DEVASTATING FLOOD IN BRISBANE AUSTRALIA: DON’T SAY YOU WEREN’T WARNED. (World Socialist News)
(REUTERS/Tim Wimborne)
A 2007 “feasibility study” indicated that the city’s flood protection depended on enhancing two dams. The recommendations were ignored and, after the flood, the Queensland Prime Minister said, apparently inaccurately, that such enhancement of flood protection could not have prevented this damage
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ANTI-WAR PROTEST MAKES STRANGE BEDFELLOWS: THINK CODE PINK AND GROVER NORQUIST. (Firedoglake)
Norquist, who wants government shrunk to a size it can drained down a bathtub, now carries his fiscal conservatism to its logical conclusion and demands that the billions of dollars of “discretionary” spending for the Afghan conflict be put on the budget chopping block. In reviewing material on the “cost of war” Jon Walker expresses some hope that other Republicans will follow suit.
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INSTEAD OF ONE BLACK FRIDAY OF BAD NEWS, NEW YORK CITY PUBLIC SCHOOLS WILL GET SMALL DOSES OF DISASTER ON 8 LATER FRIDAYS. (New York Times)
New York Times executes a kind of mini-WikiLeaks by publishing details from a Department of Education report which indicates how 26 schools closed because of “poor performance” will be re-opened. These plans emphasize the replacement of whole public schools as charter ones, or else the splitting of school buildings between private and public operation. Given the lack of input from the constituents of these schools, the Department is releasing their plan in small increments, to blunt effects of opposition to them.
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IS THE TED WILLIAMS STORY A “CAUTIONARY TALE” FOR THE WAY MEDIA AND CORPORATIONS TREAT NEWLY-FOUND “CELEBRITIES?” (Christian Science Monitor)
His rags to riches tale from homeless man to broadcaster and TV ad-maker has an additional chapter now that he has acknowledged unresolved drug problems and moved to a celebrity re-hab center. His story seems to highlight the “24-7″ news cycle of celebrity and the failure to do “due diligence” on candidates for new-found celebrity: both by the media who report these stories and the corporations who use them for monetary advantage.
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NEW FLORIDA AGRICULTURAL COMMISSIONER DOUBTS THAT THE STATE SHOULD DO A “CUT AND PASTE” OF ARIZONA IMMIGRATION LAW. (Florida Capital News)
Republican Adam Putnam parts ways with Republican Governor Scott, who campaigned on a platform of “bringing” the Arizona law to Florida. Putnam points out that the agricultural industry is heavily dependent on foreign workers and that local unions have not “objected” to job loss to immigrants. Also he cites the disruptions to the tourist industry were visitors to be stopped and required to prove their nationality. What’s good for Arizona may not be so for Florida.
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Quote of the day…
Every time he has the opportunity to take the higher moral ground in terms of the right he won’t go there. He persists thinking that all that is needed is to invoke coming together. And while it’s comfortable to not lay blame, the ruin it wreaks can not be stopped if he refuses to identify the wrongs that have been committed. Barack Obama keeps forgiving. Sometimes forgiveness is moral failure.
Debra Cooper, on President Obama’s Tucson speech following the massacre there.
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