inequality

Who You Callin’ Moderate?

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 09:08:06 -0500

by Laura Flanders

The Senate held a historic vote on health care reform last night at 1 AM. Splitting exactly along party lines-that is, if you call Joe Lieberman a Democrat-the health care bill made it through a cloture vote and is one step away from final passage and the conference committee.

To get so-called moderate Democrat Ben Nelson on board, however, Harry Reid had to agree to a decidedly un-moderate compromise on abortion rights. It's not Stupak language-but it's close.

On Health Care, Women Compromise

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 08:57:04 -0500

by Derrick Z. Jackson

Male privilige in health care reform deepens with each line drawn in the sand. Senate Democrats got their 60th vote to close debate and move reform toward a Christmas Eve vote by succumbing to Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson's demands to include abortion restrictions. The reform bill passed by the House contains even more harsh restrictions.

Division Between Developed and Developing Countries

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 08:28:04 -0500

by John Buell

Why did Copenhagen yield meager results? Divisions between the so-called developed and developing worlds have been cited as one of the major causes, with the developed nations — especially the U.S. — being seen as especially reluctant to reduce their carbon footprint.

Healthcare Crisis Tears at Fabric of Holiday Traditions

Sat, 19 Dec 2009 10:48:24 -0500

by Donna Smith

Our elected officials in Washington, DC, are rushing to finish their work and get home for the holidays. Many of the people who elected them aren't so richly blessed. Millions and millions of Americans do not get the Norman Rockwell holiday scene played out in their lives because millions and millions of people have been left financially and physically broken and battered by the healthcare crisis.

Copenhagen Negotiators Bicker and Filibuster While the Biosphere Burns

Sat, 19 Dec 2009 09:12:50 -0500

by George Monbiot

First they put the planet in square brackets, now they have deleted it from the text. At the end it was no longer about saving the biosphere: it was just a matter of saving face. As the talks melted down, everything that might have made a new treaty worthwhile was scratched out. Any deal would do, as long as the negotiators could pretend they have achieved something. A clearer and less destructive treaty than the text that emerged would be a sheaf of blank paper, which every negotiating party solemnly sits down to sign.

Copenhagen: The Courage to Say No

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 08:23:49 -0500

by Naomi Klein

Copenhagen

On the ninth day of the Copenhagen climate summit, Africa was sacrificed. The position of the G-77 negotiating bloc, including African states, had been clear: a 2 degree Celsius increase in average global temperatures translates into a 3-3.5 degree increase in Africa.

Copenhagen and Us

Wed, 16 Dec 2009 12:18:04 -0500

by Rinku Sen

Negotiations have resumed in Copenhagen after a walkout by the African delegation on Monday.

Shifting Climate, Moving People: Immigration and Climate Justice

Tue, 15 Dec 2009 14:09:02 -0500

by Michelle Chen

The impasse in Copenhagen underscores just how interconnected, and perhaps collectively doomed, we all are in the face of global climate change.

And like the rapid currents of trade coursing around the globe, environmental destruction is reshaping the flow of labor and people as they move from one endangered livelihood to another. So it turns out there’s an immigration question embedded in the climate issue. As populations shift, so does economic and political power.

America's Race to the Bottom

Sat, 12 Dec 2009 09:20:36 -0500

by David Michael Green

I sure hope that there is a full and speedy recovery to the massive recession we are all now suffering under.

But, I'll be honest. I doubt that there will be. Most of the upticks following our latest national downturns have been dismal enough that economists have had to invent a new term for them. The phrase is "jobless recovery", and the implications are as ugly as they sound.

What it means is that GDP rises, but life remains crappy for real people with real jobs. If they're lucky enough to have one, that is.

Why It Is Essential to Stand up to Bigots

Thu, 10 Dec 2009 09:20:01 -0500

by Haroon Siddiqui

Last winter, the Israelis attacked minarets in Gaza. Last month, the Swiss voted to ban non-existent minarets.

The reasons proffered in both cases were patently false.

Bombed Gaza mosques probed by Justice Richard Goldstone were found not to have been hiding Hamas arms or militants.

Minarets are definitely not proliferating in Switzerland, there being only four in a nation with 350,000 Muslims – most of them refugees, ironically, from European ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and Kosovo.