Ward 2 Forum with Mayor Rothschild
April 10, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie: Announcement from Ward 2 City Councilman Paul Cunningham: WARD 2 TUCSON CITY COUNCILMANPAUL CUNNINGHAMHOSTSMAYOR JONATHAN ROTHSCHILD Please join Tucson City Councilman Paul Cunningham and MayorJonathan Rothschild at a Ward 2 Town Hall. Mayor Rothschild willdiscuss his first 180 days in office and have a question and answersession following. Light Refreshments will be … Read more
Conduct unbecoming a Board Member
April 10, 2012
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by David Safier The Star's top, center, front page article is about a letter sent by former TUSD Board members to the current board. It's carefully worded to be as diplomatic as possible. Explicity, the letter asks the Board to be a bit more careful about its public statements concerning the MAS program. Implicity, it … Read more
AIRC Update: DOJ approves Arizona’s new congressional districts map
April 10, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie: All the sturm and drang from Tea-Publicans over the new congressional districts map turned out to be so much sound and fury, signifying nothing. When the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission (AIRC) hired former Department of Justice lawyer Bruce Adelson as its compliance consultant, it ensured that the maps would pass Department of Justice … Read more
Martha McSally Slaps Jesse Kelly Around for his Absurd Energy Claims
April 9, 2012
By Michael Bryan
About time one of the CD8 Republican candidates pointed out what an ill-informed, truth-twisting dolt Jesse Kelly is when he talks about energy policy.
Martha McSally outright contradicted Kelly's claim that the U.S. has "significantly more oil than Saudi Arabia" during a recent debate. Of course, right-wingers jumped on her, claiming she "appeared unsure and reluctant about using American oil and gas resources for our own domestic energy needs — apparently content to remain dependent on costly foreign imports." Apparently, working with the actual facts is now defeatism among GOPers.
What McSally said was:
"We need a strategy that uses all the resources we have to get on the path to energy independence. And, Jesse, we don't have more oil than Saudi Arabia. The oil your talking about is cost prohibitive in order to actually get to it, because we don't have those technologies, yet. So we need those to be developed. And maybe you should use your G.I. Bill to go back and get a geology degree, and you can help with that. But the reality is that that is not available."
Oh, smack! The crowd starting oohing and laughing when McSally recommended Kelly get himself some actual education on the topic. It has to sting a little for college drop-out Kelly to get told by the candidate with two Masters degrees, and a stint as a professor of National Security Studies at the George C. Marshall Center in Germany, to get back to school and learn some shit.
It's nice to see a little reality-based discussion on the Right. Let's see if McSally keeps up the criticism of Kelly's less-than-real energy policy talking points.
See the video after the click…
Anti-government Tea-Publican austerity has inhibited economic recovery
April 9, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie: Private businesses have added jobs for 25 consecutive months as the American economy recovers from the Bush Great Recession. At the same time, however, the loss of public sector jobs at the federal, state, and local levels has inhibited economic recovery. It is largely due to the ideology of Tea-Publican controlled state … Read more
Rampant speculation by the banksters of Wall Street is driving up gas prices
April 9, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
As I posted back in March, the real reason for rising gasoline prices today is the same as it was during the 2008 election — these guys. OK, let me be clear, not these guys in the photo specifically, but speculators in the commodities futures trading and derivatives markets in general.
Shannon Stapleton/Reuters
Traders on the floor of the New York Mercantile Exchange.
The rise in gasoline prices has almost nothing to do with energy policy. It has everything to do with America’s continuing failure to adequately regulate Wall Street. The Huffington Post reported last week Gas Price Experts: Wall Street 'Casinos' Raise Pain at the Pump:
Americans are paying for $4-a-gallon gasoline because Wall Street "casinos" have blocked regulators from cracking down on rampant oil speculation, finance experts argued on Capitol Hill [last] Wednesday.
In an effort to counter Republican claims that gas prices are high because the Obama administration does not allow enough drilling, House Democratic leaders staged a hearing featuring former Reagan and Clinton administration oil and trading analysts who blame the surge on speculation.
And the vast profits from that speculation do not go into developing more oil or creating jobs, the analysts argued.
"Your constituents should know that every time they break their heart by buying $4 and maybe soon $5 gasoline, that money isn't going into production," said University of Maryland professor Michael Greenberger, who served as director of the division of trading and markets for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission in the Clinton administration. "It's going into homebuilding in the Hamptons and yacht building."
And the big finance firms are working overtime to ensure that the speculative commodity keeps flowing, he said.
"They've got hundreds of millions of dollars that they are using in lobbying on the Hill" or the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Greenberger told HuffPost after the session. "Now they are bringing all these lawsuits; they are stopping the action that has already been asked for by Congress to stop the speculation."
He was referring to suits that seek to limit certain Dodd-Frank financial reforms that, among other things, grant the commission the power to crack down on excessive oil speculation.
About the Quality Education and Jobs Initiative to renew the one cent sales tax
April 9, 2012
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by David Safier I haven't written much about the Quality Education and Jobs Initiative to renew the one cent sales tax, which will mainly be used to fund education, because it's fairly complex and I didn't want to get it wrong. So I sat down with Ann-Eve Pedersen, one of the driving forces behind the … Read more
Money = Choice (video)
April 9, 2012
By Pamela Powers Hannley
At the risk of dating myself…
I remember the days when the only place a young, sinlgle woman could buy affordable birth control pills– without being judged or lectured– was Planned Parenthood.
I remember riding the Columbus city bus for an hour and a half each way to go to the near east side clinic– to the ghetto. I remember the dark, dingy waiting room packed with young black women, little kids, and college students like me– all waiting for a free exam and contraception.
I remember those days before Roe v Wade legalized abortion in the US.
I remember women in my dorm– crying when they found out they were pregnant. Most of them scraped together the money to fly to New York City or drive to Detroit to have abortions because those were the only places in the US where that service was offered. I even drove a friend to Detroit… a somber, desparate journey.
We don't want to go back to that time
… a time when women had to deal with the circumstances of an unwanted pregnancy without a full aray of choices.
… a time when only wealthy women had the right to choose what is best for themselves, their bodies, and their families.
Here are two eye-opening stories about how choice is being whittled away by political and religious leaders.
As It Was Before Roe, So It Is Again: "Choice" Often Comes Down to Money
The real impact of a 20 week abortion ban
Video after the click…
