In Virginia, just one of two states with off-year gubernatorial elections this year, child advocates have just kicked off an effort to bring children's issues to the fore of the campaign, releasing results of a new Mason-Dixon poll at a number of different events across the state.

Only 37% of Virginians think that the state's children will be better off than their parents are today when they grow up, according to the poll released on June 18. Nearly half of all Virginians—48%—think today's children will be worse off. The response to that long-term question contrasts sharply with the 54-28 majority that says the state is on the right track today in the same poll, Shifting focus to the long-term and the well-being of children today is one way of describing the purpose of Strong Kids, Strong Virginia, the non-partisan child advocacy campaign, which released poll as part of its statewide push this week to put children's wellbeing in the spotlight of the state's elections this year.

“In Virginia, more than 284,000 children live in poverty, more than 18,000 are homeless, one in six faces food insecurity, 148,000 still have no health insurance, thousands are unable to attend high quality early learning and care programs, and nearly 65,000 were reported victims of child abuse and neglect,” the group said in a press release.

There are strong indications that voters would be receptive to the shift in focus towards children's issues. Of those polled, 87% say child hunger is an important problem to deal with; 79% say that health care for kids is important; 78% say that after-school programs are important; 71% say pre-school education is important; and 54% say it's a "greater concern" that Virginia kids "won't have opportunities" than that "state taxes too high”, compared to just 36% who say the opposite. Significantly, views are similar among blacks (56-31) and whites (53-38).

Continue reading »

3 NSA veterans speak out on whistle-blower: We told you so:

In a roundtable discussion, a trio of former National Security Agency whistle-blowers tell USA TODAY that Edward Snowden succeeded where they failed.

When a National Security Agency contractor revealed top-secret details this month on the government's collection of Americans' phone and Internet records, one select group of intelligence veterans breathed a sigh of relief.

Thomas Drake, William Binney and J. Kirk Wiebe belong to a select fraternity: the NSA officials who paved the way.

For years, the three whistle-blowers had told anyone who would listen that the NSA collects huge swaths of communications data from U.S. citizens. They had spent decades in the top ranks of the agency, designing and managing the very data-collection systems they say have been turned against Americans. When they became convinced that fundamental constitutional rights were being violated, they complained first to their superiors, then to federal investigators, congressional oversight committees and, finally, to the news media.

To the intelligence community, the trio are villains who compromised what the government classifies as some of its most secret, crucial and successful initiatives. They have been investigated as criminals and forced to give up careers, reputations and friendships built over a lifetime.

Today, they feel vindicated.

They say the documents leaked by Edward Snowden, the 29-year-old former NSA contractor who worked as a systems administrator, proves their claims of sweeping government surveillance of millions of Americans not suspected of any wrongdoing. They say those revelations only hint at the programs' reach.

On Friday, USA TODAY brought Drake, Binney and Wiebe together for the first time since the story broke to discuss the NSA revelations. With their lawyer, Jesselyn Radack of the Government Accountability Project, they weighed their implications and their repercussions. They disputed the administration's claim of the impact of the disclosures on national security — and President Obama's argument that Congress and the courts are providing effective oversight.

And they have warnings for Snowden on what he should expect next.

Video below the fold (warning, the embed autoplays).

Continue reading »

DOWNLOADS: (40)

PLAYS: (201)

Embed

Conservative radio host Glenn Beck told Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach (R) on Tuesday that immigrant activists have the "same ideology" as the Ku Klux Klan but they "are just changing their hood."

Over the weekend, about 300 activists traveled had traveled to Kobach’s home after holding a prayer vigil and and a town hall event to protest his efforts to crackdown on immigrants, including a role in an Arizona law which was eventually overturned by the United States Supreme Court.

"I believe that this is the same exact tactics used by the Klan in the 1960s," Beck declared on Tuesday. "And they're doing it in the name of civil rights. But make no mistake, you are on the right side. You are the new civil rights movement."

"The civil rights movement did produce some laws that would stop you from doing these kinds of things," he observed. "Have you thought about going and using the civil rights laws to stop this kind of harassment and intimidation at your own home?"

Continue reading »

Woot! Hump day! :)

Sorry, Rick Perry, but Ted Cruz is the current toast of Texas.

Marmel: It's time for Sen. Jeff Flake to focus on his family.

Bulletin of Atomic Sciences: "Pandora's Promise," a pro-nuclear energy documentary is chock full of problems - mainly by completely ignoring any nuclear power problems.

Michael Wolraich: Is Hassan Rouhani,Iran's last chance?

We the People: A look at the Supreme Court's voter registration ruling.

Finally, The U.S. media will report on a lot of things, except what it's really like to live in the U.S. ".

Round-up by Bill Wolfrum of William K. Wolfrum Chronicles. Send tips to mbru AT crooksandliars DOT com.

DOWNLOADS: (54)

PLAYS: (437)

Embed

Very sad and tragic news on Michael Hastings passing:

BuzzFeed is saddened to report that Michael Hastings died in a car accident early this morning in Los Angeles. He was 33.

Ben Smith, BuzzFeed Editor-in-Chief, said in a statement:
We are shocked and devastated by the news that Michael Hastings is gone. Michael was a great, fearless journalist with an incredible instinct for the story, and a gift for finding ways to make his readers care about anything he covered from wars to politicians. He wrote stories that would otherwise have gone unwritten, and without him there are great stories that will go untold. Michael was also a wonderful, generous colleague, a joy to work with and a lover of corgis — especially his Bobby Sneakers. Our thoughts are with Elise and and the rest of his family and we are going to miss him.

Here's more from Rolling Stone: Michael Hastings, 'Rolling Stone' Contributor, Dead at 33:

Continue reading »

The tweet is fake, but still perfect.

Open thread below...

Bourbon In Kentucky
	Price: $1.29 (As of 06/18/13 03:46 pm details)

Dierks Bentley is readying the fall release of his next album, Riser, on Capitol Records Nashville. Here's the first release for its lead single, "Bourbon in Kentucky," which features country songstress Kacey Musgraves. She joins in on the chorus "There ain't enough bourbon in Kentucky to forget you," which serves as a tribute to Bentley's father's death. Riser was written and recorded in the year after he passed.

For information on tour dates, check out his website dierks.com.

Enjoy!

Via OccupyWallSt:

Liberate Space - July 4th - Cities Everywhere - Be Daring

In a few weeks, on July 4th we call on all individuals to blockade, disrupt and disobey the architecture of repression in their own cities. We act against the surveillance state not because it has overstepped an imaginary line, we rebel against it for the simple fact that it is designed to intimidate, imprison and demoralize us. We act against it because we know that politicians, corporations and the ruling class will never listen or change. We know that it is up to us to be disobedient, that direct action is the only road to freedom.

There is no better time than now to push forth an initiative which calls out the surveillance state for what it is; a web of police, prisons and politicians designed to protect the wealthy. At a time of upheaval and massive repression worldwide we don't ask for permission, we recognize that those who grant us permission are those that spy on us at the same time. The world we fight for is a world free from politicians, states and security agencies.

On July 4th we call on individuals and groups to gather in the busy thoroughfares, parks and squares in your town. We suggest an overnight occupation designed to call out and confront the means in which surveillance is carried out. This could simply be holding a sign in front of a camera, your tactics are only limited by creativity. It is important to not fall into the marching around in circles trap. We hold our space in a busy area on the 4th because this is where people, commerce and surveillance are.

Circulate Widely * Create Your Own Event * Write A Call To Action

-Valley Anarchist Circle
https://www.facebook.com/events/280921688720561/

Now we get the usual baloney argument over immigration reform. OH NOES, we'll have to have a national identification card!!! This time, it's coming from Democrats who have concerns about E-Verify.

New York Times:

Driver’s license photographs and biographic information of most Americans would be accessible through an expanded Department of Homeland Security nationwide computer network if the immigration legislation pending before the Senate becomes law.

The proposed expansion is part of an effort to crack down on illegal immigration by requiring all employers to confirm the identity and legal status of any new workers by tapping into a Homeland Security Department system called E-Verify, which is now used voluntarily by about 7 percent of employers in the United States.

But the proposal already faces objections from some civil liberties lawyers and certain members of Congress, who worry about the potential for another sprawling data network that could ultimately be the equivalent of a national ID system.

Continue reading »

DOWNLOADS: (67)

PLAYS: (422)

Embed

Cornel Rasor, who chairs the Idaho Republican Party's resolutions committee, says that he pushed for a resolution to void all local ordinances banning discrimination against LGBT people because he wants to be able to fire any gay man who "comes into work in a tutu."

The Associated Press reported that a non-binding resolution passed Saturday at the party's Central Committee summer meeting in McCall calls for the state legislature to block anti-discrimination ordinances passed by at least five municipalities throughout the state.

For seven years, the Republican-controlled Legislature has refused to add sexual orientation to the Idaho Human Rights Act, which bans discrimination based on race, religion and disability. So local governments like Coeur d'Alene, Sandpoint, Ketchum, Moscow and Boise have responded by passing their own ordinances protecting LGBT people.

That's a trend that the Idaho Republican Party wants to stop before it spreads to more towns.

"I’d hire a gay guy if I thought he was a good worker," Rasor explained at the party's summer meeting, according to The Spokesman-Review. "But if he comes into work in a tutu … he’s not producing what I want in my office."

"If a guy has a particular predilection and keeps it to himself, that’s fine," he added. “But if he wants to use my business as a platform for his lifestyle, why should I have to subsidize that? And that’s what these anti-discrimination laws do.”

The Spokesman-Review reported that the central committee approved the resolution with "little debate."

The resolution states: "Resolved, that the Idaho Republican State Central Committee recommends that our legislators support Idaho’s current anti-discrimination laws and policies and enact a law that would make unenforceable any municipal ordinances that would seek to expand categories of prohibited discrimination beyond current state anti-discrimination laws and policies."