Undernews For 21 July 2009

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JULY 21

OBAMA'S CZARS SHORT CIRCUIT THE CONSTITUTION

Politico - President Barack Obama has kindled a firestorm on Capitol Hill by appointing an ever-expanding team of "czars" to help him deliver on campaign pledges as varied as reforming health care , achieving energy independence, combating climate change and thwarting cyberterrorism.

The president's czars often wield powers greater than those of Cabinet secretaries yet, quite unlike Cabinet secretaries and other high-ranking executive officers, the czars are not subject to Senate confirmation.

. . When the founders gathered at the Philadelphia State House in 1787 to draft a new constitution, their purpose was to create a new structure whose intersecting powers and intermingled functions would repudiate the English parliamentary system and its consolidation of power in the executive branch. Hence the advice and consent clause, which requires the president to obtain Senate approval for his principal appointments, including Cabinet secretaries, ambassadors and other high-ranking officers. This separation of executive and legislative powers was, for the founders, the cornerstone of the American constitutional edifice.

. . Congressional leaders from both parties are understandably troubled that Obama has installed his czars without the Senate's advice and consent. They see it as stripping them of their constitutional prerogatives and more ominously as an arrogation of power that could be a prologue to the now-familiar abuses of executive authority that characterized the previous administration.

. . Nothing in the Constitution expressly prevents the White House from tapping expert advisers to help him do his job. And the advice and consent clause, in particular, does not require confirmation for presidential advisers, nor has it been invoked in the past to derail czar appointments ever since they came into vogue in the last half-century.

COURT REBUKES GOVERNMENT OVER "SECRET LAW"

Secrecy News - "Government must operate through public laws and regulations" and not through "secret law," a federal appellate court declared in a decision last month. When our government attempts to do otherwise, the court said, it is emulating "totalitarian regimes."

The new ruling overturned the conviction of a defendant who had been found guilty of exporting rifle scopes in violation of the International Traffic in Arms Regulations. The court said that the government had failed to properly identify which items are subject to export control regulations, or to justify the criteria for controlling them. It said the defendant could not be held responsible for violating such vague regulations.

Accepting the State Department's claim of "authority to classify any item as a 'defense article' [thereby making it subject to export controls], without revealing the basis of the decision and without allowing any inquiry by the jury, would create serious constitutional problems," wrote Chief Judge Frank H. Easterbrook of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. . .

Normally, "A regulation is published for all to see," explained Judge Easterbrook, a Reagan appointee who is considered a judicial conservative. "People can adjust their conduct to avoid liability. [In contrast,] a designation by an unnamed official, using unspecified criteria, that is put in a desk drawer, taken out only for use at a criminal trial, and immune from any evaluation by the judiciary, is the sort of tactic usually associated with totalitarian regimes," he said.

URBAN FARMING GAINS STRENGTH

Culture Change - Will Allen is gaining national attention for Growing Power, a Milwaukee program that's growing food in the city for 10,000 urbanites (including schools and low-cost market baskets delivered to neighborhood drop off points); trains want-to-be growers in the ways of intensive farming on small plots; turns organic waste into rich soil; and employs local residents, including some from public-housing project.

In Seattle, a gardening twist on Match.com is expanding the reach of the urban-farming movement. Garden Share links homeowners with land available for planting with folks eager to grow food but lacking a place to do it.

. . Another option for urban farming is the city's Department of Neighborhoods P-Patch Program, which aims to "serve all citizens of Seattle with an emphasis on low-income and immigrant populations and youth." The p-patchers provide 7 to 10 tons of produce to food banks each year.

Additionally, the Seattle Market Gardens program provides veggie baskets to low-income neighborhoods. The produce comes from two community supported agriculture plots farmed by Seattle residents.

NO GEOGRAPHICAL LIMITS ON CIA ASSASSINATION PLAN

Stephen Webster, Raw Story - The Central Intelligence Agency's secret assassination squad was allowed to operate anywhere in the world, including the United States, according to a report in The Washington Post.

"The plan to deploy small teams of assassins grew out of the CIA's early efforts to battle al-Qaeda after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks," the paper reported. "A secret document known as a 'presidential finding' was signed by President George W. Bush that same month, granting the agency broad authority to use deadly force against bin Laden as well as other senior members of al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups."

Reporter Joby Warrick added: "The finding imposed no geographical limitations on the agency's actions, and intelligence officials have said that they were not obliged to notify Congress of each operation envisaged under the directive."

This revelation, buried in paragraph 12 of the Post's report, was highlighted by Talking Points Memo's Zachary Roth later in the afternoon.

"'No geographical limitations' presumably means that operations could potentially be carried out in countries, friendly or unfriendly, that are far from any war zone - including even the US itself," he opined. "And it seems likely that they would be carried out without notifying the foreign country in question.". . .

According to historian Christopher Andrew, under questioning by New York Times reporters and editors in 1975, President Gerald Ford explained that U.S. intelligence documents must not be revealed to the public because the revelations would "blacken the reputation of every President since Truman."

"Like what?" he was asked.

"Like assassinations!" replied Ford, who later insisted the comment be kept "off the record."

The discussion was held following Ford's recent receipt of the CIA inspector general's now-infamous report informally known as the "Family Jewels." It revealed hundreds of CIA indiscretions ranging from experimenting on soldiers and prisoners with illegal, hallucinogenic drugs to assassination plots against South American leftists.

"The Times group returned to their bureau for a spirited argument about whether they could pass up a story potentially so explosive," noted reporter Daniel Schorr. "Managing Editor E. C. Daniel called the White House in the hope of getting Nessen to ease the restriction from 'off-the-record' to 'deep background.' Nessen was more adamant than ever that the national interest dictated that the president's unfortunate slip be forgotten. Finally, Sulzberger cut short the debate, saying that, as the publisher, he would decide, and he had decided against the use of the incendiary information."

HOW CLIMATE AFFECTS THE ECONOMY

Morning Edition NPR - New research suggests that higher temperatures can have a damaging effect on the economies of poor countries. The study, by economists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, found that in years with higher temperatures, poor countries experienced significantly slower economic growth.

The research adds to an economic puzzle that dates back hundreds of years: Why do the poorer economies of the world tend to be in hot places, while the more successful economies are found in cooler climates?

The French writer Montesquieu wondered about it in the 1700s. Now there is significantly more data to work with. A graph of per-capita GDP and average temperature shows rich countries at one end - Norway, Germany, France and the U.S. - and poverty at the other end in Cambodia, Liberia and Congo.

Many researchers have written this off as a historical accident, perhaps a legacy of colonialism.

Ben Olken, an associate professor of economics at MIT, and his colleagues wanted to examine the temperature connection more closely. They decided that instead of comparing one country to another, they would look within countries. Did a hot year mean slower economic growth?

The answer appears to be yes. They found that for poor countries, an increase in annual average temperature by 1 degree centigrade corresponded to a 1.1 percent drop in per-capita gross domestic product. .

It's unclear exactly why temperature would have this effect. It might be that crop yields go down, or that disease is more of a problem. Or it might just be what you could call the "sloth" theory - it's hard to work when it's hot out. Who wants to mow the lawn in August?

BASEBALL BECOMES RESEGREGATED

Dave Zirin, Edge of Sports - There were as many African-American presidents at the All-Star Game as players in the starting lineups. Only the fourteen-year veteran Derek Jeter represented people of African descent. (Jeter, like Obama, is of mixed heritage.) Eighteen percent of the players in the All-Star Game were African-American, including game MVP Carl Crawford, but none were voted in by the fans to open the contest. Jeter is also the only African- American player in the starting lineups of the two marquee teams in Major League Baseball, the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox. The Red Sox in particular have become so bleached in recent years, you wonder if Red Sox Nation has a Whites Only sign on the front door. This is particularly notable considering that the Red Sox were the last team to integrate in Major League Baseball.

It sends a message throughout the land that America's pastime has reinstituted a de facto color line. Yes, Jackie Robinson's number is retired in every park, but also retired seems to be the historic place baseball has had in the African-American community. As African- American star pitcher C.C. Sabathia said in 2007, "I go back home to Vallejo, and the kids say, 'What's baseball?' It's not just an issue for my hometown, it's an issue for the whole country. I think Major League Baseball should do something about it. I don't know exactly what they could be doing, but I know it's not enough."

In the mid-1970s, African-Americans made up 27 percent of the players in the league. Today it stands at just over 8 percent. In the NCAA only 6 percent of the nearly 9,800 Division I baseball players are of African descent.

Every year I write about this issue, because every year the media assess this problem and get it terribly wrong. Jayson Love wrote on Bleacher Report, "More of the African American athletes whose future is in sports seem to opt for football or basketball over baseball, possibly because the sports have 'more action.'?"

Gerald Early, an African-American scholar, wrote, "Black Americans don't play major league baseball so much these days because they don't want to.". . .

Seattle's Garfield High baseball coach Tom Riley said, "Right now, if you're a black guy, it's not hip to play baseball."

All well-meaning commentaries; all wrong. It's not a question of action. It's a question of access. Baseball players now tend to come in two groups. There are Latino players, scouted before they are 10, signed into baseball academies before their sweet 16 and imported along a global pipeline until they are cast aside or make the majors. Then there are white players, who largely come from suburban backgrounds and college programs. Baseball--in the US context--has gone country club. Like golf and tennis, or their hemp-addled cousins in the X Games, they are sports that require serious bank for admission. In addition, you need parents with the leisure time to be involved. These sports just don't fit the reality for today's working families, black or white. . .

Major League Baseball has attempted to address the access question through a program it runs called RBI (Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities), but it has been like shoveling sand in the ocean. The greater problem is that our cities have become shells of their former selves. . .

Each city is also the site of a sparkling new baseball stadium, paid for in part or in full on the taxpayer dime. The irony has become a collective noose: fewer African-Americans play baseball because our cities are being strangled; our children are being fast-tracked to a ravenous prison industry; and no one has the time, money or will to organize a good old-fashioned game of baseball. . .

For African-Americans the national pastime is now past its time. The canary in the mine shift has fluttered to the ground. It would behoove us to notice.

GAMING THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM

James Crawford, President, Institute for Language and Education Policy in letter to Washington Post - Removing low scorers from the testing pool is an effortless way to raise average scores and create the illusion of progress for D.C. schools. But it prevents any fair comparison with test results from prior years.

Intensive teaching to the test, especially for students on the cusp of "proficiency," is even more pernicious. It destroys the validity of academic assessments, which are designed to sample a broad range of skills and knowledge. Narrowing instruction to items expected to be on the test is like holding a match under the thermostat. It produces misleading results, not to mention an impoverished curriculum.

Mayor Adrian M. Fenty and Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee have taken credit for what they call "steady gains" by students. But pumping up test scores by artificial means tells us nothing about whether children are learning.

It's too bad The Post relied on a euphemism -- "improved statistical housekeeping" -- to characterize these deceptive tactics. A more accurate description would be "gaming the system."

THE FRAUD OF MANDATORY ARBITRATION

Pam Martens, Counterpunch - For the past 18 years, a motley mix of corporate law firms, Wall Street powerhouses and private justice providers have been serving up false testimony to the highest court of our land that mandatory arbitration is "inexpensive, fast and fair" and a proper substitute for the public court system. And for 18 years a majority of the U.S. Supreme Court has been cozying up to these brazenly preposterous statements while gutting our Constitution's Seventh Amendment guarantee to a jury trial. In doing so, wittingly or unwittingly, the Supreme Court had aided and abetted the key linchpin of a wealth transfer system that has brought the nfation to its knees.

Today, everything from Wall Street brokerage accounts, employment contracts, credit cards, mortgages, even cell phone contracts have routinely removed the individual's constitutional right to file a claim in court to seek redress of a grievance or fraudulent action. Instead, the individual's claim is forced into one of the privately run arbitration organizations where conflicts are rampant, discovery is limited, and the right to appeal is typically impossible because the arbitrators are not required to explain the rationale for their decisions in writing.

In a saner era, these mandatory arbitration contracts would be thrown out by courts as contracts of adhesion because they were offered on a take it or leave it basis. Under any rational interpretation of contract law, contracts must be a meeting of the minds, freely entered into, between parties of equal bargaining power.

But just as profits have been privatized on Wall Street and losses socialized, the right to a jury trial in a court system paid for by individual taxpayers is now increasingly reserved for corporations, not people. It's a form of judicial apartheid not dissimilar to the way the Supreme Court rationalized the segregation of blacks in its Plessy v. Ferguson decision in 1896, promising "equal" facilities, just separate.

Last week, a lone female state attorney general put the lie to mandatory arbitration. And when she pulled back its dark curtain, what we saw was a grand theft of both justice and wealth perpetuated by the U.S. Supreme Court against the American people.

Lori Swanson, Attorney General of Minnesota, charged the National Arbitration Forum with consumer fraud, deceptive trade practices and false advertising. The National Arbitration Forum is a private justice provider that adjudicates upwards of 200,000 consumer claims a year and acknowledges that it has been appointed as the arbitrator in "hundreds of millions of contracts."

Swanson's lawsuit charges that the National Arbitration Forum, which masquerades as functioning like an independent judge and jury, is in fact financially shackled to debt collection law firms representing major credit card companies. . .

RECOVERED HISTORY: JFK WANTED FOREIGN POLICY PAPERS RELEASED AFTER ONLY 15 YEARS

Secrecy News - The latest volume of the Foreign Relations of the United States series, the official record of U.S. foreign policy, reflects events that took place from 1969 to 1972, or nearly forty years ago. This represents a continuing violation of a 1991 statute which requires the Secretary of State to publish FRUS "not more than 30 years after the events recorded." But even that seemingly unachievable goal is insufficiently ambitious, according to a 1961 directive issued by President John F. Kennedy.

"It has long been a point of pride of our government that we have made the historical record of our diplomacy available more promptly than any other nation in the world," President Kennedy wrote.

"In recent years the publication of the 'Foreign Relations' series has fallen farther and farther behind currency," he wrote back then. "The lag has now reached approximately twenty years. I regard this as unfortunate and undesirable. It is the policy of this Administration to unfold the historical record as fast and as fully as is consistent with national security and with friendly relations with foreign nations."

"In my view, any official should have a clear and precise case involving the national interest before seeking to withhold from publication documents or papers fifteen or more years old," President Kennedy concluded.

LIVING UNDER THE CLOUD OF CHROME

Jonathan Zittrain, LA Times - Earlier this month Google announced a new operating system called Chrome. It¹s meant to transform personal computers and handheld devices into single-purpose windows to the Web. This is part of a larger trend: Chrome moves us further away from running code and storing our information on our own PCs toward doing everything online - also known as in 'the cloud' - using whatever device is at hand.

. . The cloud, however, comes with real dangers. Some are in plain view. If you entrust your data to others, they can let you down or outright betray you. For example, if your favorite music is rented or authorized from an online subscription service rather than freely in your custody as a compact disc or an MP3 file on your hard drive, you can lose your music if you fall behind on your payments - or if the vendor goes bankrupt or loses interest in the service.

. . Worse, data stored online has less privacy protection both in practice and under the law.

. . Thanks in part to the Patriot Act, the federal government has been able to demand some details of your online activities from service providers ‹ and not to tell you about it.

. . The cloud can be even more dangerous abroad, as it makes it much easier for authoritarian regimes to spy on their citizens.

FEDERAL JUDGE SAYS CIA REPEATEDLY MISLED HIM

McClatchy Newspapers - A federal district judge ruled that the CIA repeatedly misled him in asserting that state secrets were involved in a 15-year-old lawsuit involving allegedly illegal wiretapping. U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth also ordered former CIA director George Tenet and five other CIA officials to explain their actions or face potential sanctions.

Lamberth also questioned the credibility of current CIA Director Leon Panetta , saying that Panetta's testimony in the case contained significant discrepancies, and rejected an Obama administration request that the case continue to be kept secret. He released hundreds of previously secret filings.

"The court does not give the government a high degree of deference because of its prior misrepresentations regarding the stated secrets privilege in this case," Lamberth wrote. "Although this case has been sealed since its inception to protect sensitive information, it is clear . . . that many of the issues are unclassified."

. . Lamberth said the agency refused to make the "basic acknowledgement" that the spy agency possesses eavesdropping equipment, even though this is information quickly available through a "public online encyclopedia." Lamberth also said that an unclassified declaration by Panetta "appears to significantly conflict with his classified declaration" over whether CIA eavesdropping technology is publicly known.

BREVITAS

CRASH TALK

NY Times - The anemic economy decimated state tax collections during the first three months of the year, according to a report by the Rockefeller Institute of Government. The drop in revenues was the steepest in the 46 years that quarterly data has been available. . . Over all, the report found that state tax collections dropped 11.7 percent in the first three months of 2009, compared with the same period last year. After adjusting for inflation, new changes in tax rates and other anomalies, the report found that tax revenues had declined in 47 of the 50 states in the quarter.

Matt Taibbi, Trueslant - So what's wrong with Goldman posting $3.44 billion in second-quarter profits, what's wrong with the company so far earmarking $11.4 billion in compensation for its employees? What's wrong is that this is not free-market earnings but an almost pure state subsidy.

Last year, when Hank Paulson told us all that the planet would explode if we didn't fork over a gazillion dollars to Wall Street immediately, the entire rationale not only for TARP but for the whole galaxy of lesser-known state crutches and safety nets quietly ushered in later on was that Wall Street, once rescued, would pump money back into the economy, create jobs, and initiate a widespread recovery. This, we were told, was the reason we needed to pilfer massive amounts of middle-class tax revenue and hand it over to the same guys who had just blown up the financial world. We'd save their asses, they'd save ours. That was the deal.

It turned out not to happen that way. We constructed this massive bailout infrastructure, and instead of pumping that free money back into the economy, the banks instead simply hoarded it and ate it on the spot, converting it into bonuses. So what does this Goldman profit number mean? This is the final evidence that the bailouts were a political decision to use the power of the state to redirect society's resources upward, on a grand scale. It was a selective rescue of a small group of chortling jerks who must be laughing all the way to the Hamptons every weekend about how they fleeced all of us at the very moment the game should have been up for all of them. . .

Washington Post - The White House announced that, as expected, Robert D. Hormats, vice chairman of Goldman Sachs (International) and formerly deputy U.S. trade representative, has been tapped to be undersecretary of state for economic, energy and agricultural affairs. He was also assistant secretary of state for economic and business affairs in the Reagan administration, deputy assistant secretary of state in the Carter administration and a senior international economic affairs aide on Nixon's National Security Council.

Washington Post - Eighteen highway rest stops in Virginia were scheduled to shut down, the latest step in the state's struggle to close a $2.6 billion shortfall in transportation revenues.

Kennebec Journal, - In a sign of the economic times, the Franklin County, Maine, Children's Task Force has given its last welcome-baby bag at Franklin Memorial Hospital. For 20 years, all first-time parents at Franklin Memorial received a handmade diaper-bag tote filled with baby essentials and parenting information. But with a drop in state and private funds, the Task Force has no money left to provide the gifts. The totes were sewn by Belle Foss, of Temple, using donated material. They were packed with a baby quilt made by local quilters, diapers, baby toiletries, pacifiers, socks, washcloth, receiving blanket and a new outfit. In the past, these items were donated -- but now, even the quilters have stopped providing their cozy blankets.

Wall Street Journal - During the boom years, Las Vegas wasn't just a place where gamblers could hit the jackpot, but where hard-working hotel maids and cocktail waitresses could, too. The city offered something almost no other place in America did: upward mobility for the working class.

The recession has jolted Las Vegas in a fundamental way. Like other job-creating cities in the Sunbelt, Las Vegas saw its population, income levels and housing prices surge over the past decade. And like those cities -- including Phoenix, Orlando and San Diego -- it's been battered in the bust.

But by many measures, Las Vegas's rise and fall has been more dramatic than most. Last year, Clark County's population declined for the first time in more than two decades. More than 10,000 people left Las Vegas between July 2007 and July 2008, according to Keith Schwer, director for the Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Nevada Las Vegas. The unemployment rate in the metropolitan area tripled from 4% in May 2007 to just over 12.3% in June 2009, higher than the national rate of 9.5%. And after the median price of existing homes rose by 122% in sales between 2000 and 2006 -- more than double the national rise of 49% -- sale prices fell by 30% between last year and this year.

The big bet that fueled Las Vegas's growth for so long is the same one that's now going bad: tourism. Vegas expanded into the lucrative market for business meetings and conventions, building massive exhibition halls and new hotels and casinos. Construction jobs multiplied and the housing market bubbled over. Now that tourism and business travel have collapsed, Vegas has little else to cushion the blow.

Washington Post - Cash-strapped states are increasingly turning to alternative sentencing methods and to streamlined probation and parole as a way to keep low-level offenders out of prison and in their communities.

The alternative sentencing methods have been in limited use for years, often with little funding and less publicity. But recently they have gained in popularity across the country and have attracted interest from lawmakers. The measures include drug courts, which allow low-level drug offenders to avoid prison time through treatment and intense, personal, weekly intervention by a judge, and at least 500 courts for people arrested for driving while intoxicated. Drivers avoid jail by attending regular alcohol-treatment classes and by submitting to random tests. States have also begun to shorten probation and to reduce the number of people sent to prison for technical violations, such as missing appointments. Some states are also more readily granting parole to prisoners as they become eligible, reversing a trend that kept even parole-eligible inmates locked up longer.

CORPORADOS

Wall Street Journal - Executives and other highly compensated employees now receive more than one-third of all pay in the U.S., according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of Social Security Administration data . . . Highly paid employees received nearly $2.1 trillion of the $6.4 trillion in total U.S. pay in 2007, the latest figures available. The compensation numbers don't include incentive stock options, unexercised stock options, unvested restricted

THE MIX

Lost in the debate about gay marriage is that it is overwhelmingly a freedom of religion issue. While the state may have the right to define marriage, the opposition to gays being included comes almost entirely from certain religious groups. For example, 44% of the contributions to overturn Maine's gay marriage provision comes from the Portland Catholic dicese and the Knights of Columbus. Another 9% comes from the rightwing religious group, Focus on Family. Further, the arguments against gay marriage are almost exclusively those of Catholic or fundamentalist Christian religions. Thus for any state - or the federal government - to ban gay marriage is to establish a hierarchy of religions in this country, which is unconstitutional. For example, a gay marriage ban officially places the Catholic Church above Unitarians or fundamentalist Christianity over Quakerism. That's against the law.

While waiting for a lawyer to take on that case, there are some other legal problems with gay marriage. . . Boston Globe: Episcopal bishops in New England and Iowa, the only parts of the nation where same-sex marriage is legal, are preparing for a wave of requests . . . In interviews, none of several bishops interviewed said they were immediately prepared to allow priests to officiate at same-sex weddings, which remain prohibited by the canons of the Episcopal Church. But, citing the denomination's decision Friday to allow bishops in states where same-sex marriage is legal to "provide generous pastoral response'' to same-sex couples, the bishops indicated that they are looking for ways to allow priests to at least celebrate, if not perform, gay nuptials in church. "The problem is the prayer book says that marriage must conform to the laws of the state and the canons of the church, but if we respond to the laws of the state, we are in violation of the canons of the church,'' said Bishop Stephen T. Lane of Maine, where the situation is further complicated by a possible referendum to overturn same-sex marriage. "We're trying to respond pastorally, but not to get so far beyond the bounds of what the church understands that our clergy are just sort of hanging out there.'' Lane also said bishops of New England, where same-sex marriage has been approved in every state but Rhode Island, are hoping to reach a common plan, because "we don't want people running back and forth between the New England states.''

POLICE BLOTTER

Washington Post - Violent crime has plummeted in the Washington area and in major cities across the country, a trend criminologists describe as baffling and unexpected. The District, New York and Los Angeles are on track for fewer killings this year than in any other year in at least four decades. Boston, San Francisco, Minneapolis and other cities are also seeing notable reductions in homicides. "Experts did not see this coming at all," said Andrew Karmen, a criminologist and professor of sociology at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York. In the District and Prince George's County, homicides are down about 17 percent this year. . .

ECO CLIPS

INDIA'S LOW COST ELECTRIC CAR

SUSTAIN YOURSELF

Guardian, UK - The government announced the formal go-ahead for four environmentally friendly eco-towns across England. . . The ecotown project is intended to meet housing needs and tackle climate change, with as many as 10 environmentally friendly settlements built by 2020 What makes an eco-town: community heat sources, charging points for electric cars . . . all homes within 10 minutes walk of frequent public transport and everyday services . . . parks, playgrounds and gardens to make up 40% of towns . . . zero carbon buildings including shops, restaurants and schools . . . car journeys to make up less than half of all journeys . . homes fitted with smart meters plus solar and wind generation . . . residents can sell surplus energy back to the grid

HOME FUNERALS BECOMING MORE COMMON

DRUG BUSTS

Register Guard - Oregon is about to become the first Western state to permit its farmers to grow industrial hemp. But there are a couple problems to be confronted before Oregon becomes a Hemptopia by the Pacific: It's still an illegal crop, according to the federal government. . A spokesman for Gov. Ted Kulongoski said he plans to sign Oregon's new hemp legislation, Senate Bill 676, into law. When that happens, Oregon will become the seventh state to allow farmers to grow hemp. And it will be the only one in the continental United States west of the Rockies. Hawaii's governor signed a similar law this month, and Maine's governor did the same in June.

CBS - Over the last several years, without many people realizing it, the U.S. government has changed the focus of its anti-drug efforts, deemphasizing marijuana in favor of prescription drugs. A CBS News survey of government and nonprofit anti-drug groups has found a retreat from anti-marijuana campaigns over the past several years as prescription and over the counter drug abuse has grown amongst teens. In fact, the Partnership for a Drug Free America, the nation's largest creator of anti-drug messages, hasn't produced a single anti-marijuana public service advertisement since 2005. The change comes as a result of the decline in marijuana use amongst teens, and growing worry over the abuse of prescription drugs. Marijuana use has been declining for 10 years and past-month use is down 25 percent since 2001 according to the largest tracking study in the U.S., "Monitoring the Future" by the University of Michigan. Meanwhile prescription drug abuse has held steady over the past five years according to the Partnership for a Drug-Free America, with nearly one in five teens (19 percent) abusing prescription medications to get high.

Science Daily - Injections of THC, the active principle of cannabis, eliminate dependence on opiates (morphine, heroin) in rats deprived of their mothers at birth. The findings could lead to therapeutic alternatives to existing substitution treatments.

FREEDOM & JUSTICE

Washington Times - For more than a month, two U.S. citizens who worked for contractors in Iraq were held in prison with no formal charges against them. They were pressed to sign an Iraqi government statement but refused, their attorneys say, and waited 43 days for their day in court before being released on bond after a hearing in Iraq's Central Criminal Court over the weekend. Yet their attorneys say they still do not know specifically why they were detained. The men weren't being held by Iraqi authorities but rather by the FBI in a U.S. military prison, prompting allegations from their attorneys that American due-process laws weren't being followed. "When American citizens are held by American authorities, the Constitution and Bill of Rights all apply regardless of the technical circumstances," said Tim Haake, a former two-star Army general and lawyer who is helping to represent the two detained men, Micah Milligan and Jason Jones.

HEALTH

USA Today - The number of Hispanic workers who die on the job has risen, even as the overall number of workplace deaths has declined, according to federal statistics. Hispanic worker deaths increased from 533 in 1992 to 937 in 2007 - a 76% jump. In the same period, total fatalities in all jobs nationwide fell from 6,217 to 5,657, according to the data. The 2007 tally, the latest available from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, followed a record 990 Hispanic deaths in 2006.

INDICATORS

Fox News - The typical driver in Sioux Falls will go 13.5 years between collisions; that's more than two and a half times as long as the 5.1 years for Washington, D.C. drivers. The results are part of Allstate's fifth annual "America's Most Improved Driving City" report, which ranks the 200 largest U.S. cities based on collision frequency. Among the most-improved cities were Alexandria, Virginia; Lexington-Fayette, Kentucky; and Arlington, Texas. . . The Safest Driving Top Ten: 1. Sioux Falls, SD 2. Fort Collins, CO 3. Chattanooga, TN 4. Cedar Rapids, IA 5. Knoxville, TN 6. Fort Wayne, IN 7. Lexington-Fayette, KY 8. Eugene, OR 9. Boise, ID 10. Colorado Springs, CO. . . Bottom of the List - Riskiest Driving Cities: 1. Washington, D.C. 2. Baltimore, MD 3. Glendale, CA 4. Hartford, CT 5. Newark, NJ 6. Philadelphia, PA 7. Elizabeth, NJ 8. Providence, RI 9. San Francisco, CA 10. Los Angeles, CA

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