From Business Insider:    http://www.businessinsider.com/everything-thats-going-on-in-hungary-and-why-the-central-bank-law-it-just-passed-is-making-the-eu-and-imf-furious-2011-12

Simone Foxman
Dec. 30, 2011

Hungary just approved a new central bank law, to the dismay of the International Monetary Fund and European Union.

It’s the same law that caused the two international organizations to withdraw their support for Hungary’s bailout earlier this month.

The law changes the way Hungary’s central bank is managed, in a way the EU and IMF have argued will to compromise its independence from politics.

Hungary has been at the center of quiet economic angst in Eastern Europe, largely overshadowed by the sovereign debt crisis in southern Europe. Standard & Poor’s downgraded Hungarian government debt to junk last week and the government staged the latest in a series of failed bond auctions yesterday.

However, Austrian banks’ ties to the struggling country are the primary cause for concern in the European economy. They have an estimated $226 billion in exposure to Eastern Europe, with €1.14 trillion ($1.6 trillion) of assets held in the region. Though the silent beneficiary of liquidity measures by the European Central Bank, yields on Austrian 10-year government bonds have risen to more than 2.93% this morning.

The fact that an estimated 50% of government debt is denominated in foreign debt seriously callsinto question Hungary’s ability to pay back lenders. The forint is hitting its lowest value against the dollar since early 2009 and bailout aid is in jeopardy, the prognosis is grim for investors.

Not what you think in this highly aware transgender sensitive world, more based in the 1970s feminist question of the role the penis plays in fixing a car or assembling a box of furniture from Ikea.

From Huffington Post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/karen-mangiacotti/the-penis-mom_b_1163693.html

Karen Mangiacotti
Posted: 12/21/11

When I was little I wanted to be a lot of things: Johnny Carson’s replacement; A Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader so good I was the only one on the team; an artist with my own wing at the Boston Museum of Fine Art — you know, normal stuff. I wanted to be a lot of things, but I never — I PROMISE you — ever wanted to grow up to be someone known as “The Penis Mom”.

But here I am.

It all started way back in early November, when my 13-year-old’s teacher sent an email to parents saying they were doing a little Pumpkin Chunkin‘ — this is a very cool physics project where the kids launch pumpkins with a trébuchet. Awesome. Except the email asked for help setting up the trébuchet. Help from dads. That’s right, dads. Are there any strong dads who can help? So if you know me, you know I’m cautious. I sat down at my computer to check the facts, first looking at the calendar to see what year we were in — yep, still 2011. So with time-travel ruled out, we were only left with the possibility that we had somehow slipped into an alternate universe, one where teachers have giant balls. Balls clearly big enough to toss such gender-biased questions out into the wind without concern for where they might land. And thus began my verbal rant. I am uncertain how long it lasted, however when I finally came up for air my husband/editor had made dinner, cleaned up, and put the kids to bed.

At that point, I sat down to respond to the email.

Dear teachers and parents:Are you guys seriously only asking for Dads?

Is lifting done with a penis?

Thoughtfully yours,

- Karen

Continue reading at:   http://www.huffingtonpost.com/karen-mangiacotti/the-penis-mom_b_1163693.html

From Raw Story: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/12/31/ultra-orthodox-jews-wear-holocaust-garb-at-religious-protest/

By Agence France-Presse
Saturday, December 31, 2011

Hundreds of ultra-Orthodox Jews, some wearing yellow stars or the uniforms of Holocaust death camp inmates, demonstrated Saturday against what they called media attacks against them over their efforts to segregate the sexes in public.

The bearded men and young boys in Jerusalem’s ultra-Orthodox Mea Shearim neighbourhood were ostensibly gathered to protest the jailing of a member of their community for leading vigilante attacks against a local religious bookshop, which was considered not religious enough by hardliners.

But ultra-Orthodox news website Kikar Hashabbat said that the main purpose of the rally had become that of fighting back against “incitement against the ultra-Orthodox public”.

Jews in Germany and countries occupied by the Nazis were forced to wear yellow stars to identify themselves in public. Kikar Hashabbat said that wearing them at the rally was “an exceptional protest measure”.

A witness said that a television news crew was shoved by protestors but police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said there were no incidents or arrests.

Israeli TV channels have screened images from the town of Beit Shemesh, where hardline residents are waging a sometimes violent gender segregation campaign, which showed an ultra-Orthodox man in Beit Shemesh spitting at a woman and others hurling verbal abuse at an eight-year-old schoolgirl.

Continue reading at:   http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/12/31/ultra-orthodox-jews-wear-holocaust-garb-at-religious-protest/

From Huffington Post:     http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/29/nuclear-power-gregory-jaczko-nuclear-regulatory-commission_n_1160711.html

Ryan Grim 
12/30/11

WASHINGTON — A feud at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, where five presidentially appointed commissioners oversee the safety of the nation’s nuclear power reactors, has broken out into full public view, with Chairman Gregory Jaczko’s fellow commissioners assailing his character and management style, both in a letter made public earlier this month and in the resulting testimony before Congress.

Republicans have begun calling for Jaczko’s ouster.

“The situation at the NRC sounds dire,” wrote Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.) in a letter to President Barack Obama, “leaving me very concerned that the Chairman is unable to lead the Commission in the fulfillment of its responsibilities.”

On K Street, energy lobbyists have rallied to support the four other commissioners.

So far, the White House is standing by Jaczko, one of the least industry-friendly leaders to serve at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in a generation.

For Washington’s tight nuclear policy circle, where scientifically trained political operatives move back and forth between the industry, the NRC, the Department of Energy and key congressional committees, it’s déjà vu. Interviews with several senior officials who worked on nuclear energy policy in the 1990s reveal that at least two of those operatives — both with strong ties to the nuclear industry — were closely involved in the ouster of an earlier reformist regulator and are now involved in the current drama.

Continue reading at:   http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/29/nuclear-power-gregory-jaczko-nuclear-regulatory-commission_n_1160711.html

From The Telegraph UK:      http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/8976204/Treasury-plans-for-euro-failure.html

The Government is considering plans to restrict the flow of money in and out of Britain to protect the economy in the event of a full-blown euro break-up.

By Philip Aldrick, Economics editor
26 Dec 2011

From The Portland Phoenix: http://portland.thephoenix.com/news/131298-chomsky-to-occupy-move-to-the-next-stage/

By LANCE TAPLEY
December 23, 2011

Noam Chomsky has advice for the Occupy movement, whose encampments all over the country are being swept away by police. The occupations were a “brilliant” idea, he says, but now it’s time to “move on to the next stage” in tactics. He suggests political organizing in the neighborhoods.

The Occupy camps have shown people how “to break out of this conception that we’re isolated.” But “just occupying” has “lived its life,” says the man who is the most revered radical critic of American politics and capitalist economics.

Chomsky gave his counsel answering questions in a small group after a speech Monday evening, December 12, in the 1000-seat Westbrook Middle School auditorium (a/k/a Westbrook Performing Arts Center), which was filled to capacity. The speech was sponsored by the University of New England’s Center for Global Humanities.

#OCCUPY: Complete coverage of #Occupy in New England and beyond

The Occupy movement’s repression, which Chomsky decried, has a saving grace, he said: the opportunity for it to expand more into “the 99 percent” by engaging people “face to face.”

“Don’t be obsessed with tactics but with purpose,” he suggested. “Tactics have a half life.”

Much is at stake. An angry and frustrated population, as exists now in this country, provides “a combustible mix,” he said, adding: “Look at Weimar Germany” — the economically and politically turbulent time in Germany in the early 20th century that led to the rule of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis.

From Common Dreams:   http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/12/30-3

by Jennifer Browdy de Hernandez
Published on Friday, December 30, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

I believe that we are coming to a crossroads as a nation.

Since 9/11, we’ve been traveling down a road bristling with guns, military technology, paranoia and fear.  Though most of our aggressive energy has been aimed outside our borders, there has also been a steady preparation for mass violence within the U.S. as well.  In the decade since 9/11, our national police forces have been armed with military hardware, and have trained extensively in riot control, with the results that we saw for the first time during the recent Occupy protests.

In the peaceful town of Fargo, North Dakota, report Andrew Becker and G.W. Schulz of the Center for Investigative Reporting, “Every city squad car is equipped today with a military-style assault rifle, and officers can don Kevlar helmets able to withstand incoming fire from battlefield-grade ammunition. And for that epic confrontation—if it ever occurs—officers can now summon a new $256,643 armored truck, complete with a rotating turret.”

Billions of federal tax dollars have been spent nationwide on this kind of military hardware for police, in the name of Homeland Security.

Security from what?  Security for whom?

Short of an all-out military invasion by a foreign force, which seems hugely unlikely, these weapons can only be meant to confront an insurgency within our own borders.

Are we thinking about a civil war, then?

Are these police being armed and trained to protect the interests of the 1% against the raging anger of the 99%?

Continue reading at:   http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/12/30-3

Yesterday Tina and I took a day off from posting.

We went to the Amon Carter and saw shows by Will Barnet and John Marin.

We ate ate Fred’s, arguably  the best dive burger and fry joint in the the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex.  Jalapeno, cheese and bacon fries to kill for.

Our local PBS played a couple of shows from Opry Street the precursor to Austin City Limits, shows from the Seventies with Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings.

May the coming year be better than the last few years.

May Occupy grow stronger and stronger and the voices of the progressives drown out the right wing propaganda.

I’ll post more tomorrow but for now.

Happy Fucking New Year!