The 14th Amendment

I don't do this often, but I think I might agree with morons (or whores, depending on your view of the sincerity of their publicly proclaimed positions). Maybe Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham and Jon Kyl and so many other conservative dumbasses and lunatics are right: Maybe it is time to review the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. In fact, quit pussy-footing around the issue, bitches. Quit your cowardly floating of trial ballons and checking of polls. Let's repeal the fucker.

After all, why should U.S. citizenship be accorded to just anyone? To people who, through no effort or accomplishment of their own, just happen to be born within the borders of the United States? Since when do we just give away shit for free in this country? Citizenship isn't a right, it's a privilege. It's a responsibility that requires knowledge of our history and hard work to stay informed about issues affecting this great nation today. How could an uninformed citizenry possibly be effective stewards of our democracy? How could an ignorant, disinterested electorate keep its leadership honest and strike fear into a corrupt government? How could a lazy, apathetic public be anything more than a punch line, allowing thieving criminals with their hands on the levers of power to begin their lies with the phrase, "The American people ..."?

Citizenship is a serious responsibility that shouldn't be trusted to just anyone. If you can't be bothered to stay informed about the issues facing this country and protect it from those who would do it harm for personal gain; if you are too busy to learn the history of the nation you purport to love; if you are here just to take what you can from this country for yourself with no regard for it or anyone else who lives here; if you can't name the three branches of our government; if you couldn't pass what amounts to a high school civics pop quiz; then please explain to me why you deserve citizenship.

And don't hand me any of that shit about "my parents were here legally." This isn't about their citizenship, it's about yours. So what have you done to deserve to be an American citizen? And remember, if we repeal the 14th Amendment, being born here ain't gonna cut it no more.

If the extent of your commitment to this country is to fly American flags on your vehicle, find somewhere else to live. If you think patriotism is a weapon for divisiveness in a country founded on the virtue of tolerance by people fleeing persecution, if you think loving your country means hating others, get the fuck out of my country. You're too fucking stupid to live here.

No more free rides and no more getting credit for your parents' circumstances. If you want to be an American citizen, earn it. It's the American way.

The best healthcare in the world

This nauseating affront to basic human decency is brought to you by the free-market, for-profit healthcare system.

Kyler Van Nocker’s story shows that even 5-year-old kids are not exempt from this insurance company abuse. Van Nocker has neuroblastoma, which is a very rare form of childhood cancer that targets the nervous system and creates tumors throughout the body.

Due to successful treatment in 2007, Van Nocker’s cancer went into remission, giving him 12 months of pain-free life. Unfortunately, in Sept. 2008, the cancer returned, and Van Nocker was once again in need of treatment. Unfortunately, his health insurer, HealthAmerica, refused to pay for one form of treatment doctors believe could save his life (MIBG treatment) because they consider it “investigational/experimental” since it has yet to be approved by the FDA.

Yet in April 2008, the insurer approved cheaper treatment for Van Nocker that was also “experimental,” prompting Philadelphia Daily News columnist Ronnie Polaneczky to ask, “So why, pray tell, is HealthAmerica playing the ‘experimental therapy’ card in the case of the MIBG treatment Kyler now needs? Gee, money couldn’t have anything to do with the decision, could it?”

And remember: this child has health insurance. But in 21st century America, there is little difference between having and needing to use health insurance and having no coverage at all.

I have a feeling the revolution just got moved up a day, and that Kyler Van Nocker’s family and friends have just been "radicalized."

Cadmium

Corporations manufacture items in China and then ship them to the United States to sell rather than just make and sell them here for a reason: It's cheaper. They can pay the kind of exploitive wages that would get them thrown in prison here, and they can use whatever cheap shit they want in their products. Sure, the American public finally caught on to lead and now manufacturers are being forced to phase it out, but they were selling their lead-laced shit for years. They had a great, extremely profitable run.

Now they've turned to some shit that's so fucking toxic that we may one day look back fondly on the days when they were poisoing us with something as relatively benign as lead. Say hello to cadmium.

Barred from using lead in children's jewelry because of its toxicity, some Chinese manufacturers have been substituting the more dangerous heavy metal cadmium in sparkling charm bracelets and shiny pendants being sold throughout the United States, an Associated Press investigation shows.

The most contaminated piece analyzed in lab testing performed for the AP contained a startling 91 percent cadmium by weight. The cadmium content of other contaminated trinkets, all purchased at national and regional chains or franchises, tested at 89 percent, 86 percent and 84 percent by weight. The testing also showed that some items easily shed the heavy metal, raising additional concerns about the levels of exposure to children.

Cadmium is a known carcinogen. Like lead, it can hinder brain development in the very young, according to recent research. [...]

Some of the most troubling test results were for bracelet charms sold at Walmart, at the jewelry chain Claire's and at a dollar store. High amounts of cadmium also were detected in "The Princess and The Frog" movie-themed pendants.

"There's nothing positive that you can say about this metal. It's a poison," said Bruce A. Fowler, a cadmium specialist and toxicologist with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. On the CDC's priority list of 275 most hazardous substances in the environment, cadmium ranks No. 7.

Jewelry industry veterans in China say cadmium has been used in domestic products there for years. Zinc, the metal most cited as a replacement for lead in imported jewelry being sold in the United States, is a much safer and nontoxic alternative. But the jewelry tests conducted for AP, along with test findings showing a growing presence of cadmium in other children's products, demonstrate that the safety threat from cadmium is being exported.

A patchwork of federal consumer protection regulations does nothing to keep these nuggets of cadmium from U.S. store shelves. If the products were painted toys, they would face a recall. If they were industrial garbage, they could qualify as hazardous waste. But since there are no cadmium restrictions on jewelry, such items are sold legally.

While the agency in charge of regulating children's products, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, has cracked down on the dangers posed by lead and products known to have killed children, such as cribs, it has never recalled an item for cadmium — even though it has received scattered complaints based on private test results for at least the past two years.

There is no definitive explanation for why children's jewelry manufacturers, virtually all from China in the items tested, are turning to cadmium. But a reasonable double whammy looms: Cadmium prices have plummeted as factories grasp for substitutes now that lead is heavily regulated under the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act of 2008.

Nope, no definitive explantion. But do you think that "it's cheaper" reason I mentioned above might have something to do with it?

But it looks like federal regulators have taken notice.

Federal and state watchdogs opened a new front Monday in the campaign to
keep poisons out of Chinese imports, warning Asian manufacturers not to
substitute other toxins for lead in children's jewelry and beginning an inquiry
into cadmium found in the products around the United States.

Regulators reacted swiftly to an Associated Press investigation reporting that some Chinese manufacturers have been using cadmium in place of lead in children's charm bracelets and pendants, sometimes at extraordinarily high levels. Congress clamped down on lead in those products in 2008, but cadmium is even more harmful.

I just hope they plan to do more than warn.

The best healthcare in the world

 

Meet six-year-old Madison Leuchtmann. Madison was born with bilateral artesia, meaning she was born without ear canals. She needs a hearing implant in order to recognize sounds. Without it, she could lose her hearing.

Madison's family has health insurance, but their insurer, Cigna, refuses to cover the $20,000 cost of the implant. The company claims that the device is not medically necessary. Madison's pediatrician, Dr. Randall Clary, disagrees, saying, “This is obviously medically necessary. You have a child that has no ear canals!”

In addition, as reported by Think Progress, Cigna said in a written statement to the local news station Fox 2, “It is not unusual for commercial benefit plans to exclude hearing assisted devices.” Get it? There's nothing unusual about this situation. This is standard operating procedure.

But there is a silver lining in this horrible mess: At least it's an employee of a for-profit health insurance company -- and not a government bureaucrat -- coming between this six-year-old girl and her doctor.

It seems that if you need to use your health insurance, having health insurance is not much different than not having it. And remember, Cigna is doing this while the nation's attention is focused on the for-profit health insurance industry, and while legislation that could put them out of business is being crafted in Congress.

Imagine what Cigna and other for-profit insurance companies will do when no one is looking.

Why do we always have to shame these amoral scumfucks into doing the right thing? That this is a necessary and oft-repeated step in the process of getting healthcare is evidence that the for-profit health insurance system Just. Doesn't. Work.

Their real goal

with programs like NCLB, "issues" like gay marriage, networks like Fox News and amendments like this is to try to keep us ignorant. The less informed and more distracted from the real issues we are, the more crimes they can get away with.

Closing

All branches of the Free Library of Philadelphia, due to budget constraints, unless state legislators take action. Too bad legislators like tax cuts more than providing services for their constituents. Too bad more rich people don't use libraries.

In a related matter, I wonder if the Philadelphia Eagles have ponied up the $3 million they owe the city or if team owner Jeff Lurie is going to continue dicking around in the courts and paying well-heeled attorneys while the people who have supported his team for so long lose yet another service as the city goes broke.

Gold standard

Horrible.

A reef of gold buried beneath this vast, parched grassland arcs across some of the world's poorest countries. Where the ore is rich, industrial mines carve it out. Where it is not, the poor sift the earth.

These hard-working miners include many thousands of children. They work long hours at often dangerous jobs in hundreds of primitive mines scattered through the West African bush. Some are as young as 4 years old.

In a yearlong investigation, The Associated Press visited six of these bush mines in three West African countries and interviewed more than 150 child miners. The agency's journalists watched as gold mined by children was bought by itinerant traders. And through interviews and customs documents, they tracked gold from these mines on a 4,800-kilometer, or 3,000-mile, journey to Mali's capital city and then on to Switzerland, where it entered the world market.

[...]

They pound the dirt with wooden posts for hours until it is as fine as flour. They wash the dirt in a large sieve-like box. Then they squat next to a plastic tub, pour mercury into their bare hands and rub it into the mud like a woman scrubbing laundry on rocks.

Mercury attracts gold. But it also attacks the brain and can cause tremors, speech impediments, retardation, kidney damage and blindness.

Learn all you can about that jewelry you have your eye on before you plunk down one cent.

Cronyism

Here’s a little context for today’s House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearings, in which J. Robert Flores, administrator of the Justice Department’s office of juvenile justice and delinquency prevention, will accuse members of Congress of bias against golf and the wealthy.

Yes, we all know how much members of Congress dislike golf and wealth.

Setting aside its traditional mission, Flores’ office awarded a $500,000 federal grant last year to the World Golf Association. In explaining why he overrode his career staff in awarding the grant, Flores explained: “We need something… to engage the gangs and the street kids. Golf is the hook.” Flores awarded the grant despite the fact that the group’s grant proposal rated 47th best out of 104 applicants. The honorary chairman the Golf Association’s First Tee program is former [president] George Herbert Walker Bush.

In a draft of his testimony to be given to Congress tomorrow, Flores has decided to come out swinging against those who criticize the grant to the World Golf Association, claiming that they are “biased against the wealthy.” Flores wrote in the draft testimony that he believes that the grant has been “pilloried because it was tied to golf, and I assume for those who are biased against the wealthy, because it has historically been a sport of the well-to-do.”

Flores also overruled his professional staff and awarded a million dollar grant to the Best Friends Foundation, an organization that promotes sexual abstinence. Best Friends ranked 53rd out of 104 grant applicants. Additionally, the organization refused to participate in a congressionally mandated study into the effectiveness of abstinence programs for teens.

Why then did Best Friends obtain its grant? The founder and president of Best Friends is Elayne Bennett. Her husband, Bill Bennett, had been, respectively, the Secretary of Education during the Reagan administration and the drug czar for the first Bush administration. Now at days, of course, Bill Bennett spends most of his time as a cable television personality supporting the policies of the current Bush administration Moreover, funding sexual abstinence for teenagers has been a priority for the White House.

While Best Friends and the World Golf Association received their grants, more than forty other organizations that had received higher ratings from Justice Department reviewers received no federal money at all. Those denied grants included organizations that train youth corrections officers, counsel rape victims, and work to prevent suicide among gay and lesbian youth.

A program to help troubled teens in San Diego, Vista, was ranked number two by the staff out of 202 applicants in its category of prevention and intervention but was turned down for a grant to help deal with inner city teen violence in San Diego. Why was its grant turned down? Justice Department employees said Flores did not like the fact that group distributed condoms.

After defending his actions before Congress, Flores can concentrate on the Justice Department’s investigation of his taxpayer-funded golf and tennis trips.

More here.

Guinea pigs

That’s us.

A woman whose toddler son ingested a popular toy that contains a chemical that turns into a powerful "date rape" drug when eaten said Thursday she knew he was ill when he began to stumble, seemed drunk and started vomiting.

The mother, Shelby Esses, said her 20-month-old son Jacob, fell down and was limp after getting into his older sister's Aqua Dots, a Chinese-made toy recalled Wednesday by the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

Turns out that Aqua Dots contain a toxic chemical, a fact that was discovered when we tested the product. Which we got around to just after children started getting sick.

The toys were supposed to use 1,5-pentanediol, a nontoxic compound found in glue, but instead contained the harmful 1,4-butanediol, which is widely used in cleaners and plastics.

The Food and Drug Administration in 1999 declared the chemical a Class I Health Hazard, meaning it can cause life-threatening harm.

It's not clear why 1,4-butanediol was substituted. However, there is a significant difference in price between the two chemicals. The Chinese online trading platform ChemNet China lists the price of 1,4 butanediol at between about $1,350-$2,800 per metric ton, while the price for 1,5-pentanediol is about $9,700 per metric ton.

Nope, not clear at all.

Why do we have to wait until after these things happen to test children’s toys for dangerous substances? Why can’t this be done, you know, before children get their hands on them? As it is now, it appears that our children are the canaries in the coal mine, and we’re using them, not tests, to figure out which products aren’t safe.

Maybe, just maybe, it’s about motherfucking time the CPSC gets itself more than one full-time toy tester.

But that’s life under Republican rule. “Small government” is really just a euphemism for defunding public-safety programs, less oversight and zero accountability. “Don’t interfere with the market.” Well the market has given us a year full of product recalls and placed millions of children at risk while the watchdogs are in bed with the industries they’re supposed to be overseeing. It’s way past time to start interfering with it.

Make no mistake: When you vote for a Republican, this is exactly what you’re voting for. You may not support such a policy, but you better believe your vote helps make it possible.

And for all you Bush administration apologists who might be inclined to argue that a high number of recalls indicates increased oversight activity, I remind you that it isn’t necessary to recall products that are identified as dangerous before they make it to the marketplace.

What’s it going to take before we start putting our children’s welfare ahead of corporate profits?

UPDATE: Sign the online petition calling for acting CPSC chair Nancy Nord to resign.

Conflict of interest? What interest?

Nothing to see here. No reason to suspect this has anything to do with the flood of toxic products into this country. Move along.

The chief of the Consumer Product Safety Commission and her predecessor have taken dozens of trips at the expense of the toy, appliance and children's furniture industries and others they regulate, according to internal records obtained by The Washington Post. Some of the trips were sponsored by lobbying groups and lawyers representing the makers of products linked to consumer hazards.

The records document nearly 30 trips since 2002 by the agency's acting chairman, Nancy Nord, and the previous chairman, Hal Stratton, that were paid for in full or in part by trade associations or manufacturers of products ranging from space heaters to disinfectants. The airfares, hotels and meals totaled nearly $60,000, and the destinations included China, Spain, San Francisco, New Orleans and a golf resort on Hilton Head Island, S.C.

[...]

The agency's travel patterns during the Bush administration, detailed in internal agency documents, differ from those of the Clinton era. Ann Brown, who served as chairman from 1994 to 2001, traveled only at the expense of the agency or of media organizations that sponsored appearances where she announced product recalls, according to the documents provided.

"We hated to have an industry pay for our staff for anything," said Pam Gilbert, a lawyer who was executive director of the agency under Brown.

Is whoring out agencies vital to public health and safety part of that “restoring dignity” thing George was told to talk about in 2000?

Note how well this post dovetails with the post below. One has to think that Nancy Nord’s days on the public (and toy manufacturers’) dole are limited, even if, in true Bushie fashion, she demonstrates a complete lack of shame.

Not in my cart

Consumers Union has posted a letter urging Congress to pass legislation requiring higher standards for manufacturers, importers and retailers to stem the flow of dangerous foods and consumer products into this country and, ultimately, into our homes. Sign on and tell your representative that you want higher standards, more inspections and safer products.

UPDATE: Not a moment too soon.

US authorities recalled some 440,000 Chinese-made toys Wednesday because of high levels of lead, just hours before US children were set to use some of them while celebrating Halloween.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) recalled 380,000 Galaxy Warriors figures, 43,000 sets of plastic disguise teeth, 16,000 sets of military-style Elite Operations action figures distributed by the global Toys R Us chain, and 1,500 Ribbit board games.

The recall of the "ugly teeth," which were found by an independent test team to contain 100 times the permissible level of lead, was the latest in the run-up to Halloween, which has already seen a record number of products recalled by the CPSC for lead violations.

The latest round of recalls came amid calls for the resignation of CPSC chief, Nancy Nord, who has been accused by Democratic lawmakers of doing too little to stem the flow of dangerous toys from China into the United States.

Nord, an appointee of President George W. Bush, has followed the Republican executive's deregulatory line and stood firm against proposed legislation seeking to increase the CPSC's authority and staff.

The safety watchdog has one full-time toy tester, an expert report has said.

UPDATE 2: How we got here. Go read this.

Pen pal

I've been trading e-mail about Bush's response to the tragedy in New Orleans with a Republican friend of mine (if there's a way to argue politics good-naturedly, we do it). Other than the shortcoming of his political leanings, he's a very intelligent, articulate guy. He's one of my best friends and I have a great deal of respect for him.

Anyway, for some reason I spent a lot of time writing today's response, so since I went to the trouble to write it, here it is. OK, most of it. The whole thing is WAAAAAY too long:

Every time Bush is called on in a time of crisis, he comes up nonexistent. When he does act, it's never quick and decisive, probably because of the lengthy consideration of the political consequences of each course of action.

That's not just jaded cynicism talking, that's a response to the fact that everything this administration does is politically motivated. Sure every administration considers the political ramifications of everything they do, but these people have completely abandoned sound policy in favor of political points at every turn. "The jury's still out on global warming." Are you fucking kidding me?

Naturally, Bush's response to the situation is pure politics -- the visit to GMA when he told softballer Diane Sawyer that "I don't think anybody anticipated the failure of the levees?" Is he joking? In 2001, FEMA warned that a hurricane striking New Orleans was one of the three most likely disasters in the U.S. So what did the Bush administration do? It cut New Orleans flood control funding by 44 percent to pay for the Iraq war. Clearly this is someone who doesn't read any briefing put before him.

Also, he made a point to say, "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job" in front of a group of reporters. Brownie, of course, being, according to Maureen Dowd, "Michael Brown, the blithering idiot in charge of FEMA -- a job he trained for by running something called the International Arabian Horse Association."

Looting, rapes, shootings, anarchy, bodies rotting in the streets. I'd hate to see what Bush considers a lousy job.

What we are seeing here, my friend, isn't politicians scoring political points, but a revolt by an outraged and suddenly ballsy press. Consider the aforementioned blithering idiot's appearance on GMA. (transcript excerpt deleted)

Meanwhile, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff was dressed down on NPR's "All Things Considered." (transcript excerpt deleted)

Let's not forget Anderson Cooper vs. Sen. Mary Landrieu, who was busy thanking the president, Bill Frist et al. while bodies were rotting in the streets (is that what you meant about a Democrat trying to score political points during a crisis by tearing down the president?)

This isn't political opposition trying to tear down a damaged president. This is the press doing its job, reporting what it sees. And what it sees is failure in the face of tragedy.

It would be one thing if this show of incompetence were unusual for the administration. But this administration has damaged everything it has touched. It turned a record surplus into a record deficit in two years. NCLB is such a success that, acording to the Chicago Sun-Times, as of April "21 states have introduced legislation or taken other action to change NCLB." Connecticut has sued Education Secretary Margaret Spellings, and the largest teachers union in Pennsylvania urged Gov. Rendell to join the suit. The Texas State Teachers Association, a group you might think would be sympathetic to Bush, has joined the suit. Iraq is a quagmire from which we have no exit strategy, Osama is an afterthought (and still on the loose). The gap between the rich and poor is as big as its ever been, 45.8 million people in this country have NO health insurance and 37 million people in this country live below the poverty level -- a number that has not gone down since Bush took office. Meanwhile, in 2004, CEOs saw their average total compensation boosted an average of nearly 12 percent, to more than $9.8 million. The average nonsupervisory workers' pay increased just 2.2 percent, to $27,485. Also, corporate income tax revenues in 2003 were 36 percent lower than in 2000, and represented only 1.2 percent of the GDP and only 7.4 percent of all federal tax receipts in 2003. The latter number is, with the exception of 1983, the lowest percentage on record.