Welcome! "The Evening Blues" is a casual community diary (published Monday - Friday, 8:00 PM Eastern) where we hang out, share and talk about news, music, photography and other things of interest to the community.
Just about anything goes, but attacks and pie fights are not welcome here. This is a community diary and a friendly, peaceful, supportive place for people to interact.
Everyone who wants to join in peaceful interaction is very welcome here.
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Hey! Good Evening!
This evenings music features early blues musician and member of the Mississippi Sheiks, Bo Carter who is known for his many songs that feature a single entendre, so to speak.
Bo Carter - Pigmeat Is What I Crave
"When the president does it, that means that it is not illegal."
-- Richard Milhous Nixon
News and Opinion
Read this whole article. Just do it.
How Nixon Won Watergate
Who actually won? From unilateral military actions to warrantless surveillance that were key parts of the basis for Nixon’s impending impeachment, the painful fact is that Barack Obama is the president that Nixon always wanted to be.
Four decades ago, Nixon was halted in his determined effort to create an “imperial presidency” with unilateral powers and privileges. In 2013, Obama wields those very same powers openly and without serious opposition. The success of Obama in acquiring the long-denied powers of Nixon is one of his most remarkable, if ignoble, accomplishments. ...
Obama has not only openly asserted powers that were the grounds for Nixon’s impeachment, but he has made many love him for it. More than any figure in history, Obama has been a disaster for the U.S. civil liberties movement. By coming out of the Democratic Party and assuming an iconic position, Obama has ripped the movement in half. Many Democrats and progressive activists find themselves unable to oppose Obama for the authoritarian powers he has assumed. It is not simply a case of personality trumping principle; it is a cult of personality.
Long after Watergate, not only has the presidency changed. We have changed. We have become accustomed to elements of a security state such as massive surveillance and executive authority without judicial oversight. We have finally answered a question left by Benjamin Franklin in 1787, when a Mrs. Powel confronted him after the Constitutional Convention and asked, “Well, Doctor, what have we got — a republic or a monarchy?” His chilling response: “A republic, if you can keep it.”
We appear to have grown weary of the republic and traded it for promises of security from a shining political personality. Somewhere, Nixon must be wondering how it could have been this easy.
Obama allows one of the two people who destroyed the
Watergate CIA torture tapes to ascend to head the CIA Clandestine Service. Wonder if her name is
Rose Mary Woods.
First Female Head of CIA’s Clandestine Service Signed Off on Destruction of Torture Tapes
One week before John Brennan assumed office as CIA director, a woman was put in charge of the CIA’s clandestine service. It was the first time in the history of the agency that a female officer was running the agency. But, according to the Washington Post, the officer was one of two CIA officers, who signed off on the destruction of torture tapes in 2005.
The Post reports the woman served in a senior position at the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center after the September 11th attacks. She was in the chain of command for the Rendition, Detention and Interrogation program (RDI).
The CIA recorded brutal interrogations of prisoners with a video camera in a secret prison in Thailand. Over ninety tapes were ultimately recorded.
When the head of the Counterterrorism Center, Jose Rodriguez, was promoted to head of the clandestine service in 2004, he took the female officer along as his chief of staff. According to former officials, the two repeatedly sought permission to have the tapes destroyed but were denied.
In 2005, instructions to get rid of the recordings went out anyway. Former officials said the order carried just two names: Rodriguez and his chief of staff.
The officer went on to hold top positions in London and New York before returning to Langley as deputy chief of the clandestine service. She became acting director on Feb. 28, when the previous head of the service, John Bennett, retired.
Obama's FBI to spy in real-time on web chats
Guantanamo Bay hunger strikers say they’ve been denied drinking water and heat
Prisoners taking part in a growing hunger strike at Guantanamo Bay complained that their handlers have denied them drinking water and kept their cells at “extremely frigid” temperatures.
US attorneys claimed Thursday that the allegations were “false,” as they urged the US District Court in Washington to dismiss the emergency motion filed by Yemeni prisoner Musaab al-Madhwani.
Madhwani, who has been held at the US naval base in southern Cuba for 11 years, is demanding “emergency humanitarian relief” in the form of drinking water and clothing to keep warm, according to his complaint. ...
Prison authorities have denied Madhwani and other detainees access to potable water for at least three days, according to his complaint. ...
In addition, for the 10 days that preceded the filing, “prison authorities have maintained the air conditioning at extremely frigid temperatures, much colder than ever before,” Madhwani’s lawyers wrote to the court.
Public Banking Needed to Stop "Cannibalization" of the Economy
What you really want is for banks, instead of loading the economy down with debt, to be able to finance economic growth instead of just eating into growth as an overhead.
Well, suppose that the government were to do what Sheila Bair, head of the FDIC, recommended her agency do in 2008. When Citibank went under, Bank of America, she said, look, we're in the business of taking over banks. It's not really socialism. It's what we do. When a bank is insolvent, the government takes it over.
Now, imagine what America government, the public sector, could have done with Citibank and Bank of America. These were the two largest mortgage holders in America.
What actually happened was that President Obama said, gee, I hope the banks write down the mortgages to what people can afford so that we can take off again. Instead, Citibank, Bank of America that bought Countrywide Financial refused to write the loans down. And so what you have now is 10 million Americans in the foreclosure process or already losing their homes. What you're having is the banks having a predatory process. And all of a sudden, the banks are part of the problem, not part of the solution.
Canadian Budget "Austerity on Autopilot
The vultures are circling Cyprus looking to pick off a piece of their remaining bank deposits:
Rich Cypriots are in demand
Experts working in the financial sector in Cyprus say they are being increasingly approached by officials and people in the corporate services sector in Malta, Luxembourg and Lichtenstein.
Helena Smith reports that the contacts are an attempt to persuade wealthy depositors to move their assets out of Cyprus.
Christos Neophytou, a lawyer who specializes in registering foreign companies on the island told Helena:
I’ve received three emails today and that’s just from Malta.
They’re even offering financial incentives to try and convince clients to move out of Cyprus.
Keep cash in banks? 'Be worried as Euro thieves can steal it any time'
Cyprus bailout: eurozone policymakers at loggerheads over implications
Policymakers in the single currency area were at loggerheads on Tuesday over the long-term implications of the Cyprus bailout and whether savers across Europe will be exposed to raids on their bank accounts in future rescues.
The European commission and influential MEPs involved in drafting new laws on resolving bank failures confirmed that the proposed rules would include "bail-ins", which are favoured by Germany and would see investors and savers taking the hit instead of taxpayers. ...
The controversy over having savers and investors foot the bill for bank failure erupted on Monday when Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the inexperienced Dutch finance minister who has been chairing the eurogroup committee of finance ministers for two months, said that the Cyprus model would be extended to other countries and situations to avoid the injustice of having taxpayers shell out for the risky behaviour of bankers.
His remarks bore the hallmarks of policies pursued in particular by Berlin since last year. But the timing of his remarks were viewed as a disastrous gaffe as the markets plunged and speculation mounted about deposits fleeing the eurozone periphery for the safer havens of northern Europe.
Cypriot businesses do battle with the faceless eurocrats trying to destroy them
Christakis Petsas counts the cost of the turmoil in Cyprus in terms of cars - 40 of them, stuck at the port in the coastal town of Limassol and costing him 800 euros a day in lost earnings.
That's 12,000 euros ($15,000) since banks in Cyprus closed their doors almost two weeks ago and refused to transfer the import tax payment on the new fleet of vehicles for Petsas Rent-A-Car of Nicosia. ...
"The situation is tragic," said Petsas, a veteran of the 1974 Cypriot war that left the island divided between Greeks and Turks.
"I lived through the war as a soldier and I've never seen people so anxious. Back then you knew who the enemy was. These days you don't know whom you're fighting, or what tomorrow will bring."
Obama's "all of the above energy policy" is a disaster. Anybody want to start a pool on whether the DOJ responds with real action to the Coast Guard's request to prosecute Shell for its environmental destruction? I'm betting against it, Shell is a big, wealthy company and Obama won't allow the 1% to be held accountable.
Despite 'Enormous Risk' White House Reaffirms Commitment to Arctic Drilling
A White House official reaffirmed Wednesday the Obama administration's commitment to the Arctic offshore drilling program despite the "dangerous risk" of catastrophic consequences for the pristine marine ecosystem.
Speaking via video conference before a Alaskan Senate hearing in Anchorage regarding the recent grounding of Shell's Kulluk drilling rig, Bureau of Ocean Energy Management Director Tommy Beaudreau said, “The administration is committed to supporting safe and responsible exploration of potential energy resources in frontier areas such as the Arctic.”
Beaudreau's statement came as the US Coast Guard made a plea to the Justice Department to consider "taking action" against Shell for marine pollution violations—referring to the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution From Ships—committed in the operations of the Kulluk drillship, said head of the Alaskan Coast Guard Rear Admiral Thomas Ostebo.
30,000 Gallons of Oil Spill in Minn. Derailment
Up to 30,000 gallons of oil spilled on Wednesday when a mile-long train carrying the crude derailed in Minnesota, giving further evidence that there are no safe "delivery mechanisms for the poison" of fossil fuels.
14 of a Canadian Pacific train's 94 cars went off the tracks near the town of Parkers Prairie in western Minnesota on Wednesday morning, and, the Associated Press reports, up to three cars leaked or spilled oil.
Ask Your Doctor About Tacos
Ed Rendell’s plea for fracking fails to disclose his trip through the golden revolving door
Former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell took to the New York Daily News op-ed page Wednesday with a message to local officials: stop worrying and learn to love fracking.
As New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo agonizes over whether to allow the controversial natural gas drilling technique, Rendell invoked his own experience as a Democratic governor who presided over a fracking boom. New York state, Rendell argued, has a major part to play in the nation’s fracking “revolution” — and it can do so safely. He rejected what he called the “false choice” of “natural gas versus the environment.”
What Rendell’s passionate plea failed to note was this: since stepping down as governor in 2011, he has worked as a paid consultant to a private equity firm with investments in the natural gas industry. ...
Reached Wednesday, Rendell told ProPublica that he should have disclosed to the Daily News his work at the private equity firm, Element Partners, and that the newspaper “should have included it.”
Rendell said the Pennsylvania-based firm pays him about $30,000 per year. ... Rendell is also a senior adviser at the investment bank Greenhill, which has worked on several large transactions involving natural gas companies.
Explosive fracking accident in Texas
Obama EPA Shut Down Weatherford, TX Shale Gas Water Contamination Study
The Obama Administration's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) censored a smoking gun scientific report in March 2012 that it had contracted out to a scientist who conducted field data on 32 water samples in Weatherford, TX.
That report, according to the AP, would have explicitly linked methane migration to hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") in Weatherford, a city with 25,000+ citizens located in the heart of the Barnett Shale geologic formation 30 minutes from Dallas.
It was authored by Geoffrey Thyne, a geologist formerly on the faculty of the Colorado School of Mines and University of Wyoming before departing from the latter for a job in the private sector working for Interralogic Inc. in Ft Collins, CO.
This isn't the first time Thyne's scientific research has been shoved aside, either. Thyne wrote two landmark studies on groundwater contamination in Garfield County, CO, the first showing that it existed, the second confirming that the contamination was directly linked to fracking in the area.
Record UK cold freezes economy
IMF: Want to fight climate change? Get rid of $1.9 trillion in energy subsidies
What’s the simplest way to tackle global warming? Make sure that fossil fuels are priced properly and not subsidized.
That’s the core idea behind a large new report (pdf) from the International Monetary Fund, which argues that the world “misprices” fossil fuels to the tune of some $1.9 trillion per year. ...
In 2011, governments around the world spent some $480 billion to lower the price of petroleum, natural gas, coal, and electricity for their citizens. ... The IMF report argues that governments should be taxing fossil fuels appropriately in order to take account of the air pollution and climate damage they cause. Standard economic models peg these “externalities” at about $25 per ton of carbon dioxide. So, the failure to price these fossil fuels correctly amounts to a subsidy of some $1.4 trillion worldwide.
Once this is taken into account, the IMF says, the the countries that subsidize fossil fuels most heavily are the United States ($502 billion per year), China ($279 billion per year), and Russia ($116 billion).
Colombian eco-village thrives
Blog Posts of Interest
Here are diaries and selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
What's Happenin'
Rare Reporting Reveals Afghan Civilians Terrorized by US Drones
The Demographic Horror Story and Other Children’s Tales
Unlike heaven, West Virginia
Chiggers: WTF Are they? And What do You do About Them?
A Little Night Music
Bo Carter - Your Biscuits Are Big Enough For Me
Bo Carter - Please Warm My Weiner
Bo Carter - Old Devil
Bo Carter - All Around Man
Bo Carter - Pussy Cat Blues
Bo Carter - Banana In Your Fruitbasket
Bo Carter - Beans
Bo Carter - Cigarette Blues
Bo Carter - Let's Get Drunk Again
It's National Pie Day!
The election is over, it's a new year and it's time to work on real change in new ways... and it's National Pie Day. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to tell you a little more about our new site and to start getting people signed up.
Come on over and sign up so that we can send you announcements about the site, the launch, and information about participating in our public beta testing.
Why is National Pie Day the perfect opportunity to tell you more about us? Well you'll see why very soon. So what are you waiting for?! Head on over now and be one of the first!
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