x/p'd from Constellations

Streams and mountains never stay the same.

(Gary Snyder, from Mountains and Rivers Without End, 1996)

An historic agreement to restore water flows for salmon in the San Joaquin River below Friant Dam near Fresno while undertaking one of the West's largest river restoration efforts was announced today [Wed, Sept 13] by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Friant Water Users Authority (FWUA) and U.S. Departments of the Interior and Commerce.

The settlement, filed this morning in U.S. District Court in Sacramento, ends an 18-year legal dispute over the operation of Friant Dam and resolves longstanding legal claims brought by a coalition of conservation and fishing groups led by NRDC. It provides for substantial river channel improvements and sufficient water flow to sustain a salmon fishery upstream from the confluence of the Merced River tributary while providing water supply certainty to Friant Division water contractors.

Historically, Central California's San Joaquin River supported large salmon populations, including the southernmost Chinook salmon population in North America. Since Friant Dam became fully operational in the late 1940s, approximately 60 miles of the river have been dried up in most years, eliminating salmon above the river's confluence with the Merced River.

The Settlement Agreement is based on two goals and objectives:

1) A restored river with continuous flows to the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta and naturally reproducing populations of Chinook salmon.

2) A water management program to minimize water supply impacts to San Joaquin River water users.

The settling parties have carefully studied San Joaquin River restoration for many years, and as part of the settlement have identified the actions and highest priority projects necessary to achieve the restoration goal. These include expanding channel capacity, improving levees, and making modifications necessary to provide fish passage through or around certain structures in the river channel. The settlement identifies a number of funding sources to support implementation of these projects, including current environmental contributions from farmers and cities served by Friant Dam, state bond initiatives and authorization for federal contributions. NRDC link

The federal government's assumption of 'responsibility' for storing radioactive waste forms one of the nuclear industry's largest subsidies, enabling it to produce power, profit & toxic wastes without the worry of finding a solution to a problem that has eluded scientists ever since the dawn of the nuclear age: what do with all those waste materials for thousands of years. The status of the proposed Yucca Mountain repository (more info at Citizen Alert) is up in the air with no realistic opening date in sight (officially it's Mar 31, 2017), and a plan for "temporary storage" at a private facicilty on a small Goshute Indian reservation in Utah fell apart last week (in part due to a recently designated wilderness area!) when "the U.S. Interior Department on Thursday rejected the lease to build the facility." Power plants across the country are now storing the waste they generate on-site, both in pools which are filling up, and in 'dry cask storage' which has led citizens to question if those plants are little more than terror targets awaiting an incident, and are demanding that the plants' safety plans account for a terrorist threat.

Call to Action: August 6-9, 2006

From Hiroshima to Yucca Mountain to the Middle East: Stop Bechtel

NO NUKES! NO WARS! NO PROFITEERS! Support Indigenous Rights!

Between August 6 and 9, the anniversaries of the U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, demand an end to the war in Iraq, no military attacks on Iran or North Korea, and the global abolition of nuclear weapons, starting with our own. This year, we call on groups to protest at the corporate offices of Bechtel, the world's number-one nuclear profiteer, and at nuclear facilities everywhere. Sixty-one years after the U.S. killed tens of thousands of civilians by dropping nuclear bombs on two densely populated cities, our aim is to expose the continuing hypocrisy of the U.S. nuclear double standard and to directly confront the U.S. corporations who are perpetuating and profiting from a worldwide nuclear crisis and the war in Iraq.

August 9 has also been declared by the United Nations as the International Day of the World’s Indigenous People. Indigenous peoples have often borne the brunt of nuclear devastation. In the United States alone, Native Americans have seen their land stolen to build nuclear infrastructure, mined for uranium, and bombed with test weapons; the U.S. government continues to push forward with plans to store massive amounts of highly radioactive waste beneath Yucca Mountain in Nevada, a site sacred to the Western Shoshone. We have an opportunity to make the connections between nuclear proliferation and attacks on indigenous rights.

Confusion reigns, allegations fly: a nation waits in limbo.

XicanoPwr has a great diary with background on the election, & more on the irregularities/fraud allegations.

Discovery of 3.5 million uncounted ballots in Mexico's disputed presidential election cast doubt Tuesday on early projections showing conservative Felipe Calderón in the lead, raising fears of prolonged uncertainty and political unrest. (cont.)

Imagine your wet dream come true & the Democrats seize control of both houses of Congress this fall. Investigations are possible! Take it one step further & a Democrat is elected to the White House in 2008. Now what? Who are the democratic establishment consultants and advisors vying for policy jobs?

We already know about Clinton Administration spinmeister Mike McCurry, who's been feverishly running a dis-info campaign, Hands off the Internet, against net-neutrality, using the libertarian appeal (& old Republican theme) against government regulation:

In Coney Island they have a sign hanging
Outside one of those spooky rides
That reads: Come inside and see the
Invisible man

--Victor Hernandez Cruz, from Tropicalization, Reed, Cannon & Johnson, 1976

So, what are you?
"Yo Soy Boricua, Pa'Que Tu Lo Sepas" ("I'm Boricua, Just So You Know")

The Independent Film Channel last night aired the premier of Rosie's Perez' (Do the Right Thing, White Men Can't Jump, Fearless) doumentary on Puerto Rican political and cultural history, Yo Soy Boricua, Pa'Que Tu Lo Sepas that artfully weaves her personal history to tell the story of the island's people. It's an excellent film that deserves to be seen by all Americans, not just a 'niche' Puerto Rican & Latino audience.

The camera often focuses on Perez (who also directs) with her family & friends (the film doesn't talk about 'family values,' it shows them) who discuss the culture, history, and people of Puerto Rico and those who migrated to New York. Jimmy Smits does voice-over narration for the other segments. The personal and historical segments alternate to create a rich tapestry where the personal is political. One of my favorite moments in the film is a story of when, after Perez has reluctantly joined in a civil disobedience action at the United Nations, fear and panic sets in as they're herded into the paddywagon. "What's going to happen?" She calms down after one of her elderly fellow protesters lets her know that this is about the 20th or 22nd time she has been arrested for trespass & everyone had a good laugh at popping Perez' CD-arrest cherry.

In these days of 'immigration debate' & demonizing the brown 'other,' Yo Soy Boricua, Pa'Que Tu Lo Sepas plunges headfirst into issues of race, ethnicity, skin color, language, cheap labor, culture in the melting pot, and political amnesia. A defacto colony (formally a Commonwealth) following the Spanish American war, Puerto Ricans are citizens of the US (Wilson wanted their bodies for WW I) unable to vote for the President that might send them to war. Brown square pegs trying to fit into the black & white holes of American race consciousness.

Shocking, forgotten incidents of history are remembered:

Yesterday morning, Caracas awoke to the news in the Venezuelan daily paper, 2001, that US intelligence sources had reported the existence of a secret agreement between Iran and Venezuela whereby Iran will be sending nuclear weapons to Venezuela and Cuba.

Michael Fox of Venezuelanalysis.com sheds light on Tuesday's headlines in his article A U.S. Intelligence Hoax on Venezuela?

Curiously, yesterday’s 2001 article, which caused the stir, is no longer available online.  In its place is an article on the Minister’s reaction.  A reaction, which has been covered by over 80 media outlets around the world.  But according to the AP, which reported only a tiny blurb on the piece, “other papers did not carry the [original] report and the newspaper did not give any details about how it obtained the information.”

Given recent announcements that the Pentagon is stepping up its Info-wars in the foreign press, it's hard not to see this as a black propaganda campaign designed to resonate throughout Latin America & to blow-back through the US media, planting a blatantly false accusation in the underbelly of America's memory. No matter that there's no evidence that Iran has its own nukes, let alone ones to ship abroad. Fox locates a shady source for the article's assertions:

Most people have heard by now of the $385 million DHS contract to Halliburton to build immigration detention facilities. Just when I think my outrage meter is broken, I read Jeffrey St. Clair's tale (from his book Grand Theft Pentagon of no-bid DHS contracts, including some given to Native American cut-out corporations in Alaska which are then sub-contracted out to the usual Pentagon trough-feeders. Brokered by Ted Stevens. More big pork $$$.

Their campaign is starting now. It's time to let your senators know how you feel about selling nuclear technology to India. It's far from a  done deal; we can stop this!

1st Amendment case, from the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom's press release:

Another comment turned diary, spurred by Booman's Black Male Unemployment: End the Drug War.

I've gotten through the first 4 parts of Catherine Austin Fitts' 6 part series, Dillon, Read & Co. Inc. and the Aristocracy of Prison Profits, which is a wide-ranging insider's look at the inter-relations to the drug war & prison populations between stock market investors, government officials, private prison contractors, black-market drug money laundering, investment & mortgage bankers, HUD contracts, Iran-Contra figures & 'methods,' & corporate leveraged buy-outs. She names names, starting with Part 1's title, "Brady, Bush, Bechtel & 'the Boys' [CIA]."

Part 3 talks about how one private prison firm,

Cornell Corrections was created to take advantage of plans to privatize the government’s prison operations. The War on Drugs and its related mandatory sentencing were fueling an explosion in the U.S. prison population. The construction and management of new prison facilities was potentially big business for the construction industry -- firms like Brown & Root [now Halliburton's notorious KBR, who just received a contract to build immigration detention facilities for DHS] who Cornell used to build their first detention center -- and those who financed them -- like Dillon Read.   {snip}

Prison stocks also are valued on a “per bed” basis-- which is based on the number of beds provided and the profit per bed. “Per bed” is really a euphemism for people who are sentenced to be housed in their prison.

. . . for every contract Cornell got to house one prisoner, at that time, their stock went up in value by an average of $24,261. According to prevailing business school philosophy, this is the stock market’s current present value of the future flow of profit flows generated through the management of each prisoner. This, for example, is why longer mandatory sentences are worth so much to private prison stocks. A prisoner in jail for twenty years has a twenty-year cash flow associated with his incarceration, as opposed to one with a shorter sentence or one eligible for an early parole. This means that we have created a significant number of private interests -- investment firms, banks, attorneys, auditors, architects, construction firms, real estate developers, bankers, academics, investors among them -- who have a vested interest in increasing the prison population and keeping people behind bars as long as possible.   link

The article is fine example of whistle-blowing; she's a Republican financial conservative. Her bio reads:

This was originally dropped in Suskind's CENSORED NEWS BREAKS THROUGH - AIR WAR ON IRAQ this morning:

where after complimenting him on his piece, I briefly mention (again) that the 'story' of the hidden (neglected) air war in Iraq began when the US started enforcing the 'no-fly' zones & littering the ground with depleted uranium in the 90's.

The air war did burst into the headlines this morning:

US launches largest air assault since invasion of Iraq: google news search

but the sad thing is that even when reported, few will give a fuck.

Promoted by Steven D.

Briefly, for those of you still following, via TalkLeft:

Judge Warns Prosecutors in Moussaoui Trial

"I must warn the government it is treading on delicate legal ground here," U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema said at the conclusion of the day's testimony, after the jury had left the courtroom. "I don't know of any case where a failure to act is sufficient for the death penalty as a matter of law."

The key issue in Moussaoui's sentencing trial has been his failure to disclose his terrorist ties to federal agents when he was arrested in August 2001 on immigration violations.     {snip}

Both sides agree Moussaoui lied to the FBI, but they differ on what Moussaoui was legally obliged to do given the Fifth Amendment's guarantee against self-incrimination. Prosecutors argue that once Moussaoui agreed to talk to federal agents, he was required to tell the truth - to confess his ties to al-Qaida and his plans to fly an airplane into the White House.

The defense argues Moussaoui was not required to confess.

The issue is crucial because, to obtain the death penalty, prosecutors must prove that federal agents would have prevented at least one death on Sept. 11 if Moussaoui had not lied. Their case would be much easier if that means Moussaoui also was obligated to disclose his al-Qaida membership and terrorist training.    {snip}

Brinkema made her comments as she rejected a defense motion for a mistrial. Moussaoui's lawyers were angry because they believed a question from prosecutor David Novak implied to the jury that Moussaoui had an obligation to speak to FBI agents even after Moussaoui had invoked his right to a lawyer two days into questioning by the FBI. Agents immediately stopped questioning him at that point.

Brinkema said she did not feel a mistrial was warranted because she struck Novak's question from the record as soon as he asked it.

The DoJ's overreach here is astounding. The implications of their argument for the death penalty in this case is plain scary. In the prosecutor's words from his opening statement, "He lied, and 3,000 people died" & so must be murdered by the State, despite there being no evidence that Moussaoui knew about or participated in the 9/11 attacks, or had any direct contact with the 19 hijackers. As Jeralynn points out, Michael Fortier, who had demonstrable foreknowledge of the Oaklahoma City bombing, received only 12 years.

Who will stand up for Rachel Corrie's voice?

The award winning London production of of "My Name Is Rachel Corrie" will not be coming to NY after producers succumbed to political pressure. Given the current discussions here, I want to make clear that to my mind this isn't a free speech issue, or even an instance of "censorship," but a business decision that offers a clear-cut example of the cultural struggles here in the US to give the voices of dissent a role on the stage -- literally in this case -- of public discourse.