![[image]](http://mowser.com/img?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.populist.com%2FBanner3.jpeg)
Your Independent Journal from the Heartland
Welcome to the online edition of
The PROGRESSIVE POPULIST,
the People's Voice in a Corporate World.
See selections from the current issue
Selections from the September 1, 2008 issue
COVER/Roger Bybee
From promised land to graveyard
EDITORIAL
Netroots survivor; McCain’s bellicose rhetoric
RURAL ROUTES/Margot McMillen
Food security needs local markets
DISPATCHES
US exports fuel at record levels; Mission accomplished for bin Laden; Teamsters go green; Drilling switch greases contributions; Bipartisan adultery; McCain no stranger to low road; Gaps in anthrax case; Senate welcomes indicted Stevens ...
GREG PALAST
McCain plan: Homer without the donut
JOHN BUELL
2004 all over again?
DON ROLLINS
Understanding Knoxville
HEALTH CARE/Joan Retsinas
Awaiting the right time
SAM URETSKY
Move forward from Bush mess
HOLLY SKLAR
Minimum wage raise too little, too late
WAYNE O’LEARY
Bubble, bubble, oil and trouble
GRASSROOTS/Hank Kalet
Energy crises
MARK ENGLER
Obama should stay tough on trade
ROB PATTERSON
Killing zone beyond ‘The Wire’
POPULIST PICKS/Rob Patterson
‘Weeds’ chases shark
(7/1/08)
SPORTS WITH RALPH. Dave Zirin writes: "Ralph Nader is best known as a legendary consumer advocate, a person who has touched virtually every aspect of our lives from car safety to the quality of our food. He's also a notable thorn in the side of Democratic Party activists desperate to win a presidential election and flummoxed by his quadrennial candidacy. However, few people know that Nader is also an avid sports fan. He was responsible for the launching of the League of Fans, a sports reform project, and he has also passionately pushed for a "Bill of Rights" for the American sports fan. ... See his interview with Nader.
(6/20/08)
BUSH GUSHES MISINFORMATION. With his approval ratings sinking below 30%, George W. Bush once again has lowered the bar for contempt of the nation's chief executive with his suggestion that lifting the federal ban on offshore oil exploration in the Outer Continental Shelf would bring immediate relief to high gas prices.
Bush on June 18 called on Congress to “pass good legislation as soon as possible” that would lift the ban and allow states to permit offshore oil drilling. Bush said in order to relieve the “painful level” of gas prices, “our nation must produce more oil.”
As part of his plan, Bush also reiterated his demand that Congress allow oil drilling in the Alaskan Arctic Wildlife Refuge. According to Bush, drilling for oil in the Arctic Refuge will “bring enormous benefits to the American people”:
BUSH: we should expand oil production by permitting exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge or ANWR. … In the years since [1995], the price of oil has increased sevenfold and the price of American gasoline has more than tripled. … I urge members of congress to allow this remote region to bring enormous benefits to the American people.
But ThinkProgress.org notes that Bush’s claim isn’t even backed up by his own administration. A Department of Energy report released in May found that the Arctic Refuge’s reserves will do little to reduce the price of a barrel of oil:
If Congress were to open up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling, crude oil prices would probably drop by an average of only 75 cents a barrel, according to Department of Energy projections issued Thursday.
The report…found that oil production in the refuge “is not projected to have a large impact on world oil prices.”
Moreover, in 2005, DoE estimated that there are nearly 18 billion barrels of oil available in the OCS, which is roughly double the reserves in the Arctic Refuge. Thus, by 2025, drilling in Alaska and the OCS would shave around $2.25 off the cost of a barrel of oil meaning “little to no impact on the price at the pump, today or tomorrow.”
ThinkProgress concluded, “At best, Bush’s plan saves mere pennies on a gallon of gasoline 20 years from now, while putting billions more into Big Oil’s pockets. Perhaps oil company executives were the ‘American people’ he was referring to.”
Brad Johnson of ThinkProgress.org adds that lifting the offshore moratorium is a boon to Big Oil and nobody else.
He notes that the federal moratorium on Outer Continental Shelf drilling was signed into law by President Reagan in 1981 and extended by President George H.W. Bush after the Exxon Valdez disaster in 1989. Bush's justification for ending the moratorium relies on misleading and false statements, Johnson added:
Congress — which was under Republican control for most of the Bush presidency — is not blocking drilling. The number of off- and on-shore drilling permits has exploded in recent years, going from 3,802 five years ago to 7,561 in 2007. Between 1999 and 2007, the number of drilling permits issued for development of public lands increased by more than 361%.
In fact, Congress and this administration have already opened the floodgates for more oil and gas drilling in the years to come. Since 2002, the number of permits issued has greatly outstripped the number of new wells drilled. In the last four years, the Bureau of Land Management has issued 28,776 permits to drill on public land; yet, in that same time, 18,954 wells were actually drilled. That means that companies have stockpiled nearly 10,000 extra permits to drill that they are not using to increase domestic production.
Furthermore, less than a quarter of offshore acreage open to drilling is being used. Only 10.5 million of the 44 million leased acres are currently producing oil or gas.
The vast majority of federal oil and gas resources offshore are already available for development. According to the Minerals Management Service, of all the oil (85.9 billion barrels) and gas (419.9 trillion cubic feet) believed to exist on the Outer Continental Shelf, 82% of the natural gas and 79% of the oil is located in areas that are currently open for leasing (such as areas in the Gulf of Mexico and off the Alaska coast).
Joe Romm's notes at Climate Progress that the 2007 Annual Energy Outlook from the U.S. Energy Information Administration found:
The projections in the OCS access case indicate that access to the Pacific, Atlantic, and eastern Gulf regions would not have a significant impact on domestic crude oil and natural gas production or prices before 2030.
And in 2030, “any impact on average wellhead prices is expected to be insignificant.”
Romm has more on McCain's flip-flop on offshore drilling, pandering to the oil companies, and embrace of “the exact same strategy endorsed by the man McCain is trying so hard to run away from — President Bush.”
We add that Bush was not a very successful oil executive, but he has enough background in the oil business to know that drilling in the Arctic Refuge and offshore reserves would take years to produce oil, if they are successful.
John McCain and Fla. Gov. Charlie Crist also have strained their credibility by jumping on the offshore drilling bandwagon. Florida House Speaker Marco Rubio (R) “challenged Gov. Charlie Crist and John McCain’s implication that drilling could lower gas prices anytime soon.” Rubio, an attorney involved in real estate and land use, told the Miami Herald that Crist and McCain are making a “disingenuous” and “flawed” argument:
“For anyone to represent that someone drilling off the coast in Florida is going to lower gas prices here or anywhere in this country is disingenuous and a flawed argument,” he said. “Oil drilling could take 10 years before any oil is pulled out of the ground, and there are a large number of leases held by oil companies that are not being exploited now. We can’t say we need more until we’ve exploited those.”
(See ThinkProgress.org)
(6/13/08)
TIM RUSSERT, R.I.P. We're sorry to hear that Tim Russert, host of NBC's "Meet the Press," has died of a heart attack at age 58.
(6/9/08)
WHY CLINTON LOST (AND OBAMA WON)
Contributing editors at DailyKos.com focused their Sunday essays on one question, Why Clinton Lost (and Obama Won) in the first-ever Sunday Kos Symposium in which we all focused on one topic, but came at it from different angles, for a full day. The essays were as follows:
See previous postings in our weblog archives:
2008
2007
December 2006
November 2006
October 2006
September 2006
August 2006
July 2006
June 2006
May 2006
April 2006
March 2006
February 2006
January 2006
December 2005
November 2005
October 2005
September 2005
August 2005
July 2005
June 2005
May 2005
April 2005
March 2005
February 2005
January 16-31, 2005
January 1-15, 2005
December 2004
November 2004
October 2004
September 2004
August 2004
"We believe people are more important than corporations"
If you would like to receive Progressive Populist News Updates
Click to subscribe to populist-news
If you would like to discuss Progressive Populist issues in our email group, join the Populist Email Discussion List:
Click to subscribe to populist-talk
If you would like to help us defray the costs of providing this website as a free resource, please consider making a donation via our secure PayPal account. Just click on the button below. Any help is appreciated.
Note: Contributions to The Progressive Populist are not tax deductible.
Progressive Populist Privacy Policy:
The Progressive Populist web site does not identify browsers or monitor your activity on this web site, other than to count how many people visit individual pages. Since we don't collect any information from you, your browser or your computer, we can't sell it or give it away or produce it under subpoena or search warrant or any other sort of coercion or blandishment to governments, corporations, organizations, cabals or busybodies. You don't get cookies from The Progressive Populist site, though occasionally we offer the milk of human kindness.
However, if you click on ads served on our site, the advertisers might collect information. So watch out!
Copyright © 1995-2008 The Progressive Populist
By the way, the name is Progressive Populist, not populous, populace, papalist or populisp.
The Progressive Populist is an independent newspaper that reports from the Heartland of America on issues of interest to workers, small business people and family farmers and ranchers.
We produce our newsprint edition and email versions twice monthly with updates and resources online.
We hope you enjoy our website, which includes the blog below as well as other resources, including samples of articles from our current newsprint issue, recent editorials, online essays and resources you might find useful and a summary of what we're all about.
We also hope you'll try a subscription to our twice-monthly tabloid newspaper or email version of the paper under our special discount introductory rate of $10 for six months (11 issues). That rate is good for addresses in the US as well as our email version. And if you're not satisfied with the first three issues we'll refund the entire $10
![[image]](http://mowser.com/img?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.populist.com%2Fcafepresstank.jpg)
Do your gift shopping with us:
See our new Progressive Populist Gift Shop with items for men, women and children.
Read a Good Book:
![[image]](http://mowser.com/img?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.populist.com%2Fpowells1.gif)
If you can't find the book you're looking for at your local independent bookstore, Powell's Books is an indy bookseller in Portland, Ore., with whom we have partnered. Get your book there and help support our website. See our book page for more suggested titles.
Progressive Populist columnists:
• Americas/Patrisia Gonzales & Roberto Rodriguez
• Margie Burns
• Alexander Cockburn
• Corporate Focus / Robert Weissman
• Joe Conason
• Andrew Greeley
• Jim Hightower
• Arianna Huffington
• Molly Ivins
• Jesse Jackson
• Hank Kalet
• Donald Kaul
• Naomi Klein
• A.V. Krebs
• Labor Talk/Harry Kelber
• Muckraker/Amanda G. Little
• Gene Lyons
• Ralph Nader
• Nathan Newman
• John Nichols
• Greg Palast
• Ted Rall
• Max Sawicky
• Norman Solomon
• This Modern World
• Mark Weisbrot
• Dave Zweifel
![[image]](http://mowser.com/img?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.populist.com%2Fforeverdada-button.gif)
See Forever Dada, an animated political cartoon created by California artists Louis Dunn & Steve Campbell.
Alternative News Sites
See these web sites with breaking news and commentary from progressive writers and publications around the world:
• Air America Radio, progressive radio network. Also Ed Schultz, the progressive talker from North Dakota
• Brave New Films creates and hosts political videos on the web.
• Buzzflash, the left's answer to Matt Drudge
• Common Dreams News Center, with selected articles from newspapers and periodicals. See also the concise list of national and international news services, newspapers and periodicals.
• In These Times, updates from the monthly magazine.
• MotherJones.com, daily updates from the bimonthly muckraker.
• The Nation, liberal weekly has daily updates.
• Salon.com (requires a subscription to read many articles).
• TomPaine.com, rousing rabble in the spirit of the Revolutionary pamphleteer.
• Credo Action, formerly Working for Change, updated daily with progressive features.
And you never know what will turn up on
C-SPAN.
Presidential Candidates:
A Few Good Weblogs
to keep you from getting your work done:
• Eric Alterman's Altercation
• The American Prospect
• Buzzflash
• Center for American Progress
• Juan Cole's Informed Comment on Middle East politics, history and religion.
• Daily Kos (Democratic politics)
• Daily Scare exposes fearmongering and scare tactics in government and media.
• Democratic Strategist journal of public opinion and political strategy by William Galston, Stan Greenberg and Ruy Teixeira.
• Eschaton by Atrios (politics)
• FightingBob.com, progressive voices in Wisconsin
• Bob Harris, smart aleck lefty.
• Iowa Indepndent what's up in the Hawkeye State.
• Liberal Oasis
• Media Matters for America
• MyDD, progressive politics
• Nathan Newman (mainly labor law)
• The New Republic
• Progressive Review Undernews
• Political Wire by Taegon Goddard
• Primal Screed, by the Slangwhanger.
• Raw Story
• Romenesko's Media News (journalism scuttlebutt)
• Salon's War Room
• Talking Points Memo by Josh Marshall
• Talk Left, the politics of crime.
• This Modern World, by Tom Tomorrow
• TomPaine.com, progressive insights .
• Washington Monthly, by Kevin Drum (formerly Calpundit)
For international news which the US media such as the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times and the Washington Post might not see fit to print:
From Canada
• Globe and Mail of Toronto, for Canadian news and perspectives on its southern neighbor.
• Toronto Star, a liberal Canadian newspaper.
From Britain
• The Guardian, a liberal newspaper in London (formerly the Manchester Guardian). See also its US-oriented website, Guardian America.
• The Independent, a liberal newspaper in London
• Daily Mirror, liberal tabloid in London.
• New Statesman, British Socialist weekly.
• BBC World News
From Elsewhere:
• Al Ahram, English-language weekly based in Cairo, for Arab perspective on Mid-East
• Dawn, of Karachi, centrist English-language Pakistan daily.
• The Frontier Post of Peshawar, Pakistan, for news from the front lines of the war on terrorism in Afghanistan.
• Haaretz, Israeli liberal daily with English language edition
• International Herald Tribune, Paris-based daily operated by the New York Times.
• Le Monde Diplomatique, English language monthly digest of the French daily newspaper.
• Mail and Guardian, daily web edition of South African liberal weekly.
• Mexico City News, the English language daily in our neighbor to the south.
• South China Morning Post, independent Hong Kong and Pacific news (registration required).
• Spiegel, English version of German newsweekly.
• Sydney Morning Herald, for news from Down Under.
• Watching America, links to articles in foreign press about the USA, with translations of articles originally written for foreigners about the US. Updated daily.
• World Press Review, a monthly magazine with analyses and English translations of articles in the international press, as well as an excellent directory of publications by nation, with ideological leanings.
--------------------------------
They say a picture is worth a thousand words; well, here are some good cartoon sites:
Forever Dada, an animated political cartoon created by California artists Louis Dunn & Steve Campbell.
This Modern World, by Tom Tomorrow. (And he has a pretty good links page.)
Ted Rall, our cartoonist/columnist.
Tom the Dancing Bug, by Ruben Bolling
Also see our Links to Alternative Media
See links to health care reform
--------------------------------
--------------------------------
This World Wide Web site not only features selections from the newsprint edition of the Progressive Populist, to which we hope you will subscribe. It also gives you another crack at selected articles from back issues as well as texts of populist speeches and essays on populism that we could not otherwise fit into our printed edition.
Watch our Global Trade site for information on the World Trade Organization, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and citizen efforts to check the globalization of corporate power. And after you have bookmarked our site, go to the Links for pointers to other web sites that you might find of interest.
WARNING: Be wary of any email message you might receive from someone purporting to be from "support" or "admin" at populist.com, regarding "Notify about using the e-mail account," and suggesting that you use an attached "free anti-virus tool to clean up your computer software." In the first place, we're not nearly organized enough to help you clean your software or your computer. The "antivirus tool" is an attempt to spread a computer virus by email. We would never send you bug fixes attached to email messages. Do not open it, but delete the attached zip file immediately. If you have already run this thing, see real free antivirus solutions at www.austintx.com.
More on our features:
Featured in the Essays section are collections of articles and resources on Health Care, Social Security and Voting Security, among other topics. Also see our collection of resources on 9/11 and the aftermath of terror attacks on the United States.
We mainly cover current events, but in an effort to provide historic background, our Populist Reader offers texts such as the Preamble to the People's Party Platform, which formed the rhetorical underpinning for the Populist movement, the People's Party Platform of 1896, which represented the Populist demands at the peak of the agrarian/labor revolt, and more. And Mark Twain's "War Prayer," written in response to the Spanish-American War, is as relevant as ever.
Also featured in the Essays section is "Democratic Money: A Populist Perspective", with Lawrence Goodwyn, William Greider and Tom Schlesinger of the Southern Finance Project discussing the Populism of the 1890s and how those historical lessons relate to the prospects for financial reform today.
Also see reminiscences by two former Alabama journalists about the late George Wallace, the former Alabama governor who transformed American politics with his combination of racism and populism. Claude Duncan remembers the good George Wallace in "George Wallace Joins the Ghost Brigade", while Peggy Roberson reminds us of the bad George Wallace in "Remembering George Wallace"
We also offer Eugene J. McCarthy's remarks on his career in politics on the event of his 80th birthday, as well as his remembrances of Chicago as the Democrats returned to the scene of the crime in 1996 after 28 years.
Another feature that we hope you will check out is Dan Yurman's Samizdat: Militia News from Idaho; Blood Oaths and Fish Stories Swim in Political Waters. This collects a series of dispatches, analysis and commentary by Yurman on militias, wise-use and white-supremacist movements in Idaho and the Rocky Mountain states. Please tell us what you think.
The Progressive Populist started in November 1995 as a monthly newspaper with editorial offices in Austin, Texas, and business and production offices in Storm Lake, Iowa. In October 1999, after four years, The Progressive Populist switched to twice-monthly publication. Our editorial offices moved to Manchaca, Texas, just south of Austin, in 2005.
We aim to make the Progressive Populist the antidote to the monopoly daily news, throw a lifeline to progressives who feel like they are stranded in a sea of conservatives, and maybe play a role in reviving political and economic debate. We hope this web site is useful to you.
If you would like to hear more about our project, or if you would like to comment on our web site or receive a sample copy of the Progressive Populist, drop me a line by email or regular post.
Also, register below to receive email updates on news and features or to donate to our enterprise.
-- Jim Cullen, Editor
E-mail populist@usa.net
PO Box 819
Manchaca TX 78652
You are viewing a mobilized version of this site...
View original page here
