Monthly Archives: August 2015

Retired General: Drones Create Terrorists; Iraq War Helped Create ISIS

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“Retired Army Gen. Mike Flynn, a top intelligence official in the post-9/11 wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, says in a forthcoming interview on Al Jazeera English that the drone war is creating more terrorists than it is killing. He also asserts that the U.S. invasion of Iraq helped create the Islamic State and that U.S. soldiers involved in torturing detainees need to be held legally accountable for their actions. Prior to serving as director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Flynn was director of Intelligence for the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/07/16/retired-general-drones-create-terrorists-kill-iraq-war-helped-create-isis/

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Hiroshima: Lincoln’s Legacy to Civilians

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“Truman had two choices: drop the two bombs or else abandon unconditional surrender as civilian policy governing the military. He was unwilling to drop unconditional surrender, just as Lincoln had been unwilling to drop it in the summer of 1864. So, he decided to escalate the war on civilians.  The main criterion of conditional surrender for Japan would have been the maintenance of the Emperor’s formal control, at least officially, over Japan. That was exactly what Truman unofficially gave to Japan. American military forces did not bomb his residence during the firebombings of Tokyo. After the war, he was not removed from command.”

http://www.garynorth.com/public/14128.cfm

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Sheldon Richman: Truman, A-Bombs and the Killing of Innocents

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“Nothing can justify what Truman did – neither revenge for the Japanese attack on the U.S. naval fleet at Pearl Harbor nor avoidance of a U.S. invasion of Japan. (Truman first justified the bombings in terms of vengeance.) Top American military leaders – Eisenhower, MacArthur, and Leahy among others – opposed the bombings. The estimate of American casualties in an invasion have been grossly exaggerated. Truman’s Secretary of State James Byrnes said the death rate would be in the thousands. But even if we accept the high guesses, why was the slaughter of Japanese noncombatants preferable to the deaths of military personnel?”

http://fff.org/explore-freedom/article/tgif-truman-killing-innocents/

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What U.S. citizens weren’t told about the atomic bombing of Japan

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“Newborn death rates skyrocketed in the nine months after the bombing: 43% of pregnancies in which the fetus was exposed within a quarter-mile of the hypocenter ended in spontaneous abortion, stillbirth or infant death. Young mothers giving birth in the ruins did not know it yet, but even those infants who survived would face severe physical and mental disabilities. For years, tens of thousands of hibakusha (‘atomic bomb-affected people’) suffered agonizing radiation-related illnesses. Many died. Meanwhile, Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s occupation press code censored Japanese news accounts, personal testimonies, photographs and scientific research on the survivors’ conditions.”

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-0809-southard-atomic-bomb-survivors-20150806-story.html

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Water rationing, tax and rate hikes add to woes of Puerto Ricans

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“Puerto Ricans are learning to live without water on an island that already was suffering an economic crisis.  Rationing rules that had meant water coming through the pipes only one day out of three will increase the cutoff to one day out of four starting next week, government officials say.  The situation has grown so dire that Puerto Rico’s water and sewer company announced that it would spend about $200,000 to use ‘cloud seeding’ in hopes of creating rain clouds over three of the island’s main reservoirs.  The drought comes as Puerto Rico struggles in a nearly decade-long economic slump that has hit the government’s coffers and led authorities to raise the sales tax, even on bottled water.”

http://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2015/08/06/puerto-ricans-face-punishing-drought-amid-economic-slump

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Puerto Rico’s crisis illustrates the risks of minimum wage hikes

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“Only 40 percent of the adult population on the island is employed or looking for a job — versus a U.S. labor force participation rate of 63 percent.  Of course, many Puerto Ricans work for less than the minimum — in the black-market economy, which is untaxed. In other words, the minimum wage also helps explain Puerto Rico’s lack of revenue with which to service its debt.  Also killing the demand for, and supply of, labor are the island’s onerous overtime, paid-vacation and job-security regulations.  And even at the minimum wage, full-time work in Puerto Rico pays less than the combined package of welfare, Medicaid and food stamp benefits for which a family of three might qualify.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/puerto-ricos-lesson-for-the-mainland/2015/07/08/24e63970-25ad-11e5-b77f-eb13a215f593_story.html

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Should Puerto Rico Shut Down Schools to Pay Its Debts?

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“The hedge fund report, authored by a trio of former International Monetary Fund economists, noted that Puerto Rico’s education spending had risen 39 percent in a decade during which school enrollment actually fell by a quarter. Surely, there must have been some unnecessary fat in the system to cut.  It’s easy to understand why this might seem outrageous. Firing teachers in the middle of what’s essentially a nine-year depression seems like a good way to further exacerbate Puerto Rican unemployment, possibly while sacrificing some childrens’ educations.”

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2015/08/04/puerto_rico_s_debt_crisis_hedge_funds_say_the_island_should_shut_down_schools.html

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NYC Rips Hedge Funds Over Puerto Rico, While Giving Them Billions

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“Hedge funds that hold billions of dollars of Puerto Rico’s high-yield debt ‘are feeding off the misery of the island,’ Mark-Viverito, speaker of the City Council, told a cheering crowd last week at a City Hall rally. She accused the funds of trying to gut wages, education and health care for the island’s 3.5 million residents.  What she and other critics who spoke that day didn’t say was that New York taxpayers and retirees entrust some of those hedge funds with more than $2.2 billion of the city’s $166 billion in pension assets.  The Puerto Rican government said officials need to cut spending and take other steps to revive the economy, such as cutting the island’s minimum wage below the federal $7.25 level.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-08-06/nyc-rips-hedge-funds-over-puerto-rico-while-giving-them-billions

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Amid economic crisis, Puerto Rico cuts spending by $150 million

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“Puerto Rico’s government says that in recent years it has reduced certain expenditures by nearly $150 million amid a worsening economic crisis.  Budget director Luis Cruz says the cost of contracting for professional services has dropped by more than 55 percent. He says the government of the U.S. territory also has cut contracts related to services purchased by $93 million.  Cruz said late Monday that the government also has moved public offices from private buildings to state-owned locations for nearly $20 million in savings. Puerto Rico is entering its ninth year of recession and is struggling with $72 billion in public debt that Gov. Alejandro García Padilla has said is unpayable.”

http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/money/2015/07/22/amid-economic-crisis-puerto-rico-cuts-spending-by-150-million/

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The DOJ ‘Intended To Discourage’ A Historic Medical Marijuana Bill

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“An internal Department of Justice memo leaked this week reveals that in the days leading up to last year’s historic passage of a federal medical marijuana protections measure, the DOJ passed around ‘informal talking points’ to members of Congress that were ‘intended to discourage passage’ of the statute due to concerns about overreach.  The leaked memo reveals that the DOJ was concerned that the proposed amendment could effectively ‘limit or possibly eliminate the Department’s ability to enforce federal law in recreational marijuana cases as well.’  Within a year of the amendment passing, though, the DOJ would decide that it actually wasn’t that concerned after all.”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/doj-medical-marijuana_55c382ade4b0d9b743db14fc

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