Clippings for 25 September

Paulson Bailout Plan a Historic
William Greider writes for The Nation: "Financial-market wise guys, who had been seized with fear, are suddenly drunk with hope. They are rallying explosively because they think they have successfully stampeded Washington into accepting the Wall Street Journal solution to the crisis: dump it all on the taxpayers. That is the meaning of the massive bailout Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson has shopped around Congress. It would relieve the major banks and investment firms of their mountainous rotten assets and make the public swallow their losses - many hundreds of billions, maybe much more. What's not to like if you are a financial titan threatened with extinction?"

Fleecing What’s Left of the Treasury
Chris Hedges writes for Truthdig.com that the lobbyists and corporate lawyers, the heads of financial firms and the crooks who control Wall Street, all those who spent the last three decades assuring us that government was part of the problem and should get out of the way, are now busy looting the U.S. treasury.

The $700 Billion Bailout Plan's Fine Print
Nomi Prins, Mother Jones: "Treasury Sec. Hank Paulson's $700 billion bailout plan now has a name: the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP. But even as Capitol Hill debates TARP, few seem to have noticed the proposal item that puts taxpayers on the hook for future bailouts. It's in Section 6, and the key phrase is this: 'The Secretary's authority to purchase mortgage-related assets under this Act shall be limited to $700,000,000,000 outstanding at any one time.'"

Taxpayers, Congress Push Back Against Bailout
Matt Renner writes for Truthout: "Push back against the massive $700 billion Wall Street bailout proposal has come hard and fast from members of Congress on both sides of the aisle. The bailout plan proposed by the Bush administration would give the Treasury Department and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson - a former Wall Street CEO himself - the power to buy up extremely risky mortgages and other dangerous debt using taxpayer dollars. Members of Congress point to a severe lack of oversight in the proposed Bush administration plan."

Schools: Obama Stresses More Investment, McCain Parental Choice
Stacy Teicher Khadaroo reports for The Christian Science Monitor: "Presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama offer different visions for how the federal government can help America's students get ahead. Senator McCain's drumbeat is parental choice and empowerment - making it easier for students in substandard schools to take funding with them, whether to a tutoring company or another public or private school. Senator Obama's thrust is strategic investment - more federal dollars to put good teachers into high-needs schools, increase charter-school options, and boost early childhood development to stave off achievement gaps."

AUDIO: Truthdig.com Podcast: Robert Scheer on the Economic Meltdown
Community Bridge receommends this week's podcast from Truthdig.com. Robert Scheer, editor in chief at Truthdig.com, warns against thinking about the economic crisis as an “act of God,” saying “this is man-made” and that the individuals responsible are well known and entirely too influential in the current election.

RFK Jr. and Mike Papantonio: "Is Your Vote Safe?"
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. anchor on Air America's Ring of Fire writes: "There are about 30 scams the Republicans are deliberately using, particularly in the swing states to get Democratic voters off the rolls. These scams originate in the so-called Help America Vote Act, which was passed after the Florida debacle in the year 2000. It was originally suggested by Democrats and Republicans, but it was passed by a Republican Congress with a Republican Senate and a Republican president. And instead of reforming what happened in Florida, it basically institutionalized all the problems that happened in Florida."

Election Deception on College Campuses in Swing States
Greg Gordon, McClatchy Newspapers: "Colorado Democrats accused a Republican county clerk Wednesday of falsely informing Colorado College that students from outside the state could not register to vote if their parents claimed them as a dependent on their tax returns."

Free Trade Can Mean the Poor Stay Hungry
Felicity Lawrence writes for The Guardian (UK): "More than half the world's population also still depends for some of its income on agriculture. Rising food commodity prices ought to have helped them, but they haven't. The fact is that much of the money made in the food chain is captured by transnational corporations based in richer nations."

Listen to the Women: The UN Weighs Its Millennium Development Goals
Barbara Crossette writes for The Nation: "On September 25, in a summit-style gathering at the UN to which all 192 member nations are invited, successes and failures will be parsed, region by region, country by country. Then, predictably, the conversation will turn to money, the perennial quick fix prescribed for soul-destroying underdevelopment in the world's poorest places. Money is always needed, but there is more to ensuring development than that."