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North Korea tested a nuke and fired a rocket today. According to Reuters, a North Korean ruling party official said: "We have successfully conducted another nuclear test on May 25 as part of the republic's measures to strengthen its nuclear deterrent."

Despite the Corporate media's overly optimistic and distorted reporting of today's employment report, the news was not good at all. The economy continues to lose jobs at a rapid rate. And without the multiple statistical manipulations used to concoct today's report, job losses in August would have been almost -300,000 or more.

Japan and Russia have never signed a peace treaty over World War II. The reason for this is that there is a dispute over four islands off Hokkaido that were occupied by Soviet forces that were once in Japanese hands. A 1956 Japanese-Soviet joint declaration signed in Moscow stated that Shikotan island and the Habomai islets would be returned to Japan after a peace treaty was concluded between Japan and the Soviet Union.

"We have a 200-plus-page text riddled with square brackets," Yvo de Boer said at the opening of the Bonn UN Framework Convention on Climate Change informal negotiating session happening now. "And it worries me to think how on earth we're going to whittle that down to meaningful language with just five weeks of negotiating time left." According to Marianne Bom, the head of the UN's Climate Secretariat was referring to 2,000 square brackets indicating unresolved issues.

Campaign yard signs are an important element in local campaigning. Over time, a single campaign sign can be seen by hundreds or even thousands of people. Multiply that effect by the total number of yard signs promoting a campaign, and you have a powerful

Another great moment in modern American law enforcement. Man gets bludgeoned and tasered by the police for having an epileptic seizure.

The good news is that those who would have been working on dealing with this problem are mostly now off flipping hamburgers, if they're lucky. Outsourcing in an economy where applicants are refused employment on the basis of long term unemployment - an idea that just keeps on getting better. Link posted to Digg by user Ironeus.

LAHORE: Police have captured suspected terrorist involved in attack on police training centre in Manawan, Lahore. A hand grenade has been found from the arrested man.

But during these already traumatic shopping outings, the women are often accompanied by their husbands or male relatives, who tag along to "ensure that the women remain safe" with male sales people. Confronted with the embarrassment already interacting with strange men about their own "unmentionables," the added layer of having embarrassed male relatives there is too much for most women to bear.

The UK argument about bonuses has crossed to the US. Year-end rewards for pushing the world economy over the brink? I don't think so.

WARNING: Profanity is present at the other end of this link. Tedious reading, but informative for those who, on hearing a job seeker complain about how he was treated by the people in personnel, think "oh, it's just him complaining". No, not even close. Horror stories from those dealing with Human Resources, and the rest of management, from those lucky enough to have permanent jobs to suffer through. How the neocon and libertarian supported doctrine of "employment at will" has been working out in the real world.

I think voting on rights is ridiculous to begin with, but when I think of the people who fought for this discrimination - organizations like NOM who are not even IN Maine... it makes my blood boil! What right does the majority have to tell another adult citizens who they can marry.

At Fort Hood, the largest military base in the country, it would be assumed that it would have a superior level of security, at least when compared to the streets of New York City, Chicago or some other urban area. People are watched going in and out of the base, they are constantly observed and they are subject to the rules and disciplines of the armed forces. In our cities and towns there is no such surveillance or rules. Malik Nadal Hasan was a known entity, and one whose actions had been under scrutiny. In other words, all of the signs were there if someone wanted to see them...

Are you tired of big banks making record profits, paying giant executive salaries and bonuses and then cooking the books so they avoid paying taxes?  We are.  And, we are responding.  Join us.On April 15 in Union Square Park in New York City at 11:00 AM we are holding a "Sounds of Resistance Concert" and protest against the big corporate banks that have undermined the U.S. economy and displaced families from their homes. Big Finance has taken more than a trillion from the Department of Treasury and Federal Reserve to pay for their casino gambling on Wall Street but they are still forcing people out of their homes, not lending to small businesses and choking the economy.The concert will feature political hip-hop/rock powerhouse Junkyard Empire with special guests Broadcast Live and Sketch the Cataclysm. Chris Hedges will speak about the growing culture of resistance. Other performers and speakers are invited.The protest will include a picket of the Union Square Bank of America - a major culprit in the great rip off of the American taxpayer.This concert and protest are part of the effort to build the urgently needed movement to shift power to the people and away from concentrated capital interests.                                        

Americans have been watching protests against oppressive regimes that concentrate massive wealth in the hands of an elite few. Yet in our own democracy, 1 percent of the people take nearly a quarter of the nation's income-an inequality even the wealthy will come to regret.

For months, Speaker John Boehner and his fellow Republicans have been threatening a government shutdown.   They've been unwilling to compromise, instead choosing to follow the shrill, irrational calls of their base to take a slash and burn approach to government funding, regardless of the consequences.  They've ignored the havoc such a shutdown would wreak upon our still fragile economy, and the hardships it would cause for millions of Americans, including the poor and the elderly.  The most unbelievable thing of all?  In their version of a shutdown... Congress would still get paid.  We're not kidding.  It's taking hypocrisy to an 11. That's why we're making a simple request to Speaker Boehner: "Speaker Boehner, if you and the Republicans in Congress really are foolish enough to threaten a government shut-down, then put your money where your mouth is, pass Senate bill 388, and make your members give up their own government salary too!"

A coalition of 295 legal scholars from universities around the world have signed a letter protesting the torture of Bradley Manning, and published this week in the New York Review of Books. Composed and drafted by Bruce Ackerman, of Yale Law School, and Yochai Benkler, of Harvard, the letter details his treatment, and points out that it is a violation of both the Eighth and Fifth Amendments. "If continued," the letter states, "it may well amount to a violation of the criminal statute against torture, defined as, among other things, 'the administration or application…of… procedures calculated to disrupt profoundly the senses or the personality.'"

'The underlying problem isn't the budget deficit. It's that so much income and wealth are going to the top that most Americans don't have the purchasing power to sustain a strong recovery.' Robert Reich, Robert Reich's Blog

In December, President Obama signed legislation to extend hundreds of billions of dollars in Bush tax cuts, benefiting the wealthiest Americans. Last week, Obama agreed to billions of dollars in cuts that will impose the greatest burden on the poorest Americans. And now, virtually everyone in Washington believes, the President is about to embark on a path that will ultimately lead to some type of reductions in Social Security, Medicare and/or Medicaid benefits under the banner of "reform." Tax cuts for the rich -- budget cuts for the poor -- "reform" of the Democratic Party's signature safety net programs -- a continuation of Bush/Cheney Terrorism policies and a new Middle East war launched without Congressional approval. That's quite a legacy combination for a Democratic President. All of that has led to a spate of negotiation advice from the liberal punditocracy advising the President how he can better defend progressive policy aims -- as though the Obama White House deeply wishes for different results but just can't figure out how to achieve them. Jon Chait, Josh Marshall, and Matt Yglesias all insist that the President is "losing" on these battles because of bad negotiating strategy, and will continue to lose unless it improves. Ezra Klein says "it makes absolutely no sense" that Democrats didn't just raise the debt ceiling in December, when they had the majority and could have done it with no budget cuts. Once it became clear that the White House was not following their recommended action of demanding a "clean" vote on raising the debt ceiling -- thus ensuring there will be another, probably larger round of budget cuts -- Yglesias lamented that the White House had "flunked bargaining 101." Their assumption is that Obama loathes these outcomes but is the victim of his own weak negotiating strategy. I don't understand that assumption at all. Does anyone believe that Obama and his army of veteran Washington advisers are incapable of discovering these tactics on th

And more of those who oppose interracial marriage have a favorable view of Sarah Palin, a new poll reports