@Gerald, disappointing. A year ago I was expecting to hear about Obama backing projects such as huge wind farms and solar power plants, cross country high speed rail, retro-fitting worn bridges, Green Tech research facilities, etc... while raising tariffs on imports so the jobs aren't outsourced.

I'm about as tired as any other progressive, to see that Obama is enabling the military industrial project, over the investment in the private sector. DLC BS.

Here is Father John Dear's recent article. Father Dear is a peace activist.

Obama and the works of death
by John Dear SJ on Feb. 09, 2010

New Mexico is abuzz with the news. Soon from our austere landscape will rise a spanking new, state-of-the-art, plutonium bomb factory. Setting pen to paper and thereby blessing the project was President Obama, who had announced a year ago in Prague the goal of a nuclear-free world, but with his recent budget, will actually increase nuclear weapons production more than any other president since Ronald Reagan.Here's a piece of hypocrisy that surpasses even that of George W. Bush. Cheer on disarmament while drawing up plans for new facilities. Raise up a hopeful vision and, behind the scenes, ensure its dying. An Orwellian nightmare.

Need it be added, the weapons manufacturers are delighted.

"Obama's Nuke Vision Sees Cash Flow to Labs," was the headline last week in the Santa Fe New Mexican. The article reported that Obama will increase funding for nuclear weapons research and security programs $7 billion more next year, an increase of $624 million from the 2010 fiscal year.
Obama approved three new nuclear weapons facilities, according to the National Catholic Reporter, the second in Oak Ridge, Tenn., and the third in Kansas City, Mo. As Obama feeds the nuclear weapons industry with a $7 billion increase, he'll go through the motions of hammering out a disarmament deal with Russia —and of reviewing the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. In that convoluted logic, so common to the holders of nuclear weapons, he thinks he can promote peace while adding billions for nuclear advances.

"This budget is implementing the president's nuclear vision," Thomas D'Agostino, administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration, told the Santa Fe New Mexican.

The total Department of Energy request for Los Alamos National Nuclear Laboratory totals $2.21 billion, up from $1.82 billion in 2010.
In the actions-speak-louder-than-words department, all this is telling. Said Greg Mello, director of the nuclear watch-dog Los Alamos Study Group "The nation hasn't seen any increase in weapons activities like this since the early years of Ronald Reagan ... It's a complete surrender to Senate Republicans."
Some of this largess, pending final review, will go toward building the new plutonium plant -- a chemical and metallurgy research facility known as the "CMRR," to replace a 58-year-old lab. The CMRR will enable Los Alamos to make far more new plutonium pits (a nuclear weapon's triggering device). In previous years they could make 20 a year; they'll soon be able to make 125 a year.

Obama -- the nuclear free world visionary -- has given the green light to the nuclear madmen of Los Alamos to lay their largest nest of doomsday bombs in years.

Under Obama, the Pentagon budget for mass murder and the impasse we call deterrence would grow by more than three percent, not counting separate funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan . It adds up to $741 billion. The budget cuts no weapons programs, only social programs.

All this insanity is hard to bear. Obama's recent unmanned drone blitz killed 123 civilians and three al-Qaeda leaders in January; Guantanamo, the off-shore prison and torture center, is still in business; our troops still occupy Iraq and invade Afghanistan. All this insanity while Haiti lies in ruins at our doorstep, like Luke's starving Lazarus lying at the rich man's door. American culture is rotting from the inside out.

‘March to Overrule the Court’ Set for Feb. 16 in Madison, WI

The U.S. Supreme Court has spoken. Now it's our turn.

A coalition of democracy reform groups is organizing a public protest of the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision on election financing for Tuesday, February 16, starting at noon with a rally at the State Capitol followed by a march to the nearby federal courthouse.

Citizens United Against Citizens United Groups involved in organizing the March to Overrule the Court include the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, Center for Media and Democracy, Liberty Tree Foundation, Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice, and the Wisconsin Public Interest Research Group, in coordination with MovetoAmend.org.

In its January 21 ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the sharply divided court overturned two key Supreme Court precedents and invalidated longstanding laws governing how elections are financed, sweeping away virtually all restrictions on campaign spending by corporations. The court majority reached this decision on the basis of the supposed constitutional rights of corporations, as persons, to speak and influence elections.

The demonstration's aim is to build momentum for the adoption of constitutional amendments overruling the court and legislative remedies to the effects of the ruling.

@Richard, OK, don't mind me, sometimes I think my comments are being misconstrued.

@Nels: I was expanding my comment and largely dittoing your comment . . .

RE: Anthem rate increase in CA - going up in maine too. The following is a message I sent to Collins & Snowe our "moderate" republicans -

Here in our NO OPTION health insurance state of Maine we have just been informed that our Anthem rates will go up again this coming March. My wife & I, by the grace of God, have not needed to avail ourselves of our health insurance coverage over the last 4 or 5 years. We have a $ 4,000.00 deductible EACH. Yet our rates are still climbing. Our President Obama still wants to share the leadership and the glory with the republicans , but we as registered Independents would cheer if he closed the door on all of you. We will not be voting for any republicans any time soon. You stick to your cohesive nay sayer caucus on all issues. This we will not forget – you are the party of No. You have lost credibility on all other issues no matter how close to reasonable you might be. There is NO SENSE that you care about your constituents but rather only about your corporate sponsors. Good luck.

@Richard, I agree... I just wanted to expand upon your comment regardless of what prompted it. Seems to me, that ignorance is a vice with the majority of the Tea Baggers (and the minority is leading them off the cliff for their own selfish means). Its why I pointed out that their actions are destructive, rather its self inflicting or upon others, their actions do have a negative effect. As a caller later mentioned how the movement rudely and selfishly these bastards went around shouting down Senators and Congress members at town hall meetings during the summer recess to prevent any reasonable conversations to take place.

Any who, I wasn't trying to argue against anything you said, I was just trying to take the ball and run with it.

@Charles: On Facebook, you can label Turner’s stuff as offensive material.

@rewinn

Turner has been grandstanding about 30 questions he presented to Timothy Geithner regarding Delphi salaried retirees getting their benefits cut due to Delphi filing bankruptcy and dumping their retirement plan onto the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation. He is propogating that Geithner was directly involved in cutting the retirees benefits. Turner's sheep repond with the likes of "keep up the good work" and "hold them accountable". The best (worst) was "Who does the government think it is to tell people what they can make?"

My responses were to explain how the Delphi workers are lucky that the PBGC exist since the bankruptcy judge absolved Delphi of their pension responsibilities. Noted that PBGC is limited by law (ERISA) to the maximum annual payout, $54K. Also questioned Turner's authenticity in presenting his questions to Geithner or if he was just piling onto the scapegoat.

Where do wealth, which here is exampled here as food, and jobs come from?
I prefer a mutual biological/social relationship rather than a parasitic biological/social relationsip. Most capitalists and Corporatists, are parasitic while our current government is trying to be mutual. The parasites create wealth bubbles because they can only flourish on a healthy host/middle class. But they feed on that health until the death of both. They party while the host diminishes its resources and dies. If there is no health, the parasites have nothing to eat, no wealth. They flourish for a while, all looks healthy and then all die. Who was it that supplied the food/wealth potential, to begin with? It was the host. The potential always existed within the host, not the parasite. No company/parasite can create food/wealth or a single job, without the wealth of the people. They create the health of the economy and the demand for product and services. The parasite will not sacrifice its own resources for the host. That is why it is called a parasite. A good government will offer its health and resources because they pursue a mutual relationship. Like parasites, they cannot exist without siphoning from the host, but they keep the host healthy, because they see the value in a mutual relationship.

@Shyla: Read the actually written words of Thomas Paine . . . Bob Brasso usually says the diametric opposite of Paine’s hallowed words when he is even in the ball park.

I feel for the single working mom, 3 jobs. Works the late shift at Wal-Mart, nets $27 for her 4 hours, spends almost all of it on the way home for a large box of cereal, gallon of milk, box of Pampers and box of tampons.