America Needs to Switch to Green Energy -- Now

The millions of gallons of crude oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico should be more than enough persuasion for Americans to kick their petroleum habit. They say that freedom isn't free, well neither is cheap gas. Cheap gas is paid for in American and Middle Eastern blood.

The American-led invasion of Iraq, which was first dubbed Operation Iraqi Liberation (OIL), has cost about 5,000 American lives and between 100,000 to 1.5 million Iraqi lives. This was done so American companies could have access to Iraq's oil reserves,which are the second largest in the world.

The war made a handful of oil executives very wealthy, and also ensured that Americans could keep driving big-honking, gas guzzlers. It also means that the air is less healthy and the Earth's climate continues to warm up.

Americans need to get behind green energy, fuel efficient vehicles and public transportation. This is slowly happening. Ford is investing $135 million in plants that will produce more clean-energy cars by 2012. And President Obama has proposed funding a high-speed rail system. The switch to clean-energy cars would also be a huge shot in the arm for the ailing American auto industry.

Imagine what would happen if people started switching to solar or electric-powered cars? It would mean a drive for new vehicles and new technicians.

Detroit plants would be humming as workers produced a new fleet of clean cars. Americans go back to work, stocks goes up, the climate improves and we stop fighting oil wars. What's the down side?

Corporations Want to Be Left Alone to Kill Workers

One of the mantras that conservatives like Sarah Palin love to repeat is that business does better without the intervention of government. Neocons would have us believe that government simply slows down enterprise and make things more complicated. Of course who needs little things like safety regulations or anti-fraud laws?

But these recent stories should make all Americans have second thoughts. Over the past year we have seen:

• Twenty nine workers killed in the worst mine accident in U.S. history
• Billions of dollars evaporated because of high-risk financial ventures on Wall Street
• Eleven workers killed in the British Petroleum oil rig explosion.
• Apple has outsourced manufacturing of the iPhone to a plant in China that has seen nine worker suicides this year.

In all of these cases, the main problem was lack of government regulation. Massey Energy mines were infamous for their violations and owner Don Blakenship, had utter contempt for the federal government. Massey Energy racked up a total of 250 safety violations.

Wall Street created financial terms that were so risky and complicated that few people understood them. One of the monsters they cooked up were derivatives, where bankers took out insurance on people to default on loans they gave them.

And as for the BP explosion, under the Bush administration, the Mineral Management Service, was stocked with cronies who were trying to get jobs at the very companies they were supposed to be monitoring. And when they weren't lobbying for cushy government gigs, they were looking at porn or doing drugs.

So what can we learn from these debacles? One, corporations don't give a damn about their workers, and two, when the government lets corporations monitor themselves, workers die. Ideally, corporations would love to have slave labor, who they don't have to pay and who never complain. The closest we have got to that is illegal immigrants.

http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/why-were-bp-executives-hired-mms-fox

American Preachers Will Spawn African Bloodbath

Uganda President Yoweri Museveni

If there were any evidence of the damage that colonialism has done to Africa, consider the current blood lust that is being directed at gays in Uganda.

The Current TV series Vanguard has covered this difficult subject in a show titled "Missionaries of Hate." The documentary shows how a visit by homophobic American evangelists, like Dr. Scott Lively, led to Ugandan politicians proposing legislation that would make homosexuality punishable by life in jail or death.

American-trained evangelists are also using slick tactics to whip up hatred towards gays. Homosexuality is largely a taboo subject in Africa, and I don't see this changing. African culture is largely geared around family and producing children, and gays simply don't fit into the structure.

If that wasn't bad enough you have ministers like Martin Ssempa, who have launched a holy crusade against gays and likened them to demons. Ssempa uses shock tactics, which would not be tolerated in America, such as showing images of hard-core gay pornography involving anal sex and scat play. (If you don't know what that is look it up!)

This leaves his followers gagging in revulsion and ready to string up the nearest gay person. Ssempa is following the same tactics that were used in Nazi Germany and judging by the violent, and unstable nature of African countries, it's easy to see a country launching a deadly purge of gays. I feel sorry for the gay people profiled in this documentary, who would be better of seeking asylum in the West.

It seems nothing has changed. Africans are still swallowing the worst aspects of Western culture and religion is still being used to enslave the minds of Africans. Uganda has more pertinent issues such as corruption, poverty,a long-standing civil war and an AIDs pandemic.

But it makes you wonder why does a Christian minister have hard-core gay porn on his computer? Lively, the American preacher, looks like a "bear," which is not suprising. Most Africans are unaware that the American "ex-gay" movement is riddled with closeted gay men, like the recent defrocked George Rekers. Michael Bussee and Gary Cooper, two of the founders of the Ex-gay movement, later quit and end up falling in love with each other. And we are all aware of the gay sex scandal that felled Ted Haggard, head of the National Association of Evangelicals.

Right Wing Using Nazi Tactics to Stir Up Rage

It seems that everyday you hear of a new Arizona law designed to drive brown-skinned people out of the state. The latest proposed legislation will force educators to become immigration agents, by making them determine if the parents of their students are here legally.

Unfortunately many of these policies, and anger at Latinos, are gaining traction. I've listened to liberal radio shows and heard blue-collar workers call in and vent their frustrations at Mexicans who are stealing their jobs, driving down wages and clogging up the health care system.

There is real anger from many segments of America at the state of the economy. Sadly it seems that some politicians are looking to direct that anger at "foreigners," or anyone who looks illegal. It's not surprising there have been incidents of Latino workers being attacked by groups of young men.

This is the same tactic used by the Russian Neo-Nazi movement that takes angry, disaffected men and tells them those black and brown people are the real enemy. Ethnic (white Russians) make up 80 percent of the population, although there are several people from the minority groups that use to comprise the old Soviet Union. However, the idea of a Russian Nazi is darkly ironic considering that about 20 million Russians died in the war against' Hitler's Germany.

So the next time you hear an American raging about how Mexicans have taken his job, stop and think about where that rage is coming from.

Japan Sees Robots as Solution to Population Time bomb

Check out this Current television show titled "Robot Nation." It talks about Japan's population time bomb. The country is facing an ageing population, and Japanese people are also not producing enough children to sustain their economy. The show estimates that Japan could lose up to 2/3rds of its population in the next century.

Apparently Japanese men and women work so hard that they don't have enough energy have sex when they get home. (Sounds like parts of Orange County.) A Japanese sex expert says that Japanese married couples have the lowest rate of intercourse in the world.

Immigration would be a solution to Japan's workforce problem, but Japan is a largely homogeneous country which is not welcoming to outsiders. Even ethnic Koreans, who are born and raised in Japan, have to adopt Japanese names if they want Japanese citizenship.

Being a forward-thinking country, the Japanese look to robotic technology to solve their labor shortage. Japanese scientists envision robotic home helpers being used to aid senior citizens.

Latinos Have Become America's New Whipping Boy

In my almost 40 years as a black man, I have seen and experienced more than my fair share of racism. I have seen acts that would make most white people's hair stand on end, and some acts that many people simply would not believe.

I have always believed that of all the ethnic groups in America, black people have it worst. But I am beginning to have second thoughts. The level of racism and hatred directed at Latinos is beginning to dwarf the discrimination that African Americans face. A recent Associated Press poll stated that 61 percent of Latinos face significant discrimination, compared 52 percent of African Americans.

These news reports back up the AP poll's findings:

Much of the vitriol directed at Latinos, like the Arizona pass laws, is mixed up with xenophobia and the erroneous belief that all Latinos are illegal immigrants. Republican politicians are tapping into the rage of blue-collar and middle class Americans, who are still reeling from the economic recession. Politicians would rather have angry white people direct their rage at poor brown people, instead of the reckless Wall Street executives who got rich while they wrecked the economy.

And that might be why the instigators of these new laws think they can get away with this new form of racism. Since undocumented workers are not supposed to be here, no one cares about them or will fight for their rights.

It is the worst form of hatred, because it is targets the most helpless segment of society. Much like criminals who victimize undocumented workers, these bullies want to beat up on defenseless people. But this really should not be surprising. Illegal immigration is tolerated because American companies like having workers who will work for slave wages and are too scared to complain. If you can drive down workers' salaries, that means more money for the shareholders. And one of the constant complaints from arch capitalists is that American workers cost too much and demand too many benefits.

One can only hope that all this anti-Latino rhetoric will shake voters, black, white and Asian, out of their apathy. The other side has shown us what direction they want this country go, now it's up to us to stop them.

IPhone Factory Sees Ninth Suicide

For all those neo-conservatives who believe that the business world should be unfettered by government interaction, consider the case of Foxconn, a China plant that makes iPhones. The plant has seen nine suicides this year. Eleven workers jumped from buildings, but two survived.

There have been complaints about long work hours and harsh working conditions at the plant. You wonder if Apple deliberately moved production to China, where they can get away with paying workers slave wages and working them to death -- in this case literally. Conservatives claim that American workers demand too many benefits and rights, but I think most American workers want to be paid a living wage and treated live human beings, not automatons.

So this is the end product of outsourcing? Dead workers, cheap goods and huge corporate profits? It seems that the developing world, with the help of activists from the West, will have to get on board the union bandwagon or stand by and watch more workers die.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/21/foxconn-suffers-ninth-sui_n_585325.html