Democracy, I would repeat, is the noblest form of government we have yet evolved, and we may as well begin to ask ourselves whether we are ready to suffer, even perish for it, rather than readying ourselves to live in the lower existence of a monumental banana republic with a government always eager to cater to mega-corporations as they do their best to appropriate our thwarted dreams with their elephantiastical conceits. ~ Norman Mailer
Leaked: The Internet must go!
Hey! Are you on the internet right now? Of course you are! Then you should definitely check out this amazing video about what the internet companies are planning.
This move could hurt both consumers and content creators--but of course would be a huge windfall for internet providers.
How weathly are Americans?
The disparity in wealth between the richest one percent of Americans and the bottom 80 percent has grown exponentially over the last thirty years — but the video, posted by user politizane and relying on data from a popular Mother Jones post, focuses on the difference between the ideal disparity that Americans would like to see and the reality.
Tax the Rich
So long! It's been fun.
Dear listeners,
In July 2011 I started a new job teaching Italian at Kansas State University. In some ways this was a return to my roots, as I taught English as a Foreign Language for 17 years in Italy. Now I am teaching English speakers Italian. I've come full circle.
This coming full circle also means the end of an attempt on my part to start a new career in my 50s. Sadly, as much as I tried to bring community radio to Manhattan, I was not successful. So I have decided to dedicate my energy and time to my first love, being an educator.
The archive of my shows will remain active - there's a lot of great content in the shows. So I hope you continue to listen and enjoy them.
Once again thank you for your support and encouragement over the five years the show was on the air. I know many feel that my program needs to be on the air and I agree with you that a diversity of voices is sorely lacking in the local media. But alas, it is not I who will bring that diversity. It will have to be someone else.
Christopher E. Renner
Showing posts with label US legal system. Show all posts
Showing posts with label US legal system. Show all posts
David Solnit first became involved in creating change in high school when he joined a campaign to abolish draft registration. Since then, the California-based carpenter, activist, and puppeteer, has been on the frontlines of direct action, protesting the US role in Central America in the 1980s, free trade deals and the WTO in the 1990s, and, more recently, the US intervention in Iraq.
Solnit is a co-founder of Art and Revolution, a loose-knit collective that combines art and theater with direct action. This creativity-with-a-purpose stands in a colorful tradition of theatrical dissent from the Diggers, the Yippies, and the French Situationists of the 1960s. Solnit and his predecessors subvert the system by pointing to alternatives, using blatant contrast they show how fundamentally flawed the “normal” state of affairs truly is.
Solnit was in Manhattan earlier this month to conduct a workshop on social action and to speak at the Manhattan Alliance for Peace and Justice annual meeting. I spoke with him on April 8th here in the KSDB studio.
The MRFF fights unconstitutional religious oppression and tyranny in the U.S. armed forces. Founded by Michael Weinstein, a 1977 Honor Graduate of the United States Air Force Academy and legal counsel for the Reagan administration, MRFF directly battles the far-right militant radical evangelical religious fundamentalists who have infiltrated the US military. This battle is detailed in: With God On Our Side: One Man’s War Against an Evangelical Coup in America’s Military released by St. Martin's Press in October 2006. The book is an expose on the systemic problem of religious intolerance throughout the United States armed forces.
Rodda is a regular contributor at Talk2Action.org, a blogger on the Huffington Post, and maintains the Liars for Jesus website that provides inquiring minds with news and information on the radical extremists Dominionist Christian activities to pervert our constitutional rights and our US history.
What WikiLeaks Revealed to the World in 2010
Glenn Greenwald writes for Salon.com: "Throughout this year I've devoted substantial attention to WikiLeaks, particularly in the last four weeks as calls for its destruction intensified. To understand why I've done so, and to see what motivates the increasing devotion of the U.S. Government and those influenced by it to destroying that organization, it's well worth reviewing exactly what WikiLeaks exposed to the world just in the last year: the breadth of the corruption, deceit, brutality and criminality on the part of the world's most powerful factions."
Keeping State Secrets
Shay Toten reports for Seven Days: "You’ve probably heard of Wikileaks and its founder, Julian Assange. Maybe even Bradley Manning, the Army private and former intelligence officer who allegedly turned over thousands of classified documents to Wikileaks. But chances are you don’t know the name Thomas Drake, a former Vermonter charged under the Espionage Act for mishandling classified information. His alleged crime? Drake blew the whistle on a wasteful surveillance program within the National Security Agency."
Mark Clayton, Ron Scherer, Amanda Paulson and Chris Gaylord report for The Christian Science Monitor: "History, it seems, will remember 2010 in the United States as the year of health-care reform, the Gulf oil spill, and the tea party movement. But the most widely covered stories are clearly not the only events that could shape the future of the nation. Here we note five overlooked stories of 2010 - developments that might have received some press coverage but perhaps not as much as they should have, given the impact they could have on various aspects of American life in the years ahead." Photo: Christian Science Monitor
Alex Pareene writes for Salon.com: "Every day, right-wing blogs and Fox News are abuzz with hysterical reports of partly or wholly invented scandals that, in their fevered imaginations, threaten to once-and-for-all destroy the Obama administration. While most of the bloggers are true believers, convinced that they're one smoking gun away from opening everyone's eyes to the criminality of the administration, on Fox they just run with whatever sounds good until they get bored with it or something more entertaining comes along. Once a pseudo-scandal ceases to be useful, it doesn't really go away forever -- Free Republic commenters will reference it until the end of time -- but most people just sort of forget about it shortly after Megyn Kelly stops mentioning it." Photo: Salon.com
Free Trade Won't Cure Unemployment
Paul Krugman writes for Krugman and Co. via Truthout: "Now that there seems to be no hope of using reasonable fiscal policy to fix the United States's economy, I've been hearing a different idea lately: that trade can be a driver of economic recovery. Namely, the suggestion that the trade proposal South Korea and the United States recently agreed on can serve as a form of macroeconomic policy. Um, no. The problem in the United States is insufficient spending on American-produced goods and services - that is, a lack of demand."
Arun Gupta reports for AlterNet: "The severe economic crisis, now in its fourth year, is being used to batter the remnants of the social welfare state. Having decimated aid to the poor over the last 30 years, especially in the United States, the economic and political elite are now intent on strangling middle-class benefits, namely state-provided pensions, health care and education." Image: AlterNet
SEC Describes Possible Criminal Activity in Unprosecuted Hedge Fund Case
Adam Zagorin and Michael Smallberg report for the Project on Government Oversight: "The Obama administration has stated it will aggressively go after Wall Street criminals, but is the government letting two defendants off easy? But what [the Obama administration has not] highlighted is a major case involving Pequot Capital Management, once the world’s largest hedge fund, and alleged insider trading in shares of Microsoft."
Where Things Stand: Foreclosure Paperwork Scandal
Marian Wang reports for ProPublica: "Some struggling homeowners are currently getting a temporary reprieve from foreclosure sales and evictions during the holiday season, but that doesn't mean all foreclosure cases have stopped moving through the courts -- and it doesn't mean we're done covering the developments in the foreclosure scandal either. Here's where things stand..."
John Reimann comments for the Daily Censored: "After the mid-term elections, President Obama made a further turn to the right in part in an attempt to placate the right wing populists. Many supporters, including critical supporters, of Obama were somewhat shocked at. They shouldn’t have been, and if they’d read Robert Scheer’s “The Great American Stickup” maybe they would have been better prepared. Scheer’s book is a fairly detailed history of how the “financial services” industry – finance capital – integrated itself with the federal government. Reagan and then Bush Sr. had popularized the idea of deregulation, but it wasn’t until the 90s, first under President Clinton, that finance capital really came into its own in terms of political control. The main blow in this realm was the repeal of the Glass-Steagal Act. This Depression-era law established certain limits on what banks could do. The main limitation was the separation of banks into commercial and investment banks. Only the former held accounts from customers that were insured by the federal government. In return, they were forbidden from certain of the more risky investment practices that investment banks could engage in."
Jonathan Battaglia and Robert Weiner comment for The Palm Beach Post: "Under the radar screen, the new tax deal is threatening the livelihood of America's present and future seniors - to line the pockets of millionaires. If made permanent, a new Social Security 'payroll tax holiday,' reducing the 'match' employers pay from 6 percent to 4 percent of salary, will drop the solvency of the program 14 years, from 2037 to 2023, according to the Congressional Budget Office. At the same time, Congress agreed to increase high-end loopholes in the estate tax, exempting 39,000 estates worth as much as $5 million."
Beyond WikiLeaks: The Privatization of War
Jose L. Gomez de Prado reports for UN Working Group on Mercenaries via Truthout: "Human rights violations perpetrated by private military and security companies are indications of the threat posed to the foundations of democracy when inherently public functions - such as the monopoly on the legitimate use of force - become privatized."
Matthew Harwood provides the followign analysis for Truthout: "Even though the TSA failed to carry out scientific testing of Screening Passengers by Observation Techniques (SPOT), the TSA has allotted nearly $383 million to SPOT since 2007, rolling it out at 161 of 457 TSA-regulated airports. Despite this considerable investment, the agency didn't even perform a cost-benefit analysis on the pilot tests that began in 2003, according to the GAO.... Maybe the most damning evidence that SPOT doesn't work is that it has never identified a terrorist at an airport where the program has been implemented." Image: Troy Page / t r u t h o u t; Adapted: phunkstarr, Travelin' Librarian, Joshua Davis
Nearly One In Nine Federal Judgeships Are Now Vacant
Ian Millhiser reports for Think Progress: "The Senate adjourned earlier this week, even though it confirmed only half of the 38 judicial nominees awaiting a vote on the Senate floor. And the overwhelming majority of the blocked nominees cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee without a single negative vote."
EPA Presents Plan on Greenhouse Gases. Can Next Congress Stop It?
Mark Clayton reports for the Christian Science Monitor: "Setting the stage for a New Year battle royale between Congress and the White House over greenhouse gas emissions, the US Environmental Protection Agency Thursday laid out a timetable for the nation's largest carbon emitters – power plants and refineries – to begin curbing those pollutants."
Elliot D. Cohen writes for Truthdig.com: "The recent Federal Communications Commission decision to “protect” net neutrality was long awaited by activists, but it turned out to be smoke and mirrors, catering largely to service providers such as Comcast and AT&T. What is needed now is a collective movement by all Internet users throughout the world, not just the relative few who have been fighting on our behalf, to stop the demise of Internet freedom before it’s too late." Photo: AP / Matt Rourke
The Art Of “Kicking The Can”—Uncertainty Rules When It Comes To Net Neutrality
Tim Wu writes for TechCrunch: "The new Net Neutrality rules put off most of the hard questions—but who does that help and hurt? When government faces a tough decision, it has three options: “Aye,” “Nay,” or “Kay”—“Kick the Can.” Postponement is attractive, and the Obama administration’s 2010 Net Neutrality rule has transformed can-kicking, the traditional domain of small children, into an art form. In its rule the FCC has successfully put off almost all of the hard Net Neutrality questions that have been buzzing around since 2000 or so. It is a remarkable feat to write a rule that actually creates more uncertainty than no rule, but by golly, the agency has done it."
Is This the Beginning of the End for the Open Internet?
John Naughton comments for The Guardian: "Readers with long memories will recall the celebrated Schleswig-Holstein question. This referred to a bundle of thorny diplomatic and other issues arising from the relations of two duchies, Schleswig and Holstein, to the Danish crown and to the German Confederation. It was the bane of diplomats' lives in the late 19th century, but we remember it nowadays mainly because of Lord Palmerston's famous wisecrack about it. 'The Schleswig-Holstein question is so complicated,' he said, 'that only three men in Europe have ever understood it. One was Prince Albert, who is dead. The second was a German professor who became mad. I am the third and I have forgotten all about it.'"
New Report Exposes Media Love Affair with Right-Wingers and the Fox News Worldview: 'Reporters Can't Get Enough'
Joshua Holland reports for AltertNet: "Forget about fake moon landings and Obama's birth certificate. The most enduring unfounded conspiracy theory in America is that our institutions of knowledge – the media, the academy and even science -- are biased in favor of liberals. The national media is based in large urban centers, so it should come as no surprise that conservatives would rarely see their views on strictly social issues well represented. But on matters of substance, we are talking about a corporate-owned media that pushes relentlessly for "free trade" deals, foreign wars and fiscal "austerity."
We hear views and perspectives not getting much air-time on corporate media - first we hear from GRITtv featuring retired US Army Colonel and former State Depatment official, Ann Wright; then we hear a clip from Law and Disorder Radio featuring Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights and Michael Steven Smith; and finally a clip looking at the how the media has handled the document dump from NPR's On the Media, hosts Brook Gladstone and Bob Garfield interview the executive editor of the New York Times, Bill Keller.
Where do the documents come from? Wikileaks had been using Tableau's hosted charting software to display visualization of the State Department cables. The company now says that it removed the charts in response to Senator Joe Lieberman's public request. Here's a copy of the chart for our readers to review.
Community Bridge celebrates Human Rights Day (Dec. 10th) with a look at human trafficking in Kansas with Kansas Assistant Attorney General Christine Ladner, Vicky Luttrell of the Kansas Human Trafficking Advisory Board, and K-State Prof. Nadia Shapkina.
Human trafficking generates approximately $32 billion international each year making it one of the top 3 international crimes. The U.S. State Department reports that nearly 1 million people are trafficked across international borders each year. Roughly 80 percent of those trafficked are females and 50 percent are children. Trafficked people are modern slaves forced to work in sweatshops, prostitution rings, as farm labors, in private homes as domestic workers and other enterprises.
Approximately 2 million undocumented children are educated in American schools, hold American values, know only the U.S. as home and who, upon high school graduation, find the door to their future slammed shut. As a follow up to the screening of the film Papers: Stories of Undocumented Youth on K-State in September, 2010. The film explores the challenges that face undocumented youth and the gridlock around immigration reform in the United States.
The panel was moderated by Michael Kaye, law professor at Washburn University, and included: Roberta Farrell, Immigration Attorney; Amanda Morales, Ph.D., Graduate Student Advisor K-State College of Education; Jonathan Willmouth, Immigration Attorney; Rep. Sydney Carlin, state legislator; and Erin Fleming who works extensively with undocumented youth-many of whom are actually pictured in the film. Fleming is part of the KS/MO DREAM Alliance-a local Kansas City group made up of mostly undocumented youth, as well as national projects such as The DREAM Is Coming and United We DREAM. The panel walks through the life of an undocumented youth trying to go to college and explore the roadblocks she encounters.
For our second hour, Dr. Charles Barden, K-State Extension, opens the show with a discussion of two invasive tree killers invading Kansas. Then Jonathan Mertz and Joshua McGinn from the Flint Hills Human Rights Project discuss their efforts to have sexual orientation and gender identity added to the City of Manhattan's Anti-discrimination Ordinance. We close out with a clip from GRITtv featuring David Kirby, author of Animal Factory: The Looming Threat of Industrial Pig, dairy, and Poultry Farms, who discusses why cheap food is making Americans sick and in some cases killing them.
The Republican's nominee for the job of Kansas Secretary of State, Kris Kobach, is a well know nativist extremist who makes a living by drafting anti-immigrant laws and, after they are adopted, trains officers to enforce them. If the laws are challenged, he goes to court to defend them. Quite the racket since the laws are always rule unconstitutional and in the mean time he lines his pockets with tax-payer dollars from the legal fees he racks up.
Immigration lawyer Angie Williams and UMKC law student Raymond Rico join us for a frank discussion of Kobach and his anti-immigrant crusade.
David Leopold, President-elect of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, and immigration lawyer at David Wolfe Leopold and Associates writes for the Wronk Room at Think Progress: "In an Op-Ed piece published in today’s New York Times, Kris W. Kobach, who claims that he “helped draft” Arizona’s notorious anti-immigrant S.B. 1070, sets out to “rebut the major criticisms” of the new law individually. However, Kobach offers little more than a recital of the fallacious propaganda espoused by the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR)—a group which has been designated by the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League as a hate group—and its legal arm the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI), to which Kobach serves as counsel. Let’s look at Kobach’s central claims..."
Racial Profiling 101: Kris Kobach Teaches Reasonable Suspicion
Prerna Lal writes for Change.org: "The architect of SB 1070 is now training police officers in Arizona on how to conduct racial profiling, using the pretext of 'reasonable suspicion.' Unlike probable cause, "reasonable suspicion" is a legal term that permits police misconduct based on a "totality of circumstances." In the following video, Kris Kobach launches into some of the factors local law enforcement can use to identify undocumented immigrants, which he says are mostly common sense."
Meet Kris Kobach: Lawyer For The Anti-Immigrant Movement
Melinda Warner writes for Media Matters for America: "As the debate over immigration reform continues, anti-immigrant forces have offered some downright heinous solutions on how to deal with the issue and policymakers around the country are starting to dance to the nativist beat. It's an old pattern, and it's not limited to Arizona's notorious show-me-your-papers law."
Hazleton, PA Anti-Immigrant Law Is Unconstitutional, Federal Appeals Court Rules
The American Civil Liberties Union reports: "The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit today issued a sweeping decision striking down as unconstitutional the city of Hazleton's law that would punish landlords and employers who are accused of renting to or hiring anyone the city classifies as an "illegal alien." The case, Lozano v. Hazleton, has been closely watched across the country because the Hazleton ordinance has served as a model for similar laws nationwide and was challenged by civil rights groups in a lengthy trial. The suit has been underway for more than four years in the federal district and circuit courts. Today's unanimous appeals court decision is the latest legal victory against discriminatory state and local laws that target immigrants and invite racial profiling against Latinos and others who appear "foreign." Many cities like Fremont, Nebraska and Summerville, South Carolina have voluntarily tabled or blocked these laws under legal pressure and local opposition."
Suzy Khimm reports for Mother Jones: "When Arizona passed a law that handed local police unprecedented authority to investigate and arrest suspected illegal immigrants, the state ignited a firestorm in a midterm election year. And for Kris Kobach, the former Bush administration lawyer who helped draft the legislation, the crackdown in Arizona is just the beginning."
Kris Kobach, Architect Of Arizona Immigration Law SB1070, Is Behind Other Controversial Laws
John Hanna reports for the Huffington Post: "When politicians and police across the country want to crack down on illegal immigration, they often reach out to the same man: a little-known Kansas attorney with an Ivy League education who is the architect behind many of the nation's most controversial immigration laws. Kris Kobach could not attend West Point because of diabetes, but he regards his efforts on immigration as a substitute for military service."
Campaign Notebook: Kobach working on “birthright citizenship” issue
Scott Rothschild reports for the Lawrence Journal World: "Kris Kobach, the Republican candidate for Kansas secretary of state who helped Arizona legislators approve a controversial immigration law, said Wednesday he is working with those legislators on a proposal aimed at denying automatic citizenship to children born in the country to parents who are illegal immigrants."
Excess Is the Way to Oblivion
Mike Hendricks reports for the Kansas City Star: " Is Kris Kobach the reincarnation of Phill Kline? And if so, should Kansans be worried? KU political science professor Burdett Loomis thinks so as Kobach vies to become secretary of state. Like Kline, Loomis says, Kobach is an ambitious crusader bent on using his office to focus on wedge issues that are more important to his political career than to you and me. “Phill Kline grabbed one issue — late-term abortions — and turned it into witch hunts that threatened the privacy of many Kansas women,” Loomis wrote in a recent commentary."
Andrea Nill reports for Think Progress: “Local Kansas newspapers are reporting that Kris Kobach, the architect of the Arizona immigration law and candidate for Kansas Secretary of State, is being criticized by the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) for the financial management of the Kansas Republican Party during his tenure as chairman. According to reports, when Kobach left the group in 2009, it had less than $5,000 in its treasury. A recent audit reveals he and then executive director Christian Morgan spent $788,000 during their two years in charge, nearly $10,000 more than was contributed. The audit also shows that, under Kobach and Morgan’s watch, 'state and federal taxes weren’t paid, illegal contributions were accepted and questionable expenditures were made.'”
Audit Links to Past KS GOP Miscues
Tim Carpenter reports for the Topeka Capitol Journal: "Two former administrators of the Kansas Republican Party were implicated Monday in a case of financial mismanagement that ranged from failure to pay state and federal taxes, acceptance of illegal contributions and approval of questionable expenditures over a two-year period."
Kris Kobach Relies Heavily On Voter Fraud Scare Tactics For His Kansas Seat Bid
Media Matters for American has provided an extensive listing of Kobach's "voter fraud" arguments and checks his "facts." MMA writes: "Known nationally as a key proponent of anti-illegal immigrant legislation, Kris Kobach has also set his sights on becoming the Kansas Secretary of State. A large part of his push for the seat rests on his assertion that Kansas elections are rife with fraud. In truth, instances of voter fraud are rare in Kansas. That fact and Kobach's moves to enact laws that prevent the elderly and the poor from voting probably won't endear him to Kansans."
Recommended Audio: Martin Luther King Jr.'s 'I Have a Dream' Speech
Rotten Eggs and Our Broken Democracy
Amy Goodman writes for Truthdig.com: "What do a half-billion eggs have to do with democracy? The massive recall of salmonella-infected eggs, the largest egg recall in U.S. history, opens a window on the power of large corporations over not only our health, but over our government. While scores of brands have been recalled, they all can be traced back to just two egg farms. Our food supply is increasingly in the hands of larger and larger companies, which wield enormous power in our political process. As with the food industry, so, too, is it with oil and with banks: Giant corporations, some with budgets larger than most nations, are controlling our health, our environment, our economy and increasingly, our elections."
Paul B. Farrel writes for MarketWatch.com: "'How my G.O.P. destroyed the U.S. economy.' Yes, that is exactly what David Stockman, President Ronald Reagan's director of the Office of Management and Budget, wrote in a recent New York Times op-ed piece, Four Deformations of the Apocalypse. Get it? Not 'destroying.' The GOP has already 'destroyed' the U.S. economy, setting up an 'American Apocalypse.' Yes, Stockman is equally damning of the Democrats' Keynesian policies. But what this indictment by a party insider -- someone so close to the development of the Reaganomics ideology -- says about America, helps all of us better understand how America's toxic partisan-politics 'holy war' is destroying not just the economy and capitalism, but the America dream. And unless this war stops soon, both parties will succeed in their collective death wish."
Banks' Self-Dealing Super-Charged Financial Crisis
Jake Bernstein and Jesse Eisinger report for ProPublica: "Over the last two years of the housing bubble, Wall Street bankers perpetrated one of the greatest episodes of self-dealing in financial history. ... Faced with increasing difficulty in selling the mortgage-backed securities that had been among their most lucrative products, the banks hit on a solution that preserved their quarterly earnings and huge bonuses: They created fake demand."
Robert Scheer writes for Truthdig.com: "Barack Obama and the Democrats he led to a stunning victory two years ago are going down hard in the face of an economic crisis that he did nothing to create but which he has failed to solve. That is somewhat unfair because the basic blame belongs to his predecessors, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, who let the bulls of Wall Street run wild in the streets where ordinary folks lived. And there was universal Republican support in Congress for the radical deregulation of the financial industry that produced this debacle." Photo: White House / Pete Souza - President Barack Obama, in background, talks on the phone in the Oval Office earlier this month as National Economic Council Director Larry Summers listens in.
Speculation and the New Commodity Price Crisis: Separating the Wheat From the Chaff
Steve Suppan provides the following news analysis for TripleCrisis.com: "Wheat prices had been climbing prior to the August 5 announcement of a Russian wheat export ban. Kansas Board of Trade wheat futures contracts had gone from $4.92 a bushel on June 10 to spike at $7.95 a bushel on August 5, prompting a reporter to ask, 'How could a Russian drought in the age of instant information escape the world's notice until the country's wheat crop was devastated?' This excellent question does not yet have a clear answer."
Zach Carter reports for AlterNet: "The Treasury Department's plan to help struggling homeowners has been failing miserably for months. The program is poorly designed, has been poorly implemented and only a tiny percentage of borrowers eligible for help have actually received any meaningful assistance. The initiative lowers monthly payments for borrowers, but fails to reduce their overall debt burden, often increasing that burden, funneling money to banks that borrowers could have saved by simply renting a different home."
Let's Be Honest about Taxes
Ruth Marcus writes for Trughtdig.com: "I was pretty tough on House Minority Leader John Boehner the other day, and I don’t regret a word, but the Ohio Republican made one important suggestion that’s worth highlighting. It’s about the obscure-sounding but increasingly costly subject of tax expenditures."
Hawks Box in Obama on Afghan War
Ray McGovern comments for Consortium News: "Just back from Afghanistan, Marine Commandant, Gen. James Conway held a news conference to add his voice to the Pentagon campaign to disparage the July 2011 date President Barack Obama set for U.S. troops to begin leaving Afghanistan."
Adam Weinstein writes for Mother Jones: "Seven and a half years after the invasion of Iraq, the last American "combat brigade" picked up stakes and left the country in mid-August. Come September 1, Operation Iraqi Freedom will just be another campaign for the history books. In its place: Operation New Dawn. Time to break out the "Mission Accomplished" banner! Not so fast. The United States is keeping nearly 50,000 troops in Iraq—the fewest since the war started in March 2003, but still enough to fill a stadium. What else are we leaving behind? It's more than just Humvees and huge bases. Here's a photographic tally of the human, financial, and political impacts being left in our wake in Iraq." Photo: US Marine Corps photo by Corporal Bobbie A. Harris / Creative Commons
10 Needed Steps for Obama to Start Dismantling America's Gigantic, Destructive Military Empire
Chalmers Johnson writes (via AlterNet): "However ambitious President Barack Obama's domestic plans, one unacknowledged issue has the potential to destroy any reform efforts he might launch. Think of it as the 800-pound gorilla in the American living room: our longstanding reliance on imperialism and militarism in our relations with other countries and the vast, potentially ruinous global empire of bases that goes with it. The failure to begin to deal with our bloated military establishment and the profligate use of it in missions for which it is hopelessly inappropriate will, sooner rather than later, condemn the United States to a devastating trio of consequences: imperial overstretch, perpetual war, and insolvency, leading to a likely collapse similar to that of the former Soviet Union."
Kevin Drumm writes for Mother Jones: "MoJo's Suzy Khimm, on sabbatical over at Ezra Klein's place, has a post today that sets out the current state of play on E-Verify, an electronic system designed to prevent employers from hiring illegal aliens. The good news is that the system has gotten better over time: the initial error rate for authorized workers is now only 0.8%, and that error rate drops very close to zero when results are contested. Error rates for foreign-born workers were a bit higher, but this has also improved considerably over the past couple of years. (The full report is here.) Photo: Mother Jones
Are Arizona's Political Leaders Deliberately Blocking Electronic Voting Machine Transparency?
Denis G. Campbell provides the following news analysis for Truthout: "Why did Arizona's two main gubernatorial candidates, Gov. Jan Brewer, former secretary of state/head of elections, who contracted for highly criticized and easily-hacked Diebold and Sequoia ballot scanning systems, and Attorney General (AG) Terry Goddard, with his three-year 'criminal investigation' into a 2006 Pima County (Tucson) local election allegedly hacked, according to a whistleblower, do everything in their power for years to stifle polling accountability while expensively fighting enforcement of Arizona's election laws?"
Laura Sofen writes for Teaching Tolerance: "I used to be a bad girl. I was self-destructive, angry and fearless. These traits, coupled with a decent amount of intelligence, took me to all the places bad girls go. For many years, I bounced from bad decisions to bad jobs to bad relationships. My life was a mess for a long time, and all I knew how to do was make it worse. I couldn’t talk to my mother, my father wasn’t around, and my friends were either victims of their own circumstances or they were busy creating better lives for themselves. I was alone for a long time, and it felt like I would drown forever."
Paul Krugman writes for Truthout: "The biggest problem dogging American politics and media isn’t a deficiency of expertise or a lack of good intentions. It’s a lack of courage. But there is courage out there — and it should be honored. Kudos should go to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York, who amid fierce criticism publicly defended Muslims who were looking to build a community center in lower Manhattan. Also to Fareed Zakaria, the Newsweek columnist and CNN host, for making a case for tolerance by returning an award given to him five years ago by the Anti-Defamation League. He did so after the Jewish organization released a statement on July 30 maintaining that the planned Islamic center, which includes a mosque, should be relocated because it is too close to the site of the World Trade Center." Photo: David Shankbone
Alan Simpson, Senator Guttermouth, Spews Again
William Greider writes for The Nation: "Retired Wyoming Senator Alan Simpson, who inherited a soft-cushion career in politics from his father, is a garrulous old crank who at 79 seems desperate for attention. Simpson likes to pop off provocatively. He cannot resist mocking lesser mortals like Social Security recipients with mean-spirited ridicule. Simpson is an always quotable darling of Washington reporters, who mistake his nastiness for straight talk, who are too lazy to check out his ugly distortions."
Covert Operations: The Billionaire Koch Brothers' War Against Obama
Jane Mayer writes for the New Yorker: "Members of the John Birch Society developed an interest in a school of Austrian economists who promoted free-market ideals. Charles and David Koch were particularly influenced by the work of Friedrich von Hayek, the author of “The Road to Serfdom” (1944), which argued that centralized government planning led, inexorably, to totalitarianism. Hayek’s belief in unfettered capitalism has proved inspirational to many conservatives, and to anti-Soviet dissidents; lately, Tea Party supporters have championed his work. In June, the talk-radio host Glenn Beck, who has supported the Tea Party rebellion, promoted “The Road to Serfdom” on his show; the paperback soon became a No. 1 best-seller on Amazon. (Beck appears to be a fan of the Kochs; in the midst of a recent on-air parody of Al Gore, Beck said, without explanation, “I want to thank Charles Koch for this information.” Beck declined to elaborate on the relationship.)"
In Ken We Trust: Why do Ken Cuccinelli's legal opinions always match his personal ambitions?
Dahlia Lithwick writes for Slate: "It must be Wednesday, because Virginia's hyperactive attorney general, Ken Cuccinelli, is back in the news. Of course, he was also in the news on Tuesday, on Monday, and last Friday. Religious displays on public land, abortion, immigration, climate change. Is there a single issue from the culture wars over which Cuccinelli hasn't picked a fight? But that's one of the perils of treating one's elected office like a Fox News show: If Cuccinelli isn't launching five national ideological battles per week, his ratings might slip. And so ever onward he trudges, devoting his every working day to treating the commonwealth like it's the Lord's Disneyland.
Stephanie Mencimer writes for Mother Jones: "For a guy who loves chalkboards and slogans, Glenn Beck has issued a peculiar edict to potential attendees of his "Restoring Honor" rally at the Lincoln Memorial being held this Saturday. He has repeatedly told people coming to DC not to bring political signs. What? No signs? The hallmark of the last year's worth of tea party rallies that he helped fuel? But it's true. In an info packet on his website about the rally, Beck instructs, 'Please refrain from bringing signs (political or otherwise) as they may deter from the peaceful message we are bringing to Washington.'" Photo: Truthout
Could This Be A Crime? U.S. Climate Bill Is Dead While So Much Life On Our Earth Continues To Perish
Subhankar Banerjee, Climate StoryTellers: "Consider for a moment the top two carbon sinks of our planet. Oceans absorb more than 25 percent of the CO2 humans put in the air, and forests absorb almost the same amount. By doing so, our forests and oceans together make living possible on this earth for life as we know it now. All of that is changing rapidly and for the worse."
Russell Mokhiber reports for Corporate Crime Reporter: "Factory farms makes you sick. Let us count the ways. Just last week, more than half a billion eggs recalled. Why? Salmonella poisoning. More than 1,300 people sick. Just last week, a recall of more than 380,000 pounds of deli meat products distributed nationwide to Wal-Mart stores. Why? Possible contamination with the bacterium Listeria monocytogenes. The bacteria can cause listeriosis – a rare but potentially deadly disease. Move over Animal Farm."
Why Is Obama Siding with Polluters?
Kate Sheppard reports for Mother Jones: "The Obama administration has repeatedly vowed that tackling climate change is among its top priorities. But in a landmark legal case that could force the nation's dirtiest power plants to clean up their acts, the administration this week sided with some of the biggest polluters in the country. This latest development has left a number of environmental advocates wondering whose side the White House is really on when it comes to global warming."
Blogger Booman writes on Booman Tribune (via AlterNet): "There is not a single black or openly gay Republican in Congress or in any of the 50 governor’s mansions around the country. Conservatives do not like black people and they actively legislate against gay people. The contempt from the left is for people who are willing to trade their dignity and rights for a paycheck. It’s a strange kind of bigotry that expects people to hold a belief system that isn’t hateful towards themselves."
Facebook Now Believes It Owns the English Language, Too
Tom Scocca writes for Slate: "Facebook, the data-mining and junk-software-marketing Internet behemoth, is suing a startup in Northbrook, Illinois, because the new company plans to use '-book' in its name, according to a Tribune report. The startup, Teachbook.com, is meant to help teachers 'share lesson plans and other resources,' and has 'fewer than 20 users signed up.'"
Karl Bode writes for DLSReports.com: "We've explored how the Goorizon alliance is the regulatory equivalent of a bobble-head doll: cute and stuffed largely with air, but primarily designed to pre-empt tougher consumer protections. Worse perhaps, Google and Verizon's defense of their proposal has been one distortion after another, the companies insisting the weak-kneed framework is solely about empowering the consumer, and has nothing to do with keeping wireless consumer protections away from their tablet/smartphone Android partnership." Photo: DoomDaily.com
Net Neutrality argument Names the Wrong Villain
The Boston Globe writes in an editorial: "IN HIS Aug. 21 response to your editorial “After Google-Verizon fizzle, FCC should force Net neutrality,’’ Phil Kerpen, a vice president with Americans for Prosperity (Orwell would be proud) would have us believe that the threat of government censorship is reason enough to keep the Internet “unregulated’’ (“FCC should not upend decade of sound Net policy,’’ Letters). Issuing dire predictions of an Internet controlled by the government is a transparent attempt to harness the current mood of the nation. The argument, however, names the wrong villain."
In Minnesota, Hundreds Urge FCC to Protect Net Neutrality
Jenn Ettinger reports for SavetheInternet.com: "It was standing room only at South High in Minneapolis on Thursday night as more than 750 people turned out to show their support for Net Neutrality and free speech online. FCC Commissioners Michael Copps and Mignon Clyburn listened to hours of impassioned public testimony about the future of the Internet."
Matthew Lasar writes for Ars Technica: "'I believe that net neutrality is the First Amendment issue of our time,' declared Democratic Senator Al Franken at Thursday's public hearing on the Internet, held in his home state of Minnesota. 'Unless it's freedom of religion,' he added, 'which, until last week, I thought we had kind of worked out.' The audience at Minneapolis' South High School cracked up over Franken's reference to the Ground Zero Mosque slugfest. But this was a warm-up rally for their own cause—getting the Federal Communications Commission to pass rules that would partially reclassify ISPs as common carriers and apply various neutrality provision to their activities. Two Democratic members of the FCC also attended the event: Michael Copps and Mignon Clyburn." Photo: Ars Technica
This podcast features Hon. Rebecca Kourlis, Executive Director of the Institute for the Advancement of the Legal System. Hon. Kourlis spoke at the Kansas League of Women Voters forum: "Does the Kansas Judiciary Reflect the Diversity of our State? If Not, Why Not?" held on 17 October 2009 in Topeka, KS. The forum was the opening of a two-year League project focusing on promoting diversity at all levels of the state judiciary and enhancing the legitimacy of our system of justice in the eyes of an increasingly diverse public.
Rebecca Love Kourlis was appointed to the Colorado Supreme Court in 1985 and resigned in 2006 after serving for 11 years. Kourlis authored of more than 200 opinions and dissents during her tenure and spearheaded significant reforms in the court system relating to juries, family law and attorney regulation.
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since 1 January 2009
Promoting Change
I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.
~ Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
From "Beyond Vietnam," an address delivered to the Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam, at Riverside Church, 4 April 1967 in New York City.
Community Bridge won two first place awards at the 2010 Kansas Association of Broadcasters collegian competition for public affairs programming and for documentaries.
First place for public affairs programming was awarded to An Interview with Marci Penner, in which we explored the wonders of Kansas. Penner is the Executive Director of the Kansas Sampler Foundation. We discuss the mission of the foundation, how it works to help small communities thrive, and the quest for perfect pie.
Our first place documentary, Voices from the National Equality March, captures the essence of participating in Equality Across America's march in Washington on October 11, 2009. In order of appearance we hear: Cleve Jones; Courage Camp participants; voices from 15th and I Streets; Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington, DC; Reverend Troy Perry; Robin McGehee and Kip Williams; David Mixner, Corrine Mina; Tobias Packer; Aiyi’nah Ford; Mario Nguyen, Lady Gaga, Billy Myer and Dave Koz; Maxin Thorne; Julian Bond; Kate Clinton; Urvashi Vaid; and conclude with the voices of the DC Gay Men’s Chorus. C-Span has recorded all the speakers at the rally. Visit: http://www.c-spanvideo.org/videoLibrary/video.php?progid=213759 to watch.
In 2008 the Kansas Association of Broadcasters awarded Community Bridge it's First Place Award for public affairs programming for the program entitle The Kansas Stem Cell Debate.
This episode of Community Bridge features Brad Kemp, Executive Director of Kansans for Lifesaving Cures and Dr. Mark Weiss of the K-State School of Veterinary Medicine in a discussion of the issues around stem cell research
Kansans for Lifesaving Cures' policy position is that any stem cell research, therapies or cures that are permitted by federal law should be allowed in Kansas – provided that such activities are conducted ethically and safely and do not involve human reproductive cloning.
Community Bridge also received First Place in 2007 for public affairs programming for Evolutionary Faith. Join our guests: John Carlin, Roman Catholic theologian; Keith Miller, Assistant Professor of Geology at KSU; and, Boo Tyson, MAINstream Coalition in a discussion of evolution, faith and reason.
With over 30 years of publishing under its belt, and more than 55,000 subscribers worldwide, the New Internationalist is renowned for its radical, campaigning stance on a range of world issues, from the cynical marketing of babymilk in the Majority World to human rights in Burma.
Podcasts for 2011
For a complete listing of 2010 shows, please click on the 2010 page link above.
May 19 - GOP's War on Women
It’s almost an unbelievable figure — 916. That’s the amount of legislation that has been introduced primarily by the GOP so far this year, in an attempt to regulate a woman’s reproductive system. And Kansas is no different that the national trend. With tens of millions of Americans unemployed, states facing dire fiscal situations, and more and more people loosing their homes, one has to ask why abortion has become the GOP's number one priority?
A report by The Guttmacher Institute, finds that in addition to these laws, more than 120 other bills have been approved by at least one chamber of the legislature, and some interesting trends are emerging. As a whole, the proposals introduced this year are more hostile to abortion rights than in the past: 56% of the bills introduced so far this year seek to restrict abortion access, compared with 38% last year. Three topics—insurance coverage of abortion, restriction of abortion after a specific point in gestation and ultra sound requirements—are topping the agenda in several states and all three have been approved by the Kansas legislature. For the complete Guttmacher report, click here.
For our second hour we take up the theme of American empire in a tribute to GRIT TV which ceased operations on May 13th. First we hear GRITtv host, Laura Flanders, interviews Chris Hedges about the death of Bin Laden and the continuing concern over terrorism, the end of empathy in the U.S., and what avenues are left for progressives to fight back. Then we hear Flanders interviewing retired Colonel Andrew Bacevich about the changes in the administration and the ongoing situation in Libya and Syria, and notes that at a time when the Arab world is undergoing deep changes, it should be a time for modesty in the US and a reconsideration of military power and the use of violence to achieve goals. We close out this hour with a clip form Law and Disorder Radio featuring the award-winning independent journalist Will Potter. Potter is the leading authority on “eco-terrorism.” He’s the author of the new book, "Green Is the New Red: An Insider’s Account of a Social Movement Under Siege."
Community Bridge opens this week with our third round table discussion on the state of the media in Kansas. Joining the discussion are Mike Shields, Managing Editor of the Kansas Health Institute's News Service; Justin Kendall, weekly writer for the KC Pitch, the largest of alternative weeklies in Kansas; Michael Caddell, newspaper publisher, blogger and radio talk show host; and R. J. Dickens, news director at KCTU TV in Wichita.
Andrew Breitbart has no problem lying to his readers, especially if he can score points against progressives. Breitbart's website BigGovernment.com is famous for promoting heavily edited videos that turn truth on its head that are produced by anti-abortion rights activist Lila Rose and falsely claiming that the video proves that Planned Parenthood engages in systemic criminal activities. In 2009, Breitbart promoted heavily edited tapes that he falsely claimed showed systematic corruption at the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) related to child prostitution and sex trafficking. In 2010, Breitbart posted heavily edited video of Shirley Sherrod speaking at an NAACP function and falsely suggested that Sherrod discriminated against a white farmer in her capacity as the Agriculture Department's Georgia Director of Rural Development. This video caused her to lose her job, but Sherrod is now suing Breitbart.
Then in April, just a week after he promised to "go after the teachers and the union organizers," his website started running a series of choppy, heavily edited videos taken from labor studies courses taught at the University of Missouri-St. Louis and the University of Missouri-Kansas City by this week’s guest, Judy Ancel and a colleague, Don Giljim. Ancel is the Director of UMKC's Institute for Labor Studies. Breitbart's posts promoting these videos claim, among other things, that the professors "instruct students on how fear, intimidation, and, even, industrial sabotage are important and, often, necessary tools," and that they teach their students that the US flag is "racist." But as listeners will hear, this is just another lie by a right-wing fanatic as Ancel exposes Breitbart's tactics and his dishonesty on this week’s show.
Since the 1980´s, Sister Cities has built people-to-people solidarity relationships between the United States and El Salvador. These relationships are the core of their work and the foundation upon which the Sister City project works for human rights, social justice, and cultural exchange. This important work only happens through hundreds of dedicated volunteers in cities around the United States who maintain “sister city” relationships with Salvadoran communities. On this week’s show, we hear from Sara Bishop, national coordinator of the US - El Salvador Sister City Project, about the Sister City program. Then we hear from Sofia Pablo-Hoshino, Shahna Campbell and Ivone Damian, three of the fourteen K-State student who when to El Papaturro, the Salvadorian community coupled with the Manhattan Alliance for Peace and Justice since 1995 through the Sister City program. The students talk about their experiences with in El Salvador and the plans to return in 2012.
In our second hour we first hear from Dr. Vandana Shiva is a clip from GRITtv. Shiva says: "The American people should see that corporations have abandoned them long ago." Shiva is a scientist, environmentalist, and food justice activist Dr. Vandana Shiva. Shiva was named one of the seven most influential women in the world by Forbes magazine. Shiva spoke at K-State in October 2009 and the podcast of her speech is available on the Community Bridge website. Click on the link to the 2009 podcasts and scroll down to October.
Then we hear a clip from Truthdig Radio featuring Tim Canova, the Betty Hutton Williams Professor of International Economic Law and co-director of the Center for Global Law & Development at the Chapman University School of Law in Orange, California. Canova takes on the Standards and Poors treat to downgrade the US credit rating in a discussion of the economic meltdown in our casino economy. The show closes out addressing the Manhattan City Commission’s vote to repeal the new anti-discrimination ordinance.
MP3 File
April 28 - Living in a Fact-Free Political World
Community Bridge opens this week with a look at lying as normative political discourse. Political lying has always been with us, but what the GOP and some Democrats have done is akin to carpet-bombing the truth. Mother Jones Magazine turns its investigative eyes on this reality in its May/June edition entitled: You Lie! Inside the GOP’s Fact Free Nation. We hear from Rick Perlstien whose article “Fact-Free Nation from Nixon’s Dirty Tricksters to James O’Keefe’s Video Smears: How political lying became the new normal," opens the topic.
Perlstien is the author of two noteworthy books: Nixonland: The Rise of a President and the Fracturing of America, and Before The Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus, which won the 2001 Los Angeles Times Book Award for history. From the summer of 2003 until 2005 he covered the presidential campaigns as chief national political correspondent for the Village Voice. He has also published The Stock Ticker and the Superjumbo: How the Democrats Can Once Again Become America's Dominant Political Party, an essay with responses from commentators including Robert Reich, Elaine Kamarck, and Ruy Teixeira. In 2006 and 2007 he wrote a biweekly column for The New Republic Online. Perlstein was a senior fellow at the Campaign for America's Future, for whom he wrote the blog The Big Con.
The hour closes out with Josh McGinn, Flint Hills Human Rights Project, discussing the what’s happening with the Manhattan City Commission and the efforts by the right-wing extremists Matta and Butler to repeal the city’s recently passed Anti-discrimination Ordinance.
David Solnit first became involved in creating change in high school when he joined a campaign to abolish draft registration. Since then, the California-based carpenter, activist, and puppeteer, has been on the frontlines of direct action, protesting the US role in Central America in the 1980s, free trade deals and the WTO in the 1990s, and, more recently, the US intervention in Iraq. Solnit is a co-founder of Art and Revolution, a loose-knit collective that combines art and theater with direct action. This creativity-with-a-purpose stands in a colorful tradition of theatrical dissent from the Diggers, the Yippies, and the French Situationists of the 1960s. Solnit and his predecessors subvert the system by pointing to alternatives, using blatant contrast they show how fundamentally flawed the “normal” state of affairs truly is.
Community Bridge opens with representatives of Morning Star, Inc., a consumer run organization (CRO). CROs are not-for-profit organizations, run by current and former consumers of mental health services. Richard Stitt, Executive Director and Elizabeth Stitt, Community Transition Coordinator at Morning Star, Inc., will join us to discuss this important community service. Then David Bacon, union activist, journalist, and immigration rights advocate has a conversation with Community Bridge host Christopher Renner. Bacon presented the spring Manhattan Alliance for Peace and Justice lecture at K-State on February 28th.
Community Bridge opens this week with our follow up to last month's panel discussion on the state of the media in Kansas. This week we take up the issue of conservative bias on the op-ed pages have how that affects reporting in general. We touch on the issue of think tanks and how their talking points help determine what is said on the editorial pages. Panelists also explore the role of Net Neutrality in providing people with access to diverse opinions and its role in a health democracy. We also hear about the National Conference for Media Reform, which took place this past weekend in Boston. Joining us for this discussion are Michael Caddell, host of Radio Free Kansas; Tim Hjersted, Co-Founder and Director of Films for Action; and Pam Pohly, editor in chief of the Kansas Free Press.
In our second hour, Riley County Commissioner Karen McCulloh and aTa Bus director Anne Smith join us for a update on the future of public transportation in Manhattan. aTa has received millions in federal grants to begin a regional and fix route transportation system in Manhattan. Smith and McCulloh provide an update, but could the recent Manhattan City Commission election waste this possibility to improve the quality of life in Manhattan? We also find out what is planned for the 2011 Earth Day celebration at K-State from Students for Environmental Action president Zach Pistora.
April 7 - An Interview with Author Pam Schoenewaldt
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Community Bridge opens this week with an interview featuring author Pamela Schoenewaldt in a discussion of her new novel, When We Were Strangers. The novel tells the story of Irma Vitale, an Italian immigrant who leaves her Abruzzo mountain village to come to America. Schoenewaldt takes up such current issues as immigration reform and women's reproductive rights in this historical novel that readers of Geraldine Brooks, Nancy Turner, Frances de Pontes Peebles, and Debra Dean will most certainly cherish. When We Were Strangers will live in the mind and the heart long after its last page is turned. Visit Schoenewaldt's webpage for more background information about the story.
The MRFF fights unconstitutional religious oppression and tyranny in the U.S. armed forces. Founded by Michael Weinstein, a 1977 Honor Graduate of the United States Air Force Academy and legal counsel for the Reagan administration, MRFF directly battles the far-right militant radical evangelical religious fundamentalists who have infiltrated the US military. This battle is detailed in: With God On Our Side: One Man’s War Against an Evangelical Coup in America’s Military released by St. Martin's Press in October 2006. The book is an expose on the systemic problem of religious intolerance throughout the United States armed forces.
Rodda is a regular contributor at Talk2Action.org, a blogger on the Huffington Post, and maintains the Liars for Jesus website that provides inquiring minds with news and information on the radical extremists Dominionist Christian activities to pervert our constitutional rights and our US history.
What’s happening to American Democracy? Why are the two political parties only interested in what the wealthy think? Why does the middle class continue to shrink? Why does it seem corporations are above the law? Well the answer lies in the growing reality that our democracy is being replaced by plutocracy. In the March/April edition of Mother Jones, Kevin Drum provides insights that every American should understand in preventing our experiment in democracy from becoming and fascist plutocracy. Joining us to discuss the Drum article as well as his own work on the topic is Andy Kroll, a journalist at Mother Jones. You can find Any's writing at Mother Jones here.
In the second half of our first hour we take up HB 2390 that intends to terminate Kan-ed - the technology backbone that provides Internet services to K-12 education, public hospitals, public libraries, and public institutes of higher education. Joining us to discuss what Kan-ed is and how it benefits Kansans are Carol Barta from the North Central Kansas Libraries System; Jennifer Findley, Senior Director of Education at the Kansas Hospital Association; and Carol Woolbright who is the director Interactive Distance Learning Network at Greenbush Regional Education Service Center in southeastern Kansas.
A new report from the National Alliance on Mental Illness, entitled, "State Mental Health Cuts: A National Crisis," reports that Kansas ranks seventh in the nation when it comes to cutting state funding for mental health programs.
During the second half, we are joined by Rev. Tobais Schlingensiepen, paster of First Congregational Church in Topeka, and Rev. Trudy Cretsinger, former pastor of Trinity Lutheran Church in Topeka, representing Kansas families served by the Kansas Neurological Institute, another service Sam Brownback has deemed too costly for the state to continued to support. State appropriations for KNI amount to $10 million. KNI serves around 160 Kansans, the majority (83%) are aged between 30 and 59; 88 percent have a profound intellectual disability; 83 percent are unable to speak and the remainder have very limited speech abilities; 68 percent are unable to walk; and, 94 percent have lived at KNI for 10 years or more. But for Sam Brownback these people do not deserve to be care for by the state.
since 1 January 2009
