Yes.

The verdict has been in for some time, and it’s unanimous. Obama (and the Democratic consensus) is not, nor should it be confused with, anything remotely associated with the “Left”, or Progressive policies.

Does this really need to be restated ?

But I plan to change the way I work–with a focus on also producing longer, more finished articles and possibly another book project.

Great but bittersweet news. Will be following you to your new location.

Slightly OT, but when the hell did our country become a “homeland”, anyway?
From Clapper’s letter :

Should the authority to use these critical intelligence tools expire, our nation’s intelligence and law enforcement… less capability… to detect and thwart terrorist plots against our homeland…”

How can serious people talk like this?
This language (reminiscent of German war propaganda) deliberately tugs on the sentimentality strings of people, making it easier to impose on them the Orwellian administrative tentacles whose stated purpose is to protect them.

For me, too, the word “homeland” conjures a kind of antediluvian primitive nationalism (tribalism) based on blood and soil, not a people united by their devotion to political ideals like liberty and free speech.

http://reason.com/blog/2007/07/19/what-does-homeland-mean-to-you

I wasn’t expecting you ! (sorry)

selise has it right, it’s largely the insurance companies. The problem is not quality of the care itself, it is access to that care which restricts care to a certain part of the population on largely economic factors. The doctors and other professionals are only a part of the equation.
The tort reform argument is total bullshit (malpractice suits driving prices up, making hospitals schedule every type of exam possible in order to cover all their bases even if there is no need for certain exams), and even if malpractice suites are sometimes abused and can be costly, it has little to do with why care is so expensive. Care is expensive because it CAN be, it is not a law of nature.
Another reason why insurance companies and clinics can charge so much for services is that it is a complex subject and most people simply understand little about medicine, procedures or the drugs used, so they are easily manipulated – there’s a “knowledge gap” :
eCAHNomics the other day :

That’s precisely the point. To enhance the knowledge gap betw buyer & seller so that seller gets more profits.

This is a quote from a book on political economy, but the same principle holds here, namely that :

Most outsiders cannot decipher its complicated sign language and mysterious rituals, and even those who can are often left excluded by its professional barriers to entry. The reason, though, is not that the study of economics is somehow more difficult than other social subjects, but rather that it is deliberately made to look that way. Moreover, by depicting the economy as if it were ‘natural’, and therefore subject to ‘objective’ scientific inquiry, economists have effectively managed not only to stifle meaningful public discussion, but also to eliminate the need for such discussion in the first place.

My mother just began chemotherapy the other day, which can cause nausea ; I was proposed two drugs to counter the effects, one costing $120, the other $8. These are financial and economic manipulations, not medical ones.

Agreed, amazing article.
The fog of war (and also the semantics which render the words “war” and “terrorism” almost devoid of meaning, or so elastic as to mean whatever you want them to mean) also has the function of creating an exceptional circumstance (see : Yoo, Rumsfeld and Bybee memos on torture and detention of “enemy belligerents”, etc.) providing cover for continued crimes and policies which would under normal circumstances be considered unacceptable. By creating a situation in which violence is to be expected – a “war zone” (which is basically now wherever Obama decides it is…) there is a sort of tacit assumption that “things are messy” and therefore anything is possible.
The AUMF and all the subsequent memos which are considered controversial were drafted assuming that there was a general climate of hostilities which would justify such acts, rendering them necessary. If we are going to put and end to this type of incident it seems to me that we will have to create a reality in which there is no longer an ongoing “war” at all – indeed, these are horrible, but not isolated nor extraordinary events, on the contrary, this is what war is all about, it’s foolish to believe otherwise.
Alan Nairn :

“…But we did it with the intent of protecting our forces.”

And there’s a certain logic to that. If you’re a soldier and you’re in combat, naturally you want to protect yourself and protect your friends, and you will do everything possible to do that, including killing someone who you think, who you speculate, might be firing at you or might potentially fire at you. So that inevitably sets up a situation where when you send troops into a country in a hostile situation, when you invade a country, that means—really it means, in a practical sense—that in order to protect your troops, you have to kill civilians, you have to kill them in large numbers. And that’s what the U.S. is doing in Afghanistan. That’s what it did in Iraq. And that’s what it’s setting up to do in a series of other places. It’s an inevitable result of the initial act, of the initial act of invasion, and, in legal terms, what is often the initial act of aggression.

http://www.democracynow.org/2010/12/29/allan_nairn_as_us_loses_its

The call I want to hear from Obama is one to attend to human principles

Please don’t hold your breath

…are unlikely to perceive political advantage in responding morally…

Therein lies one of the core problems, doesn’t it?
If you want people like Obama to change course on any given issue, you must make it politically damaging for him to stay the course. Until then, the goal (for someone politically active, that is) is to create tactics which will make the continuation of such policies politically unfeasible.

The article didn’t comment on whether Netanyahu has any rights to claim the rich, cultural history of an entire religion and history, but it’s my view that his claims to represent that incredible history are not all that legitimate.

Lest we forget about that wonderful, magical ring :
http://maxblumenthal.com/2010/08/george-wills-irrepressible-conflict-with-facts/

And :
“America is a thing you can move very easily, move it in the right direction.”
https://voices.washingtonpost.com/checkpoint-washington/2010/07/netanyahu_america_is_a_thing_y.html

Ha ! Studying and displaying the hypocrisy of the MSM is a full time job, if one so chooses. It is a veritable cornucopia of material, and it seems they never tire of it.

Thoughts from Philip Giraldi, former CIA officer, on this, after Marcy’s interview w/ Scott Horton :

The guy was definitely not a NOC and the pause in the drone activity has nothing to do with the case. Davis was a CIA contractor either out providing security for a CIA case officer who was meeting a source that was not completely trusted or he was himself meeting such a source. The backup van was there in case something went wrong and to provide additional security. He was not a diplomat as he was not accredited to the Pak foreign ministry, but he would have limited immunity if it could be demonstrated that he was out doing work for the consulate (which he will be unable to do). I have been “technical and administrative” while overseas and it really provides very little protection. The US government is going crazy trying to get this guy freed because CIA is apoplectic insisting that it has to be done because the US government takes care of its own, particularly when they are on dangerous missions. The Obamas have mishandled the whole thing by publicly demanding the release. It should have been dealt with quietly with plenty of bribe money all around, which is not to say this guy should go free, but that is the way CIA makes flaps go away.

As for why he had contacts from the tribal areas on his cell phone :

Because he was meeting people from those areas, which is where the militants are as well as the targets for drones. It would not be safe to meet them outside of an urban area with elaborate security laid on.
I am not saying that the intelligence he might have been seeking wasn’t connected to drone activity, only that the pause is unrelated. BTW the Agency fear is that Davis might start blabbing to save his skin and tell about all of the CIA unilateral operations in Pakistan, which would end any cooperation from the Paks.

HARRIS 3:50 :

There’s greed on the part of people who buy houses they have no business buying, just cause someone tells them they can…

“How greedy of you to get hoodwinked by a bunch of huckster bankers ! The American Dream must be EARNED by those who are able to see through the scams of those trying to profit off the taxpayers and lower income brackets ! How dare you force those banks to grudgingly manipulate loan interest rates and prey on unsuspecting victims, you made them to it !”

Money is its own justification, it doesn’t need to explain anything. Capital IS power.

To take up the idea of the possibility of “Davis” being Special Ops rather than CIA :
https://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/25/world/25military.html?_r=2

The secret directive, signed in September by Gen. David H. Petraeus, authorizes the sending of American Special Operations troops to both friendly and hostile nations in the Middle East, Central Asia and the Horn of Africa to gather intelligence and build ties with local forces.

and :
http://www.thiscantbehappening.net/node/442

Davis (whose identity was first denied and later confirmed by the US Embassy in Islamabad), and the embassy have claimed that he was hired as an employee of a US security company called Hyperion Protective Consultants, LLC, which was said to be located at 5100 North Lane in Orlando, Florida. Business cards for Hyperion were found on Davis by arresting officers.

However Counterpunch Magazine has investigated and discovered the following information:

Firstly, there is not and never has been any such company located at the 5100 North Lane address. It is only an empty storefront, with empty shelves along one wall and an empty counter on the opposite wall, with just a lone used Coke cup sitting on it. A leasing agency sign is on the window…

We’re only scratching the surface with this story.

Thanks. Someone already has, but the site the analysis was on is acting weird – I’ll post it if I can access it. Suffice it to say that something is not right.
Should be here :
http://www.columnspk.com/blackwater-alternative-of-cia-in-the-world/

I should have saved screenshots.