Fixed Class, America

Poorer U.S. students are being told by wealthy officials they're being 'saved' from high interest rates on student loans. But in fact, they're being screwed -- in comparison to friendly agreements with crooked banks. How can this be?

U.S. government funds are loaned to the biggest banks at below 1%, though most such banks have been in default and have troubled histories. Clearly, the Federal Reserve is comprised of bankers who largely help themselves and their industry.

A Congressional "bipartisan compromise" for student loans would lend initially at 3.86% for undergraduates (capped to 8.25%). Ten years of this program would earn the national government an estimated $184 billion. Massachusetts Senators Elizabeth Warren & Edward Markey support legislation pegging student rates to the rate granted banks, presently 0.75%

But -- Don't hold your breath waiting. Agitate. Vote Green Party, or for those resisting the banker cabal. Poor students - thanks to Washington you'll remain poor.

Nuclear Deformities? Nah

Assorted plant deformities are being found in the vicinity of the Fukushima nuclear disaster (link). Officials say there's no proven relationship to the radioactivity release.  Local people claim otherwise.

Entry to the evacuation zone is still prohibited, so the closest land area is uninhabited and monitoring is controlled. What's happening at sea? Nothing good...

Zimmerman Justice

George Zimmerman hunted down and confronted an unarmed high school boy, and shot the kid dead. It was just 7PM when Trayvon Martin was killed.

Zimmerman was acquitted of both second-degree murder and of manslaughter. He now walks free, but Trayvon Martin's ghost will forever haunt his killer.

Zimmerman claimed he feared for his life. He may indeed have been afraid before, during and after the killing - but Zimmerman initiated the confrontation, and he finished it by shooting the teenager dead.

NFL quarterback Michael Vick was sentenced to federal prison for 23 months for dogfighting & killing a pit bull. Why is a dog more valued than a child who'd just gone shopping for ice tea & skittles candy? Zimmerman, the child-killer who refused to testify in his own defense, sniggered free: his supporters are well-pleased, and he himself seems unrepentant. The remains of Trayvon Martin lie violated, an ambushed child of racist & genocidal America.

 

Nuke Dude Dead

Masao Yoshida, nuclear engineer, died of cancer this week in Japan. He was chief of Fukushima Dai'ichi nuclear plant during the March 2011 explosions & meltdown. He remained based onsite, organizing Tokyo Electric Power Company's response to the disaster and monitoring the leakage of radioactivity into the surrounding air, ground and sea.

TEPCO has not acknowledged responsibility for Yoshida's collapsed health.

Yoshida was 58 years old.   吉田昌郎 ・ 元東電原発所長が死去

 

Invasive Government?

Does an individual have any abiding rights to their own DNA? Police followed a person they acknowledge was uninvolved in crime, and collected DNA from a drink bottle discarded at their workplace. The DNA was then used to link a dead relative to a series of crimes 50 years ago, and showed probable cause to force exhumation of the accused relative's remains.

The Boston Globe reports (13 July 2013, p.A7) that the extended family of Albert DeSalvo and his nephew "were outraged by collection of the DNA without their permission." A spokesman for the ACLU is quoted: "It's not hard to understand why people would be uncomfortable with having samples of their DNA collected and used without their knowledge."

Yet Professor of Law Rosanna Cavallaro of Suffolk University defends the police action. She claims: "It's pretty clear that any kind of discarded material is fair game for the police to retrieve and use to obtain information. If I take a cup and throw it in the garbage, that's saying to the world, 'I lost interest in this, it's not important to me, and I no longer care what happens to it.'"

One problem is technology is quickly developing. In the near future, if not now, cells and DNA are likely be bases for creating body parts or even cloned individuals. Would we have no say in such experimentation with our personal genetic material?

When we discard something in the trash, we've the expectation it's to be trashed, not that it serve as an experimental sample for the police, raw material for commercial laboratories, or a disqualification exhibit by our health insurance company.

Prof. Rosanna Cavallaro is a doofus. Or perhaps the newspaper printed only part of her comments. If "Rosanna+" clones were surreptitiously brought to market, she'd surely start singing a different tune...

Miss Deedy

Chris Deedy shot & killed a man in a crowded McDonalds in Waikiki. It was 2:30 AM. Both men had been drinking.

After the shooting, Deedy refused to be tested for drunkenness (see link).  Kollin Elderts was tested as a corpse, involuntarily.

Elderts is dead. Christopher Deedy is on trial for murder (second-degree).  No winners.

An inexperienced Federal employee, Deedy has worked for short periods in Baghdad (Iraq) and Benghazi (Libya). Deedy may have felt comfortable barking orders at the people of Hawaii as perhaps he'd done in the Middle East. Whatever the case, Deedy's use of deadly force, precipitous & ill-advised, was a major tragedy.

Sad!  (link)

Buying Egypt Misery

Each year the USA gives Egypt's military over $1.3 billion (link); $1,300,000,000 in "military aid"... Now Egypt's military has staged a coup overthrowing their elected government, and this week Egyptian military patrols are executing people on the streets.

Our monies flow continually. That's $25 million each week... (probably more in untraced funds).

America needs these multi-millions for its own development.

We need to get out of the overseas militarism business.

It's dirty, wretched & not our business.

Shadow Endurance?

Cape Cod, Massachusetts is downwind of Entergy's Pilgrim Nuclear Power plant. In case of accident, survivors can't run away -- gateways to the peninsula are near the nuclear site.

As with many nuclear facilities, danger and horrors multiply due to radioactive stockpiles (link). Pilgrim is a nuclear waste storage site, located on a beach.

The disaster at Fukushima taught little or nothing.  It's a tragedy when radioactive fallout enters the food chain & contaminates towns full of children. Git some radionuclide wit yer fish, beach sand & lobster...

Japan's disaster teaches of great danger & irresponsibility by nuclear reactor operators. Nothing can compensate for an accident. Wake Up America.

 

Pansy Press

Major media in the USA is servile. Corporate interests don't equal public interest.

Duh

Sad the Washington Post eliminated its ombudsman earlier this year (link). Editorial independence is abandoned. American Democracy has become a farce. Media treats us as silly sheep - choosing either to be boiled or broiled.

Even an objective veneer is abandoned.
US media serves big money employers.