What's this? A Book!
Or buy here: Light Publications, Powell's, or Bn, Amazon A look at the lousy situation Rhode Island is in, how we got here, and how we might be able to get out. Featuring
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Thu, 26 Oct 2006
[This is an article from the October issue, printed here because we have an election coming.]
In a few weeks, we'll have an election to vote in. Because most of the content has been leached out of the reporting of politics in America, most of us will vote on candidates without exactly knowing what policies they stand for. How many know, for example, that Lincoln Chafee has fully backed CAFTA (free trade with Central America) and permanent trade relations with China, and voted for the credit-card industry-backed bill to restrict personal bankruptcies in 2005? How many know that Governor Carcieri has repeatedly passed up an easy opportunity to lower pension costs for all the cities and towns in the state?
But there is one place on the ballot where we have to learn about the issues, since the issue is the only thing there. Here is our list of the statewide referenda you'll see in the voting booth this November.
14:57 - 26 Oct 2006 [/y6/oc] link
Tue, 24 Oct 2006
North Kingstown Candidate Questionnaires
For Town Council and School Committee candidates are available here.
Happy reading.
17:22 - 24 Oct 2006 [/y6/oc] link
Almost out. Subscribe here.
- Review of Out
of Iraq
by George McGovern and William R. Polk
- Analysis of Kentucky River NLRB damage by Peter Asen (see below)
- The referendum questions. What is that question 3 about? And the others.
- Is it really all peaches and cream and low taxes in New Hampshire? What are we to make of comparisons between RI and our flinty neighbors to the north?
Bilmes-Stiglitz: NBER paper on the true cost of the Iraq war — $2 trillion. See here.
17:22 - 24 Oct 2006 [/y6/oc] link
Sat, 14 Oct 2006
Quakers a threat to National Security
According to internal documents from the Defense Department (see NY Times story), they have been collecting and keeping information on anti-war protests and protestors.
The documents, obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, show, for instance, that military officials labeled as "potential terrorist activity" events like a "Stop the War Now" rally in Akron, Ohio, in March 2005.The Defense Department acknowledged last year that its analysts had maintained records on war protests in an internal database past the 90 days its guidelines allowed, and even after it was determined there was no threat.
11:48 - 14 Oct 2006 [/y6/oc] link
Wed, 11 Oct 2006
A study came out last year from researchers at Johns Hopkins, and published in the British journal Lancet that tried to estimate the deaths of Iraqis attributable to the war there between March 2003 and September 2004. The number they came up with (100,000) was controversial, but there weren't any rigorous criticisms that seemed to hold water. The methodology seemed sound to me, as well as to the editors of Lancet, among others.
Anyway, the same authors, using the same methodology (statistical
sampling based on random surveys) have updated their data to September
2006, and corrected some misattributed surveys from the earlier
study. Their new number: 655,000 people have died because of the war,
about 601,000 from violence (mostly gunfire), and the others from
disease. They further note that the number dying have increased every
year, and car bombings have gone up substantially.
You can find the report here.
The prospects don't look so happy, do they? Just to give some perspective, 655,000 people is somewhere between 2% and 5% of the population.
14:38 - 11 Oct 2006 [/y6/oc] link
Fri, 06 Oct 2006
Through the kind efforts of a local businessman, the NK local candidate questionnaire team gets a publicity boost. See here.
Go to whatcheer.net/nksc to find the questionnaire.
09:06 - 06 Oct 2006 [/y6/oc] link
Wed, 04 Oct 2006
Did you know you were a supervisor?
The quarter-century assault on labor unions continues today with a decision by the National Labor Relations Board that will have the effect of making hundreds of thousands of workers (minimum) legally ineligible to be represented by a union because they have some management responsibilities among their duties.
This is one more of those acts that seems very limited and technical, but will have vast implications for union organizing around the country: is the head of a high school english department an employee or a manager? How about a shift captain in a fire department? A floor manager in a grocery store? The management of the school, fire department and store don't think of these people as managers, even if they have some responsibility for other employees. But the NLRB now calls them part of management. Too bad for them.
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