Tag: Dick Durbin

Cross posted at Dkos http://www.dailykos.com/story/…

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Two nights ago, President Obama said this in his Oval Office speech:

Now, as we approach our 10th year of combat in Afghanistan, there are those who are understandably asking tough questions about our mission there. (emphasis added)

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And recently, Sen. Dick Durbin had this to say about Afghanistan:

Durbin, who voted against the Iraq war but for the Afghanistan war, said the consequences of combat in Afghanistan, particularly growing numbers of wounded and disabled veterans, “weigh dearly on me.” He added that Americans must continue to ask not only what the US has achieved in Afghanistan but also “how will it end, when will it end, and at what cost.” (emphasis added)

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Neither Obama nor Durbin described exactly who is asking questions about Afghanistan, or exactly what questions are being asked and what answers are being given.

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Cross-posted at Dkos http://www.dailykos.com/story/… and Firedoglake

The mainstream media do not ask our government the questions they should be asking about Afghanistan.  

I diaried about this last week.

Since the MSM won’t ask the tough questions, it’s up to you and me, it appears.

I’m a military dad whose progeny has served in both Iraq and Afghanistan in heavy combat, where the batallion had many KIAs and serious WIAs.

I’m sick of constant endless war based on specious reasoning, and I have questions I want Dick Durbin, my senator, to answer about Afghanistan.  It’s our service members and their families who are paying the price and bearing the burden for all of it.  Members of congress who keep shoveling the money for constant, endless war ought to look us families who OPPOSE it in the eye, and answer questions.

(Note: Sen Durbin had a small tumor removed from his stomach by minimally invasive surgery on August 12.  He’s reported to be recovering well, and is campaigning in Illinois, according to this report)

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Cross-posted at FireDogLake and Dkos http://www.dailykos.com/story/…

I’ve had two face-to-face meetings with Sen. Dick Durbin in the past, arranged by the director of the senator’s downstate office in Springfield, Illinois.

Fifteen minutes were promised, but I actually got thirty minutes each time.  

And, one of my progeny is serving in the Armed Forces, and has survived one deployment to Iraq and one to Afghanistan, both involving heavy combat where the batallion sustained many KIAs and severe WIAs.

I’m sick of constant, endless war which is based on specious reasoning.  The populace of the U. S. of A. is not paying the price and bearing the burden;  it’s our service members and their families who are paying the price and bearing the burden.

And, I want to talk directly with Sen. Durbin about it.

The “DREAM Now Series: Letters to Barack Obama” is a social media campaign that launched Monday, July 19, to underscore the urgent need to pass the DREAM Act. The Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act, S. 729, would help tens of thousands of young people, American in all but paperwork, to earn legal status, provided they graduate from U.S. high schools, have good moral character, and complete either two years of college or military service.  With broader comprehensive immigration reform stuck in partisan gridlock, the time is now for the White House and Congress to step up and pass the DREAM Act!

This post will mark the completion of the first week of the DREAM Now Letters.  This social media campaign has been an immediate success, which is in large part due to the historic actions of DREAMers this week. 

Major bloggers from across the net, which I will link to below, have already cross-posted both Mohammad Abdollahi’s and Yahaira Carrillo’s stories.  The letters even made a brief appearance on memeorandum, a news aggregator that I’m addicted to.

If you haven’t read about it, yet, on Tuesday, 21 DREAM Act youth were arrested on Capitol Hill.  Nativists’ heads are already exploding at the notion that undocumented youth could openly declare their immigration status, get arrested, and not get deported.  David Bennion, my co-blogger at Citizen Orange, has the best write up of the action, by far.  It’s new media at it’s best.  He was actually there while it was happening. 

Source:

http://www.deepwaterhorizonres…

A Press Conference w/ EPA Admin Lisa Jackson & USCG Rr Adm Mary Landry on Monday 5/24/10 3:30 pm Central DT to discuss dispersants.  There’s a transcript of the live blog.

Last week EPA ordered BP to stop using Corexit and look for something less toxic.  BP is still using Corexit.  From the following transcript, it appears that BP will continue to be using Corexit and EPA “will be conducting their own tests  to find the least toxic dispersants.”

Then the conference call goes over to Rr Admiral Landry at 3:58 pm.  “In a crisis mode still, never dealt with a well releasing oil 5000 feet below the water.”

5/24/2010

original caption:

“GULF OF MEXICO – Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Senate Energy Committee Ranking Member

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Assistant Majority Leader Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Senate Energy Committee Chairman Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) view response efforts

first hand during a flyover of areas affected by the BP oil spill. U.S. Coast Guard photo by Lt. Cmdr. Rob Wyman.”

edit one.  why did this diary post 3 times….

Dallas Fed chief calls for breakup of ‘too big to fail’ banks in New York speech

BRENDAN CASE, The Dallas Morning News – March 4, 2010

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas President Richard Fisher traveled to New York to trumpet a message he’s told Texas audiences before: Banks that are too big to fail are too big to exist in the first place.

Speaking Wednesday at the Council on Foreign Relations, Fisher said big, systemically important banks should be dismantled before regulators have to deal with another crisis like the one that nearly brought down Wall Street and the rest of the U.S. financial system in late 2008.

“The dangers posed by too-big-to-fail banks are too great,” he said.

Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and others have said Congress should pass a law giving regulators “resolution authority” to close down failing financial companies.

http://www.dallasnews.com/shar…

That is Good News, sort of.

Cross-posted at dkos  http://www.dailykos.com/story/…

Update:  Please see my update in comment #6 below.  This thing looks as if it is much less a concern for the ordinary essayist/diarist than I thought!

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THIS AFFECTS ALL BLOGGERS/CITIZEN JOURNALISTS

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Thanks to kos himself, and to kossack WilliamKWolfrom, and AMERICAblogger John Aravosis, I am now aware of Senators Durbin and Feinstein’s efforts to deny citizens who do citizen journalism the benefits of the same shield law which protects professional journalists.