Monthly Archives: February 2010

by Mike "Mish" Shedlock Coming Commercial Real Estate Crisis; 3000 Community Banks at Risk Here are a couple of stories similar to thousands playing out across...

Whatever the delusions of war planners, the costs come home and disperse. We're waging wars on different continents, but deadly echoes reverberate here. As Lt....

Juan Cole at Informed Comment offers some excellent advice for climate scientists under attack from corrupt corporate and media sources. Al Gore writes that ignoring climate change won't make it go away nor will continuing to dump 90 million tons of pollutants into the atmosphere daily at the New York Times. A 110-year-old Chicago woman reflects on Jim Crow and the civil rights movemnt in the Chicago Sun Times. Those stories and more in today's picks.

Despite billions of additional dollars pumped into veterans benefits in recent years, many military personnel still leave service unaware of their VA benefits or of programs set up to help them transition to civilian life, a senior Defense official and veteran advocates testified Wednesday.

Regional stories on veterans' health, education and other benefits and issues today from Jackson, Tennessee, Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, Shreveport, Louisiana, Billings, Montana, Austin, Texas, Fayetteville, North Carolina, Norwich, Connecticut, Durango, Colorado, and Grand Island, Nebraska

The results of the 2003 invasion of Iraq: Over 4,300 American troops, over 30,000 wounded, 100,000s traumatized, 100,000s of Iraqis killed, $3 trillion looted, Iran...

Rachel Corrie was a 23-year-old American peace activist from Olympia, Washington working with other citizens from all over the globe to alert the world...

After I got home from the Army and Viet Nam, in 1969, my wife Nanci, Sherri, our baby, (who was born while I was...

Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki announced that the department’s Gulf War Veterans’ Illnesses Task Force has nearly completed a comprehensive report that will redefine how VA addresses the pain and suffering of ill Veterans who deployed during the Gulf War in 1990 and 1991.

Regional stories on veterans' health, education and other benefits and issues today from Silver City, New Mexico, Reno, Nevada, St Paul, Minnesota, Los Angeles, California, and Springfield, Missouri.

(C) James Alonzo While we did find ways to move closer in the last two years of my step-father's  life, after he was diagnosed with Terminal...

BENEATH THE SPIN • ERIC L. WATTREE   Urban Comedy: Tavis Smiley - A Crab Determined to Reach Beyond His Grasp * Well, he's at it again, people....

In an effort to improve pain management, the VHA began the “Pain as the 5th Vital Sign” initiative in 1999 which required a pain intensity rating of 0 to 10 at all VA clinical encounters. The first four vital signs are pulse(time repetitions), blood pressure(force/area), temperature(degree),and breathing rate(time repetitions) : the first four vital signs are objective with unit dimensions scientifically calibrated to the unit standard at the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).

Utah Governor Turns Back Two Uranium Trains SALT LAKE CITY, Utah, Planned shipments of depleted uranium from the U.S. Department of Energy's Savannah River nuclear materials...

No. 152-10 ------------------------------------ CONTRACTS: NAVY   General Dynamics, National Steel and Shipbuilding Co., San Diego, is being awarded an $824,642,437 modification to previously awarded contract (N00024-02-C-2300) for construction...

Benefits reconsidered for ill Gulf War vets By Kimberly Hefling - The Associated Press WASHINGTON — The Veterans Affairs Department says it will look again at...

An angry U.S. Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND) blasted contractor KBR today for its electrical work that has become infamous at U.S. military bases in...

Gulf War Veterans question how well the VA's plan will work at reopening Gulf War Veterans' claims on Gulf War Illness. Gulf War Veterans are...

Medical researchers and veterans advocates eagerly await the findings of  a University of Wisconsin-Madison study on Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) focusing on how brains...

From Yves Smith at Naked Capitalism: Goldman may have made a fatal mistake. Fatal not to the existence of the firm, but to its standing, reputation,...

A Dirt-Cheap and Dirty Scam Over the years, Ralph Tillman, the Director of Asset Management for the Greater Los Angeles VA Healthcare System, has facilitated...

Sunday, February 21, 2010 100th Consecutive Sunday Rally to “Save Our Veterans Land” plus a major Press Conference Protest Rally / 1:00 - 4:00 PM Press...

A Navy veteran whose son serving in the Navy reports she and her son were recently "very concerned when  got very upset when  posted on his Facebook references to...

Vets Say They Will Sue the Veteran’s Administration      By Andres Chavez, Sun Staff Reporter    Veterans and their supporters make it a 100 Sundays in a row...

- Bad-Suicide-Bombings: 18 Dead, 32 Wounded; Indians Targeted - "I saw foreigners crying and shouting ... It was a very bad situation inside," said Najibullah,...

"Tough s__t!" That's a precise quote. Is Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) all there? Maybe not. Does this guy have any clue, any compassion for the...

The Afghan human rights commission reported that 28 civilians had been killed so far in NATO's offensive on Marja, AP reports. The commission based its numbers on witness reports. NATO has confirmed at least 16 civilian deaths.

Douglas Valentine at Consortium News draws some parallels between our current wars and William the Conqueror, they're not pretty. The bumpkin senator from Oklahoma has started an inquisition of climate scientists; their crimes? Being climate scientists, of course. The Taliban strike in downtown Kabul in a story from Juan Cole at Informed Comment and according to McClatchy News their goal is driving America out. Those stories and more in today's picks.

Update: CQ Politics reports a spokeswoman for Florida Gov. Charlie Crist's U.S. Senate campaign says reports are "patently false" that Crist will to drop out of GOP to run as an...

Rush Limbaugh is honest about medical care: You can't buy it, you don't deserve it.

Popular pressure is the difference between progress and oppression.

This is a follow-up to my review of the film Severe Clear being released in March. Shot by First Lieutenant Mike Scotti on his Mini-DV...

Find out What's Inside Today's Local News for Veterans Shinseki To Attend Senate Budget Hearing Today. VA Preparing To Re-Examine Gulf War Vets' Disability...

Regional stories on veterans' health, education and other benefits and issues today from Rockwall, Texas, Hampton Roads, Virginia, Atlantic City, New Jersey, Colorado Springs, Colorado, Washington, DC, Midland, Texas, Aurora, Colorado, Columbia, Missouri, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and Albuquerque, New Mexico.

APNewsBreak: VA to reopen Gulf War vets' files Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki speaks Monday, Aug. 3, 2009, at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va....

Simon Johnson is a brilliant economic analyst. But brilliant economic analysis rests upon an understanding of the predictable behavior and nature of people and...

Only in America is a legislative body voting on a majority-rules basis considered nuclear, something  drastic and unholy. Specifically, the U.S. Senate's commitment to obstruction protected by the...

It was a gloomy morning, which may have accounted for my morbid thoughts. Thoughts of today, and the past. I recalled a similar dawn,...

The Veterans Affairs Department will re-examine the disability claims of what could be thousands of Gulf War veterans suffering from ailments they blame on their war service, the first step toward potentially compensating them nearly two decades after the war ended.

Back in the 1960’s The group of Ham operators known as MARS, offered to make calls in the USA and connect them by radio...

No. 148-10 ---------------------- CONTRACTS: AIR FORCE Raytheon Co., Aurora, Colo., was awarded an $886,440,679 contract which will provide for command, control and mission support for the Block...

Anthony Weiner pulled off the kid gloves and called the GOP a 'Wholly Owned Subsidiary Of The Insurance Industry,' see the video at Crooks and Liars. South Dakota, that center of scientific endeavor and bitter cold, is urged to use astrology to explain global warming to its students by 36 recently evolved members of the state legislature and Jim Hightower provides some guidance on dancing with the devil in today's picks.