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Monday 19 March 2012

Fracking's Health and Environmental Impacts Greater Than Claimed
Walter Brasch, Wanderings: "The response by the industry and its political allies to the scientific studies of the health and environmental effects of fracking 'has approached the issue in a manner similar to the tobacco industry that for many years rejected the link between smoking and cancer,' say Drs. Bamberger and Oswald."
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Chris Hedges | Murder Is Not an Anomaly in War
Chris Hedges, Truthdig: "The war in Afghanistan - where the enemy is elusive and rarely seen, where the cultural and linguistic disconnect makes every trip outside the wire a visit to hostile territory, where it is clear that you are losing despite the vast industrial killing machine at your disposal - feeds the culture of atrocity.... Civilians and combatants merge into one detested nameless, faceless mass. The psychological leap to murder is short."
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Police Arrest 73 in Occupy Wall Street Crackdown on Protest Movement's Six-Month Anniversary (Video)
Amy Goodman, Democracy NOW!: "Many people reported excessive use of force by officers; several cases were caught on camera. In one widely reported incident, a young woman suffered a seizure after she was pulled from the crowd and arrested. Witnesses say police initially ignored Cecily McMillan as she flopped about on the sidewalk with her hands zip-tied behind her back, but she was eventually taken away in an ambulance."
Watch the Video and Read the Transcript

Corporate Campaign Spending: They Get What They Pay for
Salvatore Babones, Truthout: "Why would corporations want to influence elections? The answer is simple. It pays. In a January 2011 article in the Journal of Management, University of Tennessee Business Professor Russell Crook found that corporate political activity has a significantly positive effect on company performance measured using return on investment, return on assets and government-derived revenues."
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With Larry Summers' World Bank Bid in Trouble, Mexico Insists on Open Process
Robert Naiman, Truthout: "... [T]he Treasury had leaked a purported 'short list' consisting of former Harvard President Larry Summers, UN Ambassador Susan Rice and Sen. John Kerry. But it turned out that Rice and Kerry were fake candidates, because neither one wanted the job. So, it appears that Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner really had a 'short list' consisting of just one person: his buddy Summers. Perhaps Geithner calculated that if he presented President Obama with a 'short list' consisting of Summers and two fake candidates, then Obama would have to choose Summers."
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Dean Baker | Medicare Costs Too Much and They Better Not Cut It
Dean Baker, Truthout: "There is an old story about two men in a retirement home. The first declares, 'the food in this place is poison.' His friend agrees and adds, 'and the portions are so small.' This exchange perfectly captures the Republican approach to Medicare."
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After Six Months, a Look at What Occupy Wall Street Has Accomplished
Travis Waldron, ThinkProgress: "The movement turned six months old last Saturday, and a closer look at its record of achievement reveals that it has done more than spark conversation around Wall Street's watercoolers. Occupy groups have shifted the national debate on taxes and inequality, helped homeowners stay in their homes, forced major policy issues to the forefront of debate at the state and federal level, and gotten the attention of the institutions they've challenged most forcefully."
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On the News With Thom Hartmann: Congress' Approval Rating Lowest on Record, and More
In today's On the News segment: Mitt Romney won Puerto Rico Sunday night, most conservative Congress in history also has the lowest approval rating on record, Julian Assange will run for Australian Senate, and more.
Watch the Video and Read the Transcript

"Librotraficantes" Bring Banned Books Into Arizona
Valeria Fernandez, New America Media: "'Every great movement is sparked by outrage at a deep cultural offense,' said Diaz, founder of Nuestra Palabra: Latino Writers Having Their Say, a group that promotes Latino authors and culture. 'Latinos are not the sleeping giant; we're the working giant. When any state in this nation passes an anti-Latino law they'll know we'll respond together,' he said."
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Drifting Right, Illinois Is Test for Romney
Monica Davey, The New York Times News Service: "Illinois has been known for choosing Republicans of a moderate brand ... So for Mitt Romney, who has had to defend himself against the moderate label elsewhere, a primary here - with its large prize of delegates and the symbolism of President Obama's backyard - would seem a welcome, natural fit. And yet ... Illinois is not shaping up to be the effortless romp some had presumed."
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Reclaiming Our Rights From HR 347
Phil Rockstroh, Consortium News: "A new law, known as H.R. 347, expands the power of the Secret Service and police to arrest protesters near a 'protected person' or at special public events like nominating conventions.... Reflecting how dire the assault on civil liberties has become: The aforementioned bill passed the House of Representatives by a 388 to 3 margin (and was signed, shortly thereafter, by President Obama, on Friday March 9, 2012)."
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To Break the Bonds of Injustice
Kerry Kennedy, Inter Press Service: "As Robert Kennedy broke bread with Cesar Chavez in 1968, so allies from around the country will join members of the Immokalee Workers who are fasting at Publix Super Market headquarters, calling on the Florida-based supermarket chain to meet with [the Coalition of Immokalee Workers] to address abuses in its supply chain. To date, Publix executives have declined to meet with CIW representatives and have not answered a single letter."
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Ever More and Ever Less: The Unstoppable Legacy of the War on Terror
Karen Greenberg, TomDispatch: "By now, you'd think we'd be entering the end of the 9/11 era. One war over in the Greater Middle East, another hurtling disastrously to its end, and the threat of al-Qaeda so diminished that it should hardly move the needle on the national worry meter. You might think, in fact, that the moment had arrived to turn the American gaze back to first principles: the Constitution and its protections of rights and liberties."
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Jim Hightower | Standing Up for Peace
Jim Hightower, OtherWords: "During a recent city council meeting, the mayor of Keene, New Hampshire leaned over to a council member and whispered excitedly: 'We're going to have our own tank.'... [T]hanks to such richly funded boondoggles as the 'war on drugs' and the 'war on terrorism,' the federal government is throwing money at cities and states to militarize their various police forces. The sensible people of Keene, however, aren't swallowing the fearmonger pill, and they've forced the town council to reconsider."
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Why Didn't Rick Santorum Denounce the Immoral Epidemic of Child Abuse in the Catholic Church?
Mark Karlin, BuzzFlash at Truthout: "Santorum has run as a fundamentalist Catholic who actually said that he throws up when he watches the tape of John F. Kennedy, in his 1960 campaign, proclaiming the separation of church and state. Yet, in a radio interview, Santorum would not stand up on behalf of children - many of them now men and women who have suffered life-long trauma as a result of institutionalized sexual child abuse within his church. That's not a moral leader; that's an enabler of vile and unforgivable violations of the youngest among us."
Read the BuzzFlash Commentary

Paul Krugman: Hurray for Health Reform
Read the Article at The New York Times

Broadcasters Fight FCC Plan to Post Names of Political Ad Buyers on Web
Read the Article at Bloomberg

Investigate NYPD Violence Against Occupy Wall Street
Read the Article at The Nation

Bank of America: Too Crooked to Fail
Read the Article at Rolling Stone

Women Democrats Push for Violence Against Women Act
Read the Article at Feministing

Al Gore Endorses Eliminating the Current Obstructionist Filibuster
Read the Article at ThinkProgress

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