Who, ME?

[paft.livejournal.com]

Wausau Daily Herald: IRMA — A state lawmaker from Lincoln County who once opposed a bill that would force insurers to cover chemotherapy pills says she changed her position after she learned she has cancer.

Mary Czaja, R-Irma, the state representative for the 35th Assembly District, said her view on the bill — which could take effect next year — began to change in January. That’s when she began her own battle with stage 3 breast cancer.

“I’m not a big mandate person,” said Czaja, who spent the bulk of her career in the insurance industry. “After a long conversation with my doctor, I started to think about the issue in a new way. It’s not just the affordability factor; it’s about helping people get back to normal and get back to work.”

IOW, it just didn’t occur to Czaja before that people with cancer might need help to “get back to normal and get back to work.”

Or at least, their pain wasn’t real to her. Not like it is now.

( Read more )

Hey Gov. 1%, who do you represent?

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

All politics is local, right?
So, I am a NY state resident, and my local politics are all sorts of crazy-pants.

I live in a state that is fabulously wealthy.....and absurdly fucking poor.
We here in NY have the absolute highest income inequality in the entire country. And the US, as you may know, is the worst in inequality in the developed world. It's gotten so absurd that the Pope is having to explain the immorality of rich people feasting while poor people go without.

Now, here in NY, the Gov is a democrat. Andrew Cuomo--sometimes called, Governor 1%.
Despite being a democrat, he has courted republican donors and republican policies. He has refused to put any of his weight into fighting for the democrats in the state assembly or senate, and his liberal "victories" are of the sort that do not bother wall-street and the banks. It's an open secret that Gov. 1% has national ambitions--a 2016 run is not out of the question for him. He's trying to build a record to run on--but all he has is a record to run FROM.
( Read more... )

NATO/EU is back in the game?

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

"I submit this motion to the Federal Assembly and request that you review a constitutional bill for accepting two new subjects into the Russian Federation, the Republic of Crimea, and the City of Sevastopol. I am also asking you to ratify the bill for accepting the Republic of Crimea and the City of Sevastopol into the Russian Federation. I do not doubt your support". These words of Putin's were met with standing ovations in the two chambers of the Duma, the Russian parliament, and they effectively put an end to all hopes for a diplomatic solution of the Crimean crisis, and marked another modern-day re-drawing of Europe's map.

The annexation of Crimea (because that's what it is), which for the rest of the world remains de jure part of Ukraine, comes a few days after the Crimean secession referendum that's recognized only by Moscow. And also a day after the EU and US imposed some minor sanctions against Russia. Brussels and Washington had warned many times that including the Black Sea peninsula into the RF would be a breach of international law, and would undermine the principle of national sovereignty that has been at the core of the European legal framework post-WW2. Putin's response was that he doesn't want to break up Ukraine and he has always respected its territorial integrity, but "in the hearts and minds of the people of Crimea, it has always been and remains an inseparable part of Russia". Those pesky Crimean Tatars be damned.

( Read more... )

The Arctic standoff

[airiefairie.livejournal.com]

Canadians perceive themselves as a proud northern nation. The new 50 CAD bill displays the ice-breaker Amundsen, which is also an explorer ship. "The north is part of the Canadian soul", an official document on Arctic foreign policy says, endorsed by the government ot Stephen Harper. One of his priorities is the active presence in the defense of the state sovereignty of the North.

The Canadian north is really huge, but it is very sparsely populated (not more than 110 thousand inhabitants). It is true that Canada has certain territorial disputes with the US and Denmark, but these are not viewed as a national security problem. The new dynamic in the region mostly comes from the melting of the polar ice cap.

Unlike the Antarctic, the Arctic is not a continent, it is actually an ocean. And in recent times, climate change has been particularly well pronounced in the northern latitudes, where the water area is expanding at the expense of the ice shield. This is opening new territories for navigation, and promises new opportunities for exploiting hypothetical or established deposits of natural resources.

( Read more... )

United States and Russia -- Hypocrisy, Excuses & The Relative Merits of Going Through The Motions

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

Vladimir Putin has made it perfectly clear the believes the West in general and the United States in particular have some nerve criticizing his actions in Crimea. Central to Putin's indignity are actions in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya where he believes the United States acted without proper authorization. Putin wants to know why Western powers were willing to accept Kosovo independence and to even help bring it about by bombing Serbia in the 1990s while ignoring that precedent when it comes to Crimean independence.

( Let me start by suggesting that Mr. Putin may have a point. )