We have a $180 billion dollar jobs bill likely to get a vote this week. Very few people know about it. But labor has made it a litmus test.

A new article at Truthout, by H.P. Albarelli and Jeffrey Kaye, describes how the CIA’s Artichoke Project was the contemporaneous and operational side of the MK-ULTRA mind control research program. It was not superceded by MK-ULTRA in the 1950s, as often supposed. Even more, Artichoke-derived methods of using drugs, hypnosis, sensory deprivation and overload, behavioral modification techniques and other methods of mind control have resurfaced as a primary component of U.S. interrogation practice.

The New York Times has been tracking the Mineral Management Service’s compliance with the moratorium on new OCS/Gulf drilling permits announced by President Obama and Interior Secretary Salazar. Their finding: MMS continues to issue new drilling and related permits on activities just like those conducted by the Deepwater Horizon rig.

We learned during this months-long debate that the progressive space for economics and finance is perilously narrow. The institutional players either don’t know how to pitch this to their audiences, have been bought off from the beginning, or don’t view it as a problem. That’s unfortunate, but a newer class of activists have engaged with this problem, and now they have a coherent critique. It has not yet been successful, but it sets up very well for campaigns in the future.

• Great messaging, guys.
• Drill baby, drill.
• So, the biggest problem we face right now is wasteful spending?
• Let’s hope so.
• Obama vs. the corporations.
• Is this the best we can do?

I was in college in the Spring of 1986 when the Chernobyl nuclear power plant had its meltdown. Without Twitter, Blogs or Facebook we actually had to sit around and hyperventilate with each other face-to-face, it was terrible. One thing we did have is Reagan Administration officials on television telling us that non-commie nuclear reactors [...]

Johnny Carson as Carnac The Magnificent, featuring Ed McMahon. This skit aired on The Tonight Show in February, 1981.

Ombudsman Andy Alexander of the Washington Post wondered this morning why women readers are abandoning the newspaper even faster than men.

Fishermen’s woes, a paddle trip through the bayou, and staying true to ourselves — a journey along State Highway 46 in Louisiana through St. Bernard parish, towards the Gulf of Mexico.

Two weeks ago, our CentCom commander took a break from meeting with Wali Kharzai to accept the annual Irving Kristol Award at a dinner hosted by the American Enterprise Institute.