It is peculiar how the smallest, most innocent, observation can become the “straw that breaks the camel’s back.” Barb With was volunteering as an observer at the Waukesha recount when she made a glaring discovery. The poll tape that was being counted and matched for votes cast in the April 5 election for Supreme Court Justice was dated March 30, 2011. When she brought the suspicious date to the attention of election officials, they could not come up with any reason for the mis-dated poll tape.

Weeks later Barb appeared before the Assembly Committee for Election and Campaign Reform. This is a portion of her testimony:

An observer of the Waukesha County recount noticed such a small, innocent piece of paper that was spit out of a voting machine in Pewaukee. It was a poll tape from a voting machine on which is recorded your vote. But what caught her eye was the date at the top of the tape: 03-30-2011 or March 30. That was six days before the Supreme Court election of April 5!

I recall the Facebook messages in the group Election Integrity as she communicated the finding to the group. “Get a picture!” -- and she did.

On Wednesday in federal court, 10 members of the U.S. Congress sued President Obama in an attempt to end U.S. involvement in a war in Libya.

These are the plaintiffs: Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), Walter Jones (R-NC), Howard Coble (R-NC), John Duncan (R-TN), Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD), John Conyers (D-MI), Ron Paul (R-TX), Michael Capuano (D-MA), Tim Johnson (R-IL), and Dan Burton (R-IN).

According to a statement from Congressman Kucinich:

Republicans and Democrats....two hands to one head
There is no republic and democracy's dead
Conspirarchy. Duopoly. Together in bed.
Your fake choice is no voice when choice is spoonfed
But that's polartics.
Republicans and Democrats....two hands in one till
There is no more cold war...just icy chill
Fewer but newer. Shock and awe. Kill.
And borrow from China to pay on the bill.
Yeah that's polartics.
Republicans and Democrats..two hands on one clicker
Control the remote, you control the stock ticker
Keep them confounded with fast food and liquor
The head becomes sicker, the hands even quicker
In polartics.
Polartics as usual. As ESPN.
Polartics in rabidbites from angry old men
Polartics to split us kids on two sides of the gym
And kill em all in Murder Ball till its just you and him
Republicans and Democrats...two puppets one trigger
Troops, dupes and front groups for something that's much bigger
Too divided, diverted, deluded to figger
This tagteam warmachine electoral rigger
That's polartics.
For most Palestinians, leaving Gaza through Egypt is as exasperating a process as entering it. Governed by political and cultural sensitivities, most Palestinian officials and public figures refrain from criticizing the way Palestinians are treated at the Rafah border. However, there is really no diplomatic language to describe the relationship between desperate Palestinians -- some literally fighting for their lives -- and Egyptian officials at the crossing which separates Gaza from Egypt.

"Gazans are treated like animals at the border," a friend of mine told me. She was afraid that her fiancé would not be allowed to leave Gaza, despite the fact that his papers were in order. Having crossed the border myself just a few days ago, I could not disagree with her statement.

The New York Times reported on June 8: "After days of acrimony between Hamas and Egypt over limitations on who could pass through the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt, Hamas said Egypt had agreed to allow 550 people a day to leave Gaza and to lengthen the operating hours of the crossing."

And so the saga continues.

While "Europe's slow-motion financial collapse" – as Mother Jones magazine described it in a June 6th article – continues to unravel, Spain, like other European states continues to implement anti-social-neo-liberal policies with strong opposition from the citizenry.

This may be the moment history has turned definitively against atomic energy.

To be sure:  we are still required to fight hard to bury reactor loan guarantees in the United States.  There are parallel struggles in China, Indian, England, France and South Korea.

The great fear is that until every single reactor on this planet is shut, none of us is really safe from another radioactive horror show.

Thus the moment is clearly marked at Fukushima by three reactors and a radioactive fuel pool still untamed after three months, with the horrific potential to do far more apocalyptic damage than we've seen even to date.

That image includes Japanese school children being issued Geiger counters to carry with them 24/7.

And Fukushima's radiation raining down on the United States, with links to reports of a heightened infant death rate in Seattle.

Keep EON on the net and catalyzing effective grassroots action. We’re not called ‘C-Span for the grassroots’ for nothing. If you’re on this list, you know how hard we work to keep a steady stream of citizen voices and useful information in a variety of media coming your way. EON is also an official party in California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) Smart Meter Opt-Out proceedings in your behalf. Since 2000, we’ve organized and informed locally and globally about the dangers of wireless RF radiation. We’ve been working for clean renewable energy and a nuclear-free world for decades. [ see: Norman Solomon Interviews EON Founders on the TV series 'Making a Difference in Marin.' ]

Our increasingly popular blog – Eon3EMFblog.net – covers both wireless and nuclear issues. For example, check out our recent posts Paradigm Shift Happens – EON E-Smog Digest and Dead End for Nuclear Power?

LONDON -- Before long public pressure might just lead Britain to drop out of participation in US wars, a move that would seriously damage future pretenses of acting as an international coalition.

I've spent the past few days here in London talking with leaders of the Stop the War Coalition, sitting in on a weekly planning meeting, and attending a day-long conference on building opposition to the Afghanistan and Libya wars. This movement is strong, smart, well-organized, and eager to work with other peace movements around the world.

Columbus city officials ended public access TV about 10 years ago after it had existed for decades in Central Ohio. The reason given was lack of funds. In subsequent years, city officials gave the same reason in response to suggestions to restore public-access TV.

But the financial situation has changed. At the urging of city officials, Columbus voters passed a substantial increase in the city income tax in 2009, resulting in the city having millions of dollars of surplus funds. Nevertheless, city officials are still refusing to restore public access TV.

The officials, including Democratic mayor Michael Coleman and an all-Democratic city council, now say that because of the Internet, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter, citizens can communicate by those means and don’t need TV to communicate to the public. Volumes could be written about problems with their position.

There are twenty thousand nuclear weapons on the planet, a quarter of them ready for launch at a moment’s suicidal impulse, aimed at countries that stopped being enemies two decades ago. It’s six minutes to midnight. “Disarmament” has as much cachet in America’s corridors of power as “socialism.”

And the U.S. House, bless its evil heart, has just sliced the Achilles tendon of peace. It recently passed the National Defense Authorization Act of 2011, which has many seriously worrisome provisions, two of which stand in stark, grinning contrast to one another.

One part of the bill, which now heads to the Senate, would give the president unilateral authority to pursue the “war on terror” anywhere in the world. Anywhere evil resides, the president could go after it, no congressional approval needed. It’s kind of like that already, but this would legalize the streamlining of war and help push the United States, in its role as global superpower, completely beyond the constraints of democracy.

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