Nelson Mandela's story, if told as a novel, would not be deemed possible in real life. Worse, we don't tell such stories in many of our novels.

A violent young rebel is imprisoned for decades but turns that imprisonment into the training he needs. He turns to negotiation, diplomacy, reconciliation. He negotiates free elections, and then wins them. He forestalls any counter-revolution by including former enemies in his victory. He becomes a symbol of the possibility for the sort of radical, lasting change of which violence has proved incapable. He credits the widespread movement in his country and around the world that changed cultures for the better while he was locked away. But millions of people look to the example of his personal interactions and decisions as having prevented a blood bath.

’Tis the season to feel rage and heartache about the economy.

I feel hope as well, praise the Lord, thanks to Pope Francis and the alley behind my house, where nothing of value goes to waste.

I’m the kind of person who can’t throw anything away, but sometimes I have to anyway — an old microwave, a sewing machine that hasn’t been used in 20 years, a threadbare easy chair, tangled computer wires and other excruciating miscellany — and when I do, it’s usually gone within a day, if not an hour. When I can no longer find value in what I possess, others see it as a gift from the universe.

The alley economy flows though my Chicago neighborhood 24/7, a sort of gift economy that continually revitalizes one’s material possessions, in unnoticed defiance of the official, throwaway, money-profit-growth economy that has its claws around our world and is squeezing us to death. The alley economy is, in fact, part of a rudimentary social ecosystem, where forces collude for the common good and nothing is wasted.

This week, Boehner helped aggressively spread the story of a New York man unable to cover his toddler on his new family insurance plan through the Affordable Care Act.
Turns out that, despite coverage in the New York Post, the man's appearance on Fox, and Boehner's posts on his website and Twitter account, the man was simply mistaken—he'd typed the wrong number when listing his family members. "100% false," as a spokesman for New York's Department of Health said. "Of course, everyone is covered in the family policy."
This is just one of many mistaken, falsified, or debunked stories being spread since the rollout of the new health care exchanges. The difference this time? Boehner has yet to apologize, edit the post on his website, or even delete the tweet he posted. He's apparently standing by this story.

But it's one thing for the media to settle for bad journalism—it's another for the nation's most powerful lawmaker to go around perpetuating lies. Can you join other MoveOn members in publicly calling on Boehner to apologize?

A headline in the Saturday, November 30 Columbus Dispatch screamed: “Family’s well not tainted by driller.” The lead asserts that, “Natural gas that caught fire after it bubbled from a faucet in a Portage County house did not come from a nearby shale well, state officials have concluded.” The question is, can we trust these state officials?

The investigation conducted by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR) needs to be closely examined. The ODNR is at best a “captured agency” which has been accused repeatedly of promoting the oil and gas industry and specifically fracking, the practice of horizontal drilling.

The freepress.org reported earlier this year that formal complaints were filed against ODNR employees for falsifying “production records on wells.” Reports were also made to the FBI that the ODNR was covering up 1200 gas wells that were on record without tax ID numbers in southern Ohio. By leaving out ID numbers, the wells’ ownership can often be hidden so public doesn’t know who is responsible for the pollution.

BANGKOK, Thailand -- The authoritarian leader of an increasingly violent anti-government protest met Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra on Sunday (Dec. 1) and told her to resign so a dictatorial provisional regime could run Thailand and stop voters electing "bad politicians".

Hours earlier, the government advised Bangkok residents on Sunday (Dec. 1) to stay indoors overnight after three people died and police battled protesters, while mobs swarmed government ministries, TV stations and police headquarters, escalating their week-long clashes to topple the prime minister.

Protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban "told the prime minister that dissolution of parliament, and her resignation paving the way for new election, could not resolve the underlying deep-rooted problem because bad politicians" could return to power, Thai Public Broadcasting Service (ThaiPBS) reported.

"He said the problem could be resolved only when she returned the power to 'the people' to form the 'people's council' [which could] appoint a 'people's government' to rule the country," the report said.

Suthep announced his ultimatum in a live TV broadcast at 10 p.m.