Published on Monday, July 13, 2009 by The Hill

Rep. Eshoo Wants House Probe of CIA Program

by Jordy Yager

WASHINGTON – A senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee (D-Calif.) is calling for a probe into a canceled CIA program kept secret from Congress.

Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.) said the Intelligence panel should find out where funding for the program originated and who directed the CIA not to inform Congress of its existence.

“We, by no means, have the full story,” Eshoo said in an interview Sunday.

“We don’t know who gave the order. We don’t know where the money came from. We don’t know all the people who were involved.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said Sunday that Democrats have been told by CIA Director Leon Panetta that former Vice President Dick Cheney called on the CIA not to tell Congress of the program.

“We need a full investigation,” Eshoo continued. “My preference is that we hire an attorney to come in and run this, someone that is known for their prosecutorial knowledge as well as their knowledge of this particular area of the law.”

Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) also called on congressional panels to investigate the matter Sunday during an appearance on ABC’s “This Week.”

Details about the eight-year CIA program are unclear, as members are refusing to disclose specifics about it. Still, several have referred to it as a serious program, and members of both parties have said Congress should have been informed.

Eshoo would not confirm or deny Cheney’s involvement, but called for a full prosecution of whoever was found to be responsible, saying that she hoped fellow members would not shirk the task for partisan reasons.

“Once facts are established, if in fact laws have been broken, then one individual or more should be prosecuted,” she said. “I think Congress has to have the stomach for this.”

Durbin also said it could have been illegal to keep the program from Congress. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said Sunday that CIA Director Leon Panetta told members of the Intelligence panels that Cheney had told the agency not to inform Congress.

“This was purposefully concealed from Congress from 2001 to 2009, so it’s not just the story that breaks, but the Congress has to have the stomach to do the right thing, regardless of who it is,” Eshoo said.

Eshoo is one of seven panel members who sent a letter to Panetta last month asking him to publicly recant his previous statement that it is not the CIA’s “policy or practice to mislead Congress” in light of his more recent testimony that revealed the CIA’s concealment of information from members.

Eshoo said that her calls for an investigation were not simply to punish those in violation of the National Security Act, which requires the CIA to completely inform Congress. She said the CIA’s actions had jeopardized her congressional responsibilities.

“This goes to the heart of the work of our responsibility on this committee,” she said of not being informed by the CIA. “We can not do our work unless the Agency is forthcoming, the National Security Act calls for that to completely and fully inform Congress. Now, if you don’t have the information, how can you shape policy?”

© 2009 Capitol Hill Publishing Corp., a subsidiary of News Communications, Inc.

Published on Monday, July 13, 2009 by The Independent/UK

The Planet’s Future: Climate Change ‘Will Cause Civilisation to Collapse’

Authoritative new study sets out a grim vision of shortages and violence – but amid all the gloom, there is some hope too

by Jonathan Owen

An effort on the scale of the Apollo mission that sent men to the Moon is needed if humanity is to have a fighting chance of surviving the ravages of climate change. The stakes are high, as, without sustainable growth, “billions of people will be condemned to poverty and much of civilisation will collapse”.

 

This is the stark warning from the biggest single report to look at the future of the planet – obtained by The Independent on Sunday ahead of its official publication next month. Backed by a diverse range of leading organisations such as Unesco, the World Bank, the US army and the Rockefeller Foundation, the 2009 State of the Future report runs to 6,700 pages and draws on contributions from 2,700 experts around the globe. Its findings are described by Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the UN, as providing “invaluable insights into the future for the United Nations, its member states, and civil society”. 

The impact of the global recession is a key theme, with researchers warning that global clean energy, food availability, poverty and the growth of democracy around the world are at “risk of getting worse due to the recession”. The report adds: “Too many greedy and deceitful decisions led to a world recession and demonstrated the international interdependence of economics and ethics.”

Although the future has been looking better for most of the world over the past 20 years, the global recession has lowered the State of the Future Index for the next 10 years. Half the world could face violence and unrest due to severe unemployment combined with scarce water, food and energy supplies and the cumulative effects of climate change.

And the authors of the report, produced by the Millennium Project – a think-tank formerly part of the World Federation of the United Nations Associations – set out a number of emerging environmental security issues. “The scope and scale of the future effects of climate change – ranging from changes in weather patterns to loss of livelihoods and disappearing states – has unprecedented implications for political and social stability.”

But the authors suggest the threats could also provide the potential for a positive future for all. “The good news is that the global financial crisis and climate change planning may be helping humanity to move from its often selfish, self-centred adolescence to a more globally responsible adulthood… Many perceive the current economic disaster as an opportunity to invest in the next generation of greener technologies, to rethink economic and development assumptions, and to put the world on course for a better future.”

Scientific and technological progress continues to accelerate. IBM promises a computer at 20,000 trillion calculations per second by 2011, which is estimated to be the speed of the human brain. And nanomedicine may one day rebuild damaged cells atom by atom, using nanobots the size of blood cells. But technological progress carries its own risks. “Globalisation and advanced technology allow fewer people to do more damage and in less time, so that possibly one day a single individual may be able to make and deploy a weapon of mass destruction.”

The report also praises the web, which it singles out as “the most powerful force for globalisation, democratisation, economic growth, and education in history”. Technological advances are cited as “giving birth to an interdependent humanity that can create and implement global strategies to improve the prospects for humanity”.

The immediate problems are rising food and energy prices, shortages of water and increasing migrations “due to political, environmental and economic conditions”, which could plunge half the world into social instability and violence. And organised crime is flourishing, with a global income estimated at $3 trillion – twice the military budgets of all countries in the world combined.

The effects of climate change are worsening – by 2025 there could be three billion people without adequate water as the population rises still further. And massive urbanisation, increased encroachment on animal territory, and concentrated livestock production could trigger new pandemics.

Although government and business leaders are responding more seriously to the global environmental situation, it continues to get worse, according to the report. It calls on governments to work to 10-year plans to tackle growing threats to human survival, targeting particularly the US and China, which need to apply the sort of effort and resources that put men on the Moon.

“This is not only important for the environment; it is also a strategy to increase the likelihood of international peace. Without some agreement, it will be difficult to get the kind of global coherence needed to address climate change seriously.”

While the world has the resources to address its challenges, coherence and direction have been lacking. Recent meetings of the US and China, as well as of Nato and Russia, and the birth of the G20 plus the continued work of the G8 promise to improve global strategic collaboration, but “it remains to be seen if this spirit of co-operation can continue and if decisions will be made on the scale necessary to really address the global challenges discussed in this report”.

Although the scale of the effects of climate change are unprecedented, the causes are generally known, and the consequences can largely be forecast. The report says, “coordination for effective and adequate action is yet incipient, and environmental problems worsen faster than response or preventive policies are being adopted”.

Jerome Glenn, director of the Millennium Project and one of the report’s authors, said: “There are answers to our global challenges, but decisions are still not being made on the scale necessary to address them. Three great transitions would help both the world economy and its natural environment – to shift as much as possible from freshwater agriculture to saltwater agriculture; produce healthier meat without the need to grow animals; and replace gasoline cars with electric cars.”

©independent.co.uk

Published on Sunday, July 12, 2009 by The Sunday Observer/UK

The Words of God Do Not Justify Cruelty to Women

Discrimination and abuse wrongly backed by doctrine are damaging society, argues the former US president

by Jimmy Carter

“Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status …” (Article 2, Universal Declaration of Human Rights)

“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3:28)

I have been a practising Christian all my life and a deacon and Bible teacher for many years. My faith is a source of strength and comfort to me, as religious beliefs are to hundreds of millions of people around the world.

So my decision to sever my ties with the Southern Baptist Convention, after six decades, was painful and difficult. It was, however, an unavoidable decision when th e convention’s leaders, quoting a few carefully selected Bible verses and claiming that Eve was created second to Adam and was responsible for original sin, ordained that women must be “subservient” to their husbands and prohibited from serving as deacons, pastors or chaplains in the military service. This was in conflict with my belief – confirmed in the holy scriptures – that we are all equal in the eyes of God.

This view that women are somehow inferior to men is not restricted to one religion or belief. It is widespread. Women are prevented from playing a full and equal role in many faiths.

Nor, tragically, does its influence stop at the walls of the church, mosque, synagogue or temple. This discrimination, unjustifiably attributed to a Higher Authority, has provided a reason or excuse for the deprivation of women’s equal rights across the world for centuries. The male interpretations of religious texts and the way they interact with, and reinforce, traditional practices justify some of the most pervasive, persistent, flagrant and damaging examples of human rights abuses.

At their most repugnant, the belief that women must be subjugated to the wishes of men excuses slavery, violence, forced prostitution, genital mutilation and national laws that omit rape as a crime. But it also costs many millions of girls and women control over their own bodies and lives, and continues to deny them fair access to education, health, employment and influence within their own communities.

The impact of these religious beliefs touches every aspect of our lives. They help explain why in many countries boys are educated before girls; why girls are told when and whom they must marry; and why many face enormous and unacceptable risks in pregnancy and childbirth because their basic health needs are not met.

In some Islamic nations, women are restricted in their movements, punished for permitting the exposure of an arm or ankle, deprived of education, prohibited from driving a car or competing with men for a job. If a woman is raped, she is often most severely punished as the guilty party in the crime.

The same discriminatory thinking lies behind the continuing gender gap in pay and why there are still so few women in office in Britain and the United States. The root of this prejudice lies deep in our histories, but its impact is felt every day. It is not women and girls alone who suffer. It damages all of us. The evidence shows that investing in women and girls delivers major benefits for everyone in society. An educated woman has healthier children. She is more likely to send them to school. She earns more and invests what she earns in her family.

It is simply self-defeating for any community to discriminate against half its population. We need to challenge these self-serving and out-dated attitudes and practices – as we are seeing in Iran where women are at the forefront of the battle for democracy and freedom.

I understand, however, why many political leaders can be reluctant about stepping into this minefield. Religion, and tradition, are powerful and sensitive area to challenge.

But my fellow Elders and I, who come from many faiths and backgrounds, no longer need to worry about winning votes or avoiding controversy – and we are deeply committed to challenging injustice wherever we see it.

The Elders have decided to draw particular attention to the responsibility of religious and traditional leaders in ensuring equality and human rights. We have recently published a statement that declares: “The justification of discrimination against women and girls on grounds of religion or tradition, as if it were prescribed by a Higher Authority, is unacceptable.”

We are calling on all leaders to challenge and change the harmful teachings and practices, no matter how ingrained, which justify discrimination against women. We ask, in particular, that leaders of all religions have the courage to acknowledge and emphasise the positive messages of dignity and equality that all the world’s major faiths share.

Although not having training in religion or theology, I understand that the carefully selected verses found in the holy scriptures to justify the superiority of men owe more to time and place – and the determination of male leaders to hold onto their influence – than eternal truths. Similar Biblical excerpts could be found to support the approval of slavery and the timid acquiescence to oppressive rulers.

At the same time, I am also familiar with vivid descriptions in the same scriptures in which women are revered as pre-eminent leaders. During the years of the early Christian church women served as deacons, priests, bishops, apostles, teachers and prophets. It wasn’t until the fourth century that dominant Christian leaders, all men, twisted and distorted holy scriptures to perpetuate their ascendant positions within the religious hierarchy.

I know, too, that Billy Graham, one of the most widely respected and revered Christians during my lifetime, did not understand why women were prevented from being priests and preachers. He said: “Women preach all over the world. It doesn’t bother me from my study of the scriptures.”

The truth is that male religious leaders have had – and still have – an option to interpret holy teachings either to exalt or subjugate women. They have, for their own selfish ends, overwhelmingly chosen the latter.

Their continuing choice provides the foundation or justification for much of the pervasive persecution and abuse of women throughout the world. This is in clear violation not just of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights but also the teachings of Jesus Christ, the Apostle Paul, Moses and the prophets, Muhammad, and founders of other great religions – all of whom have called for proper and equitable treatment of all the children of God. It is time we had the courage to challenge these views.

 

© Guardian News and Media Limited 2009

Jimmy Carter was US president from 1977-81. The Elders are an independent group of eminent global leaders, brought together by Nelson Mandela, who offer their influence and experience to support peace building, help address major causes of human suffering and promote the shared interests of humanity.

Sponsored by: Environmental Defense Fund

Target: Ken Salazar, Secretary of the Interior
Sponsored by: Care2

Target: U.S. Congress
Sponsored by: Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund

Published on Friday, July 10, 2009 by The Huffington Post

G-8 Failure Reflects US Failure on Climate Change

by James Hansen

It didn’t take long for the counterfeit climate bill known as Waxman-Markey to push back against President Obama’s agenda. As the president was arriving in Italy for his first Group of Eight summit, the New York Times was reporting that efforts to close ranks on global warming between the G-8 and the emerging economies had already tanked:

The world’s major industrial nations and emerging powers failed to agree Wednesday on significant cuts in heat-trapping gases by 2050, unraveling an effort to build a global consensus to fight climate change, according to people following the talks.

Of course, emission targets in 2050 have limited practical meaning — present leaders will be dead or doddering by then — so these differences may be patched up. The important point is that other nations are unlikely to make real concessions on emissions if the United States is not addressing the climate matter seriously.

With a workable climate bill in his pocket, President Obama might have been able to begin building that global consensus in Italy. Instead, it looks as if the delegates from other nations may have done what 219 U.S. House members who voted up Waxman-Markey last month did not: critically read the 1,400-page American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 and deduce that it’s no more fit to rescue our climate than a V-2 rocket was to land a man on the moon.

I share that conclusion, and have explained why to members of Congress before and will again at a Capitol Hill briefing on July 13. Science has exposed the climate threat and revealed this inconvenient truth: If we burn even half of Earth’s remaining fossil fuels we will destroy the planet as humanity knows it. The added emissions of heat-trapping carbon dioxide will set our Earth irreversibly onto a course toward an ice-free state, a course that will initiate a chain reaction of irreversible and catastrophic climate changes.

The concentration of CO2 in our atmosphere now stands at 387 parts per million, the highest level in 600,000 years and more than 100 ppm higher than the amount at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution. Burning just the oil and gas sitting in known fields will drive atmospheric CO2 well over 400 ppm and ignite a devil’s cauldron of melted icecaps, bubbling permafrost, and combustible forests from which there will be no turning back. But if we cut off the largest source of carbon dioxide, coal, we have a chance to bring CO2 back to 350 ppm and still lower through agricultural and forestry practices that increase carbon storage in trees and soil.

The essential step, then, is to phase out coal emissions over the next two decades. And to declare off limits artificial high-carbon fuels such as tar sands and shale while moving to phase out dependence on conventional petroleum as well.

This requires nothing less than an energy revolution based on efficiency and carbon-free energy sources. Alas, we won’t get there with the Waxman-Markey bill, a monstrous absurdity hatched in Washington after energetic insemination by special interests.

For all its “green” aura, Waxman-Markey locks in fossil fuel business-as-usual and garlands it with a Ponzi-like “cap-and-trade” scheme. Here are a few of the bill’s egregious flaws:

• It guts the Clean Air Act, removing EPA’s ability to regulate CO2 emissions from power plants.
• It sets meager targets — 2020 emissions are to be a paltry 13% less than this year’s level — and sabotages even these by permitting fictitious “offsets,” by which other nations are paid to preserve forests – while logging and food production will simply move elsewhere to meet market demand.
• Its cap-and-trade system, reports former U.S. Undersecretary of Commerce for Economic Affairs Robert Shapiro, “has no provisions to prevent insider trading by utilities and energy companies or a financial meltdown from speculators trading frantically in the permits and their derivatives.”
• It fails to set predictable prices for carbon, without which, Shapiro notes, “businesses and households won’t be able to calculate whether developing and using less carbon-intensive energy and technologies makes economic sense,” thus ensuring that millions of carbon-critical decisions fall short.

There is an alternative, of course, and that is a carbon fee, applied at the source (mine or port of entry) that rises continually. I prefer the “fee-and-dividend” version of this approach in which all revenues are returned to the public on an equal, per capita basis, so those with below-average carbon footprints come out ahead.

A carbon fee-and-dividend would be an economic stimulus and boon for the public. By the time the fee reached the equivalent of $1/gallon of gasoline ($115/ton of CO2) the rebate in the United States would be $2000-3000 per adult or $6000-9000 for a family with two children.

Fee-and-dividend would work hand-in-glove with new building, appliance, and vehicle efficiency standards. A rising carbon fee is the best enforcement mechanism for building standards, and it provides an incentive to move to ever higher energy efficiencies and carbon-free energy sources. As engineering and cultural tipping points are reached, the phase-over to post-fossil energy sources will accelerate. Tar sands and shale would be dead and there would be no need to drill Earth’s pristine extremes for the last drops of oil.

Some leaders of big environmental organizations have said I’m naïve to posit an alternative to cap-and-trade, and have suggested I stick to climate modeling. Let’s pass a bill, any bill, now and improve it later, they say. The real naïveté is their belief that they, and not the fossil-fuel interests, are driving the legislative process.

The fact is that the climate course set by Waxman-Markey is a disaster course. Their bill is an astoundingly inefficient way to get a tiny reduction of emissions. It’s less than worthless, because it will delay by at least a decade starting on a path that is fundamentally sound from the standpoints of both economics and climate preservation.

Former Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, who died this week, suffered for 40 years — as did our country — from his failure to turn back from a failed policy. As grave as the blunders of the Vietnam War were, the consequences of a failed climate policy will be more severe by orders of magnitude.

With the Senate debate over climate now beginning, there is still time to turn back from cap-and-trade and toward fee-and-dividend. We need to start now. Without political leadership creating a truly viable policy like a carbon fee, not only won’t we get meaningful climate legislation through the Senate, we won’t be able to create the concerted approach we need globally to prevent catastrophic climate change. Copyright © 2009 HuffingtonPost.com, Inc.

Jim Hansen is director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, but he writes on this policy-related topic as a private citizen.

Published on Friday, July 10, 2009 by McClatchy Newspapers

Obama Campaign Vow of Public Debate on Health Care Fading

by David Lightman and Margaret Talev

WASHINGTON – Campaigning for president, Barack Obama said repeatedly that any overhaul of the health care system should be negotiated publicly and televised for all to see. Throughout this year’s negotiations, however, the big deals have been struck in secret.

 

With tax increases and limits on what’s covered among the possible ways of offsetting perhaps $1 trillion over a decade in expenses, neither the administration nor Congress is willing to give up its right to do the most sensitive talking in private, as it’s always been done. 

“It’s unrealistic to think every aspect of the negotiations is going to be public,” said Senate Assistant Majority Leader Richard Durbin, D-Ill.

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, traveling with Obama in L’Aquila, Italy, said Thursday that “this president has demonstrated more transparency than any president.” He said that Obama had participated in multiple town-hall meetings with doctors, nurses and providers to discuss revamping health care.

“I don’t think the president intimated that every decision putting together a health care bill would be on public TV,” Gibbs said.

The notion of televising negotiations behind a health care revamp was so central to Obama’s campaign promises of change and openness, however, that it became part of his stump speech as he traveled the country in 2007 and 2008.

He’d describe how televised deliberations would take place around a big table, with seats filled by doctors, nurses, insurers and other interested parties. As president, he’d joke, he’d get the biggest chair.

“Not negotiating behind closed doors, but bringing all parties together and broadcasting those negotiations on C-SPAN,” Obama explained in a Democratic debate in Los Angeles in January 2008, in language similar to many of his campaign stops.

However, the two biggest deals so far – industry agreements to cut drug and hospital costs – were reached in secret.

“They were private, yes,” said Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., a key participant in the process.

C-SPAN, the cable public-policy network, did carry a White House Forum on Health Reform in early March in which the president spoke and participants fanned into working groups.

That was a kickoff event, however, not a negotiation. C-SPAN spokesman John Cardarelli said that beyond that, “There hasn’t been a collaborative effort of coordination of coverage of ’special events.’ ” The decisions about what to air are made independently on a case-by-case basis, he said.

The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee’s bill-writing sessions, which began about three weeks ago, have been open, and various committees and subcommittees have had dozens of public hearings.

The private sessions continue, however.

Four Senate Republicans met for an hour and a half Wednesday to discuss health care with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. Separately, Sens. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, and John Kerry, D-Mass., have been in intense discussions. White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and Office of Health Reform director Nancy-Ann DeParle are in constant, private contact with key players.

The House of Representatives could vote on a plan before the August recess. The Senate is poised for a longer debate. Assuming they pass differing plans, any final product would emerge from a conference committee, whose negotiations typically offer even less public scrutiny.

Lawmakers, health care interests and public policy experts acknowledge that Obama’s campaign vision hasn’t exactly come to pass.

“Sometimes for people to say what’s really on their mind, it helps to do it outside the public eye,” said Senate Finance Committee member Thomas Carper, D-Del. “Could the process be more transparent? I suppose it could be.”

The health care negotiations are “no different from any other negotiation over the years when deals are struck quietly,” said Sen. Judd Gregg of New Hampshire, the top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee and a member of the health committee.

Some experts said that Obama’s decision, once in office, to ask Congress to write the legislation rather than repeat the Clinton administration’s failed approach in 1993 of writing its own bill and delivering it to Capitol Hill meant that the president was relinquishing control of how public the process would be.

They said that despite all the private talks involved in this year’s effort, it was still far more open than others had been, including the Clinton plan.

“I think it’s been as open as it can be given the way things work around here,” said William A. Galston, a former policy adviser to President Bill Clinton who’s now affiliated with the center-left Brookings Institution, a research center.

In contrast, Galston said, the Clinton health care task force was “a systematically insulated process. We had hundreds of participants on the inside, but it was not a process that was designed to be open to public scrutiny during the actual drafting. What’s happened now is significantly more public.”

Last month, Baucus and the pharmaceutical industry announced on a Saturday afternoon that they’d reached a deal to cut drug costs for elderly people. The White House gave the talks “its blessing,” said Ken Johnson, a senior vice president at the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America. “The average person doesn’t understand our business model.”

Vice President Joe Biden formally announced another deal Wednesday, in which leading hospital groups would accept $155 billion in cuts to government programs. Biden and the hospital executives who flanked him declined to take questions from reporters.

One participant who agreed to talk later, Sister Carol Keehan, the president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association of the United States, said that her group had been in “constant conversation” with policymakers, which had “accelerated in the last month.”

In May, two Senate committees, Finance and Commerce, held three days of closed-door meetings to discuss health care legislation. One of the meetings lasted eight hours, and participants said that no agreement was reached on the biggest controversy, a public-insurance option.

Committee members said this week that none of these deals or meetings violated the spirit of transparency.

In a twist, the post-campaign version of Obama’s grass-roots group, Organizing for America, now controlled by the Democratic National Committee, sent an e-mail this week to supporters asking them to call their lawmakers and urge them to back Obama’s concept of health care restructuring.

“The behind-the-scenes committee negotiations aren’t front page news,” the e-mail said, but warned that “as we speak, key committees in Congress are weighing options and making final decisions about how to tackle health care reform. This could be one of the last opportunities to shape the legislation before it’s written.”

(Steven Thomma contributed to this report from L’Aquila, Italy.)

McClatchy Newspapers 2009