Green Balloons fly over Tehran today...

-Diane

-Diane

Off to Celebrate the Arrival of Pedamundo

How are you going to celebrate?

-Diane

Congressman Kucinich demonstrates how to deal with Wall Street scum

Former Bank of America CEO, Ken Lewis, testified June 11, 2009 to congress about the BOAs merger with Merrill Lynch. During the hearing Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, challenged Lewis to be more forthcoming about his dealings with the Federal Reserve during the merger. Specifically Kucinich cited emails from Fed officials saying Lewis had asked government officials to provide a letter saying that they had in fact ordered Lewis to merge with the struggling financial firm, Merrill Lynch, because Lewis feared lawsuits from company shareholders if the merger led to company losses. Lewis said he did not recall asking for such a letter. After the hearing Kucinich told reporters that Lewis testimony could put the former CEO in legal jeopardy.


-Diane

The Toll of the Forever and Ever Wars

McClatchy reports:

On March 7, 2007, Army Spc. Trevor Hogue was inside his barracks in Baghdad, describing his morning on the battlefield.

"I saw things today that I think will mess me up for life," Hogue typed to his mother, Donna, as she sat at her computer thousands of miles away from Iraq, in Granite Bay.

That day the young soldier, whose assignment included driving a Humvee through perhaps the most dangerous ZIP code on the globe, saw his sergeant blown to pieces. He saw the bodies of half of the men in his platoon torn apart. Heads were cut off and limbs severed. It happened 30 yards in front of him, and he had never been so afraid, he told his mom.

"My arms are around you," Donna Hogue wrote. "You'll be alright."

Trevor made it home from Iraq, but he was not alright. Last week, at age 24, he hung himself in the backyard of his childhood home.

The suicide rate among soldiers continues at a record pace.

The Army released a report this week detailing the climb:

As many as 17 soldiers took their own lives during May, 10 more than in April, despite aggressive efforts by the Army to get soldiers the help they need.

The number of suicides had been steadily going down since January, when 23 soldier deaths were thought to be suicides, to April when seven soldiers’ deaths were investigated as possible suicides. This year’s deaths are on pace to come close to last year’s 144 suicides, an unprecedented number for the Army.

One of the May deaths was confirmed as a suicide and 16 were listed by the Army as potential suicides.

So far this calendar year, 82 deaths have been investigated among active-duty troops, including Reserve and National Guard soldiers on active duty. Of the 82 deaths, 45 have been confirmed as suicides and 37 are pending the outcome of ongoing investigations, according to Army statistics released June 11.

Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Chiarelli says, “We have got to do better.”

Yeah, when someone comes up with a kinder, gentler war...be sure to let us know.

-Diane

Mike's New Movie Coming October 2nd

At select theaters in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago and Washington D.C. audiences were treated to this surprise teaser for Mike's new film. Since we didn't already give the CEOs enough, ushers entered the theaters with collection jars and some audience members actually pitched in!

Always giving it to the CEOs at http://www.michaelmoore.com/


-Diane

Torture Memo Author Ordered to Testify

NYT reports:

A federal judge has ruled that John Yoo, a former Bush administration lawyer who wrote crucial memorandums justifying harsh interrogation techniques, will have to answer in court to accusations that his work led to a prisoner’s being tortured and deprived of his constitutional rights.

A baby step, but I'll take it.

-Diane

Caption this...

[Photo: Robert F. Bukaty/Associated Press]

Former President George H. W. Bush rode tandem with Army Sgt. Michael Elliott of the Army Golden Knights parachute team as he celebrated his 85th birthday with a parachute jump on Friday.



-Diane

Screech...

Associated Press:

Chrysler's five weeks of breakneck-speed bankruptcy proceedings came to a screeching — but possibly temporary — halt Monday, when a Supreme Court justice delayed its sale of assets to Italy's Fiat.

The move could derail the government's ambitious plan for the U.S. automaker to blaze a path to profitability without the burden of many of its debts.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg issued a stay just a week before Chrysler says the government-backed sale must go through. After June 15, Fiat could walk away from the deal and leave the struggling U.S. automaker with little option by to liquidate.

It was unclear late Monday just how long the stay would last, or if the high court planned to take up the case.

Chrysler said it had no comment until it receives further information from the court.


As if this process hasn't been painful enough, now we get it in slow-mo. Great.

-Diane

Doing bidness with Phil Gramm's bank...

Via Bloomberg:

California billionaire Igor Olenicoff had already invested $200 million with UBS AG in 2001 when his Swiss bankers ushered him to an underground vault in Geneva.

Olenicoff, a real estate developer with a taste for yachts and Russian art, saw floor upon floor of safe-deposit boxes. His private banker, Bradley Birkenfeld, and a colleague showed Olenicoff his own space for valuables.

“They said, ‘Whatever you want — corporate stock, cash, gold, silver — put it in here,’” says Olenicoff, 66, at the Newport Beach, California, headquarters of Olen Properties Corp., the company he founded in 1973. “It was that aura of legitimacy and secrecy. They say, ‘We’re the world’s largest wealth manager,’ so how do you question?”


Senator Gramm has been a senior executive with UBS since 2002.

-Diane