6
POPSAmerica Leads --- In Gun Homicides #1 with a bullet! Since May 2007, concealed handgun permit holders have killed at least 175 individuals--including nine law enforcement officers--in 26 states. Of the 104 incidents that resulted in the deaths, in half (52) the concealed handgun permit holder has already been convicted or committed suicide after the shooting. Of the 52 cases still pending, the vast majority (46) are charged with criminal homicide, two were unintentional shootings, three are still under investigation, and one involved a concealed handgun permit holder who was also shot and killed during the incident. Of the 104 incidents, 16 were mass shootings. Among the new incidents included in the June update are: * Florida: On June 6, 2010, permit holder Gerardo Regalado, 38, committed Hialeah, Florida’s worst mass shooting: killing four women, including his estranged wife, and wounding three others at the Yoyito Cafe-Restaurant. Regalado killed himself after the attack.
7
POPSRepublican Chariman Michael Steel forgetting recent Aghanistan War history How f**king stupid are the republicans? Afghanistan was a war of President Obama's choosing? Have they already forgotten about 9/11? Iraq was the war the U.S. did not want to be involved in until the Bush Administration lied to the U.S. about Weapons of Mass Destruction. Why are idiots still voting for republicans?
6
POPSRepublicans Genetic Link to Big Oil Dubbed "Liberty," this project requires a technique called "extended reach," which is even more prone to explosions than the gulf process. First, BP is drilling down two miles under the Beaufort Sea, drilling sideways for up to eight miles to tap into one of our national oil reserves. But wait — didn't Obama impose a moratorium on such offshore drilling? Yes ... BUT: When Liberty was planned in the George W. Bush years, it was magically declared by his Republican devil-may-care regulators to be an "onshore project." How can that be? Because the rig sits on a tiny artificial island that BP built, so — voila! — it's "onshore" even though it's three miles offshore. Meanwhile, as another oil giant drills away in the Beaufort Sea, GOP lawmakers are dutifully working in Congress to limit the legal liability of BP and its partners to a paltry $75 million each. Republicans working for them, not you.
14
POPSYour Choice: Vote Republican and give up Social Security for Wars Republican priority number one = foreign warfare, even at the expense of Social Security. What a laugh. Conservatives fought transparency and Texas Senator Phil Gramm wrote it into law. Conservatives have been underfunding regulation reforcement for decades ever since Ronald Raygun took office. Then they tell you the exact opposite. It's amazing how rethuglican politicians take for granted that their voters are dumbshits.
17
POPSFor Antara: White on White Race Hate Murder in Northern Ireland Anybody can find individual articles to clip and then choose to misrepresent real world events. From this clip I could chose to stay. "Oh my, those Irish are the worst despicable breed ever. If we don't stop them they will eventually crush us all. Be weary of those Irish. Be afraid of them when they walk by. The are evil". But I won't stoop to your level of trashiness and hate mongering.
11
POPSHate Crime Statistics in the US for Antara. (2008) I really cannot think of a more disgusting person in this community than Antara who strives daily to contribute to misinformation, hysteria, and hatred. Each of us witness her attempts to paint a picture that the white individual is under attack worldwide. When I called her on her tactics and lies she chose to run and hide. She could not defend her position so she decided to silence conversation. Antara, denies official U.S. Federal Burea of Investigation statistics. Apparently they are "untrue" unless I can provide a newspaper article clip of each incident. What a hateful moron. Facts are facts. Where the offenders race is known, Whites in the US committed Hate Crimes at a rate almost 4 times greater than did Blacks. Antara, your home belongs at a white nationalist hate site like Stormfront.org.
4
POPSPenis Jesus has some Okies Outraged - Call the Militia! Seeton said the crucifix doesn’t concern him, and there are no plans to remove it. Monsignor Edward Weisenburger of the Oklahoma City Archdiocese also said he has no problems with the crucifix. Crucifix is a Catholic icon Jaime, a local iconographer known for her religious artwork, was commissioned by the church to design the crucifix. Seeton wouldn’t disclose whether Jaime was paid. Jaime’s husband, Reggie, said his wife will not discuss the crucifix publicly until she meets with officials from the church and Oklahoma City Archdiocese to discuss the controversy it has caused. Reggie Jaime said critics of the crucifix probably aren’t aware of its history and meaning to the Catholic Church. "This isn’t just a subjective drawing. This is a historical icon of the church,” Reggie Jaime said. "I can’t help what you see in things, or she sees in things, or anyone.”
14
POPSGOP Family Values Teabagger candidate for NY Gov - Grade A Creep But the Buffalo real estate developer offered a widespread, if weak, apology for the first time. Just two days ago, he apologized only to women who were offended by the e-mails he forwarded. Nice job. Then it comes out Paladino, who's married, fathered a now-10-year-old daughter with an employee of his real estate development firm. As a Buffalo News profile this weekend revealed, he has made millions leasing office space to various state agencies and political outfits. Meanwhile, he has supported the powers that be in Buffalo, Albany and Washington with hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign cash - making him one of western New York's biggest donors. In other words, Paladino is a member of the "ruling class" he railed against in his campaign kickoff speech last night. He's propped up the system and profited from it.
8
POPSConclusion: Sarah Palin Speaks Like a Toddler More from the article: This reminds me of toddlers who speak from inside their own experience in a related way: they will come up to you and comment about something said by a neighbor you’ve never met, or recount to you the plot of an episode of a TV show they have no way of knowing you’ve ever heard of. Palin strings her words together as if she were doing it for herself — meanings float by, and she translates them into syntax in whatever way works, regardless of how other people making public statements do it. McWhorter’s conclusion is especially damning…and not just to Palin: As such, Sarah Palin can talk, basically, like a child and be lionized by a robust number of perfectly intelligent people as an avatar of American culture. And linguistically, let’s face it: she is.
9
POPSPresident Obama and President Reagan dream of a Nuclear-free World.
More from the article: Many of the world's leading statesmen favor such an effort. They include former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, former Defense Secretary Perry, former Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and George Shultz, and former Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Sam Nunn. Unfortunately, for eight years the Bush administration moved in another direction, pushing aggressive policies and new weapons programs, threatening to reopen the nuclear door and spark the very proliferation we seek to prevent. President Bush made it the policy of the United States to contemplate first use of nuclear weapons in response to chemical or biological attack -- even against nonnuclear states. He changed the "strategic triad" -- which put nuclear weapons in a special category by themselves -- by lumping them with conventional weapons in the same package of battlefield capabilities. This blurred the distinction between the two, making nuclear weapons easier to use.
12
POPSFamily Values Republicans party at LA bondage club. Rack up $2,000 bill. The Los Angeles Times, in a review of the club soon after its opening in October last year, described it as being modelled on sex scenes in the Stanley Kubrick film Eyes Wide Shut. "There is also a heavy net suspended above the club's lounge area where performers writhe above the heads of clubgoers. Even more provocative scenes are played out in an enclosed glass booth area adjacent to the club's dancefloor area," the paper said. A reviewer for the Yelp website wrote: "At one point I walked to the bathroom and pretty much just stopped dead in my tracks to watch two girls simulating oral sex in a glass case." The Washington-based Daily Caller website, which dug out the details of the Republican spending, also unearthed an RNC trip to California that included a $9,099 stop at the Beverley Hills Hotel, and a trip to Hawaii for the party's mid-winter convention that cost $43,828.
9
POPSPresident Obama and Russian President Medvedev to sign Nuclear Reduction Treaty Obama spent an hour Wednesday in the White House briefing Democratic Sen. John Kerry, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Sen. Richard Lugar, the committee's ranking Republican. Both would play major roles in ratification of the emerging treaty. Kerry said he and Lugar would hold hearings to examine the details. "A well-designed treaty will send an important message to the rest of the world that America is prepared to lead efforts with key stakeholders to reduce the threat of nuclear weapons," Kerry said.
10
POPSRepublicans block Senate Committee Hearings, including matters of National Security McCASKILL: Mr. President, I’m just confused about why the hearing that we had scheduled this afternoon cannot go forward. The subject matter of this hearing is oversight of the contract that is engaged in police training in Afghanistan in the Contracting Oversight subcommittee. This is a hearing that is getting to the heart of the matter that we have a real problem with the mission part in Afghanistan on police training because of problems with these contracts, problems with oversight of the State Department. Also on the Senate floor, Carl Levin (D-MI) asked permission for the already-scheduled Senated Armed Services Committee to go forward — a request supported by ranking member Sen. John McCain (R-AZ). Levin pointed out that a couple of the commanders had traveled long distances to attend today’s hearing, from as far away as Japan. Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC), speaking on behalf of Republicans, objected and blocked the request:
8
POPS'Most Crushing Legislative Defeat' for Republicans since the 1960's. Robert Creamer, political strategist: It brought us into the company of every other industrial nation by establishing that from this day forward in America - health care is no longer a privilege or a commodity but a right. Robert Kuttner, Co-Founder And Co-Editor Of The American Prospect: "We have just witnessed what could be a turning point in the Obama presidency. In many respects we can thank Scott Brown. For it took the humiliating loss of Ted Kennedy's senate seat, and the even deeper incipient humiliation of lost health reform, for Obama to be reborn as a fighter. Paul Begala, CNN Political Commentator: The merits of the health care law have been debated ad nauseum. I will not revisit them here. Rather, I want to take a moment to salute the raw courage of the women and men who made this possible."
6
POPSHistoric Healthcare Bill Passes The healthcare legislation would extend coverage to about 32 million uninsured people and would impose new rules on insurance companies to prevent them from denying benefits because of preexisting conditions. To help those who must buy their own insurance, it would establish insurance exchanges to increase competition among insurance companies. In a closed-door caucus for Democrats before the vote, Rep. John Lewis, a Georgia Democrat and veteran of the civil rights movement who reportedly faced racial epithets from protesters outside the Capitol on Saturday, reminded his colleagues that they were acting on healthcare on the 45th anniversary of the civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery in Alabama. Lewis was beaten in an infamous confrontation with police during the first of those marches.
9
POPSMercenaries Circling Haiti Patrick Elie, the former Minister of Defence in Haiti, told Anthony Fenton of the Inter Press Service that "these guys are like vultures coming to grab the loot over this disaster, and probably money that might have been injected into the Haitian economy is just going to be grabbed by these companies and I'm sure they are not the only these mercenary companies but also other companies like Haliburton or these other ones that always come on the heels of the troops." Security is a necessity for the development of human rights. But outsourcing security to private military contractors has not proven beneficial in the U.S. or any other country. Recently, U.S. Representative Jan Schakowsky(IL) and U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (VT) introduced bills titled "Stop Outsourcing Security" to phase out private military contractors in response to the many reports of waste, fraud and human rights abuse.
5
POPSClean Energy 101: An Excellent learning and reference site by Scientists and Citizens From the site, a non-profit collaboration of MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), citizens, and industry. More link at site also. The Union of Concerned Scientists is the leading science-based nonprofit working for a healthy environment and a safer world. UCS combines independent scientific research and citizen action to develop innovative, practical solutions and to secure responsible changes in government policy, corporate practices, and consumer choices. What began as a collaboration between students and faculty members at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1969 is now an alliance of more than 250,000 citizens and scientists. UCS members are people from all walks of life: parents and businesspeople, biologists and physicists, teachers and students
12
POPSCracking Down on Natural Gas and Oil Fracking Drillers do not have to reveal the chemical cocktail, thanks to a slew of exemptions given to the industry, most notably in the 2005 Energy Policy Act, which actually granted the fracking industry a specific exemption from the Safe Drinking Water Act. California Congressman Henry Waxman, chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, has just announced an investigation into the composition of the proprietary chemicals used in fracking. In a Feb. 18 letter, Waxman commented on the Safe Drinking Water Act exemption: “Many dubbed this provision the ‘Halliburton loophole’ because of Halliburton’s ties to then-Vice President Cheney and its role as one of the largest providers of hydraulic fracturing services.” Before he was vice president, Dick Cheney was the CEO of Halliburton.
11
POPSTeabaggers burn Moderate Republican at the Stake: No Brown in 2012 Laughing my ass off. Shortest honeymoon in history. I guess it will be a Dick Cheney/Sarah Palin ticket for the republicans in 2012 after all. Conservatives still believing they will capture Congress and the White House from behind the curtain, past the edge of the last dot on the far right spectrum. 2012 looks brighter every day.
13
POPSRepublicans betting America fails From the article: I talked on Monday with Lakshman Achuthan, the managing director of the Economic Cycle Research Institute, which has a long history of correctly forecasting major economic turns based on his idea that the great battleship of the American economy moves upward and downward in powerful waves based on turns in the economic cycle. Achuthan told me “we are now in the strongest economic recovery since the early 1980s that will continue through 2010.” He calls this “the Rodney Dangerfield recovery” that he first predicted last spring and now believes is strongly underestimated. Achuthan believes the jobless numbers already peaked last October and will improve further before Election Day. The February jobless numbers will be distorted by the weather, but the March numbers, to be reported in early April, could show a significant jobs surge and begin a period of job growth that continues through Election Day.
13
POPSLobby Firm tells Corporate Clients how to Sway Elections while avoiding 'Public Scrutiny'. So, what's a corporation looking to advance its political goals to do? According to the alert, written by K&L lawyers Tim Peckinpaugh and Stephen Roberts: roups of corporations within an industry may form coalitions or use existing trade associations to support candidates favorable to policy positions that affect the group as a whole. While corporations that contribute to these expenditures might still be disclosed, this indirect approach can provide sufficient cover such that no single contributing entity receives the bulk of public scrutiny. And the conservatives had argued that the Citizens United ruling would not have an effect because corporations would risk alienation for political donations. As usual conservative arguing points turn out to be bullshit.
5
POPSTiger Farms in China Feed Thirst for Parts “All of the demand for tiger parts is coming from China,” said Belinda Wright, executive director of the Wildlife Protection Society of India. “Unless the Chinese change their attitude, the tiger has no future on this earth.” How ironic that today is the beginning of the Chinese New Year ------ The Year of the Tiger.
8
POPSThe Case Against Corporate Speech But not until last month has the court declared that the First Amendment gives corporations the right to spend unlimited money to influence elections. The court majority, self-styled believers in precedent and judicial restraint, overturned two major Supreme Court decisions and reversed decades of campaign-finance laws aimed at preventing corporations from having undo influence over local, state and national elections. he court has challenged whatever social mores are left that view no-holds-barred corporate cash register politics as unseemly. The disparities between individual contributions and available corporate dollars mock any pretense of equal justice under the law. A total of $5.2 billion from all sources was spent in the 2008 federal election cycle (which includes 2007 and 2008), according to the Center for Responsive Politics. For the same two-year period, ExxonMobil's profits were $85 billion. Pfizer's Lipitor, grossed $27 billion in sales during that time.
11
POPSTwo-Thirds of Americans disagree with Bush Supreme Court Campaign Finance Decision "The last thing people want to see in this environment is corporations having more influence on politicians." That's especially true among independents, as data from the poll shows. More than 80% of independents said new limits should be placed on campaign spending. Seventy-four percent of independents agreed with the statement that "special interests have too much influence in Washington."
10
POPSFor-Profit Health Insurer raising rates 40% Anthem said its costs have been driven up in part because the weak economy has led many people in good health to forgo coverage, leaving those with greater medical needs in its pool of customers. i.e.... due to the republican recession healthy people are playing russian roulette in the hopes of saving some bucks so they can either pay the house mortgage or ride it out till the find a job.
10
POPSWars sending U.S. into ruin. Obama’s Afghan “surge” of 30,000 new troops will cost an additional $33 billion — more than Germany’s total defence budget. Military and intelligence spending relentlessly increase as unemployment heads over 10% and the economy bleeds red ink. America has become the Sick Man of the Western Hemisphere, an economic cripple like the defunct Ottoman Empire. The Pentagon now accounts for half of total world military spending. Add America’s rich NATO allies and Japan, and the figure reaches 75%. China and Russia combined spend only a paltry 10% of what the U.S. spends on defence. There are 750 U.S. military bases in 50 nations and 255,000 service members stationed abroad, 116,000 in Europe, nearly 100,000 in Japan and South Korea. Military spending gobbles up 19% of federal spending and at least 44% of tax revenues. During the Bush administration, the Iraq and Afghanistan wars — funded by borrowing — cost each American family more than $25,000.
4
POPSShrimp's Dirty Secrets Upon arrival in the U.S., few if any, are inspected by the FDA, and when researchers have examined imported ready-to-eat shrimp, they found 162 separate species of bacteria with resistance to 10 different antibiotics Problems with irresponsible methods of farming don't end at the "yuck," factor as shrimp farming is credited with destroying 38 percent of the world's mangroves, some of the most diverse and productive ecosystems on earth. Mangroves sequester vast amounts of carbon and serve as valuable buffers against hurricanes and tsunamis. Some compare shrimp farming methods that demolish mangroves to slash-and-burn agriculture An estimated average of 1.4 pounds of wild fish are used to produce every pound of farmed shrimp. Sometimes the wild fish used is species like anchovies, herring, sardines and menhaden. These fish are important foods for seabirds, big commercial fish and whales, Bottomfeeder - Named one of the Fifteen Books that Mattered Most in 2008
2
Clips
Latest Pops
Latest Comments
Most Pops
Tags
Print
Save
Turn on live update