New Developments III

[MovieWes]

Obama on Fort Hood: 'Horrific outburst of violence'

President Obama said today his prayers are with the victims of the Fort Hood shootings, as he paid tribute to all of those who risk their lives to serve their country.

"It's difficult enough when we lose these brave Americans in battles overseas," the president said. "It is horrifying that they should come under fire at an Army base on American soil."

He called it "a horrific outburst of violence" and said his administration will work for "answers to every single question." Obama said he has spoken with Defense Secretary Robert Gates and other Pentagon officials, and that the FBI and Department of Homeland Security are involved in the investigation.

"We are going to stay on this," he said. " But I hope in the meantime that all of you recognize the scope of this tragedy and keep everybody in their thoughts and prayers."

Obama made his comments before making final remarks at the White House Tribal Nations Conference. He shortened his speech because of the shootings in order to return to the White House.

Obama's full remarks on the shootings follow the jump

I had planned to make some broader remarks about the challenges that lay ahead for Native Americans as well as collaboration with our administration.

But as some of you might have heard, there has been a tragic shooting at the Fort Hood Army base in Texas. We don't yet know all the details at this moment. We will share them as we get them.

What we do know is that a number of American soldiers have been killed, and even more have been wounded in a horrific outburst of violence.

My immediate thoughts and prayers are with the wounded and with the families of the fallen and with those who live and serve at Fort Hood.

These are men and women who have made the selfless and courageous decision to risk and at times give their lives to protect the rest of us on a daily basis.

It's difficult enough when we lose these brave Americans in battles overseas.

It is horrifying that they should come under fire at an Army base on American soil.

I've spoken to Secretary Gates and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, and I will continue to receive a constant stream of updates as new information comes in.

We are working with the Pentagon, the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, all to ensure that Fort Hood is secure and we will continue to support the community with the full resources of the federal government. In the meantime, I would ask all Americans to keep the men and women of Fort Hood in your thoughts and prayers. We will make sure that we get answers to every single question about this horrible incident, and I want all of you to know that as commander-in-chief, there's no greater honor, but also no greater responsibility for me than to make sure that the extraordinary men and women in uniform are properly cared for an that their safety and security when they are at home is provided for.

So we are going to stay on this, but I hope in the meantime that all of you recognize the scope of this tragedy and keep everybody in their thoughts and prayers. Again, thank you for your participation here today. I am confident that this is going to be resulting in terrific work between this government and your governments in the weeks, the months and years to come.

God bless you and God bless the United States of America.

Thank you.

[MovieWes]

The death toll is up to 12, with 31 wounded.

I want to throw up.

[Greg]

NBC: 7 dead, 20 injured in Fort Hood shooting
SWAT teams battle at least one gunman on Texas Army base

At least seven people were killed dead and 20 others were wounded in a mass shooting incident Thursday at Fort Hood, Texas, where at least one suspect were believed to be in custody, NBC News and NBC affiliate KCEN-TV reported.

More shots were reported later in the afternoon, reported KCEN of Waco, which said no further details were immediately available.

It was unknown whether the victims were all soldiers or civilians at Fort Hood, one of the largest military complexes in the world. The base was on lockdown, as were schools in the area.

At least one suspect was in custody, reported KCEN, which quoted a source as saying at least one of the shooters had a high-powered rifle. The station reported that at least four SWAT officers were among those wounded.

A spokesman for Fort Hood said the shootings took place at two locations around 1:30 p.m.: the Soldiers Readiness Processing Center and Howze Theater.

The spokesman, Sgt. Major Jamie Posten, said processing center was where soldiers “cycle through as they prepare to deploy.” That complex is on the West side of post, off Battalion Avenue.

Greg Schannep, an aide to Rep. John Carter, R-Texas, who was on the post to attend a graduation service, told the Austin American-Statesman that a soldier with blood on his uniform ran past him and said a man was shooting.

The Temple Independent School District was on a “soft” lockdown. Parents were asked to pick their children up at the normal times, although they could experience delays.

Agents of the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were on their way to the post, federal officials said.

Fort Hood is adjacent to Killeen, about 60 miles northeast of Austin. The sprawling complex is home to at least 4,929 active-duty officers and 45,414 enlisted. Civilian employees total nearly 9,000.

A spokesman for the Army, Lt. Col. Lee M. Packnett, said he was unaware whether security measures were put in place at other military bases. A spokesman at Fort Lewis, Wash., said the incident was being treated as isolated.

President Barack Obama was briefed on the shootings, press secretary Robert Gibbs said.

Homeland Security spokeswoman Sara Kuban said officials from several federal agencies are still collecting information on the shootings. "Because this is early in this event, we cannot at this time confirm motives behind these shootings," she said.

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson, R-Texas, said in a statement: “I am shocked and saddened by today’s outburst of violence at Fort Hood that has cost seven of our brave service members their lives and has gravely injured others. My heart goes out to their loved ones.”

Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s campaign spokesperson said the governor was in Denton, scheduled to attend a campaign event, when word of the shooting occurred. There was no word on whether he had left Denton or whether he was headed to Fort Hood.

Milly Land, who works at the base fitness center, said she was headed for the graduation ceremony at 2 p.m. at the Howze Theater when the campus was locked down. She went back to the fitness center. She said she spoke by phone with friends at the soldier processing center, who said a gunman walked in about 1:30, walked to the medical area of the processing center, and started shooting. A second gunman was shooting at the theater next door, she said.

Fort Hood has seen other violence in recent years. In September 2008, a 21-year-old 1st Cavalry Division soldier shot his lieutenant to death and then killed himself. Spc. Jody Michael Wirawan of Eagle River, Alaska, shot himself to death after shooting 1st Lt. Robert Bartlett Fletcher, 24, of Jensen Beach, Fla. to death.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33678801/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/

[Damien]

From TrueSlant:

Knock, knock!

Who’s there?

Joe.

Joe who?

Joe Lieberman.

Get off my doorstep, you asshole.

[criddic3]

I don't think Obama is in "freefall" but I do think the Democrats have something to be worried about. Most of the polls had shown Corzine in a dead-heat with Christie, but he did worse than expected. The fact that Obama did extensive campaigning in the state shows he had little impact on the result, which spells trouble for him and his party next year. Having said that, I do think that conservatives got overly optimistic about NY-23, where the virtually unknown third party candidate did very well but fell short of trumped up expectations.

The fact is, though, that the special elections for the House were not the major events that the gubernatorials were, for the simple fact that more people vote in state-wide elections than for a mere district. Plus, as some have stated, Obama won big in Virginia last year (prompting many to speculate that the state may be turning blue, calling it the purple state). It's true that Deeds made some strategic mistakes but that's no excuse. Add NJ and you have a possible indication of where 2010 could go. Traditionally the party in power loses seats in the first mid-term, with few exceptions, and with voter anger fueling events it could be a major blow to the Democrats who were hoping that 2008 was a re-alignment election.

[Damien]

As the Washington Monthly noted, the two Congressional victories yesterday mean the Dems have been 5 for 5 this year in special elections, having won earlier in New York's 20th, Illinois's 5th, and California's 32nd.

[OscarGuy]

Of course the corporate-controlled media are going to latch onto anything that paints Obama as weak. They are all over the two gubernatorial races but ignoring NY 23 even though for the last month or so, you would have that that that was THE vote to watch. Virginia was a foregone conclusion. No one expected Deeds to pull out a victory. New Jersey would had had a chance had people in the state not absolutely despised Corzine. His bottom-dwelling approval numbers were a sure sign of defeat there.

And what these media congloms also won't be reporting with any vigor is that neither NJ nor VA have elected a governor of the party of the president in decades. if that were part of the news, more people might realize that these were expected changes in power, not anathema because of environment.

The NY 23 race is a bit rough because A) it exposed splinters in the Republican Party which suggest that shifting to the right consistently will only cause to shift moderates out of the party altogether, which is what many of them want, but few of them understand. Doing so will destroy the Republican party and it will become a minority party for decades to come. That they are targeting a more moderate Charlie Crist only shows how idiotic they are. If they unseat Crist, not only will they lose the Florida Senate race but it will prove to everyone that the wing nuts are not going to be able to win national politics if they can't even win a moderate contest in Florida.

[Mister Tee]

The predetermined media narrative -- Obama In Freefall -- is all over the air this morning, but it's clearly bullshit.

VA was, as expected a rout, and it was a rout not because Deeds was hurt by the national party but because he needlessly ran away from it. NBC had numbers yesterday showing Obama's approval in the state is precisely the percentage of the vote he scored a year ago. Yet, among those who turned out yesterday, McCain had won 51-43%. Deeds thought it was still 1985, when Dems had to claim to love Reagan to have a chance in VA. When he said he'd opt out of the public option, he forfeited any chance of getting the young activist wing of the party to show up. (According to an exit poll on Rachel last night, under-30 turnout plummeted from 20% of the electorate last year to 9% this time) Blue dogs who take this as license to move right are proving they can't read statistics.

Corzine was facing an uphill battle, thanks to low approvals and the deep recession (lots of GOP governors lost in the early Reagan years, for the same reason). When I saw the third-party candidate Daggett was only pulling 5-6%, I knew the mission was hopeless; Corzine needed him to hit double digits to have a chance. The silver lining: losses in the legislature were virtually non-existent, so the state remains reliably Dem beyond the governor's mansion.

NY-23 was a disaster for the GOP, but the best part is, the wingnuts don't understand that. As Rachel noted last night, a Whig has represented the district more recently than a Democrat. It took a lunatic to lose the seat for the GOP...but there are plenty such lunatics around these days, running for various GOP seats next year, and the Beck/Palin/Limbaugh axis of the party seems determined that they all get a chance to destroy themselves and the party. This is a very big story for '10, thought the press won't report it out that way.

In other races: Apparently alot of folks took my attitude toward the Bloomberg race, and made it tighter than expected for him. (I got a robo-call from Bloomberg around 6:30 lamenting low turnout, so I had an inkling he might be in a little trouble)... CA had a special Congressional election that virtually no one noticed, but it resulted in a VERY liberal Dem Garadmendi replacing a wishy-washy one in Ellen Tauscher... The ME repeal was another, narrow loss for gay marriage -- but gay civil unions did well in Michigan (EDITED) and appear to have prevailed in WA state as well. Marriage seems to be just a bridge too far for right now, for religious reasons (I know this from members of my family, who are all for civil unions but get queasy on marriage). Full equality will come, thanks to actuarial tables, but we're going to have to wait a few more years for the most resistant generation to vanish from the voting rolls.



Edited By Mister Tee on 1257364795

[Big Magilla]

I don't think the outcome of the governors' races mean all that much in the long haul. The Democrat in Virginia was a virtual unknown who lost to the same guy four years ago when they were both running for Attorney General so that one's not surprising at all.

I don't know a whole lot about why Corine was unpopular in New Jersey, but he was, so it's apparently a local thing, not a referendum on the party.

The upstate N.Y. race is another matter. The Democrat won in that district for the first time since 1880. It will be interesting to see how much was due to the split within the Republican party and how much was due to people's disgust with the tactics of the ultra-right. The real test of their power will come next year when the popular Charlie Crist faces similar challenges to his senatorial run in Florida.

Gay marriage lost in Maine but a new medical marijuana distribution law passed. Gambling passed in Ohio. The country as a whole is moving to the left. These tea partying nuts will make a lot of noise for a while, but eventually they'll go away.

[OscarGuy]

Well, so far, the Republicans have won the two Gubernatorial races and I guess this means we'll be stuck listening to the GOP crowing for the next several months that somehow this is a sign things are changing.

Of course, they will immediately push aside any criticism that Deeds ran a shitty campaign and Corzine was disliked a great deal in the state (and that indie candidates always poll higher before election day than they do in actual election results). But they'll claim victory.

The NY 23 race, though, is still close with the Dem leading. I hope it stays this way.

[OscarGuy]

Could this be the beginning of the long-discussed split in the Republican party between moderates and the religious right? Look to the last paragraph for a quote that suggests the far right does not want the moderates in the party, which suggests that either one side goes or the other does. Either way, at this point, the Democrats will win. In-fighting within your own party does not lead to success.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/11/02/new.york.23/index.html

[OscarGuy]

Let's hope so. At first, I thought for sure the RNC pressured her to step out of the race and promised her a better position elsewhere. But now, I think she just wants to see the Republican lose all the moderate voters she was courting.

[Mister Tee]

And now, to add to the fun in the 23rd District, the GOP moderate who dropped out -- Dede Scozzafava (I had to copy and paste that name) -- has endorsed the DEMOCRAT Bill Owens over the right-winger Hoffman.

GOP Civil War?

[Mister Tee]

A few comments on this Tuesday's US elections (which, whatever the outcome, will be massively over-interpreted by most of the press as Doom For Obama and the Big GOP Comeback):

Here in NY, Bloomberg will roll to re-election despite many being pissed off he blithely disregarded the term limits rule. I'll vote against him -- for that, and because he began airing ads accusing his opponent of running a negative campaign before the cash-starved Thompson had put a single spot on TV -- but I have no illusions (or rooting interest, really) that he'll lose.

Across the river, Corzine becomes the first incumbent governor to face Recession Voters, and doing it as a representative of Goldman Sachs when that company is viewed as a den of thieves. The GOP for once resisted the impulse to nominate an unelectably-far-right candidate, but, even so, with the help of a third party entity, the state's party demographics have pulled Corzine back into a race that seemed long-gone. Toss-up.

Down in VA, Creigh Deeds has done that stupid thing Democratic moderates always convince themselves is smart: run against their party's DC establishment, specifically by saying he would opt out of the public option (the one that has roughly 60% approval in the state). This tactic has never won over right-leaning voters, but always depresses Democratic base turnout. Well played, sir. Though it may be moot in the end: since the early 70s, VA voters have always elected a governor from the party that lost the previous year's presidential election. McDonnell by a solid margin.

But the most fun has been had in NY's 23rd Congressional District, a special election held because the GOP Rep has moved on to work for the Obama administration. This is a district, Lawrence O'Donnell informs me, that FDR never carried; that Pat Moynihan lost while racking up 67% statewide totals. It shouldn't be remotely competitive -- and may not be, after today's development. But that's not the end of the story.

What's happened (for those not watching): the party faithful nominated a pro-choice, vaguely stimulus-supporting GOP moderate, the sort that until recently had held a bunch of NY upstate seats. And the wingnut purity brigade went crazy, labelling her a RINO (Republican in name only). They threw their support behind a far-right-er who's never lived in the district (who, by editorial board agreement, doesn't know squat about the district), and, despite official party muscle going to the moderate, got big names like Palin and Fred Thompson to come in and endorse him. Polls have been showing the GOPer and this conservative interloper splitting the vote enough that the hapless Dem has actually been leading.

So, today, the official GOP candidate actually "released her supporters" -- though she'll stay on the ballot, she's conceding she can't win the race. This ought to mean the rightie, Hoffman, wins, unless there were serious pro-choicers among the woman (with an unspellable name)'s support. The Malkin crowd is flashing Mission Accomplished already.

But even if this Hoffman does win, it's hard to see this not being disastrous for the GOP over the rest of the country. Crist in FL, Kirk in IL and Castle in DEL are three guys with similar candidate profiles to the deposed nominee -- guys who were expected to run formidable races in purple or blue stae Senate races next year. Now you have to question if they can survive primary races, or if they'll move so far right in those primary heats they lose their general election appeal.

This could obviously be hyperbole, but it's not beyond possibility that, for the GOP, this little race turns out to be what broke their party for a generation.

[Heksagon]

Any comments on the Copenhagen environmental treaty?

Here are a few articles from The Independent

*********************************

Rainforest treaty 'fatally flawed'

Climate summit loophole lets palm oil producers cull vital wilderness

By Michael McCarthy, Environment Editor

Monday, 26 October 2009

A vital safeguard to protect the world's rainforests from being cut down has been dropped from a global deforestation treaty due to be signed at the climate summit in Copenhagen in December.

Under proposals due to be ratified at the summit, countries which cut down rainforests and convert them to plantations of trees such as oil palms would still be able to classify the result as forest and could receive millions of dollars meant for preserving them. An earlier version of the text ruled out such a conversion but has been deleted, and the EU delegation – headed by Britain – has blocked its reinsertion.

Environmentalists say plantations are in no way a substitute for the lost natural forest in terms of wildlife, water production or, crucially, as a store of the carbon dioxide which is emitted into the atmosphere when forests are destroyed and intensifies climate change.

Now they are calling on Britain to take a lead in restoring the anti-plantations safeguard at the final negotiating session in a week's time, saying that otherwise the agreement – which seeks to halve global deforestation rates by 2020 – will be fatally flawed.

"It is a priority for the safeguard to be reinserted, or otherwise we will have a situation where countries are paid for converting their natural forests into palm plantations," said Emily Brickell, the climate and forests officer for the Worldwide Find for Nature (WWF-UK).

"If this is not changed, the agreement will be part of the problem, not part of the solution, because it will allow things to carry on as they are now and we will continue to see the loss of natural rainforest," added Simon Counsell, the executive director of the Rainforest Foundation.

The key piece of text which was lost said that parties to the treaty "shall protect biological diversity, including safeguards against the conversion of natural forests to forest plantations".

It was deleted in closed negotiations but some observers think it was done at the instigation of African rainforest countries, such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Cameroon, while other states including Indonesia and Malaysia are believed to have supported it. Both are heavily involved in the oil palm industry, which is a major driver of deforestation because palm oil is used to make biofuels.

A move to reinsert the clause was blocked at the last talks in Bangkok by British officials, who feared that the gains of the week's negotiations (the text was reduced from 19 pages to nine) would be lost if the text were reopened. Green campaigners accept that this was a matter of procedure but think it will have been a disastrously bad call if officials do not move swiftly to replace the lost text at the final negotiations in Barcelona, beginning a week today.

"The EU has to make sure the wording goes back in," said Charlie Kronik, of Greenpeace. "It's absolutely essential, otherwise it leaves open the possibility of removing intact, high-value forests and replacing them with oil palms as party of the treaty."

The Department of Energy and Climate Change said: "The UK is pushing hard for the strongest possible deal to stop deforestation and that includes wanting specific language in the UN text on the protection of natural forests."

The proposed forest pact, which could be one of the most positive outcomes of the Copenhagen summit, addresses the fact that deforestation, mostly in Central and South America, Africa and Asia, now produces nearly 20 per cent of annual carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions – more than from all the world's transport. Many policymakers consider that the key goal of limiting global warming to no more than C above the pre-industrial level will be unattainable unless the problem of deforestation emissions is tackled. The issue, which has become known in official jargon as Redd (reducing emissions from deforestation in developing countries), now has a section to itself in the proposed Copenhagen accord.

Nearly 200 countries will meet in December to try to frame a new treaty that would put the world on a path towards cutting CO2 emissions by 80 per cent by 2050. Scientists say this is the very minimum that can be done to keep temperature rises below C, which is regarded as the threshold of climate change that presents a real threat to humans society. Last week, British government scientists said a potentially disastrous rise of 4C by 2060 was on the cards if emissions continued to rise at their present rate.

The Copenhagen accord, if signed, will replace the 1997 Kyoto protocol. A deal will depend on developing nations such as China and India cutting pollution because their growing economies will be responsible for 90 per cent of CO2 emissions growth in the future.

**********************************************

Illegal logging responsible for loss of 10 million hectares in Indonesia

By Kathy Marks, Asia-Pacific Correspondent

Monday, 26 October 2009

Lush tropical rainforest once covered almost all of Indonesia's 17,000 islands between the Indian and Pacific oceans. And just half a century ago, 80 per cent remained. But since then, rampant logging and burning has destroyed nearly half that cover, and made the country the world's third largest emitter of greenhouses gases after the US and China.

Indonesia still has one-tenth of the world's remaining rainforests, a treasure trove of rare plant and animal species, including critically endangered tigers, elephants and orang-utans. However, it is destroying its forests faster than any other country, according to the Guinness Book of Records, with an average two million hectares disappearing every year, double the annual loss in the 1980s.

It is that frenzied rate of deforestation that has propelled Indonesia, home to 237 million people, into its top-three spot in the global league table of climate change villains. According to a government report released last month, the destruction of forests and carbon-rich peatlands accounts for 80 per cent of the 2.3 billion tons of carbon dioxide emitted in the country annually.

The situation is partly a legacy of the 32-year rule of the dictator Suharto, during which Indonesia's forests were regarded purely as a source of revenue to be exploited for economic gain. Suharto, who stepped down in 1998, handed out logging concessions covering more than half the total forest area, many of them to his relatives and political allies.

Although the current Indonesian government, under President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, is committed to reducing deforestation and CO2 emissions, not much has changed on the ground. Poor land management is compounded by lawlessness and corruption, and illegal logging is widespread. According to one official estimate, the latter is responsible for the loss of 10 million hectares of forest.

Legal logging, too, is conducted at unsustainable levels, thanks to soaring demand from a rapidly expanding pulp and paper industry, in a country struggling with high levels of poverty.

The recent government report forecast that carbon emissions, which have risen from 1.6 billion tons in 1990, will increase to 3.6 billion by 2030, a leap of 57 per cent from today's level. The main reason is logging and clearing of forests for agriculture and industrial plantations, including oil palms. The government granted permission last year for two million hectares of peatland to be cleared for oil palms.

The rapid spread of oil palm plantations, particularly on Sumatra and Borneo islands, is threatening the orang-utan's forest habitat and hastening its extinction, according to conservationists.

Clearing land releases into the atmosphere the carbon stored in trees and below ground, either during burning or when the timber decomposes. Forest fires – regarded as a cheap and easy way of clearing forest – are deliberately lit by farmers as well as timber and oil palm plantation owners, and occur regularly on Sumatra and Borneo during the dry season.

Indonesia supports the UN's Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) initiative, welcoming the idea of being paid to conserve its forests. However, some observers question whether the carbon credits it would receive will be priced high enough to make the scheme worthwhile.

At present, Indonesia accounts for 8 per cent of global carbon emissions, although the archipelago represents barely 1 per cent of the world's landmass. It still has the third largest tracts of tropical rainforest, after Brazil and the Democratic Republic of Congo, despite losing one-quarter of its forest cover between 1990 and 2005.