Welcome! "The Evening Blues" is a casual community diary (published Monday - Friday, 8:00 PM Eastern) where we hang out, share and talk about news, music, photography and other things of interest to the community.
Just about anything goes, but attacks and pie fights are not welcome here. This is a community diary and a friendly, peaceful, supportive place for people to interact.
Everyone who wants to join in peaceful interaction is very welcome here.
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Hey! Good Evening!
This evenings music features the Soul Brothers Six an r&b group best known for their song, "Some Kind of Wonderful," which was later a big hit for Grand Funk Railroad despite the superiority of the original. You can check out the original below and decide for yourself. B) Enjoy!
Soul Brothers Six - Some Kind of Wonderful
"The statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is being attacked, and every man will be glad of these conscience-soothing falsities."
--Mark Twain
News
US warships steam towards Libya coast - President Barack Obama promises to bring justice to attackers who brought about death of US ambassador in Benghazi.
US President Barack Obama has pledged to bring to justice those who attacked the US consulate in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi. ...
US officials confirmed to Al Jazeera that a special unit of roughly 50 members of the Marine Corps had been dispatched to Libya to reinforce the troops guarding diplomats there, as two warships headed to the Libyan coast.
The Marines' Fleet Anti-Terrorism Security Team (FAST) detachment is specially trained to deploy rapidly to protect government workers overseas. ...
"We will not be deterred - we will keep going, we will keep going because the world needs us," the president said. "We are the one indispensable power in the world."
Islamic Scholar Tariq Ramadan on Growing Mideast Protests and "Islam & the Arab Awakening"
Crowd Storms US Embassy in Yemen as Regional Anger Burns
Thousands of angry protesters stormed the US embassy in Sanaa, the capital of Yemen, on Thursday. The crowd was able to breach the outer wall of the heavily-fortified compound, burning an American flag and pulling a large sign down from the building.
Tensions were high, and possibly rising, across the Middle East on Thursday as large crowds of protesters, angered by an amateur anti-Muslim film produced in the US, also gathered angrily outside US embassies or in the streets in Egypt, Tunisia, Iran, and Gaza.
Permanent Injunction Against Indefinite Military Detention in NDAA Issued by Federal Judge
A federal judge issued a ruling on September 12 that permanently enjoined a provision of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that was signed by President Barack Obama codifying indefinite military detention into United State law last year. She found that the writers, journalists and activists who were plaintiffs in the lawsuit had demonstrated actual and reasonably that their First Amendment-protected activities could subject them to indefinite military detention and ruled the public had a greater interest in preserving the First Amendment and due process rights than allowing law enforcement to have this tool. ...
The judge did not stop there. Her permanent injunction systematically deconstructed the provision picking up on the core of the argument against the government in the case—that “substantially supported,” “directly supported,” and “associated forces” were vague or lacked specificity. She determined these terms did not appear in any prior case law and that “the respective meanings of the terms at issue” are unknown but “the penalty of running afoul of it is severe.” ...
Forrest added it was impossible to understand the “scope” of this provision without key terms being defined. The government was unable or unwilling to provide definitions. The government expended little energy or resources in trying to provide the court with definitions. They did not take the vagueness seriously at all or think the judge would care that they had no interest in defining these terms, which were primarily responsible for the plaintiffs bringing a lawsuit against the government. She determined the “statute’s vagueness” fell short of “what due process requires.”
U.S. Appeals Order Blocking U.S. Military Detention Law
The U.S. appealed an order permanently blocking enforcement of a law that opponents claim may subject them to indefinite military detention for activities including news reporting and political activism.
Lawyers from the office of U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara in Manhattan today filed papers seeking review of yesterday’s ruling on the law, which is part of the National Defense Authorization Act for 2012. In the ruling, U.S. District Judge Katherine Forrest said the law is unconstitutionally vague.
Forrest extended a preliminary injunction she had entered in May and said that the statute violates rights guaranteed by the First, Fifth and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
As U.S. Inequality Widens, Cornel West and Tavis Smiley Launch Poverty Tour 2.0
Fed meets under gun to act on weak U.S. economy
The Federal Reserve’s policy board began a two-day meeting to weigh a fresh response to the weak US economy and stagnant jobs market.
The dollar fell against the euro and stock markets rose amid anticipation that the Federal Open Market Committee would decide on some form of monetary easing action.
Options, analysts said, include a strong verbal statement by the FOMC committing themselves to holding their benchmark interest rate at the current near-zero level through 2015.
But also possible is the launch of “QE3″, a huge “quantitative easing” bond-buying program aimed at further depressing long-term interest rates.
The Fed and the Crisis
Clarke and Dawe - Understanding the GFC
Troika's demands drive Greeks into streets again
Public workers in Greece took to the streets again on Wednesday to protest ongoing talks between the Greek government and European leaders of the 'Troika', who are working to finalize the country's latest round of large scale austerity measures. 2,000 teachers, hospital doctors and municipal staff demonstrated in the streets of Athens against state salary cuts and job losses expected by October.
Reports on Wednesday suggested the government was under pressure from the 'Troika' -- the EU, IMF and the European Central Bank -- to additionally cut pensions, severance pay and revise working hours, beyond original plans proposed by the Greek government over the weekend, according to Agence France-Presse.
Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras had announced a final proposal of austerity measures on Saturday containing deep cuts to the public budget, including large cuts to pension funds and public sector wages; however, the Troika now wants Greece to make even deeper cuts, including mass lay-offs in the the public sector workforce, officials say.
The negotiations have incited protests throughout the week.
SCANT TESTING FOR ARCTIC BLOWOUT CAPPING SYSTEM — Safety Agency Can Produce Only One Page of Notes to Demonstrate Cap Reliability
The key system for preventing a repeat of the massive Gulf of Mexico blowout in the sensitive waters of the Arctic underwent only partial and cursory testing with no independent analysis of the results, according to Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), which obtained the federal testing data. As a result, federal overseers are again completely relying upon industry assurances of safety as Royal Dutch Shell prepares to begin drilling this week in the remote Chukchi Sea.
In response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for all “records pertaining to results of Shell oil company’s testing of its well-head capping stack that would be used in response to a well-head blowout in its Arctic drilling program,” the Bureau of Safety & Environmental Enforcement (BSEE is an arm of the Interior Department, formerly within the Minerals Management Service) could produce only one document – a one-page set of notes. This slim production belied the agency’s claim in press statements that it had conducted “comprehensive” testing to meet “rigorous new standards.”
The field-testing took place over less than two hours in Puget Sound on June 25th and 26th and involved only two BSEE officials and Shell. ...
“The first test merely showed that Shell could dangle its cap in 200 feet of water without dropping it,” stated PEER Staff Counsel Kathryn Douglass, who filed a federal lawsuit against BSSE to force the release of its report. “The second test showed the capping system could hold up under laboratory conditions for up to 15 minutes without crumpling. Neither result should give the American public much comfort.”
Blog Posts of Interest
Here are diaries and selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
What's Happenin'
Teachers Have No Friends Among the Journalistic Elite
Lean Production: What’s Really Hurting Public Education
False Flag - A series of CIA memos describes how Israeli Mossad agents posed as American spies to recruit members of the terrorist organization Jundallah to fight their covert war against Iran
A Little Night Music
Soul Brothers Six - What Can You Do When You Aint Got Nobody
Soul Brothers Six - I Can't Live Without You
Soul Brothers Six - You Better check yourself
Soul Brothers Six - Lost the Will to Live
Soul Brothers Six - What You Got
Soul Brothers Six - Thank You Baby For Loving Me
Soul Brothers Six - Drive
Soul Brothers Six - Funky Funky Way Of Making Love
Soul Brothers Six - Let Me Do What We Ain't Doin'
Soul Brothers Six - Makin Love Makes Me High
Soul Brothers Six - Don't Give My Love Away
We are ready for some serious change. We are ready to take up the tools of a free and analytic press to peacefully undermine the stranglehold of the kleptocrats on our battered democracy. We are ready to expose and publicize their greed, lies and illegal machinations and hold their enablers in government and the media to account. Are you in?
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."
~ Margaret Mead
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