Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Capitalism without a Heart, without a Conscience: Obama Blind to the Needs of the American People
President Obama's compromise with Congressional Republicans to reduce the deficit is “a rotten deal” that “hits the poor and the middle class the hardest,” The Nationmagazine said in a May 2nd editorial.
The president may have called for “shared sacrifice”to reduce the budget by $4 trillion over the next 12 years but for every $1 raised by closing tax loopholes for the wealthy, he proposes $2 in spending cuts, the liberal magazine says.
And “Two-thirds of those cuts would come from education, health and other social programs while one-third would come from the military budget,” the magazine editorialized.
“The president's vision of 'shared sacrifice,' in other words, hits the poor and the middle class hardest. Meanwhile, wealthy Americans and the military are asked to sacrifice less, even though it was unfunded tax cuts and wars that got us a deficit in the first place,” the editorial continued.
To avoid a government shutdown, the president agreed to a 2011 budget compromise that cut spending by $38 billion, “the majority of which will come from the departments of education, labor and health,” The Nation pointed out.
The magazine concluded Mr. Obama's “balanced approach” “conceded too much too early to the deficit hawks and austerity pushers.” Where he “needed to reset the debate,” instead “he split the difference.”
In a similar vein, former Labor Secy. Robert Reich wrote on his blog the president “is losing the war of ideas because he won't tell the American public the truth: That we need more government spending now---not less---in order to get out of the gravitational pull of the Great Recession.”
That's because “the increasingly lopsided distribution of income and wealth has robbed the vast working middle class of the purchasing power they need to keep the economy going at full capacity,” Reich explained.
Early in the last century, enlightened industrialists raised workers' salaries so they could buy the goods they were manufacturing. Today, corporations show zero loyalty to their workers. They do not cut productive workers in for a share of the profits. Working Americans, Reich says, are earning on average “only about $280 more a year than 30 years ago, adjusted for inflation. That's less than a 1 percent gain over more than a third of a century.”
Worse, corporations whose employees made them great in the first place quit the country to find cheaper labor overseas. And many of the new jobs being created in recent months are bottom-of-the-barrel, minimum wage work.
“Real hourly wages continue to fall,” Reich says, because “with unemployment so high, most people have no bargaining power and will take whatever they can get.”
At the same time ever more families are sliding into poverty, signing up for food stamps, and lining up at church soup kitchens, “Wall Street profits soared to $426.5 billion last quarter,” Reich says.
Since Corporate America is largely responsible for the Great Recession by starving its workers of the purchasing power they need to put punch back into the economy, you might think companies would plow some of their lush profits back into the work force. You might think the oil companies would share some of their fabulous profits with motorists. But no such luck.
Worse, the corporate types and their Republican allies in Congress want to stop federal and state governments from paying their workers fairly and creating needed public service jobs. Instead, they want to lay off loyal employees. They want to bust the unions. They move whole factories overseas. They abandon cities and counties, robbing them of their industrial base. They relocate offshore to evade taxes. They even outsource help-line jobs to low-paid workers in India. And if they can, they will privatize Social Security and gut Medicare.
This is capitalism without a heart, without a conscience.
Yet if the private sector will not live up to its responsibilities, who would deny government the role of employer of last resort and the trainer of last resort?
Right now, not tomorrow, the U.S. needs to provide a job for every person who wants to work. Right now, the U.S. has got to mobilize and upgrade a vast network of vocational training facilities---in trade schools, union halls, community colleges and, yes, corporations---to train millions of workers in skilled trades. Right now, the U.S. needs to create millions of jobs in day care centers, hospitals, the building trades and for work on all phases of infrastructure---from replacing sewer and water pipes, to creating solar, sea, and wind power plants, to refurbishing run-down housing and beautifying deteriorating communities.
Tragically, Mr. Obama is virtually blind to the needs of the American people. He is smitten with the imperial vision. Americans have been electing presidents who, upon taking office, act like kings, and kill like tyrants, and he is no exception. Americans want jobs at home, not wars abroad. They want money for local schools, not for foreign bases. They want peace and prosperity. At the least, Democrats need a new standard-bearer in 2012. Americans need a Green Revolution. President Obama talks a great game. But his promises before an election are broken after he's elected. And his foreign policy of wars and assassinations is cruel and contemptible. It's time for a change!
Sherwood Ross worked as a reporter for the Chicago Daily News and as a columnist for wire services. To comment or contribute to his Anti-War News Service contact him at sherwoodross10@gmail.com
Euro strikes 16-month high against dollar
The European single currency hit $1.4653 in morning trade, the highest point since mid-December 2009, as many dealers returned from a long holiday weekend. It later stood at $1.4619, compared with $1.4572 late in New York on Monday.
The dollar meanwhile tumbled to an all-time low point of 0.8745 Swiss francs.
Investors moved to adjust positions ahead of the US Federal Reserve's two-day policy meeting, which was to open later on Tuesday, dealers said.
The central bank's Federal Open Market Committee is widely expected to maintain interest rates at between zero and 0.25 percent, where they have stood since December 2008.
Traders are also eagerly awaiting Thursday's publication of US gross domestic product (GDP) data for the first three months of 2011.
"The US dollar continues to remain under pressure ahead of this week's key FOMC rate meeting tomorrow and first quarter GDP figures, which are due on Thursday," said CMC Markets analyst Michael Hewson.
Markets are keenly awaiting Fed chairman Ben Bernanke's first news conference on Wednesday after the meeting. It will be the first by any Fed chief, in contrast with regular news conferences held by European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet.
Home Prices in 20 U.S. Cities Decreased 3.3% From Year Ago
April 26 (Bloomberg) -- Residential real estate prices dropped in February by the most in more than a year, a sign the U.S. housing market is struggling to stabilize.
The S&P/Case-Shiller index of property values in 20 cities fell 3.3 percent from February 2010, the biggest year-over-year decrease since November 2009, the group said today in New York. The decline matched the median forecast in a Bloomberg News survey.
Increases in foreclosures are adding to a growing inventory of unsold homes, which may further depress prices and dissuade potential buyers anticipating even cheaper dwellings. Declining property values also limit construction and restrain consumer spending as homeowners have less equity to borrow against.
NATO starts hunting for Gaddafi
Voice of Russia
April 25, 2011 |
Guantánamo Bay files: Torture gets results, US military insists
Camp X-ray authorities defiant in face of official criticism, arguing 'harsh interrogation' yielded valuable leads from 9/11 suspects
The US military insists its use of torture has extracted accurate information from al-Qaida prisoners, according to the secret Guantánamo files.
The two "enemy combatants" who were the first victims of the policy of deliberate ill-treatment cannot be prosecuted because of the illegal way they were interrogated almost a decade ago. Saudi inmate Maad al-Qahtani and Mauritanian Mohammed Ould Salahi are among the 172 prisoners languishing indefinitely at the internment camp in Cuba despite Barack Obama's attempts to close it down. Qahtani has been there for over nine years.
The US military still claims Qahtani to be a would-be "20th hijacker" who narrowly failed to get into the US in time for 9/11, when teams of terrorists seized control of planes and flew them into the World Trade Centre and Pentagon. The prisoner assessment file claims: "Although publicly released records allege detainee was subject to harsh interrogation techniques in the early stages of detention, detainee's admission of involvement in [Osama bin Laden's] special mission to the US appear to be true and are corroborated in reporting from other sources."
The file adds: "He has admitted using a cover story and continues to withhold information of intelligence value."
The records make similar claims about Salahi, claimed to be head of an al-Qaida cell in Germany and recruiter of three of the 9/11 hijackers. He was arrested at his home in Mauritania, rendered to Jordan for eight months, passed on to the US interrogation unit at Bagram in Afghanistan and finally shipped on to Guantánamo in July 2002. He was subjected to the same range of deliberate maltreatment at Guantánamo detailed in 2005 by a military investigation, the Schmidt-Furlow report.
Once again the Guantánamo authorities refused to accept that information obtained through torture is unreliable. Salahi's classified assessment file, dated 3 March 2008, says: "Analyst note: Detainee is determined to be highly credible, notwithstanding … the Schmidt-Furlough [sic] report ... Given the extensive reporting provided by detainee, he remains one of the most valuable sources in detention at JTF-GTMO. He has been highly co-operative and continues to provide valuable intelligence."
(Salahi brought an action against the US government for illegal detention in 2010 in which he claimed his association with al-Qaida ended after 1992 and any incriminating statements he had made should be disregarded because of the mistreatment he had suffered.)
The interrogation techniques first used on Qahtani in 2002 and then repeated on Salahi were bluntly described as torture by the top military judge overseeing the Bush-era military tribunals at Guantánamo. "We tortured Qahtani," Susan Crawford told the Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward in 2009. "His treatment met the legal definition of torture. And that's why I did not refer the case for prosecution."
A Senate inquiry reported: "Military working dogs had been used against Qahtani. He had also been deprived of adequate sleep for weeks on end, stripped naked, subjected to loud music and made to wear a leash and perform dog tricks." During his 20-hour continuous interrogations, which were repeated for 48 days, he was also chained in stress positions, screamed at, had water dripped on his head and was chilled using air conditioning.
The maltreatment he suffered was so severe that his heart rate crashed and he had to be treated in hospital. Permission for waterboarding was sought at Guantánamo, but not used on Qahtani.
His interrogation plan was the first experiment at Guantánamo in adopting illegal Chinese methods previously used against US servicemen in the Korean war of the 1950s. The use of "enhanced techniques" was signed off by Donald Rumsfeld, despite protests from the army and FBI who said the methods were illegal.
The techniques later migrated from the so-called "battle lab" of Guantánamo to the more conventional theatres of war in Afghanistan and Iraq, where prisoners were supposedly entitled to the protections of the Geneva conventions. This ultimately led to the scandal of inmate maltreatment at Abu Ghraib, which fuelled hostility throughout the Arab world.
Chuck Baldwin -- Have The Tea Parties Been Neoconned?
By Chuck Baldwin
April 21, 2011
NewsWithViews.com
Back in February of 2010, I appeared on Neil Cavuto’s FOXBusiness TV show to talk about the emergence and effectiveness of America’s Tea Party movement. I warned FOX biz host Charles Payne that I was very concerned about the Tea Parties being infiltrated and taken over by big-government neocons.
See my interview on Neil Cavuto’s show (hosted by Charles Payne).
With more than a year having gone by since that interview, I believe the concerns I expressed on FOX were more than warranted. I am seeing more and more Tea Parties fall into the same trap, as did their predecessors back in the “Conservative Revolution” of 1994 and ‘95.
Right here in my home State of Montana, voters overwhelmingly threw the liberal Democrats out of both State houses and replaced them with Republicans who campaigned on strong conservative rhetoric. But what has happened since? Neocon Republicans in leadership positions squashed the best legislation and bullied compromised, big-government legislation through both chambers. The result: big-government neocons, once again, stymied and squashed the efforts of constitutionalist GOP legislators.
A press release at the half-way point of the Montana legislative session stated, “According to Montana Conservatives’ just-released mid session scorecard, the new wave of Republican legislators elected in November’s landslide are actually voting less conservative than their party’s incumbents.
“This is not good news for Tea Party organizers and other conservative activists, who were hopeful the strong conservative mood of the fall elections would sweep into office a new breed of bolder conservative voices. Instead, the organization’s Taxpayer Advisory Bulletin (TAB) reveals that returning GOP legislators (including those who switched houses) voted 46% conservative through the transmittal break, while newcomers graded a slightly lower 43%. Democratic legislators had an average conservative score of 7%.
“Commenting, MC spokesman Roger Koopman said, ‘This poor performance of Republican freshmen perpetuates what is functionally a three-party system in Helena, consisting of small government Republicans, big government Republicans and big government Democrats. The pattern has existed for years. Consequently, even with large Republican majorities in both houses, conservative ideas remain in the minority and the overall thrust of the legislature is toward bigger, more intrusive government, with greater state control and less individual freedom.’”
See the TAB press release and report here.
What the report does not make a point to say is that the poor performance of many of these freshman GOP legislators is primarily due to the political pressure brought upon them by big-government neocons in leadership positions within the GOP State caucus. This is the same thing that has been going on in State legislatures all over America, and even more so in Washington, D.C. When the courageous freshman class of 1994 was elected to the US House of Representatives, everyone was talking about the great “Conservative Revolution” that had just taken place. Conservative freshman House members such as Helen Chenowith, Bob Barr, Steve Largent, J.C. Watts, J.D. Hayworth, Joe Scarborough, Sonny Bono, etc., marched into the US Capitol with broad support from the American electorate and a sense of commitment to reign in an out-of-control federal leviathan in Washington, D.C. So, what happened? Were any federal departments dismantled? No. Was the size and scope of the federal government reduced? No. Was federal spending reduced? No. Within a year from that historic election in 1994, the “Conservative Revolution” was dead, and it was “business as usual” in Washington, D.C.
Why did this happen? Two reasons: big-government neocon GOP Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich and big-government neocon GOP Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott. These two big-government establishment phony conservatives used their leadership positions to stymie, steamroll, and squash the conservative agenda of the 1994 conservative freshman Republicans.
And the same way that Gingrich and Lott killed the “Conservative Revolution” of 1994 in Washington, D.C., big-government neocons in the State legislatures (including here in Montana) have killed and are killing the limited-government revolutions of the various Tea Parties in 2010 and ’11. Beyond that, many Tea Party leaders and activists are currently touting the Presidential candidacy of the same man who helped kill the “Conservative Revolution” of 1994: former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich.
In my interview on FOX, I said that I was angrier with the Republican Party than I was the Democrat Party. If you listened to the interview referenced above, you heard my reason why: with Democrats there is no pretense. One knows exactly what the Donkeys stand for: Big Government, more taxes, more spending, more welfare, etc. Republicans, however, constantly campaign for less government, less taxes, less spending, less welfare, etc., but after they are elected, they continue the big-spending ways of their colleagues on the other side of the aisle (then throw in their own propensities to expand a burgeoning Police State and Warfare State). Say what you want, at least Democrats are honest about their affinity for Big Government.
If Tea Party activists really believe they are going to change the size and direction of government (at any level) by promoting and electing people such as Newt Gingrich, they are living in fantasyland. (Or, if they live in Montana, they are smoking too much of the weed that they seem hell-bent to deny everyone else!)
Furthermore, this whole Republican vs. Democrat, or “conservative” vs. liberal, paradigm is a joke, anyway! Voters have been replacing Democrats with Republicans, liberals with “conservatives” (and vice versa) for decades; and what has it gotten us? Nothing but bigger and bigger government; more and more government spending; more and more welfare programs; more and more taxes; more and more Police-State legislation; more and more political correctness; more and more environmental wackoism; more and more foreign wars; less and less freedom; and less and less State autonomy.
Koopman’s “three party” description is well taken, except I might refine it a little by maintaining that we still have only two parties: socialist Democrats and neocon Republicans in one party, and limited-government, freedom-oriented constitutionalists in the other party. It’s time that people start identifying big-government neocons in the GOP as being nothing more than a clandestine fifth column unit of the Democrat Party!
Subscribe to the NewsWithViews Daily News Alerts! |
If Tea Parties have a death wish, they will promote and support big government neocons such as Newt Gingrich. If they want to truly change the course of their states and country, they will promote and support only those men and women who understand what constitutionalism, limited-government, and liberty really mean--and who have the courage and fortitude to actually defend those principles after being elected. Anything less is just more of the same.
Chuck Baldwin -- Have The Tea Parties Been Neoconned?
By Chuck Baldwin
April 21, 2011
NewsWithViews.com
Back in February of 2010, I appeared on Neil Cavuto’s FOXBusiness TV show to talk about the emergence and effectiveness of America’s Tea Party movement. I warned FOX biz host Charles Payne that I was very concerned about the Tea Parties being infiltrated and taken over by big-government neocons.
See my interview on Neil Cavuto’s show (hosted by Charles Payne).
With more than a year having gone by since that interview, I believe the concerns I expressed on FOX were more than warranted. I am seeing more and more Tea Parties fall into the same trap, as did their predecessors back in the “Conservative Revolution” of 1994 and ‘95.
Right here in my home State of Montana, voters overwhelmingly threw the liberal Democrats out of both State houses and replaced them with Republicans who campaigned on strong conservative rhetoric. But what has happened since? Neocon Republicans in leadership positions squashed the best legislation and bullied compromised, big-government legislation through both chambers. The result: big-government neocons, once again, stymied and squashed the efforts of constitutionalist GOP legislators.
A press release at the half-way point of the Montana legislative session stated, “According to Montana Conservatives’ just-released mid session scorecard, the new wave of Republican legislators elected in November’s landslide are actually voting less conservative than their party’s incumbents.
“This is not good news for Tea Party organizers and other conservative activists, who were hopeful the strong conservative mood of the fall elections would sweep into office a new breed of bolder conservative voices. Instead, the organization’s Taxpayer Advisory Bulletin (TAB) reveals that returning GOP legislators (including those who switched houses) voted 46% conservative through the transmittal break, while newcomers graded a slightly lower 43%. Democratic legislators had an average conservative score of 7%.
“Commenting, MC spokesman Roger Koopman said, ‘This poor performance of Republican freshmen perpetuates what is functionally a three-party system in Helena, consisting of small government Republicans, big government Republicans and big government Democrats. The pattern has existed for years. Consequently, even with large Republican majorities in both houses, conservative ideas remain in the minority and the overall thrust of the legislature is toward bigger, more intrusive government, with greater state control and less individual freedom.’”
See the TAB press release and report here.
What the report does not make a point to say is that the poor performance of many of these freshman GOP legislators is primarily due to the political pressure brought upon them by big-government neocons in leadership positions within the GOP State caucus. This is the same thing that has been going on in State legislatures all over America, and even more so in Washington, D.C. When the courageous freshman class of 1994 was elected to the US House of Representatives, everyone was talking about the great “Conservative Revolution” that had just taken place. Conservative freshman House members such as Helen Chenowith, Bob Barr, Steve Largent, J.C. Watts, J.D. Hayworth, Joe Scarborough, Sonny Bono, etc., marched into the US Capitol with broad support from the American electorate and a sense of commitment to reign in an out-of-control federal leviathan in Washington, D.C. So, what happened? Were any federal departments dismantled? No. Was the size and scope of the federal government reduced? No. Was federal spending reduced? No. Within a year from that historic election in 1994, the “Conservative Revolution” was dead, and it was “business as usual” in Washington, D.C.
Why did this happen? Two reasons: big-government neocon GOP Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich and big-government neocon GOP Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott. These two big-government establishment phony conservatives used their leadership positions to stymie, steamroll, and squash the conservative agenda of the 1994 conservative freshman Republicans.
And the same way that Gingrich and Lott killed the “Conservative Revolution” of 1994 in Washington, D.C., big-government neocons in the State legislatures (including here in Montana) have killed and are killing the limited-government revolutions of the various Tea Parties in 2010 and ’11. Beyond that, many Tea Party leaders and activists are currently touting the Presidential candidacy of the same man who helped kill the “Conservative Revolution” of 1994: former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich.
In my interview on FOX, I said that I was angrier with the Republican Party than I was the Democrat Party. If you listened to the interview referenced above, you heard my reason why: with Democrats there is no pretense. One knows exactly what the Donkeys stand for: Big Government, more taxes, more spending, more welfare, etc. Republicans, however, constantly campaign for less government, less taxes, less spending, less welfare, etc., but after they are elected, they continue the big-spending ways of their colleagues on the other side of the aisle (then throw in their own propensities to expand a burgeoning Police State and Warfare State). Say what you want, at least Democrats are honest about their affinity for Big Government.
If Tea Party activists really believe they are going to change the size and direction of government (at any level) by promoting and electing people such as Newt Gingrich, they are living in fantasyland. (Or, if they live in Montana, they are smoking too much of the weed that they seem hell-bent to deny everyone else!)
Furthermore, this whole Republican vs. Democrat, or “conservative” vs. liberal, paradigm is a joke, anyway! Voters have been replacing Democrats with Republicans, liberals with “conservatives” (and vice versa) for decades; and what has it gotten us? Nothing but bigger and bigger government; more and more government spending; more and more welfare programs; more and more taxes; more and more Police-State legislation; more and more political correctness; more and more environmental wackoism; more and more foreign wars; less and less freedom; and less and less State autonomy.
Koopman’s “three party” description is well taken, except I might refine it a little by maintaining that we still have only two parties: socialist Democrats and neocon Republicans in one party, and limited-government, freedom-oriented constitutionalists in the other party. It’s time that people start identifying big-government neocons in the GOP as being nothing more than a clandestine fifth column unit of the Democrat Party!
Subscribe to the NewsWithViews Daily News Alerts! |
If Tea Parties have a death wish, they will promote and support big government neocons such as Newt Gingrich. If they want to truly change the course of their states and country, they will promote and support only those men and women who understand what constitutionalism, limited-government, and liberty really mean--and who have the courage and fortitude to actually defend those principles after being elected. Anything less is just more of the same.
Russia warns over new U.N. resolution on Libya
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia said on Tuesday it will not support any United Nations Security Council resolutions on Libya which could escalate the conflict in the North African nation, local news agencies reported.
"If a resolution leads to a further escalation of a civil war by any means, including outside intervention, we will not be able to support this," Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was quoted as saying by Interfax news agency.
Russia, a veto-wielding permanent U.N. Security Council member, abstained last month from the vote on a resolution authorizing force to protect civilians in Libya by enforcing a no-fly zone.
But Russia's leaders have repeatedly criticized the extent of the coalition operation.
Shock employment figures: Fewer than 46% of Americans have jobs
The percentage of Americans who have jobs has fallen to the lowest point in three decades and now hovers just above 45 percent of the total population, according to an analysis of labor data published by USA Today.
The report, based on figures provided by the Census and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, showed that at 36.7 percent, Mississippi had the lowest percentage of population working.
Employment rates were also low in California and Arizona, where just over 37 percent had jobs. At 55.8 percent, North Dakota had the highest rate of employed residents.
Overall, 45.4 percent of Americans were working, the lowest since 1983. Employment peaked at 49.3 percent in 2000.
"The bad economy, an aging population and a plateau in women working are contributing to changes that pose serious challenges for financing the nation's social programs," the paper noted.
The news comes at a time when Republican senators have unveiled a plan to raise the retirement age, which would force more Americans to search for jobs that just aren't there.
Freshman tea party-backed Sens. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Rand Paul (R-KY) -- along with Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) -- have joined the call, seeking to raise the retirement age to 70 in the next 20 years.
US tipped off about al-Qaida cell that did not exist
The US military created a detailed intelligence file on a London-based al-Qaida cell that did not exist, as a result of its reliance on tip-offs from one of its detainees, the Guantánamo files reveal.
One of the men whom the camp authorities believed to have been a leading member of the "cell" in the 1990s was 11 years old at the time, and had not left his family's village in Saudi Arabia.
The files on most of the other supposed members suggest that they, too, had never visited Britain.
A list of the members of the group described as the "London, United Kingdom-based al-Qaida cell" is to be found in the file of Yousef Abkir Salih al-Qarani.
This file wrongly states that he was born in Saudi Arabia in 1981. Lawyers representing him discovered that his birth certificate shows him to have been born in 1987.
The man who identified al-Qarani as having been a member of the London cell in 1998 was Mohammed Basardah, who has implicated at least 122 other inmates.
Basardah told the authorities that he had learned which prisoners were members of the "London cell" during conversations with Shaker Aamer, a former London resident who is still incarcerated in Guantánamo.
Basardah said he had learned that the leader of the cell was Abu Qatada, who was a well-known radical cleric in the city before 9/11.
Qatada's "second-in-command" was said to be Abu Hamza, another well-known figure.
The Guantánamo files show that the camp authorities accepted that the other members of the cell were a group of Saudi and Kuwaiti detainees. However, the files on these individuals, which detail their movements over many years, show no sign that they had ever visited Britain.
Baltimore sends parents to jail for truant kids
About a dozen parents have been sentenced for their children's truancy this year and some have gone for jail for the crime, the Baltimore Sun's Erica Green reports.
Green profiles Barbara Gaskins, who spent 10 days in jail after her 15-year-old son missed the overwhelming majority of school days this year. She says she dropped him off at the bus stop each morning and taught him the importance of education. She was worried about finding childcare for her four young children while serving the time.
"We're dealing with less than 1 percent of students and parents, and certainly this is one of the toughest decisions we have," Jonathan Brice, who oversees the school district's truancy office, told Green. "But it's critical that we get those parents' and young people's attention about the seriousness of being in school." Education experts, however, were less confident that cracking down on parents would lift attendance.
The school system's court liaison Alfred Barbour told the paper that no parents served jail time last year--and that only three did in 2009. Hundreds of them are cited each year for truancy however, and charges are filed after a student misses 15 days. For parents to be convicted, the school has to prove they knew their child wasn't attending school.
Iraqis demand end to US military stay
Around 5,000 people took to the streets in the main square of northern city of Mosul to demonstrate against the eight-year presence of US troops in their homeland, Reuters reported Sunday.
The demonstrators were joined by provincial council members and tribal leaders.
"We are trying to put pressure on the government to not even think about extending the presence of Americans, who brought havoc to our country," said the chief of Mosul's Badrani tribe, Sheikh Barzan al-Badrani.
"The second demand is for the release of detainees held in Iraqi prisons... and the other is to make reforms in the Iraqi government. We do not accept corrupt officials and regret that we voted for them," he added.
Tribes from other Iraqi cities also joined the rally in Mosul to express the popular demand.
Anti-US protests in the northern Iraqi city have persisted since April 9, which marks the day that the statue of executed former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was toppled in a major square in the capital Baghdad.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki earlier said Baghdad had no plans to extend the presence of US troops in the country beyond December 2011.
About 47,000 American soldiers are currently stationed in the oil-rich Middle Eastern country.
The US has long eyed a prolonged stay in war-torn Iraq and has expressed reservations about withdrawing all American troops from the country by the end-of-the-year deadline.
HSN/MB/HRF
Tornado Threat Continues Overnight: Texas to Tennessee
Sights similar to this may be seen by residents from northeastern Texas into Arkansas and Missouri tonight. Of course, any tornadoes touching down after dark will not be visible, making them especially dangerous. This photo was taken in Orchard, Iowa on Tuesday, June 10, 2008. (AP Photo/Lori Mehmen)Yet another nasty tornado outbreak is under way across the south-central U.S., with tornadoes touching down in Arkansas, northern Texas and southeastern Oklahoma this afternoon and evening.
Multiple tornadoes, including one large twister, reportedly touched down in the Little Rock, Ark., area between 7 and 8 p.m. CDT, mainly north of the city. According to KATV, extensive damage has been reported with a large tornado in Vilonia, which is north of Little Rock, with a number of homes destroyed.
Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe has reportedly issued a state of emergency due to the tornadoes and flash flooding.
This remains a a particularly dangerous situation with a risk of large, long-track tornadoes, especially from eastern Texas and northwestern Louisiana into Arkansas, northern Mississippi, western Tennessee and western Kentucky into the overnight hours.