year to do so before the next president takes office. It's time to take a close look at this system of detention and prosecution and move quickly to establish viable alternatives. With apologies to the Harper's Index, the following data provide a historical snapshot.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-China-Toys-Date-Rape-Drug.html?hp
China Bans Exports of Drug-Tainted Toy
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
November 10, 2007
Filed at 2:20 a.m. ET
BEIJING (AP) -- China's government has suspended exports of toys covered with a toxic chemical that have been subject to recalls from Australia to the United States after sickening children, the state-run Xinhua News Agency reported Friday.
China's move came as seven more U.S. children were reported ailing after ingesting Chinese-made toy beads because of the toxic chemical coating, bringing the total of U.S. children sickened to nine, according to a spokeswoman for the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
The Chinese government's quality control administration issued the export ban, sealed the toys at the sites where they were produced and ordered an investigation, Xinhua said in a brief report.
Millions of units of the popular toys, which are sold as Aqua Dots in the United States and as Bindeez in Australia, were recalled in those countries as well as in Britain, Malaysia, Singapore and elsewhere this past week after children began falling sick from swallowing the toy's bead-like parts.
Tests showed they were coated with the industrial chemical 1,4-butanediol. When ingested the chemical metabolizes into the ''date-rape'' drug gamma hydroxy butyrate, and may cause breathing problems, loss of consciousness, seizures, drowsiness, coma and death. In addition to the nine in the U.S., three children in Australia have taken sick.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/world/americas/10venez.html
Students Emerge as a Leading Force Against Chávez
By SIMON ROMERO
November 10, 2007
CARACAS, Venezuela, Nov. 9 - Finding Yon Goicoechea, a leader of the nascent student movement protesting the expanding power of President Hugo Chávez, is not easy. He changes cellphones every few days. After receiving dozens of death threats, he moves among the apartments of friends here each day in search of a safe place to sleep.
In an interview this week in a back room at one such residence, a villa in a leafy district in this city, Mr. Goicoechea described the movement that has supplanted traditional political parties in recent weeks as the most cohesive and respected challenger to Mr. Chávez's government.
"We believe in exhausting the democratic options available to us through peaceful action," said Mr. Goicoechea, 23, who studies law at Andrés Bello Catholic University here, referring to the students' opposition to a constitutional overhaul. In the polarized world of Venezuelan political debate, such parsed and polished statements are rare.
But what about the claims, from Mr. Chávez and his loyalists, that the students ultimately want to oust him from office? "We want social transformation, not a coup," Mr. Goicoechea said. "The real coup d'état is coming from Chávez, who wants to perpetuate himself in power."
Indeed, the students first burst onto the scene over the summer with protests against Mr. Chávez's move to push RCTV, a critical television network, off public airwaves. But the president's proposed charter, which would abolish his term limits, has led to much larger protests here and in other large cities this month.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/opinion/l10schools.html
November 10, 2007
Letters
A School Is More Than an A, B or C
To the Editor:
Re "50 City Schools Get Failing Grade in a New System" (front page, Nov. 6):
No doubt the mayor and the schools chancellor will now be the recipients of unending grief from those schools and principals who feel they were graded unfairly.
Grading schools is as absurd as grading students. The criteria for both are equally detrimental to achieving the goals of a truly useful education: self-awareness, an engaged citizenry and the skills necessary to generate meaningful, dignified work.
Until we address the core societal conditions that now make such goals unattainable for the vast majority, there is little hope that obfuscating parlor tricks like high-stakes testing, free cellphones for every child and schoolwide report cards will serve as successful incentives.
Roland Legiardi-Laura
New York, Nov. 6, 2007
The writer is producing a film on the history of schooling and is a guest teaching artist at University Heights High School.
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Forwarded by Susan Frishkorn
frishkorn@bellsouth.net
The Baltimore Chronicle
http://baltimorechronicle.com/2007/110807Lindorff.shtml
Suddenly, Impeachment Hearings Are Looking Like a Strong Possibility
by Dave Lindorff
Thu, 11/08/2007-You wouldn't know it if you just watch TV news or read thecorporate press, but this past Tuesday, something remarkable happened.Despite the pig-headed opposition of the Democratic Party's topcongressional leadership, a majority of the House, including threeRepublicans, voted to send Dennis Kucinich's long sidelined Cheneyimpeachment bill (H Res 333) to the Judiciary Committee for hearings.
The vote was 218 to 194.
Now the behind-the-scenes partisan maneuvering that preceded that vote wasarcane indeed, with Kucinich first exercising a member's privilege motion topresent his stymied impeachment bill to the full House, only to have SpeakerNancy Pelosi arrange for a colleague (Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-MD)offer a motion to table it. The Republicans, anxious to embarrass theSpeaker, threw a wrench into that plan, though, by voting as a bloc tooppose tabling. Since Kucinich already has 22 co-sponsors for his bill, itwas clear that the tabling gambit would fail. As soon as that becameapparent, rank-and-file Democrats, unwilling to be seen by theirconstituents as defending Cheney, rushed to change their votes to opposingthe tabling motion. In the end, tabling failed by 242 to 170 with 77Democrats supporting a pleasantly surprised Kucinich.
In order to avoid a floor debate on the merits of impeaching the eminentlyimpeachable Vice President Cheney, Pelosi and her allies then moved to sendKucinich's bill directly to the Judiciary Committee. They were joined bythree Republicans, including maverick Republican presidential candidate RonPaul (R-TX).
Now the hope of the Democratic leadership is that this means Kucinich'simpeachment bill will continue to be safely bottled up in a subcommittee ofthe Judiciary Committee. But it may not work out that way for them.
Whatever the explanation, this impeachment bill has been endorsed by a floorvote of the full House, with bipartisan support.
more....
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/washington/10tax.html
House Backs Tax Relief Bill, but Fate in Senate Is Unsure
By EDMUND L. ANDREWS
November 10, 2007
WASHINGTON, Nov. 9 - The House passed a $78.3 billion tax bill on Friday that would shield about 21 million people from the alternative minimum tax next year, and pay for it in part by ending tax breaks for private equity funds, hedge funds and other partnerships.
But the bill, approved 216 to 193, faces a highly uncertain future in the Senate. Republicans are staunchly opposed to any tax increases, and some Democrats are torn between appealing to their party instincts and alienating some of their big contributors.
President Bush has already threatened to veto the bill, which also includes xtensions of several other tax provisions, if it includes higher taxes that would shift more of the tax burden to the wealthy. He argues that Congress should freeze the alternative minimum tax without trying to make up the $50.6 billion revenue loss for the 2007 tax year.
Following Mr. Bush's prescription, however, would increase the budget deficit, something Democrats have vowed to avoid. Because it is not adjusted for inflation, and because of the way it interacts with Mr. Bush's tax cuts of 2001 and 2003, the alternative tax has exploded in the last six years and is set to hit people with incomes as low as $50,000.
Congress has prevented that expansion by passing a series of one-year "patches," but the cost of those patches has exploded. House Democrats said their bill was both fiscally responsible and fair, protecting middle-income families without additional borrowing by repealing tax breaks that benefit the wealthiest people in the world.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/09/AR2007110901897.html
How to Win The War Of Ideas
By Robert Satloff
Saturday, November 10, 2007; A17
The resignation of Karen P. Hughes as undersecretary of state for public diplomacy gives President Bush an opportunity to fix one of the most glaring blunders in his administration's response to the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 -- a failure to prioritize ideological warfare over public relations.
Today, most Americans believe that the United States is fighting three wars: in Iraq, in Afghanistan and against violent Islamist extremists around the world (i.e., "the war on terror"). But as the Sept. 11 commission pointed out, we are, more accurately, engaged in what can be considered a fourth war, gainst the spread of the ideology of radical Islamism. In this war, the attlefields are the many cities, towns and villages where extremists seek to impose their absolutist view of sharia-based rule. The stakes in this contest are no less consequential for U.S. interests than those in the other three wars -- perhaps greater.
In terms of the narrow "war on terror," there is considerable evidence that the terrorists are losing. Captured al-Qaeda documents paint a portrait of a ovement in distress, fearing defeat. Al-Qaeda and its satellites have failed to overthrow local Muslim governments, galvanize popular support or make headway toward replacing the international order with one based on the collective action of the world's Muslims.
In the ideological battle, however, radical Islamists are doing well. They have taken advantage of the administration's "freedom agenda," and in Lebanon, Egypt and the Palestinian territories, they have made substantial progress. Elsewhere, Islamists are expanding their influence in other ways, exploiting governmental weakness or failure in educational, financial and social welfare systems.
The U.S. government has a great stake in the outcome of this contest. But our government operates as though this war barely exists and has focused its energies on the wrong problem.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/09/AR2007110901790.html
The Real Pending Tax Hike
By Alex M. Brill
Special to washingtonpost.com's Think Tank Town
Friday, November 9, 2007; 4:57 PM
Washington is abuzz about the tax proposal introduced recently by House Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.). The bill tackles a host of tax policy matters but its centerpiece proposes to repeal the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) and offset that revenue loss with an $800 billion tax increase on the roughly 3.5 million taxpayers earning above $200,000 a year. The tax increase hikes marginal tax rates by nearly 5 percentage points. Republicans have been quick to attack this tax increase on small business owners and entrepreneurs and rightly point out that the high marginal tax rates in the Rangel plan would negatively impact the economy.
Yet Chairman Rangel's proposal is not the biggest hike on the horizon. Today's current tax code will "naturally" deliver a tax increase to all taxpayers in 2011. While Republicans have attacked the Democrat's proposal as "the mother of all tax hikes", the biggest tax increase is the pending expiration of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts. That hike will boost tax collections by over $200 billion a year after 2011, more than twice the size of the revenue raisers proposed by Rangel.
The reason that these "natural" tax increases are on the horizon is a function of the legislative process and bizarre rules of the United States Senate. Senate procedures are such that while a permanent tax increase can be enacted with a simple majority vote under a budget process known as "reconciliation," a permanent tax cut requires support from 60 Senators. Tax cuts can be enacted through the 51 vote reconciliation process but the rules require those cuts to be temporary (up to ten years). As a result of these rules and slim Republican majorities in the Senate, the key individual tax cuts enacted by the Republican Congress over the last six years are set to expire at the end of 2010.
If Congress does not act to prevent these hikes, the impact will be dramatic. According to an analysis by the Treasury Department, for a family of four earning $50,000, it will be, an average tax hike of $2,100. Five million taxpayers currently paying no federal income tax will be brought onto the tax rolls. Marginal tax rates would rise for most taxpayers. The tax on dividend income would more than double and capital gains tax rate would jump from 15 percent to 20 percent. In a time when the tax on capital has been declining in other countries to encourage investment and attract capital, the U.S. tax code is scheduled to head in the opposite direction.
While these tax hikes are slated to occur under current law, the political reality of what will happen in the next few years is much more complicated. For one, after 2008, the President's budget won't be advocating a simple extension of current law. The next President, Democrat or Republican, will craft his or her own tax agenda. Second, budget pressures are rapidly becoming near-term problems and therefore likely to attract substantial political attention. Extending hundreds of billion in annual tax reductions without other changes may be politically untenable.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/09/AR2007110902202.html?hpid=topnews
A Human Rights Champion, Cheerfully Defiant
By Emily Wax
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, November 10, 2007; A12
LAHORE, Pakistan, Nov. 9 -- Female prison guards sit in Asma Jahangir's art-filled living room, watching as she sips tea, smokes cigarettes and talks about how proud she is to be Pakistani.
Jahangir, a lawyer and head of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, was placed under house arrest last Saturday, and since then the government has turned her two-story family villa into a jail. More than 20 prison guards, some with submachine guns, are posted in her garden, and plainclothes officers in oversize suits peer through her windows.
Her country is now in a state of turmoil, following President Pervez Musharraf's declaration of emergency rule, which has included the firing of Supreme Court justices and the detention of hundreds of opposition leaders, lawyers and human rights activists.
But Jahangir remains defiant and upbeat, waving to neighbors and continuing to work on position papers on how to bring the rule of law, an independent judiciary and stability to Pakistan.
Life under house arrest has been "just lovely, and it hasn't hurt me," Jahangir, 55 and a mother of three, said Friday in an interview at her home. "I am so proud of Pakistanis and specifically of our lawyers for speaking out and getting their heads bashed in for a better Pakistan."
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The Washington Post
http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/postglobal/needtoknow/2007/11/voice_from_house_arrest_dont_l.html
Voice from House Arrest: Don't Let Pakistan Follow Burma
By Afsin Yurdakul
''I can't speak for too long on the phone,'' Asma Jahangir said in a calm, determined tone, ''the military might cut it off.'' Nonetheless, Pakistan's leading human rights lawyer and activist accepted my offer of a phone interview this morning. She spoke from her home, where she was being held under house arrest, via the one phone line that the Pakistani police had somehow forgotten to cut off.
She spoke quickly, not because she was nervous, but because she wanted to tell the world as much as she could about what is really going on behind the scenes of Pakistan's current political turmoil. She said the electronic media is completely shut down, and satellite dishes have been removed from the supermarket shelves, ostensibly by the military, to prevent people from getting or spreading any information about the state of emergency.
Jahangir urged the world not to turn a blind eye to violations of democracy and free speech in Pakistan, and called for maximum international pressure on General Pervez Musharraf.
However, as she was telling me that these are defining moments for her country's future, the police interjected, and we lost the connection. I called back immediately. A male voice answered (she had been home alone only moments before) and told me that 'she was not allowed to talk anymore,' because 'she was with the police.' At the moment I have no information regarding her status.
I originally conducted this interview for Turkey's NTV-MSNBC news portal, where it was published this morning in Turkish. I worry that the interview itself, intended as a chance for her to speak freely, is in fact a chilling example of the ban on free speech in Pakistan today.
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miamiherald.com/851/story/302630.html
The U.N.'s campaign to demonize Israel
By U.N. WATCH
Posted on Sat, Nov. 10, 2007
Below are excerpts from ''The United Nations and Anti-Semitism,'' a report
by U.N. Watch, a Geneva-based monitoring group.
An alien observing U.N. debates, reading its resolutions and walking its halls could well conclude that a principal purpose of the world body is to censure a tiny country called Israel. Beginning in the late 1960s, the full weight of the United Nations was gradually but deliberately turned against the country it had conceived by General Assembly resolution a mere two decades earlier.
The campaign to demonize and delegitimize Israel in every U.N. and international forum was initiated by the Arab states together with the Soviet Union and supported by what has become known as an ''automatic majority'' of Third World member states. In 1975, following a steady drumbeat of anti-Israel declarations, the majority of the General Assembly adopted the ''Zionism is Racism'' resolution. At the same time, it instituted a series of related measures that installed an infrastructure of anti-Israel propaganda throughout the United Nations.
It was not until 1991, after strenuous efforts by democratic forces that the nfamous resolution was repealed. However, in many ways the legacy of 1975 remains fully intact: a plethora of U.N. committees, annual resolutions, bureaucratic divisions, permanent exhibits in New York and Geneva headquarters -- all dedicated to a relentless and virulent propaganda war against the Jewish state. . . .
The U.N. campaign to delegitimize Israel has its desired effect. Sworn enemies of Israel or Jews brandish U.N. resolutions as evidence of international support and legitimacy. Others who may have held no previous bias become convinced that the Jewish state is an international outlaw, with similarly negative views about those seen as its supporters. . . .
Most worrying of all, the U.N. record between 2004 and 2007 shows an intensification of one-sided, redundant and irrational measures that, taken together, form an infrastructure to demonize and delegitimize the Jewish state. In 2006-07, for example, the extraordinary amount of annual General Assembly resolutions singling out Israel for condemnation were increased still further, intensifying an insidious double standard.
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miamiherald.com/851/story/302638.html
Prepare for the $100 oil tsunami
By FRIDA GHITIS
Posted on Sat, Nov. 10, 2007
By now, after years of skyrocketing fuel prices, the news that the price of a barrel of oil is hitting $100 doesn't exactly cause us to panic. When you consider that a barrel of crude cost just $11 in 1998, and double that at the beginning of the decade, the truly astonishing development is that our lives have changed so little as a result of the higher prices.
And yet, as some oil exporting countries swim in the riches of our gas money, the consequences of $100 oil are not always what you -- or they -- might expect.
Reshaping the world
Soaring prices at the pump could cause Western economies to slow down, and they will continue to enrich and embolden shady rulers in dangerous countries. But far beyond our SUV-clogged highways, the price of oil could reshape the world in unexpected ways.
Many countries, including major oil exporters, spend huge sums subsidizing fuel prices; the higher the price of oil, the higher the cost of these subsidies. At some point, the subsidies become too much and the government has to cut back, potentially sparking unrest. That was the experience of Venezuela in the late 1980s, when thousands of people died in riots that followed a cut in subsidies.
In Venezuela today, where the world's cheapest gasoline sells at about 8 cents a gallon, President Hugo Chávez is already laying the groundwork for a ossible cut in a subsidy that costs his deficit-riddled treasury about $9 billion a year.
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Local10.com
http://www.local10.com/print/14549402/detail.html
Does Skipping Meals Help Your Heart?
Monthly Fast Tied To Better Arteries
POSTED: 10:19 am EST November 9, 2007
UPDATED: 10:28 am EST November 9, 2007
Skipping food one day a month may be good for your health, researchers toldthe American Heart Association.
Doctors had noticed that Mormons -- members of the Church of Jesus Christ ofLatter-Day Saints -- who fast once a month have lower rates of heart diseasethan the general population.
Mormons are known for other practices that can boost health, such as aprohibition on tobacco use.
"People who fast seem to receive a heart-protective benefit, and thisappeared to also hold true in non-LDS people who fast as part of ahealth-conscious lifestyle," said Dr. Benjamin D. Horne of the IntermountainMedical Center.
Looking at medical record of more than 4,600 men and women from 1994 to2002, the team found that 61 percent of Mormons had significant narrowing inheart arteries. That compared to 66 percent for those who claimed anotherreligion or none at all.
When looking deeper at specific behaviors -- such as drinking caffeine andattending worship services -- they found that fasting was the biggestpredictor of who would have heart disease.
Fifty-nine percent of those who fast had heart disease, compared ot 67percent who did not.
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Local10.com
http://www.local10.com/print/14559201/detail.html
Author Norman Mailer Dead At 84
Debut Novel Was 1948's 'The Naked And The Dead'
POSTED: 8:11 am EST November 10, 2007
NEW YORK -- Norman Mailer has died.
The noted American author was 84 and died early Saturday at New York's Mount Sinai Hospital of kidney failure.
Word of his death came from Mailer's literary executor Michael Lennon, who is also his official biographer.
Mailer's debut novel "The Naked and the Dead" was published in 1948 and went on to become a classic, followed by other literary masterworks. The two-time Pulitzer Prize winner was revered for the insight, passion and originality of his works.
Over the years, Mailer encouraged an image as feisty, streetwise and high-living. He drank, fought, smoked pot, married six times and stabbed his second wife, almost fatally, during a drunken party.
He had nine children, produced five movies, dabbled in journalism and once ran for mayor of New York. At one point, he was banned from the Manhattan YWHA for reciting obscene poetry. And he crusaded against women's lib.
But in the end, as Newsweek magazine review Raymond Sokolov noted, "it is his writing that will count."
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[Send your comments about articles to rays.list@comcast.net]
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NYTimes.com
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Ordaining-Women-Synagogue.html?pagewanted=print
Synagogue's Hospitality Rankles Church
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 6:20 a.m. ET
November 10, 2007
ST. LOUIS (AP) -- The Archdiocese of St. Louis and a Jewish Reform congregation are on the same side when it comes to advocating for immigrants and the poor, often finding common ground in a zeal for social justice. But when the Central Reform Congregation offered its synagogue for Sunday's ordination of two women in a ceremony disavowed by the Roman Catholic church, it drew the ire of church officials and a pledge to never again partner with the congregation.
Two women who profess to be Roman Catholic -- Rose Marie Dunn Hudson, 67, of Festus, and Elsie Hainz McGrath, 69, of St. Louis -- are to be ordained by a former nun as part of Roman Catholic Womenpriests, a small movement that began in 2002 independently from the Roman Catholic Church.
The Reform congregation's rabbi, Susan Talve, informed her friend and colleague, the Rev. Vincent Heier, who directs the archdiocese office for ecumenical and interreligious affairs, of the decision.
Heier told her it was unacceptable.
''It's not appropriate to invite this group, to aid and abet a group like this, which undercuts our theology and teaching,''' Heier said he told Talve.
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WashingtonPost.com
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/10/AR2007111000261_pf.html
Synagogue's Hospitality Rankles Church
By CHERYL WITTENAUER
The Associated Press
Saturday, November 10, 2007; 6:20 AM
ST. LOUIS -- The Archdiocese of St. Louis and a Jewish Reform congregation are on the same side when it comes to advocating for immigrants and the poor, often finding common ground in a zeal for social justice. But when the Central Reform Congregation offered its synagogue for Sunday's ordination of two women in a ceremony disavowed by the Roman Catholic church, it drew the ire of church officials and a pledge to never again partner with the congregation.
Two women who profess to be Roman Catholic _ Rose Marie Dunn Hudson, 67, of Festus, and Elsie Hainz McGrath, 69, of St. Louis _ are to be ordained by a former nun as part of Roman Catholic Womenpriests, a small movement that began in 2002 independently from the Roman Catholic Church.
The Reform congregation's rabbi, Susan Talve, informed her friend and colleague, the Rev. Vincent Heier, who directs the archdiocese office for ecumenical and interreligious affairs, of the decision.
Heier told her it was unacceptable.
"It's not appropriate to invite this group, to aid and abet a group like this, which undercuts our theology and teaching,'" Heier said he told Talve.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/washington/10cable.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
F.C.C. Planning Rules to Open Cable Market
By STEPHEN LABATON
November 10, 2007
WASHINGTON, Nov. 9 - The Federal Communications Commission is preparing to impose significant new regulations to open the cable television market to independent programmers and rival video services after determining that cable companies have become too dominant in the industry, senior commission officials said.
The finding, under a law that gives the commission expanded powers over the cable television industry if it becomes too big, is expected to be announced this month. It is a major departure for the agency and the industry, which was deregulated by an act of Congress in 1996.
Officials say the finding could lead to more diverse programs; consumer groups say it could also lead to lower rates.
Heavily promoted by those groups and by the commission's Republican chairman, Kevin J. Martin, the decision would be a notable exception to the broad deregulatory policies of the Bush administration. Officials in various gencies have relaxed industry regulations and have chosen not to challenge big corporate mergers.
"The finding will provide the commission with additional authority to assure that there is opportunity for additional voices," Mr. Martin said Friday in an interview. "It is important that we continue to do all we can to make sure that consumers have more opportunities in terms of their programming and that people who have access to the platform assure there are diverse voices."
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/opinion/10collins.html?ref=opinion
Rudy and Bernie: B.F.F.'s
By GAIL COLLINS
Op-Ed Columnist
November 10, 2007
The past seven years have given us some helpful hints on what we want to avoid in the next president. I'm starting to make a list.
Quality to avoid No. 1: Loyalty.
Whenever you read that a candidate "values loyalty above all else" - run for the hills. Loyalty is a terribly important consideration if you're choosing a pet, but not a cabinet member.
How about if this time we try for a president who would recruit gifted people who can accomplish great things, as opposed to a room full of dopes who will never write tell-all memoirs?
Loyalty is on our mind today because of the indictment of Bernard Kerik, the really, really loyal former New York City police commissioner. Rudy Giuliani, who was entirely responsible for Kerik's meteoric rise from mayoral chauffeur, has not seemed to draw any great lessons from his protégé's pectacular fall. Giuliani did say that he made a "mistake in not clearing him effectively enough," which sounds as if he is kicking himself for not sending a second squad of detectives out to interview Kerik's neighbors. In fact, the lapse in the "clearing" procedure involved Giuliani ignoring the city investigations commissioner when he arrived with the news that Kerik was involved with a company suspected of having ties to organized crime.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/opinion/10herbert.html?ref=opinion
Recession? What Recession?
By BOB HERBERT
Op-Ed Columnist
November 10, 2007
If it looks like a recession and feels like a recession ...
"Quite frankly," said Senator Charles Schumer, peering over his glasses at the Fed chairman, Ben Bernanke, "I think we are at a moment of economic crisis, stemming from four key areas: falling housing prices, lack of confidence in creditworthiness, the weak dollar and high oil prices."
He asked Mr. Bernanke, at a Congressional hearing Thursday, if we were headed toward a recession.
An aide handed the chairman his dancing shoes, and Mr. Bernanke executed a flawless version of the Washington waffle. He said: "Our forecast is for moderate, but positive, growth going forward." He said: "Economists are extremely bad at predicting turning points, and we don't pretend to be any better." He said: "We have not calculated the probability of recession, and I wouldn't want to offer that today."
With all due respect to the chairman, he would see the recession that so many others are feeling if he would only open his eyes. While Mr. Bernanke and others are waiting for the official diagnosis (a decline in the gross domestic product for two successive quarters), the disease is spreading and has been spreading for some time.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/opinion/10sat2.html?ref=opinion
Hope for the Everglades
Editorial
November 10, 2007
Seven years ago, Congress and the Clinton administration set in motion the most ambitious environmental initiative on the planet: an $8 billion, 40-year project to restore South Florida's ecosystem and, in particular, the Everglades, which had been punished by a half-century of uncontrolled development and starved of fresh water.
It was a 50-50 deal, and so far Florida has lived up to its share of the bargain, contributing more than $2 billion already. The federal response, crippled by an inattentive president and a divided, ineffectual Congress, has been pathetic - a mere $363 million - putting the whole enterprise way behind schedule.
Now, at last, comes some good news. Overriding a rare veto by President Bush, Congress this week approved a $22 billion water resources bill that has been hanging around for seven years. Like all big infrastructure bills, this one includes a little something for every member of Congress. But in addition to the pork, the bill also contains several necessary projects. Among them are coastal restoration in Louisiana and two big wetlands restoration projects in the Everglades.
For the Everglades, three tasks lie ahead. The first is to get the money. This water bill merely authorizes the necessary funds, which Congress must then appropriate. The second is to make sure that the Army Corps of Engineers, which is essentially running the Everglades project, spends it wisely and expeditiously. The water bill's biggest shortcoming is the absence of far-reaching reforms of the corps' operations that were proposed by Senator Russell Feingold but rejected by the House. The reforms sought to impose discipline on a notoriously dysfunctional agency.
The third task is to sustain the momentum. The departure of the Clinton administration and the retirement of Senator Bob Graham cost the Everglades many of its champions, and this is the kind of project that can fall by the wayside in time of war and massive deficits.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/opinion/10kayeintro.html?ref=opinion
Guantánamo by the Numbers
By DAVID BOWKER and DAVID KAYE
Op-Ed Contributors
November 10, 2007
SIX years ago this Tuesday, President Bush granted American armed forces sweeping authority to detain and interrogate foreign members of Al Qaeda and their supporters and to use military commissions to try them. By doing so, the president set in motion the creation of military commissions and the detention camp in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
The Bush administration may legitimately claim certain benefits from the Guantánamo system. Some dangerous men are held there, and valuable intelligence has probably been gathered, perhaps even some that has enabled the government to disrupt terrorist activities.
But the costs have been high. Guantánamo has come to be seen worldwide as a stain on America's reputation. The military commissions have failed to deliver justice, stymied by the federal courts' refusal to permit the president to create a system at odds with United States courts-martial and the international law of war.
Meanwhile, the number of detainees at Guantánamo has steadily dropped to a little over 300, from its peak of more than 700, no more than 80 of whom are likely to face any kind of American prosecution. Not a single defendant has gone to trial, and only one has pleaded guilty.
Today, most American leaders acknowledge the need for a new approach. The president himself has expressed a desire to see the detention camp closed. But he has only a little more than a year to do so before the next president takes office. It's time to take a close look at this system of detention and prosecution and move quickly to establish viable alternatives. With apologies to the Harper's Index, the following data provide a historical snapshot.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-China-Toys-Date-Rape-Drug.html?hp
China Bans Exports of Drug-Tainted Toy
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
November 10, 2007
Filed at 2:20 a.m. ET
BEIJING (AP) -- China's government has suspended exports of toys covered with a toxic chemical that have been subject to recalls from Australia to the United States after sickening children, the state-run Xinhua News Agency reported Friday.
China's move came as seven more U.S. children were reported ailing after ingesting Chinese-made toy beads because of the toxic chemical coating, bringing the total of U.S. children sickened to nine, according to a spokeswoman for the Consumer Product Safety Commission.
The Chinese government's quality control administration issued the export ban, sealed the toys at the sites where they were produced and ordered an investigation, Xinhua said in a brief report.
Millions of units of the popular toys, which are sold as Aqua Dots in the United States and as Bindeez in Australia, were recalled in those countries as well as in Britain, Malaysia, Singapore and elsewhere this past week after children began falling sick from swallowing the toy's bead-like parts.
Tests showed they were coated with the industrial chemical 1,4-butanediol. When ingested the chemical metabolizes into the ''date-rape'' drug gamma hydroxy butyrate, and may cause breathing problems, loss of consciousness, seizures, drowsiness, coma and death. In addition to the nine in the U.S., three children in Australia have taken sick.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/world/americas/10venez.html
Students Emerge as a Leading Force Against Chávez
By SIMON ROMERO
November 10, 2007
CARACAS, Venezuela, Nov. 9 - Finding Yon Goicoechea, a leader of the nascent student movement protesting the expanding power of President Hugo Chávez, is not easy. He changes cellphones every few days. After receiving dozens of death threats, he moves among the apartments of friends here each day in search of a safe place to sleep.
In an interview this week in a back room at one such residence, a villa in a leafy district in this city, Mr. Goicoechea described the movement that has supplanted traditional political parties in recent weeks as the most cohesive and respected challenger to Mr. Chávez's government.
"We believe in exhausting the democratic options available to us through peaceful action," said Mr. Goicoechea, 23, who studies law at Andrés Bello Catholic University here, referring to the students' opposition to a constitutional overhaul. In the polarized world of Venezuelan political debate, such parsed and polished statements are rare.
But what about the claims, from Mr. Chávez and his loyalists, that the students ultimately want to oust him from office? "We want social transformation, not a coup," Mr. Goicoechea said. "The real coup d'état is coming from Chávez, who wants to perpetuate himself in power."
Indeed, the students first burst onto the scene over the summer with protests against Mr. Chávez's move to push RCTV, a critical television network, off public airwaves. But the president's proposed charter, which would abolish his term limits, has led to much larger protests here and in other large cities this month.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/opinion/l10schools.html
November 10, 2007
Letters
A School Is More Than an A, B or C
To the Editor:
Re "50 City Schools Get Failing Grade in a New System" (front page, Nov. 6):
No doubt the mayor and the schools chancellor will now be the recipients of unending grief from those schools and principals who feel they were graded unfairly.
Grading schools is as absurd as grading students. The criteria for both are equally detrimental to achieving the goals of a truly useful education: self-awareness, an engaged citizenry and the skills necessary to generate meaningful, dignified work.
Until we address the core societal conditions that now make such goals unattainable for the vast majority, there is little hope that obfuscating parlor tricks like high-stakes testing, free cellphones for every child and schoolwide report cards will serve as successful incentives.
Roland Legiardi-Laura
New York, Nov. 6, 2007
The writer is producing a film on the history of schooling and is a guest teaching artist at University Heights High School.
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Forwarded by Susan Frishkorn
frishkorn@bellsouth.net
The Baltimore Chronicle
http://baltimorechronicle.com/2007/110807Lindorff.shtml
Suddenly, Impeachment Hearings Are Looking Like a Strong Possibility
by Dave Lindorff
Thu, 11/08/2007-You wouldn't know it if you just watch TV news or read thecorporate press, but this past Tuesday, something remarkable happened.Despite the pig-headed opposition of the Democratic Party's topcongressional leadership, a majority of the House, including threeRepublicans, voted to send Dennis Kucinich's long sidelined Cheneyimpeachment bill (H Res 333) to the Judiciary Committee for hearings.
The vote was 218 to 194.
Now the behind-the-scenes partisan maneuvering that preceded that vote wasarcane indeed, with Kucinich first exercising a member's privilege motion topresent his stymied impeachment bill to the full House, only to have SpeakerNancy Pelosi arrange for a colleague (Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-MD)offer a motion to table it. The Republicans, anxious to embarrass theSpeaker, threw a wrench into that plan, though, by voting as a bloc tooppose tabling. Since Kucinich already has 22 co-sponsors for his bill, itwas clear that the tabling gambit would fail. As soon as that becameapparent, rank-and-file Democrats, unwilling to be seen by theirconstituents as defending Cheney, rushed to change their votes to opposingthe tabling motion. In the end, tabling failed by 242 to 170 with 77Democrats supporting a pleasantly surprised Kucinich.
In order to avoid a floor debate on the merits of impeaching the eminentlyimpeachable Vice President Cheney, Pelosi and her allies then moved to sendKucinich's bill directly to the Judiciary Committee. They were joined bythree Republicans, including maverick Republican presidential candidate RonPaul (R-TX).
Now the hope of the Democratic leadership is that this means Kucinich'simpeachment bill will continue to be safely bottled up in a subcommittee ofthe Judiciary Committee. But it may not work out that way for them.
Whatever the explanation, this impeachment bill has been endorsed by a floorvote of the full House, with bipartisan support.
more....
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/washington/10tax.html
House Backs Tax Relief Bill, but Fate in Senate Is Unsure
By EDMUND L. ANDREWS
November 10, 2007
WASHINGTON, Nov. 9 - The House passed a $78.3 billion tax bill on Friday that would shield about 21 million people from the alternative minimum tax next year, and pay for it in part by ending tax breaks for private equity funds, hedge funds and other partnerships.
But the bill, approved 216 to 193, faces a highly uncertain future in the Senate. Republicans are staunchly opposed to any tax increases, and some Democrats are torn between appealing to their party instincts and alienating some of their big contributors.
President Bush has already threatened to veto the bill, which also includes xtensions of several other tax provisions, if it includes higher taxes that would shift more of the tax burden to the wealthy. He argues that Congress should freeze the alternative minimum tax without trying to make up the $50.6 billion revenue loss for the 2007 tax year.
Following Mr. Bush's prescription, however, would increase the budget deficit, something Democrats have vowed to avoid. Because it is not adjusted for inflation, and because of the way it interacts with Mr. Bush's tax cuts of 2001 and 2003, the alternative tax has exploded in the last six years and is set to hit people with incomes as low as $50,000.
Congress has prevented that expansion by passing a series of one-year "patches," but the cost of those patches has exploded. House Democrats said their bill was both fiscally responsible and fair, protecting middle-income families without additional borrowing by repealing tax breaks that benefit the wealthiest people in the world.
more . . . . .
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/09/AR2007110901897.html
How to Win The War Of Ideas
By Robert Satloff
Saturday, November 10, 2007; A17
The resignation of Karen P. Hughes as undersecretary of state for public diplomacy gives President Bush an opportunity to fix one of the most glaring blunders in his administration's response to the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 -- a failure to prioritize ideological warfare over public relations.
Today, most Americans believe that the United States is fighting three wars: in Iraq, in Afghanistan and against violent Islamist extremists around the world (i.e., "the war on terror"). But as the Sept. 11 commission pointed out, we are, more accurately, engaged in what can be considered a fourth war, gainst the spread of the ideology of radical Islamism. In this war, the attlefields are the many cities, towns and villages where extremists seek to impose their absolutist view of sharia-based rule. The stakes in this contest are no less consequential for U.S. interests than those in the other three wars -- perhaps greater.
In terms of the narrow "war on terror," there is considerable evidence that the terrorists are losing. Captured al-Qaeda documents paint a portrait of a ovement in distress, fearing defeat. Al-Qaeda and its satellites have failed to overthrow local Muslim governments, galvanize popular support or make headway toward replacing the international order with one based on the collective action of the world's Muslims.
In the ideological battle, however, radical Islamists are doing well. They have taken advantage of the administration's "freedom agenda," and in Lebanon, Egypt and the Palestinian territories, they have made substantial progress. Elsewhere, Islamists are expanding their influence in other ways, exploiting governmental weakness or failure in educational, financial and social welfare systems.
The U.S. government has a great stake in the outcome of this contest. But our government operates as though this war barely exists and has focused its energies on the wrong problem.
more . . . . .
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/09/AR2007110901790.html
The Real Pending Tax Hike
By Alex M. Brill
Special to washingtonpost.com's Think Tank Town
Friday, November 9, 2007; 4:57 PM
Washington is abuzz about the tax proposal introduced recently by House Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.). The bill tackles a host of tax policy matters but its centerpiece proposes to repeal the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) and offset that revenue loss with an $800 billion tax increase on the roughly 3.5 million taxpayers earning above $200,000 a year. The tax increase hikes marginal tax rates by nearly 5 percentage points. Republicans have been quick to attack this tax increase on small business owners and entrepreneurs and rightly point out that the high marginal tax rates in the Rangel plan would negatively impact the economy.
Yet Chairman Rangel's proposal is not the biggest hike on the horizon. Today's current tax code will "naturally" deliver a tax increase to all taxpayers in 2011. While Republicans have attacked the Democrat's proposal as "the mother of all tax hikes", the biggest tax increase is the pending expiration of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts. That hike will boost tax collections by over $200 billion a year after 2011, more than twice the size of the revenue raisers proposed by Rangel.
The reason that these "natural" tax increases are on the horizon is a function of the legislative process and bizarre rules of the United States Senate. Senate procedures are such that while a permanent tax increase can be enacted with a simple majority vote under a budget process known as "reconciliation," a permanent tax cut requires support from 60 Senators. Tax cuts can be enacted through the 51 vote reconciliation process but the rules require those cuts to be temporary (up to ten years). As a result of these rules and slim Republican majorities in the Senate, the key individual tax cuts enacted by the Republican Congress over the last six years are set to expire at the end of 2010.
If Congress does not act to prevent these hikes, the impact will be dramatic. According to an analysis by the Treasury Department, for a family of four earning $50,000, it will be, an average tax hike of $2,100. Five million taxpayers currently paying no federal income tax will be brought onto the tax rolls. Marginal tax rates would rise for most taxpayers. The tax on dividend income would more than double and capital gains tax rate would jump from 15 percent to 20 percent. In a time when the tax on capital has been declining in other countries to encourage investment and attract capital, the U.S. tax code is scheduled to head in the opposite direction.
While these tax hikes are slated to occur under current law, the political reality of what will happen in the next few years is much more complicated. For one, after 2008, the President's budget won't be advocating a simple extension of current law. The next President, Democrat or Republican, will craft his or her own tax agenda. Second, budget pressures are rapidly becoming near-term problems and therefore likely to attract substantial political attention. Extending hundreds of billion in annual tax reductions without other changes may be politically untenable.
more . . . . .
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/09/AR2007110902202.html?hpid=topnews
A Human Rights Champion, Cheerfully Defiant
By Emily Wax
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, November 10, 2007; A12
LAHORE, Pakistan, Nov. 9 -- Female prison guards sit in Asma Jahangir's art-filled living room, watching as she sips tea, smokes cigarettes and talks about how proud she is to be Pakistani.
Jahangir, a lawyer and head of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, was placed under house arrest last Saturday, and since then the government has turned her two-story family villa into a jail. More than 20 prison guards, some with submachine guns, are posted in her garden, and plainclothes officers in oversize suits peer through her windows.
Her country is now in a state of turmoil, following President Pervez Musharraf's declaration of emergency rule, which has included the firing of Supreme Court justices and the detention of hundreds of opposition leaders, lawyers and human rights activists.
But Jahangir remains defiant and upbeat, waving to neighbors and continuing to work on position papers on how to bring the rule of law, an independent judiciary and stability to Pakistan.
Life under house arrest has been "just lovely, and it hasn't hurt me," Jahangir, 55 and a mother of three, said Friday in an interview at her home. "I am so proud of Pakistanis and specifically of our lawyers for speaking out and getting their heads bashed in for a better Pakistan."
more . . . . .
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The Washington Post
http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/postglobal/needtoknow/2007/11/voice_from_house_arrest_dont_l.html
Voice from House Arrest: Don't Let Pakistan Follow Burma
By Afsin Yurdakul
''I can't speak for too long on the phone,'' Asma Jahangir said in a calm, determined tone, ''the military might cut it off.'' Nonetheless, Pakistan's leading human rights lawyer and activist accepted my offer of a phone interview this morning. She spoke from her home, where she was being held under house arrest, via the one phone line that the Pakistani police had somehow forgotten to cut off.
She spoke quickly, not because she was nervous, but because she wanted to tell the world as much as she could about what is really going on behind the scenes of Pakistan's current political turmoil. She said the electronic media is completely shut down, and satellite dishes have been removed from the supermarket shelves, ostensibly by the military, to prevent people from getting or spreading any information about the state of emergency.
Jahangir urged the world not to turn a blind eye to violations of democracy and free speech in Pakistan, and called for maximum international pressure on General Pervez Musharraf.
However, as she was telling me that these are defining moments for her country's future, the police interjected, and we lost the connection. I called back immediately. A male voice answered (she had been home alone only moments before) and told me that 'she was not allowed to talk anymore,' because 'she was with the police.' At the moment I have no information regarding her status.
I originally conducted this interview for Turkey's NTV-MSNBC news portal, where it was published this morning in Turkish. I worry that the interview itself, intended as a chance for her to speak freely, is in fact a chilling example of the ban on free speech in Pakistan today.
more . . . . .
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miamiherald.com/851/story/302630.html
The U.N.'s campaign to demonize Israel
By U.N. WATCH
Posted on Sat, Nov. 10, 2007
Below are excerpts from ''The United Nations and Anti-Semitism,'' a report
by U.N. Watch, a Geneva-based monitoring group.
An alien observing U.N. debates, reading its resolutions and walking its halls could well conclude that a principal purpose of the world body is to censure a tiny country called Israel. Beginning in the late 1960s, the full weight of the United Nations was gradually but deliberately turned against the country it had conceived by General Assembly resolution a mere two decades earlier.
The campaign to demonize and delegitimize Israel in every U.N. and international forum was initiated by the Arab states together with the Soviet Union and supported by what has become known as an ''automatic majority'' of Third World member states. In 1975, following a steady drumbeat of anti-Israel declarations, the majority of the General Assembly adopted the ''Zionism is Racism'' resolution. At the same time, it instituted a series of related measures that installed an infrastructure of anti-Israel propaganda throughout the United Nations.
It was not until 1991, after strenuous efforts by democratic forces that the nfamous resolution was repealed. However, in many ways the legacy of 1975 remains fully intact: a plethora of U.N. committees, annual resolutions, bureaucratic divisions, permanent exhibits in New York and Geneva headquarters -- all dedicated to a relentless and virulent propaganda war against the Jewish state. . . .
The U.N. campaign to delegitimize Israel has its desired effect. Sworn enemies of Israel or Jews brandish U.N. resolutions as evidence of international support and legitimacy. Others who may have held no previous bias become convinced that the Jewish state is an international outlaw, with similarly negative views about those seen as its supporters. . . .
Most worrying of all, the U.N. record between 2004 and 2007 shows an intensification of one-sided, redundant and irrational measures that, taken together, form an infrastructure to demonize and delegitimize the Jewish state. In 2006-07, for example, the extraordinary amount of annual General Assembly resolutions singling out Israel for condemnation were increased still further, intensifying an insidious double standard.
more . . . . .
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miamiherald.com/851/story/302638.html
Prepare for the $100 oil tsunami
By FRIDA GHITIS
Posted on Sat, Nov. 10, 2007
By now, after years of skyrocketing fuel prices, the news that the price of a barrel of oil is hitting $100 doesn't exactly cause us to panic. When you consider that a barrel of crude cost just $11 in 1998, and double that at the beginning of the decade, the truly astonishing development is that our lives have changed so little as a result of the higher prices.
And yet, as some oil exporting countries swim in the riches of our gas money, the consequences of $100 oil are not always what you -- or they -- might expect.
Reshaping the world
Soaring prices at the pump could cause Western economies to slow down, and they will continue to enrich and embolden shady rulers in dangerous countries. But far beyond our SUV-clogged highways, the price of oil could reshape the world in unexpected ways.
Many countries, including major oil exporters, spend huge sums subsidizing fuel prices; the higher the price of oil, the higher the cost of these subsidies. At some point, the subsidies become too much and the government has to cut back, potentially sparking unrest. That was the experience of Venezuela in the late 1980s, when thousands of people died in riots that followed a cut in subsidies.
In Venezuela today, where the world's cheapest gasoline sells at about 8 cents a gallon, President Hugo Chávez is already laying the groundwork for a ossible cut in a subsidy that costs his deficit-riddled treasury about $9 billion a year.
more . . . . .
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Local10.com
http://www.local10.com/print/14549402/detail.html
Does Skipping Meals Help Your Heart?
Monthly Fast Tied To Better Arteries
POSTED: 10:19 am EST November 9, 2007
UPDATED: 10:28 am EST November 9, 2007
Skipping food one day a month may be good for your health, researchers toldthe American Heart Association.
Doctors had noticed that Mormons -- members of the Church of Jesus Christ ofLatter-Day Saints -- who fast once a month have lower rates of heart diseasethan the general population.
Mormons are known for other practices that can boost health, such as aprohibition on tobacco use.
"People who fast seem to receive a heart-protective benefit, and thisappeared to also hold true in non-LDS people who fast as part of ahealth-conscious lifestyle," said Dr. Benjamin D. Horne of the IntermountainMedical Center.
Looking at medical record of more than 4,600 men and women from 1994 to2002, the team found that 61 percent of Mormons had significant narrowing inheart arteries. That compared to 66 percent for those who claimed anotherreligion or none at all.
When looking deeper at specific behaviors -- such as drinking caffeine andattending worship services -- they found that fasting was the biggestpredictor of who would have heart disease.
Fifty-nine percent of those who fast had heart disease, compared ot 67percent who did not.
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Local10.com
http://www.local10.com/print/14559201/detail.html
Author Norman Mailer Dead At 84
Debut Novel Was 1948's 'The Naked And The Dead'
POSTED: 8:11 am EST November 10, 2007
NEW YORK -- Norman Mailer has died.
The noted American author was 84 and died early Saturday at New York's Mount Sinai Hospital of kidney failure.
Word of his death came from Mailer's literary executor Michael Lennon, who is also his official biographer.
Mailer's debut novel "The Naked and the Dead" was published in 1948 and went on to become a classic, followed by other literary masterworks. The two-time Pulitzer Prize winner was revered for the insight, passion and originality of his works.
Over the years, Mailer encouraged an image as feisty, streetwise and high-living. He drank, fought, smoked pot, married six times and stabbed his second wife, almost fatally, during a drunken party.
He had nine children, produced five movies, dabbled in journalism and once ran for mayor of New York. At one point, he was banned from the Manhattan YWHA for reciting obscene poetry. And he crusaded against women's lib.
But in the end, as Newsweek magazine review Raymond Sokolov noted, "it is his writing that will count."
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[Send your comments about articles to rays.list@comcast.net]
#####
FLORIDA DIGEST November 10, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US AT rays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
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Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/features/health/sfl-flrxlow1109nbnov09,0,5432994,print.story
Some Florida Medicare users may be hit with higher drug costs
Low-income people could have to change plans
By Bob LaMendola
November 9, 2007
More than half of the 570,000 low-income Medicare recipients in Florida will be forced to change their prescription coverage or pay more per month on Jan. 1 because their drug plans are raising prices too much, consumer advocates said Thursday.
Many low-income people are unaware of or confused about the issue and may wind up unable to pay the higher prices or unable to get medicine if they switch to a drug plan that doesn't cover what they take, advocates said.
"We fear there will be bad health outcomes," said Anne Swerlick, deputy director of Florida Legal Services, one of three nonprofit agencies that raised the issue at a news briefing. "When you have people with serious health conditions, it's nightmarish for them to navigate all this."
Nationwide, the change affects one-quarter of 9.2 million low-income seniors and disabled recipients. Low income is under $15,315 for individuals, $23,410 for couples.
Medicare's drug program lets low-income recipients avoid premiums and co-payments if they join drug plans with premiums below a certain price, about $20 per month in Florida next year. But eight of this year's 10 qualifying plans in Florida will not qualify next year because they raised prices, including popular plans from Humana and AARP.
As a result, 230,000 Floridians will automatically be switched into plans that do qualify. Another 80,000 will have to switch on their own or choose to pay premiums of up to $10 a month to stay in their plans, said the National Senior Citizens Law Center, one of the nonprofit groups.
Medicare recipients are getting letters to help them address the situation, but some will not take action or understand, said Kevin Prindiville, staff attorney at the senior law center. Those who switch may not find out until too late that the new plan does not cover their drugs, he said.
Medicare officials were not available for comment.
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ExpressGayNews.com
http://cbs4.com/sports/tim.hardaway.heat.2.564043.html
Hardaway Is Changed Man After Anti-Gay Slurs
Former Heat Star Says "Words Were Terrible"
Reporting
Jim Berry SOUTH MIAMI (CBS4) ? Months after Tim Hardaway's anti-gay comments sparked anger in the homosexual community the former Heat star has resurfaced a new man. Hardaway says gay classes at the YES Institute made him realize how wrong he was.
CBS4 's Jim Berry caught up with Hardaway at the YES Institute. The former Heat all-star says he is a more open person and is hopeful that he can live a normal life again.
"I know a lot more now and I'm willing to talk to people and I want to make sure they understand that my words were terrible and I didn't mean them," said Hardaway.
(CBS4)
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From Mark LaFontaine for Florida State House District #92
www.MarkLafontaine.com
Mark will be a guest on Florida Progressive Radio, for a special VeteransDay edition at 2:00 P.M. on Sunday November 11th, 2007.
Also if you have not already done so be sure to RSVP for :
Join Candidate Mark LaFontaine
Avi & Chef Simone
for a Campaign Fundraiser
November 12th 2007 6:00 PM
Dinner at MAMALE KOSHER Restaurant
1672 E Oakland Park Blvd Fort Lauderdale, 33334
954-563-0770
Minimum Contribution $50.00
Seating is Limited Please RSVP 954-651-3147
If you would prefer to contribute by mail, send a check to:
Mark LaFontaine Campaign
P.O. Box 23697
Oakland Park, FL 33307-3697
To Make a Contribution on line CLICK HERE
http://marklafontaine.com/donate.html
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/us/10immig.html
Florida Ends Shuttling of Refugees to Canada
By MONICA DAVEY
November 10, 2007
A Florida organization that assisted hundreds of illegal immigrants in fleeing to Canada must close and return thousands of dollars it collected from the immigrants, who believed they would be given legal status in that country, Florida's attorney general said yesterday.
Complaining of stepped-up sweeps by American immigration officials, about 450 people made their way from Florida to Canada in recent months with guidance from the organization, the Jerusalem Haitian Community Center, of Naples. Mostly Mexicans and Haitians, they presented themselves as refugees seeking asylum. Many are still waiting for hearings.
"While the state attorney general's office cannot enforce federal immigration law in this case, my office can investigate potentially misleading or deceptive practices, and I believe this organization was engaging in questionable practices," said Bill McCollum, the state attorney general. Many of the immigrants paid "donations" to the center of as much as $400, his office found.
The authorities in Windsor, on the Canadian side of the border at Detroit, complained that they could not afford the costs of social services if the arrivals continued. Most of all, advocates for refugees in Canada warned that the odds of such immigrants being granted asylum were poor.
To win refugee status in Canada, immigrants must show a reasonable fear of persecution connected to their race, religion, nationality or political background.
more . . . . .
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Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-flpfoodbank1110nbnov10,0,7697973.story?coll=sofla_tab01_layout
Federal aid to South Florida's food banks dwindles as the need grows
Donations decline as more residents suffer from hunger
By Ivette M. Yee
November 10, 2007
Much-desired staples including rice, pasta, milk and peanut butter are showing up less in food bags for the needy as federal aid has sunk to food banks nationwide. And those fighting hunger have to rely more heavily on businesses and the public to lend a hand.
Officials at the Daily Bread, South Florida's largest food bank, said U.S. Department of Agriculture commodities - surplus food and food the government buys regularly from farmers, such as rice, produce and pasta - once made up 15 percent of its total food supply. Now that's down to 11 percent. Daily Bread gives 18 million pounds of food to 700 nonprofit organizations in South Florida each year.
"The agencies continue coming to us and telling us that their need is growing," said Robert Peters, associate director of Daily Bread. "But we're not holding onto the food, we're not storing it. We're just not receiving it."
Just three years ago the USDA gave food banks in Florida 26 million pounds of food for the needy through The Emergency Food Assistance Program, known as TEFAP. This year the total fell to 15 million pounds, said Gloria Van Treese, of the state Bureau of Food Distribution, part of the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. The USDA gives a certain amount to each state based on the level of unemployment and poverty.
The USDA drop comes at a time when one out of six Broward County residents say they suffer from hunger, according to a Broward County Food Security Survey released in June. In Palm Beach County, more than 53,000 people are enrolled in the government food stamp program, said officials at the United Way.
more . . . . .
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Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-flbpark1110pnnov10,0,7218506.story
Broward County to close parks on Veterans Day
County says it needed to cut budget
By Scott Wyman
November 10, 2007
If you're off work Monday for Veterans Day, don't plan to grill out with friends at Topeekeegee Yugnee Park or take the kids to the water playground at Quiet Waters Park.
For the first time, regional parks run by Broward County government will be closed on a holiday - a decision forced by budget cuts made to provide tax relief to homeowners.
County parks traditionally are open year-round, but Monday is one of three days that visitors will now find the gates shut and locked. Parks will also be closed the day after Thanksgiving as well as Christmas Day.
"It's a travesty, an absolute travesty," said Barry Wilen of Hollywood, who walks four days a week in his city's T.Y. Park. "They could have a skeleton crew. A park needs to be available on the days when the public is most inclined to use it, and that would seem to be when schools are closed and people are off work."
Parks officials said they chose the three days because they believe they are the ones when the fewest people visit. Also, the days are costly because workers are paid at the holiday rates of 50 percent over their normal salary.
more . . . . .
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Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/sfl-editdlvetonbnov09,0,6819607.story
Override of Everglades bill a lesson for Bush, a benefit for Florida
November 9, 2007
ISSUE: Congress overrides a Bush veto.
Congress voted to override a Bush veto - the first time for this president. That milestone is notable enough, but there's a more important message coming out of this bipartisan decision to defy the White House.
The president took a dubious stand on the wrong bill. America needs to shore up its ailing infrastructure, which includes a number of aging dams, levees, flood control systems and waterways across the country. Congress crafted the Water Resources Development Act as a bipartisan effort to address those problems.
Florida, in particular, will be a big beneficiary. Seven years have passed since the historic signing of the measure to restore the Florida Everglades. Since then, Congress and the president have sparred over federal funding. Bush spoke favorably of Everglades restoration, but he still vetoed the one bill that would have opened the door to federal coffers and accelerate this badly needed water project. The override will jump-start that process.
Given the importance of the restoration project, it should surprise no one that a number of House Republicans in Florida's congressional delegation rebuffed Bush. The override makes sense for an elected official from Florida, even for those lawmakers who normally stand with the president, right or wrong.
Granted, the bill carries a $23 billion price tag, a cost the president said arranted the veto. The reasoning, though, doesn't make any sense.
The water bill doesn't guarantee immediate funding. Congress still has to ppropriate the money to pay for projects listed in the bill, which gives the president ample opportunity to address cost concerns. Besides, the president only discovered his veto pen very late in the game - after Democrats gained a majority in the Congress. His five vetoes in this Congress aren't enough to make him a budget hawk.
Bush and the Congress will spar again over spending. The override, though, should send a message that this legislation, and the projects it authorizes, is too important to cast aside.
BOTTOM LINE: The decision amounts to a lesson for Bush and a benefit to Florida.
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[Send your comments about articles to rays.list@comcast.net]
#####
=
Sun-Sentinel.com
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/features/health/sfl-flrxlow1109nbnov09,0,5432994,print.story
Some Florida Medicare users may be hit with higher drug costs
Low-income people could have to change plans
By Bob LaMendola
November 9, 2007
More than half of the 570,000 low-income Medicare recipients in Florida will be forced to change their prescription coverage or pay more per month on Jan. 1 because their drug plans are raising prices too much, consumer advocates said Thursday.
Many low-income people are unaware of or confused about the issue and may wind up unable to pay the higher prices or unable to get medicine if they switch to a drug plan that doesn't cover what they take, advocates said.
"We fear there will be bad health outcomes," said Anne Swerlick, deputy director of Florida Legal Services, one of three nonprofit agencies that raised the issue at a news briefing. "When you have people with serious health conditions, it's nightmarish for them to navigate all this."
Nationwide, the change affects one-quarter of 9.2 million low-income seniors and disabled recipients. Low income is under $15,315 for individuals, $23,410 for couples.
Medicare's drug program lets low-income recipients avoid premiums and co-payments if they join drug plans with premiums below a certain price, about $20 per month in Florida next year. But eight of this year's 10 qualifying plans in Florida will not qualify next year because they raised prices, including popular plans from Humana and AARP.
As a result, 230,000 Floridians will automatically be switched into plans that do qualify. Another 80,000 will have to switch on their own or choose to pay premiums of up to $10 a month to stay in their plans, said the National Senior Citizens Law Center, one of the nonprofit groups.
Medicare recipients are getting letters to help them address the situation, but some will not take action or understand, said Kevin Prindiville, staff attorney at the senior law center. Those who switch may not find out until too late that the new plan does not cover their drugs, he said.
Medicare officials were not available for comment.
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ExpressGayNews.com
http://cbs4.com/sports/tim.hardaway.heat.2.564043.html
Hardaway Is Changed Man After Anti-Gay Slurs
Former Heat Star Says "Words Were Terrible"
Reporting
Jim Berry SOUTH MIAMI (CBS4) ? Months after Tim Hardaway's anti-gay comments sparked anger in the homosexual community the former Heat star has resurfaced a new man. Hardaway says gay classes at the YES Institute made him realize how wrong he was.
CBS4 's Jim Berry caught up with Hardaway at the YES Institute. The former Heat all-star says he is a more open person and is hopeful that he can live a normal life again.
"I know a lot more now and I'm willing to talk to people and I want to make sure they understand that my words were terrible and I didn't mean them," said Hardaway.
(CBS4)
=
From Mark LaFontaine for Florida State House District #92
www.MarkLafontaine.com
Mark will be a guest on Florida Progressive Radio, for a special VeteransDay edition at 2:00 P.M. on Sunday November 11th, 2007.
Also if you have not already done so be sure to RSVP for :
Join Candidate Mark LaFontaine
Avi & Chef Simone
for a Campaign Fundraiser
November 12th 2007 6:00 PM
Dinner at MAMALE KOSHER Restaurant
1672 E Oakland Park Blvd Fort Lauderdale, 33334
954-563-0770
Minimum Contribution $50.00
Seating is Limited Please RSVP 954-651-3147
If you would prefer to contribute by mail, send a check to:
Mark LaFontaine Campaign
P.O. Box 23697
Oakland Park, FL 33307-3697
To Make a Contribution on line CLICK HERE
http://marklafontaine.com/donate.html
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/10/us/10immig.html
Florida Ends Shuttling of Refugees to Canada
By MONICA DAVEY
November 10, 2007
A Florida organization that assisted hundreds of illegal immigrants in fleeing to Canada must close and return thousands of dollars it collected from the immigrants, who believed they would be given legal status in that country, Florida's attorney general said yesterday.
Complaining of stepped-up sweeps by American immigration officials, about 450 people made their way from Florida to Canada in recent months with guidance from the organization, the Jerusalem Haitian Community Center, of Naples. Mostly Mexicans and Haitians, they presented themselves as refugees seeking asylum. Many are still waiting for hearings.
"While the state attorney general's office cannot enforce federal immigration law in this case, my office can investigate potentially misleading or deceptive practices, and I believe this organization was engaging in questionable practices," said Bill McCollum, the state attorney general. Many of the immigrants paid "donations" to the center of as much as $400, his office found.
The authorities in Windsor, on the Canadian side of the border at Detroit, complained that they could not afford the costs of social services if the arrivals continued. Most of all, advocates for refugees in Canada warned that the odds of such immigrants being granted asylum were poor.
To win refugee status in Canada, immigrants must show a reasonable fear of persecution connected to their race, religion, nationality or political background.
more . . . . .
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Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-flpfoodbank1110nbnov10,0,7697973.story?coll=sofla_tab01_layout
Federal aid to South Florida's food banks dwindles as the need grows
Donations decline as more residents suffer from hunger
By Ivette M. Yee
November 10, 2007
Much-desired staples including rice, pasta, milk and peanut butter are showing up less in food bags for the needy as federal aid has sunk to food banks nationwide. And those fighting hunger have to rely more heavily on businesses and the public to lend a hand.
Officials at the Daily Bread, South Florida's largest food bank, said U.S. Department of Agriculture commodities - surplus food and food the government buys regularly from farmers, such as rice, produce and pasta - once made up 15 percent of its total food supply. Now that's down to 11 percent. Daily Bread gives 18 million pounds of food to 700 nonprofit organizations in South Florida each year.
"The agencies continue coming to us and telling us that their need is growing," said Robert Peters, associate director of Daily Bread. "But we're not holding onto the food, we're not storing it. We're just not receiving it."
Just three years ago the USDA gave food banks in Florida 26 million pounds of food for the needy through The Emergency Food Assistance Program, known as TEFAP. This year the total fell to 15 million pounds, said Gloria Van Treese, of the state Bureau of Food Distribution, part of the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. The USDA gives a certain amount to each state based on the level of unemployment and poverty.
The USDA drop comes at a time when one out of six Broward County residents say they suffer from hunger, according to a Broward County Food Security Survey released in June. In Palm Beach County, more than 53,000 people are enrolled in the government food stamp program, said officials at the United Way.
more . . . . .
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Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-flbpark1110pnnov10,0,7218506.story
Broward County to close parks on Veterans Day
County says it needed to cut budget
By Scott Wyman
November 10, 2007
If you're off work Monday for Veterans Day, don't plan to grill out with friends at Topeekeegee Yugnee Park or take the kids to the water playground at Quiet Waters Park.
For the first time, regional parks run by Broward County government will be closed on a holiday - a decision forced by budget cuts made to provide tax relief to homeowners.
County parks traditionally are open year-round, but Monday is one of three days that visitors will now find the gates shut and locked. Parks will also be closed the day after Thanksgiving as well as Christmas Day.
"It's a travesty, an absolute travesty," said Barry Wilen of Hollywood, who walks four days a week in his city's T.Y. Park. "They could have a skeleton crew. A park needs to be available on the days when the public is most inclined to use it, and that would seem to be when schools are closed and people are off work."
Parks officials said they chose the three days because they believe they are the ones when the fewest people visit. Also, the days are costly because workers are paid at the holiday rates of 50 percent over their normal salary.
more . . . . .
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Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/sfl-editdlvetonbnov09,0,6819607.story
Override of Everglades bill a lesson for Bush, a benefit for Florida
November 9, 2007
ISSUE: Congress overrides a Bush veto.
Congress voted to override a Bush veto - the first time for this president. That milestone is notable enough, but there's a more important message coming out of this bipartisan decision to defy the White House.
The president took a dubious stand on the wrong bill. America needs to shore up its ailing infrastructure, which includes a number of aging dams, levees, flood control systems and waterways across the country. Congress crafted the Water Resources Development Act as a bipartisan effort to address those problems.
Florida, in particular, will be a big beneficiary. Seven years have passed since the historic signing of the measure to restore the Florida Everglades. Since then, Congress and the president have sparred over federal funding. Bush spoke favorably of Everglades restoration, but he still vetoed the one bill that would have opened the door to federal coffers and accelerate this badly needed water project. The override will jump-start that process.
Given the importance of the restoration project, it should surprise no one that a number of House Republicans in Florida's congressional delegation rebuffed Bush. The override makes sense for an elected official from Florida, even for those lawmakers who normally stand with the president, right or wrong.
Granted, the bill carries a $23 billion price tag, a cost the president said arranted the veto. The reasoning, though, doesn't make any sense.
The water bill doesn't guarantee immediate funding. Congress still has to ppropriate the money to pay for projects listed in the bill, which gives the president ample opportunity to address cost concerns. Besides, the president only discovered his veto pen very late in the game - after Democrats gained a majority in the Congress. His five vetoes in this Congress aren't enough to make him a budget hawk.
Bush and the Congress will spar again over spending. The override, though, should send a message that this legislation, and the projects it authorizes, is too important to cast aside.
BOTTOM LINE: The decision amounts to a lesson for Bush and a benefit to Florida.
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