Dinah Washington, Newport Jazz Festival 1958
All of Me

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Senate refused to consider a resolution on Saturday denouncing President George W. Bush’s Iraq troop buildup that the U.S. House of Representatives passed the day before.

For the second time in two weeks, the Senate voted not to debate a non-binding measure that would repudiate Bush’s recent decision to send 21,500 troops to Iraq to bolster security in Baghdad and Anbar province. The Democrats had wanted to bring the measure to the floor but failed to overcome Republican resistance.

The vote was 56 in favor and 34 against. Under Senate rules, 60 votes were needed to bring the resolution to the floor for debate. Before the vote, Democrats argued in vain for minority Republicans to break with Bush and support taking up the measure.

Read more at Reuters

Seven Republicans voted for debate: Senators Coleman (R-MN), Collins (R-ME), Senators Warner (R-VA), Hagel (R-NE), Specter (R-PA), Smith (R-OR) and Snowe (R-ME).

Why aren’t the Iraqis building new grocery stores and cleaning? Aren’t there plenty of them to do the jobs? If 6,000 forced labor workers have been evacuated since 2003, I’m guessing it’s not just a small percentage of the 30-50,000 foreign workers who are forced into labor. Again the poor are taken advantage of.

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka - In Sri Lanka’s war-torn north and east, where killings happen every day and work is nearly nonexistent, it doesn’t take much to entice a man to leave.

So when an employment agency offered a steady paycheck for laboring amid Dubai’s soaring glass and steel towers, 17 young Sri Lankan men paid their fee to the job brokers - $2,000, a small fortune on this tropical island - and signed up.

But instead of going to work, they were locked in a room guarded by a man with a pistol. They had been sold to another agency, they were told, for $1,200 apiece.

It took them two weeks to realize where they were: Iraq.

“We knew Iraq was dangerous, and Sri Lanka was dangerous, but at least we thought our parents will get to see our corpses if we die here,” said Krishnan Piraitheepan 32, shortly after returning to Sri Lanka this month with the help of the International Organization for Migration, a Geneva-based intergovernmental organization.

Thousands of Sri Lankans, and tens of thousands of other people from such poverty-battered countries as the Philippines, India and Nepal, go to the oil-rich Middle East every year to work. Their pay, usually $200-$400 a month, can be many times what they would earn at home, even after the agency fees that can leave families deeply indebted.

So they become maids in Kuwait, and drivers in Saudi Arabia. They work as nannies in Dubai and Bahrain.

Some, like the 17 Sri Lankans, end up in Iraq.

While there are no reliable statistics on forced labor in Iraq, government officials and aid groups warn the Sri Lankans’ case highlights the potential for abuse. The situation is further distorted because a number of countries that are major labor suppliers to the Middle East, including Sri Lanka, ban their citizens from traveling to Iraq.

Read more at Chron.com

This is scarey….. and really stupid.

WASHINGTON, DC, February 15, 2007 (ENS) - Over congressional objections, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, FDA, is closing seven of its 13 laboratories across the country, according to documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, PEER, a national association of employees in natural resources agencies.

The closures will be completed during the next few months, before the new Congress can act to block the shutdowns through the appropriations bill for the next fiscal year, PEER said.

According to briefings of agency staff, facilities in Denver, Detroit, Philadelphia, Kansas City, San Francisco, Winchester, Massachusetts; and San Juan, Puerto Rico will be closed.

These laboratories are often the first line of defense in detecting and combating potential bio-terrorist attacks on foods.

In addition, they trace tampering with food and medicines and respond to public health threats, such as E. coli and listeria outbreaks, and support agency compliance inspections and enforcement actions.

FDA specialists have argued that eliminating laboratories will slow agency response time to outbreaks or attacks, as samples may have to be transported long distances.

In addition, closing laboratories located near ports or large food distribution centers may reduce the agency’s ability to uncover contamination before the effects ripple through the country’s food chain.

Congressional committee chairs, such as Senator Ted Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat who chairs the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions; and Congressman John Dingell, a Michigan Democrat who chairs the House Energy and Commerce Committee have raised concerns about FDA lab closure plans, PEER said.

The FDA has informed agency staff that no money has been set aside for buy-outs of employees who lose their positions or relocation costs for specialists whose jobs have been moved to one of the six remaining labs.

“FDA has yet to explain why slashing its network of laboratories will make it more capable of protecting the American people,” said PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch, noting that a previous review by the Government Accountability Office failed to confirm any fiscal savings from a similar laboratory consolidation plan a decade ago.

Both President George W. Bush and Congress have proposed more funds to increase FDA laboratory capacity to respond to bio-terrorist attacks. But due to the collapse of the FY 07 budget process, none of those funds were actually delivered to the FDA.

Source

Operation Imposing Law…….how sickening is that? Who comes up with these names? Let me guess…….Dickoilhead Cheney! 49 U.S. deaths this month, 2 UK, 1 Other and 909 Iraqi’s dead in 17 days……and Condi thinks it’s off to a good start. Uh huh….ok. If you say it….it must be so.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Saturday lauded early progress in a military operation against militants in Baghdad, but said Iraqis had to use this “breathing space” to push ahead with reconciliation.

Rice made an unannounced visit to Baghdad as U.S. and Iraqi troops make initial gains in an offensive seen as a final push to end sectarian bloodshed that threatens to tear Iraq apart.

“They are off to a good start,” said Rice, referring to Operation Imposing Law. “How the Iraqis use the breathing space that might provide is what is really important,” she told reporters.

While major car bombings and death squad killings in Baghdad have declined, a double car bombing on Saturday at a crowded market in the northern city of Kirkuk killed at least 10 people and wounded 60, police sources said.

The explosions took place in the Rahim Awa district, a predominantly Kurdish area of the ethnically mixed city.

Rice said Iraq’s leaders needed to speed up efforts to reconcile warring Shi’ite and Sunni groups, finalize an oil revenue sharing law and hold provincial elections.

Read more here

Comedians, artists and certainly political cartoonists tend to possess an anti-authoritarian, skeptical, irreverent streak. This makes the staunchly conservative cartoonist an especially odd bird.

Which cartoonists dare to criticize their own party? Who seems to literally illustrate GOP talking points? Who and what are their favorite targets? Who mocks liberals - and who seems to truly hate them? Who’s funny? Who’s independently-minded and who’s a hack? Read, and decide, for yourself!

Rightwing Cartoon Watch #14 is another super’sized edition, covering two weeks, 1/29/07 to 2/11/07. There were some really odd cartoons in this stretch!
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