Israel passed a law punishing people who advocate for a boycott of the settlements. The law is definitely not only a blow to freedom of speech in Israel but also another act of repression against Palestinian solidarity activism in Israel.

A lot of state legislators are wastes of space. But there are a few who aren’t. Neil Haugerud, my buddy, was a very good one.

What do you think of socialism, and do you feel insulted or complimented with being identified with that particular philosophy/economy/practice. Or do you think we have a need to reject an identification with a philosophy that’s been misused – just like every other philosophy, including democracy?

Paul Williams — Sad Song, from episode 108 of The Muppet Show.

Sure, it would would be better if B.O. laid down a progressive gauntlet and challenged GOP budget priorities head on, daring them to oppose aggressive job-creating measures without any deficit-cutting camouflage. But then, we all know that frontal assaults aren’t exactly Obama’s thing.

So instead we get the reluctant(?) endorsement of conservative budget frames, and a passive-aggressive approach to boosting the economy that might have been borrowed from a character in the old Popeye cartoons: “I’ll gladly pay you in budget cuts Tuesday for some stimulus today.”

Herman Cain goes all-in on the 2012 Crazy Primary.

While most of creation is still trying to predict if Congress will raise the debt ceiling, and what will happen to the economy if they don’t, I thought I’d spend some quality time with disasters quite present, and in some ways, quite predictable. I am talking about nuclear power in the wake of Japan’s Fukushima disaster.

After yesterday’s profile of Ron Wallen, it occurred to me you’d like to meet another widower drastically affected by the Defense of Marriage Act. Private employers’ — and federal government agencies’ — human resources policies use their pension plans to enshrine DOMA-based discrimination against legally married couples and surviving spouses. This discrimination hugely affects survivors’ quality of life, in a way that simply does not happen to opposite-sex couples.

Meet Andrew Sorbo.

Video from Russia Today of a press conference that Julian Assange and Kristinn Hrafnsson, WikiLeaks spokesperson. RT claims not a lot of press organizations were there to cover the press conference.

The main problem with our health care system is… the health care system itself. The chart shows that the US has the lowest life expectancy when plotted against 19 other affluent nations, AND spends the most money on health care. We have the worst of all possible worlds, and the Affordable Care Act isn’t going to radically improve matters,