Product safety is supposed to be about protecting consumers

If the CPSC chairman can't get on board, then it's time to find a replacement. Considering the steady stream of tainted products in the market, it would be nice to see someone take their role seriously.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) yesterday called on the head of the Consumer Product Safety Commission to resign, and a Senate committee passed legislation to increase the embattled agency's funding and expand its authority.

Pelosi criticized acting chairman Nancy A. Nord for her opposition to parts of the Senate bill that would widen the CPSC's regulatory role in response to several high-profile recalls of toys containing dangerous amounts of lead and powerful magnets.

The bill, sponsored by Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), would more than double the agency's funding over seven years, to $142 million. It would ban lead in products for children and raise the cap on civil penalties to $100 million, from $1.8 million. It would also give the agency new responsibilities, including collecting and acting on corporate whistle-blower complaints about product safety.

In a perfect world, industry would care about what they sell and we wouldn't have to worry about such penalties but just as the tooth fairy and Easter Bunny don't exist, industry self regulation doesn't exist either so it's important that we step up regulation. Read the rest of this post...

Inflation, here we come

The Fed cuts interest rates, leading many to ask how long until we hit $100 per barrel for oil. For an economy that is reportedly doing well, why the cut? Read the rest of this post...

A Savage Halloween

My slightly twisted but always amusing friend Dan Savage shares his plans for Halloween gone awry:

I sharpened up six big wooden stakes to plant along the walk up to the house. I wanted to go buy a six cheap kids’ Halloween costumes, stuff ‘em, and impale ‘em on the stakes. I wanted it to like we’d been murdering every, oh, 50th trick-or-treater that came to our house....

You really need to click through and read the entire post. Read the rest of this post...

Donna Edwards for Congress. A better Democrat. A real Democrat.

Last year, Donna Edwards challenged Congressman Al Wynn for the Democratic nomination in Maryland's Fourth Congressional District. On primary day in September of 2006, Donna stunned the political world by nearly beating Wynn. It literally took days to get the final vote count before Wynn was declared the winner. This time around, Donna is going to win. And, we can make that happen.

Over the next couple days, a number of the progressive blogs including Firedoglake, Atrios, Openleft, Color of Change, MyDD, Down With Tyranny, Swing State Project and Dailykos,, are going to be holding an online fundraiser for the real Democrat running in Maryland's 4th C.D. Coincidentally (or not), Speaker Nancy Pelosi is hosting a fundraiser for Wynn on Saturday, November 3rd. But the reality is that Donna is the kind of Democrat who will empower Nancy Pelosi to be a better Speaker.

We set up an Actblue page to raise money for Donna. Maryland has moved up its primary to February 12, 2008. That means we can send an early message in an important election year about electing real Democrats.

You can learn more about Donna on her campaign website. I've known her for more than ten years. We first met when she was the Executive Director of the National Network to End Domestic Violence. She's a committed progressive and truly a force of nature. Donna Edwards is the kind of person who will change Congress for the better.

In one succinct paragraph, Matt Stoller explains just who Al Wynn is and why he needs to go:

MD-04 is a 77% performing Democratic district that runs in Montgomery and Prince George's County. It is as safe as safe can be for a Democrat. Wynn voted for the war in Iraq, the repeal of the estate tax, was a cosponsor of the bill gutting net neutrality, the Bankruptcy Bill, and the 2005 Energy Bill. He's really the epitome of the corrupt Democrat who gives cover to the right-wing to enact legislation. He even voted for no-bid contracts for Federal prisons.

Yes, that's right. He voted for the war. He voted for the bankruptcy bill. He is a reliable vote for the telecom industry. You could pretty much call him Rep. Al Wynn (D-Verizon) or (D-Comcast).

We really need better Democrats. Help elect Donna Edwards. Contribute today. Read the rest of this post...

Minitrue is losing its chief

And let me just say, way to go AP, picking the most Halloween-ific picture of Hughes they could find (I can see the caption now: "I once ate a child that was THIS big.")

(Reader Nosybear gets credit for the title.) Read the rest of this post...

Redacted is just part of the picture

For those who don’t know, Brian De Palma’s new film “Redacted” is scheduled for release in a few weeks.

From what I have read it will depict the true story of a group of US troops who gang rape an Iraqi teenage girl then murder her and her family in cold blood.

It caught the attention of Bill O’Reilly who is accusing De Palma personally of recruiting more angry Muslim men who want to kill Americans by creating a movie that tells the story. He said if any movie chain in America agrees to show De Palma's movie that every veteran of a foreign war should protest the theaters. Standby for a tidal wave of right-wing attacks dismissing it as liberal propaganda due to their inability to detach themselves from the world of denial they live in.

I agree that the film is not helpful and I probably will never have the stomach to watch it. Nothing against De Palma or the film, but I'm upset enough over the whole incident and watching a reenactment of this horrendous crime would be hard for me.

However, this film will not incite nearly as many angry Muslim men to attack us as our continued presence in Iraq.

Bush’s vendetta against Saddam was inflicted upon an entire nation of Iraqi people who did nothing to deserve a conquering of their land or an attempt to change their whole way of life by military force. That is what recruits terrorists and incites angry Muslim men to attack us. Or it could just be a violent reaction from Iraqis who are resistant to being occupied by a foreign army.

This very same reaction was obviously never taken into consideration by the neoconservative intellectuals who planned this war with a total lack of regard for Islamic culture and human life in general.

I find it absolutely galling that supporters of the war now have the audacity to place the blame of the bloody aftermath on those who staunchly oppose it.

Going back to what O'Reilly said about veterans of foreign wars protesting theaters over a movie he and fellow war supporters disagree with. As a veteran myself, I would much rather protest the misuse of our military for a failed neocon experiment in Iraq that completely backfired in our faces creating more enemies than we can count.

I’m sorry, but it’s hard for me to talk about this one act of madness without referencing the entire illegal war.

As a former soldier who was there it pains me to even write about it.

In closing I would like to say that this post is not an attack on our military. Those who oppose my views may try and twist it as such. I wholeheartedly support our men and women in uniform. If there is ever a legitimate threat to this nation they are the people who will have the courage to defend us.

So I want to be totally clear that this is an attack on those individuals who carried out this atrocity, the Bush Administration for creating the environment for it to take place, and war supporters who wish to use diversionary tactics (like criticizing a movie) to hide the real truth.

John Bruhns
Iraq Veteran Read the rest of this post...

Happy Halloween

(I made this picture - what? - three years ago, and the jokes is sadly still relevant today. Sigh.) Read the rest of this post...

Rice/State Dept have now jeopardized entire Blackwater investigation

Winning the hearts and mind of Iraqis one dead civilian at a time.

From the Washington Post:

Potential prosecution of Blackwater guards allegedly involved in the shooting deaths of 17 Iraqi civilians last month may have been compromised because the guards received immunity for statements they made to State Department officials investigating the incident, federal law enforcement officials said yesterday.

FBI agents called in to take over the State Department's investigation two weeks after the Sept. 16 shootings cannot use any information gleaned during questioning of the guards by the department's Bureau of Diplomatic Security, which is charged with supervising security contractors.

Read the rest of this post...

Wednesday Morning Open Thread

It's Halloween. Next Halloween, we'll be five days away from November 4, 2008 -- election day. Just over a year til we pick the successor to the Bush/Cheney debacle. Those two know they are running out of time to start a war with Iran. They'll be in overdrive. Congress and the media can't play along this time.

Have at it. Read the rest of this post...

Blair and Iraq: "pathetic" barely scratches the surface

The floodgates appear to be opening on Blair stories so much more to come for Bush's favorite little lapdog.

Tony Blair turned down a last-minute offer from President George Bush for Britain to stay out of the Iraq war because he thought it would look "pathetic", according to a new book on Mr Blair's tenure.

Mr Bush was warned by the US embassy in London before the crucial Commons vote on the war that the Blair government could be brought down. He was so worried that he picked up the telephone and personally offered the then Prime Minister a surprise opt-out.

What a very macho and very manly kind of guy. Sticking to his guns, no matter how stupid or ill-planned the war may have been. He's not only "pathetic" but stupid enough to go along with a leader who is widely considered to be among the dumbest of the bunch. Brilliant. Read the rest of this post...

"100 times the US standard on lead in paint " in Halloween costume

Happy Halloween. The testing was requested by Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown who is of course, a Democrat.

"Lead paint is a problem when it's ingested by a child, so to have lead on an item that is designed to go into the mouth -- that's what's particularly horrifying about these teeth," said Dr Jeffrey Weidenhamer of Ashland University in Ohio, the team leader.

"We analysed the paint on the surface of the teeth. The orange teeth were the worst in terms of having six to seven percent lead by weight in the paint," Weidenhamer said.

"That's about 100 times the US standard on lead in paint which is .06 percent," he told AFP.

Lead can cause damage to the brain and nervous system of children, behavior and learning problems, slowed growth, hearing problems and headaches.

Read the rest of this post...