Undernews For March 12, 2009

THE PROGRESSIVE REVIEW
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Editor: Sam Smith

11 March 2009

WORD
Truth, in matters of religion, is simply the opinion that has survived -- Oscar Wilde

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a monied aristocracy that has set the government at defiance. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs. - Thomas Jefferson
WHAT'S THE MARKET TELLING US?
Sam Smith

The only people having a good time with the stock market these days are the political spinners. At issue currently is whether this is an Obama market.

One way you can make it look that way is to only look at the 2009 figures. This is what MSNBC has done a couple of times. But the fact is that the market peaked in mid October 2007.

In effect, it's a kind of pay back for Bush, though, since his first bear market and economic troubles actually began in the spring of Clinton's last year - included a stunning collapse of the over the counter market - but was universally blamed on him by a pro-Clinton media.

Now, once again, it's the guy who entered late who is being blamed. On the other hand, the drop in the Dow since Inauguration Day has been 20% and since election day it's been 29%, a pretty astounding way to begin a new era of hope. The last time anything close to this happened was the 18% drop after Gerald Ford took office following the departure of the disgraced Richard Nixon.

Fact and folklore on the markets as economic indicators and predictors is substantial. I remember reading once that if both Time and Newsweek featured the bear market on their cover the same week, the downtown was about over.

One useful way to look at it is that the markets are a form of gambling and gambling is about what's going to happen in the future: will it be a face card or higher unemployment? Because there are so many players involved, the markets inevitably become an expression of optimism or pessimism - not that of the public at large but of a segment with substantial influence over the economy. If your uncle doesn't hire anyone and doesn't play the markets, what he thinks about the economy will have less effect on both than, say, someone with 70 employees and cash in the market. In this way the markets are both less democratic and more indicative than, say, a Gallup poll. The thing that will turn the economy around will not be a popular referendum but a broad acceptance by a small segment of the population that it's worth investing, hiring and expanding again.

Mike Walden, North Carolina Cooperative Extension economist at North Carolina State University, has described it this way:
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The stock market will always look at what is expected. That is, they factor in facts and statistics that they think are going to occur. And so, for example, when the news came out recently about the unemployment rate going up and faster inflation, the stock market already expected that. So in street lingo - Wall Street street lingo - they had already priced those changes into stocks. So it wasn't a surprise.

The second thing is that the stock market is always looking ahead. The unemployment rate goes up. It's already happened. We know that. So the stock market is really not looking at the unemployment rate. They're trying to look ahead. Where is the economy going to be three months from now, six months from now? And, indeed, . . . when we had the bad news about jobs and inflation, there was actually some good news that came out about corporate earnings. So this actually caused the stock market to think, hey, maybe the bottom's been reached on the economy and we're going to be much better off down the road. So keep these two things in mind about the stock market. One is that the stock market reacts to the unexpected, not to what is expected. And secondly, the stock market is always looking forward.
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As I write this, the Dow is up four percent not thanks to a political policy but to a statement by the CEO of one of America's worst run businesses, Citigroup. Things are going better there. How many hours it will last is uncertain, but what you can say Is that nothing emanating from the Obama White House has had as much immediate effect even when backed by hundreds of billions of tax dollars.

A fair summary would be that Bush caused the recession and Obama can't figure out how to get us out, and the markets know it.

His solutions have tended to be ethereal rather pragmatic; they have emphasized creating financial rather than human bailouts; they have not been decentralized enough that the public can see them; they have failed to significantly help that major job producer - small business; they have been top down rather than bottom up; they have been too indifferent to those hurting most; and they have not sufficiently emphasized job creation and new economic development.

You can't bailout the biggest and worst banks and expect to have the executives of smaller and more careful ones not to share their bitterness with colleagues over lunch at the Chamber of Commerce. You can't expect small business to hire new workers when they can't see any progress in their towns. And you can't turn around an economy without turning around the psychology, spirit and visual evidence for those who have to lead the move.

Perhaps it will change as some of Obama's cures begin to work. Or perhaps it will change because all over America it will seem that it can't get any worse so things can begin again. Watch the markets because chances are - and only chances - they will be one of the first harbingers. But for the time being, it is not fair to call it an Obama market because he doesn't seem to be able to affect it much at all.
THE MARKET AS PREDICTOR
Prudent Speculator - We looked at the latest sentiment figures from the American Association of Individual Investors. With data compiled as of March 4, those AAII members who responded to the bullish/neutral/bearish question were overwhelmingly negative. In fact, only 18.9% said they were bullish while 70.3% said they were bearish. That difference of 51.4% has been higher on only one other occasion in the 22-year history of this weekly gauge. When was that worse reading recorded? October 19, 1990. When did the market bottom that year? That same week.

Wikipedia - In the U.S. a significant stock market drop has often preceded the beginning of a recession. However about half of the declines of 10% or more since 1946 have not been followed by recessions. In about 50% of the cases a significant stock market decline came only after the recessions had already begun.

Brad Comincioli, Illinois Wesleyan - Another reason why skeptics do not trust the stock market as an indicator of the economy is because of investors' expectations. Critics reason that expectations about future economic activity are subject to human error, which in many cases causes stock prices to deviate from the "real" economy. Since investors do not always anticipate correctly, stock prices will sometimes increase before the economy enters into recession and decrease before the economy expands. As a result, the stock market will often mislead the direction of the economy. Even when stock prices do precede economic activity, a question that arises is how much lead or lag time should the market be allowed. For example, do decreases in stock prices today signal a recession in six months, one year, two years, or will a recession even occur?

An examination of historical data yields mixed results with respect to the stock market's predictive ability. Douglas Pearce found support for stock prices leading the direction of the economy. His study discovered that from 1956-1983, stock prices generally started to decline two to four quarters before recessions began. Pearce also found that stock prices began to rise in all cases before the beginning of an economic expansion, usually about midway through the contraction. Other studies have found evidence that does not support the stock market as a leading economic indicator. A study by Peek and Rosenberg, for example, indicates that between 1955 and 1986, out of eleven cases in which the Standard and Poor's Composite Index of 500 stocks (S&P 500) declined by more than 7 percent (the smallest pre-recession decline in the S&P 500), only six were followed by recessions. Furthermore, a study conducted by Robert J. Barro found that stock prices predicted three recessions for the years 1963, 1967, and 1978, that did not occur. . .

The 1987 stock market crash is one example in which stock prices falsely predicted the direction of the economy. Instead of entering into a recession which many were expecting, the economy continued to grow until the early 1990's
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LIST: MOST NEEDED VOTING REFORMS
No one has done a better job of covering election count problems than Brad Friedman of Brad Blog. Here's his list of the most needed reforms:

- Hand-Marked Paper Ballots For All: All ballot selections, in all federal elections, must be hand-marked by the voter, on paper ballots, except for ballots marked by a non-tabulating assistive device, as may be required to meet HAVA's accessibility voting mandate, one per polling place, for use by those who wish such assistance in order to vote privately and independently.

- Fully Disclosed Hardware & Software: All electronic voting and tabulating systems (eg. ballot tabulators, ballot marking devices for optional use voters who wish assistance), in jurisdictions that may use such systems, must employ fully open source, publicly disclosed hardware and software.

- Precinct-Based Counting: Ballots cast at the precinct are to be counted in a fully public, transparent, and verifiable manner at the local precinct level, with full citizen observation allowed by law, and results posted publicly at the precinct before either ballots or results are forwarded to any other location(s).

- Voting Databases Released: All vote tabulation databases are to be made available to the public.

- Full Transparency: All ballot counting/tabulation/auditing processes are to be fully open and transparent to any and all members of the public.

- No Remote/Networked Communications: No voting system may have remote communication capabilities, infrared or bluetooth capabilities, or be attached to the Internet or to a local area network at any time.

- No Internet Voting: No ballots may be cast over the Internet.

- Disclosure of Federal Testing Processes/Results: All federal voting system testing/certification processes must be fully documented and results made immediately available for public inspection.

- Outlaw Deceptive Practices: Deceptive practices (such as disinformation concerning Election Day, poll locations, and registration information and processes, etc.), voter caging (the removal of voters from the rolls without notification or process for appeal), and voter intimidation (eg. use of threats, uniformed officers at the polls, etc.) shall be outlawed. These laws shall be enforced and penalized as felony crimes.

- Same Day Registration: Same day voter registration will be mandated for all voters in federal elections.

- Ban Disenfranchising Photo ID Restrictions: Restrictive Photo ID measures at the polling place must be outlawed. Federalize the types of voter ID that may be required at the polls for federal elections.

- Notification of Rejected Absentee Ballots: All voters are to be notified and allowed timely opportunity to appeal the rejection of their absentee ballots for any reason.

- Make Election Day a Holiday: Election Day must be made a federal holiday.

- Move Election Day to Wednesday: Election Day is to be moved to Wednesday. (Would likely require a Constitutional amendment - see this for a quick explanation of why moving it to Wednesday is a good idea.)

- "Right to Vote" Amendment: Amend the U.S. Constitution to declare a federal "Right to Vote" in all federal elections.

- Disenfranchisement a Felony Crime: The purposeful disenfranchisement of any legal voter, for any reason, by any person, in any election, at any time, is to be a felony crime. Each individual case of such disenfranchisement is to be prosecutable to the full extent of the law.
BASEMENT APARTMENTS IN THE SKY
Tree Hugger - Apartment designs are usually fixed and people have to move a lot. That is why the designs recently approved in Burnaby, BC are so intriguing; they are purported to be the first legalized secondary suites within apartments. Designed to provide housing for students, the blue zone can be "locked off" and rented out separately and has its own entrance. It's kind of like a basement apartment in the sky. . .

Condos and apartments are not very good at adapting to life cycles; one starts out with a small one, moves when they have kids, then has too much space when the kids are gone. (Or you are stuck with them and have no privacy when you want it).

Designs like this would let young people rent out part of their apartment until they need it, getting some extra income to help with the mortgage, and then could use the space with the family comes along. . .

It isn't a new concept; Kathryn McCamant and Charles Durrett talk about it a lot in their important book Cohousing: A contemporary approach to housing ourselves. They demonstrate how "flexible rooms or "give and take" rooms can be exchanged between the dwelling on either side, which is another twist.
OBAMA DISSES TEACHERS, CONGRESS
For someone who taught constitutional law, Obama is showing striking contempt for some of the founding document's key provisions such as the division of powers between the legislative and executive branch and that between federal and state government.

His hectoring of public school teachers - some of the hardest working and least well paid professionals in America - is not only disrespectful, it ignores the fact that how a state runs its school system is, constitutionally, not subject to the sort of federal interference that Obama and his predecessors have engaged in, using funds as the whip to drive their preferred policies. Further, if we applied federal standards to heads of school systems, Obama's own education secretary would be in trouble as he didn't do all that well in Chicago.

As for earmarks, some are good - like a new playground or museum - and some are bad - like the way Pentagon spending is divided among the 50 states. But limiting Congress' power to engage in this practice would not eliminate earmarks. Rather it would merely - again dissin' the Constitution - transfer the power to create earmarks from Congress to the White House.

Washington Post - President Obama sharply criticized the nation's public schools yesterday, calling for changes that would reward good teachers and replace bad ones, increase spending, and establish uniform academic achievement standards in American education. . .

Obama's speech, his first as president devoted to education, struck a tone of urgency at a time when public education is slated to receive about $100 billion in new federal money under the recently passed economic stimulus package. The money may give Obama and his education secretary, Arne Duncan, more influence in reshaping a public education system traditionally guided by state governments and local school districts.

"The resources come with a bow tied around them that says 'Reform,' " Rahm Emanuel, Obama's chief of staff, said in a telephone interview. "Our basic premise is that the status quo and political constituencies can no longer determine how we proceed on public education reform in this country.". . .

The president signaled a willingness to take on influential Democratic constituencies, including teachers unions, which have been skeptical of merit-pay proposals. He said he intends to treat teachers "like the professionals they are while also holding them more accountable."

Good teachers will receive pay raises if students succeed, Obama said, and will "be asked to accept more responsibility for lifting up their schools." But, he said, states and school districts must be "taking steps to move bad teachers out of the classroom."

"If a teacher is given a chance but still does not improve, there is no excuse for that person to continue teaching," he said. "I reject a system that rewards failure and protects a person from its consequences.". . .

To encourage classroom innovation, Obama said, he wants the District and the 26 states that now limit the number of permitted charter schools to lift those caps. Such schools, founded by parents, teachers and civic groups, receive public money but are allowed to experiment broadly with curriculum.

CNN - President Obama will announce new "rules of the road" on earmarks, the White House says. Some lawmakers have urged Obama to veto the $410 billion omnibus spending bill -- saying it goes against the president's campaign pledge to bring an end to wasteful spending.

White House officials said Obama will sign the bill to keep key government agencies funded, but the president will lay out the new guidelines on earmarks as a not-so-subtle threat that he could veto future spending bills that do not comply with his objectives. Video Watch what's in the spending bill . . .

Top Democrats, including House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland, have suggested lawmakers do not appreciate being dictated to on an issue that is a congressional prerogative. Asked last week about the administration's plan to put forth guidelines to overhaul earmarks, Hoyer said flatly, "I don't think the White House has the ability to tell us what to do." He paused and quipped to reporters, "I hope you all got that down."

National Education Association - Name a profession in which people earn less each year Through collective bargaining or state legislation, most teachers are placed on a salary schedule with pay "steps" or "increments" for seniority -- seasoning -- on the job and added professional development. They are rigorously evaluated, face recertification requirements, deal with ever-more-complex state and federal standards, and are expected to advance to the master's degree level and beyond.

Merit pay systems force teachers to compete, rather than cooperate. They create a disincentive for teachers to share information and teaching techniques. This is especially true because there is always a limited pool of money for merit pay. Thus, the number-one way teachers learn their craft --learning from their colleagues -- is effectively shut down. If you think we have turnover problems in teaching now, wait until new teachers have no one to turn to.

The single salary schedule is the fairest, best understood, and most widely used approach to teacher compensation -- in large part because it rewards the things that make a difference in teacher quality: knowledge and experience.

Plus, a salary schedule is a reliable predictor of future pay increases. Pay for performance plans are costly to taxpayers and difficult to administer. In contrast, single salary schedules have known costs and are easy to administer. School boards can more easily budget costs and need less time and money to evaluate employees and respond to grievances and arbitrations resulting from the evaluation system. Worse yet, there is often a lack of dedicated funding for merit pay systems.

Merit pay begs the question of fairness and objectivity in teacher assessments. Is teacher performance based on multiple measures of student achievement or simply standardized test scores? Are there teachers who are ineligible to participate in a merit plan because their field of expertise (art, music, etc.) is not subject to standardized tests?
SOUTH LEADS NATION IN LOCK UPS - ESPECIALLY BLACKS
Institute for Southern Studies - One in 31 adults (7.3 million people) is under some form of correctional supervision. It's a historic high. The United States has the highest incarceration rate and the biggest prison population of any country in the world. Even though the United States represents only 5 percent of the world's population, it has 25 percent of the world's prison inmates.

When it comes to locking people up, Louisiana leads the South, and the South leads the nation. Simply put: the South has more of its population in prisons or jails than any other part of the country.

Since 1980, the country's prison population has quadrupled to more than two million, with the South accounting for nearly half of that increase.

The racial disparity of these policies has been tremendous: Nationally, black adults are four times as likely as whites to be under correctional control. One in 11 black adults -- 9.2 percent -- was under correctional supervision by 2008. And because the majority of African Americans live in the Deep South (the highest populations are in Mississippi, Louisiana, and Georgia respectively), the racial disparities of "get-tough" policies have been disproportionately felt there.
RIGHT TO COUNSEL SLIPPING AWAY
Walter F. Mondale, Washington Post - More than 45 years ago, as attorney general of Minnesota, I joined with the attorneys general of 21 states in asking the Supreme Court to ensure that counsel would be appointed for all people facing criminal charges who could not afford it. The court answered our plea. Yet today, its historic decision in Gideon v. Wainwright is at risk.

In Gideon, the Supreme Court ruled that Florida violated the Constitution when it refused to appoint counsel for Clarence Gideon, a defendant who lived in a rooming house and had just $25 to his name. The opinion recognized the "obvious truth" that "in our adversary system of criminal justice, any person hauled into court, who is too poor to hire a lawyer, cannot be assured a fair trial unless counsel is provided for him."

Yet states across the country routinely fail to appoint counsel to people who are genuinely unable to afford representation on their own. A report published by the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School last fall, "Eligible for Justice," found that if Gideon were to face criminal charges in Florida today, he might well be denied a public defender. Under Florida law, he could be disqualified for counsel if he has assets exceeding $2,500 (excluding a house), a car valued above $5,000, or had posted bail of more than $5,000, even if none of those assets permitted him to pay the retainer -- often several thousand dollars -- that defense lawyers routinely charge.

Even in Minnesota, things are grim. The Office of the State Public Defender absorbed a $1.5 million budget cut in 2008 and faced a $4.7 million shortfall at the end of fiscal 2009. The office announced late last year that it may need to cut 61 full-time equivalent attorney positions.

Sadly, Gideon's chances of getting counsel would be worse elsewhere. In New Hampshire, he could be found ineligible for counsel if he had a home valued at more than $20,000, even if he could not sell the home in time to finance his defense and even if selling it would leave him homeless. Courts in Virginia could deny him counsel because of the amount of money possessed by family members, even if Gideon had no power over that money.
NEW QUESTIONS RAISED ABOUT STATINS
Daily Mail, UK - Could statins, the cholesterol-lowering drugs taken by more than three million Britons, be doing more harm than good to many thousands of patients? This is the rather alarming suggestion to emerge from two new studies.

The research challenges the medical convention that lowering your cholesterol is always a good thing - indeed, they suggest statins may affect intelligence, cause depression and even raise the risk of suicide. .

In patients vulnerable to heart attacks and strokes, the drugs reduce the risk of fatty deposits gathering in their bloodstream and causing life-threatening blood clots.

But cholesterol is also produced by the brain, where it is used to release vital chemicals called neurotransmitters that carry messages between brain cells. Now a study by Iowa State University suggests that statins inhibit this vital process.

When brain cells are deprived of cholesterol, they are five times less effective at releasing chemical messengers, says the research, published in the highly respected journal Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences.

'If you deprive cholesterol from the brain, then you directly affect how smart you are and how well you remember things,' says Yeon-Kyun Shin, the biophysics professor behind the study. 'This may lead to depression and irrational acts.' He believes this is directly caused by disruption in the neurotransmitter release in the brain.
HOW ISRAEL SPIES ON THE U.S.
Christopher Ketcham, AlterNet - Scratch a counterintelligence officer in the US government and they'll tell you that Israel is not a friend to the United States. This is because Israel runs one of the most aggressive and damaging espionage networks targeting the US. The fact of Israeli penetration into the country is not a subject oft-discussed in the media or in the circles of governance, due to the extreme sensitivity of the US-Israel relationship coupled with the burden of the Israel lobby, which punishes legislators who dare to criticize the Jewish state. . .

When the FBI produces its annual report to Congress concerning "Foreign Economic Collection and Industrial Espionage," Israel and its intelligence services often feature prominently as a threat second only to China. In 2005 the FBI noted, for example, that Israel maintains "an active program to gather proprietary information within the United States." A key Israeli method, said the FBI report, is computer intrusion. In 1996, the Defense Intelligence Service, a branch of the Pentagon, issued a warning that "the collection of scientific intelligence in the United States [is] the third highest priority of Israeli Intelligence after information on its Arab neighbors and information on secret US policies or decisions relating to Israel." In 1979, the Central Intelligence Agency produced a scathing survey of Israeli intelligence activities that targeted the US government. Like any worthy spy service, Israeli intelligence early on employed wiretaps as an effective tool, according to the CIA report. In 1954, the US Ambassador in Tel Aviv discovered in his office a hidden microphone "planted by the Israelis," and two years later telephone taps were found in the residence of the US military attach. In a telegram to Washington, the ambassador at the time cabled a warning: "Department must assume that all conversations [in] my office are known to the Israelis." The former ambassador to Qatar, Andrew Killgore, who also served as a foreign officer in Jerusalem and Beirut, told me Israeli taps of US missions and embassies in the Middle East were part of a "standard operating procedure."

According to the 1979 CIA report, the Israelis, while targeting political secrets, also devote "a considerable portion of their covert operations to obtaining scientific and technical intelligence." These operations involved, among other machinations, "attempts to penetrate certain classified defense projects in the United States." The penetrations, according to the CIA report, were effected using "deep cover enterprises," which the report described as "firms and organizations, some specifically created for, or adaptable to, a specific objective." . . .

In 2004, the authoritative Jane's Intelligence Group noted that Israel's intelligence organizations "have been spying on the US and running clandestine operations since Israel was established." The former deputy director of counterintelligence at FBI, Harry B. Brandon, last year told Congressional Quarterly magazine that "the Israelis are interested in commercial as much as military secrets."
INSIDE OBAMA'S HEALTHCARE SHOW SUMMIT: SINGLE PAYER PRESENT BUT IGNORED
Oliver Fein, MD - Thanks to many grassroots activists and physicians who called the White House and threatened to demonstrate outside its gates, I was at the Health Care Summit at the White House on March 5 along with Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.). And it was good thing. It meant that the single-payer position was recognized as one pathway to health care reform. It also meant that one of our concerns was present: namely, that any health care reform that includes the for-profit, private health insurance companies will fail to provide universal coverage, will not be able to reduce heath care costs, and will increase the number of underinsured.

It’s important to note that there were others at the summit who are known to be sympathetic to single payer, including some past and present co-sponsors of H.R. 676 and Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont.

That said, it is true that the summit was carefully choreographed. The opening plenary featured Travis Ulerick, a 24-year-old firefighter from Dublin, Ind., who had sponsored a “health care community discussion” (house party) in his fire station in December. He read off the names of six other people who had hosted similar house parties who had been invited to participate in the summit.

Ulerick called attention to a booklet, "Report on Health Care Community Discussions," which was distributed to all summit participants. It focuses on cost, access, quality and system performance as the major problems facing the American health care system. As solutions, it offers creation of a health insurance exchange, reducing prescription drug costs, research and standards to improve quality and efficiency, simplification and information technology, education for wellness and the promotion of healthy lifestyles. Interestingly, in the middle of the report, there is a box labeled Single-Payer System, which states: "œOver one-quarter (27 percent) of the groups discussed the merits of a single-payer system, and the majority of those groups supported this idea. These groups argue that this radical change was a necessary step for reform."

President Obama then spoke about the urgency of the problem, focusing heavily on the need to rein in skyrocketing health care costs that are straining the budgets of families, businesses and federal and state governments. Health care reform is "not just a moral imperative, but also a fiscal imperative,"he said. He warned "special interests"not to stand in the way of reform and then dispatched the assembled group with "Let's get to work."

The approximately 150 participants were then split up into five breakout groups. I conferred with Rep. Conyers, author of H.R. 676, the major single-payer bill in the House of Representatives, about what we might be able to accomplish during the breakouts. He was assigned to Breakout Session One, chaired by Melody Barnes and Bob Kocher, the principal staffers who had organized the summit. I was assigned and attended Breakout Session Two, chaired by Valerie Jarrett, a senior adviser to the president, and Ezekiel Emanuel, an oncologist and former bioethicist for the NIH, now one of the chief health care advisers in the White House.

The discussion in my breakout group was relatively unfocused. Most agreed the time and circumstances were different from 1993-94, when the Clinton health plan was defeated by special interests. The opportunity for reform now was real. The major problem was high costs and access. Solutions ranged from community health centers to malpractice reform, physician payment reform, reduction of medical errors, wellness programs, comparative effectiveness research, and health information technology.

Because no one had yet mentioned for-profit, private health insurance companies as the source of our problems, I was preparing to speak. But at that moment Sen. Sanders burst in and pointed out that private health insurance added cost but no value. He then announced that he intends to introduce a bill in the Senate resembling the McDermott bill in the House, a national single-payer program administered through the states.

The only panel member who advocated for an existing bill was Sen. Bennett. He spoke on behalf of the Wyden-Bennett bill, which would remove the tax deduction that employers who sponsor private health insurance have, thrusting everyone into the individual market, which he claims would reduce costs through market competition. He had not heard of the "health insurance death spiral," in which the healthy pay less for premiums and the sick pay more, although he understood the concept.

After an hour and half of discussion and without reaching consensus, we reconvened in the East Room of the White House, which had been reconfigured into a "theater in the round" with lectern in the middle for the president. The president had a list of names to call upon and started with Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.). He then proceeded to name the important Congressional committee chairs (Democrats) and their ranking members (Republicans). This gave each an opportunity to make a statement and/or ask the president a question.

It was clear that the main message that President Obama wanted to communicate was bipartisanship and transparency, since he avoided most of the truly contentious issues, such as an individual mandate to carry health insurance either for children and/or adults; an employer mandate to pay for coverage; a public plan to compete the private plans in a health insurance exchange; elimination of pre-existing conditions exclusions from private health insurance; taxation of health benefits offered by employers; or permitting Medicare to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies for drug prices. These are all issues left for discussion and resolution within Congress. While this is the opposite of the Clinton administration's approach, the president may be seeking to lay a broad foundation for making hard choices in the future.

Besides the lawmakers, it is interesting to note which organizational leaders he called on to make statements. These included Karen Ignagni, president of America's Health Insurance Plans; Dan Danner, president of the National Federation of Independent Businesses; and Ted Epperly, president of the American Academy of Family Physicians. A few other audience members were called on for statements, including Fredette West, president of Racial and Ethnic Disparities Health Coalition, and Irwin Redliner (a recently mentioned candidate for U.S. surgeon general) from National Center for Disaster Preparedness at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.

What was my role in all of this? Despite my best efforts, I was unable to make a public statement at the meeting, although thanks to the PNHP staff in Chicago we were able distribute my prepared remarks to the media while the summit was under way. Our staff member in Washington, Danielle Alexander, also handed out hard copies to summit participants as they left the White House.

In sum, I came out of the White House Health Care Summit with conviction that single payer "“ that is, publicly funded, privately delivered health care, which removes the wasteful for-profit, private health insurance companies as middlemen, remains the only solution that can guarantee access to comprehensive, quality health care with choice of doctor and hospital, and reduce overall cost. Single-payer, an improved and expanded Medicare-for-All, is the gold standard against which all other proposals for health care reform should be measured.

Advocates need to focus on Congress during the next few months. We need to make the case that co-sponsorship of H.R. 676 raises its legitimacy as a gold standard, and that single-payer advocates should be called to testify at congressional hearings.
QUESTIONING THE DRUG WAR
More than three decades after the war on drugs was launched an increasing number of establishment figures are questioning its value. We will occasionally update the list. The Review, incidentally, has been a critic of the drug war from the start.

The Economist editorialized for legalization.

"We consider the war on drugs a failure because the objectives have never been achieved," says Cesar Gaviria, Colombia's former president.

"The strategy of the US here, in Colombia and Peru . . . has not worked," said Colonel Rene Sanabria, head of Bolivia's anti-narcotic police force.

A report by the Brookings Institution, and a separate study by Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron which was endorsed by 500 economists, demand change in our approach to drugs.

From the Guardian and other sources
RETURN OF THE MINI CAR

WTOP, DC - A French company, MDI, has created a car that runs on compressed air. The three-wheeled Air Pod can travel nearly 140 miles on a tank of air. Once you hit empty, the tank can be refilled by plugging the car into an electric outlet or at special air stations. The car can only hit 45 mph, and only produces 8 horsepower. Commercial trials will first hit Paris and Amsterdam in the spring, and will cost $7,500.

Tree Hugger - Swedish car company Vehiconomics will unveil a lightweight, three-wheeled economical vehicle the company hopes will begin to be seen in the streets of Swedish cities already in summer 2009. The first out, three-wheeled two-seater Smite, as it is currently called, weighs just 130 kilos (286 lbs.) and will cost under 50,000 Swedish crowns ($5,500), says Ny Teknik. It will debut in gas, ethanol, and all-electric versions, and is reported to have a top speed of 90 kilometers per hour - the clear opposite of that other famous Swedish vehicle, the Volvo.. . .

Back at the end of WWII, very small, economical automobiles became popular in Europe for a time, many of them three wheelers and able to be licensed as motorcycles. They typically had aircraft-style bubble canopies, giving rise to the term "bubble" cars. . .

Sam Smith, Multitudes - In the 1950s, WWDC's news fleet consisted of two vehicles, a Nash Rambler station wagon and an Isetta minicar. The light blue Rambler had WWDC NEWS, in reverse image, painted on its hood in large dark blue letters, thus allowing the sign to be read correctly in a rear view mirror. The style would become common, especially with ambulances, but at the time was the sort of novelty WWDC loved.

The Rambler had an even more startling, albeit unintentional, characteristic. The front seats of Ramblers folded down to become beds. Unfortunately, this capability had developed an anarchistic streak in our model, resulting in a tendency for the driver's seat back to become prone whenever sturdy brake pressure was applied, say at an ordinary stop light.

The Rambler was, however, the more conventional vehicle of the two. The Isetta, an Italian import, was far smaller than any car on the road today, and powered by a motor scooter engine. It had four wheels, but they were tiny and the two in back were almost adjacent to each other. You sat in what amounted to little more than a cockpit with barely enough room for a 210-pound reporter and a radio telephone. The door doubled as the entire front end, with the steering wheel swinging out of the way for entrance and egress. More than once I pulled up to a wall or post only to remember that I had blocked my own departure.

From its door-width bow, the Isetta slimmed almost to a point in the stern. It was painted bright red with the words WWDC NEWS inscribed in large white letters. In sum, the Isetta looked much like a lopsided, egotistical, overgrown tomato rolling down the highway.

It was not the best way to cover the news. The Isetta had a flank speed of 50 mph on flat, good pavement, and it practically had to be pedaled up hills. This sometimes interfered with arriving promptly at the scene of a distant fire, murder or drowning. Nonetheless, no one at WWDC would admit that novelty in this case had gotten a bit out of hand. Besides, the Isetta's light carriage allowed me to push it out of mud and sand in which a heavier car would have become mired.
GREAT MOMENTS IN RECYCLING

National Geographic - Explorer, environmentalist, and British celebrity David de Rothschild will set out on a 11,000-mile journey across the Pacific Ocean at the end of March - in a boat made of plastic bottles. Created from a special composite of recycled plastic, de Rothschild's boat is a 60-foot (18-meter) catamaran called Plastiki.

De Rothschild will steer the fiberglass-like frame, made buoyant by the addition of 12,000 two-liter plastic bottles along the hulls, from San Francisco to Sydney-with several island stops-on an exploration of plastic litter-the most common in the type of ocean pollution.
CRASH TALK
Stateline - More than 600 attorneys have volunteered to help New Jersey homeowners facing foreclosure in an unprecedented state-sponsored effort to keep people in their homes.

North Carolina has begun requiring subprime mortgage servicers to notify distressed borrowers and state officials 45 days before filing foreclosure proceedings so homeowners can work with housing counselors and attorneys to renegotiate the loan.

California launched a program late last year offering first-time homebuyers a chance to buy vacant, foreclosed homes at below market interest rates. As much as helping homebuyers, the goal is to stabilize neighborhoods ravaged by the worst foreclosure crisis in the state's history. . .

Last year, governors in 33 states signed 70 pieces of legislation addressing the foreclosure crisis, and nearly every state has adopted new rules to improve oversight of the state-regulated mortgage lending industry, according to a new report by the National Governors Association. . .

State efforts, the report said, have centered on mitigation, or reaching out to distressed borrowers to avoid foreclosure; stabilization, such as California's effort to prop up its decaying neighborhoods; and prevention, including tougher regulation of the mortgage lending industry. . .

NY Times - Rarely have so few people had so little time to prop up so many pillars of the economy as those in the Treasury Department under Timothy F. Geithner. . .

But even as he maintains a frenetic pace - unveiling plans, testifying before Congress and negotiating new bailouts with the likes of Citigroup, General Motors and the American International Group - there are signs that events are getting ahead of him.

Administration officials say they are postponing their plan to produce a detailed road map for overhauling the nation's financial regulatory system by April, in time for the Group of 20 meeting in London. Though officials say they will still develop basic principles in time for the meeting, the plan will not include much detail.

Treasury officials are also still scrambling to decide details of their plan to buy up as much as $1 trillion in toxic assets from the nation's banks, one month after being widely criticized for presenting a plan that lacked any specifics on how it would work.

Analysts say it is far too early to know if Mr. Geithner and his team will be effective. But some worry that political and financial constraints have made them reluctant to grapple with the full magnitude of the crisis. . .

Pro Publica - It's looking increasingly like the FDIC will have to turn to Treasury to help it weather the storm. FDIC's deposit insurance fund has plummeted in the past year as a growing number of banks have failed.

"We'd like a bigger cushion," FDIC Chair Sheila Bair said on CBS' Early Show. The fund relies on fees from member banks, and Bair held out hope that a recent bump in those fees would provide enough cushion. But if it doesn't, Bair said, people shouldn't be nervous about their FDIC-insured accounts: "It is important for people to understand, we're backed by the full faith and credit of the United States government. The money will always be there. We can't run out of money."

New legislation requested by the FDIC and the Fed seeks to make sure that's true, even if FDIC's cushion proves dramatically inadequate. The legislation would allow the FDIC to borrow $100 billion from Treasury and as much as $500 billion with White House approval. Currently, FDIC only has access to up to $30 billion.

Independent, UK - A silent $1 trillion "Run on Britain" by foreign investors was revealed in the latest statistical releases from the Bank of England. The external liabilities of banks operating in the UK - that is monies held in the UK on behalf of foreign investors - fell by $1 trillion between the spring and the end of 2008, representing a huge loss of funds and of confidence in the City of London. . . This is by far the largest withdrawal of foreign funds from the UK in recent decades - about 10 times what might flow out during a "normal" quarter. The revelation will fuel fears that the UK's reputation as a safe place to hold funds is being fatally compromised by the acute crisis in the banking system and a general trend to financial protectionism internationally.

Reuters - Warren Buffett said on Monday the U.S. economy had "fallen off a cliff" but would eventually recover, although a rebound could kindle inflation worse than that experienced in the late 1970s. Speaking on CNBC television, the 78-year-old billionaire investor also said the economy was mere hours away from collapse last September when credit markets seized up, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc went bankrupt and insurer American International Group Inc got its first bailout. "The world almost did come to a stop," he said. . .

Buffett called on banks to "get back to banking" and said an overwhelmingly number would "earn their way out" of the recession, even if stockholders don't go along for the ride.

Saying that "a bank that's going to go broke should be allowed to go broke," Buffett nevertheless added that the "paralysis of confidence" in the sector is "silly" because of safeguards such as deposit insurance.

Wired - A year ago, it was hardly unthinkable that a math wizard like David X. Li might someday earn a Nobel Prize. After all, financial economists-even Wall Street quants-have received the Nobel in economics before, and Li's work on measuring risk has had more impact, more quickly, than previous Nobel Prize-winning contributions to the field. Today, though, as dazed bankers, politicians, regulators, and investors survey the wreckage of the biggest financial meltdown since the Great Depression, Li is probably thankful he still has a job in finance at all. Not that his achievement should be dismissed. He took a notoriously tough nut-determining correlation, or how seemingly disparate events are related-and cracked it wide open with a simple and elegant mathematical formula, one that would become ubiquitous in finance worldwide.

For five years, Li's formula, known as a Gaussian copula function, looked like an unambiguously positive breakthrough, a piece of financial technology that allowed hugely complex risks to be modeled with more ease and accuracy than ever before. With his brilliant spark of mathematical legerdemain, Li made it possible for traders to sell vast quantities of new securities, expanding financial markets to unimaginable levels.

His method was adopted by everybody from bond investors and Wall Street banks to ratings agencies and regulators. And it became so deeply entrenched-and was making people so much money-that warnings about its limitations were largely ignored.

Then the model fell apart. Cracks started appearing early on, when financial markets began behaving in ways that users of Li's formula hadn't expected. The cracks became full-fledged canyons in 2008-when ruptures in the financial system's foundation swallowed up trillions of dollars and put the survival of the global banking system in serious peril.

David X. Li, it's safe to say, won't be getting that Nobel anytime soon. One result of the collapse has been the end of financial economics as something to be celebrated rather than feared. And Li's Gaussian copula formula will go down in history as instrumental in causing the unfathomable losses that brought the world financial system to its knees.

Penelope Lemov, Governing - Many states have programs to target the street people who make up the bulk of the chronically homeless. Few have comprehensive plans for families that become homeless and fewer still, programs to help the children who get stuck in that precarious and vulnerable situation. The extent of the problem and the ranking of states in their approach to it are in a study by the National Center on Family Homelessness, "America's Youngest Outcasts." Connecticut comes out on top, followed closely by the tight group of New Englanders. Bottom of the heap: Texas. Close to bottom: Florida. As Ellen Bassuk, president of the center, noted, "Extreme poverty is the driving force behind homelessness, and the top 10 states had poverty levels that were half that of the bottom 10 states."

THE TENT CITY RETURNS
BREVITAS
MID EAST

Guardian, UK - A confidential EU report accuses the Israeli government of using settlement expansion, house demolitions, discriminatory housing policies and the West Bank barrier as a way of "actively pursuing the illegal annexation" of East Jerusalem. The document says Israel has accelerated its plans for East Jerusalem, and is undermining the Palestinian Authority's credibility and weakening support for peace talks. "Israel's actions in and around Jerusalem constitute one of the most acute challenges to Israeli-Palestinian peace-making," says the document, EU Heads of Mission Report on East Jerusalem.

HEALTH & SCIENCE

Tree Hugger - The Billings Gazette covered a recent report from Centers for Disease Control researchers, documenting that "just 1.4 percent of young children had elevated lead levels in their blood in 2004, the latest data available. That compares with almost 9 percent in 1988." Highest US childhood lead exposures were leaded gasoline and lead-based paint, both of which were phased out of commercial use, and/or mitigated, since the mid-1970's.

Think Progress - At a news conference promoting a Republican amendment to continue D.C.'s school voucher program, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) - a longtime cheerleader for vouchers - suggested that "If you send a kid to [public] school in D.C., chances are that they will end up in a gang rather than graduating." In fact, nearly 70 percent of D.C. students graduated last year, putting the District in line with the national average, while Sen. DeMint's home state of South Carolina had a graduation rate of almost 56 percent, the fourth worst in the nation.

MEDIA

A radical presidential candidate in El Salvador - Mauricio Funes - is a former CNN correspondent.

POLICE BLOTTER

Sheboygan Press - A 34-year-old Sheboygan man was charged after allegedly leaving his library card behind while stealing beer from a Plymouth tavern.

A New York man is claiming he was defrauded of almost $250,000 by a psychic who promised to create a golden statue to ward off negativity. It was the recurrent negativity that bothered him; he never go the statue.

RULES OF THUMB

I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the first and last ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can still raed it wouthit a porbelm. This is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

INDICATORS

Times, UK - One in seven people [in Britain] believe it is acceptable in some circumstances for a man to hit his wife or girlfriend if she is dressed in "sexy or revealing clothes in public", according to the findings of a survey. A similar number believed that it was all right for a man to slap his wife or girlfriend if she is "nagging or constantly moaning at him". The findings of the poll, conducted for the Home Office, also disclosed about a quarter of people believe that wearing sexy or revealing clothing should lead to a woman being held partly responsible for being raped or sexually assaulted. Although a majority of 1,065 people over 18 questioned last month believe that it is never acceptable to hit or slap a woman, the poll found that those aged 25-39 were more likely to consider that there were circumstances in which it was acceptable to hit or slap a woman.

Mass transit ridership was up last year to levels unseen since the 1950s.

Reuters - Temp payrolls are down by a quarter from a year ago, and have declined for 26 months in a row. In the recession of the 1980s -- the one many economists say most compares to the current situation -- temp employment fell by a third from peak to trough.

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