Bangladesh has been ruled by a military-backed interim government for almost two years. Officials are expected to lift the state of emergency in the coming days in order to allow election campaigning to start. But critics argue this will do little to change the political landscape. Tony Birtley reports from Dhaka.
Richard Haass of the Council on Foreign Relations joins Martin Savidge to discuss the weeks top stories including the challenges facing Barack Obama in the Middle East with developments in the West Bank, the U.S. auto industrys bailout request, and India-Pakistan relations after the Mumbai attacks.
The Authors@Google program welcomed Howard Zinn to Google’s Cambirdge office on November 11, 2008.
Here in their own words are Frederick Douglass, George Jackson, Chief Joseph, Martin Luther King Jr., Plough Jogger, Sacco and Vanzetti, Patti Smith, Bruce Springsteen, Mark Twain, and Malcolm X, to name just a few of the hundreds appearing in Voices of a People’s History of the United States, edited by Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove. Paralleling the 24 chapters of Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States, Voices of a People’s History is the long-awaited companion volume to the national bestseller.
Historian and activist Howard Zinn is the author of the best-selling A People’s History of the United States and many other books, including The Zinn Reader (Seven Stories Press 2000), Artists in the Time of War (Seven Stories Press, 2003) and Terrorism and War (Seven Stories Press 2002).
The above lecture runs 52 minutes. The abridged version below runs eight minutes.
Energy tycoon T. Boone Pickens met with Senate Leader Harry Reid and with the Obama transition team to talk energy, the economy and how America can win the energy war. Afterwards, MicroSoft founder Bill Gates with Mr. Pickens outside the Transition Office. Gates said that they would celebrate after the Picken’s Plan is made into law.
Latin America has the highest homicide rate for young adults in the world, with the Caribbean a close second, a global study by a Brazilian research group shows. Based on figures from 83 countries, a person age 15 to 24 is almost 15 times more likely to be murdered in Latin America than in Canada, says the group. The spread is even greater when Latin American rates are compared with those in several of the safer European and Asian countries. El Salvador, Venezuela, Guatemala, and Brazil have some of the highest murder rates according to a new study looking at violence in the region from a Brazilian think tank. The Young People of Latin America is produced by Brasilia-based Latin American Technological Information Network. Its researchers drew on recorded murder totals from 2002 to 2005, and also give historical trends as well as overall murder rates.
The most dangerous country surveyed is El Salvador, where the annual murder rate for young people is 92 per 100,000, and rising. Murder rates for the young also are increasing in Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Paraguay, the study shows.
Al Jazeera’s Lucia Newman reports from Buenos Aires, where she takes a look at some of the reasons behind the alarming statistics.
The new movie Slumdog Millionaire from acclaimed director Danny Boyle of Trainspotting fame is an endearing love story and well worth seeing. The movie is now also a conservative talking point for you see Larry Elder, a conservative African-American LA-based radio talk show host, thinks after seeing the movie that well that the poor in America don’t have it so bad and liberals who complain about poverty in America should just shut up about it already. From Real Clear Politics:
The viewer of this film is stunned — time and time again — at the poverty that makes the poorest rundown shack in Appalachia look like the honeymoon suite at the Bellagio.
In America, we consider a family of four “poor” if its annual income falls below $21,203. And we actually undercount income — ignoring assets accumulated in prior years and disregarding non-cash welfare, such as taxpayer-funded education, lunch programs, health care, food stamps and subsidies for public housing. Only 6 percent of poor households, according to The Heritage Foundation, are overcrowded — meaning more than one person per room. More than two-thirds of “poor” Americans live in housing with more than two rooms per person. And 43 percent of America’s poor households own their own homes — and the average poor person’s home has three bedrooms, one-and-a-half bathrooms, a garage and a porch or a patio.
“Overall,” writes Heritage, “the typical American defined as poor by the government has a car, air conditioning, a refrigerator, a stove, a clothes washer and dryer, and a microwave. He has two color televisions, cable or satellite TV reception, a VCR or DVD player, and a stereo. He is able to obtain medical care. His home is in good repair and is not overcrowded. By his own report, his family is not hungry and he had sufficient funds in the past year to meet his family’s essential needs. While this individual’s life is not opulent, it is equally far from the popular images of dire poverty conveyed by the press, liberal activists, and politicians.”
It had to happen. We gays do love to tap our toes, just ask Larry Craig. In a clever retort to the hate thrown against us, our wit and frankly charm just exudes. Here’s Proposition Eight, the Musical.
Jack Black, Neil Patrick Harris and a host of headlining stars lent their time and talent to a hilarious three-minute video written and produced by Marc Shaiman (Tony-winner for Hairspray). The clip portrays a frolicking group of gays, lesbians and supporters celebrating the dawning of the Age of Obama and turning the page on an America that values diversity and freedom for all. Margaret Cho, Andy Richter and Maya Rudolph play members of the happy gay group.
Unfortunately their parade is rained on by a conservative Christian group (including John C. Reilly as a pastor and Allison Janney and Kathy Najimy as his wives) introducing and supporting Proposition 8. After they remind the gays the Bible considers gays and lesbians an abomination, Jack Black appears as Jesus to remind them the Bible also considers tasty shrimp cocktail an abomination.
Though I am not sure that gay marriage can save the economy as the finale suggests. Still, it bears nothing that being denied the right to marry does mean gays and lesbians pay higher taxes. We are not eligible for the tax benefits of marriage.
It’s that time of year again. The time when most (some?) people soften their hearts and and are a little kinder to their fellow man.
This video is amazing.
Watch it a few times and see if you don’t get a little misty eyed. Notice how the dog does not use his teeth, which would have been faster and safer, but his front paws to clumsily drag his injured friend to safety. Personally I think if it doesn’t touch your heart you simply don’t have one.
Following the week when a man was trampled to death by people fighting for Plasma TeeVees while no one stopped to help and in a world where we see things like this and this perhaps we could stop for a moment in this season for caring and take a lesson from this little dog who is most likely a homeless stray.
Happy Holidays.
Speaking only for me.