By Dave Lindorff

What nobody in the corporate media is mentioning amid all the
blather about the $700-billion Paulson bailout proposal is the impact
it will have on the US dollar.

We are told that this huge gift to the financial sector—the
assumption, at top dollar, of all the bad debt they’ve piled up--will
be at taxpayer expense, but that’s only the half of it. (Really only
the quarter of it because since the US government is technically
bankrupt already, spending more than it takes in each year, all that
money will be borrowed, and will be added to the national debt, meaning
that just as the real cost of the $500-billion Iraq War is closer to $2
trillion, the real cost of the $700 billion bailout will be more like
$1.5-2.5 trillion.)

By Dave Lindorff

Listening to the endless stream of cars passing my house every day,
and knowing, from watching them from my mailbox, that they are almost
all carrying just one person, either commuting to work or running some
kind of errand, I know we are headed for disaster.

Two days ago, there was a report by Agence France Presse
about the ongoing destruction of the world’s remaining wetlands (60
percent have already been destroyed by man over the past century), and
how they contain within them an amount of stored carbon equal to all
the carbon currently in the atmosphere. Global warming and property
development are drying out those remaining wetlands, causing the
release of that carbon, which will more than negate even the most
radical efforts at reducing carbon emissions from power plants,
factories and automobiles.

By Dave Lindorff

In a New York Times column on Monday (“Behind the Bush
Bust”), economics columnist Paul Krugman mused on whether President
George Bush could be blamed for the nation’s economic crisis. His
conclusion was that, yes, to some extent the crisis was Bush’s fault,
but he largely lets the current administration off the hook, instead
blaming Republican policies dating back 10-15 years.

Oddly, Krugman does say that a key cause of economic problems has
been rising energy prices, but he then attributes these to “growing
demand from China and other emerging economies,” and suggests that
prices might have been at least a bit lower had the US, after 9/11,
adopted “higher gas taxes and fuel efficiency standards,” a failing he
attributes to Bush.

THE FOLLOWING ARTICLE APPEARED IN THE SAN DIEGO UNION TRIBUNE TODAY (7/2/08). THE AMERICAN PEOPLE MUST UNITE TO SHOW THE WORLD WE DID NOT SUPPORT OR APPROVE OF THE INJUSTICES OF THIS ADMINISTRATION AND THE CRIMES IT COMMITTED AGAINST IRAQ, THE CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES AND THE WORLD.  TO REGAIN OUR STATURE IN THE WORLD, WE MUST CHARGE BUSH AND CHENEY WITH WAR CRIMES BEFORE THE REST OF THE WORLD DOES IT FOR US.  CONTACT YOUR CONGRESSPERSONS TODAY!

By Dave Lindorff

Laid-off American workers will be getting temporary extended
benefits as the nation sinks into recession, thanks to Congressional
Democrats, who cleverly tacked a funding provision onto a bill giving
the president all the money he asked for (and then some) to fund the
Iraq and Afghanistan wars on out through next June. Veterans of the
Iraq War will also be getting tuition benefits equal to the full cost
of in-state public college tuition plus $1000 a year for books and
supplies.

By Dave Lindorff

 Americans are in a panic over rising gas and heating oil prices, and with reason. For months, the price of a barrel of crude oil has been rising steadily, hitting a record $127 yesterday.

Analysts keep getting trotted out on TV and in print, attributing the dramatic price rise to everything from “peak oil”—the idea that producing countries have reached their peak of productive capacity, and that the only direction for oil supplies looking forward is down, while demand continues to rise—to increasing demand in China and India, to supply bottlenecks, to specific news events, like a pipeline break in Nigeria, or a closed refinery in California.

By David Swanson

"Jacked: How 'Conservatives' Are Picking Your Pocket (Whether You Voted for Them or Not)" is a short book by Nomi Prins that makes an excellent education for those remaining Americans who still do not understand that right-wing politicians take from those who work and give to those who live in luxury off the sweat of others.

At the end of World War II, corporations paid half the cost of the federal government. They now pay 7 percent, and many of them pay 0 percent. Unless you are very wealthy, you pick up the tab, and the tab has grown. The federal government now spends more than what it spends on everything else on the military alone, and that cost keeps rising.

US / Iranian rhetoric is at fever pitch. Both sides are claiming to have “evidence” of military foul play. Both sides are holding military exercises in each others faces and the Gulf is so full of warships it must be highly dangerous to navigate. Both sides are threatening a massive military response to any use of force. Both presidents have backed themselves into political corners and neither shows the slightest sign of backing down.

A second US carrier strike group has just arrived in the Gulf bringing the total number of US (and allied) warships there to about 50 and a third group, headed by USS Reagan has just been ordered to rendezvous in the Western Pacific with destroyers from Pearl Harbour before sailing to the Gulf.

If it's Friday, it's time to take a look at what's been floating around the political world this week and that I haven't commented on, might have slipped under your radar or has just flat-out been too silly for you to notice…

Yeah, We Should Give These Guys Bipartisanship - Showing, as they always do, that any Republican talk about a new spirit of bipartisanship in Washington is just a bunch of garbage, the GOP last week elected Oklahoma Congressman Tom Cole as the new head of the National Republican Congressional Committee for the next election cycle.

Cole is the same guy who, in 2004, pushed for George W. Bush to remain in office by saying that John Kerry winning would mean that Osama bin Laden also wins.

WeDemocrats In order to stimulate an active interest in government affairs, to restore TRUST of our government, to foster and perpetuate the idea of FREEDOM and principles of a Democratic Nation and to provide for our people through administration of the highest degree of justice, FAIRNESS and social welfare, do associate ourselves together as an official progressive grassroots organization, of the Progressives' Democratic Party. Auxilary groups on Democrats.org and BarackObama.com.
What will help Democrats win elections will be a surge in grassroots energy and a reengaged corps of activists who are working to take their party and country back. 6,236 - IN ALL 50 STATES AND DC!!! It’s a Fantastic Start.
Join this group!

Ron McBride

http://www.WeDemocrats.org

ron@wedemocrats.org

Join WeDemocrats at: http://www.wedemocrats.org/dadamail/mail.cgi/list/maillist/