Welcome! "The Evening Blues" is a casual community diary (published Monday - Friday, 7:00 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.
|
Hey! Good Evening!
Tonight continues the women in the blues theme. Enjoy!
Big Mama Thornton - Rock me
"There are only two mistakes one can make along the road to truth; not going all the way, and not starting."
-- Buddha
News
Fellow Kossack Jesselyn Radack appears on Democracy Now:
After Attack on Whistleblowers, Obama Admin Accused of Leaking Info for Political Gain
Breaking '08 Pledge, Leaked Doc Shows Obama Wants to Help Corporations Avoid Regulations
Whistleblower Bradley Manning Thanks Supporters
Pfc. Bradley Manning is facing court-martial for leaking government documents to the website WikiLeaks. Manning's case has garnered support from many followers who regard him as a champion for governmental transparency.
In a statement released by Manning's lawyer David Coombs, Manning passed along the following message: “I am very grateful for your support and humbled by your ongoing efforts.”
Coombs added, "Brad also asked me to specifically thank on his behalf the unflinching support of Courage to Resist and the Bradley Manning Support Network...What happens in this court-martial is of vital importance to all of us. With your continued support, we will ensure that justice is achieved for Brad."
I Met a 16-Year-Old Kid. 3 Days Later Obama Killed Him
Last October I was at a jirga in Islamabad where 80 people from Waziristan had assembled to talk about the US Predator drones that buzz around overhead, periodically delivering death by Hellfire missile. A jirga is the traditional forum for discussing and resolving disputes, part parliament, part court of law. The turbaned tribal elders were joined by their young sons on a rare foray out of their region to meet outsiders and discuss the killing. ... During the day I shook the hand of a 16-year-old kid from Waziristan named Tariq Aziz. One of his cousins had died in a missile strike, and he wanted to know what he could do to bring the truth to the west. At the Reprieve charity, we have a transparency project: importing cameras to the region to try to export the truth back out. Tariq wanted to take part, but I thought him too young.
Then, three days later, the CIA announced that it had eliminated "four militants". In truth there were only two victims: Tariq had been driving his 12-year-old cousin to their aunt's house when the Hellfire missile killed them both. This came just 24 hours after the CIA boasted of eliminating six other "militants" – actually, four chromite workers driving home from work. In both cases a local informant apparently tagged the car with a GPS monitor and lied to earn his fee. ...
It is easy to understand how the CIA slaughtered Tariq and many other innocent victims. Those who press the Hellfire buttons are 8,000 miles away in Nevada and are dependent on local "intelligence". Just as with Guantánamo Bay, the CIA is paying bounties to those who will identify "terrorists". Five thousand dollars is an enormous sum for a Waziri informant, translating to perhaps £250,000 in London terms. The informant has a calculation to make: is it safer to place a GPS tag on the car of a truly dangerous terrorist, or to call down death on a Nobody (with the beginnings of a beard), reporting that he is a militant? Too many "militants" are just young men with stubble. At least 174 have been children.
Revealed: 64 Drone Bases on American Soil
We like to think of the drone war as something far away, fought in the deserts of Yemen or the mountains of Afghanistan. But we now know it’s closer than we thought. There are 64 drone bases on American soil. That includes 12 locations housing Predator and Reaper unmanned aerial vehicles, which can be armed.
Public Intelligence, a non-profit that advocates for free access to information, released a map of military UAV activities in the United States on Tuesday. Assembled from military sources — especially this little-known June 2011 Air Force presentation – it is arguably the most comprehensive map so far of the spread of the Pentagon’s unmanned fleet. What exact missions are performed at those locations, however, is not clear. Some bases might be used as remote cockpits to control the robotic aircraft overseas, some for drone pilot training. Others may also serve as imagery analysis depots.
The medium-size Shadow is used in 22 bases, the smaller Raven in 20 and the miniature Wasp in 11. California and Texas lead the pack, with 10 and six sites, respectively, and there are also 22 planned locations for future bases. ”It is very likely that there are more domestic drone activities not included in the map, but it is designed to provide an approximate overview of the widespread nature of Department of Defense activities throughout the US,” Michael Haynes from Public Intelligence tells Danger Room.
When is a major concession to a powerful industry with a history of environmental destruction a limitation? Why when the New York Times is reporting it:
Cuomo Proposal Would Restrict Gas Drilling to a Struggling Area
Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s administration is pursuing a plan to limit the controversial drilling method known as hydraulic fracturing to portions of several struggling New York counties along the border with Pennsylvania, and to permit it only in communities that express support for the technology. ...
The plan, described by a senior official at the State Department of Environmental Conservation and others with knowledge of the administration’s strategy, would limit drilling to the deepest areas of the Marcellus Shale rock formation in an effort to reduce the risk of groundwater contamination. ...
Mr. Cuomo’s administration is now trying to acknowledge the economic needs of the rural upstate area, while also honoring the opposition expressed in some communities, and limiting the ire of environmentalists, who worry that hydrofracking could contaminate groundwater and lead to other hazards. The administration had initially expected to allow 75 hydrofracking permits in the first year, but now expects to reduce that to 50.
How Jamie Dimon's New Business Model From Hell Could Take Down Wall Street – Again
An “Investment” office sans licensed investment brokers is the latest deregulatory mutation on Wall Street. The other mutation is the JPMorgan model to create an art form out of depicting itself as a “fortress balance sheet” while holding $156 billion of capital and $66 trillion (with a “t”) in derivatives according to financial filings for March 31, 2012 with the Comptroller of the Currency.
Ina Drew, the head of the Chief Investment Office at JPMorgan in New York earned $29 million total for years 2010 and 2011. She was paid on a par with a hedge fund manager because, in essence, she was a hedge fund manager. She held no securities licenses so she was ineligible under securities law to supervise others who did hold a license; sort of like an operating room full of unlicensed brain surgeons who never went to medical school.
But even though Drew was not licensed as a principal, she was somehow supervising traders in London who were registered with the Financial Services Authority (FSA), the UK securities regulator. That included the infamous London Whale, Bruno Michel Iksil, whose trades in a credit derivative index were so large that he effectively cornered the market, pushing up the cost for American businesses to buy credit insurance on exposure they legitimately held on their balance sheets. We used to prosecute people who corner markets. But that’s so yesterday. Today, Congress just wants to study “lessons learned” like it’s fallen under a Vatican trance – there are no bad men or prosecutable crimes, just evil temptations.
Charting the Cozy Connections between JP Morgan and the Senate Banking Committee
This morning, Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JP Morgan Chase, faced a Senate hearing over more than $2 billion in bank losses caused by risky hedges that blew up. Dimon said that the hedges—investments meant to protect the bank—had grown into “complex and hard-to manage risks.” The losses “let a lot of people down, and we are sorry for it.”
Many lawmakers are holding up the losses as evidence of the need for stronger financial regulation. The chairman of the Senate banking committee, Tim Johnson, D-S.D., in his opening remarks, asked for “a full accounting” of JP Morgan’s losses.
But through campaign contributions and well-connected staff, JP Morgan appears to have already taken its own accounting of the Banking committee. Here’s a picture of connections between the company and the committee: [follow link above to see extensive list of connections between JP Morgan and the Senate Banking committee.]
Blog Posts of Interest
Here are diaries and selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
What's Happenin'
Report: Banks, Financial Institutions Still Funding Cluster Bomb-Making Companies with Billions of Dollars
Reuters slideshow of child laborers around the world
A Little Night Music
Etta James Something's Got A Hold On Me
Big Time Sarah & Blue Jeans - Woke up this morning
Koko Taylor - Twenty Nine Ways
Toni Price with James Cotton 29 Ways
Toni Price - Write Me in Care of the Blues
Marcia Ball - Let Me Play with your Poodle
Etta James & The Grateful Dead- Hard To Handle
Sandra Hall - Meet me with your black drawers on
For further listening:
Big Mama Thornton W/The Muddy Waters Band - I'm Feeling Alright
Big Mama Thornton - Hound Dog
Big Time Sarah - Long tall Daddy