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General Info + Info re Next Meeting - WEDNESday, February 8th
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Our next meeting is WEDNESday Evening February 8th.

We will meet at the Salt Lake Public Library (210 East 400 South) in Conference Room A on the lower level accessible by the SPECIAL elevator just inside the EAST entrance.

Please join us for socializing from 6:15 pm > 7:00 pm or, if you prefer, come only from 7:00 pm > 8:55 pm for our formal discussion. We provide coffee/decaf and chocolate-chunk cookies and peanut-butter cookies. Or you could bring your own snack from home or the Salt Lake Roasting Co. branch on the first floor of the library.

[Everyone is welcome to join John Karls afterwards half a block south at Cannella's for drinks to socialize and/or continue the discussion -- everyone is welcome but Dutch treat.]

Please skip to the fifth section below for information about the topic for February 8th.

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WE ARE VERY SORRY THAT THERE IS TEMPORARILY INOPERATIVE CLICKING ON “VIEW THE HOMEPAGE” ON THE SECOND LINE AT THE TOP OF THIS BULLETIN BOARD TO FIND OUT –
(1) WHAT WE ARE,
(2) HOW TO SIGN UP FOR OUR WEEKLY E-MAIL, AND
(3) HOW TO POST/REPLY/EDIT/DELETE YOUR COMMENTS ON THIS BULLETIN BOARD.

WE WILL REPAIR IT AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. IN THE MEANTIME, PLEASE BE ADVISED THAT DUE TO SABOTAGE AND PORN ATTACKS, ONLY ATTENDEES OF ONE OR MORE MEETINGS ARE PERMITTED TO POST ON THE BULLETIN BOARD. IF YOU HAVE ATTENDED ONE OF OUR MEETINGS AND WOULD LIKE TO REGISTER TO POST SOMETHING, PLEASE SEND AN E-MAIL TO ReadingLiberally-SaltLake@johnkarls.com WITH THE SUBJECT "PLEASE REGISTER FOR THE BULLETIN BOARD" WITH A SUGGESTED USER NAME AND PASSWORD AND YOU WILL BE REGISTERED.

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Last post by jimandellen
Sat Nov 15, 2008 12:40 am
CALL TO ACTION -- "SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION" E-MAIL CAMPAIGN = TRillions Being Printed To Bail Out Foreign Banks and Governments -- (ONLY 5 MINUTES NEEDED TO PARTICIPATE)
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Although Sec. 14 of the Federal Reserve Act permits loans to foreign banks and governments, Sec. 2A clearly permits such loans only insofar as they promote U.S. employment.

The Fed decisions to print TRillions (probably more than $10 TRillion) to bail out foreign banks/governments to promote U.S. employment is viewing the foreign banks/governments as proverbial “butterflies” whose beating wings cause a “hurricane” on the other side of the globe.

This e-mail campaign respectfully requests President Obama to prosecute the Federal Reserve Governors for their malfeasance and to insure that printing Dollars for bail outs is confined to the few U.S. banks that might face bankruptcy from defaults by European banks/governments so that our limited resources can be focused on critical domestic needs.

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Last post by Pat
Tue Jan 31, 2012 11:27 pm
Possible Topics – March 14th Meeting
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Click here to view possible topics for the March 14th meeting (participants at the February 8th meeting will vote on the topic for March 14th). If you would like to suggest a topic, it is requested as a courtesy that your suggestion be posted here at least 24 hours in advance so that others will have time to give it proper consideration.

EXPIRATION. We have always had a rule that a Possible Topic remains active so long as it receives at least one vote every six meetings. However, if a possible-topic proposal contains a wealth of information that is worth preserving but has not received a vote for six consecutive meetings, it is listed as “Expired” – “Bagram vs. Guantanamo & Abu Graib” is such a proposal.

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Last post by UtahOwl
Sun Feb 05, 2012 11:22 pm
Possible Topic Beginning Fall 2011 - Inner-City Holocaust and America's Apartheid "Justice" System (In Honor of Jonathan Kozol and In Memory of John Howard Griffin)
“Inner-City Holocaust and America’s Apartheid ‘Justice’ System” is a book that “Yours Truly” has (except for the final chapter) already written and placed in safe hands. However, the last chapter cannot be written before Fall 2011 because it will record the actions taken, if any, by the recipients of the 5 letters whose texts are posted in this section (the casual reader would best start with the letters to Messrs. Axelrod/Plouffe and to Sen. Chris Coons) =

(1) to President Obama and 20 other US & California governmental officials imploring them AS THEY REFUSED TO DO LAST YEAR to cause Amicus Curiae briefs to be filed on behalf of 10 million inner-city children and thereby REPRESENT THEIR OWN CONSTITUENTS.

(2) to Gwen Ifill and 42 other news-media superstars imploring them AS THEY REFUSED TO DO LAST YEAR to provide the same kind of spotlight on the lawsuits involving the 10 million inner-city children that they routinely provide for, say, David Boies and his Proposition 8 lawsuits.

(3) to 51 inner-city clergy from Los Angeles, San Francisco and Oakland CA providing the latest report on what the report described as “The Segregated Toilet and The Fatal Flush” – the “Segregated Toilet” being the abhorrent practice, even authorized by statute in California, that judges can flush away the rights of minorities in opinions THAT CANNOT BE PUBLISHED OR CITED because the judges know that the opinions are diametrically opposed to the well-settled law enjoyed by first-class American citizens.

(4) to Messrs. David Axelrod and David Plouffe, the Chicago- and Washington-based co-heads of President Obama’s Reelection Campaign providing them a “heads up” on what is “going down” because the aim of “Inner-City Holocaust” is to make the inaction of the 21 governmental officials an issue in any 2012 re-election campaigns in which they are involved – by making “Inner-City Holocaust” available without charge and electronically for ethics classes in law schools and divinity schools, and in undergraduate courses in political science, ethics/philosophy, sociology, etc.

(5) to U.S. Senator Christopher Coons from Delaware, newly elected last November, to provide him a “heads up” on what is “going down” because Senator Coons served with “Yours Truly” in the 1990’s on the national “I Have A Dream”® Board as Secretary and Treasurer, respectively, and it was IHAD- and IHAD-style programs that the $84 billion involved in the lawsuits was designed to provide for the 10-million inner-city children.

“Inner-City Holocaust” has been written In Memory Of John Howard Griffin whose “Black Like Me” half a century ago tried to convince America of its racism.

It is also written in honor of Jonathan Kozol whose award-winning books over the last half century have tried to convince America that it has created a permanent “untouchable” under-caste as a result of its racism – (1) The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America (2005); (2) Ordinary Resurrections: Children in the Years of Hope (2001); (3) Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation (1995); (4) Savage Inequalities: Children in America’s Schools (1991); (5) Rachel and Her Children (1988); (6) Illiterate America (1985); (7) The Night is Dark and I Am Far From Home: Political Indictment of US Public Schools (1975); (8) Death at an Early Age (1967)

One might wonder why I am placing myself on the same stage as these two Saints. I’m not. They are on pedestals in my place of worship. Like one of Ghandi’s followers, it is my turn to have my head bashed in since the expected reactions to the prospect of “Inner-City Holocaust” are to try to defame me and to try to explain why the racism of the judges involved, the 21 governmental officials and the 43 news-media super-stars is all my fault rather than theirs.

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Last post by johnkarls
Tue Jun 14, 2011 12:24 pm
Addendum - Inner-City Holocaust and America's Apartheid "Justice" System
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The previous section of this bulletin board includes copies of 4 letters over 2 years to President Obama and 20 other US & California governmental officials imploring each to cause Amicus Curiae briefs to be filed on behalf of 10 million inner-city children. Each of the 4 letters, using President Obama as an example, began with:

Dear Mr. President:

Re: $84 Billion Legally Pledged For Education of Californian Inner-City Children Rapidly Slipping Away Due To Judicial Improprieties – AMICUS BRIEFS UNDER US SUPREME COURT RULE 37(2) NEEDED URGENTLY!!!

The previous section also includes copies of 4 letters over 2 years to 43 news-media superstars. Each of the 4 letters, using Gwen Ifill as an example, began with:

Dear Ms. Ifill:

Re: $84 Billion Legally Pledged For Education of Californian Inner-City Children Rapidly Slipping Away Due To Judicial Improprieties – EQUAL PROTECTION BY THE MEDIA URGENTLY NEEDED!!!

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“Equal Protection of the Media” recognizes that the only practical way to get the US Supreme Court to agree to hear an appeal is what David Boies always does vis-à-vis his litigation, such as his current gay-rights litigation = get the media to report on his cases. Indeed, the first letter to the 43 news-media superstars cited CNN broadcasts re the gay-rights litigation as trumpeting “the Supreme Court justices do not live in a vacuum -- they are influenced by media reporting in deciding whether an issue is so important that the Court should accept an appeal.”

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The letters informed the 21 governmental officials and 43 news-media superstars of the “Question Presented For Review” by the U.S. Supreme Court =

“Can state court judges order their decisions which they know are diametrically-opposed to well-settled law, not to be published or cited (a strategy labeled ‘the segregated toilet’ in correspondence with 51 inner-city clergy who represent the 10 million inner-city children who have been disclosed from the outset as the ‘real parties at interest’ in this law suit) in order to flush away the rights of the 10 million inner-city children without disturbing the rights of first-class American citizens -- without violating the ‘Equal Protection of the Law’ requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution?”

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None of the 21 governmental officials or 43 news-media superstars did anything to save the 10 million inner-city children EVEN THOUGH EACH OF THEM KNEW THAT A SINGLE AMICUS BRIEF OR A SINGLE NEWS-MEDIA ITEM MIGHT HAVE BEEN SUFFICIENT TO SAVE THE CHILDREN.

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The previous section contains copies of reference materials through 6/15/2011 -- the date of the last set of letters to the 21 governmental officials and 43 news-media superstars to inform them that the Petition for Certiorari (request to agree to hear an appeal) had just been filed with the US Supreme Court.

This section of the bulletin board contains subsequent letters to --

Jonathan Kozol (6/22/11) to provide him a “heads up” that “Inner-City Holocaust and America’s Apartheid ‘Justice’ System” was being written in his honor.

Marcia Coyle (6/29/2011), the PBS News Hour’s regular Supreme Court reporter/analyst.

Marc Morial (7/28/2011), CEO of the National Urban League with a copy to his wife, Michelle Miller, CBS News super-star.

Also included is the final report to each of the 51 inner-city clergy from San Francisco, Los Angeles and Oakland who had been supporting the cause to (A) inform them that the US Supreme Court on 10/4/2011 refused to hear our appeal, (B) thank them for their efforts with the solace that each of us would be able to say at The Pearly Gates with St. Paul (II Timothy 4:7): “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith” and (C) request them and their congregants to pray for the souls of the 43 news-media superstars, the 21 governmental officials, the California judges and the U.S. Supreme Court Justices.

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Nov 12, 2011 12:16 pm
Discussion Outline – Real Politik (aka National Interest) and America’s Looming Attack On Iran -- Feb 8th
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In addition to the Suggested Discussion Outline, this section contains two outlines that are referenced in the Suggested Discussion Outline and that Yours truly cribbed from other sources concerning “The Just War Doctrine” as developed by the Roman Catholic Church over 2,000 years and the attitude toward war by C.S. Lewis whose “Tales of Narnia” and other religious works have been made into extremely-popular movies (both outlines were prepared by Yours Truly for another book group in which he participates and which is reading currently a C.S. Lewis biography)]

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Last post by johnkarls
Mon Feb 06, 2012 6:16 am
Original Proposal -- Real Politik (aka National Interest) and America’s Looming Attack On Iran -- Feb 8th
Click here for the Original Proposal and 17 replies which received 1,268 views before being transplanted here.

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The Original Proposal on 3/21/2011 was to examine Real Politik in relation to the U.S./British/French attack on Libya because that attack was condemned on the grounds that no American “national interest” was involved by Defense Secretary Robert Gates, by senior members of the American media, and by key members of both parties in Congress including Richard Lugar (ranking minority member and former Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee).

Although not contesting the fact that the attack on Libya involved no American “national interest,” President Obama and State Secretary Hillary Clinton organized the U.S./British/French attack on Libya in order to avoid a “blood bath” if the rebellion were not successful.

Now, after refusing to support in 2009 the “Green Revolution” in Iran which then failed, the Obama Administration in the person of Defense Secretary Leon Panetta proclaimed on “Face the Nation” on 1/8/2012 that Iran’s developing a nuclear weapon is a “red line” and (after his co-interviewee, U.S. Joint Chiefs Chairman Martin Dempsey, confirmed military planning for a strike against Iran HAS INCLUDED POSITIONING OF MILITARY ASSETS) Leon Panetta stated -- “I think they [Iran] need to know that if they take that step [develop a nuclear weapon], that they’re going to get stopped.”

[The transcript for the “Face the Nation” interview of Panetta and Dempsey is posted below in the “Reference Materials” section.]

Although neither Defense Secretary Panetta nor Joint Chiefs Chairman Dempsey provided any detail on positioning military assets, the media is currently full of stories about how the American aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln is racing across the Indian Ocean to join in the Persian Gulf the carrier Carl Vinson which recently replaced the carrier John Stennis. One carrier in the P.G. is fairly routine while two in the P.G. has only happened during Gulf Wars I and II.

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As we have studied in the past, The Gulf State Six (Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, The United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman) plan to go nuclear immediately after Iran acquires nuclear weapons because, like Charles de Gaulle, they have no faith in the so-called American “nuclear umbrella.”

And as we have studied in the past, 27.7% of worldwide oil production comes from the Middle East and another 20.2% originates “down wind” from the Middle East. Which is why the Middle East has always been viewed as a vital American “national interest.”

It is ironic that the consensus of our foreign-policy cognoscenti is that the U.S./British/French attack on Libya has made it much more difficult to enlist support for doing anything about Iran and its “cat’s paw” Syria.

And it is ironic that our foreign-policy cognoscenti are now waking up to the fact that the U.S./British/French attack on Libya (whose President Qaddafi gave up his nuclear-weapons program immediately after the U.S. launched Gulf War II against Iraq in 2003) appears to have convinced Iran that the only protection against an American attack is to develop nuclear weapons.

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Our focus will be “Power Rules: How Common Sense Can Rescue American Foreign Policy” (Harper Collins - 2009) by Leslie H. Gelb -- available from your local library and from http://www.Amazon.com for $11.20 + shipping.

Leslie Gelb crowned his 40-year Pulitzer-Prize winning career with the NY Times as OpEd-Page Editor and Foreign-Relations OpEd Columnist to become President of the Council on Foreign Relations which, inter alia, publishes Foreign Affairs, the premier foreign-policy journal. He had also served as a senior official at the State and Defense Departments and at the Brookings Institution.

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Last post by Pat
Sat Jan 14, 2012 8:07 am
Participant Comments -- Real Politik (aka National Interest) and America’s Looming Attack On Iran -- Feb 8th

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Last post by Pat
Thu Jan 26, 2012 1:33 pm
Reference Materials -- Real Politik (aka National Interest) and America’s Looming Attack On Iran -- Feb 8th
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Click here for, inter alia, the 1/8/2012 "Face the Nation" transcript of the interview of Defense Secretary Leon Panetta AND A 1/17/2012 ARTICLE BY OUR AUTHOR IN THE DAILY BEAST CONCERNING THE PANETTA INTERVIEW ON "FACE THE NATION" (as well as book reviews of "Power Rules: How Common Sense Can Rescue American Foreign Policy” in the NY Times and Washington Post).

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Last post by Pat
Sat Feb 04, 2012 3:09 am
Discussion Outline - All The Devils Are Here: The Hidden History Of The Financial Crisis - Jan 11th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Jan 07, 2012 4:21 am
Original Proposal - All The Devils Are Here: The Hidden History Of The Financial Crisis - Jan11

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Last post by UtahOwl
Fri Dec 16, 2011 10:14 pm
Participant Comments - All The Devils Are Here: The Hidden History Of The Financial Crisis - Jan 11

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Last post by Thomas Chancellor
Sat Dec 31, 2011 7:02 pm
Reference Materials - All The Devils Are Here: The Hidden History Of The Financial Crisis - Jan 11

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Dec 17, 2011 6:27 am
Discussion Outline - Balanced-Budget Amendments & Redeeming National Debt With “Wallpaper” In Both Europe and the U.S. - December 14th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Dec 10, 2011 10:39 am
Original Proposal - Balanced-Budget Amendments & Redeeming National Debt With “Wallpaper” In Both Europe and the U.S. - December 14th

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Last post by johnkarls
Tue Nov 15, 2011 10:27 am
Participant Comments - Balanced-Budget Amendments & Redeeming National Debt With “Wallpaper” In Both Europe and the U.S. - December 14th

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Last post by Pat
Sat Dec 10, 2011 10:44 am
Reference Materials - Balanced-Budget Amendments & Redeeming National Debt With “Wallpaper” In Both Europe and the U.S. - December 14th
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In addition, please refer to the "Original Proposal" two sections above, because it contains a wealth of information.

Click here for, inter alia, (A) information about what Bloomberg News discovered as a result of its Freedom-Of-Information-Act lawsuit regarding QE-1 which the Federal Reserve fought all the way to the US Supreme Court including how in 2008-2009 the Fed printed $7.7 TRillion and loaned it to banks on three continents, providing them with $13 billion in profits, (B) Fed Reserve Chair Bernanke's own explanation of QE-2, and (C) Fed Reserve Chair Bernanke's STEALTH QE-3 only 2 weeks after his Jackson Hole WY speech promising there would be no QE-3 (per Q&A-24/First Quiz calculations located in "Participant Comments" above), QE-3 comprised printing as much as $2.9 TRillion more dollars to keep Italy and Spain afloat through 12/31/2011.

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Last post by Pat
Mon Dec 05, 2011 2:49 pm
CALL TO ACTION -- "SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION" E-MAIL CAMPAIGN = Benefiting American Taxpayers For The Scientific Discoveries Of Basic Research They Have Financed -- (ONLY 5 MINUTES NEEDED TO PARTICIPATE)

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Last post by johnkarls
Tue Nov 15, 2011 10:25 am
Discussion Outline - That Used To Be Us By Thomas Friedman - Nov 9th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Nov 05, 2011 1:48 pm
Original Proposal - That Used To Be Us By Thomas Friedman - Nov 9th

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Last post by solutions
Fri Oct 14, 2011 1:07 pm
Participant Comments - That Used To Be Us By Thomas Friedman - Nov 9th

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Last post by solutions
Wed Nov 09, 2011 12:06 pm
Reference Materials - That Used To Be Us By Thomas Friedman - Nov 9th

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Last post by johnkarls
Fri Oct 14, 2011 11:51 am
Discussion Outline - Can The Middle Class Be Saved - Oct 12th

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Last post by UtahOwl
Fri Oct 14, 2011 8:35 pm
Original Proposal - Can The Middle Class Be Saved? - Oct 12th
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Participants at our Sep 2011 meeting voted for Tom Chancellor's proposal = "Can The Middle Class Be Saved?" as the focus for our October meeting -- an article which appeared in the current (Sep 2011) issue of The Atlantic AND WHICH IS POSTED IN THE “REFERENCE MATERIALS” SECTION WHICH IS THE SECOND SECTION BELOW.

Tom's proposal noted that there are quite a few remedies being proposed in the media and requests everyone to "keep her/his eyes open" and to come prepared for a good discussion on Oct 12.

It would also help the cause considerably if everyone could post in the “Reference Materials” section below every good idea s/he encounters in the media and post in the “Participant Comments” section immediately following each of her/his own good ideas -- in order to spark the thinking of everyone else before our meeting.

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Last post by UtahOwl
Mon Sep 19, 2011 12:12 pm
Participant Comments - Can The Middle Class Be Saved - Oct 12th
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Last post by Cal Burgart
Tue Oct 11, 2011 5:06 pm
Reference Materials - Can The Middle Class Be Saved? - Oct 12th
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This forum contains, inter alia, the article suggested by Tom Chancellor as the focus for our October 12th meeting = "Can The Middle Class Be Saved" by Don Peck in The Atlantic Magazine (Sep 2011).

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Suggested Discussion Outline - Even Silence Has An End by Ingrid Betencourt - Sep 14th

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Last post by UtahOwl
Wed Sep 14, 2011 6:21 pm
Original Proposal - Even Silence Has An End by Ingrid Betencourt - Sep 14th
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Silence Has An End by Ingrid Betancourt -- available from barnesandnoble.com for $16.64 + shipping.

It is highly recommended not only by Yours Truly who heard Ingrid speak last fall in SLC, but also by Ted and Tucker Gurney (our two retired U/U-Biology-Professor members) who also guarantee that you will find it a real page turner.

Ingrid's book describes her 6.5 years of captivity in Columbia after being kidnapped while running for President of Columbia in 2002 as the representative of the poor and dispossessed -- both of her parents had also represented the poor and dispossessed (her father had been a Minister in several Colombian governments before serving as Assistant Director of UNESCO which has a worldwide focus and then as Head of the Education Commission of U.S. President Kennedy's Alliance for Progress which focused on all of Latin America; Ingrid's mother is a former beauty queen who represented Bogota's poor and dispossessed in the Colombian Congress as a Senator).

Ingrid started a new political party (the Green Oxygen Party) to represent the poor and dispossessed -- it also opposed corruption and the drug cartels which had driven more than 4 million peasants off the land to live in poverty in Colombia's cities.

It would appear that Ingrid's capture by a drug cartel was engineered by the government since it feared she was about to be elected President (just like the Pakistani Government suddenly withdrew security in a notoriously-dangerous area during Benizir Bhutto's 2007 political campaign as the favorite to head the national government resulting in her assassination, the Colombian Government did the same to Ingrid resulting in her capture and imprisonment for 6.5 years).

It took the Colombian Government only a few days to rescue her once they decided after 6.5 years to do so -- Ingrid has dual French and Colombian citizenship (her education is French and she married another student who was French), as a result of which French President Sarkozy, upon assuming office, launched a diplomatic campaign to free her and Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez used President Sarkozy's campaign as a reason for massing troops on the border with Colombia (the Colombian Government quickly freed Ingrid before Venezuela could invade!!!).

After 6.5 years of captivity, Ingrid has no stomach for further politics or for living in Colombia, but immensely invaluable are her insights into Latin American politics, U.S. relations with Latin America, the operations of drug cartels and how the international community should act vis-à-vis hostages.

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Last post by Pat
Fri Aug 12, 2011 12:00 pm
Participant Comments - Even Silence Has An End by Ingrid Betancourt - Sep 14th

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Last post by johnkarls
Tue Aug 30, 2011 9:33 am
Reference Materials - Even Silence Has An End by Ingrid Betancourt - Sep 14th
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This section contains, among other things --

(1) The NY Times Book Review of Even Silence Has An End,

(2) The PBS Newshour (aka MacNeil-Lehrer) interview of Ingrid Betancourt after the publication of her book.

(3) Two book reviews of Until Death Do Us Part: My Struggle to Reclaim Colombia by Ingrid and published only a few weeks before her capture in 2002 by the FARC. Ingrid had been urged to write the book to explain herself and her mission by Dominique de Villepin, her university professor and mentor who, by 2002, was French Foreign Minister and would later become Prime Minister.

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Last post by Pat
Thu Sep 01, 2011 10:13 am
Discussion Outline - Blood Brothers by Elias Chacour - August 10th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Aug 06, 2011 10:29 am
Original Proposal – Blood Brothers by Elias Chacour – August 10th
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Just in time for the United Nations General Assembly vote in September to recognize the Statehood of Palestine, our focus is Blood Brothers by Elias Chacour (available from your local library or for $5.20 from Amazon.com + shipping).

Elias Chacour is the Archbishop of Akko, Haifa, Nazareth and All Galilee of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church which is part of the worldwide Roman Catholic Church (although the Melkite Greek Catholic Church's origins lie in the Middle East, its members are spread throughout the world and number 1.6 million).

Chacour was born November 29, 1939 in the village of Kafr Bir'im in Upper Galilee in the British Mandate of Palestine to a Palestinian Christian family, members of the Melkite Catholic Church. At the age of eight he was evicted along with his whole village of Biram by Yishuv forces and became a deportee and a refugee but remained in the region. Because he remained in his homeland, he was granted Israeli citizenship when the state was created in 1948.

Completing his schooling in Nazareth, he studied theology at St. Sulpice Seminary in Paris, returning home in 1965. He was ordained a priest by Archbishop George Selim Hakim of Akko, Haifa, Nazareth and all Galilee, who became Patriarch Maximos V two years later after the death of Patriarch Maximos IV Sayegh who was called "The Lion of the Council" (Vatican II). Chacour later studied the Torah and Talmud at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem as well as Aramaic and Syriac, becoming the first Arab to gain a higher degree there.

Noted for his efforts to promote reconciliation between Arabs and Israelis, he is the author of two books about the experience of Palestinian people living in present-day Israel. Blood Brothers covers his childhood growing up in the town of Biram, his development into a young man, and his early years as a priest in Ibillin. This book has been translated into more than twenty languages. His second book, We Belong to the Land, recounts his work in the development of Mar Elias Educational Institutions, from humble beginnings to major schools for educating Palestinian young people and for helping to bring about reconciliation in a land of strife. This book has been translated into 11 languages.

An advocate of non-violence, Chacour travels often between the Middle East and other countries around the world. In addition, many visitors, fact-finding missions, and pilgrims have come to Ibillin. In recognition of his humanitarian efforts he has received honors including the World Methodist Peace Award, the Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur, and the Niwano Peace Prize (Japan) as well as honorary doctorates from five universities including Duke and Emory.

The Forward for Blood Brothers was written by James Baker III, Chief of Staff for President Reagan and Secretary of State for the first President Bush.

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Last post by ClaudiaOlson
Sun Jul 17, 2011 12:53 pm
Participant Comments - Blood Brothers by Elias Chacour - August 10th
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Questions 2-21 of the 24 questions contained in the Short Quiz posted in this section, comprise a Quick Review since they are a condensation of the Short Quizzes for the last time we studied the Israel-Arab imbroglio two years ago for our 10/14/2009 meeting when our suggested books were “A Safe Haven: Harry S. Truman and the Founding of Israel” by Allis Radosh and Ronald Radosh (HarperCollins © 2009) and “Israel Is Real” by Rich Cohen (Farrar, Straus & Giroux © 2009). For the massive materials assembled for that meeting (12 Participant Comments and 13 Reference Materials) including the vastly-more-detailed quizzes, please see the sections of this bulletin board below for the 10/14/2009 meeting.

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Jul 30, 2011 10:24 am
Reference Materials - Blood Brothers by Elias Chacour - August 10th
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The first three postings in this section were among the 13 Reference Materials posted on this bulletin board for the 10/14/2009 meeting --

(A) the text of the 8/31/1947 Report of the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP) comprising 8 full pages in the 9/9/1947 New York Times and, inter alia, detailing precisely who owned each plot of land in Palestine, Jew or Arab.

(B) the text of United Nations Resolution 181 of 11/29/1947 which provided for the partition of the Palestine Mandate into a “Jewish State” and an “Arab State” -- each of which was a checker board because it reflected the UNSCOP survey of which plots were owned by Jews and which plots were owned by Arabs.

(C) the text of the Encyclopaedia Brittanica = The Coming of the Cold War, 1945–57 » The Cold War in the Middle East and Asia » The Creation of Israel (the last sentence of the Encyclopaedia Brittanica article is the authority for Q&A-14 for the 10/14/2009 meeting and Q&A-7 of the current Short Quiz that 567,000 Jews were expelled from Arab countries following the 1948 Arab-Israeli War for Independence which is roughly comparable to the number of Arabs that were displaced in that conflict from what became Israel).

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Last post by TheChancellors
Thu Aug 11, 2011 12:22 pm
Discussion Outline - America's Climate Problem, The Way Forward - July 13th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Jul 09, 2011 10:44 am
Original Proposal - America's Climate Problem, The Way Forward - July 13th
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Our focus on July 13th will be "America's Climate Problem, The Way Forward" by Robert Repetto (available from Amazon.com for $22.76 + shipping).

It was enthusiastically proposed after having been read by Ted Gurney, one of our retired U/U Biology Professors.

Robert Repetto is a Prof. at the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies and the President of Green-Think. He has also served as a Pew Fellow for Marine Conservation at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute and as a member of the Economics Advisory Committee of the EPA's Science Advisory Board.

However, his background is economics = MS from the London School of Economics and PhD in Economics from Harvard. Before concentrating on environmental matters, he worked for the World Bank in Indonesia, for the Ford Foundation in India, and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

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Last post by Ted Gurney
Tue Jun 21, 2011 12:09 pm
Participant Comments - America's Climate Problem, The Way Forward - July 13th

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Last post by Ted Gurney
Fri Jul 15, 2011 12:27 pm
Reference Materials - America's Climate Problem, The Way Forward - July 13th

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Last post by Pat
Sat Jun 25, 2011 11:18 am
DO-IT-YOURSELF SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION-E-MAIL-CAMPAIGN = Insuring The Survival Of The Democratic Party Following A Nuclear Attack On The U.S. By Terrorists - ONLY-5-MINUTES-REQUIRED-TO-PARTICIPATE

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Last post by johnkarls
Wed Jun 22, 2011 11:29 am
Post-Meeting Discussion - Monsoon: The Indian Ocean and the Future of American Power - June 15th

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Last post by johnkarls
Thu Jun 16, 2011 2:04 pm
Discussion Outline - Monsoon: The Indian Ocean and the Future of American Power - June 15th

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Last post by johnkarls
Wed Jun 15, 2011 11:56 am
Original Proposal - Monsoon: The Indian Ocean and the Future of American Power - June 15th
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80 views in "Possible Topics" before being transplanted here.

"Monsoon: The Indian Ocean and the Future of American Power" by Robert Kaplan is available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $16.17 + shipping.

Robert Kaplan is a correspondent for Atlantic Monthly. His articles have also appeared in The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The New Republic and Foreign Affairs. In 2009, U.S. Defense Secretary Gates appointed Kaplan to his Defense Policy Board. This is his 13th book (obviously he is not superstitious).

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Last post by UtahOwl
Thu May 12, 2011 11:03 am
Participant Comments - Monsoon: The Indian Ocean and the Future of American Power - June 15th

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Last post by Pat
Tue Jun 14, 2011 11:29 am
Reference Materials - Monsoon: The Indian Ocean and the Future of American Power - June 15th

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Last post by johnkarls
Thu May 12, 2011 11:28 am
SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION-E-MAIL-CAMPAIGNS = Taxing-Corporate-Profits-From-Exporting-American-Jobs + Benefitting-American-Taxpayers-For-The-Scientific-Discoveries-Of-Basic-Research-They-Have-Financed - ONLY-5-MINUTES-REQUIRED-TO-PARTICIPATE
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Both of these campaigns were discussed at our May 11th meeting. The Introduction posted in this Section also discusses a third e-mail campaign that was considered at our May 11th meeting.

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat May 28, 2011 11:21 am
Discussion Outline - Debtor Nation: The History Of America In Red Ink - May 11th

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Last post by johnkarls
Mon May 09, 2011 10:54 am
Original Proposal - Debtor Nation: The History Of America In Red Ink - for May 11th

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Last post by UtahOwl
Tue Apr 19, 2011 1:12 pm
Participant Comments - Debtor Nation: The History Of America In Red Ink - for May 11th

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Last post by solutions
Tue May 10, 2011 12:07 pm
Reference Materials - Debtor Nation: The History of America in Red Ink - for May 11th
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Our focus for May 11 is "Debtor Nation" by Louis Hyman, available from your local library, or from Amazon.com for $29.35 + shipping.

Louis Hyman is a 2007 PhD in American History from Harvard who became an Assistant Professor of History at Cornell's School of Industrial and Labor Relations. His book, released 1/23/2011, is an update and embellishment of his doctoral dissertation which was entitled "Debtor Nation: How Consumer Credit Built Postwar America."

It was recommended by June Taylor (aka Utah Owl) because she had attended the Sundance Film Festival this past winter where she saw "The Flaw" which is a documentary directed by noted British filmmaker David Sington (e.g., "In The Shadow Of The Moon") and produced by Christopher Hird (e.g., "The End of the Line"). It was purchased during the Festival by New Video for commercial distribution later this year under its Docudrama Films brand.

"The Flaw" explores the reasons for the 2008-20?? crash of the American economy with interviews of two dozen noted economists, as well as Wall Street insiders and victims of the crash. The film's title is inspired by former U.S. Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan's acknowledgment in testimony before a Congressional investigating committee that there had been "a flaw" in his model of how the economy worked.

June reported that the Sundance screening of "The Flaw" was followed by a Q&A session featuring David Sington and Louis Hyman during the course of which Sington credited Hyman's book with explaining the "why" of the crash -- that Sington had expected the Wall Street experts to provide the "why" but all they could provide was the "how"!!! Sington gave Hyman major credit for Sington's understanding of the crisis, and the story line of the film.

About his doctoral dissertation, Louis Hyman has written --

"My dissertation is about how what we call personal debt, that is debt incurred by individuals and not by businesses, went from being owed to other people to being owed to institutions, and what this has meant at the largest level about American capitalism. In the dissertation, Debtor Nation: How Consumer Credit Built Postwar America, I wanted to know how personal debt, which was at the end of the nineteenth century illicit, illegal, and always personal, became by the end of the twentieth century legal, institutional, and shockingly condoned. How did it move from the smoky backrooms of loan sharks to the brightly lit boardrooms of multinationals? How did it move from the margin of capitalism to its center? How did consumer credit become a site of investment and profit, and by the choice of these investments, what was left out? What other investments did consumer credit lending crowd out? How did this growth of consumer credit reframe the largest business narratives of the twentieth century-the second industrial revolution at the beginning of the century and so-called "deindustrialization" at its end?"

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Ordinarily, we post at a minimum book reviews from the NY Times, Washington Post and/or Wall Street Journal in this "Reference Materials" forum.

Debtor Nation does not appear to have been reviewed by any of those publications.

Nevertheless, this “Reference Materials” forum is still provided for any other materials that any of our members would like to post.

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Last post by solutions
Tue May 10, 2011 12:49 pm
DO-IT-YOURSELF SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION E-MAIL CAMPAIGN – Apr.13th
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Petitioning President Obama to reprocess spent nuclear fuel rods rather than leave them what are essentially home swimming pools at the 65 nuclear-power electricity-generation plants around the United States, many of which are located in earthquake zones and many more of which are near aviation corridors.

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Apr 16, 2011 1:12 pm
Original Proposal - President Obama’s Nuclear Stand Post-Japan - April 13th
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Suggested reading materials will be all of the news articles that our members consider relevant and post on the bulletin board and "Terrestrial Energy: How Nuclear Power Will Lead the Green Revolution and End America's Energy Odyssey" (2008) – available from Amazon.com for $17.23 + shipping) by William Tucker.

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Last post by johnkarls
Fri Mar 18, 2011 2:00 pm
Discussion Outline - President Obama’s Nuclear Stand Post-Japan - April 13th

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Last post by johnkarls
Mon Apr 11, 2011 1:23 pm
Participant Comments - President Obama’s Nuclear Stand Post-Japan - April 13th

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Last post by solutions
Sat Apr 09, 2011 10:50 am
Reference Materials - President Obama’s Nuclear Stand Post-Japan - April 13th

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3 Posts

Last post by solutions
Fri Apr 01, 2011 11:59 am
Discussion Outline - Religious Freedom And National Security - Mar 16th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Mar 05, 2011 12:15 pm
Original Proposal - Religious Freedom And National Security - Mar 16th
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Our focus will be "Freedom From Religion - Rights and National Security" (Oxford University Press 2009) by Amos Guiora, University of Utah Law Professor.

ACLU President (1991-2008) and current NYU Law Professor Nadine Strossen has said: "This book will provoke much debate in the legal community and far beyond. While I disagree with Amos Guiora's conclusions, I applaud his candid and compelling discussion of a challenging question that should certainly be forthrightly debated: whether legal protections for religious speech and conduct should be reduced in order to counter the threat posed by religiously motivated terrorists. Even for those of us who urge that the answer should be 'No,' Guiora's impassioned work must be reckoned with."

Please press reply to ReadingLiberally@johnkarls.com if you would like to borrow the book for a week because it is expensive ($61.20 + shipping from Amazon.com).

It is a quick read (only 125 pages) and we have six copies (two from the SL County Library, two from the U/U Law Library and two purchased by John Karls) so for everyone willing to read 18 pages/day for a week, we should be able to accommodate 24 members who don't want the expense of buying their own copies.

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Last post by Pat
Fri Feb 18, 2011 12:13 pm
Participant Comments - Religious Freedom And National Security - Mar 16th

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Last post by UtahOwl
Wed Mar 16, 2011 9:32 am
Reference Materials - Religious Freedom And National Security - Mar 16th
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Normally we post under “Reference Materials,” among other things, any book reviews from the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, or Washington Post. “Freedom From Religion” does not appear to have been reviewed in any of these three publications – though we have posted for “Original Proposal” (before one even clicks on it for the postings in that category) the very-intriguing quotation of the former ACLU President (1991-2008) and current NYU Law Professor regarding “Freedom From Religion.”

HOWEVER, ON MARCH 2, 2011, THERE OCCURRED THE FIRST ITEM FOR POSTING UNDER “REFERENCE MATERIALS” –

By way of background, Q&A No 8 posted as part of the monthly Short Quiz under “Participant Comments” stated –

(1) The Roman Catholic Doctrine of "Blood Guilt" held that every Jew alive at any point in time including the present, is responsible for the death of Christ.

(2) It is politically incorrect to notice that The Holocaust was proper under the Roman Catholic Doctrine of "Blood Guilt"!!!

(3) However, one of Germany's most famous trial lawyers, Weddig Fricke, wrote a famous book on the subject = "The Court Martial of Jesus: A Christian Defends The Jews Against The Charge Of Deicide." Fricke wrote the book in the wake of defending a person who had killed 9 Jews in a concentration camp as a "wonderful Grandfather" whose only fault was being misled by his Roman Catholic religion. [Only the northern half of Germany is Lutheran, while the southern half has always remained Roman Catholic.]

(4) According to Fricke, the Roman Catholic Church did not abandon its Doctrine of "Blood Guilt" until 1961 - 16 years after the end of World War II.

*****

The first posting in this “Reference Materials” section is from a 3/2/2011 Transcript of MacNeil-Lehrer (aka The PBS News Hour With Jim Lehrer) in which the last item in the News Wrap mentions that Pope Benedict XVI’s new book “Jesus of Nazareth: Part II, Holy Week: From the Entrance into Jerusalem to the Resurrection” will be released on March 11, 2011 – AND MAKES THE CASE AGAINST BLOOD GUILT!!!

According to The PBS News Hour (which apparently received an advance copy), the Pope states that the Doctrine of Blood Guild was renounced by the Catholic Church in 1965 – apparently Weddig Fricke’s 1961 renunciation date must have been an earlier unofficial renunciation.

The PBS News Hour does not indicate whether the Pope acknowledges that the Roman Catholic Church’s Doctrine of Blood Guilt caused (or at least contributed to) the World War II Holocaust in which 6 million Jews were killed.

However, it is interesting to note that virtually all of the Roman Catholic countries [e.g., France, Poland, Austria and Germany (though only the southern half of Germany was and is Roman Catholic, Hitler was born and raised in Austria which is 100% Roman Catholic)] eagerly volunteered their Jews to Hitler’s death camps, and only in the Protestant countries of Northern Europe (e.g., Denmark and Holland) was their substantial resistance to doing so.
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Last post by johnkarls
Mon Mar 14, 2011 12:37 pm
DO-IT-YOURSELF SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION E-MAIL CAMPAIGN – Feb 9th
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European-Style Gasoline Tax (i.e. significantly higher) To “Kill 4 Birds With One Stone” = (1) adequate financing for social security and universal health care, (2) reducing carbon emissions, (3) reducing the international balance-of-payments deficit, and (4) increasing national security by reducing the reliance of the U.S. and its allies on foreign oil.

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Last post by solutions
Fri Feb 18, 2011 3:25 pm
Discussion Outline - Reports By Two Deficit-Reduction Commissions - Feb 9

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Feb 05, 2011 2:39 am
Original Proposal - Reports By Two Deficit-Reduction Commissions - Feb 9
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Click here for a short background summary of the two Deficit-Reduction Commissions.

We will focus on the two issues that will dominate both the 2011-2012 Congress and the 2012 Presidential Campaign –- deficit reduction and the failure to finance 2010 Health-Care Reform (the Congressional Budget Office rated it “deficit neutral” on the assumptions (1) that half of the admitted cost could be taken from Medicare which is already facing bankruptcy and therefore won’t happen, (2) that half of the admitted cost could be dumped on the states in the form of an increased Medicaid mandate when the states are already bankrupt, and (3) that most of the non-admitted cost in the form of higher premiums for health insurance now required to be purchased by healthy young people is constitutional which is under challenge in litigation by 22 state Attorneys General).

This all against the backdrop of the Tea Party movement and the bankruptcies of Greece, Ireland, Portugal, etc.

Please help us formulate a third way (vs. the obvious relish with which the two established parties want to demagogue the tax rate for the top personal-income-tax bracket which will probably lead to gridlock).

The third way would be to kill four birds with one stone by financing social security and universal health care with a European-style (that is, dramatically higher) gasoline tax. The four birds = adequate financing for social security and universal health care, reducing carbon emissions, reducing the international balance-of-payments deficit, and increasing national security by reducing the reliance of the U.S. and its allies on foreign oil.

A potential fifth bird, as discussed briefly at our 1/12/2010 meeting, is the preservation of (vs. mere financing for) Universal Health Care. Attended by 4 attorneys and 4 non-attorneys, the meeting considered Tom Chancellor’s Discussion Outline and then considered how the US Supreme Court is likely to decide three cases that are likely to reach it in the near future = (1) the gay-rights litigation currently pending before the Ninth Circuit, (2) the 43 detainees at Guantanamo Bay whom the Obama Administration will not grant trials (civilian or military) and will be held as enemy combatants until the end of the War on Terror (please see the materials for our 12/15/2010 meeting), and (3) the litigation brought by 22 state Attorneys General challenging the constitutionality of 2010 Health-Care Reform (specifically arguing the requirement to purchase health insurance is not Constitutional under the Commerce Clause because, if the failure to act comprises interstate commerce, then there is nothing that is not interstate commerce and presumably America’s Founders thought that there must be something that was not interstate commerce if they specified it as a requirement for federal legislation.)

At our 1/12/2010 meeting, the consensus was that with a majority of “strict constructionists” on the Supreme Court (as well as a sixth Roman Catholic member vis-à-vis the gay-rights litigation), the Supreme Court will rule AGAINST gay rights, enemy-combatant rights, AND THE CONSTITUTIONALITY OF HEALTH-CARE REFORM!!!

So our looming Six-Degrees-Of-Separation E-mail Campaign proposing a European-style (i.e., large) gas tax to finance social security and universal health care may be the only way to save them!!!
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Last post by solutions
Fri Jan 14, 2011 9:31 pm
Participant Comments - Reports By Two Deficit-Reduction Commissions - Feb 9

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Last post by UtahOwl
Sat Jan 29, 2011 6:10 pm
Reference Materials - Reports By Two Deficit-Reduction Commissions - Feb 9
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Click here for, among other things, the texts of (1) The 11/17/2010 Rivlin-Domenici Deficit-Reduction Plan, (2) The 11/10/2010 Blue Print of the Co-Chairs of President Obama's Deficit-Reduction Commission, and (3) The 12/1/2010 Official Report of President Obama's Deficit-Reduction Commission which fell 3 votes short of the 14 votes required for adoption by President Obama's original Executive Order establishing the Commission.
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Last post by johnkarls
Mon Jan 31, 2011 8:48 pm
Discussion Outline - Making Our Democracy Work by US Supreme Ct Justice Stephen Breyer - Jan 12th
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Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer's new book (Making Our Democracy Work: A Judge's View) which was selected by last month's meeting attendees -- had been suggested by Denise Chancellor, who handles environmental matters for the Utah Attorney General's Office, and her husband Tom Chancellor who, though retired, headed for many years the Parisian Office of the worldwide American law firm of Gibson Dunn & Crutcher.

As with previous books recommended by the Chancellors, Tom has graciously prepared a Discussion Outline and has graciously agreed to lead the discussion January 12th.
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Last post by TheChancellors
Sat Jan 08, 2011 2:58 am
Original Proposal - Making Our Democracy Work by US Supreme Ct Justice Stephen Breyer - Jan 12th
"Making Our Democracy Work: A Judge's View" by Stephen Beyer (Knopf - 9/14/2010 - 270 pages) is available from your local library or Amazon.com for $15.72 + shipping.

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Last post by TheChancellors
Wed Dec 22, 2010 4:09 pm
Post-Meeting Participant Comments - Making Our Democracy Work by US Supreme Ct Justice Stephen Breyer - Jan 12th

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Last post by UtahOwl
Sun Jan 23, 2011 12:46 pm
Participant Comments - Making Our Democracy Work by US Supreme Ct Justice Stephen Breyer - Jan 12th

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Last post by solutions
Sun Jan 09, 2011 9:55 pm
Reference Materials - Making Our Democracy Work by US Supreme Ct Justice Stephen Breyer - Jan 12th
NY Times and Washington Post Book Reviews of "Making Our Democracy Work" available here.

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Last post by johnkarls
Wed Dec 22, 2010 3:32 pm
Discussion Outline - The US Gov's "Kill List" To Assassinate US Citizens in Yemen - Dec 15th
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Click here for the Non-Traditional Discussion Outline = A Proposal For A Counter-Weight To The Tea Party Movement = The Eye-On-The-Ball Movement which was approved at our 12/15/2010 meeting.

[There is also a Traditional Discussion Outline which was discussed from 7:30 pm > 8:30 pm, with the discussion of The Eye-On-The-Ball Movement and its approval taking place from 8:30 pm > 8:45 pm.]

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Last post by TheChancellors
Wed Dec 22, 2010 4:07 pm
Original Proposal - The US Gov's "Kill List" To Assassinate US Citizens in Yemen - Dec 15th
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We will focus on two lawsuits filed last August challenging the U.S. Government's right to assassinate U.S. citizens far from any battlefield, so long as the U.S. Executive Branch deems them to be terrorists who are a threat to the U.S.

The suits were brought by the ACLU and the Center for Constitutional Rights in the name of Dr. Nasser Al-Aulaqi on behalf of his son, Anwar Al-Aulaqi. The father has spent his entire career as a Yemeni Government Minister or as President of two different Yemeni Universities. His son is a U.S. citizen because he was born in the U.S. in 1966 when the father was here during his student days on a Fulbright scholarship. The U.S. government believes the son is a member of Al Qaeda in Yemen. The father disputes that.

The key legal issues from reading quite a few of the materials (including court papers) are whether the entire world is a battleground against terrorism or, alternatively, whether the target is an imminent threat to the U.S. -- in either of which cases our Commander In Chief has the right to impose capital punishment by drone upon U.S. citizens without a trial.

An interesting question in the event that the courts hold that the entire world is a battleground against terrorism = what is the difference between sending drones over Yemen and sending drones over, say, Britain, France or Germany???

And would we want other countries to begin flying their drones over the U.S. in order to implement assassinations here, including assassinations of U.S. citizens deemed by the other countries to be a threat to them??? After all, our drones have assassinated in the Tribal Areas of Pakistan at least 3 German citizens and more than a dozen citizens of other Western European allies.

Are these questions really governed by "might makes right" tempered only by discretion in the case of friends and allies??? In other words, since Russia for example is not normally considered a friend or ally, would we consider flying drones into their air space in order to conduct assassinations within their borders since our drones, if provided stealth technology, might be difficult to bring down (and how much does a drone cost anyway???)???

The practical problems, as we have discussed in the past, are (1) Osama bin Laden issued long ago a Fatwa to nuke 10 million Americans (the number of Arabs he calculated had been killed by the U.S. or its allies), (2) the Founding Dean of Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government wrote a book on how to deal with Osama's Fatwa by controlling nuclear material, (3) it has often been pointed out that this approach is wishful thinking because, for example, the old Soviet Union's missing 178 suitcase-size nuclear weapons contained a considerable amount of recycle-able nuclear material and have long since been universally agreed by experts to be in the hands of terrorists, and (4) this issue has been the subject of intense concern for every recent Chair of the Sen Fgn Rel or Sen Armed Services Committees with, indeed, Sen Fgn Rel Chair Joe Biden writing an Op Ed piece for the Wall St. Journal during the 2008 Presidential campaign arguing that all nuclear material has "DNA" indicating where it was produced and the U.S. should announce to the world that if it is ever subject to a nuclear attack from terrorists, the U.S. will annihilate with nuclear weapons the country of origin of the nuclear material used against the U.S. (causing some wags to point out that if the U.S. itself is the country of origin, the Biden Doctrine would obligate us to commit nuclear suicide!!!).

A companion problem, as we have also discussed in the past, is that if there is a nuclear attack by terrorists on the United States and President Obama is not seen to have done everything in his power to protect America, that will probably be the end of the Democratic Party.

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Last post by johnkarls
Fri Nov 12, 2010 6:22 pm
Participant Comments - The US Gov's "Kill List" To Assassinate US Citizens in Yemen - Dec 15th

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Last post by Pat
Wed Dec 01, 2010 11:49 am
Reference Materials - The US Gov's "Kill List" To Assassinate US Citizens in Yemen - Dec 15th
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Click here for the Center For Constitutional Rights Press Releases concerning Al-Aulaqi vs. Obama and CCR/ACLU vs. OFAC -- and for a list of legal documents filed in those cases that are available as Adobe.pdf files from the CCR web site.

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Last post by solutions
Wed Nov 24, 2010 6:17 pm
Unofficial Six-Degrees-Of-Separation E-mail Campaign - Obama's Wars - Nov. 10th

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Last post by TheChancellors
Wed Nov 17, 2010 10:09 am
Original Proposal - Obama's Wars by Bob Woodward - Nov 10th
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Obama’s Wars by Bob Woodward is available at your local public library or from Amazon.com for $15.00 + shipping.

Bob Woodward is the Pulitzer Prize winning Columnist and Associate Editor of the Washington Post who, as a young reporter, teamed with Carl Bernstein, another young Washington Post reporter, to break the Nixon Watergate story and then to pursue it with the help of Deep Throat until Nixon was forced to leave office.

Woodward’s latest book was released September 27th and rocketed straight to Number One on the NY Times Bestseller List. Its title, Obama’s Wars, refers to (1) his decision at the beginning of his Administration to surge American troop strength in Afghanistan by 21,000 and then, after an extended period of re-evaluation, to surge American troop strength in Afghanistan by another 33,000, bringing it from 47,000 at the beginning of his Administration to a total of 101,000, and (2) his decisions to increase the number of drone attacks inside Pakistan by a factor of more than 10 and to pressure the Pakistani Army to provide the “boots on the ground” to support his new war in Pakistan.

Bob Woodward’s new book is obviously timed to influence President Obama’s Review of American Policy in Afghanistan which is scheduled to commence in December and which was announced at the same time as his second American troop surge in Afghanistan.

Accordingly, we hope to see and hear all of you on Nov 10th!!!
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Last post by Pat
Sat Oct 16, 2010 4:05 am
Participant Comments - Obama's Wars by Bob Woodward - Nov 10th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Oct 30, 2010 10:37 am
Reference Materials - Obama's Wars by Bob Woodward - Nov. 10th
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For additional materials, please scroll down to the materials for our 4/8/2009 meeting 18.5 months ago, when we focused on Newsweek’s Cover Story of 2/9/2009 titled “Obama’s Vietnam” in response to the President’s first surge in Afghanistan.

We concluded (1) that we can’t just fight a war every place Al Qaeda acquires another sanctuary (already including Somalia and Yemen as of 18.5 months ago), (2) that fighting such wars is counter-productive since such wars are one of the primary reasons for the existence of Al Qaeda, (3) that fighting such a war in Afghanistan is probably doomed to fail since Afghanistan has defeated every foreign invader beginning with Alexander the Great and continuing through the Soviet occupation in the 1980’s with 110,000 troops on the ground, and (4) that infiltrating Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations will be much more effective than fighting such wars if only America can re-grow its human-intelligence capability that was destroyed by President Clinton’s Executive Order barring the recruitment of spies and double agents who had committed violent illegal acts – which provoked the resignation of his first CIA Director (R. James Woolsey, Jr.) in protest that Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations do not trust anyone who has not committed violent illegal acts at their direction.

Accordingly, we launched one of our Six-Degrees-Of-Separation e-mail campaigns urging every American to send the following e-mail to President Obama –-

President Barack Obama

Dear Mr. President:

Re: Human Intelligence and Afghanistan

R. James Woolsey Jr.’s 26 December 1994 letter resigning as CIA Director stated that he believed that the new Executive Order banning the use as agents of anyone who had committed a violent illegal act would make it impossible to gather sufficient intelligence about terrorist organizations since they typically do not trust a new member until s/he has committed at least one violent illegal act at the direction of the terrorist organization.

The President who signed that Executive Order and provoked that resignation left office in January 2001 and, presumably, that Executive Order and the policy it represented have been reversed.

Accordingly, we believe that the American people are owed an explanation why our human intelligence capabilities, together with other programs that have been put in place since 9-11-2001, are not sufficient to protect America and its allies from potential attacks from terrorist organizations based in Afghanistan and Pakistan. And whether fighting an air war against the areas of Pakistan that are not controlled by its central government (thereby risking the extension of Fundamentalist-Islamic rule installed earlier this year in the Swat Valley to all of Pakistan) and trying to subjugate Afghanistan as a base to fight that air war when Afghanistan has never been conquered successfully for any length of time throughout recorded history, add to or detract from our overall intelligence capabilities to detect and prevent terrorist attacks on America and its allies.

Thank you for your consideration.

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Oct 16, 2010 4:28 am
Discussion Outline -- Murder City – What Does Juarez say about our future? -- Oct 13th
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Please press here for the Discussion Outline.

Although our focus will be Murder City: Ciudad Juarez and the Global Economy's New Killing Fields by Charles Bowden, our policy has always been that everyone is welcome to attend and participate, even if s/he hasn't had time to read the suggested materials. This is especially true this time (please read on!!!) --

Utah Owl (aka June Taylor), who recommended Murder City, has written the Discussion Outline.

Her 2.5-page discussion outline is really a CALL TO ACTION on three policy questions = (1) whether to halt the war on drugs as having been a disaster, (2) whether to re-negotiate the North-American Free-Trade Agreement (NAFTA) as having been a disaster, and (3) whether to change U.S. immigration policy to ameliorate the effects on the Mexican population of Items 1 and 2.

There is a good chance that our discussion will result in one of our SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION e-mail campaigns. And although some of us may be skeptics, there is no question that the Democratic Party would not be in the sad shape it is in today if President Obama had decided to accept one of our dozen SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION e-mail campaigns since he took office = Eliminating Unemployment With A National-Security Work Force (12/12/2009).

That recommendation last year would have REDUCED UNEMPLOYMENT TO ZERO. The simple Roosevelt-style concept was to extend unemployment benefits so that there would be no time limits at all –- but recipients would work for those benefits by manufacturing solar panels. Recipients would also be granted unlimited time off for job interviews to rejoin the private economy.

Ask yourself whether you think President Obama, Majority Leader Reid and Speaker Pelosi would admit that the current election outlook would be much brighter IF THE UNEMPLOYMENT RATE HAD BEEN REDUCED TO ZERO!!!

And then join us this coming Wednesday evening to discuss June’s just-as-vital issues facing our nation.

[If you would like to inspect our 12/12/2009 recommendation for Eliminating Unemployment With A National-Security Work Force or any of our other dozen or so SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION e-mail campaigns, please scroll below.]

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Last post by UtahOwl
Wed Oct 20, 2010 2:16 pm
Original Proposal - MurderCity - What does Juarez say about our future? - Oct 13th
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Our focus will be Murder City: Ciudad Juarez and the Global Economy's New Killing Fields by Charles Bowden ((c) Nations Books 3/1/2010), available in hardcover only from your local library or from Amazon.com for $18.15 + shipping.

UtahOwl (aka June Taylor), who recommended Murder City, reports that the Booklist book review said: "Just across the Rio Grande from El Paso sits Juárez, Mexico, a city so overtaken with the violence of drug trafficking that its leading citizens-police, politicians, even the drug lords-find it safer to live in El Paso. Bowden... details the forces that have led to Mexico's place in the multinational drug business. Hundreds of millions of dollars flow into Juárez each week, and the violence and corruption that follow yield 200 to 300 murders each year. Bowden laments the silence on both sides of the border that permits the slaughter that goes mostly unnoted and unreported." UtahOwl reports further that one of the most striking points Bowden makes is that Ciudad Juárez's culture of violence will not only worsen, but will inevitably spread north into the United States.

[Reading Liberally geographical note = El Paso/Ciudad Juárez are a single metropolitan area split by the Rio Grande at the point where, after travelling south to split New Mexico in half, it turns southeast to become the border between Mexico and Texas. Situated at the end of the West-Texas knife blade between New Mexico and Mexico, El Paso is closer to the Pacific Ocean than the Gulf of Mexico.]

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Last post by UtahOwl
Mon Sep 20, 2010 1:00 pm
Participant Comments - MurderCity: What does Juarez say about our future? - Oct 13th

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3 Posts

Last post by UtahOwl
Fri Oct 08, 2010 8:55 pm
CALL TO ACTION - "American Policy Toward Palestinians = The Key to Middle-East Peace" - ONLY 5 MINUTES NEEDED TO PARTICIPATE

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Last post by johnkarls
Mon Oct 19, 2009 4:23 am
Reference Materials - MurderCity: What does Juarez say about our future? - Oct 13th
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Murder City does not appear to have been reviewed by either the NY Times or the Washington Post.

However, the first two items in this section are quasi-reviews - (1) a feature story in The High Country News on the 3/1/2010 publication date for Murder City, and (2) a 4/14/2010 interview of Charles Bowden re Murder City by Amy Goodman for http://www.democracynow.org.

The third item is a 9/20/2010 transcript of a MacNeil-Lehrer (aka The PBS Newshour With Jim Lehrer) segment on Ciudad Juárez's largest newspaper announcing it would no longer report on the drug wars following the assassination of one of its photographers and attempted assassination of one of its interns (one of its reporters had previously been assassinated).

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Last post by solutions
Tue Oct 12, 2010 6:06 pm
Discussion Outline - - The Big Sort: Why The Clustering Of Like-Minded America Is Tearing Us Apart - Sep. 15th
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This discussion outline was prepared by Tom Chancellor who suggested the book for this month and who will lead the discussion on September 15th.

Tom is an experienced attorney. His wife, Denise, who is also a regular participant at our meetings, is the Utah Assistant Attorney General in charge of environmental matters.

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Last post by TheChancellors
Fri Sep 10, 2010 7:53 pm
Original Proposal - The Big Sort: Why The Clustering Of Like-Minded America Is Tearing Us Apart - Sep. 15th
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Rosh Hashanah begins at sundown on the second Wednesday of September. Accordingly, our next meeting will be on Wednesday, September 15. The dislocation should be minimal because each quarter there is always one 5-week gap between meetings and September 15th (vs. September 8th) will simply mean that the 5-week gap this quarter will occur before our September meeting rather than after it. We apologize for any inconvenience.

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Last post by UtahOwl
Sun Aug 15, 2010 3:51 am
Participant Comments - The Big Sort: Why The Clustering Of Like-Minded America Is Tearing Us Apart - Sep. 15th

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Last post by solutions
Sun Aug 29, 2010 12:42 pm
Reference Materials - The Big Sort: Why The Clustering Of Like-Minded America Is Tearing Us Apart - Sep. 15th
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THE BIG SORT: WHY THE CLUSTERING OF LIKE-MINDED AMERICA IS TEARING US APART by Bill Bishop and Robert Cushing (available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $10.85 + shipping)

Bill Clinton has been discussing and recommending "The Big Sort" in speeches across the nation -- "Some of us are going to have to cross the street, folks."

It is the untold story of why America is so culturally and politically divided. America may be more diverse than ever coast to coast, but the places where we live are becoming increasingly crowded with people who live, think, and vote like we do. This social transformation didn't happen by accident. We've built a country where we can all choose the neighborhood and church and news show most compatible with our lifestyle and beliefs. And we are living with the consequences of this way-of-life segregation. Our country has become so polarized, so ideologically inbred, that people don't know and can't understand those who live just a few miles away. The reason for this situation, and the dire implications for our country, are the subject of this ground-breaking work.

In 2004, journalist Bill Bishop made national news in a series of articles when he first described "the big sort." Armed with original and startling demographic data, he showed how Americans have been sorting themselves over the past three decades into homogeneous communities -- not at the regional level, or the red-state/blue-state level, but at the micro level of city and neighborhood.

In The Big Sort (Houghton Mifflin 5/7/2008) Bishop and Robert Cushing, a retired University of Texas sociology professor, deepen the analysis in a brilliantly reported book that makes its case from the ground up, starting with stories about how we live today, and then drawing on history, economics, and our changing political landscape to create one of the most compelling big-picture accounts of America in recent memory.

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Last post by johnkarls
Sun Aug 15, 2010 5:18 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Greg Mortenson's Stones Into Schools: Promoting Peace With Books, Not Bombs, In Afghanistan and Pakistan - August 11th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Aug 07, 2010 4:47 am
Original Proposal - Greg Mortenson's Stones Into Schools: Promoting Peace With Books, Not Bombs, In Afghanistan and Pakistan - August 11th

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Last post by Pat
Sat Jul 17, 2010 7:34 am
Participant Comments - Greg Mortenson's Stones Into Schools: Promoting Peace With Books, Not Bombs, In Afghanistan and Pakistan - August 11th
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Click here for, inter alia, Pat’s remarks that (1) when last we considered Afghanistan in April 2009 seventeen months ago, we issued one of our “six-degrees-of-separation CALLS TO ACTION” for everyone to send (and request all of their friends and acquaintances in an unending chain to send) an e-mail to President Obama recommending beefing up and relying on human intelligence to thwart Osama bin Laden’s fatwa to nuke 10 million Americans, and (2) documentation that this position has been recommended during the last month by Dr. Richard Haass.

Dr. Haass has, since July 2003, been President of the Council on Foreign Relations which, inter alia, publishes Foreign Affairs Magazine. Dr. Haass is the author or editor of eleven books on American foreign policy, including War of Necessity, War of Choice: A Memoir of Two Iraq Wars (Simon and Schuster, May 2009). From January 2001 to June 2003, Dr. Richard Haass was director of policy planning for the Department of State, where he was a principal adviser to Secretary of State Colin Powell. Confirmed by the U.S. Senate to hold the rank of ambassador, Dr. Haass also served as U.S. coordinator for policy toward the future of Afghanistan and U.S. envoy to the Northern Ireland peace process. From 1989 to 1993, he was special assistant to President George H. W. Bush and senior director for Near East and South Asian affairs on the staff of the National Security Council. In 1991, Dr. Haass was awarded the Presidential Citizens Medal for his contributions to the development and articulation of U.S. policy during operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm. Previously, he served in the Departments of State (1981-85) and Defense (1979-80). Dr. Haass also was vice president and director of foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a lecturer in public policy at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government. A Rhodes Scholar, Dr. Haass holds an M.A. and Ph.D. from Oxford University.

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Last post by Pat
Tue Aug 03, 2010 11:26 am
Reference Materials - Greg Mortenson's Stones Into Schools: Promoting Peace With Books, Not Bombs, In Afghanistan and Pakistan - August 11th

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Last post by Pat
Tue Jul 20, 2010 7:11 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - The Broken Branch: How Congress Is Failing America And How To Get It Back - July 14th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Jul 10, 2010 4:26 am
Original Proposal - The Broken Branch: How Congress Is Failing America And How To Get It Back - July 14th

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Last post by UtahOwl
Sun Jun 13, 2010 10:18 am
Participant Comments - "The Broken Branch: How Congress Is Failing America And How To Get It Back" - July 14th

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Last post by Ted Gurney
Sat Jul 03, 2010 10:23 am
Reference Materials - The Broken Branch: How Congress Is Failing America and How To Get It Back - July 14th

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Last post by johnkarls
Wed Jun 16, 2010 12:00 pm
Suggested Discussion Outline - Arizona's New Immigration Law - June 9th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Jun 05, 2010 4:01 am
Original Proposal - Arizona's New Immigration Law - June 9th
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Proposed by solutions » Thu May 06, 2010 12:25 pm (78 views before being transplanted here)

I propose we discuss Arizona's new immigration law. The reading materials would be:

(1) the text of the Arizona law itself,
(2) the materials posted on this bulletin board for our discussion of immigration on 10 January 2007, and
(3) whatever current (or non-current) materials any of our members would like to post.

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No posts
Participant Comments - Arizona's New Immigration Law - June 9th

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Last post by BillLee
Tue Jun 01, 2010 5:37 am
Reference Materials - Arizona's New Immigration Law - June 9th
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Click here for, among other things, the text of Arizona's new immigration law.

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Last post by TheChancellors
Tue Jun 01, 2010 5:49 pm
Meeting Cancellation - After Iran Gets The Bomb (Foreign Affairs Magazine Lead Article) - May 12th
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The meeting is cancelled as of 9 May 2010. Please click here for particulars.

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Last post by johnkarls
Sun May 09, 2010 3:45 pm
Original Proposal - After Iran Gets The Bomb (Foreign Affairs Magazine Lead Article) - May 12th
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Click here to view the original proposal comprising --

(1) The Foreign Affairs article (11.5 pages),
(2) A NY Times news article (2 pages) putting the Foreign Affairs article in context, and
(3) An essay by (3 pages) providing a sharper focus for the NY Times article.

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Last post by Pat
Sat Mar 20, 2010 3:35 pm
Participant Comments - After Iran Gets The Bomb (Foreign Affairs Magazine Lead Article) - May 12th

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Last post by johnkarls
Mon May 03, 2010 9:09 pm
Reference Materials - After Iran Gets The Bomb (Foreign Affairs Magazine Lead Article) - May 12th
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The first three reference materials = The Foreign Affairs article (11.5 Microsoft Word pages), a NY Times article (2 pages) providing context for the Foreign Affairs article, and an essay (3 pages) providing sharper focus =

Even is one presumes Arabs are more gullible than Charles de Gaulle or the Israelis, both of whom refused to place any trust whatsoever in the American nuclear umbrella (as a result of which Israel for the last 37 years has not been the answer to the trivia question – What WAS Israel?) – (1) can mutually-assured nuclear destruction (“MAD”) work with Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, or (2) is he more like Fidel Castro who, Soviet archives de-classified in the Glasnost era disclosed, was ready to fire the Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba at the U.S. upon their discovery in October 1962 if Nikita Khrushchev hadn’t ordered the missiles removed from the custody of a “mad man” (Khrushchev’s term for Castro after receiving Castro’s offer to destroy himself and the Cuban people)).

This may be the most important issue facing the world today – since it is unlikely that more than a small portion of the human race would be able to survive without Middle Eastern oil supplies that have become radioactive. After all, losing most of the world’s oil production impacts not only transportation, but also the production of fertilizer and heating oil.

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Last post by Pat
Sun Apr 18, 2010 3:55 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - "The Shock Doctrine: Rise of Disaster Capitalism" - April 14

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Last post by solutions
Sat Apr 10, 2010 10:10 am
Original Proposal - The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism - April 14
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The focus will be "The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism" - a former NY Times bestseller by Naomi Klein, available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $10.88 + shipping.

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Last post by TheChancellors
Fri Mar 19, 2010 2:55 pm
Participant Comments - "The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism" - April 14

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Last post by Pat
Sat Apr 10, 2010 9:10 am
Reference Materials - The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism - April 14
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Click here for the NY Times Book Review of "The Shock Doctrine" -- the reviewer = Joseph E. Stiglitz, Nobel Laureate in Economics 2001; Columbia U. Professor; previously (among other things) Chair of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers (1995-97); Chief Economist of the World Bank (1997-2000); his latest book is “Making Globalization Word”

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Last post by johnkarls
Fri Mar 19, 2010 2:29 pm
“SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION” CALL TO ACTION = The Supreme Court’s Recent Corporate-Campaign-Contribution Decision - (ONLY 5 MINUTES NEEDED TO PARTICIPATE)
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If you agree with our legally-sound legislative response to the Supreme Court's 1/21/2010 decision to invalidate the restrictions of McCain-Feingold campaign-finance law on independent campaign expenditures of corporations and unions, please click here to participate in our six-degrees-of-separation campaign to request every American to contact both President Obama and Senator McCain to propose and support our suggestion.

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Last post by johnkarls
Sun Mar 14, 2010 11:23 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - US Supreme Court 1/21/2010 Decision on Campaign Contributions by Corporations - March 10

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Last post by johnkarls
Tue Mar 09, 2010 4:55 pm
Original Proposal - U.S. Supreme Court 1/21/2010 Decision on Campaign Contributions by Corporations - March 10
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Click here for -
(1) Pat's original proposal 3 days before the State of the Union Speech;
(2) NY Times news account of the Supreme Court Decision; and
(3) Reuters news account of President Obama's attack on the decision during the State of the Union speech and Justice Samuel Alito's televised reaction mouthing "not true" to the President's claims.

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Last post by Pat
Fri Feb 12, 2010 5:23 am
Participant Comments - U.S. Supreme Court 1/21/2010 Decision on Campaign Contributions by Corporations - March 10

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Last post by johnkarls
Fri Feb 26, 2010 11:15 pm
Reference Materials - U.S. Supreme Court 1/21/2010 Decision on Campaign Contributions by Corporations - March 10
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Click here to view, for example -
(1) the text of the Supreme Court decisions.
(2) a Feb. 10 OpEd Article by Ralph Nader Re Corporate "Free Speech."

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Last post by Pat
Wed Mar 10, 2010 12:46 pm
Suggested Discussion Outline - When China Rules The World - Feb 10th

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Last post by TheChancellors
Tue Feb 09, 2010 1:07 pm
Original Proposal - Martin Jacques' "When China Rules The World" - Feb. 10th
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Martin Jacques co-edited and co-authored “The Forward March of Labour Halted?, The Politics of Thatcherism” and “New Times.” Jacques co-founded the U.K. think tank Demos, has been a columnist for The Times of London, and was an editor of Marxism Today and a deputy editor of The Independent. He currently writes a regular column for The Guardian. He is a visiting senior fellow at the London School of Economics – Ideas (a Centre for the Study of International Affairs, Diplomacy and Grand Strategy) and a visiting research fellow at the London School of Economics - Asia Research Centre. He has recently been a visiting professor at Renmin University (Beijing, China), at The International Centre for Chinese Studies - Aichi University (Nagoya, Japan), and at Ritsumeikan University (Kyoto, Japan) and a senior visiting research fellow at The Asia Research Institute (National University of Singapore).

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Last post by Pat
Sun Jan 10, 2010 12:03 pm
Reference Mats + Participant Comments - When China Rules the World - Feb 10th -- including Suggested Answers to the Short Quiz and the NY Times Book Review on "When China Rules The World"

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Last post by SirArthurC
Sun Jan 31, 2010 5:19 pm
“SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION” CALL TO ACTION = The ONLY Way To Transform The Prevailing SINGLE-DIGIT Inner-City High School Graduation Rates to 65%-70% And Beyond - (ONLY 5 MINUTES NEEDED TO PARTICIPATE)

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Last post by johnkarls
Sun Jan 17, 2010 7:09 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Oprah Winfrey's "Precious" - Jan. 13th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sun Jan 10, 2010 6:52 am
Original Proposal - Continuing Our Oprah Tradition With "Precious" – Jan 13th
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Three years ago, which was two years before the 2008 election, we read "The Audacity of Hope" and "Dreams From My Father" because a new U.S. Senator from Illinois who took office only 22 months earlier had just been recommended for President of the U.S. by Oprah Winfrey.

This coming Wed Jan 13th, we will focus on the story of "Precious" =

(A) the movie currently showing in first-run theaters for which Oprah Winfrey is the moving force (listed as the first of 4 Executive Producers) and starring Mariah Carey as the social worker of Clareece "Precious" Jones; and

(B) the book version which was originally named "Push" but has been re-printed in paperback as "Precious" - available in your local library or for $8.47 + shipping from Amazon.com.

For further information, click here for NPR's "Everything Considered" item of 11/6/2009.

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Last post by johnkarls
Wed Nov 25, 2009 4:17 pm
Participant Comments and Reference Materials - Continuing Our Oprah Tradition With “Precious” – Jan 13th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Jan 02, 2010 4:59 am
“SIX-DEGREES-OF-SEPARATION” CALL TO ACTION = Eliminating Unemployment With A “National Security Work Force” (ONLY 5 MINUTES NEEDED TO PARTICIPATE)

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Dec 12, 2009 12:59 am
Original Proposal - Dorothy Kearns Goodwin's Pulitzer-Prize Winning "No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II" - Dec. 9
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We will focus on Dorothy Kearns Gooodwin’s Pulitzer Prize winning “No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II” (available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $13.64 + shipping) with special emphasis on FDR’s “Economic Bill of Rights” from his 1944 “State of the Union” Speech, given 10 months before his re-election for a fourth term and a mere 15 months before he died in office –

1. The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;

2. The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;

3. The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;

4. The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;

5. The right of every family to a decent home;

6. The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;

7. The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;

8. The right to a good education.
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Last post by VictoriaNortonStrong
Sat Sep 12, 2009 4:21 am
Participant Comments and Reference Materials - Dorothy Kearns Goodwin's Pulitzer-Prize Winning "No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt: The Home Front in World War II" - Dec. 9

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Last post by BillV
Wed Dec 09, 2009 7:19 am
"SIX DEGREES OF SEPARATION" CALL TO ACTION - General Motors & the EPA Perpetrating Fraud Re the Chevrolet Volt (ONLY 5 MINUTES NEEDED TO PARTICIPATE)

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Last post by solutions
Sat Nov 28, 2009 5:02 am
Original Proposal - General Motors + the EPA Perpetrating Fraud Re the Chevrolet Volt - Nov 18
Originally proposed by Pat on 17 August 2009
361 views before being transplanted here on 24 October 2009

There is no assigned book this month. However, there is a wealth of materials posted on this bulletin board from previous discussions of the environmental disaster that is a coal-fired or natural-gas fired electrical-generation plant =

(1) For 6 September 2007 (23 months ago) – “Electricity - The Biggest Polluter” posted under Participant Comments on “Assault on Reason”

(2) For 11 October 2007 (22 months ago) – everything posted for that date as we focused on “Big Coal: The Dirty Secret Behind America’s Energy Future” by Jeff Goodell © 2006 (available from your local library or in paperback from Amazon.com for $9.50 new/$1.29 used + shipping).

(3) For 9 July 2008 (13 months ago) – Q&A No. 4 posted under Participant Comments on “Everything About Oil”

(4) For 12 November 2008 (9 months ago) – The Entire First Quiz and Suggested Answers as we were focusing on Al Gore’s Challenge to America – focusing on the disappointing championing by Barack Obama of the coal industry IN OPPOSITION TO AL GORE!!!
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Last post by Pat
Sat Oct 24, 2009 7:37 am
Participant Comments - General Motors and the EPA Perpetrating Fraud Re the Chevrolet Volt - Nov 18

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Last post by solutions
Wed Nov 11, 2009 11:07 am
Reference Materials – General Motors and the EPA Perpetrating Fraud Re the Chevrolet Volt – Nov 18
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Electric motors are 4 TIMES THE ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER as gasoline engines of equal power, because all new electrical-generation plants for many decades have been (and for the foreseeable future will be) fueled by coal (or in a few cases by natural gas, which is also a hydrocarbon producing the same amount of greenhouse gases) -- AND 75% OF THE ENERGY CONTENT OF THE COAL OR NATURAL GAS IS EXPENDED IN GENERATING THE ELECTRICITY!!!

The Chevrolet Volt, which General Motors estimates will get 230 miles per gallon of gasoline in city driving, IS A FRAUD FROM AN ENVIRONMENTAL VIEWPOINT!!!

The Volt is a “plug in” electric vehicle with a range of 40 miles. So for the first 40 miles of each trip, the Volt’s mileage on the basis of gasoline consumption is infinite.

However, when the Volt has traveled 40 miles and its batteries are exhausted, it has a gasoline engine that, INSTEAD OF POWERING THE CAR DIRECTLY, kicks in to power a generator which re-charges the batteries to keep the car running!!!

So, for the portion of any trip over 40 miles, the Volt’s mileage as measured by gasoline consumption is going to be 25% of the mileage of a conventional gasoline-powered automobile (assuming that the Volt loses the same 75% in electrical generation as the country’s electric utility industry).

So if you assume virtually all of your driving comprises trips exceeding 40 miles each, your mileage in terms of gasoline is 25% of a conventional gasoline-powered car. And if you assume all of your driving comprises trips of less than 40 miles between re-charging, your mileage in terms of gasoline is infinite.

Obviously, General Motors could have picked any number it wanted!!!

And it arbitrarily chose 230 miles per gallon of gasoline!!!

HOWEVER, THIS IS MISLEADING AND, INDEED, FRAUDULENT BECAUSE IT IS DESIGNED TO FOOL THE PUBLIC INTO BELIEVING THAT THE VOLT IS ENVIRONMENTALLY DESIRABLE -- RATHER THAN THE ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER THAT IT IS!!!

The two oldest items (in terms of time/date posted) are stories in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, both dated 11 August 2009, that were included by Pat in the original proposal of this topic on 17 August 2009 to demonstrate how the country’s media uncritically bought the fraud perpetrated by General Motors’ announcement of 230 miles per gallon for the Volt.

The next 2 articles (in terms of time/date posted) result from Googling “Chevrolet Volt” on 3 November 2009. More than half of the top 50 “hits” were General Motors web sites and virtually all of the rest were regurgitations of General Motors propaganda. Virtually the only 2 exceptions =

The U.S. News & World Report article of 11 August 2009 which, unlike the gullible NY Times and the gullible Wall Street Journal, actually explained the fraud that General Motors was perpetrating.

The year-old Car and Driver article of October 2008 which, after discussing at length such issues as styling and the tremendous extra costs of the batteries, etc., finally reported uncritically the claims of General Motors regarding the cost of the plug-in electricity on a per-mile basis vs. gasoline costs.

First, General Motors claims regarding the cost of the electricity are suspect, since they almost certainly contain quite a bit of hydroelectric power which costs virtually nothing -- but no new dams have been built in the U.S. for many decades.

Second, even the cost of electricity from a coal-fired electrical plant is not a true measure of the environmental disaster that a coal-fired electrical plant is, because the price of coal is always a mere fraction of the cost of crude oil if they are compared in terms of energy content.

Third, General Motors ignores the 75% environmental disaster from its gasoline engine kicking in after 40 miles between re-charging.

SO FOR BOTH THE FIRST 40 MILES BETWEEN RE-CHARGING AND THE ADDITIONAL MILES WHEN THE GASOLINE ENGINE KICKS IN TO GENERATE MORE ELECTRICITY, THE VOLT IS AN ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER!!!
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Last post by Pat
Sun Nov 15, 2009 1:18 am
Original Proposal - American Policy Toward Israel - Oct 14th
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American Policy Toward Israel including (1) former Vice President Cheney telling Mike Wallace Aug 30 that he had strongly advocated attacking Iran's nuclear facilities while Vice President, (2) the Wall Street Journal Lead Editorial Aug 31 saying Israel is about to attack Iran's nuclear facilities after very-publicly "war gaming" attack scenarios WITH EGYPTIAN COOPERATION, (3) the announced intention of the Gulf State Six (Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Oman) TO EACH GO NUCLEAR if Iran acquires nuclear weapons, and (4) Iran's reaction to the military threat from Israel and Egypt by requesting the United Nations to condemn at a September meeting any attack on anybody's nuclear facilities under any circumstances.

Our suggested reading is "A Safe Haven: Harry S. Truman and the Founding of Israel" by Allis Radosh and Ronald Radosh - available from your local library or from Amazon.com ($18.47 new or $15.11 used - plus shipping, or $9.99 electronically). And for extra credit, "Israel is Real" (library - Amazon for $17.82/$13.75 + shipping) which, as seems to be suggested by the reviewer, takes the provocative view that Jews should not be fixated on having a homeland despite the fact that Jewish refugees fleeing Hitler were denied admission by the rest of the world and sent back to Germany. The NY Times Reviews of both books are posted here.
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Last post by solutions
Mon Aug 31, 2009 8:12 pm
Participant Comments - American Policy Toward Israel - Oct 14th

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Last post by BillV
Thu Oct 08, 2009 4:31 am
Reference Materials - American Policy Toward Israel - Oct 14th
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Please see especially “U.N. Information on Palestinian Refugees” and “General Arab Population + Income Stats”

The Suggested Answers to the Short Quiz in the Preceding Section on “Participant Comments” traced the history of Israel-Palestine for the last 2,000 years – AND ENDED WITH THE OBSERVATION THAT MERE “COST EFFECTIVENESS” WOULD DICTATE THAT THE UNITED STATES OFFER TO MAKE EACH PALESTINIAN REFUGEE (WOMAN, MAN OR CHILD) A MILLIONAIRE ON CONDITION THAT S/HE USE THE MONEY TO LEAVE THE REFUGEE CAMPS AND GET A REAL LIFE!!! BECAUSE DECIDING (EVEN UNCONSCIOUSLY) TO LET THIS SITUATION FESTER FOR ANOTHER 60 YEARS WILL ALMOST CERTAINLY END SOONER IN A NUCLEAR BATTLE OF ARMAGEDDON PRODUCING A WORLDWIDE “TWILIGHT OF THE HUMANS”!!!

The 9/28/2009 posting on “U.N. Information on Palestinian Refugees” takes a look at the United Nation’s own web site for the U.N. Relief and Agency Works which, since 1950, has registered the Palestinian refugees and run refugee camps for them. In 1950, there were only 750,000 Palestinian refugees. Today, they have multiplied to 4.6 million – with 1.3 million of that total living in the U.N. refugee camps in near-abject poverty and the remainder faring little better. The U.N. camps are located in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the West Bank and Gaza.

The 10/4/2009 posting on “General Arab Population + Income Stats” estimates that to raise the standard-of-living of the 4.6 million Palestinian refugees to the level prevailing in the 12 countries in the Arab League whose economies are not primarily based on oil, would require annual underwriting of $6 billion/year.

HOWEVER, WHAT WAS INTENDED BY THE OFF-HAND THOUGHT OF MAKING PALESTINIAN REFUGEES MILLIONAIRES WAS TO DO MORE THAN SIMPLY GIVE THE PALESTINIANS A “COUNTRY” COMPRISING THE WEST BANK AND GAZA – WITH ALL THE PALESTINIAN REFUGEES CONTINUING TO LIVE IN POVERTY IN THE REFUGEE CAMPS!!!

Obviously what is needed is more than a “land for peace” deal – SOMEONE NEEDS TO DESIGN AN ECONOMIC PROGRAM THAT WILL TAKE THE REFUGEES OUT OF THEIR CAMPS AND MAKE THEM PROSPEROUS!!!

The “first step” was the estimate of how much it would cost/year to simply raise the standard of living of the Palestinian refugees to the level prevailing in the other 12 non-oil Arab countries at $6 billion/year.

Now think about what could be accomplished if you took that amount of money for, say, 10 years and designed a real economic-development program for all 4.6 million Palestinian refugees – bringing all of them together in the New Palestine (or how many ever of them can be enticed to leave the refugee camps in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria). AFTER ALL, $6 BILLION/YEAR FOR 10 YEARS IS ONLY 33% OF GIVING EGYPT $3 BILLION/YEAR OF FOREIGN ECONOMIC AID AND ISRAEL $3 BILLION/YEAR OF FOREIGN ECONOMIC AID BEGINNING IN 1979 WHEN THEY SIGNED THEIR PEACE AGREEMENT – AND WE ARE STILL GIVING BOTH CLOSE TO THAT 30 YEARS LATER!!!

As a “ball park” estimate of what would be required, let’s assume that half of the 4.6 million Palestinian refugees are minors and that what we should be doing is providing each of them with a good education that will equip them to compete successfully in the modern world, and let’s assume that the other half are adults who, with some basic training, could handle the jobs that would go with economic development – construction, irrigation, agriculture, manufacturing, etc. If a careful assessment were made about what the comparative strengths would be for the new country of Palestine (assuming appropriate education for minors and training for adults), it should be possible to get rid of the refugee camps and bring prosperity to the Palestinians.

Unfortunately, it does not appear that anyone is giving any thought to doing this!!! Instead, everyone appears to be taking the attitude toward the Palestinians – “You can have your own country if you stop bothering everyone else” – BUT THAT WON’T SOLVE THE REAL PROBLEM!!!
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13 Topics

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Last post by johnkarls
Sun Oct 04, 2009 12:06 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Health Care/Insurance Reform - Sep. 9th

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4 Posts

Last post by UtahOwl
Wed Sep 09, 2009 9:31 am
Bill Lee's Original Proposal - Health-Care (or Health-Insurance) Reform - Sep 9th
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Our next meeting is THIS WEDNESday evening September 9th - Salt Lake Public Library (210 East 400 South) - Conf. Rm. C (special elevator just inside EAST entrance).

Join us for socializing at 6:00 pm DURING WHICH JANUS DANIELS WILL ACCESS PRES. OBAMA'S SPEECH STREAMING LIVE OVER THE INTERNET or, if you prefer, come from 7:00 pm > 8:45 pm for our previously-planned discussion of health care/insurance reform.

We provide coffee/decaf + chocolate chunk cookies - or bring a sandwich/quiche/dessert from the Library Branch of the Salt Lake Roasting Company just inside the EAST entrance - or bring your own snack/beverage.

THERE IS NO BOOK THIS TIME TO READ (our group voted for Bill Lee's recommendation that "we consider once more all aspects of health-care reform as it heads for final passage this fall") though there is quite a bit of information posted on our bulletin board = http://www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org not only for this month but also for the last two times we addressed the subject 24 months ago and 5 months ago.
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Last post by BillLee
Sun Aug 16, 2009 11:13 am
Participant Comments - Health-Care (Health-Insurance) Reform - Sep 9th

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Last post by BillLee
Sat Aug 29, 2009 7:54 pm
Reference Materials - Health-Care (Health-Insurance) Reform - Sep 9th
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There is no suggested book to read for this month.

However for extra credit, you can skim the last four items posted in this section (they were posted as "replies" to Bill's proposal by two of our participants before Bill’s proposal was adopted) -

(1) An Op-Ed Article by the CEO of Safeway Inc. describing how they have lowered their health-care costs by 38% by charging employees for the extra actuarial cost of smoking and obesity (which is reminiscent of the "U.K. Fat Tax" Proposal by Oxford University posted on our web site for our discussion 24 months ago);

(2) An Op-Ed Article by a Wharton Professor of Health-Care Management and Insurance/Risk Management about incenting good behavior in general;

(3) A Washington Post news report on the July 16 Congressional Budget Office Report on how none of the health-care bills in Congress control costs - touching off the firestorm of opposition that is still raging; and

(4) Utah Owl's recommended web sites for info about the issue.

Also of pivotal interest in understanding the debate about so-called “death panels” is the Wikipedia article on “Quality-Adjusted Life Years” (or “QALY”) which explains how insurance policies (both employer-provided and individual policies) determine what procedures will be covered. And the article by Harvard Econ Prof Marty Feldstein (former Chair of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers) mentions, among other interesting points, that Britain’s National Health Service will only cover procedures that cost less than £ 30,000 (or $49,685) per QALY. It should be noted that so-called “gold-plated” employer-provided health-insurance plans range as high as $500,000 per QALY.

And for anyone interested in additional background material to supplement current news reports, there is quite a bit of interesting material posted on this bulletin board for the last two times we discussed health care - 24 months ago and 5 months ago.

THERE IS A GOOD CHANCE OUR DISCUSSION WILL RESULT IN ONE OF OUR "SIX DEGREES OF SEPARATION" APPEALS FOR EVERYONE TO E-MAIL PRESIDENT OBAMA WITH RESPECT TO A PARTICULAR OPPORTUNITY, AND FOR EVERYONE TO REQUEST THEIR FRIENDS AND ACQUAINTANCES TO DO THE SAME IN AN UNENDING CHAIN.
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Last post by solutions
Thu Aug 20, 2009 5:13 am
Original Proposal - Three Cups of Tea - August 12th
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Our focus will be Utah Owl’s recommendation of “Three Cups of Tea” by Greg Mortenson – about one American mountain climber’s struggle to build schools in Pakistan’s mountainous tribal region, home of Al Qaeda.

Available from your local library or from Amazon.com in Paperback for $9.00 new/$3.97 used + shipping.
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Last post by UtahOwl
Sun Jul 12, 2009 6:07 am
Participant Comments - "Three Cups of Tea" - Aug. 12th

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Last post by solutions
Sat Aug 08, 2009 10:14 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - How to Change The World - July 8th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Jul 04, 2009 8:48 am
Original Proposal - How To Change The World - July 8th
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Our focus will be “How To Change The World: Social Entrepreneurs and the Power of New Ideas” By David Bornstein (available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $10.85 + shipping).

Nelson Mandela –
“Wonderfully hopeful and enlightening…The stories of these social entrepreneurs will inspire and encourage many people who seek to build a better world.”

NY Times –
“The book is must reading for anyone who cares about building a more equitable, and therefore more stable, world.”

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Last post by Pat
Sat Apr 25, 2009 3:57 am
Participant Comments - How To Change The World - July 8th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Jun 27, 2009 4:15 pm
Reference Materials - How To Change The World - July 8th
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Although the NY Times has never published formal book reviews of either of David Bornstein’s two most famous books (“The Price of a Dream: The Story of the Grameen Bank” which probably provided the publicity that garnered the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize for the Grameen Bank and its founder, Muhammad Yunus, and our current focus “How To Change The World: Social Entrepreneurs and the Power of New Ideas” which was a NY Times Hardcover Bestseller), this section contains –

Two articles that focus primarily on Bornstein and “How to Change the World” –

(1) A Social Solution, Without Going the Nonprofit Route – 3/4/2009
(2) Of Globalization and the Greater Good – 2/22/2004

and two Letters to the Editor of the NY Times by David Bornstein and the articles that provoked him –

(1) A Nobel Prize for Wal-Mart? – 10/20/2006
(2) Inch By Inch, A Lifeline For The Poor – 5/2/2004
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Last post by johnkarls
Sun Jun 28, 2009 8:38 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Come Home America - June 10

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Jun 06, 2009 3:49 am
Original Proposal - Come Home America - June 10
We will focus on Utah Owl’s recommendation of William Greider's new book, “Come Home, America: The Rise and Fall (and Redeeming Promise) of Our Country” on his ideas about why America is losing its global leadership position and how ordinary people can use profound global changes at hand to build a more equitable society. You can download audio of Diane Rehm's interview with Greider at http://wamu.org/programs/dr/09/04/08.php#25615 - second segment of this show. The book is available at your local library or from Amazon.com for $16.52 new & $14.17 used + shipping.

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Last post by UtahOwl
Sat May 16, 2009 11:25 am
The Banking Imbroglio - Come Home America - June 10
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Considerable e-mail correspondence has been received from our members on the subjects of “toxic assets,” the “mark-to-market” rules, the bank “stress tests” and now this week’s announcement that virtually all of the large banks (except Citibank, Wells Fargo and Bank of America) will be permitted to repay the U.S. government for loans made to them under TARP.

These materials have been posted for everyone to read because “Come Home America” (as well as William Greider’s previous best-selling books) have focused to a considerable extent on economic problems. And because posting them for everyone to see should facilitate our discussion this evening.

Apparently, the reason why so much e-mail has been directed toward me is that I majored in economics in college before attending Harvard Law School and, I am guessing, the authors of the e-mails thought I had sounded knowledgeable in past postings on our bulletin board when we had discussed economic issues. In addition, much of this issue deals with the “mark-to-market” accounting rule and I did receive the Sells Silver Medal for ranking 2d out of 28,788 candidates nationally on the Fall 1971 Uniform CPA Exam.

(I hope readers will NOT assume that this is an attempt to brag, but merely an attempt to re-assure them that my comments can be accepted with some degree of accuracy.)

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Last post by johnkarls
Wed Jun 10, 2009 10:37 am
Participant Comments - Come Home America - June 10
THIS SECTION CONTAINS A TRANSCRIPT OF PRESIDENT OBAMA'S JUNE 4 CAIRO SPEECH FOLLOWING THE SUGGESTED ANSWERS TO THE SHORT QUIZ (since it relates to Q&A 12).

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Last post by Pat
Fri Jun 05, 2009 7:44 pm
Reference Materials - Come Home America - June 10
We will focus on Utah Owl's recommendation of William Greider's new book, "Come Home, America: The Rise and Fall (and Redeeming Promise) of Our Country" (published by Rodale 3/17/2009) - available at your local library or from Amazon.com for $17.13 new or $15.00 used + shipping.

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Last post by johnkarls
Sun May 31, 2009 2:41 am
CALL TO ACTION - The ONLY Way To Transform SINGLE-DIGIT Inner-City High School Graduation Rates to 65%-70% - Only 5 Minutes Needed to Answer the Call to Action

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat May 16, 2009 12:04 pm
Suggested Discussion Outline - A Report Card for U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan - May 13

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat May 09, 2009 9:28 am
Original Proposal - A Report Card for US Education Secretary Arne Duncan - May 13
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Focusing on whether to re-direct our January 14th six-degrees-of-separation e-mail campaign on "Separate BUT UNEQUAL Public Schools" toward Secretary Duncan (please see this bulletin board below re Jan 14th for details).

Suggested reading = “The Obama Education Plan: An Education Week Guide” (available from your local library or from Amazon.com from $7.83 + shipping).

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Last post by johnkarls
Mon Apr 06, 2009 7:33 am
Participant Comments - A Report Card for US Education Secretary Arne Duncan - May 13
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Our focus is Separate BUT UNEQUAL Public Schools and "The Obama Education Plan: An Education Week Guide by Education Week" (available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $14.95 (used $7.83) + shipping) and actions/decisions being taken by Education Secretary Arne Duncan.

We anticipate re-directing our six-degrees-of-separation e-mail campaign of last January from President Obama to Secretary Duncan who has an unheard-of $5 billion in the proposed budget over which he has 100% discretion and so far the Administration has been ignoring the only factor that can transform single-digit inner-city high-school graduation rates to 65%-70%!!! The budget will be approved in the next few weeks and a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to do something significant vis-à-vis educating inner-city kids effectively will be lost!!!

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Last post by johnkarls
Tue May 05, 2009 11:38 am
Reference Materials - A Report Card for US Education Secretary Arne Duncan - May 13
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Our focus is Separate BUT UNEQUAL Public Schools and "The Obama Education Plan: An Education Week Guide by Education Week" (available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $14.95 (used $7.83) + shipping) and actions/decisions being taken by Education Secretary Arne Duncan.

We anticipate re-directing our six-degrees-of-separation e-mail campaign of last January from President Obama to Secretary Duncan who has an unheard-of $5 billion in the proposed budget over which he has 100% discretion and so far the Administration has been ignoring the only factor that can transform single-digit inner-city high-school graduation rates to 65%-70%!!! The budget will be approved in the next few weeks and a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to do something significant vis-à-vis educating inner-city kids effectively will be lost!!!

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Last post by Site Administrator
Sun Apr 19, 2009 6:15 am
CALL TO ACTION – Human Intelligence vs. Surging in Afghanistan From 17,000 U.S. Troops to 70,000 and Beyond
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Click here for how to participate in our six-degrees-of-separation "Call to Action" to send (and have all of our friends and acquaintances send in an unending chain) an e-mail to President Obama respectfully requesting an explanation of why human intelligence capabilities, together with other programs that have been put in place since 9-11-2001, are not sufficient to protect America and its allies from potential attacks from terrorist organizations based in Afghanistan and Pakistan. And whether fighting an air war against the areas of Pakistan that are not controlled by its central government (thereby risking the extension of Fundamentalist-Islamic rule installed earlier this year in the Swat Valley to all of Pakistan) and trying to subjugate Afghanistan as a base to fight that air war when Afghanistan has never been conquered successfully for any length of time throughout recorded history, adds or detracts from our overall intelligence capabilities to detect and prevent terrorist attacks on America and its allies.

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Apr 11, 2009 1:18 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Afghanistan, President Obama's Vietnam and Pakistan, His Cambodia - April 8

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Last post by johnkarls
Sun Apr 05, 2009 1:44 pm
Original Proposal - Afghanistan, Pres. Obama's Vietnam and Pakistan, His Cambodia - April 8
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Focusing on --

(1) Newsweek's Cover Story for 2/9/2009 entiled "Obama's Vietnam" (posted here and under "Reference Materials" two sections below).

(2) "Counterinsurgency: Theory and Practice" by David Galula - considered "The Bible" by US General David Patraeus and required reading at the US Army's Command and General Staff School - available at your local library or from Amazon.com for $26.95 + shipping (unfortunately, the price is currently quite high due to extraordinary current demand from the U.S. media).

(3) The movie "Charlie Wilson's War" (2007) starring Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts, Philip Seymour-Hoffman and Amy Adams about one US Congressperson's covert expulsion of the Russians from Afghanistan in the 1980's - which raises the obvious question of why we think we can be more successful than the Russians in subjugating Afghanistan.

(*) For extra credit, read "The US Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual" (2007) by David Patraeus which is surprisingly readable - available at your local library or from Amazon.com for $10.20 (new) or $8.50 (used) + shipping.

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Last post by johnkarls
Thu Mar 05, 2009 6:40 am
Participant Comments - Afghanistan, Pres. Obama's Vietnam and Pakistan, His Cambodia - April 8

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Last post by johnkarls
Thu Mar 26, 2009 8:00 pm
Reference Materials - Afghanistan, Pres. Obama's Vietnam and Pakistan, His Cambodia - April 8
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Press here to view, among other things --

(1) The text of the Newsweek cover story for February 9, 2009 entitled "Obama's Vietnam"

(2) The NY Times 2/16/2009 story = "Pakistan Grants Autonomy to Swat Valley"

(3) Defense Secretary Gates on Pakistan "Safe Havens" for The Taliban and Al Qaeda Pivotal in Afgahnistan War

(4) President Obama's Official New Policy Announced March 27th per WhiteHouse.com

(5) "The Real Afghan Issue Is Pakistan – The President Has His Priorities Reversed" By Graham Allison and John Deutsch -- Graham Allison is the Founding Dean of Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government and the author of a book ("Nuclear Terrorism") on Osama bin Laden's fatwa to nuke 10 million Americans; he also served as Assistant Defense Secretary for Policy and Plans under President Clinton and was the "moving force" on the 2007 Democratic Congress' Commission on Preventing WMD Proliferation and Terrorism -- John Deutsch is a Professor at MIT and served as CIA Director in President Clinton's second term.

(6) News report that President Obama is mulling increasing his already-announced "surge" of 21,000 additional U.S. troops in Afghanistan by another 10,000 U.S. troops, for a total of 70,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
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Last post by johnkarls
Thu Apr 02, 2009 9:42 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - How Should Pres. Obama Reform Health Care - March 11

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Mar 07, 2009 9:38 pm
Original Proposal - How Should Pres. Obama Reform Health Care - March 11
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Click here to also view the article of the same title in The New Yorker of January 26th.

In addition, please read "Sick - The Untold Story of America's Health Care and the People Who Pay the Price" (Harper Collins 2007) by Jonathan Cohn, a Senior Editor at The New Republic (available from your local library or Amazon.com for $7.99 + shipping).

Please also see the voluminous material posted on this bulletin board for our August 2007 meeting 18 months ago.

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Last post by UtahOwl
Thu Feb 26, 2009 6:40 pm
Participant Comments - How Should Pres. Obama Reform Health Care - March 11

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Last post by UtahOwl
Wed Mar 11, 2009 4:50 pm
Suggested Discussion Outline - Saving the Democratic Party from Extinction: Foreign Policy - Feb. 11

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Last post by johnkarls
Mon Feb 09, 2009 7:47 am
Feb. 11 Topic = Saving the Democratic Party from Extinction - Foreign Policy
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The topic is "Saving the Democratic Party from Extinction - Foreign Policy" focusing on (1) last month's Report of the 2007 Democratic Congress' Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism (Chaired by Bob Graham, 18-year Democratic US Senator from Florida who resigned to run for President in 2004), and (2) "America and the World: Conversations on the Future of American Foreign Policy" between Zbigniew Brzezinski (National Security Adviser to President Jimmy Carter and Democratic Party foreign-policy spokesperson on all the "talking head" shows during the recent 2-year Presidential campaign) and Brent Scowcroft (National Security Adviser to President Ford and the first President Bush) - moderated by David Ignatius of the Washington Post.

BOTH BRZEZINSKI AND SCOWCROFT WROTE OP ED ARTICLES OPPOSING AN INVASION OF IRAQ 7 MONTHS BEFORE IT TOOK PLACE – SCOWCROFT IN THE WALL STREET JOURNAL OF 8/15/2002 AND BRZEZINSKI IN AN UNSPECIFIED (BY IGNATIUS) AUGUST 2002 ISSUE OF THE WASHINGTON POST.

Last month's Report of the 2007 Democratic Congress' Commission received wide publicity for one of its conclusions - that the U.S. will likely face a terrorist attack using nuclear or biological weapons by 2013. It would be a shame for the Democratic Party to become extinct if such an event were to occur.

Last month's Report of the 2007 Democratic Congress' Commission is posted on our bulletin board = http://www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org. Last fall's book of conversations of David Ignatius with Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft is available from your local library,or from Amazon.com for $18.15 new ($15.50 used) plus shipping.

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Last post by Pat
Sat Jan 03, 2009 9:38 pm
Participant Comments - Saving the Democratic Party from Extinction/Foreign Policy - Feb. 11

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Last post by AaronStander
Sun Feb 08, 2009 10:34 am
Report of the 2007 Democratic Congress' Commission on the Prevention of WMD Proliferation and Terrorism - Feb. 11
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Click here to view the Report of the 2007 Democratic Congress' Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism.

It is also available in PDF (Adobe) format at http://www.preventwmd.gov/report/.

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Jan 17, 2009 5:39 am
Other Background Mats - Saving the Democratic Party from Extinction/Foreign Policy - Feb. 11

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Last post by Pat
Fri Jan 23, 2009 4:18 am
CALL TO ACTION - Separate BUT UNEQUAL Public Schools
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Please click here to see how you can participate in solving the problem of the permanent American under-class created and perpetuated by separate BUT UNEQUAL inner-city public schools.

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As of January 21, it may no longer be possible to send the original e-mail contained in this section to President Obama. He has transformed http://www.change.gov/page/s/contact into a single window announcing that the transition is over and providing a button for the user to transfer to http://www.whitehouse.gov, which has been transformed with the departure of former President Bush.

Although the transformed http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/ provides a new suggestion box, IT NOW CONTAINS A LIMITATION OF 500 CHARACTERS (INCLUDING SPACES!!!)!!! Neither his old Senatorial suggestion box nor his President-Elect transition suggestion box had contained any limitation.

The message in our e-mail of last Saturday for sending to President Obama with respect to Separate BUT UNEQUAL Public Schools is 1,633 characters (including spaces), and our e-mail following our November meeting for sending to President Obama to encourage him to embrace Al Gore's Challenge to America to re-power our electrical grid to be based solely on solar and wind was 1,251 characters (including spaces).

The following protest (containing 489 characters including spaces) was filed on President Obama's new web site at 11:05 pm MST on January 21:

Dear Mr. President:

Our Reading Liberally/Salt Lake organization would like TO PROTEST your new limitation of 500 characters for messages to you!

We frequently encourage all of our members to contact you (and to contact all of their friends in an unending chain to contact you) with regard to issues we are studying (please see http://www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org for further info).

We suggest a limit of 500 WORDS would be more reasonable.

Thank you.

Sincerely yours,

John K.

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No auto-reply e-mail receipt (similar to the auto-reply e-mail receipts for the http://www.change.gov, an example of which is contained in the first item in this section of the bulletin board) has been received for the protest message even though it is only 489 characters long including spaces.

So we ran two tests.

(1) The original 1,561-character message was sent on January 22nd to http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/ by “cutting and pasting” the message into the “suggestion box” – it took all 1,561 characters but with no e-mail receipt, it is not certain the entire message (or indeed any part of it) went through.

(2) The original 1,561-character message was typed de novo (vs. “cutting and pasting”) into the http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/ “suggestion box” – which kept a “running count” of the characters (including spaces) AND DISABLED THE KEYBOARD AFTER 500 CHARACTERS!!!

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It is presumed that as soon as the White House staff discovers that “cutting and pasting” finesses their 500-character limitation (assuming the “cut and paste” test even went through on Jan 22nd), they will change their computer program to reject “cut and paste” messages exceeding the limit.

Accordingly, “solutions” has watered down our original e-mail message to President Obama (it is contained in the second item, time-wise, in this section) to comply with the 500 character limitation.

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Last post by solutions
Thu Jan 22, 2009 11:40 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Leaving Children Behind - Jan. 14

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Last post by johnkarls
Tue Jan 13, 2009 10:51 am
January 14th Topic = Leaving Children Behind
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Examining the position of the National Educational Association (the largest union of American K-12 teachers) on "No Child Left Behind" and the 2007 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court that race could NOT be considered by the school boards of Seattle WA and Louisville KY in order to achieve diversity -- in determining whether to initiate a "Six Degrees of Separation" campaign to submit to the on-line suggestion box of our President Elect the suggestion of John Karls from November 2007 that regional (multi-district) magnet schools be employed to avoid leaving children behind while still complying with the new Supreme Court restriction (please see the November 2007 materials on "The Jena Six and the Supreme Court's Reversal of School Integration" on this bulletin board).

Suggested reading =
(1) the NEA position per its web site vis-a-vis No Child Left Behind, AND
(2) Jonothan Kozol, The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America (2005), PLUS
(3) for extra credit, Jonothan Kozol’s other books on inner-city education =
Death at an Early Age (1967)
The Night Is Dark and I Am Far From Home: Political Indictment of US Public Schools (1975)
Illiterate America (1985)
Rachel and Her Children (1988)
Savage Inequalities: Children in America’s Schools (1991)
On Being a Teacher (1994)
Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation (1995)
Ordinary Resurrections: Children in the Years of Hope (2001)

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Last post by solutions
Sun Dec 07, 2008 8:55 pm
Background Mats + Participant Comments - Leaving Children Behind - Jan. 14
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Please also read the following essays that were prepared 14 months ago when our topic was "School Desegregation and The Jena Six" -- the following essays are contained in the 8 November 2007 section below entitled "The Controversy That Is Bill Cosby" --

Inner-City Kids and Public Education
Inner-City Measured IQ’s
Pushers Recruiting Third Graders as Runners
Perceptions of Inner-City 5-Year Olds!!!
Typical Inner-City Conditions and IHAD Results

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Last post by solutions
Sun Jan 04, 2009 9:48 am
Text - 2007 Supreme Court Reversal of School Integration - Leaving Children Behind - Jan. 14
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In 1896, the Supreme Court held in "Plessy v. Ferguson" that racial segregation in public elementary and secondary schools was constitutional provided that the minority schools were "separate but equal."

In 1954, the Supreme Court held in "Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka" that racial segregation in public schools is inherently unequal and therefore unconstitutional.

In 2007, the Supreme Court held in "Parents v. Seattle School District No. 1" that (quoting from the Court's own summary of its opinion (the summary appears in page 1 of the 8 pages of text posted in this section of the bulletin board)) -- "Further, the Court held that the districts, which did not operate legally segregated schools, denied students equal protection by classifying students by race and relying upon the classification in school assignments."

In other words, the Supreme Court approved a "Look Ma, no hands!!!" approach to segregated schools, where the "apartheid" school segregation as Jonathan Kozol terms it, is achieved by segregated housing!!!

In doing so, the Supreme Court didn't even have the grace to say that the schools for the segregated neighborhoods SHOULD BE EQUAL -- taking us back to the Dark Ages before Plessy v. Ferguson!!!

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Last post by johnkarls
Fri Jan 02, 2009 8:33 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - "It's The Economy, Stupid" - Dec. 10th

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Last post by johnkarls
Sun Dec 07, 2008 6:42 am
December 10th Meeting = "It's The Economy, Stupid"
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For those who may not remember, "It's The Economy, Stupid" was a constant reminder pasted by Bill Clinton to his shaving mirror for his entire 8 years in office.

Suggested reading = “Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism” by Kevin Phillips, author of 12 best-selling books on American politics, a regular contributor to the Los Angeles Times and National Public Radio, and a political analyst for PBS’ NOW with Bill Moyers.

Published 4/15/2008 and available from your local library or Amazon.com for $17.13 new ($11.50 used) + shipping.

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Last post by UtahOwl
Tue Dec 09, 2008 9:19 pm
Participant Comments - "It's The Economy, Stupid" - Dec. 10th

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16 Posts

Last post by UtahOwl
Sat Dec 13, 2008 7:25 am
Reference Materials - "It's The Economy, Stupid" - Dec. 10th

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Last post by johnkarls
Fri Dec 05, 2008 6:35 am
CALL TO ACTION - Al Gore's 10-Year Challenge to America
Our call to action asks all Americans to contact President-Elect Barack Obama to request him to champion Al Gore's Challenge to America to re-power America’s electrical grid so that within 10 years the grid is carbon free in order to (1) bring our economy back to life by creating American jobs, (2) achieve energy independence for our foreign policy, (3) eliminate our balance of payments deficit (borrowing $700 billion/year from the Chinese to buy oil from other foreign countries, many of whom hate us), and (4) constitute a major step in halting global warming.

Please see the details in this section regarding how you can participate!!!

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Last post by johnkarls
Sat Nov 15, 2008 10:18 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Al Gore's Challenge to America - Nov. 12

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Last post by johnkarls
Sun Nov 09, 2008 7:30 am
Text of Al Gore's July 17th Challenge To Re-Power America's Electricity Grid Within 10 Years - For Nov. 12
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Our focus for WEDNESday November 12th is Al Gore's 17 July 2008 "Generational Challenge" to America to Re-Power Its Electrical Grid To Rely 100% (except for hydro which would remain in place) on Wind and Solar WITHIN 10 YEARS!!!

In order to (1) comply with Kyoto with 100%-clean electricity, (2) achieve energy independence for our foreign policy, (3) eliminate our balance of payments deficit (borrowing $700 billion/year from China to buy oil from other foreign countries, many of whom hate us), and (4) create American jobs.

Click on the title for this section for the text of Al Gore's speech.

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Last post by UtahOwl
Sun Nov 09, 2008 6:03 am
To Go "Beyond The Call of Duty" - Info About Three Background Books - For Nov. 12
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Thomas Friedman's "Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution--and How It Can Renew America" (Hardcover 9/8/2008 - available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $15.37 new or $10.95 used + shipping). Suggested by "solutions."

Thomas Friedman is a syndicated columnist for the NY Times and a prolific author. "Hot, Flat, and Crowded" is largely a non-technical version of Option C below.

*****
T. Boone Pickens' "The First Billion Is The Hardest: Reflections on a Life of Comebacks and America's Energy Future" (Hardcover 9/2/2008 - available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $17.79 new or $13.00 used + shipping). Suggested by "solutions."

T. Boone Pickens is a famous oil man who proposes long-term solar and wind in line with Options A and C - but notes that America has virtually unlimited reserves of natural gas and proposes tapping American natural gas immediately to eliminate political dependency on foreign producers and eliminate the $750 billion/year paid to foreign producers as a bridge until solar- and wind-power can be implemented on a large scale.

*****
"Carbon-Free and Nuclear-Free: A Roadmap for U.S. Energy Policy" by Arjun Makhijani (11/15/2007 - available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $12.21 new or $9.99 used + shipping). Suggested by "UtahOwl."

Arjun Makhijani is President of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research (http://www.ieer.org). He has authored or co-authored many books, articles, and reports on energy, nuclear weapons and environmental issues. He has testified before Congress and appeared on national ABC, CBS, BBC, CNN, and NPR news programs, among others. He has written for the Washington Post, the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Technology Review, and many other publications. He has a PhD from the University of California at Berkeley where he specialized in nuclear fusion.

3 Topics

3 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sat Oct 18, 2008 7:07 am
Additional Ref Materials - Al Gore's Challenge to America - for Nov. 12

2 Topics

2 Posts

Last post by solutions
Sat Oct 18, 2008 8:05 am
Participant Comments - Al Gore's Challenge to America - for Nov. 12

4 Topics

4 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Fri Oct 31, 2008 7:17 pm
Suggested Discussion Outline - Team of Rivals - Oct. 8

1 Topics

2 Posts

Last post by BillV
Sat Oct 04, 2008 8:03 pm
Participant Comments - "Team of Rivals - Oct 8
At our September meeting, we voted to focus on Leslie Urry's recommendation of "Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln" by Dorothy Kearns Goodwin, Pulitzer-Prize winning Presidential historian and frequent guest on "Meet the Press" and "The MacNeil/Lehrer Report" (aka The Newshour with Jim Lehrer). It is available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $14.28 + shipping.

2 Topics

3 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sun Sep 28, 2008 5:36 pm
Suggested Discussion Outline - Barack Obama's Bible - Sep 10

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sun Sep 07, 2008 5:09 am
Participant Comments - "Barack Obama's Bible = Rules for Radicals" - Sep 10
"Rules for Radicals" by Saul Alinsky (available at your local library or from Amazon.com in paperback for $10.36 + shipping).

2 Topics

2 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sun Aug 31, 2008 6:26 am
Ref Mats - "Barack Obama's Bible = Rules for Radicals" - Sep 10
"Rules for Radicals" by Saul Alinsky (available at your local library or from Amazon.com in paperback for $10.36 + shipping).

2 Topics

2 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sat Aug 23, 2008 5:17 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Aug 13

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sat Aug 09, 2008 6:49 am
Comments of Participants - Obama From Promise to Power - Aug 13

5 Topics

7 Posts

Last post by Pat
Mon Aug 04, 2008 11:05 am
Reference Mats - Obama From Promise to Power - Aug 13
Ordinarily, we provide the NY Times book review among other things. However, during the last month, the NY Times has replaced its extremely cumbersome search capability with one powered by Google, which is completely inadequate!!! No Boolean search terms, no date ranges, no listing of results by date, etc., etc. As a result, the book review for “Obama: From Promise to Power” could not be located!!!

0 Topics

0 Posts

No posts
Suggested Discussion Outline - Everything About Oil - July 9th

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Mon Jul 07, 2008 7:50 am
Comments of Participants - Everything About Oil - July 9th

4 Topics

7 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Mon Jul 21, 2008 3:41 am
Reference Materials - Everything About Oil - July 9th
Including NY Times Book Review of "American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century" by Kevin Phillips

6 Topics

6 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Tue Jul 01, 2008 6:07 am
Tim Russert Eulogies
This is a eulogy contained in our weekly e-mail sent Saturday June 14th between 6:17 am and 7:25 am MDT and the responses from some of our e-mail recipients. Please feel free to add yours.

1 Topics

5 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Fri Jun 20, 2008 4:48 am
July Meeting - Possible Topics (historical)

5 Topics

12 Posts

Last post by Pat
Mon May 05, 2008 1:03 pm
Suggested Discussion Outline - "Infidel" - June 11

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Thu Jun 26, 2008 11:01 am
“Infidel” by Ayaan Hirsi Ali – for June 11
Ayaan Hirsi Ali came to the attention of the wider world in an extraordinary way. In 2004 a Muslim fanatic, after shooting the filmmaker Theo van Gogh dead on an Amsterdam street, pinned a letter to Mr. van Gogh’s chest with a knife. Addressed to Ms. Hirsi Ali, the letter called for holy war against the West and, more specifically, for her death. A Somali by birth and a recently elected member of the Dutch Parliament, Ms. Hirsi Ali had waged a personal crusade to improve the lot of Muslim women. Her warnings about the dangers posed to the Netherlands by unassimilated Muslims made her Public Enemy No. 1 for Muslim extremists, a feminist counterpart to Salman Rushdie. The circuitous, violence-filled path that led Ms. Hirsi Ali from Somalia to the Netherlands is the subject of “Infidel,” her brave, inspiring and beautifully written memoir. Narrated in clear, vigorous prose, it traces the author’s geographical journey from Mogadishu to Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia and Kenya, and her desperate flight to the Netherlands to escape an arranged marriage. At the same time, Ms. Hirsi Ali describes a journey “from the world of faith to the world of reason,” a long, often bitter struggle to come to terms with her religion and the clan-based traditional society that defined her world and that of millions of Muslims all over the world

Available from your local public library or from Amazon.com IN PAPERBACK for $10.20 + shipping

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0 Posts

No posts
Comments of Participants - "Infidel" - June 11th
“Infidel” by Ayaan Hirsi Ali is available from your local public library or from Amazon.com IN PAPERBACK for $10.20 + shipping

4 Topics

4 Posts

Last post by SamGhosh
Sun Jun 08, 2008 3:57 am
Reference Materials - "Infidel" - June 11th
“Infidel” by Ayaan Hirsi Ali is available from your local public library or from Amazon.com IN PAPERBACK for $10.20 + shipping

5 Topics

6 Posts

Last post by lesurry
Sun Jun 01, 2008 11:04 pm
Suggested Discussion Outline - Bush's Law - May 14

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sat May 10, 2008 7:45 am
Eric Lichtblau's “Bush’s Law: The Remaking of American Justice” – May 14
Eric Lichtblau, NY Times reporter, won the Pulitzer Prize for his articles disclosing the Bush Administration's secret surveillance program. His new book "off press" 4/1/2008 focuses on the secret-surveillance program but also addresses the famous 2003 Justice Department legal memorandum (1) which gave the legal rationalia for "aggressive interrogation" techniques, (2) which was withdrawn 9 months after its issuance, and (3) which was recently made public as the result of an ACLU "Freedom of Information Act" lawsuit.

JOIN US AS WE COMPARE THE GENESIS OF THE NEXT WAR IN IRAN. IN THIS REGARD, PLEASE SEE QUESTIONS 1 & 2 OF "THE SHORT QUIZ" IN THE "PARTICIPANT COMMENTS" SECTION BELOW AND "BARACK AND HILLARY - STARTING THE NEXT WAR WITH IRAN BEFORE EVEN FINISHING THE LAST WAR IN IRAQ " (ALSO IN "PARTICIPANT COMMENTS")

Suggested by "solutions" on 4/3/2008

"Bush's War" is available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $17.79 + shipping or by e-mailing "readingliberallyemaillist@johnkarls.com" with the subject = "book loan requested."

0 Topics

0 Posts

No posts
Participant Comments - "Bush's Law" - May 14
Eric Lichtblau's "Bush's Law: The Remaking of American Justice" available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $17.79 + shipping OR by e-mailing "readingliberallyemaillist@johnkarls.com" with the subject = "book loan requested"

5 Topics

5 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Thu May 01, 2008 11:36 am
Reference Materials - "Bush's Law" - May 14
Eric Lichtblau's "Bush's Law: The Remaking of American Justice" available from your local library or from Amazon.com for $17.79 + shipping OR by e-mailing "readingliberallyemaillist@johnkarls.com" with the subject = "book loan requested"

22 Topics

22 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Fri May 09, 2008 12:39 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Apr 9th

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sun Apr 06, 2008 12:33 am
Clone Rights: Involuntary Soldiers, Sex Slaves, Human "Lab Rats" Etc. - Apr 9
How would you like to be an involuntary soldier, sex slave, human "lab rat" etc. WITH NO CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS JUST BECAUSE (1) the stem cells from which you were created came from skin cells rather than an embryo, or (2) your DNA is only 99% of the way from chimp DNA to human DNA (or any of the chimp-human DNA combinations the Yale U Biology Dept has created and is creating)??? Re (2), how do legal classifications based on % of human DNA differ from legal classifications in the Old South based on % of African-American blood, or legal classifications in Hitler's Third Reich based on % of Jewish blood???

2 Topics

2 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Thu Mar 20, 2008 11:51 am
Participant Comments/Ref Mats - Clone Rights for Apr 9

5 Topics

5 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sun Apr 06, 2008 12:39 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Mar 13

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sat Mar 08, 2008 7:03 am
Benazir Bhutto's "Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy and the West" - for Mar. 13
Benazir Bhutto was assassinated Dec. 27 while campaigning for Prime Minister of Pakistan. She had served twice as Pakistan’s Prime Minister (1988-90 and 1993-96, being deposed both times by the military). She was the first female to head the government of any Islamic Country. Her father, Ali Bhutto, also served as Prime Minister – he was executed in 1979 by the military government that deposed him. Benazir Bhutto received her B.A. in Comparative Government from Harvard, where she was Phi Beta Kappa. She then studied Politics, Philosophy and Economics (“PP&E”) at Oxford – the typical educational background of most British Prime Ministers (except Churchill who attended Sandhurst - Britain's West Point). While there, she was elected President of the Oxford Union – the first Asian woman to head Oxford’s most prestigious debating society. DISCOVER WHY BEING THE ONLY ISLAMIC NUCLEAR POWER (AND BEING THE SOURCE OF IRANIAN AND NORTH KOREAN NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY) AND BEING HOME TO AL QAIDA AND THE TALIBAN MAKE PAKISTAN'S FEBRUARY 18TH PARLIAMENTARY ELECTION AMERICA'S MOST CRUCIAL 2008 ELECTION!!!

"Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy and the West" (Harper Collins 2008) is available at your local library or from Amazon.com for $17.54 + shipping.

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Thu Feb 21, 2008 11:30 am
Critiques of Benezir Bhutto’s “Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy and the West” - Mar 13th
My critiques in six major areas to “Reconciliation” are collected here. Most of them draw, despite dispensing with footnotes for the sake of brevity and simplicity, on having read 12-15 biographies and historical tomes annually for 33 years of marriage (and the 7 years since) to the co-author of the country’s best-selling H.S. world history text (McGraw-Hill with National Geographic maps/illustrations – now in its 6th edition and counting). Despite these critiques, it is impossible to express how utterly impressed I am with the incredible knowledge and understanding possessed by Benazir Bhutto, how completely devoted she was to the welfare of the Islamic world in general and her country in particular, and how incredibly brave she was in fatally confronting a military that had already assassinated her father and two brothers.

6 Topics

6 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Tue Mar 11, 2008 12:13 am
Background Materials - Mar. 13
Benazir Bhutto's "Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy and the West" (Harper Collins 2008) is available at your local library or from Amazon.com for $17.54 + shipping.

5 Topics

5 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Thu Feb 21, 2008 1:20 pm
Comments of Participants - Mar. 13
Benazir Bhutto's "Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy and the West" (Harper Collins 2008) is available at your local library or from Amazon.com for $17.54 + shipping.

2 Topics

3 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Tue Mar 04, 2008 6:16 am
DRINKing Liberally Presentation - Fri Eve Feb 29
The 2009-2010 “Old Congress” and Why “Change” Will Never Happen (Again)

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Tue Feb 26, 2008 8:00 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Feb 14th

2 Topics

2 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Wed Feb 13, 2008 7:30 am
"The Best Gov Money Can Buy: Bribery and Extortion" - Text of Original Proposal for Feb 14
Or why Barack Obama doesn't have any greater chance to bring real "change" than William J. Clinton when he ran as "The Candidate of Change" in 1992 promising the same things now on offer from Barack Obama (such as health care, though now not nearly so universal as attempted by the Clintons in the 1990's).

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Fri Jan 11, 2008 10:44 pm
Proposed Solution to The Cesspool that is Washington DC - for Feb 14

6 Topics

7 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sun Feb 03, 2008 11:05 pm
Background Mats - The Best Gov Money Can Buy: Bribery & Extortion - Feb 14th
Focus for discussion = Robert Kuttner's "The Squandering of America: How the Failure of Our Politics Undermines Our Prosperity" (Alfred A. Knopf 2007) - available at your local library or from Amazon.com for $17.79 ($14.89 used) + shipping

4 Topics

6 Posts

Last post by solutions
Sat Feb 23, 2008 7:50 am
Illegal “Bribe” vs. “Legal” Campaign Contribution - Feb 14th
Alternate Title = The Crime of Telling the Truth!!!

4 Topics

4 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sun Jan 13, 2008 9:26 am
Participant Comments - The Best Gov Money Can Buy: Bribery & Extortion - Feb 14th
Focus for discussion = Robert Kuttner's "The Squandering of America: How the Failure of Our Politics Undermines Our Prosperity" (Alfred A. Knopf 2007) - available at your local library or from Amazon.com for $17.79 ($14.89 used) + shipping

5 Topics

5 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Wed Jan 23, 2008 4:03 pm
Suggested Discussion Outline - Jan 10th

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Mon Jan 07, 2008 7:58 pm
Illegal Immigration = Topic for Jan 10th
Click here for BillV's provocative issues!!!

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by BillV
Mon Nov 19, 2007 5:59 am
Participant Comments on Immigration - Jan 10th

4 Topics

5 Posts

Last post by BillV
Sat Jan 12, 2008 7:05 am
Reference Materials - Immigration - Jan 10

12 Topics

12 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Wed Dec 19, 2007 12:18 am
Leading Dem Candidates on Immigration - Jan 10
Clinton/Obama/Edwards/Biden (top 4 in polling order as of Dec 16) positions per their official web sites. If your favorite candidate is not one of these four and you believe his position should be considered, please feel free to post it here. NB: NEITHER EDWARDS' NOR BIDEN'S WEB SITES LIST IMMIGRATION OR BORDERS AMONG THEIR ISSUES!!!

2 Topics

2 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sun Dec 16, 2007 9:10 am
Leading Rep Candidates on Immigration - Jan 10
A wise person always considers what the opposition is saying - Giuliani/Huckabee/McCain/Romney/Thompson (top 5 in polling order as of Dec 16) positions per their official web sites. NB: (1) IMMIGRATION WAS THE FIRST ISSUE ON HUCKABEE'S WEB SITE!!! (2) GIULIANI'S WEB SITE DOES NOT EVEN LIST IMMIGRATION OR BORDERS AS ONE OF HIS 12 ISSUES!!!

5 Topics

5 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sun Dec 16, 2007 8:55 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Dec 13th

2 Topics

2 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Tue Dec 11, 2007 3:17 am
Call to Action - Meeting Report for Dec 13th
This posting comprises our first weekly e-mail following our December 13th meeting – our e-mail list has 108 members.

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Thu Dec 27, 2007 7:55 am
Is War With Iran Inevitable??? - Topic for Dec 13
Including Hillary Clinton's Repeated Bashing of the Bush Administration for "Being Soft on Iran" + Israel's Bombing Syria 9/6/2007 and Israel's Iranian Plans. These three postings include (1) Pat's original proposal of this topic, (2) the careful analysis on 9/18/2007 by the former Editor of the Jerusalem Post of what happened when Israel bombed Syria on 9/6/2007 (a subject about which nobody in the U.S. or abroad was saying anything, and about which very little continues to be said) and (3) the "Face the Nation" transcript for 10/28/2007 of Sen. Armed Services Chair Carl Levin (D-MI) and Minority Member Lindsey Graham (R-SC) for which Moderator Bob Schieffer said in his introduction: "The foreign-affairs focus of the major Presidential candidates, both Democrat and Republican, seems to have swung from Iraq to Iran. On the Republican side, Guiliani, Romney, et. al., seem to be competing to provide the most emphatic sound bite that they will stop at nothing to insure that Iran does not obtain nuclear weapons. While Hillary is acting as if she already has the nomination and is already waging a general-election campaign in which she appears to be just as belligerent/militant toward Iran."

1 Topics

2 Posts

Last post by Pat
Mon Oct 29, 2007 9:14 am
Hillary's Bashing Bush as "Soft on Iran" - for Dec 13
Hillary's 1/18/2007 Princeton Speech + 4/24/2007 Speech to the National Jewish Democratic Council + Hilary as the lone Democratic Presidential Candidate to vote for the Kyl-Lieberman Amendment on 9/26/2007

10 Topics

10 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Mon Nov 12, 2007 2:20 pm
Action v. Deterrance (+ Detente) - for Dec 13
Summary of basic considerations for action v. deterrance vis-a-vis Iran's nuclear program (including the Islamic belief that Islamic martyrs by-pass The Judgment Day coupled with Osama bin Ladin's Fatwa to Nuke 10 million Americans (please see below for reference materials re the Fatwa)) + Foreign Affairs article on nuclear detente with Iran

2 Topics

2 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Mon Nov 12, 2007 1:40 pm
Bombing Syria 9/6/2007 Re Iran & N Korea - for Dec 13
Please see above “Is War With Iran Inevitable??? – Topic for Dec 13” for the 9/18/2007 analysis of Israel’s 9/6/2007 bombing of Syria and its connection to North Korea by the former Editor of the Jerusalem Post. The postings collected here comprise (1) the 11/11/2007 analysis by the NY Times of the Pakistani nuclear weapons with reference to the current Pakistani crisis, (2) the 9/25/2007 initial reaction of John Bolton to Israel’s 9/6/2007 bombing of Syria, and (3) the 10/31/2007 analysis of John Bolton THAT ISRAEL HAD BOMBED AN EXACT REPLICA OF NORTH KOREA’S NUCLEAR FACILITY BUILT IN SYRIA BY THE NORTH KOREANS TO CIRCUMVENT THE SIX-NATION TALKS REGARDING NORTH KOREAN NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT. (John Bolton was U.S. Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control (2001-2005) and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations (2005-20006))

3 Topics

3 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Mon Nov 12, 2007 2:06 pm
Participant Comments Re War With Iran - for Dec 13
The first posting is by "solutions" and comprises the book review by the Wall Street Journal (probably Israel's strongest supporter in the American media) of "Failure Is Not An Option" by John Bolton (U.S. Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control (2001-2005) and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations (2005-20006)). The fourth posting is the "Face the Nation" transcript for Nov. 25 re Condi Rice's Mideast Peace Conference involving 50 nations at Camp David and the inter-relationship between the conference and War on Iran/Iraq/Terror.

11 Topics

16 Posts

Last post by achamberlin
Thu Dec 13, 2007 5:09 pm
Ref Mats - Osama's Fatwa To Nuke 10 Million Americans - Dec 13
"Action vs. Deterrence (+ Detente)" reference materials regarding the third reason for action vis-à-vis Iran (the Islamic belief that Islamic martyrs by-pass The Judgment Day coupled with Osama bin Ladin's Fatwa to nuke 10 million Americans) = (A) 9/5/2004 NY Times Book Review of “Nuclear Terrorism” by Graham Allison, the Founding Dean of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, on Osama’s Fatwa (at that time to nuke only 4 million Americans); (B) 5/29/2005 “Meet the Press” transcript of then Sen Fgn Rel Ch Richard Lugar, his Democratic predecessor Sam Nunn and Messrs. Kean/Hamilton (9/11 Ch & Co-Ch) on Osama’s Fatwa (by then to nuke 10 million Americans); (C) 6/4/2007 proposal of current Sen Fgn Rel Ch & Presidential Candidate Joe Biden to threaten nuclear annihilation against any country whose fissile materials are used by a terrorist in a nuclear attack on the U.S.; and (D) 6/12/2007 proposal of Stanford Prof. William Perry (Clinton’s Sec/Defense) and Harvard Prof. Ashton Carter (Clinton’s Ass’t Sec/Defense for Intl Security Policy) to enact a federal law that the U.S. military (vs. state & local “first responders”) will be responsible for coping with the aftermath of nuclear terrorism and, in passing, blast Biden’s nuclear-annihilation proposal. NB: (1) Dean Allison believes nuclear terrorism is preventable by keeping track of fissile materials while Nunn/Lugar/Kean/Hamilton believe Allison’s approach is “locking the barn after the horse is out” and examine ways to DELAY TEMPORARILY nuclear attacks on the U.S.; (2) Biden’s nuclear-annihilation threat appears to be based on Allison’s “lock the barn” approach.

4 Topics

4 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Wed Nov 14, 2007 11:50 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Nov 8th

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Tue Nov 06, 2007 1:06 am
The Controversy That Is Bill Cosby for Nov 8th

7 Topics

7 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Mon Oct 22, 2007 5:57 am
Participant Comments - School Integration & The Jena Six - for Nov 8th

5 Topics

7 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Sun Oct 28, 2007 2:34 am
The KKK - "All The Best People In Society Belonged" - for Nov. 8th
This item is a synopsis of a book copyrighted by the Univ. of California Regents documenting the pervasive influence of the Ku Klux Klan IN THE UPPER MIDWEST. Aaron Stander's addition calls attention to the pervasive influence of the KKK in New England.

1 Topics

2 Posts

Last post by AaronStander
Sat Nov 24, 2007 8:43 am
Background Mats - School Integration & The Jena Six - for Nov 8th

3 Topics

3 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Tue Oct 16, 2007 8:47 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Oct 11th

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Fri Nov 16, 2007 8:40 am
Participant Comments Re Global Warming for Oct 11th
Focus for Discussion = “Big Coal: The Dirty Secret Behind America’s Energy Future” by Jeff Goodell © 2006 (available from your local library or in paperback from Amazon.com for $10.17 new/$8.88 used + shipping).

3 Topics

4 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Fri Nov 16, 2007 9:08 am
Suggested Background Materials Re Global Warming for Oct 11th
Focus for Discussion = “Big Coal: The Dirty Secret Behind America’s Energy Future” by Jeff Goodell © 2006 (available from your local library or in paperback from Amazon.com for $10.17 new/$8.88 used + shipping).

4 Topics

4 Posts

Last post by solutions
Sun Sep 16, 2007 2:23 pm
Suggested Discussion Outline - Sep 6th

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Fri Nov 16, 2007 8:55 am
Suggested Discussion Outline - Aug 2d

1 Topics

1 Posts

Last post by johnkarls
Fri Nov 16, 2007 9:04 am
Comments of Participants - Universal Health Care for Aug 2nd

2 Topics

4 Posts

Last post by Sabotage Restorer
Tue Oct 16, 2007 9:11 am
Suggested Background Materials on Universal Health Care for Aug. 2d

14 Topics

28 Posts

Last post by Sabotage Restorer
Sun Sep 30, 2007 2:28 am

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