Members of Congress in China worth billions more than US members of Congress

Obviously the US isn't the only country with a wealth gap problem. At least in the US they don't hide behind outdated labels such as "member of the communist party" as they do in China. Bloomberg:

As Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao this week opens the annual gathering of the National People’s Congress with a pledge to shrink China’s wealth gap, his challenge will be reflected in the makeup of the assembly itself.

The richest 70 of the 2,987 members have a combined wealth of 493.1 billion yuan ($75.1 billion), and include China’s richest man, Hangzhou Wahaha Group Chairman Zong Qinghou, according to the research group Hurun Report. By comparison, the wealthiest 70 people in the 535-member U.S. House and Senate, who represent a country with about 10 times China’s per-capita income, had a maximum combined wealth of $4.8 billion, data from the Washington-based Center for Responsive Politics show.

The presence of billionaires in the Congress, which is the highest state legislative body and meets to approve government economic and fiscal plans, is one consequence of the Communist Party’s opening to capitalists to join it a decade ago. The step now risks hampering efforts to tackle inequality, such as higher taxes on upper-income earners, financial disclosures and real- estate levies, said Huang Jing of Singapore National University.

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They stole their newborn babies and dropped the moms from helicopters into the river to drown

This was during Argentina's military dictatorship in the late 70s and early 80s. I was working briefly in Argentina towards the end of the 1980s and heard about these stories from Argentine friends. Just horrific. Two of the former dictators have gone on trial. Good.

About 500 babies were stolen from their mothers during the dictatorship, according to the campaign group Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo.

Pregnant female political dissidents were interned a
t secret maternity wards in centres used to torture opponents of the dictatorship.

The babies were handed to military officers or their relatives after birth while the mothers were simply killed, many of them dropped alive from military planes into the sea.

There's a wonderful (sad) movie about this chapter of Argentine history, called "The Official Story" (La historia oficial).  Do watch it sometime.

Another horrific story and movie (based on a book) about the same era is "The Night of the Pencils" (La noche de los lápices"). Wikipedia explains the background:

The motion picture was based on the non-fiction book, La noche de los lápices, written by María Seoane and Héctor Ruiz Núñez. The book profiles seven high school student activists from La Plata, Argentina, including lone survivor Pablo Díaz, who gives the authors his testimony. The students were kidnapped by the government after protesting for cheaper bus fare.

Pablo Díaz was incarcerated for four years. The other six students became a part of the 236 Argentine teenagers who were kidnapped and disappeared during the military dictatorship.

I've mentioned this before - an Argentine friend, over dinner one night when I was still in Buenos Aires, late 1980s, was telling me about her friends who were killed by the junta during the dictatorship (called "the Dirty War"). I remember her crying in the restaurant, but don't really remember anything about the conversation, or what I said to elicit her next comment (I suspect it was my usual adamant exuberance about politics), but she said to me:

"You know, they'd have killed you if you were Argentine."

I asked her what she meant, and she told me that I was smart and impassioned. Had I been born in Argentina, the dictatorship would have killed me along with her friends, only a few years before our dinner. I still get chills telling that story. Read the rest of this post...

'You dress like a prostitute' - Hilarious Athenos ads

I think these are for real. They're for a popular American brand of Greek food (hummus, yoghurt) called Athenos. The ads are absolutely hysterical, and spot on. Hard to describe, just have to watch ("yiayia" is grandma in Greek). And yeah, Greek grandmothers are pretty much like that.





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Krugman: Republican spending cuts will kill the recovery

And you know that's exactly what's going to happen. Says the Professor, short and not so sweet:

The economic news has been better lately. ... It’s too bad that so many people, mainly on the political right, want to send us sliding right back down again.

Krugman explains:

Some economists expected a rapid bounce-back once we were past the acute phase of the financial crisis — what I think of as the oh-God-we’re-all-gonna-die period — which lasted roughly from September 2008 to March 2009. But that was never in the cards. The bubble economy of the Bush years left many Americans with too much debt; once the bubble burst, consumers were forced to cut back, and it was inevitably going to take them time to repair their finances. And business investment was bound to be depressed, too. Why add to capacity when consumer demand is weak and you aren’t using the factories and office buildings you have?

And while things are coming back, there's potential trouble ahead, including rising oil and food prices, and the risk that the Fed and other central banks will "mistakenly respond to higher headline inflation by raising interest rates."

The clear and present danger to recovery, however, comes from politics — specifically, the demand from House Republicans that the government immediately slash spending on infant nutrition, disease control, clean water and more. ... Over the next few weeks, House Republicans will try to blackmail the Obama administration into accepting their proposed spending cuts, using the threat of a government shutdown. They’ll claim that those cuts would be good for America in both the short term and the long term.

But the truth is exactly the reverse: Republicans have managed to come up with spending cuts that would do double duty, both undermining America’s future and threatening to abort a nascent economic recovery. [emphasis added]

Country first, right? At some point, you'd think the country would figure it out. It's not about the economy. It's about power, just like it always is with these guys.

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PFC Manning reportedly forced to strip naked for 7 hours last night

Is this really necessary? And as Glenn Greenwald notes, they seriously want to put him to death? Even if it turns out he was the WikiLeaks source, isn't the death penalty a tad overkill? Read the rest of this post...

Video: Madison police tackle Wisc. Dem legislator in capitol building

According to local news station WKOW in Madison, Wisconsin Rep. Nick Milroy was tackled while trying to enter the Capitol (h/t email correspondent):

Representative Nick Milroy (D-South Range) had a confrontation with Capitol police as he tried to enter the building Thursday night.

Milroy was trying to get clothes from his office but police would not let him into the building. They tackled him as he tried to get past officers guarding a door. ... Everyone was ordered out of the Capitol Thursday night as part of a Dane County judge's ruling. The building will remain closed until 8 a.m. Monday morning.

TPM's comment is here.


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Protests today in Bahrain, Cairo and throughout Iraq

If the Egyptian government thought that Mubarak's departure would settle the issue, they are discovering how intent the people are on ensuring that promises are kept. In Iraq, protests are being reported due to the lack of progress since the downfall of Saddam Hussein. In Bahrain, sectarian conflict is at the heart of the problem.

Fights between Shias and Sunnis in central Bahrain raised the spectre of sectarian violence ahead of large anti-government demonstrations planned for Friday afternoon.

As protests enter their third week with largely Shia demonstrators bedded down on Pearl Roundabout in the capital, the street battles in Hamad Town on Thursday night marked the first escalation into inter-communal violence amid increasingly bitter rhetoric.

Protesters in Tripoli were reportedly tear gassed today by Gaddafi forces following Friday prayers. Read the rest of this post...

192,000 new jobs in February, unemployment at 8.9%

The numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics:

Nonfarm payroll employment increased by 192,000 in February, and the unemploymentrate was little changed at 8.9 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Job gains occurred in manufacturing, construction, professional and business services, health care, and transportation and warehousing.

Some context from Reuters:

Employers hired more workers in February than in any month since May last year and the unemployment rate fell to a near two-year low, raising hopes the economic recovery has gathered critical momentum.

Nonfarm payrolls increased 192,000, the Labor Department said on Friday, above market expectations for 185,000 jobs. Data for December and January was revised to show 58,000 more jobs created than previously estimated.

The peak of monthly employment last May was when payrolls were being boosted by government hiring for a census. The unemployment rate dipped to 8.9 percent, the lowest since April 2009, from 9.0 percent in January as more people reported finding work.

"We have moved into the expansion phase of the economic cycle and the economy is self-sustaining," said Brian Levitt, an economist at OppenheimerFunds in New York.

Heading in the right direction. Let's hope those GOPers in the House don't screw it up. It was, after all, the GOP president, George W. Bush, and his policies that destroyed the economy at the end of 2008. Read the rest of this post...

Report: Gaddafi launched air strikes for third day against protesters

A no-fly zone by outsiders may be closer to reality with each attack. Reuters:

Libyan rebels calling for air strikes to set up a "no-fly" zone came under attack by a warplane for a third day on Friday as Muammar Gaddafi tried to loosen the opposition's expanding grip on a key coast road.

Eastern-based rebels spearheading a two-week-old revolt told Reuters they were open to talks only on Gaddafi's exile or resignation following attacks on civilians that have brought global condemnation and triggered a probe at the war crimes court.

"If there is any negotiation it will be on one single thing -- how Gaddafi is going to leave the country or step down so we can save lives. There is nothing else to negotiate," said Ahmed Jabreel of the rebel National Libyan Council in east Libya.

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ICC to open investigation against alleged crimes against humanity by Gaddafi

With all of the technology available today, the ICC should have a lot to work with quickly. Al Jazeera:

Mr Ocampo, at a news conference, will name names, people to be targetted in a full scale inquiry into possible crimes against humanity. It is almost impossible to think the Colonel will not be top of the list.

As well as presenting "preliminary information as to the entities and persons who could be prosecuted", the prosecutor will "put them on notice to avoid future crimes".

Human Rights Watch says hundreds have been killed in the crackdown against the revolt which began last month, and tens of thousands of people are desperately trying to get out of the country.

Mr Ocampo only began working on Libya after the United Nations Security Council asked the ICC to establish if there were grounds for a full investigation.

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Murdoch media phone hacking scandal may be more widespread

It's no longer just the News of the World, but possibly also Murdoch's UK centerpiece The Times and The Sunday Times. The Guardian:

Other titles in Rupert Murdoch's media empire, including the Sunday Times, are being investigated for allegedly hacking into mobile phones belonging to well-known people, according to Lord Prescott.

The former deputy prime minister used parliamentary privilege to claim in the House of Lords: "The investigation into phone hacking has been extended now to the Sunday Times."

Scotland Yard announced a fresh inquiry into allegations of widespread phone hacking at the Murdoch-owned News of the World in January. The Met also told Prescott there was evidence his phone may have been targeted by Glenn Mulcaire, a private investigator who was employed by the paper.

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