Here’s  a message from Media Matters for America, a Web-based, not-for-profit,  progressive research and information center “dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media.”

“Recently, we learned that News Corp, Fox News' corporate parent, gave $1 million to the Republican Governors' Association -- a donation that a News Corp spokesman chalked up to the RGA's "pro-business agenda."

While other networks covered this unusual contribution extensively, Fox viewers have been left mostly in the dark as to the network's direct involvement in races this fall.

Media Matters for America has decided to make sure Fox viewers are aware of News Corp's donation to Republicans. We are purchasing a national ad to air during The O'Reilly Factor to share this vital information with viewers. Will you help us?”

Eric Burns, the president of Media Matters for America, said, "Fox is posing as a news operation -- even... (more)

This article originally appeared in the International Examiner and Crosscut. Reprinted with permission.

For women in the U.S., breaking the glass ceiling remains a daunting challenge, particularly in the fast-paced world of computer science. Paradoxically, while the U.S is still at the forefront of the international field of information technology, women continue to lag behind men in the workforce.

Experts agree that there continues to be a gender and ethnic imbalance in computer science. Despite modest gains in recent years, computer science remains, for the most part, a male-dominated industry.

"The most important thing is not to take the gains of recent years for granted and not to believe that the playing field is in fact level," said Ed Lazowska, the Bill and Melinda Gates chair in computer science at the University of Washington.

“There can be no doubt that computer science has a gender diversity problem,” he said. “It’s something we’ve been aware of for years... (more)

Day Hook is an occasional feature on threesheetsnw.com in which bloggers Deborah Bach and Marty McComber visit urban cruising destinations around Puget Sound and check out things to do over a 24-hour visit. Today: Nanaimo. 

Nanaimo is a natural stopping-off point for cruisers crossing the Strait of Georgia or heading to and from Desolation Sound. The second largest city on Vancouver Island, with a population of more than 80,000, Nanaimo is a good place to provision and get boat parts, with a large grocery store and chandleries conveniently located near marinas.

But the city is worth a visit as a destination in its own right.

Read more here: 

Seattle Film Guide: Sept 3-9

Opening This Week

Cairo Time    Movies this bad are  rare as comets.   The script reads like something  written by a  chronic soap opera addict under hypnosis.  Each  line comes from a pre-conscious wasteland of clichés.  Listening to the actors tick them off, one by one, is cause for universal befuddlement with the future of language, thought, and expression.  Patricia Clarkson does her job as an actress with solemn dignity, her careful elucidation clarifying each bombastic triviality with the precision of a clockmaker. Canadian writer/director Ruba Nadda  offers the viewer  touristy views of Cairo while imposing upon them the most inane non-love story of the decade.  A woman waits for her UN-employed husband to join her for their vacation, but conditions on the Gaza Strip delay his arrival, leaving her in the hands of a former colleague  with whom she becomes dangerously over-familiar. ... (more)

Are you satisfied that oil-eating microbes will tidy up the Gulf of Mexico after this year’s mammoth oil spill? Or would you prefer to do something about it yourself — and have fun at the same time?

“Hootenanny for a Healthy Gulf” at 7:30 p.m. Sept. 2 at the Moore Theatre is the latest musical fundraiser for a good cause — and it boasts a lineup of local rock luminaries that includes Mike McCready and Matt Cameron (Pearl Jam), Duff McKagan (Guns ‘N Roses) and Kim Warnick (The Fastbacks). Warnick will lead a Fastbacks reunion at the show.

Read more here: 

(EDITOR'S NOTE: The photo of McCready was incorrectly attributed in a previous version of this story. The photo was taken by Anna Knowlden.)

All children deserve the best start in life and school possible ... and we all benefit when they get it. They're healthier, more successful in school and more engaged and productive in society and life.

Washington's new statewide early learning plan, which was released Sept. 1, will help give more children that great start in life and school.

Read more here: 

Initiative 1098: That's the one that Bill Gates Sr. has helped to write and promote, even though he is one of the very few people who will see his taxes go up, should this initiative pass. Or better said, he is supporting I-1098 for that very reason. Everyone else, and all businesses, would see their tax bills go down.

Through I-1098, 197 out of 200 taxpayers will see their taxes go down, while just three will pay the initiative's new income tax on the wealthy. And our state will gain $1.6 billion for education and health care. How is that possible?

Because we start with a punitive tax system, in which middle class families pay over 10 percent of their income on state and local taxes, while the wealthiest 1 percent of families pay 2.5 percent. That's right, in our state middle class families pay four times as much, proportionally, as the wealthy. Where do the wealthy live and prosper? The answer is right in our own region: 1 percent of all the millionaires in the United States live in King County! They are all... (more)

Mamma Roma (NWFF, Sept. 3-9)

Although a remark that a job can only be found in Rome through the intercession of a priest is the sole  anti-clerical insinuation in Pier Paolo Pasolini’s “Mamma Roma,” the film is every bit as blasphemous as Luis Bunuel’s less subtle “Viridiana,” beginning with  visual references to Da Vinci’s “Last Supper” in the opening scene,  the wedding party of a pimp.

Mamma Roma is the Holy Mother of Sin, the Black Madonna of the Streets,  the Holy Whore of a False Church. When she brays to the universe that she exists,  it is the cry of the city itself after the fallen promises of Mussolini have been  broken in the dust.   Mamma Roma would suffer crucifixion itself for her pathetic, hoodlum son, a wretch borne from generations of scoundrels, but all her sacrifices only bring the boy a step closer to his own ignoble death, portrayed by Pasolini in imitation of Andrea Mantegna’s painting,... (more)

To effectively fight the prostitution of children, it helps to look at the chronic problem in terms of supply and demand.

“You will never bring down this business on the victim’s side. The driver is on the clients’ side,” said Kaffie McCullough, campaign director of the Atlanta non-profit organization A Future. Not a Past, dedicated to stopping the prostitution of children.

McCullough was one of about 80 service providers from non-profit, government and law enforcement agencies who gathered at Seattle City Hall Tuesday to focus on the problem. Few cities have a coordinated effort to help prostituted youth, and Seattle is now getting serious about tackling the problem.

The business is much bigger than many people think. McCullough shared the results of research in Georgia on the shadowy problem: 7,200 men a month in Georgia purchase sex with a female under 18 years old, and more than 400 girls are exploited each month. By 2013, that number could grow to 1,500.

Researchers counted... (more)

Last week, the Gates Foundation came under criticism for significantly increasing its investments in Monsanto. Many took it as a clear sign the world’s biggest philanthropy is championing the use of genetically modified crops, since this is the company leading the world in the production of GM seeds and crops.

It was taken as a sign because the Gates Foundation has been relatively silent on this issue, usually noting that its primary support for agricultural improvement in Africa is for a project known as AGRA (Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa) and that AGRA is “neutral” on the issue of GM crops.

This is a bit disingenuous, and disappointing for those interested in honest and open dialogue.

Full story...

A new study found infants living in poverty often have mothers with depression, The Washington Post reported.

Researchers found 11 percent of babies who lived in poverty had a mom dealing with severe depression, according to the study done by the Urban Institute.

In what was described as the first detailed portrait of its kind... (more)

From Larry Johnson's blog: Looking for Trouble.

Seven years after the invasion of Baghdad, the Iraqi people are experiencing a devastating legacy. Babies are being born with severe deformities and the cancer rate is skyrocketing. The following video from Australian Special Broadcasting Service’s Dateline program offers a visually disturbing look at this legacy.

Please be warned, journalist Fouad Hady, an Iraqi who went to Australia seeking asylum but returned to Iraq for a series of groundbreaking stories, pulls no punches in revealing the depth of the problem. The images are haunting.

(The embedding link has been disabled. When you click to start the video, you will get a message suggesting you watch it on YouTube. Please do. The video is long, but it is definitely worth watching.)

Here is a link to the study mentioned at the end of the video report:

http://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/7/7/2828/pdf, and a wiki page on the suspected cause:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depleted_uranium.

And here are... (more)

What will the Indian health system look like a decade from now?

 That’s an impossible question to answer. There is the potential of a court ruling striking down at least part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. And, there is always the possibility of Congress will rewrite the law (I view this as remote because there would have to be a Super Majority to enact something else.)

 But in the meantime there is a new foundation already under construction. The building that will rest on that structure will not be the same as the one in place now.

 Let’s start with the patient. Right now, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, nearly half of all American Indians and Alaska Natives are either uninsured or rely solely on the Indian Health Service. But health care reform changes that. Big time. Beginning in four years, hundreds of thousands of people will become eligible for insurance through government programs (such as Medicaid) because of new income rules. This insurance... (more)

The House of Representatives took a step toward greater government transparency last year by posting its expense reports online, but the clunky PDF format makes it difficult to compare lawmakers’ outlays or to pinpoint exactly how the money is spent. The Senate, on the other hand, is moving at a glacial pace and has yet to offer details about its plan to start publishing expense reports online in 2011.

Each U.S. lawmaker gets an annual allowance of between $1.3 million and $4.5 million to operate their offices, pay staff, buy equipment and supplies, and pay for travel. The amount varies according to whether a lawmaker is a member of the House or Senate, and how far away his or her home state is from Washington.

In June 2009, following an outcry in Britain over Parliamentarians’ expenses, Speaker Nancy Pelosi ordered the House chief administrative officer to begin publishing the chamber’s expense reports online. The so-called Statement of Disbursements is a quarterly document that captures... (more)

Juan Alonso is interested in the decorative flourishes of old Havana. In his paintings they are smoke - vaporous trails edging toward extinction. Flourishes are for him a family affair. His father was an iron worker from a family of iron workers, responsible for the designs of windows and gates. His mother painted flowers on pots.

Alonso was born in Havana in 1956, three years before Fidel Castro came to power. Alonso remembers food being scarce and people being taken away at night for speaking with less than revolutionary fervor. When he was six, his mother died, and when he was 9, his father sent him to Miami to live with relatives.

His career charts a quiet persistence, an insistence that he will one day produce something of consequence.

Full story at Another Bouncing Ball...

    SEATTLE – The Mariners drew 37,798 fans Friday for the opening of their series with the Twins.

    There don’t figure to be many more games of 35,000-plus for the Mariners this year with Seattle 23 games out of first place.

    The only reason Seattle drew that many Friday was a bobblehead giveaway of Ichiro Suzuki which had fans lined up four hours before the first pitch. It was the fifth and last bobblehead promotion of the season for the Mariners. Seattle lost, 6-3, to Minnesota.

    At the beginning of the decade the Mariners could be counted upon to be one of the American League leaders in home attendance. From 2000-2003 the Mariners drew over 3 million fans per year to the then-new Safeco Field. It didn’t hurt that the club won 90-plus games a season during that stretch.

    In four of the previous six years before 2010, the club lost more games than it one, three times losing 90 or more. So the attendance has... (more)

The environmental groups that helped propel Barack Obama to the White House are feeling betrayed during a summer of discontent and climate inaction.

The latest blows to the environmental movement came this week when the administration decided to side with major polluters, urging the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse a lower court ruling that would have permitted “nuisance” suits against major greenhouse gas emitters. In a separate decision, the administration also approved loan guarantees for a U.S. maker of coal mining equipment to sell to India.

The Justice Department’s friend-of-the-court filing in the case involving giant utility American Electric Power Co. came as a complete surprise to the green lobby, and had many in the movement turning red.

“What the heck is happening at the White House on climate?” Clean Air Watch asked on its website.

“Some believe the Obama White House, having failed to enact climate change legislation, has adopted the old maxim when it comes... (more)

It appears the city is still planning to cut its Crime Prevention Coordinator positions next year, and is apparently preparing to farm out some of their duties to police officers and neighbors.

As we've previously written, the CPCs at each of the five precincts work with neighbors to secure their homes using Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design, and also help organize block watches and the yearly Night Out, among other things. However, due to budget issues, the CPCs will likely be out of a job next year.

Full story at SeattleCrime.com

And USAID Confused?

That, at least, appears to be the assessment of one Till Bruckner, a former Transparency International aid monitor in Georgia (the country in the Caucasus, not the Peach State).

In brief, Bruckner’s complaint stems from a Freedom of Information Act Request (FOIA) he made to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) asking for detailed descriptions of the budget and finances of ten NGOs active in U.S.-sponsored development projects in Georgia.

Flickr, by Austin Kleon

Redacted Information

As a journalist who has had lots of frustrating experiences with FOIAs and trying to get answers from government agencies, I had to chuckle when reading Bruckner’s exasperated comments about waiting 14 months only to receive highly redacted copies of the information. I feel his pain.

Full story at Humanosphere...

There's really not a lot to add to these charts. What they show is that under I-1098, Washington's income taxes would be extremely low by national standards.

Read full story and another chart at Sightline...

MORE ON 1098 FROM SIGHTLINE

Crosscut and the Wall Street Journal flunk math

1098 and small business

Seattle Times flunks math

Wealthy flock to pay income taxes

Comparing tax rates under 1098

RELATED

Analysis by former state supreme court justice finds I-1098 income tax unconstitutional

Economists, researchers and advocates talk a lot about the economic return of good quality early learning, but few are as compelling and clear as University of Chicago professor James Heckman.

The Nobel Prize-winning economist explains the importance of putting returns of early learning efforts, such as teaching self-discipline and other soft skills, in the correct context, in a question-and-answer on the Washington Post’s “Economics and Domestic Policy, and lots of it” blog.

So what you’re learning is self-discipline, to stay on task, you’re learning social relationships, because you’re doing this assessment collectively, and you’re building a set of life skills that turn out to be important. So we looked at what the consequences were of these changes early in life for the child. And we see that those patterns are there...

Read full blog post at Birth to Thrive

The documentary photography exhibit, “Paradoxes of Living on Holy Land: Photographs from Jerusalem and West Bank,” opens at Seattle University’s Vachon & Kinsey Galleries September 20 and runs through December 3rd. Local photographer Rajiv Kapoor will speak about his work on October 8 at 6 p.m. in Wyckoff Auditorium on campus; a reception and viewing will immediately follow.

The exhibit showcases a series of photographs in two galleries, drawing visitors into a land of conflict and history. Kapoor’s images capture everyday life amid the constant reminders of territorial disputes.

A poster of a martyr hangs in a barbershop. A woman pushes a baby stroller past a checkpoint. In Jerusalem, a city dating back to the beginning of writing (4000 BC), Hasidic Jews can be seen everywhere among Muslims and Christians practicing their faith.

The old city of Jerusalem (0.35 square mile) is a walled area within the modern city of Jerusalem which is roughly divided into the Muslim Quarter, the... (more)

A new legal analysis written for Washington Policy Center by respected former state Supreme Court Justice Phil Talmadge finds that, if passed by voters this November, Initiative 1098 would likely be ruled unconstitutional by the state Supreme Court.

Justice Talmadge was a state Supreme Court Justice from 1995-2001 and served as a Democratic member of the State Senate from 1979-1995, where he chaired the Judiciary and Health Care Committees.

According to Justice Talmadge, “Initiative 1098 is clearly unconstitutional on the basis of existing case law. Its enactment will only guarantee protracted litigation to determine if the initiative meets constitutional muster.”

Justice Talmadge’s analysis addresses the argument of Initiative 1098 supporters that the state Supreme Court would overturn its past rulings and today rule in favor of a graduated income tax. Justice Talmadge wrote:

“The proponents of a graduated net income tax in Washington have vociferously argued that these older cases...