More Franken-food on the way

Sorry, but no thanks. If the question is really about feeding more people, vegetarian is a much better option. Somehow this sounds like something the meat industry is more interested in than anyone else. I don't care how much marketing you throw at it, there's little to like about this.

Winston Churchill once predicted that it would be possible to grow chicken breasts and wings more efficiently without having to keep an actual chicken. And in fact scientists have since figured out how to grow tiny nuggets of lab meat and say it will one day be possible to produce steaks in vats, sans any livestock.

Pork chops or burgers cultivated in labs could eliminate contamination problems that regularly generate headlines these days, as well as address environmental concerns that come with industrial livestock farms.

Read the rest of this post...

Democrats pushing for food safety overhaul in 2010

Amazingly enough, everyone is on board with the biggest change in decades. The Republicans pushed the country to its limit with problem after problem and so now, even industry is calling for more regulation. If only Wall Street learned as quickly. Reuters:

A U.S. Senate committee voted unanimously on Wednesday to increase government oversight of food safety but the first significant overhaul in 50 years may not happen until 2010.

Pressure to overhaul the food safety system has grown following several high-profile outbreaks involving lettuce, peppers, peanuts and spinach since 2006 that have sickened thousands and killed several.

Read the rest of this post...

The Postal service is, or isn't, shutting down its Santa letter program

One of the worst stories ever written by AP. Depending what paragraph of the story you read, the US Postal Service either is, or isn't, shutting down the "write a letter to Santa" program, and letters to Santa either will, or won't, be shredded. I've just re-read this article ten times. It makes absolutely no sense. But the program is important, to me at least, and if it's being shut down, people have the right to know (apparently, they found a - read that again, "a" - sex offender volunteering to answer letters, so they panicked). It's an important enough story - it'd be nice if an editor at AP could re-read and re-write it in proper English. Read the rest of this post...

George Bush: Terrorists should be tried in U.S. Courts.

Via Greg Sargent:

With Republicans hammering the Obama administration for trying suspected 9/11 terrorists in a New York court, a Democrat points out that in 2006, George W. Bush seemed to say outright that terrorists should be “tried in courts here in the United States.”

There was no outcry at the time.

Bush's line was: "I believe they ought to be tried in courts here in the United States." Huh. Now, as Markos noted in his recent column in The Hill (titled appropriately, "Conservative Cowards"), Republicans are fretting, trembling and wailing. Read the rest of this post...

A typical genius in line to buy Sarah Palin's book

Read the rest of this post...

Rudy isn't running for Governor of New York

After that stellar presidential run, Rudy Giuliani has apparently decided not to run for Governor of New York:

It was not clear what prompted the decision, but the prospect of potentially facing Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo, who is quietly planning his own run for governor, may not have appealed to Mr. Giuliani, who suffered a bruising defeat in the 2008 Republican presidential primary. While many political analysts believe Mr. Giuliani would have comfortably beaten Gov. David A. Paterson, he would likely have faced an uphill battle against Mr. Cuomo, one of the most popular politicians in the state.

It remains unclear if the former mayor is considering any other political race in 2010. Some have urged him to take on the newly-installed Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand, who has never run statewide and is still introducing herself to voters in parts of the state.

Rudy was going to be the great GOP hope in New York.

Isn't just about everyone really over Rudy? Read the rest of this post...

Rep. Conyers criticizes Obama, Rahm on health care

Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) in Huffington Post:

"I'm getting tired of saving Obama's can in the White House," said Conyers. "I mean, he only won by five votes in the House, and this bill wasn't anything to write home about. The public option is only available, which is the only way you manage cost and get some competition to 1,300 other health insurance companies, the only way he could have got that through is that progressives held their nose and voted for it anyway."

Asked if the president had shown enough leadership in the health care debate, Conyers facetiously wondered why Press would ask the question.

"Of course not, of course not," he said. "You know, holding hands out and beer on Friday nights in the White House and bowing down to every nutty right-wing proposal about health care, and saying on occasion that public options aren't all that important is doing a disservice to the Barack Obama that I first met who was an ardent single-payer enthusiast himself."

...."That is essentially what Rahm Emanuel has said: Just give us anything and we will declare victory," said Conyers.

Amen. Read the rest of this post...

Calls from Congress to fire Timmy and Summers

The news never gets better when it comes to Larry Summers or Timmy Geithner. It's always about another TARP fiasco or whatever Wall Street wants. We're well past the point where Wall Street deserves one more cent. The call for change was missed with this duo as they continue the same old policies that we've witnessed for well over a decade. Yes, the policies that got us into this crisis in the first place. Outside of Wall Street and the White House economic team, few Americans can stomach one more story about how poorly their money was handed over to the pure greed crowd.

Summers and Geithner both have to go. Click through for the interview with Representative DeFazio who has had enough. HuffingtonPost:

DeFazio said that there is a growing consensus among the Congressional Progressive Caucus that Geithner needs to be removed. He added that some lawmakers were "considering questions regarding him and other economic advisers" -- though a petition calling for the Treasury Secretary's removal had not been drafted, he said.

"[Obama] is being failed by his economic team," DeFazio concluded. "We may have to sacrifice just two more jobs to get millions back for Americans."

Read the rest of this post...

Fox News displays old campaign footage to claim Palin is getting ‘huge crowds’ at her book signings

Oops. Something the propaganda organ of the Soviet Union might have done. I'm sure it was a simple oversight. Just like when Hannity did the same thing last week. ThinkProgress has the whole delicious story. John Amato is filing an FCC complaint. Media Matters offers us two photos to compare:

Read the rest of this post...

I'm attending an Internet politics conference in Barcelona, and you're invited

I arrived in Barcelona yesterday for the Personal Democracy Forum's (PDF) first-ever conference in Europe (they've held annual conferences in New York). The conference is about the Internet and politics, but also governance. It should be quite interesting, as its focus is very Europe-centric. It's a great chance to meet a number of the Internet-politics leaders from around Europe, and a number of the bloggers I recently met in France are going to be attending. (As is conservative US blogger David All, who I just ran in to in our hotel lobby, and Ilyse Hogue of MoveOn, Joe Rospars who worked for Obama, and others.) PDF is offering 20% off the registration fee for anyone who wants to attend (it starts tomorrow and goes through Saturday), provided you use this link and the following discount code (discount code: americablog09 ) Read the rest of this post...

Orrin Hatch on health care debate: "It's going to be a holy war"

Holy war? That's how Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) is characterizing the upcoming debate on the health insurance reform bill:

Republicans, who have criticized the Democrats' initiative as a step toward government control of the healthcare system, are already planning a series of delaying tactics, including forcing the entire bill to be read aloud on the Senate floor.

"It's going to be a holy war," Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) said Wednesday evening.

This means that, in Hatch's world, insurance companies are deities. Republicans sure do worship at their altar.

Actually, the Catholic Bishops did turn the House debate into a holy war via the Stupak amendment. Read the rest of this post...

Thursday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

The President returns from Asia today. Soon, but not before Thanksgiving, he's going to let us know his plans for Afghanistan. I'm really hoping he includes an exit strategy.

And, we have a health insurance bill in the Senate. Debate should begin on Saturday, if all sixty Democrats vote on the motion to proceed -- in other words, overcome the initial GOP filibuster. The three Democratic Senators to keep an eye on, for now, are: Nelson (NE), Landrieu (LA) and Lincoln (AR). But, once this debate starts, who knows where it will lead or how long it will take.

Later today, I'm leaving on vacation to South Africa -- a much anticipated trip, which I've been planning to take for years. So, I won't be blogging til I get back. Petey is spending his vacation in Maine with my parents and their dog, Riley. By all indications, he is having a ball.

Let's get threading... Read the rest of this post...

Let's agree to agree to delay

To some degree this is to be expected. The left let this issue completely slip away into the hands of the deniers. Even in the comments of David Horsey's latest, you can see the countdown and then the nutcases who start their usual denier rants. Read the rest of this post...

Science returning to US contraception efforts

The Bush administration policies towards contraception, abstinence and abortion in Africa set everyone back decades. The policies sounded good in the right wing Southern Baptist churches but made little sense in the real world. Getting back to focusing on contraception is a very welcome change. After years of destructive policies, it's going to take a while and will require much more money than this, but it's a start. The sooner the US shuts down the abstinence only programs in Africa, the better.

A new 12 million dollar family planning drive launched here Wednesday highlights how Obama administration funding has revamped a contraception drive in Africa and developing states, UN officials said, noting a sharp turnaround from the Bush era.

The change in US policy was praised at a three-day conference on family planning in Kampala which launched the project to improve access to contraceptives for women in six African nations as well as Indonesia and Pakistan.

Read the rest of this post...

Citigroup increases executive salaries

The great American swindle continues. Under no circumstances should the Obama administration accept this. The Citi management may have issues today with "motivating" personnel but let's not forget about the massive amounts they all made during the peak years of the credit bubble. The last time I checked, nobody paid that back yet. If they want to hand it all over now and restart, fine. Otherwise, let Citi and the rest pound salt and go away. If they don't like it, nobody is stopping them from creating their own business without any government handouts. Let's see what kind of capitalists they really are.

The disclosures attach names to some of the 25 pay packages that Kenneth Feinberg, special master for Troubled Asset Relief Program executive compensation, approved last month. Feinberg disclosed the packages, but did not indicate the names of the recipients.

CFO John Gerspach's annual base salary will increase to $500,000 effective Nov. 1 from $400,000 prior to November, while James Forese is receiving $475,000, compared with $225,000.

Gerspach is also receiving $2.92 million of stock salary for 2009, while Forese will get $5.4 million.

Read the rest of this post...