However, conservative GOP Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, in a statement to CNN, supported Steele and said the RNC chairman's characterization of the war was correct. "He is guiding the party in the right direction and we (the GOP) are on the verge of victory this fall," said Paul, who mounted an unsuccessful bid for the GOP presidential nomination in 2008. "Chairman Steele should not back off. He is giving the country, especially young people, hope as he speaks truth about this war." Paul, meanwhile, wants the United States to withdraw its troops from Afghanistan. "I would like to congratulate Michael Steele for his leadership on one of the most important issues of today," Paul said. "He is absolutely right: Afghanistan is now Obama's war. During the 2008 campaign, Obama was out in front in insisting that more troops be sent to Afghanistan. Obama called for expanding the war even as he pretended to be a peace candidate." Steele's critics are supporting "Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama's war," Paul said of the Democratic House speaker and president. "The American people are sick and tired spending hundreds of billions of dollars a year, draining our economy and straining our military," Paul said. "Michael Steele has it right and Republicans should stick by him." However, Pelosi last week voted for an amendment to a Pentagon spending bill that would have placed tough restrictions on funding for the war in Afghanistan -- including a demand for a detailed troop withdrawal plan and a threat to pull money for the war if the military stays beyond next summer.

• we need to increase defense spending significantly if we are to carry out our global responsibilities today and modernize our armed forces for the future;
• we need to strengthen our ties to democratic allies and to challenge regimes hostile to our interests and values;
• we need to promote the cause of political and economic freedom abroad; [and]
• we need to accept responsibility for America's unique role in preserving and extending an international order friendly to our security, our prosperity, and our principles.

The US has roughly 740 military bases throughout the globe, some estimates range as high as 1000 when the clandestine operations are included. Some of these bases are located in Bulgaria, Germany, Greenland, Guam, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Kyrgyzstan, The Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Turkey, United Kingdom, Iraq, Kuwait, Kosovo, Israel, Cuba, Afghanistan, Djibouti, Bahrain and Greece. Overall, there are 2.5 million U.S. personnel serving around the globe in a capacity that supports US defense. In 2006, the Defense Department base budget was $411 billion, in 2007 $430 billion, in 2008 $481 billion, in 2009 $515.4 billion. For the fiscal year 2010, Barrack Obama has already requested $533.7 billion. This does not include additional War on Terror spending or the expenditures for the BioShield operations which is “part of a broader strategy to defend America against the threat of weapons of mass destruction” (Project BioShield Act of 2004). On top of all of this spending, and all of the personnel involved, here is another statistic that really sums up the US Empire. There are 156 countries in the world with U.S. troops stationed there. 63 countries have U.S. military bases and troops. While, there are only 46 countries with no U.S. military presence. This adds up to 202 countries in the world which by all accounts is a high estimate. Currently, the United States recognizes 196 independent countries in the world. This excludes Taiwan (because of China), Greenland, Palestine, The Western Sahara, Scotland, Wales and other nations as well. But, it includes Kosovo. The Department of Defense owns 845,441 structures around the world that spans over 30 million acres, making the US department of defense the world’s largest land owner. Does anyone see a problem with this? The United States is not only messing with the sovereignty of other nations but it is screwing itself over as well. Because of the $533.7 billion budget for the DoD, we can only spend $66.5 billion on education for our children. We are also failing at improving basic infrastructure and on providing health care for the poorest of Americans. This would drastically change if we could get our DoD budget down to the amount of $396 billion seen in 2003 or $289 billion last seen in 2000.

“The math is compelling: if we do not make reductions approximating 25 percent of the military budget starting fairly soon, it will be impossible to continue to fund an adequate level of domestic activity even with a repeal of Bush's tax cuts for the very wealthy. I am working with a variety of thoughtful analysts to show how we can make very substantial cuts in the military budget without in any way diminishing the security we need...[American] well-being is far more endangered by a proposal for substantial reductions in Medicare, Social Security or other important domestic areas than it would be by canceling weapons systems that have no justification from any threat we are likely to face."

The assertion is getting louder: President Obama is a socialist, a wealth-redistributing wolf in Democrat's clothing gnawing at America's entrepreneurial spirit. It's easy to buy "Obama is a socialist" bumper stickers on the Internet. Political commentator Dick Morris said, in a column circulated on GOPUSA.com, that conservatives are "enraged at Barack Obama's socialism and radicalism." Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich titled his new book "To Save America: Stopping Obama's Secular-Socialist Machine." So, is Mr. Obama trying to form The Socialist Republic of America? Or are the accusations mainly a political weapon, meant to stick Obama with a label that is poison to many voters and thus make him a one-term president? As is often the case in politics, the answer is in the eye of the beholder. Some people feel genuinely certain that Obama aims to make America into a workers' paradise – a land where government-appointed pay czars tell Wall Street tycoons how much they can make and where the feds take large ownership positions in companies like General Motors (GM) and insurance giant American International Group (AIG). Even if Obama is not a card-carrying Socialist, they say, he displays a disdain of the private sector. "You start with his apparent acceptance that there are major segments of the US economy for which it is reasonable for the US government to own or manage," says Michael Johns, Heritage Foundation policy analyst, "tea party" movement leader, and former speechwriter for President Bush. "Look at the auto industry, mortgage industry, the health-care industry to some extent, and, obviously, banking." Others just as assuredly refute the idea that government involvement in failing industries defines a president as socialist – or that wealth is being redistributed from the Forbes 500 richest Americans to the nation's "Joe the plumbers." What Mr. Johns, Mr. Gingrich, and others brandishing the "socialist" s-word are really complaining of is a return to the policies of John Maynard Keynes, the English economist who advocated vigorous government involvement in the economy, from regulation to pump priming, says labor historian Peter Rachleff of Macalester College in St. Paul, Minn. "Socialism suggests getting rid of capitalism altogether," says Dr. Rachleff. "Mr. Obama is not within a million miles of an ideology like that." For what it's worth, socialists deny that Obama is one of them – and even seem a bit insulted by the suggestion. "I have been making a living telling people Obama is not a socialist," says Frank Llewellyn, national director of the Democratic Socialists of America. "It's frustrating to see people using our brand to criticize programs that have nothing to do with our brand and are not even working." Adds Billy Wharton,co-chair of the Socialist Party USA: "I am not even sure he's a liberal. I call him a hedge fund Democrat." The socialism tag is nothing new for the White House. In speeches, Obama chalks up the criticism to "just politics." But he also works to counter it, sprinkling speeches with words about the appropriate role of government. "Government cannot and should not replace businesses as the true engine of growth and job creation," he said June 2 at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. That may be one reason some tea partyers doubt that Obama himself is humming "The Internationale" before breakfast. "I'm reluctant to call him a socialist, but his policies are socialistic," says Don Adams, treasurer of the Independence Hall tea party in the Delaware Valley of Pennsylvania. Which policies qualify, precisely? Gingrich, in his book, cites a "government takeover" of GM as specific evidence of the socialistic political shift. The United States owned 60.8 percent of the common stock of GM and 9.9 percent of Chrysler as of April 21, the latest figures available. The government's goal, according to the Treasury, is not to be long-term investors. "With the successful restructuring of GM and Chrysler behind us, the primary goal of the administration's auto efforts now is to monitor the investments and facilitate smooth exits from our investments in the companies," says US Treasury spokesman Mark Paustenbach. OK, so maybe Obama wants to get out of owning the companies, allows Johns of the Heritage Foundation. But the government has already used its ownership stake to impose sweeping mandates and regulations on the companies, such as closing hundreds of dealerships, he says. "They forced changes in management that should more properly have been left to the company's private shareholders," says Johns. Not true, according to GM. The US did not exert pressure to close the 1,100 shuttered dealerships, says spokeswoman Noreen Pratscher. "The government has taken a very hands-off approach." How about the Obama response to the crisis in the financial services industry? Has it veered into socialism? The largest ownership stake for Uncle Sam in the financial world is AIG, which ran into financial difficulties (not bankruptcy) in September 2008 after a complex series of financial transactions turned bad. The US government still owns almost 80 percent of AIG, which has received at least $182 billion in government assistance. In his book, Gingrich implies that government officials stormed into AIG's headquarters and took over the company. "They have taken over AIG, America's largest insurer," he writes. The actual "takeover" of AIG occurred under President Bush in 2008, right after the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy. The Congressional Oversight Panel, which lawmakers created in 2008 to review the regulation of financial markets, detailed in a recent report how it became impossible for AIG to find $75 billion in private funding to save itself as the financial markets crumbled that fall. The takeover of an ailing company whose collapse might ruin the US economy is not socialism, says Van Gosse, a Socialist and historian at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa. "Let's just say AIG was profitable, and you thought it was better if it was in public hands. That would be socialistic." To Dr. Gosse, the most socialistic move by the Obama administration to date is the massive reorganization of student lending. In late March, as part of the health-care overhaul, Congress voted to force out commercial lenders. The government was guaranteeing loans made by private companies who turned a profit on the loans. As for the assertion that Obama is pushing through policies that redistribute income from rich to poor, to some extent that is happening, says economist Mark Zandi of Moody's Economy.com. About half the growth in personal income during the Obama presidency has come from an increase in government payments for unemployment insurance, Social Security, and welfare, he says. "The economic recovery act increased those transfer payments," says Mr. Zandi, noting that, regardless, the government would pay out more in jobless benefits and welfare during a recession. Tax rates for the wealthy may also rise: Obama has said he will allow the Bush income-tax cuts to expire. The highest marginal tax rate would climb to 39.6 percent, up from 35 percent. The new health-care law, moreover, raises taxes on people making more than $250,000 a year. "Does that make it socialistic?" asks Zandi, who supported Sen. John McCain in the 2008 election. "It's not what I would define as socialism, but there is certainly a redistributional aspect to all this. The changes are taking place at the margins; there is not a sea change." Probably the last president to be tagged as a socialist was Franklin Roosevelt, who took office during the Great Depression. "FDR tried all kinds of things and was accused of all kinds of things," says Tom Cronin, a presidential scholar at Colorado College in Colorado Springs. "But in retrospect, he is someone who helped capitalism survive." He suspects that Obama and his appointees are firm believers in the free-market system. But, he adds, "It's a free country, and people can say what they want about their president."

"We welcome China's decision to increase the flexibility of its exchange rate," Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said Saturday. "Vigorous implementation would make a positive contribution to strong and balanced global growth." Obama praised the move as a "constructive step that can help safeguard the recovery and contribute to a more balanced global economy."

US President Barack Obama has apparently complained to President Hu Jintao about the yuan's low value and urged him to revaluate it substantially. Two of the most important and closely related economic issues today are the value of the yuan and the huge assets accumulated by China, mainly in the form of United States Treasury bills and other US government assets. China's central bank had the yuan's value fixed at a little over 8 per US dollar during the 1990s and until 2005. It then allowed the yuan to rise gradually to less than 7 a dollar until 2008, when it again fixed the rate of exchange at about 6.9 yuan per dollar. This exchange rate is considerably above a free market rate that would be determined in a regime of flexible exchange rates. So there is no doubt that China is intentionally holding the value of its currency below the rate that would equate supply and demand. The value of the greenback has fallen substantially against other currencies since May 2009. Since the yuan is tied to the dollar it's value, too, has declined in the same ratio: 16 percent against the euro, 34 percent against the Australian dollar, 25 percent against the Korean won, and 10 percent against the Japanese yen. This substantial devaluation of the yuan has made many countries angry with China's policy of pegging it to the US dollar. The US and other countries are worried that the undervaluation of the yuan increases the demand for Chinese exports and reduces China's demand for imports from countries like the US because China keeps the dollar and the currencies of other countries artificially expensive compared to its currency. The US and other countries hope that greater demand from China for their exports, resulting from a higher value of the yuan, will help them resume sizable economic growth as they recover from severe recession. Their governments especially want to reduce the high levels of unemployment. Indeed, in good part due to the low value of its currency, China has run substantial surpluses in its current trade account because it imports fewer goods and services than it exports. As a result, it has accumulated enormous reserves of assets in foreign currencies, especially US government assets denominated in dollars. At the end of last year, China had an incredible more than $2 trillion in foreign currency reserves, which included US Treasury bills. This is by far the largest reserve in the world and its ratio to China's GDP is huge: a quarter of about $8 trillion (purchasing power parity adjusted). I doubt the wisdom of the US for complaining against China's currency policy and of China for its response. On the whole, I believe most Americans benefit rather than being hurt by China's long-standing policy of keeping the yuan at an artificially low exchange value. The policy makes the goods imported from China, such as clothes, furniture and small electronic devices, much cheaper than they would have been if China revaluated its currency substantially. The main beneficiaries of China's current policy are poor and lower middle class Americans and people in other countries who buy made-in-China goods at remarkably cheap prices in stores such as Wal-Mart that cater to cost-conscious families. US companies that would like to export more to China have indeed been hurt by China's currency policy. They employ fewer people than their capacity and thus contribute to the high rate of unemployment in the US. But I believe the benefits to American consumers far outweigh any losses in jobs, especially because the US economy continues its recovery. Since the opposite effects hold for China, I cannot justify the country's policies from the viewpoint of its interests. Its consumers and importers are hurt because the government has kept the cost of foreign goods artificially high for them. Their exporters gain, but as in the US, that gain is likely to be considerably smaller than the negative effects on the well-being of the average Chinese family. I have reached a similar conclusion on China's excessive reserves. The US has little to complain if China wants to hold such high levels of low interest-bearing US government assets in exchange for selling inexpensive goods to the US and other countries. China's willingness to save so much reduces the need for the Americans and others to save more. But are not differences in savings rates part of the specialization that global markets encourage? It is difficult to understand why China is doing this because it is giving away goods made with hard work and capital for paper assets that carry little returns. One common answer is that China hopes to increase its influence over international economic and geo-political policies by holding so many foreign assets. Yet it seems to me just the opposite is true - that China's huge levels of foreign assets put it more at the mercy of American and other countries' policies. China can threaten to sell large numbers of the US Treasury bills and other US assets it holds, but what will it buy instead? Presumably, it would buy European Union or Japanese government bills and bonds. That will put a little upward pressure on the interest rates of other governments. But to a considerable extent, the main effect in our integrated world capital market is that sellers to China of euro and yen-denominated assets would then hold the US Treasuries sold by China. On the other hand, the US can threaten to inflate some of the real value of its dollar-denominated assets - not an empty threat because of the large US government fiscal deficits and the sizable growth in US bank excess reserves. Inflation would lower the exchange value of the dollar, and also of the yuan as long as China keeps it tied to the greenback. That would further increase the current account surpluses of China, and thereby induce it to hold more US and other foreign assets, which is not a very attractive scenario for Beijing. So my conclusion is that the US in its own interest should not urge China to revaluate its currency - countries such as India have a much greater potential to gain from such a revaluation. On the other hand, I see very little sense at this stage of China's development for Beijing to maintain a very low value of its currency and accumulate large quantities of reserves. Paradoxically, presidents Obama and Hu should have been arguing each other's position on these economic issues. The author is an Economics Nobel laureate (1992) and professor of economics and sociology at Chicago University.

When they're not shitting all over the Gulf of Mexico our old friends Halliburton are found selling nuclear technology to Iran. The fun starts around 2:20 with Byron Dorgan whacking the Halliburton VP around and do check out Sherrod Brown doing a Detective Columbo impersonation starting at 4:42. He plays with that for a while, then the real beating starts around 7:00. So, Halliburton creates offshore entities to circumvent the U.S. ban on doing business in Iran, and part of what passes through this truly ridiculous loophole is nuclear enabling technology. All of the profit ends up in a Cayman Islands shell company so there's no U.S. tax burden, and when we have to go interdict a nuclear armed Iran Halliburton gets paid again supporting our military in the conflict. The taxpayer gets fucked up, down, and sideways and nobody seems able to put a stop to it. The troops are lucky if they get crappy food and if they're having a bad day they end up a non-combat death in an curiously electrified shower. This is a three month old video, but it certainly seems worth a review given the unstoppable flood of oil pouring out of the sea floor and poisoning the Gulf of Mexico. Halliburton's cement job was a key component of the blowout and they're just as much at fault as Beach Polluters Bird Poisoners British Petroleum. If corporations are persons, as the Citizens United decision indicates, they should be subject to execution, just as real humans are. Halliburton's behavior indicates to me they'd like to be first in like for this ultimate corrective action.

(CODA: I wrote this diary about a transnational corporation with a U.S. origin violating a sanctions regime imposed on Iran. I did not write a diary about Israel, Palestine, Iraq, or Afghanistan, all areas in which I have opinions. I also did state that we might some day fight a nuclear armed Iran. I do not think this is imminent, but if the U.S. and Israel keep jacking with them they'll obviously seek to defend themselves and they are a regional power that develops their own weapons systems. The big picture in Iran at the moment is that two thirds of the population were born after the 1979 revolution. Those young people are engaged in the same cycle of resistance, martyrdom, and mourning that lead to the first revolution. That process took a year, this one is taking a bit longer. When I wrote this I made an error in the date - this was a 2009 hearing, so it's fifteen months old, not three months. I found it relevant because this is the same company that just participated in the destruction of the Gulf Coast tourism and seafood economy.)

“According to the U.S. Department of the Treasury, owned or controlled by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its leaders; added to the Specially Designated National (SDN) list maintained by the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on October 25, 2007, freezing its assets under U.S. jurisdiction and prohibiting transactions with U.S. parties, pursuant to Executive Order 13382, which targets proliferators of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and their delivery systems”

On April 30, the Arizona legislature passed, and Governor Brewer signed, House Bill 2162, which modified the law that had been signed a week earlier, with the amended text stating that "prosecutors would not investigate complaints based on race, color or national origin. "The new text also states that police may only investigate immigration status incident to a "lawful stop, detention, or arrest", lowers the original fine from a minimum of $500 to a maximum of $100, and changes incarceration limits from 6 months to 20 days for first-time offenders.

A domestic extremist group has sent letters to more than 30 U.S. governors demanding they resign, the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI said in an intelligence note. The note, dated Monday, said the letters told the governors to vacate their posts within three days. The FBI and DHS said there do not appear to be credible or immediate threats of violence attached to the letters. The group behind the letters has a "Restore America Plan" that calls for the removal of any governor who fails to comply, the intelligence note said.

Count Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty among the 30 governors who received a letter from an extremist group demanding they leave office within three days or be removed. Pawlenty says Friday that he received one of the letters, but he's not overly alarmed by it. He says he gets all sorts of "interesting" mail so it's not out of the norm. He declined to say if extra precautions were taken as a result of the letter, saying the administration does not publicly comment about his security. An intelligence note obtained by The Associated Press is warning police officials that the group's call to remove dozens of sitting governors may encourage others to act out violently. A group that calls itself the Guardians of the free Republics has a plan to "restore America" by peacefully dismantling parts of the government, according to its Web site.

I got my twelve gauge sawed off. I got my headlights turned off. I'm 'bout to bust some shots off. I'm 'bout to dust some cops off.

• All insurers are fully prohibited from discriminating against or charging higher rates for children based on pre-existing conditions.
• Adults with pre-existing conditions will be eligible to join a temporary high-risk pool, which will be superseded by the health care exchange in 2014.
• Children and young adults will be permitted to remain on their parents' insurance plan until their 26th birthday.
• Insurers are prohibited from charging co-pays or deductibles for preventative care and medical screenings on all new insurance plans.
• Individuals affected by the Medicare Part D coverage gap will receive a $250 rebate, and 50 percent of the gap will be eliminated in 2011.
• Insurers' abilities to enforce annual spending caps will be restricted, and completely prohibited by 2014.
• Insurers are prohibited from dropping policy holders when they get sick.
• Insurers are required to reveal details about administrative and executive expenditures.
• Insurers are required to implement an appeals process for coverage determination and claims on all new plans.
• Indoor tanning services are subjected to a 10 percent service tax.
• Enhanced methods of fraud detection are implemented.
• Medicare is expanded to small, rural hospitals and facilities.
• Non-profit Blue Cross insurers are required to maintain a loss ratio of 85 percent or higher in order to receive tax benefits.
• Companies which provide early retiree benefits for individuals aged 55-64 are eligible to participate in a temporary program which reduces premium costs.
• A new website installed by the Secretary of Health and Human Services will provide consumer insurance information for individuals and small businesses in all states.
• A temporary credit program is established to encourage private investment in new therapies for disease treatment and prevention.

• All insurers are fully prohibited from discriminating against or charging higher rates for adult individuals based on pre-existing medical conditions.
• All insurers are fully prohibited from establishing annual spending caps.
• Expand Medicaid eligibility; individuals with income up to 133 percent of the poverty line qualify for coverage
• Establish health insurance exchanges, and subsidization of insurance premiums for individuals with income up to 400 percent of the poverty line.
• Offer tax credits to small businesses that have fewer than 25 employees and provide health care benefits for them.
• Impose a tax penalty on employers with over fifty employees who do not offer health insurance to their workers.
• Impose an annual fine on individuals who do not obtain health insurance; exemptions to fine in cases of financial hardship or religious beliefs.
• Creation of a new voluntary long-term care insurance program.
• Creation of tax credits for individuals who purchase private insurance policies
• Employed individuals who pay more than 9.5 percent of their income on health insurance premiums will be permitted to purchase insurance policies from a state-controlled health insurance option
• Pay for new spending, in part, through spending and coverage cuts in Medicare Advantage, slowing the growth of Medicare provider payments, reducing Medicare and Medicaid drug reimbursement rate, cutting other Medicare and Medicaid spending.
• Revenue increases from a new $2,500 limit on tax-free contributions to flexible spending accounts (FSAs), which allow for payment of health costs. Raising various taxes, and creating a new excise tax for high cost "Cadillac" insurance plans.
• Chain restaurants and food vendors with 20 or more locations are required to display the caloric content of their foods on menus, drive-through menus, and vending machines. Additional information, such as saturated fat, carbohydrate, and sodium content, must also be made available upon request.