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March 2, 2013
NATO 3 Case Challenges Constitutionality of State Terrorism Statutes
Friday, 01 March 2013 00:00
By Steve Horn, Truthout | News Analysis
Nine months later and it seems like yesterday - at least for those watching from afar.
On May 16, 2012, the Chicago Police Department (CPD) conducted a violent midnight preemptive raid of an apartment housing 11 activists. Two of them, it would later be exposed, were actually undercover informants working on behalf of the CPD.
Staying in an apartment in the Bridgeport neighborhood on the south side of Chicago, the activists were in town to protest the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Summit, held May 20-21.
The military-style raid led to the eventual charging of three of those activists in the Windy City to protest the NATO Summit with conspiracy to commit acts of domestic terrorism and other related charges - under Illinois' terrorism statute - in the form of a legal bail proffer. It was the first time the law - passed in haste by the Illinois legislature after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks - had ever been used.
The defendants are now known collectively as the "NATO 3." ......................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://truth-out.org/news/item/14831-nato-3-case-challenges-constitutionality-of-state-terrorism-statutes
NATO 3 Case Challenges Constitutionality of State Terrorism Statutes
NATO 3 Case Challenges Constitutionality of State Terrorism Statutes
Friday, 01 March 2013 00:00
By Steve Horn, Truthout | News Analysis
Nine months later and it seems like yesterday - at least for those watching from afar.
On May 16, 2012, the Chicago Police Department (CPD) conducted a violent midnight preemptive raid of an apartment housing 11 activists. Two of them, it would later be exposed, were actually undercover informants working on behalf of the CPD.
Staying in an apartment in the Bridgeport neighborhood on the south side of Chicago, the activists were in town to protest the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Summit, held May 20-21.
The military-style raid led to the eventual charging of three of those activists in the Windy City to protest the NATO Summit with conspiracy to commit acts of domestic terrorism and other related charges - under Illinois' terrorism statute - in the form of a legal bail proffer. It was the first time the law - passed in haste by the Illinois legislature after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks - had ever been used.
The defendants are now known collectively as the "NATO 3." ......................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://truth-out.org/news/item/14831-nato-3-case-challenges-constitutionality-of-state-terrorism-statutes
March 2, 2013
from YES! Magazine:
The Coming Climate Exodus: What We’re Doing to Help Wildlife’s New Migration
As climate change forces species to head for cooler climates, biologists are using new tools and partnerships to make sure we help—and don't hinder—their flight.
by Peter Pearsall, Cecilia Garza
posted Mar 01, 2013
For black bears, Florida’s State Road 46 is one of the deadliest motorways in the United States. It winds east-west for some 50 miles, skirting Seminole State Forest, one of the state's key bear habitats. Since the year 2000, more than 100 bears were killed each year in collisions on Florida roads like this one, and for the last two decades around 80 percent of total bear deaths in the state came as a result of such accidents.
These deaths are a tragic outcome of what conservation biologists call “fragmentation,” which occurs when a species’ habitat is cut into small pieces by human infrastructure like roads and developments. Fragmented populations are vulnerable to threats including starvation, genetic isolation, and local extinction. If a fragmented population of bears can’t follow seasonally available food, and can’t deepen their gene pool with new mates, their chances of long-term survival are slim.
Luckily, bears that want to cross State Road 46 are better off today, because it now features an underpass designed specifically with their needs in mind. Passageways like this one, known as wildlife corridors, connect fragmented habitats. They helped to hasten the removal of the black bear from Florida’s endangered species list in 2012.
For more than 20 years, wildlife corridors have been among the tools conservationists used to make sure all sorts of animals were able to move around in search of food, mates, and territory. But today, climate change is forcing these specialists to change the way wildlife corridors are designed. As warming accelerates, animals and plants are starting to change the way they travel, generally moving north or to higher elevations in search of the cooler temperatures they’re used to. ....................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.yesmagazine.org/planet/coming-climate-exodus-what-we-re-doing-to-help-wildlife-migration
The Coming Climate Exodus: What We’re Doing to Help Wildlife’s New Migration
from YES! Magazine:
The Coming Climate Exodus: What We’re Doing to Help Wildlife’s New Migration
As climate change forces species to head for cooler climates, biologists are using new tools and partnerships to make sure we help—and don't hinder—their flight.
by Peter Pearsall, Cecilia Garza
posted Mar 01, 2013
For black bears, Florida’s State Road 46 is one of the deadliest motorways in the United States. It winds east-west for some 50 miles, skirting Seminole State Forest, one of the state's key bear habitats. Since the year 2000, more than 100 bears were killed each year in collisions on Florida roads like this one, and for the last two decades around 80 percent of total bear deaths in the state came as a result of such accidents.
These deaths are a tragic outcome of what conservation biologists call “fragmentation,” which occurs when a species’ habitat is cut into small pieces by human infrastructure like roads and developments. Fragmented populations are vulnerable to threats including starvation, genetic isolation, and local extinction. If a fragmented population of bears can’t follow seasonally available food, and can’t deepen their gene pool with new mates, their chances of long-term survival are slim.
Luckily, bears that want to cross State Road 46 are better off today, because it now features an underpass designed specifically with their needs in mind. Passageways like this one, known as wildlife corridors, connect fragmented habitats. They helped to hasten the removal of the black bear from Florida’s endangered species list in 2012.
For more than 20 years, wildlife corridors have been among the tools conservationists used to make sure all sorts of animals were able to move around in search of food, mates, and territory. But today, climate change is forcing these specialists to change the way wildlife corridors are designed. As warming accelerates, animals and plants are starting to change the way they travel, generally moving north or to higher elevations in search of the cooler temperatures they’re used to. ....................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.yesmagazine.org/planet/coming-climate-exodus-what-we-re-doing-to-help-wildlife-migration
March 1, 2013
from In These Times:
Budgetary Power to the People
An experiment with direct democracy on Chicago’s South Side.
BY Joel Handley
It’s a January night in the 5th Ward of Chicago, and a small group of ward residents have gathered at Alderman Leslie Hairston’s office in the South Shore neighborhood to evaluate a long list of ideas on how to improve the ward’s transportation system. All can agree that something needs to be done about the dangerous intersection near a neighborhood club on 55th street, where drivers can’t see pedestrians in the walkway until after they’ve accelerated around a curve. As they discuss the different options—pedestrian crossing signs? a stop sign? a roundabout?—they estimate how much each would cost, and consider complicating factors, like the fact that the eastern edge of the intersection is located in the neighboring ward.
The meeting is part of the 5th Ward’s attempt at implementing participatory budgeting, a process that allows citizens to choose how municipal funds could be best spent in their communities. In this case, the funds are the ward’s so-called “menu money”—the $1.3 million allotted annually to every ward to spend on small infrastructure projects, like fixing pot holes or installing pedestrian walkways. In the past, aldermen and ward staff have had full discretion in deciding what projects to fund. But this May, for the first time, 5th Ward residents will have the opportunity to vote directly on how the money should be spent.
The vote in May will be the culmination of a near yearlong process during which community members brainstorm potential uses of the money, narrow down the options and develop detailed project proposals. The ward is currently in the second stage: paring down over 170 ideas to create 32 proposals that ward residents will ultimately vote on.
The three community representatives gathered in Alderman Hairston’s office are members of the transportation committee, one of six committees tasked with evaluating ideas and developing proposals. (The other five committees are arts and culture, parks and recreation, centers and spaces, public safety and streets.) A total of 40 ward residents have volunteered to serve as community representatives, choosing which committee to join based on their individual experience—for example, Robert Daniels says he joined the transportation committee because he takes public transit everywhere he goes. But as the transportation committee discusses the project ideas residents have submitted—more benches at bus stops, sidewalk repairs, disability access ramps on walkways—they’re finding that many may fall under the jurisdiction of city agencies like the Chicago Transit Authority, a condition that Alderman Hairston says makes them ineligible for ward menu money. By the end of the meeting, the transportation committee has narrowed the list of ideas down to three: replacing broken reflective poles at a bike path, connecting two independent bike paths and installing a stop sign at a notoriously dangerous pedestrian crossing. ...................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://inthesetimes.com/article/14665/budgetary_power_to_the_people/
Budgetary Power to the People
from In These Times:
Budgetary Power to the People
An experiment with direct democracy on Chicago’s South Side.
BY Joel Handley
It’s a January night in the 5th Ward of Chicago, and a small group of ward residents have gathered at Alderman Leslie Hairston’s office in the South Shore neighborhood to evaluate a long list of ideas on how to improve the ward’s transportation system. All can agree that something needs to be done about the dangerous intersection near a neighborhood club on 55th street, where drivers can’t see pedestrians in the walkway until after they’ve accelerated around a curve. As they discuss the different options—pedestrian crossing signs? a stop sign? a roundabout?—they estimate how much each would cost, and consider complicating factors, like the fact that the eastern edge of the intersection is located in the neighboring ward.
The meeting is part of the 5th Ward’s attempt at implementing participatory budgeting, a process that allows citizens to choose how municipal funds could be best spent in their communities. In this case, the funds are the ward’s so-called “menu money”—the $1.3 million allotted annually to every ward to spend on small infrastructure projects, like fixing pot holes or installing pedestrian walkways. In the past, aldermen and ward staff have had full discretion in deciding what projects to fund. But this May, for the first time, 5th Ward residents will have the opportunity to vote directly on how the money should be spent.
The vote in May will be the culmination of a near yearlong process during which community members brainstorm potential uses of the money, narrow down the options and develop detailed project proposals. The ward is currently in the second stage: paring down over 170 ideas to create 32 proposals that ward residents will ultimately vote on.
The three community representatives gathered in Alderman Hairston’s office are members of the transportation committee, one of six committees tasked with evaluating ideas and developing proposals. (The other five committees are arts and culture, parks and recreation, centers and spaces, public safety and streets.) A total of 40 ward residents have volunteered to serve as community representatives, choosing which committee to join based on their individual experience—for example, Robert Daniels says he joined the transportation committee because he takes public transit everywhere he goes. But as the transportation committee discusses the project ideas residents have submitted—more benches at bus stops, sidewalk repairs, disability access ramps on walkways—they’re finding that many may fall under the jurisdiction of city agencies like the Chicago Transit Authority, a condition that Alderman Hairston says makes them ineligible for ward menu money. By the end of the meeting, the transportation committee has narrowed the list of ideas down to three: replacing broken reflective poles at a bike path, connecting two independent bike paths and installing a stop sign at a notoriously dangerous pedestrian crossing. ...................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://inthesetimes.com/article/14665/budgetary_power_to_the_people/
March 1, 2013
(Tom Lisi – New York, WNYC) A new study from the Brookings Institution shows that Amtrak ridership has grown by half since 1997, and the bulk of that growth has come from inter-city trips less than 400 miles long, especially outside the Northeast.
The study split up the number trips on Amtrak by metropolitan area. Boston, Tampa, and Dallas ridership tripled, all of which have other urban centers nearby. Trips longer than 400 miles grew, but barely and they operated at the greatest loss. The Northeast Corridor, which links Washington, Philadelphia, New York and Boston, continues to be the only Amtrak line that makes a profit, generating over $200 million in 2011.
Brookings released its findings in part to garner support for reauthorizing the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act, which expires in September. The PRIAA has eliminated the uncertainty of funding renewals from the federal government, and it has pushed states to invest in corridors that serve them. With the help of state funds, shorter corridors like the Carolinian and the Vermonter are now close to breaking even. “There is recognition of the importance of passenger rail as part of transportation costs,” says Robert Puentes, a senior fellow at Brookings. “[The states] are seeing the popularity and the economic connections.”
The study also tries to make the case to Congress and state governments that Amtrak deserves to be looked at as a smart investment. “There’s the convention that Amtrak is part of some big bloated bureaucracy, but Amtrak is actually reinventing itself,” says Puentes. ................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://transportationnation.org/2013/03/01/report-amtrak-ridership-hits-records/#sthash.W6wfjRUu.dpuf
Report: For Short Trips, Passengers Flock to Rail
(Tom Lisi – New York, WNYC) A new study from the Brookings Institution shows that Amtrak ridership has grown by half since 1997, and the bulk of that growth has come from inter-city trips less than 400 miles long, especially outside the Northeast.
The study split up the number trips on Amtrak by metropolitan area. Boston, Tampa, and Dallas ridership tripled, all of which have other urban centers nearby. Trips longer than 400 miles grew, but barely and they operated at the greatest loss. The Northeast Corridor, which links Washington, Philadelphia, New York and Boston, continues to be the only Amtrak line that makes a profit, generating over $200 million in 2011.
Brookings released its findings in part to garner support for reauthorizing the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act, which expires in September. The PRIAA has eliminated the uncertainty of funding renewals from the federal government, and it has pushed states to invest in corridors that serve them. With the help of state funds, shorter corridors like the Carolinian and the Vermonter are now close to breaking even. “There is recognition of the importance of passenger rail as part of transportation costs,” says Robert Puentes, a senior fellow at Brookings. “[The states] are seeing the popularity and the economic connections.”
The study also tries to make the case to Congress and state governments that Amtrak deserves to be looked at as a smart investment. “There’s the convention that Amtrak is part of some big bloated bureaucracy, but Amtrak is actually reinventing itself,” says Puentes. ................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://transportationnation.org/2013/03/01/report-amtrak-ridership-hits-records/#sthash.W6wfjRUu.dpuf
March 1, 2013
CHICAGO (CBS) – Attention Brown and Red Line CTA riders: Your commute is about to change in a major way.
And, at least temporarily, it’s going to be slower, confusing and a lot more crowded.
Starting Friday night at 10 p.m., the CTA will suspend Brown Line trains over the Chicago River at Wells Street to allow for reconstruction of the 90-year-old bridge.
This also means fewer trains and different routes during the rush hour. .................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2013/02/28/brown-line-service-disrupted-during-wells-street-bridge-construction/
Temporary Hell Commute begins in Chicago
CHICAGO (CBS) – Attention Brown and Red Line CTA riders: Your commute is about to change in a major way.
And, at least temporarily, it’s going to be slower, confusing and a lot more crowded.
Starting Friday night at 10 p.m., the CTA will suspend Brown Line trains over the Chicago River at Wells Street to allow for reconstruction of the 90-year-old bridge.
This also means fewer trains and different routes during the rush hour. .................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2013/02/28/brown-line-service-disrupted-during-wells-street-bridge-construction/
March 1, 2013
from Rolling Stone:
You just can't make this stuff up.
So JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon is participating in an investor conference call. This is the semi-regular ritual where a financial executive throws out some already heavily-airbrushed numbers for a select group of financial analysts and then proceeds, over the course of an extended conference call, to further verbally airbrush the already-airbrushed company data. Some of the analysts in these calls mostly toss softballs at the bankers, but some of them have a reputation of throwing the occasional brushback pitch, injecting unwanted or uncomfortable questions into the otherwise well-protected narcissistic bubbles in which these CEOs mostly always live
Not that I know the guy, but Mike Mayo of Credit Agricole is supposedly one of those analysts that people in the industry dislike. "Kind of a dick," is how one friend of mine described him – but in an admiring way, if that makes sense.
So Mayo is on this call with Dimon and he asks him a question about capital ratios, i.e. the amount of actual capital a bank has on hand as opposed to debts and liabilities. He notes that the Swiss bank UBS (which just settled in the LIBOR case, but never mind that for the moment) is saying in presentations that because it has more actual capital on hand than certain other banks – like, say, Chase? – customers should feel safer with them. .............(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/jamie-dimon-dong-slaps-inquisitive-analyst-in-hilarious-exchange-20130227#ixzz2MIoAaMsL
Matt Taibbi: Jamie Dimon Dong-Slaps Inquisitive Analyst in Hilarious Exchange
from Rolling Stone:
You just can't make this stuff up.
So JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon is participating in an investor conference call. This is the semi-regular ritual where a financial executive throws out some already heavily-airbrushed numbers for a select group of financial analysts and then proceeds, over the course of an extended conference call, to further verbally airbrush the already-airbrushed company data. Some of the analysts in these calls mostly toss softballs at the bankers, but some of them have a reputation of throwing the occasional brushback pitch, injecting unwanted or uncomfortable questions into the otherwise well-protected narcissistic bubbles in which these CEOs mostly always live
Not that I know the guy, but Mike Mayo of Credit Agricole is supposedly one of those analysts that people in the industry dislike. "Kind of a dick," is how one friend of mine described him – but in an admiring way, if that makes sense.
So Mayo is on this call with Dimon and he asks him a question about capital ratios, i.e. the amount of actual capital a bank has on hand as opposed to debts and liabilities. He notes that the Swiss bank UBS (which just settled in the LIBOR case, but never mind that for the moment) is saying in presentations that because it has more actual capital on hand than certain other banks – like, say, Chase? – customers should feel safer with them. .............(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/jamie-dimon-dong-slaps-inquisitive-analyst-in-hilarious-exchange-20130227#ixzz2MIoAaMsL
March 1, 2013
from Consortium News:
Dismantling America’s Post Offices
March 1, 2013
The U.S. Postal Service, which has bound the nation together since its founding, is under intense pressure to privatize, especially from business rivals and libertarians. But Post Offices represent some of America’s finest examples of public space and common purpose, scholar Gray Brechin tells Dennis J. Bernstein.
By Dennis J. Bernstein
There is a growing grassroots movement to save the U.S. Postal Service from right-wing Republicans who want to privatize it and turn over its most lucrative pieces to the likes of Fed Ex and United Parcel Service. Fed Ex and privatizing advocates have lobbied Congress to make this happen.
Dennis J, Bernstein spoke with Dr. Gray Brechin, project scholar for the Living New Deal at the University of California, Berkeley. Brechin is engaged in the effort to save the U.S. Post Office as a public trust, as well as the people’s art commissioned as a part of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal.
DB: I want to read a little bit from this a piece that you blogged in the middle of last year about this: “Thousands of post offices stand to be converted to condos, restaurants, real estate offices or demolished to cover the Postal Service’s largely manufactured deficit. Those that rely on the Post Office are protesting the disappearance of this still vital public service but few have registered what this fire sale represents to the nation’s architectural and artistic legacy…”
….and I guess that’s the door we’re going to come in Gray Brechin. It’s really one of the remaining peoples’ institutions, if you will. And so maybe you can give us just a little bit of history about how the Post Office evolved and why we need a Post Office when we’ve got the Internet.
GB: Well, I never imagined I’d be getting into Post Office studies but I sort of got sucked into it because in the last ten years I’ve been studying the New Deal. We’ve been inventorying and mapping it and it got me thinking about The Public, in general. Because what I realized is what the New Deal was, it was a huge expansion of the idea of The Public, or if you like, the commonwealth. That is what we all own. And very often — as with the Post Office — it’s what we’ve paid for. What our parents and our grandparents paid for and built. .................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://consortiumnews.com/2013/03/01/dismantling-americas-post-offices/
Dismantling America’s Post Offices
from Consortium News:
Dismantling America’s Post Offices
March 1, 2013
The U.S. Postal Service, which has bound the nation together since its founding, is under intense pressure to privatize, especially from business rivals and libertarians. But Post Offices represent some of America’s finest examples of public space and common purpose, scholar Gray Brechin tells Dennis J. Bernstein.
By Dennis J. Bernstein
There is a growing grassroots movement to save the U.S. Postal Service from right-wing Republicans who want to privatize it and turn over its most lucrative pieces to the likes of Fed Ex and United Parcel Service. Fed Ex and privatizing advocates have lobbied Congress to make this happen.
Dennis J, Bernstein spoke with Dr. Gray Brechin, project scholar for the Living New Deal at the University of California, Berkeley. Brechin is engaged in the effort to save the U.S. Post Office as a public trust, as well as the people’s art commissioned as a part of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal.
DB: I want to read a little bit from this a piece that you blogged in the middle of last year about this: “Thousands of post offices stand to be converted to condos, restaurants, real estate offices or demolished to cover the Postal Service’s largely manufactured deficit. Those that rely on the Post Office are protesting the disappearance of this still vital public service but few have registered what this fire sale represents to the nation’s architectural and artistic legacy…”
….and I guess that’s the door we’re going to come in Gray Brechin. It’s really one of the remaining peoples’ institutions, if you will. And so maybe you can give us just a little bit of history about how the Post Office evolved and why we need a Post Office when we’ve got the Internet.
GB: Well, I never imagined I’d be getting into Post Office studies but I sort of got sucked into it because in the last ten years I’ve been studying the New Deal. We’ve been inventorying and mapping it and it got me thinking about The Public, in general. Because what I realized is what the New Deal was, it was a huge expansion of the idea of The Public, or if you like, the commonwealth. That is what we all own. And very often — as with the Post Office — it’s what we’ve paid for. What our parents and our grandparents paid for and built. .................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://consortiumnews.com/2013/03/01/dismantling-americas-post-offices/
March 1, 2013
(Bloomberg) A federal judge in New Jersey barred a law that would legalize sports gambling in the state, siding with sports organizations, including the National Collegiate Athletic Association and the National Football League, which sued to block the legislation from taking effect.
The state law, signed by Republican New Jersey Governor Chris Christie in January 2012, permits wagering on professional and college sports at racetracks and Atlantic City casinos.
Sports organizations including the NCAA, NFL, National Basketball Association, National Hockey League and Major League Baseball, along with the U.S. government, argued that the measure would undermine the integrity of professional sports, and should be barred under a 1992 federal law requiring states to restrict sports betting. New Jersey argued that the federal law was unconstitutional.
“After careful consideration, the Court has determined that Congress acted within its powers and the statute in question does not violate the United States Constitution,” U.S. District Judge Michael Shipp said in a ruling yesterday. ..........(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-01/federal-judge-rules-against-new-jersey-sports-betting-bid.html
New Jersey Sports Gambling Law Blocked in Win for Leagues
(Bloomberg) A federal judge in New Jersey barred a law that would legalize sports gambling in the state, siding with sports organizations, including the National Collegiate Athletic Association and the National Football League, which sued to block the legislation from taking effect.
The state law, signed by Republican New Jersey Governor Chris Christie in January 2012, permits wagering on professional and college sports at racetracks and Atlantic City casinos.
Sports organizations including the NCAA, NFL, National Basketball Association, National Hockey League and Major League Baseball, along with the U.S. government, argued that the measure would undermine the integrity of professional sports, and should be barred under a 1992 federal law requiring states to restrict sports betting. New Jersey argued that the federal law was unconstitutional.
“After careful consideration, the Court has determined that Congress acted within its powers and the statute in question does not violate the United States Constitution,” U.S. District Judge Michael Shipp said in a ruling yesterday. ..........(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-01/federal-judge-rules-against-new-jersey-sports-betting-bid.html
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