Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
marmar
marmar's Journal
marmar's Journal
July 19, 2014
Why Do Banksters Get Help But Not Homeowners? -- Thom Hartmann featuring guest Mike Papantonio
"Wall Street owns him, just like they own the next person in line -- Hillary Clinton"
&index=6&list=PLrcTxj34M_VZoJoAh2O7iWvZSsTDNkL41Why Do Banksters Get Help But Not Homeowners? -- Thom Hartmann featuring guest Mike Papantonio
July 18, 2014
The chants at Netroots Nation just now as Elizabeth Warren is walking up to the podium.
"Run Liz Run"
The chants at Netroots Nation just now as Elizabeth Warren is walking up to the podium.
July 17, 2014
from Model D:
Jefferson East is coming together with new million-dollar riverfront housing, plenty of infill family homes and town homes and a reviving commercial district.
The up-and-coming area boasts active, close-knit neighborhoods, a yacht club, canalfront living and riverfront parks, plus new shopping centers filled with amenities.
Its big event is Jazzin' on Jefferson in June, which brings thousands to the district for two days of music and merriment each year.
http://www.modeldmedia.com/cities/jeffeast/default.aspx
Hidden Detroit Gems: Jefferson East
from Model D:
Jefferson East is coming together with new million-dollar riverfront housing, plenty of infill family homes and town homes and a reviving commercial district.
The up-and-coming area boasts active, close-knit neighborhoods, a yacht club, canalfront living and riverfront parks, plus new shopping centers filled with amenities.
Its big event is Jazzin' on Jefferson in June, which brings thousands to the district for two days of music and merriment each year.
http://www.modeldmedia.com/cities/jeffeast/default.aspx
July 17, 2014
from Model D:
How the rise of electricity transformed urban life in Detroit
AMY ELLIOTT BRAGG | TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014
Here's a famous story: Alex Dow, manager of the Edison Illuminating Company of Detroit, saw promise in his young chief engineer, and in 1896, he invited the engineer to join him at a conference in New York. One night, at a dinner with Thomas Edison, Dow introduced his chief engineer thusly: "There's a young fellow who has made a gas car."
Dow said it laughingly -- A gas car! At the dawn of the electric age! -- and related a story about the engineer's prototype "pop-pop-popping" along the street in front of the station. But after some discussion about the car's technology and the engineer's development of an improved sparked plug, Edison banged the table and said to the engineer: "Young man, that's the thing. You have it. Keep at it."
The chief engineer, of course, was Henry Ford, and this story is famous because it's about following your dreams and pursuing your genius in the face of a doubting world. But hidden inside of this platitudinal story is another more surprising one, a story we take for granted: In pioneering a gas-powered automobile, Ford was out of step with the innovation of his time. We know the story of Ford. We don't know the story of the step. And the step was epic. On a scale of one to "changed everything," the world-transforming rise of electricity competes pretty capably with the Model T.
"We like to think that our generation has lived through the greatest technological transformational change," says Jeff Horner, a lecturer in the Department of Urban Studies and Planning at Wayne State University. But in the late 1800s and early 1900s, "we figured out how to harness electricity as a serious source of power in a very short period of time -- 10 or 15 years."
"It was much bigger than the internet," he says. ....................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.modeldmedia.com/features/detroit-energy-history071514.aspx
How the rise of electricity transformed urban life in Detroit
from Model D:
How the rise of electricity transformed urban life in Detroit
AMY ELLIOTT BRAGG | TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2014
Here's a famous story: Alex Dow, manager of the Edison Illuminating Company of Detroit, saw promise in his young chief engineer, and in 1896, he invited the engineer to join him at a conference in New York. One night, at a dinner with Thomas Edison, Dow introduced his chief engineer thusly: "There's a young fellow who has made a gas car."
Dow said it laughingly -- A gas car! At the dawn of the electric age! -- and related a story about the engineer's prototype "pop-pop-popping" along the street in front of the station. But after some discussion about the car's technology and the engineer's development of an improved sparked plug, Edison banged the table and said to the engineer: "Young man, that's the thing. You have it. Keep at it."
The chief engineer, of course, was Henry Ford, and this story is famous because it's about following your dreams and pursuing your genius in the face of a doubting world. But hidden inside of this platitudinal story is another more surprising one, a story we take for granted: In pioneering a gas-powered automobile, Ford was out of step with the innovation of his time. We know the story of Ford. We don't know the story of the step. And the step was epic. On a scale of one to "changed everything," the world-transforming rise of electricity competes pretty capably with the Model T.
"We like to think that our generation has lived through the greatest technological transformational change," says Jeff Horner, a lecturer in the Department of Urban Studies and Planning at Wayne State University. But in the late 1800s and early 1900s, "we figured out how to harness electricity as a serious source of power in a very short period of time -- 10 or 15 years."
"It was much bigger than the internet," he says. ....................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.modeldmedia.com/features/detroit-energy-history071514.aspx
July 17, 2014
In early 2007, when he was New York State attorney general, Andrew Cuomo brought on a longtime confidant as a consultant on mortgage industry investigations, a move that has gone undisclosed until now.
The friend was Howard Glaser and he had another job at the same time: consultant and lobbyist for the very industry Cuomo was investigating.
Glaser, who went on to become a top state official in Cuomo’s gubernatorial administration, was operating a lucrative consulting firm, the Glaser Group, with a host of mortgage industry clients.
Later that year, Glaser provided insights on Cuomo’s investigations to industry players on a conference call hosted by an investment bank.
Cuomo’s office ended up giving immunity to one of Glaser’s clients a year into his term as attorney general. .................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/who_advised_cuomo_on_mortgage_industry_investigation_lobbyist_20140717
Who Advised Cuomo on Mortgage Industry Investigation? A Mortgage Lobbyist
A version of this story was co-published by ProPublica and the Albany Times-Union.
In early 2007, when he was New York State attorney general, Andrew Cuomo brought on a longtime confidant as a consultant on mortgage industry investigations, a move that has gone undisclosed until now.
The friend was Howard Glaser and he had another job at the same time: consultant and lobbyist for the very industry Cuomo was investigating.
Glaser, who went on to become a top state official in Cuomo’s gubernatorial administration, was operating a lucrative consulting firm, the Glaser Group, with a host of mortgage industry clients.
Later that year, Glaser provided insights on Cuomo’s investigations to industry players on a conference call hosted by an investment bank.
Cuomo’s office ended up giving immunity to one of Glaser’s clients a year into his term as attorney general. .................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/who_advised_cuomo_on_mortgage_industry_investigation_lobbyist_20140717
July 17, 2014
WASHINGTON, July 17 (Reuters) - A record 57 million Americans, or 18.1 percent of the U.S. population, lived in households with two or more generations in 2012, with young adults leading the trend, a report said on Thursday.
The number of Americans living in multi-generational households has doubled since 1980. The figure spiked during the 2007-2009 recession and has moved higher since then, the analysis by the Pew Research Center said.
"The increase in multi-generational living since 2010 is apparent across genders and among most racial and ethnic groups," the report said. ................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/17/multigenerational-homes-pew_n_5594440.html?ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000013&ir=Politics
Proof Young Americans Are Still Hurting From The Recession
WASHINGTON, July 17 (Reuters) - A record 57 million Americans, or 18.1 percent of the U.S. population, lived in households with two or more generations in 2012, with young adults leading the trend, a report said on Thursday.
The number of Americans living in multi-generational households has doubled since 1980. The figure spiked during the 2007-2009 recession and has moved higher since then, the analysis by the Pew Research Center said.
"The increase in multi-generational living since 2010 is apparent across genders and among most racial and ethnic groups," the report said. ................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/17/multigenerational-homes-pew_n_5594440.html?ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000013&ir=Politics
July 16, 2014
from truthdig:
Citigroup: The Original Gangsta
Posted on Jul 14, 2014
By Robert Scheer
Barack Obama’s Justice Department on Monday announced that Citigroup would pay $7 billion in fines, a move that will avoid a humiliating trial dealing with the seamy financial products the bank had marketed to an unsuspecting public, causing vast damage to the economy.
Citigroup is the too-big-to-fail bank that was allowed to form only when Bill Clinton signed legislation reversing the sensible restraints on Wall Street instituted by President Franklin Roosevelt to avoid another Great Depression.
Those filled with Clinton nostalgia these days might want to reflect back on how truly destructive was his legacy for hardworking people throughout the world who lost so much due to the financial shenanigans that he made legal.
“Today what we are doing is modernizing the financial services industry, tearing down those antiquated laws and granting banks significant new authority,” a beaming Clinton boasted after signing the Financial Services Modernization Act into law in 1999.
Called the Citigroup authorization act by some wags at the time, those antiquated laws, the Glass-Steagall Act primarily, had put a safety barrier between the high rollers in Wall Street investment firms and the staid commercial banks charged with preserving the savings of ordinary folk. The new law permitted them to merge. ...................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/citigroup_the_original_gangsta_20140715
Citigroup: The Original Gangsta
from truthdig:
Citigroup: The Original Gangsta
Posted on Jul 14, 2014
By Robert Scheer
Barack Obama’s Justice Department on Monday announced that Citigroup would pay $7 billion in fines, a move that will avoid a humiliating trial dealing with the seamy financial products the bank had marketed to an unsuspecting public, causing vast damage to the economy.
Citigroup is the too-big-to-fail bank that was allowed to form only when Bill Clinton signed legislation reversing the sensible restraints on Wall Street instituted by President Franklin Roosevelt to avoid another Great Depression.
Those filled with Clinton nostalgia these days might want to reflect back on how truly destructive was his legacy for hardworking people throughout the world who lost so much due to the financial shenanigans that he made legal.
“Today what we are doing is modernizing the financial services industry, tearing down those antiquated laws and granting banks significant new authority,” a beaming Clinton boasted after signing the Financial Services Modernization Act into law in 1999.
Called the Citigroup authorization act by some wags at the time, those antiquated laws, the Glass-Steagall Act primarily, had put a safety barrier between the high rollers in Wall Street investment firms and the staid commercial banks charged with preserving the savings of ordinary folk. The new law permitted them to merge. ...................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/citigroup_the_original_gangsta_20140715
July 15, 2014
from TomDispatch:
An Exceptional Decline for the Exceptional Country?
The Empire as Basket Case
By Tom Engelhardt
For America’s national security state, this is the age of impunity. Nothing it does -- torture, kidnapping, assassination, illegal surveillance, you name it -- will ever be brought to court. For none of its beyond-the-boundaries acts will anyone be held accountable. The only crimes that can now be committed in official Washington are by those foolish enough to believe that a government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from this earth. I’m speaking of the various whistleblowers and leakers who have had an urge to let Americans know what deeds and misdeeds their government is committing in their name but without their knowledge. They continue to pay a price in accountability for their acts that should, by comparison, stun us all.
As June ended, the New York Times front-paged an account of an act of corporate impunity that may, however, be unique in the post-9/11 era (though potentially a harbinger of things to come). In 2007, as journalist James Risen tells it, Daniel Carroll, the top manager in Iraq for the rent-a-gun company Blackwater, one of the warrior corporations that accompanied the U.S. military to war in the twenty-first century, threatened Jean Richter, a government investigator sent to Baghdad to look into accounts of corporate wrongdoing.
Here, according to Risen, is Richter’s version of what happened when he, another government investigator, and Carroll met to discuss Blackwater’s potential misdeeds in that war zone:
When officials at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, the largest in the world, heard what had happened, they acted promptly. They sided with the Blackwater manager, ordering Richter and the investigator who witnessed the scene out of the country (with their inquiry incomplete). And though a death threat against an American official might, under other circumstances, have led a CIA team or a set of special ops guys to snatch the culprit off the streets of Baghdad, deposit him on a Navy ship for interrogation, and then leave him idling in Guantanamo or in jail in the United States awaiting trial, in this case no further action was taken. ............(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175867/tomgram%3A_engelhardt%2C_the_age_of_impunity/
An Exceptional Decline for the Exceptional Country?: The Empire as Basket Case
from TomDispatch:
An Exceptional Decline for the Exceptional Country?
The Empire as Basket Case
By Tom Engelhardt
For America’s national security state, this is the age of impunity. Nothing it does -- torture, kidnapping, assassination, illegal surveillance, you name it -- will ever be brought to court. For none of its beyond-the-boundaries acts will anyone be held accountable. The only crimes that can now be committed in official Washington are by those foolish enough to believe that a government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from this earth. I’m speaking of the various whistleblowers and leakers who have had an urge to let Americans know what deeds and misdeeds their government is committing in their name but without their knowledge. They continue to pay a price in accountability for their acts that should, by comparison, stun us all.
As June ended, the New York Times front-paged an account of an act of corporate impunity that may, however, be unique in the post-9/11 era (though potentially a harbinger of things to come). In 2007, as journalist James Risen tells it, Daniel Carroll, the top manager in Iraq for the rent-a-gun company Blackwater, one of the warrior corporations that accompanied the U.S. military to war in the twenty-first century, threatened Jean Richter, a government investigator sent to Baghdad to look into accounts of corporate wrongdoing.
Here, according to Risen, is Richter’s version of what happened when he, another government investigator, and Carroll met to discuss Blackwater’s potential misdeeds in that war zone:
“Mr. Carroll said ‘that he could kill me at that very moment and no one could or would do anything about it as we were in Iraq,’ Mr. Richter wrote in a memo to senior State Department officials in Washington. He noted that Mr. Carroll had formerly served with Navy SEAL Team 6, an elite unit. ‘Mr. Carroll’s statement was made in a low, even tone of voice, his head was slightly lowered; his eyes were fixed on mine,’ Mr. Richter stated in his memo. ‘I took Mr. Carroll’s threat seriously. We were in a combat zone where things can happen quite unexpectedly, especially when issues involve potentially negative impacts on a lucrative security contract.’”
When officials at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, the largest in the world, heard what had happened, they acted promptly. They sided with the Blackwater manager, ordering Richter and the investigator who witnessed the scene out of the country (with their inquiry incomplete). And though a death threat against an American official might, under other circumstances, have led a CIA team or a set of special ops guys to snatch the culprit off the streets of Baghdad, deposit him on a Navy ship for interrogation, and then leave him idling in Guantanamo or in jail in the United States awaiting trial, in this case no further action was taken. ............(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175867/tomgram%3A_engelhardt%2C_the_age_of_impunity/
July 15, 2014
via truthout:
US Taxpayers Are Subsidizing Defense of Alleged Killers of Palestinian Teen
Tuesday, 15 July 2014 09:14
By Uri Blau, ProPublica | Report
A controversial Israeli organization that's representing the six men recently arrested in the recent revenge killing of a Palestinian teenager is receiving thousands of dollars in tax-deductible support from Americans. The group, called Honenu (which roughly translates to "pardon"
, supports Israelis charged with or convicted of violence against Palestinians.
Honenu's work goes well goes beyond legal aid.
The group says it also provides "spiritual" and "financial" assistance to prisoners and their families. Among those Honenu has helped: Yigal Amir, assassin of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin; an Israeli convicted of murdering seven Palestinians at a bus stop; and an Israeli soldier convicted of manslaughter and obstruction of justice after shooting a British photographer in Gaza.
The tax-exempt donations do not appear to run afoul of U.S. law. But they do put U.S. taxpayers in the position of subsidizing aid to Israelis convicted of politically motivated violence. ..............(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/24955-us-taxpayers-are-subsidizing-defense-of-alleged-killers-of-palestinian-teen
ProPublica: US Taxpayers Are Subsidizing Defense of Alleged Killers of Palestinian Teen
via truthout:
US Taxpayers Are Subsidizing Defense of Alleged Killers of Palestinian Teen
Tuesday, 15 July 2014 09:14
By Uri Blau, ProPublica | Report
A controversial Israeli organization that's representing the six men recently arrested in the recent revenge killing of a Palestinian teenager is receiving thousands of dollars in tax-deductible support from Americans. The group, called Honenu (which roughly translates to "pardon"
, supports Israelis charged with or convicted of violence against Palestinians.
Honenu's work goes well goes beyond legal aid.
The group says it also provides "spiritual" and "financial" assistance to prisoners and their families. Among those Honenu has helped: Yigal Amir, assassin of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin; an Israeli convicted of murdering seven Palestinians at a bus stop; and an Israeli soldier convicted of manslaughter and obstruction of justice after shooting a British photographer in Gaza.
The tax-exempt donations do not appear to run afoul of U.S. law. But they do put U.S. taxpayers in the position of subsidizing aid to Israelis convicted of politically motivated violence. ..............(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/24955-us-taxpayers-are-subsidizing-defense-of-alleged-killers-of-palestinian-teen
July 15, 2014
from truthdig:
Citigroup: The Original Gangsta
Posted on Jul 14, 2014
By Robert Scheer
Barack Obama’s Justice Department on Monday announced that Citigroup would pay $7 billion in fines, a move that will avoid a humiliating trial dealing with the seamy financial products the bank had marketed to an unsuspecting public, causing vast damage to the economy.
Citigroup is the too-big-to-fail bank that was allowed to form only when Bill Clinton signed legislation reversing the sensible restraints on Wall Street instituted by President Franklin Roosevelt to avoid another Great Depression.
Those filled with Clinton nostalgia these days might want to reflect back on how truly destructive was his legacy for hardworking people throughout the world who lost so much due to the financial shenanigans that he made legal.
“Today what we are doing is modernizing the financial services industry, tearing down those antiquated laws and granting banks significant new authority,” a beaming Clinton boasted after signing the Financial Services Modernization Act into law in 1999.
Called the Citigroup authorization act by some wags at the time, those antiquated laws, the Glass-Steagall Act primarily, had put a safety barrier between the high rollers in Wall Street investment firms and the staid commercial banks charged with preserving the savings of ordinary folk. The new law permitted them to merge. ...................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/citigroup_the_original_gangsta_20140715
Citigroup: The Original Gangsta
from truthdig:
Citigroup: The Original Gangsta
Posted on Jul 14, 2014
By Robert Scheer
Barack Obama’s Justice Department on Monday announced that Citigroup would pay $7 billion in fines, a move that will avoid a humiliating trial dealing with the seamy financial products the bank had marketed to an unsuspecting public, causing vast damage to the economy.
Citigroup is the too-big-to-fail bank that was allowed to form only when Bill Clinton signed legislation reversing the sensible restraints on Wall Street instituted by President Franklin Roosevelt to avoid another Great Depression.
Those filled with Clinton nostalgia these days might want to reflect back on how truly destructive was his legacy for hardworking people throughout the world who lost so much due to the financial shenanigans that he made legal.
“Today what we are doing is modernizing the financial services industry, tearing down those antiquated laws and granting banks significant new authority,” a beaming Clinton boasted after signing the Financial Services Modernization Act into law in 1999.
Called the Citigroup authorization act by some wags at the time, those antiquated laws, the Glass-Steagall Act primarily, had put a safety barrier between the high rollers in Wall Street investment firms and the staid commercial banks charged with preserving the savings of ordinary folk. The new law permitted them to merge. ...................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/citigroup_the_original_gangsta_20140715
Profile Information
Gender: MaleHometown: Detroit, MI
Member since: Fri Oct 29, 2004, 12:18 AM
Number of posts: 77,090