Under Pressure, USDA Works to Speed Monsanto Approval

Monday 12 December 2011

EXCLUSIVE: Under Industry Pressure, USDA Works to Speed Approval of Monsanto's Genetically Engineered Crops
Mike Ludwig, Truthout: "For years, biotech agriculture opponents have accused regulators of working too closely with big biotech firms when deregulating genetically engineered (GE) crops. Now, their worst fears could be coming true: under a new two-year pilot program at the USDA, regulators are training the world's biggest biotech firms, including Monsanto, BASF and Syngenta, to conduct environmental reviews of their own transgenic seed products as part of the government's deregulation process."
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Protesters Occupy Goldman Sachs
J.A. Myerson, Truthout: "The reason several hundred protesters have congregated on West Street is that Goldman Sachs can be found there. And, today, Occupy Wall Street has gone squidding just outside. The idea comes from Matt Taibbi's 'nailed-it' description of the banking giant as 'a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.'"
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Supreme Court to Rule on Immigration Law in Arizona
Adam Liptak, The New York Times News Service: "The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to decide whether Arizona may impose tough anti-immigration measures. Among them, in a law enacted last year, is a requirement that the police there question people they stop about their immigration status."
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Ellen Brown | Pulling Back the Curtain on the Wall Street Money Machine
Ellen Brown, Truthout: "The Fed insisted that the loans were repaid and there have been no losses, but the Bloomberg report said the banks reaped a $13 billion windfall in profits; and 'details suggest taxpayers paid a price beyond dollars as the secret funding helped preserve a broken status quo and enabled the biggest banks to grow even bigger.' The revelations provoked shock and outrage among commentators."
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Tom Engelhardt | How to Turn Election Year Into Election Life
Tom Engelhardt, TomDispatch: "Sometimes words outlive their usefulness. Sometimes the gap between changing reality and the names we've given it grows so wide that they empty of all meaning or retain older meanings that only confuse us. 'Election,' 'presidential election campaign,' and 'democracy' all seem like obvious candidates for name-change."
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On the News With Thom Hartmann: Drones Used to Pursue Suspected Cattle Thieves in North Dakota, and More
In today's On the News segment: "Occupy the Ports" planned for at least eight cities today, drones used to pursue suspected cattle thieves in North Dakota, Swiss bank officials may release the names of thousands of suspected tax dodgers, and more.
Watch the Video and Read the Transcript

Over 1,500 March at Occupy Oakland's Port of Oakland Demonstration: Police Say, "No Work Stoppage"
Susan Mernit, Oakland Local: "More than 1,500 marchers are at the Port this morning, according to Oakland police. 400 protesters at Berths 55/56 of the Port of Oakland are marching to shut down the facility at the same time that police in riot gear are massing to stop them."
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Dean Baker | US-China Trade Policy and the Class War in the US
Dean Baker, Truthout: "The interests of the 99 percent differ greatly from the interests of the 1 percent. Until this fact is recognized more generally, there is no possibility that our economic relations with China will change in a way that benefits the vast majority of working people in the United States."
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Detainee in Iraq Poses a Dilemma as US Exit Nears
Charlie Savage, The New York Times News Service: "The administration is wrestling with either turning him over to the Iraqi government - as the United States did with its other wartime prisoners - or seeking a way to take him with the military as it withdraws, according to interviews with officials familiar with the deliberations. But each option for dealing with Mr. Daqduq has drawbacks, officials say, virtually guaranteeing that his fate will add a messy footnote to the end of the Iraq war."
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The Liberties We've Lost in the "War on Terror" Are Only Lost Temporarily, Right?
William Fisher and Chip Pitts, Truthout: "As the country enters its second post-9/11 decade, I asked renowned human rights crusader Chip Pitts about what civil liberties and human rights we've collectively lost in the so-called 'war on terror' now that what was previously legal has become criminal."
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New York's Tax Overhaul, Said to Raise Taxes on the Rich, Actually Doesn't
Marian Wang, ProPublica: "The tax overhaul that New York state passed this week has been widely described in news reports as raising taxes on the rich and cutting them for the middle class - even as a win for Occupy Wall Street protesters and a possible blueprint for Congress. But perhaps New Yorkers need to take a closer look."
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Jim Hightower | Don't Call Gingrich a "Lobbyist"
Jim Hightower, OtherWords: "Mea culpa, I misspoke, my bad. I stand corrected. I have called Newt Gingrich a lobbyist. Apparently, he hates that tag, even though he has indeed gotten very wealthy by taking big bucks from such special interest outfits as IBM, Astra Zeneca, Microsoft, and Siemens in exchange for helping them get favors from federal and state governments."
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Insurers Use PR Playbook to Keep Us in the Dark About Health Insurance
Wendell Potter, PR Watch: "They're concerned that if we can get information we've been denied all these years, we just might force them to provide better value for what we soon will be forced to buy."
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Lowe's, Bank of America and Others Pull Ads From Muslim Reality TV Show After Pressure
Zaid Jilani, ThinkProgress: "The TLC reality TV show All-American Muslim chronicles the lives of a group of Muslims in Dearborn, Michigan. The show has been well-received for its fair and realistic portrayal of the Muslim American experience in the United States.... But a reality TV show that lets Americans relate to the lives of Muslims in the United States is an offensive idea to those who want to demonize Islam."
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TRUTHOUT'S BUZZFLASH DAILY HEADLINES

Is President Obama really likely to veto a Senate bill that passed the Senate that allows for the military to indefinitely detain Americans?

According to Sen. Carl Levin - chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee - who headed Democratic Party negotiations on the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012, it was the White House that insisted on the military having the option - instead of police or federal law enforcement - to detain American citizens considered "belligerent" to the security of the nation.

Glenn Greenwald points this out in a commentary that includes a videotape of Senator Levin making the claim about White House culpability in the phrasing.

RT more extensively explores the White House insistence on the military option of indefinitely detaining American citizens without involvement of the judicial system:

According to Senator Carl Levin (D-Michigan), however, Americans should be a bit more concerned about what the president's actual intentions are. Levin, who sits on the Armed Services Committee as chairman, has revealed to Congress that the Obama administration influenced the wording of the act and shot down text that would have saved American citizens from the indefinite imprisonment and suspension of habeas corpus.

Senator Levin told Congress recently that under the original wording of the National Defense Authorization Act, American citizens were excluded from the provision that allowed for detention. Once Obama's officials saw the text though, says Levin, "the administration asked us to remove the language which says that US citizens and lawful residents would not be subject to this section...."

John Wood of Change.org writes that President Obama proposed a veto of Section 1032 of the NDAA, which does not pertain to the detention of American citizens. Rather, that section deals with the use of the US military in taking custody of suspected criminals. Section 1031, which actually deals with the indefinite imprisonment of Americans, remains not only unopposed by the Obama administration, but the president has made sure that the law specifically includes Americans, urging Congress to redraft the legislation with increasingly confusing wording that makes the legalization detrimental to America.

To those who hold out hope that Obama will veto the bill on the grounds of protecting the right of habeas corpus for American citizens, as guaranteed in the Constitution, it seems an unlikely scenario.

Not only did the Defense Authorization Act pass the Senate by a landslide majority, not only does the bill fund the military - but it also appears that the White House supports its suppression of civil liberties.

Now, short of some political miracle, the Army will be able to decide which Americans to arrest in the middle of the night and make disappear.

Sounds a lot like Iraq under Saddam Hussein in terms of authorized powers, doesn't it?

Mark Karlin
Editor BuzzFlash at Truthout

Government Is Not a Business
Read the Article at BuzzFlash

Democratic Senator McCaskill Finds House Defense Bill Riddled With Earmarks
Read the Article at McClatchy Newspapers

The Green Economy and the Redefinition of Super Power
Read the Article at BuzzFlash

Mitt Romney's $10,000 Mistake
Read the Article at The Washington Post

Glenn Greenwald: The Real Definition of Terrorism
Read the Article at Salon

Long-Term Jobless Eye Bleak Future as Benefits End
Read the Article at Reuters

What a Difference an Occupation Makes
Read the Article at The Nation

ENDS

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