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“No more Fukushimas” Rally in Tokyo Draws 200,000

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The following is a report from Doro-Chiba Quake Report about a huge anti-nuke protest rally in Toyko on Friday, the 29th of June.  “No more Fukushimas” was their rally cry.

On Friday, June 29, 200 thousand people inundated the streets around the Prime Minister’s Office and Residence, the Parliament Building and other facilities.

Around 5:40 PM, the “protest on the sidewalk” spilled over to the streets. Around 6:50 PM, all the six traffic lanes of the street from the crossing in front of the Prime Minister’s Office through the Ministry of Finance were completely occupied by workers and people, young and old, who held makeshift placards. Other streets nearby were also full of protesters. It was a Tahrir Squar in Tokyo.

The huge crowd of people began to move toward the PM’s Office, chanting “Saikado hantai” (“Stop Restart”). The panic-stricken police moved dozens of armored police vehicles and built a wall with them and stopped the march of protesters at the last minute.   [Read more…]

The Supreme Court Upheld Corporate Health Care Reform – Universal Health Care Still Elusive

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Not allowing the perfect to be the enemy of the good, progressives should be happy that the Supreme Court dealt the Neanderthal right a huge blow by upholding the constitutionality of health care reform. Now 30 million more Americans will have access to health care, parents will be allowed to keep their adult children on their policies longer, and those with pre-existing conditions can no longer be excluded from coverage among other good results. This is a real, tangible win for scores of Americans, but not all of us.

On the political front, years of insane ranting about death panels, the end of American liberty, and creeping socialism got slam dunked by a conservative judge who joined the liberals in affirming the lion’s share of the provisions of the Affordable Care Act. This will not stop the bullshit machine at Fox News and elsewhere from cranking out more lies, but it will most likely help more than hurt Obama’s campaign for a second term. With no alternative to offer, all the right has, as Paul Krugman wrote last week, is prevarication and cruelty. Not an attractive combination even when being presented by the ever-so-suave Mitt Romney.
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It’s a Safe Health-Food Wonder, Agricultural Dream and Economic Jackpot: It’s Time to End our Government’s Insane Hemp Prohibition

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The Declaration of Independence was written on hemp, our ships had hemp sails, and pioneers’ covered wagons were covered in — what else? — hemp.

AlterNet / By Jill Richardson

David Bronner was recently arrested for attempting to eat a healthy breakfast. Does that sound stupid? Even once you know the details, it should sound stupid:  Bronner’s food of choice was bread spread with hemp seed oil he pressed himself from industrial hemp plants, which he did in front of the White House under a banner reading: “Dear Mr. President Let U.S. Farmers Grow Hemp.”

Bronner’s company, Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soaps, spends over $100,000 to buy over 20 tons of hemp seed oil from Canada each year to use in its soaps. Bronner wants to give that money to American farmers instead.

If it’s legal to use in soaps – and even to eat – then why is it illegal to grow here? Because according to the government, hemp is a drug. Specifically, it’s considered identical to its close cousin, marijuana. But Bronner says it is no more a drug than a poppyseed bagel. The plants he gathered seed from to press his oil in front of the White House had been tested to confirm they contained less than 0.3 percent THC, which means it would be “impossible to get a high of any kind” even from smoking extremely large quantities of it. A more likely result from smoking that much industrial hemp would be a bad headache or perhaps a sore throat.   [Read more…]

What Winning Looks Like in Reproductive Rights

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The fight for Women’s Reproductive Freedom has been going on in every country around the world. Jane Cawthorne has been a long-time advocate for women’s rights in Canada. She is the writer of the play “The Abortion Monologues”. The play, according to Vicki Saporta, President and CEO of the National Abortion Federation,“…gives a voice to the perspectives of real women who are all too often missing from the public debate. These powerful monologues have the potential to change the way people talk about abortion.”

In the following article, Jane asks us to take a moment to appreciate what our work can accomplish.

By Jane Cawthorne

Calgary, Alberta – These days with women’s reproductive rights under constant attack, especially in the United States, it’s sometimes hard to remember our true goals are in the reproductive justice movement. While we are busy trying to explain what’s wrong with legislating mandatory transvaginal ultrasounds for women seeking abortions, or explaining why it’s unacceptable and unethical for doctors to be forced to lie to women about their pregnancies so they won’t consider abortion, or fighting to make sure women facing poverty can access contraception, we might need a reminder of what winning really looks like when it comes to reproductive rights.

In Canada, a recent report describes how teen pregnancy and abortion rates in Canada dropped 36.9% between 1996 and 2006. This is an incredible achievement. The study is from the Sex Information and Education Council of Canada and Alexander McKay, one of the reports’ authors, credits this incredible decline to Canada’s “balanced, sensible approach to adolescent sexual health.”   [Read more…]

Letter from a Doctor: The Supreme Court’s (grudging) Endorsement of the ACA

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First of all, this is a good step because so much is in action already. Second, it is clear that the US has a fiscal problem. It can be solved in two ways: one is to copy what is done in countries like Germany, which have a host of private insurers, but they are severely regulated by the government. This would reduce their overhead and profiteering at the expense of the sick. If this won’t sit too well with the Congress, which it may well not, the other way may be even more controversial: proceed to a Single Payer alternative by extending Medicare. Clearly, Medicare has not broken the bank yet, nor has it failed to protect the elderly. If it were extended, say, five years at a time, per year, it would be easily accomplished. The private insurance industry, seeing the handwriting on the wall, would begin to cut its overhead and ridiculous executive pay, and switch to “supplemental” policies.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – STOP! Calling the Health Care Law “Obamacare” – Don’t Do the Right’s Job for Them

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June 29, 2012—The Supreme Court’s ruling upholding most of the Affordable Health Act dominates today’s newspapers and internet chatter around the country. There’s no escaping it. The Attorney General of the United States was held in contempt of Congress yesterday, Europe’s leaders may have finally found a way to salvage the Euro, and scientists have finally figured out why modern tomatoes have no flavor, but today none of that matters so much. The significance and the potential benefits/consequences of the high court’s decision rules the news world.

 So we’ll join the chattering mediaoids right after this unpaid political announcement: By characterizing the health care law as “Obamacare” the news media (and even some politicos who ought to know better) are carrying water for the right wingers who have used every dirty trick in the book to defeat, undermine or repeal the Affordable Health Care Act.  Even just saying the “Health Care Act” is fine. The right has spent twenty years fighting any semblance of a national policy on health care for one good reason: once people see the benefits of a rational care system (and the one under discussion here barely qualifies), they are less inclined to buy into the meme that all government is bad that is at the core of the right wing’s philosophy. So. Just. Don’t. Do. It. Don’t say or write the world. It’s lazy. And it’s wrong. Got it? Thank you!   [Read more…]

“And let there be light!” – a Tale of Recovery from Cataract Surgery

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Seven years ago I was told that I had the beginning of cataracts. When they became “ripe” I could have them removed. I wanted to think of myself as a bottle of wine, aging gracefully, and reaping the benefits later. People I knew that had had the surgery were pleased with the results: no more prescription glasses, unless they were needed for reading; waking up in the morning and seeing everything around them.

I could hardly wait. And that is what I did: I waited, and waited, and waited for the damn things to “ripen.” I no longer thought of myself as a “bottle of wine”; rather I thought of myself as an aging old woman. I found myself not willing to drive at night because of the halo’s of oncoming headlights; I couldn’t see the street signs in the dark and I was afraid that I might not see the bike riders along the streets in Ocean Beach.
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The Starting Line—Supreme Court Upholds Affordable Healthcare Act: Fox News, CNN Blow the Call

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June 28, 2012—It’s a great day for millions of American families and children who will have certainty of health care benefits and affordable care under a 5-4 Supreme Court ruling that substantially upheld President Obama’s healthcare plan. The majority agreed that the penalty that someone must pay if he refuses to buy insurance (the individual mandate)  is a kind of tax that Congress can impose using its taxing power. That is all that matters. Because the mandate survives, the Court didn’t decide what other parts of the statute were constitutional, except for a provision that required states to comply with new eligibility requirements for Medicaid or risk losing their funding. On that question, the Court held that the provision is constitutional as long as states would only lose new funds if they didn’t comply with the new requirements, rather than all of their funding.  Here’s a (pdf) copy of the court’s ruling.

It wasn’t such a great day for CNN and Fox News. CNN was first out of the box as the decision was being announced and they got it wrong, claiming that the court had ruled to overturn the Affordable Care Act. Over at Fox, the silence was deafening—perhaps it was technical difficulties—as their streaming on-line coverage was replaced by a color test pattern and a scheduled chat room feature failed to start on time. As one wag  put it, “It’s a good thing they have health insurance over at Fox, there’s gotta be a bunch of heart attacks happening now.” None-the-less, the Fox News website persisted in using the term “Obamacare” which has developed into conserv-speak for “our healthcare program is ‘don’t get sick’”.   [Read more…]

Supreme Court Upholds ‘Obamacare’

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In a stunning turn of events, the Supreme Court upheld the Affordable Care Act, the signature legislative accomplishment of the Obama Administration.

In a 5-4 decision (more on that in a minute), the Court upheld the contentious individual mandate, determining that it was indeed constitutional under the commerce clause, and justifying the fines to be levied against those who fail to purchase health insurance as a tax and therefore within the purview of Congress to enact.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line – Trans-Pacific Partnership Trade Negotiators to Face a Week of Protests

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June 26, 2012 – A diverse coalition of groups has announced plans for ongoing protests aimed at trade negotiators meeting in San Diego next week for the 13th round of talks aimed at the creation of a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade zone that would include the United States, Australia, Brunei, Chile, Malaysia, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam, with a “docking agreement” that other countries can join over time. Canada, Japan and Mexico are currently pressing to do so.. Describing the proposals being discussed at the confab as “NAFTA on steroids”, the Citizens Trade Campaign is seeking to draw attention to the fact that approximately 600 corporate lobbyists have access to the TPP negotiating texts, while the public has been barred from reviewing what trade negotiators have been proposing.

A leaked TPP document demonstrates that the group is considering a dispute resolution process that would grant transnational corporations special authority to challenge countries’ laws, regulations and court decisions in international tribunals that circumvent domestic judicial systems. Of further concern is the impact of the agreement on jobs, wages, agriculture, migration, the environment, consumer safety, financial regulations, Internet protocols, government procurement and more. Negotiations on the proposed pact will be held at the Hilton San Diego Bayfront Hotel from July 2 – 10.   [Read more…]

Sex in San Diego: Are you a prude?

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by Mrs. Grundy

The word “prude” comes from the French. Traditionally, it meant something along the lines of “honorable woman.”

Today, dear Wikipedia explains that “prude” refers to a person of any gender who is “concerned with decorum and propriety, significantly in excess of normal prevailing community standards.” Particularly when it comes to sex and nudity, a prude “may be perceived as being more uncomfortable than most.”

This suggests that determining one’s level of prudishness involves a comparison to current community norms. And when it comes to sex and nudity, the community’s norms are hard to pin down — especially in a major metropolitan community like San Diego.

Still, I believe it is possible to delineate some sex-related norms across San Diego — and therefore, to calculate the extent of a given San Diegan’s prudishness.   [Read more…]

The Starting Line — Demonstrations, Caravans and Twitterstorms, Oh My!

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June 19. 2012—Grass roots activism around the world leads the news wrap up today. In San Diego, cities around the world and in cyberspace citizens are and have been expressing their frustrations and hopes for a better world.

National Robin Hood Day demonstrations…. Rallies in San Diego and 14 other cities across the country at noon today kick off a national campaign to institute a Wall Street tax that would produce billions for the public good. This Financial Transaction Tax, called the “Robin Hood Tax,” is a levy of less than half of a percent on trades in derivatives, stocks, bonds and foreign currencies. According to the campaign, economists estimate that $350 billion could be raised each year for health care, jobs, education, infrastructure and various other needs, which may help rejuvenate the economy. The campaign states that it is pushing for “a tax for the people.”   [Read more…]

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