Jon Stewart (Daily Show -- Headlines)

Stephen Colbert (Colbert Report)

AMY GOODMAN (Democracy Now)

Children’s Healthcare Is a No-Brainer
Posted on Jul 24, 2007


Deamonte Driver had a toothache. He was 12 years old. He had no insurance, and his mother couldn’t afford the $80 to have the decayed tooth removed. He might have gotten it taken care of through Medicaid, but his mother couldn’t find a dentist who accepted the low reimbursements. Instead, Deamonte got some minimal attention from an emergency room, his condition worsened and he died. Deamonte was one of 9 million children in the U.S. without health insurance.

Congress is considering bipartisan legislation that will cover poor children in the U.S.

The major obstacle? President Bush is vowing to veto the bill, even though Republican and Democratic senators reached bipartisan agreement on it. The bill adds $35 billion to the State Children’s Health Insurance Program over the next five years by increasing federal taxes on cigarettes.

The conservative Heritage Foundation is against the tobacco tax to fund SCHIP, saying that it “disproportionately burdens low-income smokers” as well as “young adults.” No mention is made of any adverse impact on Heritage-funder Altria Group, the cigarette giant formerly known as Philip Morris.

According to the American Association for Respiratory Care, with every 10 percent rise in the cigarette tax, youth smoking drops by 7 percent and overall smoking declines by 4 percent. Marian Wright Edelman, founder of the Children’s Defense Fund, says: “It is a public health good in and of itself and will save lives to increase the tobacco tax. Cigarettes kill and cigarettes provoke lung cancer, and every child and every [other] human being we can, by increasing the cigarette tax, stop from smoking or slow down from smoking is going to have a public health benefit, save taxpayers money from the cost of the effects of smoking and tobacco.”

Two programs serve as the health safety net for poor and working-class children: Medicaid and SCHIP (pronounced “s-chip"). SCHIP is a federal grant program that allows states to provide health coverage to children who belong to working families earning too much to be eligible for Medicaid but not enough to afford private health insurance when their employers do not provide it. It’s the SCHIP funding that is now being debated in Congress.

The Children’s Defense Fund has published scores of stories similar to Deamonte’s. Children like Devante Johnson of Houston. At 13, Devante was fighting advanced kidney cancer. His mother tried to renew his Medicaid coverage, but bureaucratic red tape tied up the process. By the time Devante got access to the care he needed, his fate was sealed. He died at the age of 14, in Bush’s home state, only miles from the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, one of the world’s leading cancer treatment and research facilities.

With children’s lives at stake, Edelman has no patience for political gamesmanship: “Why is this country, at this time, the richest in the world, arguing about how few or how many children they can serve? We ought to—this is a no-brainer. The American people want all of its children served. All children deserve health coverage, and I don’t know why we’re having such a hard time getting our president and our political leaders to get it, that children should have health insurance.”

Republican Sen. Gordon Smith originally introduced the SCHIP budget resolution in the Senate. Unlike Bush, who is not up for re-election, Smith is defending his vulnerable Senate seat in 2008, in the blue state of Oregon. He, like other Republicans who are breaking with Bush on the war in Iraq, is sensitive to Bush’s domestic policies. Georgetown University’s Center for Children and Families just released a poll that says 91 percent of Americans support the expansion of SCHIP to cover more kids.

And the American people are willing to go much further. As demonstrated by the popularity of Michael Moore’s latest blockbuster, “SiCKO,” the public, across the political spectrum, is ready to fix the U.S. healthcare system. How many more children like Deamonte and Devante have to die before the politicians, all with great health insurance themselves, take action?

MAUREEN DOWD (New York Times)

Brothers and Sisters
Published: July 25, 2007


W.’s odyssey is one of the oddest in history, a black sheep who leapt above expectations and then crashed back down. It must be a crushing burden for President Bush to have wrought the opposite of what he intended in so many profound ways.

For me, one of the most amazing reversals brought about by W.’s reign of error is this: He may have turned my sister into a Democrat.

As a girl, Peggy shivered in the bitter cold through a coatless John Kennedy’s inaugural speech, and when she saw W. “debone” Ann Richards in a Texas debate in ’94, she thought: “This guy will be the greatest president since J.F.K. He’s so good looking, bright. He’s got everything going for him.”

She volunteered at the Republican convention in 2000, toting a “W Stands for Women” sign. I snuck her into the press pen at a breakfast with George and Laura and had to tackle her when, to the consternation of reporters, she began cheering as if at a Redskins game. She flew to West Virginia to work a phone bank for W. She sat up all night election night (in vain). She cut back on Christmas presents to give him money, and proudly displayed pictures of herself at fund-raisers, one with W., one with Dick Cheney. She canceled her Times subscription when I wrote about the rigged buildup to the Iraq war, and called “Bushworld” (my chronicle of W.’s warped reality) “that silly book.”

She once told a reporter that she couldn’t totally choose W. over me because she knew if she were dying “he won’t come and hold my hand, and I know Maureen will.” So imagine my surprise when she started talking about voting for Barack Obama or John Edwards, if they stop “pussyfooting” around Hillary.

“W.’s loyalty to Cheney has hurt his presidency,” she says sadly. “When Cheney picked himself as vice president, W. should have said, ‘Bug off.’ He could have made his own banquet instead of choosing leftovers. If only he had dialed his father or listened to Powell instead of Cheney and Rumsfeld on Iraq. Not only has W. brought himself down, he’s brought down John McCain, who I wanted to support but can’t because of the war.

“I grew up in the shadow of Walter Reed and was used to seeing servicemen without limbs. But recently after watching a special on soldiers coming home from Iraq with brain injuries, I picked up a picture of my four nephews and I know how I would feel if they had fought in Iraq and came home without limbs or in body bags.

“We are spending billions on this war, and yet veterans and their children are practically getting nothing. I’m no longer a Republican. I’m an American, and I will cast my vote for the person I believe will start the process to get out of Iraq — unless, of course, it’s Hillary.”

I knew my family’s cocky red state of mind had changed when one of my O’Reillyesque brothers used a mocking nickname for W., and expressed disgust about Iraq.

DAN FROOMKIN (White House Watch)

Cheney's PR Blitz
Tuesday, July 31, 2007; 1:20 PM



Vice President Cheney is on a PR blitz.

Well, at least by Cheney standards. Yesterday, he spent 14 minutes tersely answering questions with CBS Radio's Mark Knoller. Tonight, he'll be on CNN with Larry King for an hour.

Judging from the Knoller interview (here's the audio and the transcript), Cheney doesn't have a particular goal in mind other than to assert: I'm still here -- and I'm not apologizing for anything.

President Bush may well spend the final 18 months of his presidency in a defensive crouch because of policies that Cheney advocated (warrantless surveillance, harsh interrogation policies, an unprecedented expansion of executive power and, of course, the war in Iraq). Cheney's own former chief of staff recently escaped going to prison on perjury and obstruction of justice charges only due to Bush's intercession. A Washington Post series last month documented Cheney's staggering clout within the White House, even as rumors continue to swirl that on some issues he is losing his influence. And Cheney had his defibrillator replaced just last weekend.

Still, with these interviews, Cheney appears to be showing that he's still a power to be reckoned with.

The CBS Interview

Dan Eggen writes in The Washington Post: "Vice President Cheney said yesterday that he disagreed with the jury's verdict in the trial of his former chief of staff, who was convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice in the investigation into the Bush administration's leak of the identity of an undercover CIA officer. . . .

"Cheney also defended embattled Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, saying that Gonzales 'has testified truthfully' before Congress and has performed well as head of the Justice Department."

A few excerpts from the transcript:

Q. "Do you want Attorney General Gonzales to keep fighting to keep his job?

"THE VICE PRESIDENT: I do. I'm a big fan of Al's.

"Q Does he need to clarify his testimony?

"THE VICE PRESIDENT: I'm not going to get into the specifics of it. I think Al has done a good job under difficult circumstances. The debate between he and the Senate is something they're going to have to resolve. But I think he has testified truthfully. . . .

"Q Can he remain Attorney General if the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Pat Leahy, says point blank he doesn't trust the Attorney General?

"THE VICE PRESIDENT: [Chuckling] I've had my differences with Pat Leahy. I think the key is whether or not he has the confidence of the President, and he clearly does."

In his first public response to questions about the I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby verdict, sentence and commutation, Cheney was curt and elliptical.

Q. "Let me ask you, have you spoken to your former top aide since his verdict?

"THE VICE PRESIDENT: I have.

"Q And can you tell us anything about that conversation?

"THE VICE PRESIDENT: I've seen him socially on a number of occasions.

"Q Do you believe the commutation that President Bush gave Scooter Libby for his prison term was enough, or if you had been President, would you have granted a full pardon?

"THE VICE PRESIDENT: I thought the President handled it right. I supported his decision.

"Q Did you disagree with the guilty verdict in the case?

"THE VICE PRESIDENT: I did.

"Q Even though the President said he respects that verdict?

"THE VICE PRESIDENT: I still -- you asked me if I disagreed with the verdict, and I did.

"Q Do you think Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald went too far in pursuing a prosecution of Scooter Libby?

"THE VICE PRESIDENT: I don't want to go beyond where I have already. The matter is still pending before the courts. There is an appeal pending on the question, and I don't want to elaborate further."

Fareed Zakaria (Newsweek)

A Cure for Oil Addicts
Energy's Future: Amory Lovins tells how we can leave the age of gas pumps profitably and painlessly.
Aug. 6, 2007 issue -

Amory B. Lovins talks big. He proposes to wean America off oil by the 2040s, touts ultralight cars and tells some of the most powerful corporate executives in the world, like those at Wal-Mart and Texas Instruments, how to behave more efficiently. But perhaps a former Oxford don—one who built a nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer in his basement during high school, anticipated global warming in 1976 and lives in a house that can run on the same amount of energy as a conventional light bulb—is allowed to be bold. In the first of a series of conversations with thinkers and executives about the future of energy, NEWSWEEK's Fareed Zakaria spoke to the Rocky Mountain Institute's cofounder and chairman to see how this optimist makes sense of the world's energy woes. Excerpts:

ZAKARIA: President Bush says we are addicted to oil. If that is the case, is there a cure?
LOVINS: Others have noted that the term is accurate, though it obviously raises the question: when we are addicted to drugs, we're supposed to reduce the supply, so when we are addicted to oil, why are we supposed to increase the supply? There is a cure, and it is painless and profitable. In 2004, my team prepared for the Pentagon a detailed road map for getting the U.S. completely off oil by the 2040s, led by businesses for profit. Half the oil can be saved by redoubling the efficiency of using it, already doubled since 1975. The other half of the oil can be displaced by a mixture of saved natural gas and advanced biofuels. We would end up doing all the things we now do with oil at only a quarter of the cost and with uncompromised performance and improved safety.

You say it is painless and profitable, so why isn't the market doing it now?
It is actually starting to do so rather quickly, now that people realize it's possible. Let me give you an example. In 2004, Boeing launched the development of the 787 Dreamliner, which rolled out on July 8 this year and will be in the air for customers next year. It saves a fifth of the fuel of its predecessor but costs the same, and it has therefore had the fastest order takeoff of any airplane in history—it's sold out into 2014. Ford Motor Co. apparently found this persuasive because they hired the head of Boeing commercial airplanes as their new CEO. And he is now in Detroit with that knowledge and with transformational intent.

So, moving on to cars, these design efficiencies are actually more important than hybrid technology?
That's correct. It's a historical accident that hybrids came first. Three quarters of the energy it takes to move the car is caused by its weight. So there is enormous leverage in taking out weight. This was thought to be both expensive and unsafe, but with modern, very strong and light materials—light metals, ultralight steels or carbon-fiber composites—we can make weight and size independent of each other. We can make cars that are big, which is protective and comfortable, without making them heavy, which is hostile and inefficient. Therefore we can save oil and lives at the same time.

What do you think the government should do to get us off the addiction to oil?
Governments, starting at a state level, should use "feebates"—that is a combination of a fee and a rebate—to broaden the price spread of models with different efficiencies at a given size. So you go to the dealer to buy a vehicle of the size you want and there are more or less efficient models of that size, and [for] the less efficient ones [you] pay a fee. The more efficient ones [offer] a rebate paid for by the fees on the inefficient ones. Fuel taxes are a much weaker way to affect how efficient a car you buy because they are diluted, roughly seven to one, by the other costs of owning and running the car, and then they are heavily discounted. So, for a typical buyer, looking at a year or two of fuel savings is about as unimportant as whether to buy floor mats. Fuel taxes encourage you to drive less, but they're a very weak signal to buy an efficient car in the first place.

What can an average consumer do to promote energy efficiency?
When you get a car, get the most efficient one you can and drive it properly to maximize efficiency. Be thoughtful about whether the trip is necessary and how many people are in your car. Push for fairer competition between all ways to get around. Try to live nearer to where you work, shop and play.

You're an optimist.
I think we will look back in a few decades and wonder what all the oil fuss was about because, just like whale oil, we will have made this product obsolete. Oil is going to become, and has already become, uncompetitive, even at low prices, before it becomes unavailable even at high prices. So we will leave it in the ground. It's very good for holding up the ground, but it won't be worth extracting.

MICHAEL COULTER

Dr. Stage Fright
Or: How I learned to stop worrying and love the audience
Issue date: 7/26/07


Recently, a friend of mine called to ask me about public speaking because he has a presentation in a couple of weeks. I was sort of flattered and somewhat confused. I suppose he assumed that because I do stand up three or four times a year,

I could give him some tips. Trust me, I'm fairly sure he doesn't want his presentation to be anything like my little routine unless it's some sort of presentation about pornography. Nevertheless,

I made an effort to round up some tips for him just to make him feel better about it. When it comes to public speaking though, probably the best solution is to just suck it up and get it over with.

I couldn't really offer that as my only advice, so I did some half-assed research to at least give the illusion that I tried. Somewhere along the line, I figured I might as well make it into a column ... something about killing two birds with one stone while I have one in my hand and two in the bush ... that doesn't sound right. Anyway, I finally came up with a list of tips for the poor bastard.

Many folks out there insist the most important thing is to be prepared. Well, you know what? If it's good enough for the damned Boy Scouts, it ought to be good enough for everyone. The best way to prepare is to know what the hell you're talking about to begin with and then just talk about it. It really bugs the piss out of me when someone gets up to give a speech and then basically reads from a piece of paper. If that's all you're gonna do, then just make a freaking handout and sit the fuck down already. Reading aloud isn't giving a speech.

A large part of being prepared is practicing. I usually do this while I'm showering, driving, or doing housework. Just run through it in my head from start to finish over and over again until I know it by heart. Some folks will tell you it's good to practice in front of a mirror, but that never worked much for me. The first time I was about to do stand up, I held a wooden spoon in my hand and stood in front of the mirror working on every little gesture and word. I felt I looked like an idiot. This is because I did look like an idiot. Actually, all it really gave me was a splinter from the spoon and a sense of impending doom from my reflected image.

Also, remember that there actually is an audience in the room, and the presentation is for them. There's that old hint that it helps if you imagine the audience members in their underwear so they are less intimidating. This is a sound philosophy if you're talking to a room of aged, unattractive bankers. If, however, you're giving a talk to a roomful of supermodels, this is not a good approach. The audience should pay attention to you because of your intelligent lecture, not because you have an erection. I find it easier to picture everyone dressed in one of those old fake gorilla suits. There's no reason really, those things just always make me smile.

It's also a good idea to keep the whole thing as brief and simple as possible. Try to remember what it's like to be an audience member, and remember how you basically begin to zone out three or four minutes into the deal. Other people do this as well. Most folks have the attention span of a house fly during a presentation. Remember what that's like, and take it easy on them. Nobody probably cares about it nearly as much as you do.

It is also important to act confident. This doesn't necessarily mean you should threaten to kick someone's ass if they aren't paying attention. Confident is one thing, but confident and psychotic are a completely different animal. Speak in an audible voice and stand up straight first. If those two things aren't working for you, then it may be a good idea to offer an ass kicking ... but still, probably not.

It's also a good idea to use humor whenever possible. This is something that I often fail to do in my stand up routine, but it's still a fine idea. If you choose to tell a joke, remember it's probably a diverse audience so use a joke that works in that setting. Your goal is to give information, not to offend people. That's what stand up is for. If, for some odd reason, you're speaking at an Aryan Nation rally, this isn't quite as big of a deal, so pretty much anything goes. Actually, probably not best to talk to those people in any way, shape or form.

There are far more tips than this, but that's probably more than anyone actually needs. The last thing you need to worry about in front of a crowd is more things to worry about. Like I said at first, just suck it up and get it over with. When it's over with, you can finally sit back and relax, knowing your job is complete. After that, if you begin to get bored, then it's a good time to imagine the audience is naked. It's much more fun to do if everyone isn't looking at you.

Kelly Riley Barron

I ate the Hummus (oh no!!)

I didn't grow up going to the Taste of Chicago, like a lot of people I know. Living 90 miles outside of the city, and having 3 other reckless sisters, I can't blame my parents for not taking us. Instead, we went to the Taste of LaSalle. And it turns out, pretty much all LaSalle, Illinois has to taste is corn. Lots of corn.

So I was excited to visit the real Taste this year. My roommates and I biked down along the lake path on the 4 th. We ate, we sat on a blanket drinking wine in the hot, hot heat, and we bobbed our heads in enjoyment to the music as we came out of the closet for the day as John Mayer fans. I even let out a "woo" or two (or ten) when Buddy Guy took the stage. Good times.

A few days later, my supervisor gave out tickets to the Taste, and I found myself in a position of feeling obliged to go again. OK. Twist my arm. So I went back on Sunday, the last day, by my lonesome after I got off work at 6:30. I started with some pierogis, then moved onto chicken wings from Harold's, a breaded steak sandwich, washing it down with a 4 ticket Pepsi, and topping it all off with a chocolate chip cheesecake square. Delicious.

And you know what else I had? The goddamn hummus from Pars Cove. It seemed like a good idea at the time. I thought to myself, "hmmm, it'll be something somewhat healthy – like salad's little greasy sister – and it fulfilled my desire to be worldly and branch out of the Chicago staples of "fried" or "chicken" or both.

And that's the end of the story, really. I took the El home. I read more of my Phillip Roth book; I played guitar for a long while, and I went to bed. Ho hum. A typical Sunday evening.

But now all over the local news is the salmonella outbreak linked to the Pars Cove booth and the goddamn hummus. 378 people reported getting ill after eating there. And climbing. You know what's odd, though? I feel like I've been left out of the party. I could've been a news story! The Chicago Tribune could have taken a picture of me holding my stomach out on my back patio. But no, some other blonde girl got that honor.

I feel bad for the restaurant owners though. It'll be a long time before they live this reputation down. If ever. And I thought the hummus was pretty good, albeit not life changing. If anything, I would have put my money on the Bolat booth being the salmonella scare for the week. They were serving goat for Christ sakes!

But I've actually eaten at Bolat, a West African restaurant, at the behest of my sister who just got back from a stint in Burkina Faso. She was raving about guinea fowl and rare hot peppers, and wrapped it all up in the bow of "I'll pay." No offense to the nice and handsome men that worked there, but it was probably the worst meal of my life. The African beer was delicious, but the food, as far as I remember, involved lots of corn, bananas, eggs, and goat meat as tough as tires. And it was so spicy my stomach and small intestine were crying for mercy before it even hit my pallet. Top that off with a crazy woman who wondered in off of Clark St. screaming, "who's f-ing car is parked out front!!!" The tiny restaurant went dead quiet for about a half second, before the waiters who were sitting at a table busted out laughing in what looked like Oprah's crazy homeless sister's face.

My point is, now I have to live through at least two more weeks of snarky Tribune and Red Eye headlines playing off the phrase "taste of…" and all I have is this lame story of how there isn't a story. And when I see the headline, or its mentioned in small talk, I'll feel obliged to say, "I ate the hummus!!" and my friends will say, "Oh yeah, what happen??!!" And I'll just bow my head and say, "umm....nothing." Goddamn hummus.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-070713tastejul13,1,590955.story?coll=chi-news-hed

Stephen King (for Entertainment Weekly)

STEPHEN KING for Entertainment Weekly


"Goodbye, Harry"


I'm having a day of mixed feelings: happy because I'm reading the manuscript of a novel that's full of magic, mystery, and monsters; sad because it will be finished tomorrow and on my shelf, with all its secrets told and its surviving characters set free to live their own lives (if characters have lives beyond the end of a novel — I've always felt they do). It's called The Monsters of Templeton, by Lauren Groff, and it will be published early next year.

Did you think I meant the final Harry Potter tale? Don't be a sillykins — not even your Uncle Stevie gets that one in advance (although I'm sure you agree that he should, he should). But I expect to face the same feelings, only stronger, when the pages of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows dwindle down to the final few. Hell, I had trouble saying goodbye to Tony Soprano, and let's face it — he was a turd. Harry's one of the good guys. One of the great guys, in fact, and the same holds true for his friends.

The sense of sadness I feel at the approaching end of The Monsters of Templeton isn't just because the story's going to be over; when you read a good one — and this is a very good one — those feelings are deepened by the realization that you probably won't tie into anything that much fun again for a long time. This particular melancholy deepens even more when the story is spread over multiple volumes. I felt it as I approached the end of Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy, more strongly as I neared the conclusion of Frodo's quest in The Lord of the Rings, and with painful keenness when, as the writer, I got to the end of The Dark Tower, which stretched over seven volumes and a quarter century's writing time.

When it comes to Harry, part of me — a fairly large part, actually — can hardly bear to say goodbye. I'd guess that J.K. Rowling feels the same, although I'd also guess those feelings are mingled with the relief of knowing that the work is finally done, for better or worse.

And I'm a grown-up, for God's sake — a damn Muggle! Think how it must be for all the kids who were 8 when Harry debuted in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, with its cartoon jacket and modest (500 copies) first edition. Those kids are now 18, and when they close the final book, they will be in some measure closing the book on their own childhoods — magic summers spent in the porch swing, or reading under the covers at camp with flashlights in hand, or listening to Jim Dale's recordings on long drives to see Grandma in Cincinnati or Uncle Bob in Wichita. My advice to families containing Harry Potter readers: Stock up on the Kleenex. You're gonna need it. It's all made worse by one unavoidable fact: It's not just Harry. It's time to say goodbye to the whole cast, from Moaning Myrtle to Scabbers the rat (a.k.a. Wormtail). Which leads to an interesting question — will the final volume satisfy Harry's longtime (and very devoted) readers?

Although the only thing we can be sure of is that Deathly Hallows won't end in a 10-second blackout (you're going to hear that a lot in the next few weeks), my guess is that large numbers of readers will not be satisfied even if Harry survives (I'm betting he will) and Lord Voldemort is vanquished (I'm betting on this, too, although evil is never vanquished for long). I'm partly drawing on my own experience with The Dark Tower (reader satisfaction with the ending was low — tough titty, since it was the only one I had); partly on my belief that very few long works end as felicitously as Tolkien's Rings series, with its beautiful pilgrimage into the Grey Havens; but mostly on the fact that there is that sadness, that inevitable parting from characters who have been loved deeply by many. The Internet blog sites will be full of this was bad and that was wrong, but it's going to boil down to something that many will feel and few will come right out and state: No ending can be right, because it shouldn't be over at all. The magic is not supposed to go away.

Rowling will almost certainly go on to other works, and they may be terrific, but it won't be quite the same, and I'm sure she knows that. Readers will be able to go back and reread the existing books — as I've gone back to Tolkien, as my wife goes back to Patrick O'Brian's wonderful sea stories featuring Captain Aubrey and Dr. Maturin, as others do with novels featuring Travis McGee or Lord Peter Wimsey — and rereading is a great pleasure, but it's not the bated-breath, what's-gonna-happen-next suspense that Potter readers have enjoyed since 1997. And, of course, Harry's audience is different. It is, in large part, made up of children who will be experiencing these unique and rather terrible feelings for the first time.

But there's comfort. There are always more good stories, and now and then there are great stories. They come along if you wait for them. And here's something I believe in my heart: No story can be great without closure. There must be closure, because it's the human condition. And since that's how it is, I'll be in line with my money in my hand on July 21.

And, I must admit, sorrow in my heart.

PAUL KRUGMAN (New York Times)

"An Immoral Philosophy"
Published: July 30, 2007


When a child is enrolled in the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (Schip), the positive results can be dramatic. For example, after asthmatic children are enrolled in Schip, the frequency of their attacks declines on average by 60 percent, and their likelihood of being hospitalized for the condition declines more than 70 percent.

Regular care, in other words, makes a big difference. That’s why Congressional Democrats, with support from many Republicans, are trying to expand Schip, which already provides essential medical care to millions of children, to cover millions of additional children who would otherwise lack health insurance.

But President Bush says that access to care is no problem — “After all, you just go to an emergency room” — and, with the support of the Republican Congressional leadership, he’s declared that he’ll veto any Schip expansion on “philosophical” grounds.

It must be about philosophy, because it surely isn’t about cost. One of the plans Mr. Bush opposes, the one approved by an overwhelming bipartisan majority in the Senate Finance Committee, would cost less over the next five years than we’ll spend in Iraq in the next four months. And it would be fully paid for by an increase in tobacco taxes.

The House plan, which would cover more children, is more expensive, but it offsets Schip costs by reducing subsidies to Medicare Advantage — a privatization scheme that pays insurance companies to provide coverage, and costs taxpayers 12 percent more per beneficiary than traditional Medicare.

Strange to say, however, the administration, although determined to prevent any expansion of children’s health care, is also dead set against any cut in Medicare Advantage payments.

So what kind of philosophy says that it’s O.K. to subsidize insurance companies, but not to provide health care to children?

Well, here’s what Mr. Bush said after explaining that emergency rooms provide all the health care you need: “They’re going to increase the number of folks eligible through Schip; some want to lower the age for Medicare. And then all of a sudden, you begin to see a — I wouldn’t call it a plot, just a strategy — to get more people to be a part of a federalization of health care.”

Robert J. Samuelson (Newsweek)

"Prius Politics
Driving a hybrid car makes a big lifestyle statement, but is really helping to save the planet?"
July 25, 2007 -


My younger son calls the Toyota Prius a "hippie car," and he has a point. Not that Prius drivers are hippies. Toyota says that typical buyers are 54 and have incomes of $99,800; 81 percent are college graduates. But, like hippies, they're making a loud lifestyle statement: We're saving the planet; what are you doing?

This helps explain why the Prius so outsells the rival Honda Civic Hybrid. Both have similar base prices, about $22,000, and fuel economy (Prius, 60 miles per gallon city/51 highway; Civic, 49 mpg city/51 highway). But Prius sales in the first half of 2007 totaled 94,503, nearly equal to all of 2006. Civic sales were only 17,141, up 7.4 percent from 2006. The Prius's advantage is its distinct design, which announces its owners as environmentally virtuous. It's a fashion statement. Meanwhile, the Civic hybrid can't be distinguished by appearance from the polluting, gas-guzzling mob.

The Prius is, I think, a parable for the broader politics of global warming. Prius politics is mostly about showing off, not curbing greenhouse-gas emissions. Politicians pander to "green" constituents who want to feel good about themselves. Grandiose goals are declared. But measures to achieve them are deferred—or don't exist.

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is the champ of Prius politics, having declared that his state will cut greenhouse emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 (about 25 percent below today's levels) and is aiming for an 80 percent reduction below 1990 levels by 2050. However, the policies to reach these goals haven't yet been formulated; that task has been left to the California Air Resources Board. Many mandates wouldn't take effect until 2012, presumably after Schwarzenegger has left office. As for the 2050 goal, it's like his movies: make-believe. Barring big technological breakthroughs, the chances of reaching it are zero.

But it's respectable make-believe. Schwarzenegger made the covers of Time and NEWSWEEK. The press laps this up; "green" is the new "yellow journalism," says media critic Jack Shafer. Naturally, there's a bandwagon effect. At least 35 states have "climate action plans." None of this will reduce global greenhouse-gas emissions from present levels.

Even if California achieved its 2020 goal (dubious) and the United States followed (more dubious), population and economic growth elsewhere would overwhelm any emission cuts. In 2050, global population is expected to hit 9.4 billion, up about 40 percent from today. At modest growth rates, the world economy will triple by midcentury.

Just to hold greenhouse-gas emissions steady will require massive gains in efficiency or shifts to nonfossil fuels. The McKinsey Global Institute predicts that, under present trends, worldwide energy use will have risen 45 percent from 2003 to 2020. China will have accounted for a third of the increase, all developing countries for four fifths. Even after assuming huge improvements in energy efficiency (better light bulbs, etc.), McKinsey still projects an increase of 13 percent in global energy demand.

But we've got to start somewhere, right? OK, here's what Congress should do: (a) gradually increase fuel economy standards for new vehicles by at least 15 miles per gallon; (b) raise the gasoline tax over the same period by $1 to $2 a gallon to strengthen the demand for fuel-efficient vehicles and curb driving; (c) eliminate tax subsidies (mainly the mortgage interest-rate deduction) for housing, which push Americans toward ever-bigger homes. (Note: If you move to a home 25 percent larger and then increase energy efficiency 25 percent, you don't save energy.)

TED KOOSER (American Life in Poetry)

American Life in Poetry: Column 007

BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE

Leonard Nathan is a master of short poems in which two or three figures are placed on what can be seen to be a stage, as in a drama. Here, as in other poems like it, the speaker's sentences are rich with implications. This is the title work from Nathan's book from Orchises Press (1999):

The Potato Eaters

Sometimes, the naked taste of potato
reminds me of being poor.

The first bites are gratitude,
the rest, contented boredom.

The little kitchen still flickers
like a candle-lit room in a folktale.

Never again was my father so angry,
my mother so still as she set the table,

or I so much at home.

BILL MAHER (for the Huffington Post)

"The Founding Fathers Wouldn't Have Liked George Bush"
Posted July 20, 2007 | 09:54 AM (EST)


I'm in Boston today, getting ready for my standup special tomorrow night live on HBO (last shameless plug, I promise), and walking around the city has made me remember: oh yeah, America started here. That's right, America was invented by liberal men in Boston and Philadelphia. Not that I don't love all of America, but rednecks who think they're the real America should read a history book once in a while. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Franklin, Madison -- the whole lot of them were well read, erudite, European thinking children of the enlightenment, and they would have had absolutely nothing in common and less to say to a cowboy simpleton like George Bush.

And speaking of who's a real American, was anyone as outraged as I was reading Robert Novak's little interview in the NY Times magazine on Sunday? Asked if in hindsight he would leave out the part of his 2003 column that identified Valerie Plame as a CIA operative, he said "I don't know. I thought journalistically it was justifiable. Nobody had told me -- and I still don't believe -- that it put anybody's life in danger. I don't think she was an important person in the CIA."

That really is quite an astounding quote, isn't it? How the hell would he know if it put anybody's life in danger? YOU'RE NOT IN THE CIA, BOB! They don't tell you any of their business! Considering the consequences of being wrong about such a hunch, is it really the patriotic thing to do? To sit in your office and just conjecture that this agent wasn't very important to the CIA? First, I think everyone who works at the CIA is important; and second, WHO THE HELL IS THIS MAN TO OUT PEOPLE IN THE DEADLY WORLD OF ESPIONAGE BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT HE "THINKS"?!

With patriots like that, I'm sure glad there are traitors like me and Michael Moore still living here in America.

NOAM CHOMSKY

"Starving the Poor"

Khaleej Times, May 15, 2007


The chaos that derives from the so-called international order can be painful if you are on the receiving end of the power that determines that order’s structure. Even tortillas come into play in the ungrand scheme of things.
Recently, in many regions of Mexico, tortilla prices jumped by more than 50 per cent. In January, in Mexico City, tens of thousands of workers and farmers rallied in the Zocalo, the city’s central square, to protest the skyrocketing cost of tortillas.

In response, the government of President Felipe Calderon cut a deal with Mexican producers and retailers to limit the price of tortillas and corn flour, very likely a temporary expedient.

In part the price-hike threat to the food staple for Mexican workers and the poor is what we might call the ethanol effect — a consequence of the US stampede to corn-based ethanol as an energy substitute for oil, whose major wellsprings, of course, are in regions that even more grievously defy international order.

In the United States, too, the ethanol effect has raised food prices over a broad range, including other crops, livestock and poultry.

The connection between instability in the Middle East and the cost of feeding a family in the Americas isn’t direct, of course. But as with all international trade, power tilts the balance. A leading goal of US foreign policy has long been to create a global order in which US corporations have free access to markets, resources and investment opportunities. The objective is commonly called "free trade," a posture that collapses quickly on examination.

It’s not unlike what Britain, a predecessor in world domination, imagined during the latter part of the 19th century, when it embraced free trade, after 150 years of state intervention and violence had helped the nation achieve far greater industrial power than any rival.

The United States has followed much the same pattern. Generally, great powers are willing to enter into some limited degree of free trade when they’re convinced that the economic interests under their protection are going to do well. That has been, and remains, a primary feature of the international order.

The ethanol boom fits the pattern. As discussed by agricultural economists C Ford Runge and Benjamin Senauer in the current issue of Foreign Affairs, "the biofuel industry has long been dominated not by market forces but by politics and the interests of a few large companies," in large part Archer Daniels Midland, the major ethanol producer. Ethanol production is feasible thanks to substantial state subsidies and very high tariffs to exclude much cheaper and more efficient sugar-based Brazilian ethanol.

In March, during President Bush’s trip to Latin America, the one heralded achievement was a deal with Brazil on joint production of ethanol. But Bush, while spouting free-trade rhetoric for others in the conventional manner, emphasized forcefully that the high tariff to protect US producers would remain, of course along with the many forms of government subsidy for the industry.

Despite the huge, taxpayer-supported agricultural subsidies, the prices of corn — and tortillas — have been climbing rapidly. One factor is that industrial users of imported US corn increasingly purchase cheaper Mexican varieties used for tortillas, raising prices.

The 1994 US-sponsored NAFTA agreement may also play a significant role, one that is likely to increase. An unlevel-playing-field impact of NAFTA was to flood Mexico with highly subsidised agribusiness exports, driving Mexican producers off the land.

Mexican economist Carlos Salas reviews data showing that after a steady rise until 1993, agricultural employment began to decline when NAFTA came into force, primarily among corn producers — a direct consequence of NAFTA, he and other economists conclude. One-sixth of the Mexican agricultural work force has been displaced in the NAFTA years, a process that is continuing, depressing wages in other sectors of the economy and impelling emigration to the United States. Max Correa, secretary-general of the group Central Campesina Cardenista, estimates that "for every five tons bought from foreign producers, one campesino becomes a candidate for migration."

It is, presumably, more than coincidental that President Clinton militarised the Mexican border, previously quite open, in 1994, along with implementation of NAFTA.

The "free trade" regime drives Mexico from self-sufficiency in food towards dependency on US exports. And as the price of corn goes up in the United States, stimulated by corporate power and state intervention, one can anticipate that the price of staples may continue its sharp rise in Mexico.

Increasingly, biofuels are likely to "starve the poor" around the world, according to Runge and Senauer, as staples are converted to ethanol production for the privileged — cassava in sub-Saharan Africa, to take one ominous example. Meanwhile, in Southeast Asia, tropical forests are cleared and burned for oil palms destined for biofuel, and there are threatening environmental effects from input-rich production of corn-based ethanol in the United States as well.

The high price of tortillas and other, crueler vagaries of the international order illustrate the interconnectedness of events, from the Middle East to the Middle West, and the urgency of establishing trade based on true democratic agreements among people, and not interests whose principal hunger is for profit for corporate interests protected and subsidised by the state they largely dominate, whatever the human cost.

John Barron (the original "It's Like This")

*and my great grandfather*

JANUARY 3, 1977



A writer, working on a history of slot machines in America, found that patents on two early coin machines had been granted to George Kern of Peru, Ill. The weriter asked Kenneth Hansen of Peru Public library to find out something about Kern the inventor. Hansen asked me to aid in the search. A great many old time former Western Clock company employees knew Kern contributed information.

George Kern was born and raised in Germany and went to work for Juhan, the largest clock factory that country. Being a skilled designer of intricate machinery, his company had sent him on projects in Russia, Scotland, and other European countries.

To avoid being conscripted in the German army, he came to the United States and found employment in a New York machine shop. A chance meeting was to result in a new kind of clock that would become and remain the standard household clock of the world and would be cussed every morning in every language when its alarm roused the sleeping workers of the globe.

Ernest Roth, general manager of the Western Clock company in Peru, was in a New York restaurant about 1905 when he overheard a stranger speaking in German. Able to understand, Roth began a friendly conversation with Kern that resulted in Kern being hired to head the clock works' old experimental department, called the "model shop." His first order: Design a dependable and sturdy alarm clock.

Kent went to work on it. Everyone agrees, including Ernest Roth, son of the senior Roth, that Kern deserves complete credit for the invention of the clock that was to make the company phenomenonly successful. The new clock was named Big Ben.

"I went to work at Westclox under Kern on March 4, 1913," August Schierholtz, now of Elmira, Ontario, Canada, told me. "He was a very good man to work for. He was critical because he wanted perfection, but he was not hard. He had a small moustache, not turned on the ends as many others were at the time.

"Part of my problem when I began to work with him was that he refused to speaking anything but German for the first 1 1/2 years we worked together. I was born and raised in Canada and did not really know German, but to work with Kern, I had to learn it. I guess it was good training for me, though."

The Patents were a Secret

Besides its heavy, rugged reliability, one of the reasons for the instant success of the new clock that George Kern invented for Western Clock company in Peru was its loud fire alarm-like ring that brought the soundest-sleeping coal miner out of bed like he was shot from a canon.

Other alarm clocks of the time had a small bell on top and its gentle tinkle did not always do the job. Kern, who for years preferred to speak only in German, embodied a new idea: He made the entire back of the case into a bell, a bell that didn't fool around.

"After Big Ben's success, the company asked Kern to design a smaller model," August Scheirholtz tol dme from his home in Canada. "I remember our first order in 1913 was for 300 of the new small clocks." The miniature clock was named, logically, Baby Ben. Schierholtz worked under George Kern in the experiemental department and eventually succeeded him as its head.

"My father wanted me to learn the German language," says Ernest Roth, son of Western Clock's general manager, "and he figured the quickeest way to learn it was to send me off to Germany. It just happened that George Kern was going to Germany at the same time, so we sailed on the same ship and I got to know him quite well. It was in 1911. He was a wonderfuly guy and a good traveling companion. Incidentally, on the return trip, I was booked to sail on the Titanic, but had to cancel at the last moment."
"You have seen that clock on the front of Westclox?" said August Schierholtz. "Well, Kern and I designed and built that clock ourselveese. Mr. Roth, the boss, was not too happy about it when he learned how much time we had spent building it."

George Kern loved anything mechanical, especially if it was new. He was, for example, owner of one of the earliest automobiles in Peru: a Brush.

In 1911, Kern built a home at 2225 Fifth St., Peru and later married a Peru girl, Mary Akerman. The couple did not have children.

A writer who is preparing a book on the history of coin-operated machiens has learned that among early U.S. patents granted in 1917 were to "George Kern, Peru" for two such machines. The patents began: "Be it know that I, George Kern, a subject of the Emperor of Germany, and a resident of the city of Peru, Illinois, have invented a certain new and useful improvement in coin-controlled machines..."

Kern's machines are intested in that they not only vended merchandise such as cigars, but had an added element of chance that if you put in a nickel, you might be lucky and get two or more cigars or, if you chose chewing gum, you might get several packages for one nickel, a feature that today's vending machine operators might like to consider as trade stimulators; they would add a gambling element.

Curiously, even those who worked closely with Kern at the time say that they were unaware that he had applied for patents; indeed, most did not know Kern had been working on such devices. A few say they hear some rumors, but that's about all. In all liklihood George Kern did this work at his home and on his own time. It is possible that F. W. Mathiessen, the clock works' president, may not have approved of slot machines and Kern may have had no reason to bandy the news about. He did have a workshop in his home.

George Kern died July 27, 1918, in People's hospital following a ruptured appendix. Among the assets listed in his estate were: "patents."