Memorial Day Week

The Miami Story: Miami-Dade County officials are unhappy with computer voting. The solution is paper ballots, they recommend. It is almost unthinkable that computerized voting ever got adopted in the first place. There are many show-stopping negatives. The voting process should give you the basic respect you deserve.

Have you heard about lines that make you wait 6 or 10 hours to vote? How many voters with children or senior citizens saw the line and just went home? Those lines are caused by machine voting. Let your county officials know that you oppose the use of voting machines. Equally important, you the voter cannot ever have confidence in the result . . especially in a close election. The Sun-Sentinel reports . . .

Election Chief Wants Switch to Paper Ballots.
Independent Audit is Critical.
Miami-Dade Election Reform Coalition.

Paper ballots are a high priority goal of  The Fair Deal.  Smart county officials will recognize the  Common-Sense Advantages of Paper Ballots.

Bobby Kennedy, Jr.: The polls tell us that most citizens consider themselves environmentalists. Republicans? 75% plus. Democrats? 75% plus. After all, who doesn't want cleaner water and cleaner air? A former prosecutor, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.  is a leader in the movement. Kennedy teaches law and is president of the Waterkeeper Alliance. But . . . here's the best part. Soft-spoken, Kennedy is nevertheless a very hard-hitting co-host of the weekly radio program Ring of Fire.   If you're starved for intelligent discussion, you'll find the program to be absolutely electrifying . . .

"American power plants waste more energy than is needed to run the whole Japanese economy," said the former head of Britain's environmental agency. He also imagines oil at "$100 or $150 a barrel."  Click for the story . . .

There are clean alternatives using coal, which the U.S. has in abundance. This article is a very clear explanation of what the U.S. could do . . . if only it had an energy policy . . . About a new Florida plant, the New York Times said: "Not only did the plant emit significantly less pollution than a conventional coal-fired power plant, but it was also 10 percent more efficient."   Click for the whole story . . .

For your convenience, three new facilities have been added to each page. Go ahead . . . give them a try.

May Week Four

Here is a story about your health that did not get much coverage. Some chemicals have been tested. Most have not. And, no agency seems to test what these chemicals turn into when they meet and mix in the real world. New York City is phasing out pesticides.  Click and go . . .

Alan Greenspan seldom explains himself clearly. By translating Greenspan-speak, one might conclude this from his current pronouncement: "Don't buy a house. Prices are too high and are going to drop fast. Put up a 10% down payment to buy and get totally wiped out if and when prices decline by 20%. You'll lose all your equity. If you are thinking of selling, do it quickly by finding a sucker at today's prices. Be a renter until this bubble bursts." Okay, if you think that's overdone, take a look at the Greenspan bubble speech .

Our "Columnist" page has faltered. The loss of military commentator David Hackworth is profound. Hack has passed away, but his archive of columns goes back years. One does not know how long it will still be available to you.

William Greider is very quiet. His book,  Who will tell the people?, is a classic behind-the-scenes look at how the federal government tilts to money and power. It's an eye-opener for even the most sophisticated observer.

Maureen Dowd is on leave till July. Thomas Oliphant is recovering from a serious medical problem. However, Oliphant is alive and well having done radio interviews in the last couple of weeks. Arianna Huffington has suspended her weekly column to launch the blog by the well-known, the Huffington Post .

To compensate, Rhonda Chriss Lokeman of The Kansas City Star has been added to Sunday. Second, check out  Matt Miller. His columns are hard to find in one place however. Until the Miller target stops moving, we link to 3 different recent sites under Saturday. The links to Lokeman and Miller are also publicly available and free to you.

By the way . . . MyHundred.com does not utilize any pop-up windows, spyware, or virus-enabling products. See the Privacy Policy . . . Viruses may render your system unusable. Computer Associates EZ Trust Antivirus software offers considerable protection. Spyware slows down your computer. LavaSoft's Ad-Aware might remove all of it. Hackers can hijack your system. Black Ice offers an inexpensive software firewall to protect against this type of intrusion. After clicking on our links to other sites, you may notice an excessive amount of pop-up windows, for instance. Have you tried Mozilla's Firefox browser? It can stop the pop-ups and spyware. It's free. Your Webmaster uses all of the above products and would not get on the internet without them. Take a look at all of them under the heading "Internet" . . . 

May Week Three

Venezuela, a major oil power, is an unfolding story, if not a South American soap opera. Each day El Universal, more or less an opposition newspaper, reports the drama. President Hugo Chavez, repeatedly elected with awesome wins, is making things happen. Yet Chavez warns of a U.S. attack. To tune in (and risk getting hooked),  click and go . . .

See below for last week's links to the story of the year about the leaked secret Rycroft memo, aka the Downing Street memo.  The American media must be afraid to deal with this smoking gun. The story is two weeks old. Have you even heard about it? Greg Palast has more . . .

Several editorial cartoonists are lampooning the United Airlines mismanagement. The mismanagers are still taking in their multi-million dollar salaries in spite of the bankruptcy. What's not funny is that the people who built the company are losing their pensions and promised benefits.

Albert Einstein said the most powerful force in the universe is compound interest. That is why a modest savings program can lead to dramatic and surprising amounts of money and security. As you see, promises of the corporatist class do not count. Only cash counts. To see how to retire at 100% of your lifetime income, click and go . . .

Abraham Lincoln was once asked whether labor or capital were more important. President Lincoln reflected and replied: Labor existed before capital. It first took labor to create capital. Thus, Lincoln concluded, labor was more important and came first. If our system followed Lincoln's logic, then the employees would have first dibs on the assets and shares of United. Instead, it's the other way 'round. The Fair Deal  is consistent with Lincoln's analysis. Now to find some of those cartoons, click and go . . .

May Week Two

Tony Blair and his candidates had a big setback in Britain's elections. The Times of London published the government's secret "Rycroft memo" bombshell just days before the election. Key statement: "Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy." Fixed??? Really!
Smells like a smoking gun . . . . Here's the entire memo . . .  Click and go . . .

To dig into the 'cross the Atlantic strategy to invade Iraq, read what Greg Palast has to say . . . and subscribe to his free email newsletter at the same time . . . Click and go . . .

Thanks to Joel Pett's recent PR, Signe Wilkinson has been added to "Cartoons".  Click and go . . .

The Boston Globe's columnist Thomas Oliphant is absent while recovering from a serious medical problem. Newsweek's Jonathan Alter has been added to "Columnists" on Saturday . . .   Click and go . . .

Happy Mother's Day! As usual, when it comes to Mother's Day and just about everything else, The Onion has a different take: Why couldn't Dracula go to the Halloween dance? Give up? Wanna know? Because his mummy wouldn't let him! . . .  For more of these at The Onion, click and go . . .

The newest permanent link is The Sierra Club Store, take a minute to check it out. And, a few quality items are on sale. Click and go . . .

May Week One

Energy and gas prices are hot topics these days. Norway, a major oil exporter, pegs its gas prices at $6.60 per gallon. New link International Herald Tribune says "Oil-rich Norway is taxing on cars".   Click and go . . .

One expert says, "We need something like an Apollo program for the transportation sector."  Click and go . . .

Mike Keefe's editorial cartoon sums it up very well . . .  Click and go . . .

Paul Krugman has a great 2-part series on health insurance . . .  Click and go . . .

Quote of the Week by Molly Ivins . . . "If Democrats aren't going to stand up for regular people, to hell with them. " Click and go . . .

Swedish-born, prize-winning Ann Telnaes has been added to "Cartoons" . . .  Click and go . . .

All of which shows once again, says Joel Pett, why cartoons are the most potent weapons in the editorial arsenal . . .  Click and go . . .

Laura Bush did the best stand-up comedy of the year. The networks should just drop any regular program and replay her whole act. Priceless! This link also gives you access to the video/audio of her after-dinner routine.  Click and go . . .

Hope keeps you going! Finally, on a truly heart-warming note . . . find out which major extinct bird is alive and well . . .  Click and go . . .