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The World Through Brad's Eyes : A Look at Life, Politics, Current Events, Music, & More from My Perspective In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.

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Brad (Voted for Nader!)



Last Updated: 7/7/2009

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July 7, 2009 - Tuesday 

Category: News and Politics
http://www.news8.net/news/stories/0709/637939.html

Brad's note : If this is true, I'll NEVER get Alzheimer's! ;-)

WASHINGTON - For years caffeine has gotten mixed reviews from doctors and medical experts. Now, new research shows drinking coffee could help reverse the signs of Alzheimer's disease. 

New research suggests the effects of Alzheimer's disease could be reversed by drinking just a few cups of coffee a day. Doctors are calling the findings very encouraging. 

"It keeps me awake after lunch so I can remain productive," said Bethesda resident Larry Sampas of his caffeine habit. 
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Two new studies claim to have uncovered evidence that caffeine not only helps stave off Alzheimer's disease, but also can treat it. 

"I take note of [the studies], but nobody knows how much coffee is too much or how much coffee isn't enough. So I never really change my lifestyle," added Sampas. 

"I don't really believe them, they change so much," noted Andrew Hamon, an Arlington resident. 

The study, performed on mice, showed that after two months of drinking caffeine, the mice performed far better on tests of memory and thinking than mice given only water. 

Their memories were as sharp as those of healthy older mice without dementia. The human equivalent would mean drinking about five medium-sized cups of coffee, something some people admit to doing already. 

"If it's good for you, I would drink more," said Tomoko Ogawa, an Arlington resident. 

"It has bad side effects and good side effects," added Abdul Tamas, an Arlington resident. 

At this point, it's not known whether the changes appear to be permanent or not. Doctors say the caffeine worked by decreasing the inflammation in the brain.

The study is from the online edition of the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease. Doctors warn caffeine is a drug and can also be associated with increased blood pressure and increased heart rate. They say before increasing caffeine intake, a doctor should be consulted.
Currently listening:
Invincible
By Michael Jackson
Release date: 2001-10-30
1:54 PM 
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July 7, 2009 - Tuesday 

Current mood:  accomplished
Category: News and Politics
http://www.truthout.org/070609LA?n

Brad's note : I am a union steward and contract negotiation committee member for the UFCW, so this is extremely heartening for me!

Union Savors Victory at Pork Plant

Friday 03 July 2009

by: Kristin Collins  |  Visit article original @ The News and Observer

photo
After a nearly 17-year fight, employees of Smithfield Foods are working under a union contract. (Photo: Smithfield Foods)

    Workers now receive sick leave and holiday pay.
    After nearly 17 years of struggle, employees at the world's largest pork plant went to work under a union contract for the first time Thursday.
    Eighty-four percent of the approximately 5,000 employees at Smithfield Foods' slaughterhouse in Bladen County, about 80 miles south of Raleigh, approved the four-year contract in a vote this week. It ended one of the longest and most contentious fights over unionization in the state's history.
    The contract guarantees such basics as sick leave, time-and-a-half holiday pay and a $1.50-an-hour raise over the next four years. Some said it also ushers in a new era at a plant where workers have had little say in their working conditions.
    Workers and union officials say that perhaps the most important change is that workers will be allowed to voice concerns and challenge management decisions through a formal grievance process. In the past, many workers have said they were treated disrespectfully by their supervisors and fired after speaking out or being injured.
    "We really did accomplish something with this union," said Mattie Fulcher, a 10-year employee who helps usher pigs to their deaths. "We might not have gotten the raise that we wanted, but that will come in time. This is our first contract, and it is a start."
    Fulcher said that on Thursday, she got a 40-cent-per-hour raise and an extra week of vacation, and she began earning sick time for the first time since going to work for Smithfield. The sick time is unpaid, but in the past workers earned disciplinary points that could lead to firing if they stayed home sick.
    The contract will also guarantee workers at least 30 hours of work each week and only modest increases in the cost of health insurance. Union members will begin paying dues of about $7 a week in 30 to 45 days. Those who chose not to join will not pay dues but will still be covered by the contract.
    Officials with the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, which represents the workers, said the contract will give workers at the Tar Heel plant benefits similar to those in other meatpacking plants around the country, including some owned by Smithfield. Eight of the Smithfield, Va., company's plants elsewhere were already unionized.
    "It's difficult to measure or to explain in words how exactly this plant is going to change now that they have a voice and they have this clause that says they can't be fired without just cause," said Jill Cashen, spokeswoman for the Washington-based union. "This is day one of the future, and they're going to be able to make incremental, and some monumental, changes from here going forward."
    Smithfield managers declined to comment on the contract, other than to say they were satisfied with the outcome of negotiations.
    "We feel that the bargaining committee and the company have reached a fair and equitable agreement," said company spokesman Dennis Pittman.
    A 17-Year Uphill Battle
    The United Food and Commercial Workers Union won the right to represent employees in December. Since then, a committee of workers, union representatives and plant management has spent the months hammering out a contract.
    Its ratification represents a huge victory for the union, which had been fighting to organize the Tar Heel workers since the plant's opening in 1992. Federal officials threw out the results of two previous union elections in the plant, saying that the company unfairly influenced the results by harassing and firing union supporters.
    North Carolina has the nation's lowest rate of unionization, so the unionization of such a large bloc of workers is a coup as the union fights to organize meatpacking plants across the Southeast.
    The union contract comes after years of complaints about unsafe conditions in the plant.
    Workers slaughter and butcher as many as 32,000 hogs a day at the massive plant in a remote area of rural eastern North Carolina. Many workers cut meat as it moves along conveyor belts. Union officials said that the lines moved too fast, that knives weren't sharp enough and that the repetitive work often caused serious injuries. If injured workers couldn't perform their jobs, they were often fired, the union said.
    While the contract doesn't go to the level of mandating the speed of conveyor belts or the sharpness of knives, it requires company-funded safety training and gives employees access to the union's safety training. Cashen said workers can use the grievance procedure to address conditions they think are unsafe.
    The union ended up negotiating the contract in a difficult economic climate. Smithfield has recently closed some of its plants, and employees across the country are taking pay cuts and unpaid furloughs.
    "The economy makes it really tough for unions to negotiate," said Baldemar Velasquez, head of an Ohio-based union, the Farm Labor Organizing Committee. "If they got any kind of wage increase, I think they did really well."
     New Rights the Workers Won
    Some of the benefits listed in the four-year union contract for employees at the Bladen County Smithfield Foods plant are:
Wage increases of $1.50 per hour over four years, 40 cents a year the first three years and 30 cents a year the fourth.
Health insurance cost increases of up to $4 a week this year, then remaining steady for the rest of the contract.
The ability to earn up to three days of unpaid sick pay per year.
A guarantee of at least 30 working hours a week the first year and 32 hours the following three years.
Time-and-a-half pay for holidays and an extra week of vacation for longtime employees.
Three days of paid leave after a death in the immediate family.
A seniority system for filling open jobs.
Access to union representatives at the plant at all times.
Establishment of a safety committee and company-funded safety training for workers.
A grievance process through which workers can challenge management decisions.
Currently listening:
Invincible
By Michael Jackson
Release date: 2001-10-30
12:29 AM 
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July 3, 2009 - Friday 

Category: News and Politics
http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20090702/wl_time/08599190840600

Brad's note : The following article originated on the Time Magazine website.  Their banner wouldn't copy properly but I wanted to give credit to the source.

By JYOTI THOTTAM / NEW DELHI – Thu Jul 2, 7:05 pm ET
With one sweeping judgment Thursday, the Indian High Court decriminalized homosexuality, shook off a stubborn piece of colonial baggage and may have added momentum to a broader regional movement for gay rights. "This is a huge step forward," says Anjali Gopalan, director of the Naz Foundation India Trust, an advocacy group based in New Delhi that successfully brought a public interest petitionto overturn India's anti-sodomy law, Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code. "We can now take the next step forward for the community in securing our rights."
The law was enacted in 1860 by India's British rulers, but the most stubborn opposition to repealing it in India has come from those who argue that homosexuality goes against traditional Indian sensibilities. In July 2001, according to a report last year by Human Rights Watch, four HIV/AIDS outreach workers were arrested under Section 377 for distributing medical literature; a judge denied them bail, accusing them of "polluting the entire society." In 2003, the Indian Home Ministry - then under theHindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party - argued that it "responded to the values and mores of the time in the Indian society." Maulana Khalid Rashid Firangi Mahli, a member of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, said today's ruling was "against all religions. It is against the culture of Indian society." (Read: "The Battle Over Gay Marriage.")
Versions of Section 377 - often identified by the same three digits - exist throughout the former British colonies of Asia and Africa, and there is some hope among activists in the region that today's ruling will help efforts elsewhere. Nepal has already overturned the law, but as the largest country in South Asia, India's repeal effort has been watched especially closely. "We have had a very progressive leadership, and I sincerely hope that the Indian decision will help us in the right direction," says Sahran Abeysundera, a gay rights activist in Colombo, Sri Lanka's capital. As in India, Sri Lanka's law on homosexuality, known there as Section 365, has hindered HIV prevention programs among male sex workers. "We stand to gain more by repealing these laws than keeping them in the law books."
Shakhawat Hossain, moderator of Boys of Bangladesh, an online community that helps and supports gay Bangladeshis, says that India, because of its cultural and historic ties to Bangladesh, can influence the direction of the gay rights movement there. "This ruling certainly would boost up the work that is going on in here," Hossain says. "Most importantly it will pave the way for a discussion in the wider society and media here in Bangladesh." <a style="color: rgb(0, 88, 166); text-decoration: none; " target="_blank" href="http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/time/wl_time/storytext/08599190840600/32576259/SIG=12537ufdt.r{}
Currently reading:
Lea's Book of Rules for the World
By Lea DeLaria
Release date: 2000-05-02
3:16 AM 
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July 3, 2009 - Friday 

Category: News and Politics
Brad's note : I just received this e-mail from Congressman Robert Wexler (D-Fla) and thought I'd share it.  Even before reading this, I ranked him up there with Dennis Kucinich and Russ Feingold.  This definitely reinforces my admiration.

Dear Brad,

This week marks the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall riots - which occurred in reaction to anti-gay raids by NY police in 1969 and are considered by many to be the beginning of the modern gay rights movement in America.

My parents, compassionate people, taught me that it's not enough to be tolerant of people different than ourselves:  We must go beyond tolerance, and accept others as equals.

In my lifetime, the struggle for equal rights has made significant progress.  Yet today, even with an African American president...  even as we continue to break gender barriers and reverse the effects of centuries-long discrimination against African Americans, Native Americans, religious minorities, the disabled community, and others....  our laws actively discriminate against men and women who are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered.

Throughout the country, this discrimination manifests in different ways.  

In my own state of Florida, gays and lesbians are not allowed to adopt children, even as thousands of kids languish under state guardianship and in group homes.  In Florida and most other states, no provision exists that grants legal recognition of civil unions - leaving many without benefits or visitation rights when their partner becomes ill or passes away.  

This national lack of compassion and concern for our fellow Americans is immoral.

In Iraq and Afghanistan, honored combat veterans, desperately needed in the field, have been discharged from duty because it was disclosed they were gay.

Across America, couples who have lived together for decades in stable, committed relationships are deniedhealth care benefits - because they are gay.

No one should have to uproot their family and move to a different state to gain these simple legal rights.   It is fundamentally a denial of justice.

Like with so many issues we've discussed, we risk being defined by our inaction.  Make no mistake -- there will be a time when the children of this country ask their parents why we allowed things to be this way - why we allowed decisions such as to who one chooses to love to be used as cause for denying a job, right of survivorship, or access to an ill companion.

On this issue, I have felt a moral obligation to stand on the side of compassion and justice.  Long after my career ends, I hope to be proud of where I stood and of the support I gave for those who have made achieving equal rights their life's work.

I hope you see it as I do, and continue to push for equality for every American, including for our LGBT brothers and sisters.

With respect,

Congressman Robert Wexler




Currently listening:
Tinted Windows
By Tinted Windows
Release date: 2009-04-21
12:28 AM 
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July 2, 2009 - Thursday 

Category: News and Politics
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/07/02-15

Published on Thursday, July 2, 2009 by CommonDreams.orgIgnoring Propethic Predictors

by Ralph Nader

I've wondered often why people who go to "town meetings" held by campaigning politicians rarely ask fundamental questions.
Here is one that should have been asked of presidential candidate Barack Obama: "If you get to the White House, will you appoint to top positions Americans who have a track record of making the right decisions in their respective fields?"
"Of course, I will," Obama would have undoubtedly replied.
Of course, he did not when it came to the collapse of the corrupt Wall Street casinos and the bailout of these gamblers by the American people. Obama chose the very Wall Streeters and Wall Street servants who were involved in, condoned, or profited from the speculative binges that led to the biggest government bailout scheme in world history. The President's explanation is that he wants experienced people who know how Wall Street works. Yeah, right! In reality, he wanted political cover.
Something very important is missing when even people who are part of the ruling establishment are ignored, marginalized, or ridiculed even though their detailed, public warnings prove to be all too accurate.
Consider billionaire, Ross Perot. Back in the 1980s and 1990s, Ross, as everyone calls him, was right on General Motors, right on NAFTA trade, and right on the federal deficits.
In 1984, he joined the Board of Directors of GM after selling his successful company, EDS, to the auto giant. He could scarcely believe how stodgy, bureaucratic, and insensitive GM executives were in running the company. He tried to shake up the boys at the top to meet the fast-growing competition from Asia and Europe.
The GM brass couldn't stand Ross "at large" probing up and down the company, so in 1986 they bought out his shares in return for him leaving the Board.
Two years later, reflecting on his experience at GM with a reporter from Fortune, Perot called the "General Motors system a blanket of fog that keeps people from doing what they know needs to be done."
Warming up, Perot continued: "One day I made a speech to some senior executives. I said, ‘Okay, guys, I'm going to give you the whole code on what's wrong. You don't like your customers. You don't like your dealers. You don't like the people who make your cars. You don't like your stockholders. And, to a large extent, you don't like one another. For this company to win, we're going to have to love our customers. We're going to have to stop fretting about dealers who make too much money and hope they make $1 billion a year though us. The guys on the factory floor are the salt of the earth-not mad-dog, rabid, burn-the-plant-down radicals. And all this sniping at one another-the financial guys vs. the cars guys-is terribly destructive.'"
GM didn't listen to Ross. Now, after a long, relentless slide, GM is bankrupt, abandoning their workers, two thousand of their dealers, and their customers' grievances. Moreover, GM is into the U.S. taxpayer for over $70 billion.
Perot devoted much of his 1993 published book Save Your Job, Save Our Country to NAFTA and trade. Looking back, he was right most of the time. NAFTA cost more U.S. jobs than it created, generated a huge U.S. trade deficit with Mexico, and mainly benefited the "36 businessmen who own Mexico's 39 largest conglomerates or over half of Mexico's Gross National Product."
The border-located maquiladora factories have high worker turnover and squeeze the laborers in often unsafe conditions for little pay.
Here is how Perot described the scene behind the boasting of Washington, DC, and corporations about the large increase in trade after NAFTA:
"Most of the goods produced in the maquiladoras are shipped into the U.S. market. Consequently, most of the so-called trade between the U.S. and Mexico is not trade as trade is commonly understood. Rather, it is primarily U.S. companies shipping their own machinery, components, and raw materials across the border into their Mexican factories and then shipping their finished or semi-finished goods back over the border into the U.S."
A good deal of the U.S. auto industry went south after NAFTA, leaving workers and communities stranded in Michigan and other states. Bankrupt Chrysler is planning to move a modern, award-winning engine plant in Wisconsin to Mexico after receiving billions of dollars in taxpayer bailouts.
On Perot's nationally-televised deficit warnings (with charts), what more need be said? Even he did not envision what would pile up after his clarion calls. The burden on the next generation and the tax dollars diverted from our country's needs to pay the interest on these trillions of dollars of debt were pointed out again and again nearly twenty years ago by the Texas entrepreneur. He even has a website (perotcharts.com) updating the red ink.
In Bush's and Obama's Washington, there is no room for Perot to gain visibility and recognition.
It is one thing for the Washington politicians to ignore prescient progressive commentators, like William Grieder, who have been prophetically right on. It is quite another escape from reality to turn their backs on leaders within the business establishment itself.
There are many like Perot who must be watching the day's news and saying "we told you so, but you didn't listen then and you are not listening now."
Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate, lawyer, and author. His most recent book is The Seventeen Traditions.
Currently listening:
Tinted Windows
By Tinted Windows
Release date: 2009-04-21
10:54 PM 
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