President Obama’s admission in China that he will miss his self-imposed deadline for the closure of Guantánamo is disastrous for the majority of the 215 men still held in the detention facility, and for those who hoped, ten months ago, that the president would move swiftly to close this bitter icon of the Bush administration’s lawless detention and interrogation policies in the "war on terror." Despite announcing the closure of Guantánamo on his second day in office as part of a number of executive orders rolling back the Bush administration’s executive overreach, Obama then failed to follow up with a detailed plan. He missed the opportunity to bring a number of wrongly imprisoned men to the US mainland (the Uighurs, Muslims from China whose release into the US had been ordered by a district court judge), and allowing Republican fearmongers to seize the initiative, mobilizing lawmakers (including some in Obama’s own party) to pass legislation preventing any cleared prisoner from being released into the United States.

As with most things, the path that led Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan to allegedly stage an attack on his fellow servicemen and -women at Fort Hood was complex. No doubt his minority status had something to do with it, although an awful lot of adherents of minority religions get along just fine in the U.S. military. Beyond all this identity stuff, however, it looks as if Hasan had a clear history of professional incompetence. It's easy to imagine someone with minimal proficiency in his profession shifting blame for his incompetence to the system that employs him. The vast majority of Arab-Americans and American Muslims are quick to acknowledge their gratitude to a society that, while far from perfect, has offered them an equal shot at life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Let's not write off the tragic case of Nidal Hasan as Y.A.M.T. (Yet Another Muslim Terrorist).

Progressives and ardent supporters of a healthcare public option are cheering the Senate version of health reform legislation to emerge Thursday. Social conservatives, meanwhile, are attacking the bill for lack of an anti-abortion amendment that had been included in the House version.

In 2007, Congress shut the door to corporate-provided air travel by passing the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act. This week, those idiots at the Federal Election Commission reopened the door.

Talk about a short news cycle. A Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) appointed “best practices” task force dismissed the value of “routine” mammograms as a cancer prevention technique for women 40 to 49 years on Tuesday, November 17. A day later, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius issued a statement dismissing the committee recommendations.

Such narcissism reminds me of a story about a selfish, no-good rich man who died and tried to get into heaven. But you can't just walk through the Pearly Gates. An angel reviews your life, then St. Peter decides if you can enter. To counter the angel's negative review, the rich man argued that he had a history of charitable giving. He'd once tossed a nickel into a beggar's cup, he pointed out. Plus, some years later, he had aided a poor woman by giving her a nickel. Then there was the time he put a nickel into the Salvation Army kettle. Hearing all this, the angel turned to St. Peter and asked, "What in the world should we do with this man?" And St. Peter said, "Give him back his 15 cents, and tell him to go to hell!" Now that's a story that these big banksters need to hear — and ponder.

John McCain doesn’t even have an opponent in the 2010 U.S. Senate primary, but a new poll shows the race would be tied if he did. Conservative polling firm Rasmussen asked likely Republican voters whether they would vote for McCain or J.D. Hayworth, a former Arizona U.S. Representative and talk radio star. McCain had only a two-point lead...

The news media, especially cable news denigrates Palin on one hand, but spends hours talking about her and taking polls on the other, denigrating her as a presidential candidate when she's never said she is one. And there has been no outcry from feminists over Newsweek's sexist cover.

"Gap has responded to AFA's call for a Christmas boycott of their Gap, Old Navy, and Banana Republic stores with a commercial that takes a cavalier approach towards Christmas. ... Did you notice it? Gap compares Christmas to the pagan holiday called 'Solstice.' Solstice is celebrated by Wiccans who practice witchcraft!"

"The chief federal appeals court judge in San Francisco bluntly ordered the Obama administration Thursday to stop resisting his finding that the wife of a lesbian court employee was entitled to government insurance coverage."

If a 10 year old boy has prepubescent balls big enough to do the right thing in pointing out the emperor has no clothes it is high time that adults stood up and do the same.

Geithner, like Larry Summers inside the White House, has failed to respond to main street's needs directly and powerfully, and failed to stand up to Wall Street interests when they are inimical to sustained stability.

President Obama finally responded to the public outcry of concerned citizens everywhere by officially declaring that VP Biden’s motorcade poses a threat to national security. So does any other vehicle, motorcycle, or Rascal Scooter even remotely associated with Biden. Obama stated that all of Biden’s upcoming engagements for the next eight days have been canceled or rescheduled, and that the VP will be prohibited from using any official motorcades until further notice.

"...Despite continued assurances from the manufacturer that the system is unhackable, reliable, easy to use, private, and secure, a stream of lawsuits, allegations of voter fraud, and machine failures continue to contradict their statements...." -- Elections should be of, by and for the citizens. This requires transparency and citizen participation. The latest illustration that privatized elections using proprietary electronic voting machines are anathema to even indirect democracy occurred in the 23rd district of New York. http://www.gouverneurtimes.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=8144:virus-in-the-voting

Are you willing to look the Global Empire dead in the eyes? DO YOU HAVE THE COURAGE TO DO THAT? To see its soul? Look at the Congo. The Congo is the single most resource-rich place in the world. It's also the most horrific human catastrophe since World War 2. DO YOU THINK THAT IS A COINCIDENCE? And who do you think is funding the carnage? You know who it is. "Corporations all around the world ... are trading for these minerals and are making a huge profit off the warring factions. If it wasn't for this trade then it is extremely unlikely that the war would be able to continue. But the profits made off these minerals - especially colton which is needed for electronics such as mobile phones, computers and televisions - are too great for the corporations to ignore. In trading for these minerals, a whole host of foreign corporations fund the worst holocaust since World War II. "

THOSE WHO CLAIM to PROTECT DEMOCRACY MUST READ The settlements within Hebron have been declared illegal by the Geneva conventions. The official city maps, which are the documents used by Israeli courts, are wildly inaccurate. They claim that ghost streets, long sealed off by concrete and metal, are functioning thoroughfares and marketplaces. Walking through the streets of Hebron, you find a city carved up by the violent military presence and constant threat of settler violence. Some roads have a concrete barrier running along the edge, leaving a few feet for Palestinians to walk along while two wide lanes are reserved for settlers. The souks, Old City markets, have wire screens or makeshift netting overhead: insufficient protection for attacks from settlers living on the floors above. The wire screens are heavy with trash, bricks, giant concrete chunks, and exploded plastic bags that contained sewage and urine when they burst onto the people and racks of goods below. Hisham told us one young man was in a coma after a sharpened metal rod came through the screen and penetrated his skull. Now, when you look up, you can see piles of objects that got caught in the screen: crowbars, bricks, stones, chairs. While walking through a market, we saw a settler woman throw sand from her third story apartment down at a crowded market where Palestinians were shopping.

"Parental Controls on Everyone In Part one of my piece, I attempted to explain the nature and scope of the US Warrantless Wiretap Program and the growing Surveillance Regime being built in this country. In Part 2, I will compare and contrast the growth and structure of the aforementioned Surveillance Regimes with other countries’ corresponding Systems of surveillance and control. I will also spotlight the International Surveillance Industry and its efforts to market its products by offering this technology to governmental power centers around the world."

"The statement McKalip and his cohort were making is thus a political pastiche as well: Obama is foreign, strange, not "natural born"; half-naked, he is a figure of danger, seductive perhaps for his exoticism, his magic--the promise of cures--but ultimately loathsome, at once clownish, somehow thrilling to confront but also frightening, certainly not someone a white man would want to leave alone with his daughter... and a communist to boot."

The CIA built one of its secret European prisons inside an exclusive riding academy outside Vilnius, Lithuania, a current Lithuanian government official and a former U.S. intelligence official told ABC News this week. Where affluent Lithuanians once rode show horses and sipped coffee at a café, the CIA installed a concrete structure where it could use harsh tactics to interrogate up to eight suspected al-Qaeda terrorists at a time. "The activities in that prison were illegal," said human rights researcher John Sifton. "They included various forms of torture, including sleep deprivation, forced standing, painful stress positions." Lithuanian officials provided ABC News with the documents of what they called a CIA front company, Elite, LLC, which purchased the property and built the "black site" in 2004. Lithuania agreed to allow the CIA prison after President George W. Bush visited the country in 2002 and pledged support for Lithuania's efforts to join NATO.

Congressman DeFazio said yesterday: We think it is time, maybe, that we turn our focus to Main Street ... Unfortunately, the President has an adviser from Wall Street, Larry Summers, and a Treasury Secretary from Wall Street, Timmy Geithner, who don't like that idea. They want to keep the TARP money either to continue to bail out Wall Street...or to pay down the deficit. That's absurd... "[Obama] is being failed by his economic team ... We may have to sacrifice just two more jobs to get millions back for Americans.

Barack Obama has nominated the former President George Bush's press secretary, Dana Perino, for a spot on the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG). The BBG oversees the US government-sponsored international broadcasting. "I'm honored by the president's announcement and I'm looking forward to serving on the bipartisan board, if I'm confirmed," Perino said after she was tapped for the key job late on Wednesday by the US president, reported AFP. Established in 1994, the BBG oversees all of the US government's non-military international broadcasting outlets, including Voice of America, Alhurra television, Radio Sawa, TV Marti, Radio Free Asia and Radio Free Europe. Politically conservative Perino is presently a Fox News contributor and holds a job, as a counselor, for the public relations firm Burson-Marsteller. Perino and other nominees need the Senate approval to be formally appointed to the top job. [Note: I am having deja vu.]

Tony Blair was left looking like the big loser last night despite never having formally applied for the job of European president. As the EU’s 27 leaders picked two virtual unknowns for its top jobs, the man everyone said would “stop the traffic” in Washington, Beijing or even Brussels was left back in London wondering what might have been. Gordon Brown called Mr Blair shortly before the summit got under way to explain that he had had one final try in front of the European socialist leaders, whom he had told three weeks ago to “get real” and choose his predecessor as their nominee for the top post. In fact, both men knew that it was almost certainly all over before Mr Brown left for Brussels yesterday.