Constant vigilance, the price of democracy

Notes 56

Status quo uninterrupted. Egypt’s repression of Gaza continues. When do Israelis abide by international law and end blockade of Gaza?

Egypt military promises to abide by peace deal
By Maggie Michael, Associated Press --
CAIRO – Egypt's ruling military reassured its international allies Saturday that there would be no break in its peace deal with Israel following the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak, and it lay out the first tentative steps to keep Egypt's economy and state functioning while it figures out how to overhaul the country for greater democracy.
The preserving of Mubarak's last government was likely to disappoint protesters, thousands of whom remain in their camp in Cairo's central Tahrir Square. Many of them have demanded more dramatic steps like the dissolving of parliament and the scrapping of the current government to form a broader-based transitional body to oversee reforms until elections can be held.
A spokesman for the Armed Forces Supreme Council underlined the military's "commitment to all Egypt's international treaties."
The military statement, aired on state TV, was its first, cautious attempt to define the next steps after Mubarak handed over power to a council of his top generals and resigned on Friday in the face of an 18-day wave of popular protests.
The military's statement did not rule out these steps might still be carried out.

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Egypt's revolt met with wide support, censorship

By Raphael G. Satter, Associated Press –
LONDON –Nearly everywhere else, newspapers congratulated Egypt's revolution, with many headlines carrying the word: "Finally."
From London to Gaza City to Seoul, the world was savoring the spectacular fall of Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, with demonstrators rallying in the thousands Saturday in cities across the world. But other authoritarian regimes weren't celebrating — and some are trying to censor the news.
In China, where the ruling Communist Party ruthlessly stamps out dissent, terse media reports downplayed the large-scale pro-democracy protests in Egypt that forced Mubarak from power and instead emphasized the country's disorder and lawlessness.
In oil-rich Equatorial Guinea, where coup leader Teodoro Obiang has held sway since 1979, state-controlled media was ordered to stop reporting about Egypt altogether, according to African news site afrol.com.
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Before there was the Shah, there was a democratically elected government in Iran, but one that threatened American oil supply. Western values have incorporated the idea of conquest and expansion and exploitation since the Iliad and the Odyssey and the Old Testament. Maybe it’s time to reexamine them and see if anybody else has a right, without going to war, to hold their native lands in Africa, in Asia, in Australia, in the Americas where the buffalo once roamed, in peace under their own rules.

Egypt and Iran; Different looks at people power
By Robert H. Reid, Associated Press –
CAIRO –
The face of the revolution was Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, whose demeanor, vehemently anti-American rhetoric and stern interpretation of Islam challenged not only Western interests but also Western values.
On Feb. 11, 1979, the commander of the Iranian air force announced on national radio that the armed forces were withdrawing from the fight to save the American-backed regime of Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, who had already fled the country three weeks before in the face of burgeoning street protests against his autocratic rule.
No sooner had the announcement come than the streets of Cairo exploded in joyful celebration. The hated autocrat was gone. A new era was ushered in with cheers, tears and the cacophony of car horns.
And so it was in Tehran — 32 years before to the day.
The popular revolt against the shah raised alarm bells in the West, which saw the shah as a trusted ally and counterweight to hard-line Arab regimes and Palestinian radicals.

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The same complaints Third World countries have had for decades. IMF not user friendly

Greece slams IMF, EU debt inspectors for hubris
By Elena Becatoros, Associated Press –
ATHENS, Greece – An indignant Greece slammed EU and International Monetary Fund inspectors overseeing its efforts to reform its debt-crippled economy, accusing them Saturday of overstepping their role and interfering in Greece's internal affairs.
In an unusually harshly worded, pre-dawn statement, government spokesman Giorgos Petalotis called the behavior of the inspectors at a Friday news conference unacceptable.
"We have needs, but we also have limits. And we do not negotiate the limits of our dignity with anyone," Petalotis said. "We take orders only from the Greek people."

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A GREAT place to start cutting budget deficit. Stop paying Harvard tuition rates to incarcerate hundreds of thousands for drug offenses that could be eliminated by buying poppy crop in Arghanistan for pennies on the dollar and burning it.

Webb to push criminal justice reform before exit
By Bob Lewis, Ap Political Writer – Sat Feb 12
RICHMOND, Va. – U.S. Sen. Jim Webb announced this week that he had reintroduced the National Criminal Justice Commission Act to create a panel to review the system and make reform recommendations. He noted that the measure had bipartisan support last year, clearing the Senate Judiciary Committee and passing the full House of Representatives.
Webb of Virginia contends that the current system incarcerates too many people at too high a cost, with poor results. He said legislation got bogged down last year but that he's confident it will pass in this session.
"We're going to get it done," the 65-year-old Democrat told The Associated Press in a brief phone interview on Friday.

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Cutting cost of criminal justice system pales by comparison to cutting cost of Tooth Fairy dole\
Paul Ryan Criticizes Bernanke for Failing to Contain Tooth Fairy
James Kwak, The Baseline Scenario: "In a Congressional hearing Wednesday, Representative Paul Ryan (R-WI), chair of the House Budget Committee, strongly criticized Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke for failing to contain the severe inflation threat posed by the Tooth Fairy. Ryan pointed to numerous studies showing that, despite ongoing economic sluggishness, the Tooth Fairy is paying much more for children's baby teeth than in past years. In neighborhoods such as Winnetka, Cleveland Park, the Upper East Side, and Palo Alto, children can receive more than $20 per tooth - a dramatic increase from the 25-50 cents that the Tooth Fairy paid only a decade or two ago. In the Hamptons, summertime prices for teeth can easily exceed $100, according to a survey commissioned by the American Enterprise Institute."

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If we are going to return to something to get our house in order, let’s return to the pre-Reagan years when the government was solvent, the military was in control, and the sun set on an immensely smaller American pie.

Republicans take a $100 billion whack at Obama budget
By Brad Knickerbocker Brad Knickerbocker – Sat Feb 12,
“The CR contains over $100 billion in cuts compared to the President’s request – fully meeting the spending reduction goal outlined in the Republican ‘Pledge to America’ while providing common sense exceptions for our troops and veterans,” says Rep. Hal Rogers (R) of Kentucky, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee. “These cuts go far and wide, and will affect every community in the nation.”
“These were hard decisions, and I know many people will not be happy with everything we’ve proposed in this package,” he said. “That’s understandable and not unexpected, but I believe these reductions are necessary to show that we are serious about returning our nation to a sustainable financial path.”

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Is objective journalism like the Loch Ness Monster?

Katrina vanden Heuvel and Ryan Grim on the State of the Media (Video)
GRITtv: "'We don't write about class struggle in the US so it's hard for us to see it elsewhere,' says the Huffington Post's Ryan Grim on the failings of the US media around issues in Egypt. And Katrina vanden Heuvel notes that Islamophobia in the US leads many to focus on fear of the Muslim Brotherhood rather than understanding the ways that Islam and democracy coexist and complement one another.
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Another capitulation to the banking industry and the insurance industry

White House wants less gov't in mortgage system

By Daniel Wagner And Derek Kravitz, Ap Business Writers – Fri Feb 11
WASHINGTON – The Obama administration wants to shrink the government's role in the mortgage system — a proposal that would remake decades of federal policy aimed at getting Americans to buy homes and would probably make home loans more expensive across the board.
The Treasury Department rolled out a plan Friday to slowly dissolve Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored programs that bought up mortgages to encourage more lending and required bailouts during the 2008 financial crisis.
Exactly how far the government's role in mortgages would be reduced was left to Congress to decide, but all three options the administration presented would create a housing finance system that relies far more on private money.

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Public Trust is a thing of the past. The social contract has gone the way of the ardvark. Survival of he fittest has become common law and the devil take the hindmost.

Discover the Network Out to Crush Our Public Workers
Dave Johnson, Campaign for America's Future: "People hear the same story over and over and over and over, seemingly coming from everywhere: public employees have it good, with extravagant pay and 'lavish' or 'plush' pensions, while taxpayers are taking it in the shorts. Public-employee pensions are 'bankrupting' the state/county/city. 'Unfunded liabilities' are 'out of control' and it is time to do something about it before it is too late."

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Our secular government being moth eaten by efforts to make religion cornerstone of military and litmus tests.

Backward, Christian Soldiers
Stephen Glain, The Nation: "Late last summer, Mikey Weinstein broke up a fight between Crystal and Ginger, the guard dogs trained to protect him and his family from a violent reckoning with Christian zealots. For the 55-year-old civil rights activist committed to ridding the US military of religious intolerance, it was a refreshingly secular and evenly matched bout. Weinstein is, after all, famously combative, both pugnacious and profane, with the bearing and sensibility of a mastiff. In the end he prevailed and peace was restored, though at the price of some bad scratches on his arms and a hole in his right hand where a well-aimed canine had struck."

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All in the name of security but we are more secure without Big Brother’s and secret police and secret tortures secret courts

Obama Assertion: FBI Can Get Phone Records Without Oversight
Marisa Taylor, McClatchy Newspapers: "The Obama administration's Justice Department has asserted that the FBI can obtain telephone records of international calls made from the U.S. without any formal legal process or court oversight, according to a document obtained by McClatchy. That assertion was revealed — perhaps inadvertently — by the department in its response to a McClatchy request for a copy of a secret Justice Department memo. Critics say the legal position is flawed and creates a potential loophole that could lead to a repeat of FBI abuses that were supposed to have been stopped in 2006."