Category: Economy


In just a couple of months, the Department of Education (DOE) will release a decision about their “gainful employment” (GE) rule. In the 60-day comment period, they received 83,000 comments about the rule — the highest ever for a higher education rulemaking.

Here’s why: This rule is particularly devastating for African American populations and under-served communities. It would limit the amount of federal financial aid given to populations that had slower pay-back rates or were likely to have longer periods of debt – specifically the people that need financial aid.


Millions of people attend career colleges every year, and many need financial assistance to do so. Isn’t the purpose of financial aid to help those who cannot afford to pay for it themselves? Why would we take that opportunity away?


Add your voice to the 83,000 people who have already taken action. Tell the DOE that the GE rule is unfair and will have devastating results for our economy.
Don’t Leave Underserved Populations Out of Higher Ed!

The Politics of War

Everyone on the planet seems to know Christine O’Donnell’s thoughts on masturbation. She headed an “Anti-masturbation campaign” and spoke about it on MTV in 1996 on the television show “Sex in the 90’s”. Christine – who is running for Senator in the state of Delaware – has been a “gift” to comedians across the country as they debate on stage whether or not she was a “witch” (as she proclaimed on Bill Maher’s “Politically Incorrect”).  As a comic, I am grateful to Christine for all that she has done to create laughs for this great country, but Christine is not the only political candidate in this mid-term election who appears to be more fiction than substance.

Sadly, most candidates are lacking in substance and their campaign ads are more likely to tell what is wrong with their opponent instead of where they stand on the issues. I live in Los Angeles where the airwaves are full of campaign attack ads throughout most of the day. All the commercials show an out of focus bad picture of the opponent with horrible music and a few sound bites with a cheesy voice-over. Missing from all of these ads are the candidates’ platform and their stance on real issues.

The most important issues to voters in these elections are the economy, healthcare and the deficit. Large numbers of Americans are still out of work and it is a daily struggle to put food on the table. People are losing their jobs, their homes and their healthcare in one fell swoop and sometimes it seems like Washington, D.C is “printing money on demand.” I share these concerns with voters but I also have another worry – the wars.

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Students need every opportunity to get ahead, particularly in this difficult economy.



At a time when Congress should be focused on job creation and strategies to prepare today’s students for tomorrow’s jobs, it is instead targeting private-sector higher-education providers that serve about 3 million students a year. The result could be more jobs lost and fewer Americans getting the education they need to secure good jobs.



Many for-profit schools are serving those least well-served by traditional higher education. Particularly in such tough economic times, it is with low-income and minority students that our nation is failing.



Let’s stop singling out sectors of higher education for unfair, unbalanced congressional hearings and discriminatory rules. Let’s start focusing on steps that will improve educational access, opportunity and quality for all Americans.

Tell Congress: It’s my education. My job. My choice.
Protect Student Choice in Education

Dear fellow Humans,

It is now clear, that the greatest threat to mankind and Earth itself comes from overpopulation, which is growing at an exponential rateas underlined in a recent UN Study: Slower Population Growth To Help Environment

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5j74yWpJ1atBwCsu78IVj2VOABDzg

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As we all well know, the population of a given country is to be considered in relation with the available territory, the resources, the state of, interaction with and impact on the environment, the flora and fauna, and this all with regards to the modes of social and economic productions and the standard of life, which are therethrough responsibly achieved or made potentially realizable.
This is as true as the fact, that this planet forms a rather homogeneous eco-system, wherein not only all the elements are interdependent and interconnected, but also one, in which each of these elements is equally important and necessary to the preservation of the whole.
Human societies are not exempt from these natural principles and in the current world view and international practice, whereby the notions of integration and globalization are the motto, it is practically impossible to render proper measure of overpopulation in national or regional terms or to approach it exclusively in such a context. No country is an exception.

Overpopulation is a worldwide issue.
Overpopulation is an all-human tragedy and, as such, it requires a worldwide understanding and solution.
The situation may of course differ from one country to another, but this does not substantially change the global picture, for, also the less overpopulated areas would eventually face it and taste it through immigration and the effects of overpopulation on the overall state of the climate, the environment, the resources and the globalized economy as well as on world peace and stability.
Besides, without tackling overpopulation, all measures, which would be taken to ensure the growth of the economy and provide a given population of a given country with a higher quality of life, would only be postponing, shoving the problem onto future generations?? -? as if “killing our grandchildren to feed our children.”, to quote one wise man.

Overpopulation and its consequences on our evolution and our security as well as on the sustainability of this planet?are definitely a source of great concern: there are just too many of us? -? think of the amount of garbage alone, which seven billion Humans produce! Daily.

It is also obvious, that our planet is subject to far-reaching changes.
The consequences of these changes could be catastrophic, if we do not re-adjust our ways of thinking and doing, also with regards to reproduction and population.

Our world is extremely overpopulated; our legitimate demands of food, energy, water and other goods of first necessity weigh heavily on the available resources, the environment, the flora and fauna. This is no longer sustainable.

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A worldwide, rational, responsible, democratic ( applicable and mandatory to each and all! ), scientific and rigorously monitored Birth Control is the only logical, mature and ethical answer to this unprecedented, but largely foreseen challenge.

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Some, however, speak of free energy, as the ultimate remedy to this crisis.
Truly, technology alone is not a panacea in human matters.
Lasting food security, development in sustainability thus, could hardly be realized without absorbing into the equation the determining factor of human population and its diverse legitimate demands, both of which will be growing exponentially.

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Others may still say, “multiply yourself” orders The Bible.
Genesis 1:22: “God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth.”.”

Well, we certainly shall argue here, that reason is also given to us, so that we can know, judge and decide when we ‘have multiplied enough’.

And again, the Commandment could have as well been: “multiply yourself with wisdom and reason and humaneness and knowledge and care and management.”
Besides, if we keep procreating the way we now do, there wouldn’t be much animals, fish, trees, “birds” left “on the earth”!

Overpopulation has indeed a deeper spiritual dimension and, besides,? the following summary makes convincingly the case for a serious struggle against overpopulation, even if one is to consider?the issue?from a solely practical point of view:

Fewer Humans = smaller petroleum demand = less carbon dioxide/monoxide produced by cars and industry

Fewer Humans = reduced food demand = fewer trees cut down for farmland (e.g. Brazilian rainforest)

Fewer Humans = reduced demand for everything which results in a reduced price/cost for everything (education, well-being, housing, energy, food…)

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We are already causing drastic climate change; species are going extinct and fellow Humans are starving to death en masse which means that the population is obviously already too high.

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Do please endorse us and most importantly, do strongly advocate a rational, democratic and scientific birth control, at home and abroad; empower Women, add your influential voice to ours, help us promote a humane and just solution to this tragedy!

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Thank you and may reason and wisdom prevail.

Overpopulation Awareness & Birth Control

A woman named Patricia Reid was recently profiled in the New York Times. She has been unemployed for four years. Before being cut loose in massive layoffs, she worked for two decades as an internal auditor and analyst at Boeing. The biggest fear for this 57-year-old college graduate? “Becoming a bag lady.”

“Bag lady” is my generation’s term for “homeless old woman with everything she owns stuffed in two big shopping bags.” It is a position that women, regardless of age, marital status, employment or resources, fear. It summons up visions of a “living death,” of tottering down a grimy street pushing a shopping cart, dragging our eco-friendly cloth shopping bags crammed to their cloth brim with fat-free cookies, a blanket with a torn satin edging, a stuffed animal, flannel pajamas and unread copies of supermarket tabloids. Don’t laugh. I asked several women just exactly what they envisioned would be IN those bags. That’s what they told me they thought they might need if they wanted to pass the night on the street in comfort. Obviously they’ve never given serious thought to what it truly means to be homeless.

I’ve found that for the middle-to-upper class, “bag lady” is a euphemistic way of saying “homeless.” It conveys slightly more pity than “homeless” because the stereotype doesn’t include addiction of any kind, only the sheer, oppressing poverty that frightens middle-aged women living in suburbia (and maybe a little mental illness). “Bag lady” is a step above homeless because it seems more like a specter in the night than a real possibility.

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Looking for some cupcakes or cookies with rainbow frosting on them, to celebrate National Coming Out Day? Don’t head to Just Cookies in Indianapolis. The bakery, inside Indianapolis’ City Market, refused to accept an order from a gay student group at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI). Why?

According to the man who owns the bakery, rainbow cupcakes and cookies celebrating LGBT pride violate the values of the bakery.

“I explained we’re a family-run business, we have two young, impressionable daughters and we thought maybe it was best not to do that,” said co-owner David Stockton to a local Fox television station. He then added that it’s his bakery’s decision to decide what is obscene. Apparently rainbow colors fall under that label. “We have our values, and you know, some things … for instance, if someone wants a cookie with an obscenity, well, we’re not going to do that.”

All of a sudden making cookies and cupcakes for a gay student group is against family values? So much for customer service, and so much for making a good impression on those daughters, who were just shown by their parents that discrimination can come in the form of baked goods. Meanwhile, the Indianapolis City Market has a mission to enrich “the city’s economy, expands its educational options, enhances its culture.” Having vendors that refuse to serve LGBT customers doesn’t do any of that.

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“We are going to beg, borrow, steal and learn from them as quickly as we can, because it is important for our urban strategy.” That was Bill Simon, the new CEO and President of Walmart US talking about the company’s smaller format stores in Mexico and across South America, but he could just as easily have been talking about the communities it is about to enter.

Walmart has just announced that it will use smaller format stores (as opposed to the monstrosities it has favored in the past) to try and force its way into urban markets like New York, Boston, Washington, D.C., Chicago and others. The company has been struggling over the last several years to get a foothold in cities because U.S. sales are slumping and, quite frankly, it doesn’t have any other place to go. But cities aren’t like the suburbs, and you can’t go building 200,000-square-foot big box stores downtown.

So what does this mean for our cities? Nothing good. Beyond Walmart’s infamous treatment of workers, a new store, especially in an urban market, usually spells trouble for the local economy. For one thing, a recent study found that urban Walmart stores did not create new jobs in area. In other words, when a Walmart moved in to town, other stores closed. The result is that instead of improving a community by adding jobs, Walmart is instead replacing jobs that were already there. Often the jobs they replace paid more, offered better benefits and paid for some health care (which Walmart does not). To top it all off, Walmart often uses tax loopholes to cheat states and local governments out of the money they need to provide essential services.

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The Not-So-Sweet Side of Honey

Tonight marks the start of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. For those who aren’t familiar, honey plays a big role in the holiday tradition: Apples are dipped in honey to ring in a sweet new year.

Honey, of course, comes from bees. Though not the cuddliest members of the animal kingdom, they’re still animals (although the vegan community is divided on the question of eating honey). Whether you’re an omnivore or on the anti-honey side of the vegan debate, unless you eat a strictly local diet, commercial beekeeping plays a role in your life.

The “liquid gold” only accounts for a small percentage of the bee economy; in the U.S., honeybees are primarily used to cultivate plant production, including fruit, vegetables and nuts. You may imagine bees freely coming and going from hives, pollinating nearby crops and keeping ecosystems healthy. On a local level, that’s true. But in a world of concentrated animal feeding operations and genetically modified crops, Big Ag has managed to make the poor little honeybee just another cog in the factory farm system.

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The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are more than just a mouthful. They are eight poverty-fighting goals — agreed to by more than 180 countries — that fight corruption, create new jobs, empower women and increase smart investments to beat poverty and disease. If these goals are achieved, world poverty will be cut by half, tens of millions of lives will be saved, and billions more people will have the opportunity to benefit from the global economy.

Last year, President Obama stood before the UN and made a powerful pledge to the world that the U.S. will support the MDGs and approach next year’s summit with a global plan to make them a reality.

This lifesaving pledge is due this September and we need more than just talk. Sign this petition to urge President Obama to follow through on his words and take the lead on achieving the MDGs by 2015.
Tell Obama to Keep His Promise to Cut World Poverty in Half!

Sen. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas must be feeling pretty bummed – her proposed $1.5 billion in farm “aid” may be nixed by the White House after all.

Lincoln, chair of the Senate Agriculture Committee who is gearing up for a tough re-election battle this fall, has been fighting for the funds since July when they were removed as a compromise deal from a small business stimulus bill.  The Obama administration had promised to approve the package, which was designed to provide “disaster aid” to farmers who lost crops in 2009, by Aug. 31.

August has come and gone, and there’s no sign of the package. But before we get all sad for the poor farmers down the street whose crops were ruined, let’s examine this plan. America’s biggest, least sustainable farms — many of them in Blanche’s Arkansas — would benefit most from the plan, while smaller, more damaged farms would be left high and dry. Why? The funds would not be distributed based on losses, but on how much they received or should have received under a federal subsidy program based on farm size. As the New York Times explained last week, it’s an “unjustified” windfall, as farms with as little as five percent loss would receive an additional chunk of 90 percent of the subsidy in aid. Bigger, more profitable farms — the ones least damaged by rains — are far more likely to qualify. The Wall Street Journal pointed out that the top 10 percent of wealthiest farmers would receive about two-thirds of the money, and about a quarter of the funds would (curiously) go to Arkansas farms.

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