On Wisconsin! (Breaking News)

Posted: February 17, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: collective bargaining, Federal Budget, Human Rights, John Birch Society in Charge, Live, Populism, U.S. Politics, worker rights | Tags: , , , , | 47 Comments

Wisconsin Fights Back!

Public employees, largely teachers and many of their students, have been protesting in Madison for three days, flooding the Capitol building with people and signage. Many Wisconsin schools have had to close due to sick-outs by large percentages of the state’s teachers.

The fight in Wisconsin has become a flash point for a national debate over budget deficits and how to solve them, with both sides recognizing the high-stakes battle will become a template for other states, no matter who comes out on top. A large defeat for unions in the battleground state of Wisconsin—the birthplace of AFSCME— would have public policy repercussions.

The Democratic Party’s Organizing for America, the leftover campaign apparatus from the Obama campaign, has entered the fray, filling buses and running phone banks for unions in Wisconsin. President Obama offered his opinion, declaring Walker’s measures an “assault on unions” despite admitting he hadn’t looked into the details.

Democratic Senators fled the state of Wisconsin to prevent a quorum call that would allow Governor Scott Walker and the Republicans to start the process of gutting the right to organize and form collective bargaining units for state employees like teachers and police. All 14 of the Democratic senators have actually left the state. The State Patrol has been sent to fetch them by State Senate President. Most people guess they’ve fled to Illinois somewhere as a group.

Meanwhile, a second day of protests surrounded the capitol building in Milwaukee.

From WISC TV in Madison:

No Democrats were present at the start of the state Senate session shortly after 11 a.m. to vote on a bill stripping public employees of collective bargaining rights. The Democratic members are currently out of state, WISC-TV reported.The Senate’s Republican majority sought to convene on Thursday to pass Gov. Scott Walker’s union bill. The Democrats’ move means the Senate can’t act at this point.Now, police officers are looking for Democratic lawmakers who were ordered to attend a vote. Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald said law enforcement officers were searching for Democrats after they were ordered to attend the Senate session.Republicans need one Democratic senator to be present. Calls to Democratic leaders weren’t immediately returned. Republicans ordered a call of the house to force Democrats to show up. Seventeen Republicans were present so the session began without the Democrats. Calls to Democratic leaders and others in the 14-member caucus weren’t immediately returned.Thousands of people clogged the halls of the Capitol for a third straight day in opposition. Observers in the balcony shouted “Freedom! Democracy! Unions!” as Republicans tried to start debate.

There are a lot of reports in the local press on the impact of the rallies and protests. While the right wing has focused on the need to shut down schools due to teacher’s calling in sick to attend the protest, it appears students have joined the ranks of the protesters.

Walker and Republican leaders have said they have the votes to pass the plan.That didn’t stop thousands of protesters from clogging the hallway outside the Senate chamber beating on drums, holding signs deriding Walker and pleading for lawmakers to kill the bill. Protesters also demonstrated outside the homes of some lawmakers.

Hundreds of teachers called in sick, forcing a number of school districts to cancel classes. Madison schools, the state’s second-largest district with 24,000 students, closed for a second day as teachers poured into the Capitol.

Hundreds more people, many of them students from the nearby University of Wisconsin, slept in the rotunda for a second night.

“We are all willing to come to the table, we’ve have all been willing from day one,” said Madison teacher Rita Miller. “But you can’t take A, B, C, D and everything we’ve worked for in one fell swoop.”

The head of the 98,000-member statewide teachers union called on all Wisconsin residents to come to the Capitol on Thursday for the votes in the Senate and Assembly.

“Our goal is not to close schools, but instead to remain vigilant in our efforts to be heard,” said Wisconsin Education Association Council President Mary Bell.

The proposal marks a dramatic shift for Wisconsin, which passed a comprehensive collective bargaining law in 1959 and was the birthplace of the national union representing all non-federal public employees.

The same situation is happening at the Ohio Statehouse as about 1,800 have joined protests there.

Public workers jammed the Statehouse today as the Ohio Senate continued to hear testimony on a bill that would eliminate collective bargaining rights for state employees and change the rights of local government employees. The workers, many wearing bright red T-shirts, filled the Statehouse atrium and rotunda while others milled about outside. They voiced their opposition loudly, sometimes echoing into the Senate hearing room and competing with the speakers testifying in support of Senate Bill 5. The State Highway Patrol estimated the crowd at 1,800

Attempts to break state employees unions are also being made in Louisiana.

Breaking News: Forthcoming Mubarak Statement

Posted: February 1, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Diplomacy Nightmares, Egypt, Foreign Affairs, Live | Tags: , , , , , | 47 Comments

This is a developing post so it will change frequently.

Recent Tweet from
AJEnglish Al Jazeera English

Hosni Mubarak expected to speak to soon. Tune in to #AlJazeera to watch the coverage live: http://aje.me/ajelive#mubarak#tahrir#egypt

Al Jazeera continues to stream in English live.

A statement is also expected from the White House.
According to Diplomatic Sources via CNN:  Egypt crisis: Mubarak won’t run again; report says Obama pushed for decision

Update 9:38 p.m. Cairo, 2:38 p.m. ET] Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has decided not to seek re-election, according to a senior U.S. official involved in the Obama administration’s deliberations on Egypt. The official cited “reliable contacts in Cairo” for the news. The New York Times reported Obama pushed Mubarak into the decision via a message delivered by former Ambassador Frank Wisner, who paid a personal visit to Mubarak on Tuesday.

The LA Times is reporting that US Envoy Frank Wisner was sent to tell Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to step aside.

Frank Wisner, a former ambassador to Egypt who has good relations with the Mubarak regime, traveled to Cairo at President Obama’s behest to talk to the Egyptian leader about the country’s future.

Wisner delivered a direct message that Mubarak should not be part of the “transition” that the U.S. had called for, according to Middle East experts who spoke on condition of anonymity.

One expert on the region said that in his regular conversations with the Obama administration about the unrest in Egypt, he learned that Wisner’s message to Mubarak was that “he was not going to be president in the future. And this message was plainly rebuffed.”

Obama’s Message to Mubarak: Neither You Nor Your Son Should Be On the Ballot This Fall

U.S. officials tells ABC News that on Saturday, President Obama made the final authorization to send former Ambassador to Egypt Frank Wisner to deliver – gently – the message to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak that neither he nor his son should run for the presidency this September.

Wisner, a well-regarded Egypt hand with a longtime relationship with Mubarak, was “in the orbit,” an official says, “because he’s been talked about as a potential Holbrooke replacement” to be a Special Envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The White House gave Wisner his talking points, the official said, and Wisner flew to Cairo Sunday to tell Mubarak that he should not run for re-election — and that his son Gamal should not run either.

Mohamed ElBaradei Speaks to the Egypt (live updates)

Posted: January 29, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Diplomacy Nightmares, Egypt, Foreign Affairs, Live | Tags: , , , | 63 Comments

This thread is going to contain live updates on Egypt coming on Al Jazeera English and from Twitter updates. Al Jazeera is clearly the go to place for information.

The protests were the top story on every major news outlet in the Middle East, but the day belonged to Al Jazeera. The station was the first to report that the governing party’s headquarters were set on fire. Breathless phone reports came in from Jazeera correspondents in towns across Egypt. Live footage from Cairo alternated with action shots that played again and again. Orchestral music played, conveying the sense of a long-awaited drama.

Al Jazeera kept up its coverage despite serious obstacles. The broadcaster’s separate live channel was removed from its satellite platform by the Egyptian government on Friday morning, its Cairo bureau had its telephones cut and its main news channel also faced signal interference, according to a statement released by the station. The director of the live channel issued an appeal to the Egyptian government to allow it to broadcast freely.

Other broadcasters, including CNN, said their reporters had been attacked and their cameras smashed by security forces.

Two major news items right now. Opposition leader Mohamed ElBaradei has called for Hosni Mubarak to step down and says that Egyptian state is in collapse.  He’s asking for a unity government.

Egypt is reaching a “tipping point,” opposition campaigner Mohamed ElBaradei said in an interview with Monocle.

“People are desperate and anxious for change to happen overnight,” ElBaradei, the former chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said in the London-based monthly’s February edition. “I see that approaching. People say Egyptians are patient, but you go around the streets of Cairo and you’ll see that the tipping point coming.”

The West is “losing every ounce of credibility when it comes to convincing people here that it is serious about their basic values: democracy, freedom, justice, rule of law,” said ElBaradei, 68. “That fuels extremism. The West doesn’t realize that stability is not based on shortsighted security measures; stability will only come when people are empowered, when people are able to participate.”

There is looting by thugs on motorcycles and it appears to be thugs from the Mubarak’s political party. The Department of Interior’s police force appears to have melted away. There’s no visible presence of the police, only the military.  There are reports that the National Museum with its incredible collection of antiquities has experienced looting and damage.

The museum in central Cairo, which has the world’s biggest collection of Pharaonic antiquities, is adjacent to the headquarters of the ruling National Democratic Party that protesters had earlier set ablaze. Flames were seen still pouring out of the party headquarters early Saturday.

“I felt deeply sorry today when I came this morning to the Egyptian Museum and found that some had tried to raid the museum by force last night,” Zahi Hawass, chairman of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, said Saturday.

“Egyptian citizens tried to prevent them and were joined by the tourism police, but some (looters) managed to enter from above and they destroyed two of the mummies,” he said.

AJ also continues to update it’s live blog for the day. Here are three entries:

7:38pm Ayman Mohyeldin reports that eyewitnesses have said “party thugs” associated with the Egyptian regime’s Central Security Services – in plainclothes but bearing government-issued weapons – have been looting in Cairo. Ayman says the reports started off as isolated accounts but are now growing in number.

…

6:50pm As protesters continue to defy curfew, a bystander in Cairo tells Al Jazeera that there are no police left in the capital. Formerly omnipresent traffic police are nowhere to be found. Reports suggest that private property is being seized in locations throughout Egypt.

6:43pm Some of the rarest antiquities in the world are found damaged by looters at famed Cairo musuem.

There are marches on the street. People are dying and being hurt. At least 25 people have been killed in Cairo.  Suez reports 38 deaths.  Alexandria reports 36 killed.  Women are being threatened with sexual assault.   The Children’s Cancer Hospital has also been the target of looting.  Again, it appears that may of the looters are the party police in plain clothes.  AJ has been reporting that some were caught trying to loot richer areas and were found to be carrying ID cards from the State Security forces.   People are still ignoring the curfew.

Probably the most disturbing announcement is that Egypt’s Head Spy is now the VP of the country.  This is the man that has handled torture of US detainees.

In December, the Wall Street Journal’s Jerusalem correspondent pronounced Suleiman “the most likely successor … President Mubarak’s closest aide, charged with handling the country’s most sensitive issues.

“He also has close working relations with the U.S. and a lifetime of experience inside Egypt’s military and intelligence apparatus,” Charles Levinson wrote.

Likewise, the Voice of America said Friday, “Suleiman is seen by some analysts as a possible successor to the president.” “He earned international respect for his role as a mediator in Middle East affairs and for curbing Islamic extremism.”

An editorialist at Pakistan’s “International News” predicted Thursday that “Suleiman will probably scupper his boss’s plans [to install his son], even if the aspiring intelligence guru himself is as young as 75.”

Suleiman graduated from Egypt’s prestigious Military Academy but also received training in the Soviet Union. Under his guidance, Egyptian intelligence has worked hand-in-glove with the CIA’s counterterrorism programs, most notably in the 2003 rendition of an al-Qaeda suspect known as Abu Omar from Italy.

This thread will continue to update during the day.

Notable Tweets:

Category of  I know how they feel:

SultanAlQassemi Sultan Al Qassemi

Zuwail “There has been a shrinking in the middle class in Egypt while an elite group has become excessively wealthy” cc Ahmed Ezz/Gamal

SultanAlQassemi Sultan Al Qassemi

Zuwail “Education has been the issue in every household in Egypt. Science & research has reached the lowest levels, Egypt deserves better”

GREAT UPDATE!!!

What you are seeing here is very interesting.  These are Egyptian Muslims praying.  Behind them are Egyptian Christians Guarding the neighborhood so they can pray safely.

You may remember that Wonk the Vote wrote a post with a similar theme in Egypt a few weeks ago when Egyptian Muslims surrounded Christian Churches who could celebrate Christmas with out fear of suicide bombers..


The Scent of Jasmine (live blog)

Posted: January 28, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Egypt, Foreign Affairs, Live, Middle East, Wikileaks | Tags: , , , , | 88 Comments

The news from Egypt is amazing.

The military and the police are on the streets.

A strict curfew is in place.

Egypt has left the internet.

AJEnglish Al Jazeera English

Protesters across Egypt defy curfew: Buildings and vehicles set alight across the country as anti-government pro… http://aje.me/fdndau

AJELive AJELive
by AJEnglish

AP Reports that protestors have stormed #Egypt foreign minister building #Jan25 #egypt

AJELive AJELive
by AJEnglish

Clinton – US deeply concerned about events in #Egypt. Deep grievance by protestors. Violence by riot police is not a solution #Jan25

AJELive AJELive

by AJEnglish

Hilary Clinton – Disturbed by the use of violence against protestors, US supports human rights of the #Egyptian people #Jan25

Thousands protest in Jordan

Thousands of people in Jordan have taken to the streets in protests, demanding the country’s prime minister step down, and the government curb rising prices, inflation and unemployment.

In the third consecutive Friday of protests, about 3,500 opposition activists from Jordan’s main Islamist opposition group, trade unions and leftist organisations gathered in the capital, waving colourful banners reading: “Send the corrupt guys to court”.

The crowd denounced Samir Rifai’s, the prime minister, and his unpopular policies.

Many shouted: “Rifai go away, prices are on fire and so are the Jordanians.”

Another 2,500 people also took to the streets in six other cities across the country after the noon prayers. Those protests also called for Rifai’s ouster.

Members of the Islamic Action Front, the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood and Jordan’s largest opposition party, swelled the ranks of the demonstrators, massing outside the al-Husseini mosque in Amman and filling the downtown streets with their prayer lines.

BreakingNews Breaking News

US will review its stand on providing aid to #Egypt based on unfolding events – AP #Jan25

Read the rest of this entry »

State of the Union Address Live blog (Continued) Blah, Blah, Blah …

Posted: January 25, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: 2012 presidential campaign, Live, SOTU, The Bonus Class | Tags: , , , , | 83 Comments

This is our generation’s Sputnik moment. Two years ago, I said that we needed to reach a level of research and development we haven’t seen since the height of the Space Race. In a few weeks, I will be sending a budget to Congress that helps us meet that goal. We’ll invest in biomedical research, information technology, and especially clean energy technology – an investment that will strengthen our security, protect our planet, and create countless new jobs for our people

SusieMadrak Susie Madrak

How will we pay for all this innovation and infrastructure creation with a DOMESTIC SPENDING FREEZE? #bullshit#sotu

ddayen David Dayen

“Let’s fix what needs fiing and move forward” just like torture! #sotu

rickklein Rick Klein

big shout-out for malpractice reform from the president.

SusieMadrak Susie Madrak

Oh, the tort reform crap again. Even though it’s been proved it’s a myth. #sotu

PaulRieckhoff Paul Rieckhoff

We must remember we still have troops in Iraq–and some dying. The war is not over. #SOTU#NonCombatMyAss

Let’s make kissy face with the SPEAKER!!!

That dream is why I can stand here before you tonight. That dream is why a working class kid from Scranton can stand behind me. That dream is why someone who began by sweeping the floors of his father’s Cincinnati bar can preside as Speaker of the House in the greatest nation on Earth.

It’s the birth of BOEHNERELLA!!!!

owillis Oliver Willis

that was a b- speech for obama #highbar

digby56 digby

Borger:” It wasn’t a transformational speech…I’m not sure that by not talking more about the deficit and jobs they got that done.”

Now Up Paul Ryan who is also politicizing Congresswoman Giffords.
More about how reducing spending during high unemployment actually isn’t actually flat earth economics.
More blah blah blah … I wonder if he reads his kids old Ayn Rand newsletters to his kids to put them to sleep at night?
Transcript from NPR here.

What we already know about the President’s health care law is this: Costs are going up, premiums are rising, and millions of people will lose the coverage they currently have. Job creation is being stifled by all of its taxes, penalties, mandates and fees.

Businesses and unions from around the country are asking the Obama Administration for waivers from the mandates. Washington should not be in the business of picking winners and losers. The President mentioned the need for regulatory reform to ease the burden on American businesses. We agree — and we think his health care law would be a great place to start.

Last week, House Republicans voted for a full repeal of this law, as we pledged to do, and we will work to replace it with fiscally responsible, patient-centered reforms that actually reduce costs and expand coverage.

Health care spending is driving the explosive growth of our debt. And the President’s law is accelerating our country toward bankruptcy.

Our debt is out of control. What was a fiscal challenge is now a fiscal crisis.

We cannot deny it; instead we must, as Americans, confront it responsibly.

Some one needs to tell him it’s not trust in government, it’s trust in politicians that’s at an all time low. Well, I’m depressed now.

Just take a look at what’s happening to Greece, Ireland, the United Kingdom and other nations in Europe. They didn’t act soon enough; and now their governments have been forced to impose painful austerity measures: large benefit cuts to seniors and huge tax increases on everybody.

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