The situation in Somalia has not been good for some time.
A baby born in Somalia will have a life expectancy of 48.4 years.
 There is little date to measure the full extent of Somalia's poverty but in 1994 the UN Development Program ranked Somolia 165th out of 173 countries in terms of its Human Development Index.

According to the World Bank, health standards in Somalia before the 1991 were among the worst in the world. It was estimated that there was 1 doctor for every 20,000 people (in the United States it was 1 doctor for every 470 people), and 1 nurse for every 1,900 persons (in the United States it was 1 nurse for every 70 persons). Only 2 percent of births were attended by a health professional, whereas in the United States nearly 100 percent of births were so attended. In 1990 average life expectancy at birth was 46 years, the infant mortality was about 123 per 1,000 live births (in the United States it is 7 per 1,000). The adult literacy rate was 27 percent.

link

(Not much of a diary, but just wanted to post some animal cruelty/welfare news stories currently out there.)

"Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight."  ~Albert Schweitzer

Violence against innocent animals often reveals the bleak, brutal darkness that is part of this world. Compassion is sometimes a struggle amongst the darkness that surround us.
But many people love animals and can't stand the idea of animals being mistreated or abused. The people that work to protect and promote animal rights deserves much praise. They are willing to stand up against the various mistreatments of animals, rather it comes from individuals, governments, or business. (I was going to post some pictures of animal cruelty. But I just couldn't, they were just too disturbing & disgusting.)

The real mass media are basically trying to divert people. Let them do something else, but don’t bother us (us being the people who run the show). Let them get interested in professional sports, for example. Let everybody be crazed about professional sports or sex scandals or the personalities and their problems or something like that. Anything, as long as it isn’t serious. Of course, the serious stuff is for the big guys. "We" take care of that.

Noam Chomsky

A diary on a topic I'm sure everybody wants- Bolivia!!!

I am a big admirer of President Evo Morales of Boliva. Morales is the first indegenous president of Bolivia and has been a tireless advocate for economic fairness and the poor. Before being elected he was a coca grower and activist with the group Movement towards Socialism or MAS. He has been a leader in standing up against the damage & shock Washington and neo-liberalism has brought upon Latin America........

January 27 the New York Times ran an editorial "Vetoing History's Responsibility".
It is in response to Bush's veto threat of the Indian Health Care Improvement Act. The bill is a bi-partisan bill that would reauthorize the Indian Health Care Improvement Act of 1976. It will increase spending on American Indian health care and modernize the Indian Health Service.

(NYT)

President Bush’s threat to veto a bill intended to improve health care for the nation’s American Indians is both cruel and grossly unfair. Five years ago, the United States Commission on Civil Rights examined the government’s centuries-old treaty obligations for the welfare of Native Americans and found Washington spending 50 percent less per capita on their health care than is devoted to felons in prison and the poor on Medicaid.

The Indian Health Care Improvement Act is being debated this week in the Senate. The bill is to reauthorize the Indian Health Care Improvement Act and bring the Native American health care services to modernity.  The Indian Health Care Improvement Act was originally signed by Gerald Ford in 1976 to help combat Indian poverty. The Indian Health Service has brought medical care to reservations and urban Indian communities across the land. It has been over 14 years since the last authorization of the bill.

Despite the fact the bill hasn't even been passed yet in the Senate- (where if faces a series of hostile ammendments) Bush is threatening a veto.

It is being reported that the Bush Administration is threatening to veto an Indian health bill that is aimed at improving the health care of those living on Indian reserves.

(will delete if already diaried)
Today was the day polar bears were to be put on the endangered species list. It has been over a year when the Bush administration "conceded that global warming is threatening the polar bear".  

This comes as no surprise.

The administration is required by law to make its decision on the polar bear by Wednesday, but they have already postponed the announcement this  week and we may not hear from them for up to another month. A government statement said analysis of scientific data and public comment will take more time.

There is new evidence that the sea ice is melting and that the polar bear’s habitat is disappearing. The U.S. Geological Survey released a report this past September predicting that if current warming projections continue, two-thirds of the world’s polar bears will likely be extinct by 2050, including all of the polar bears in Alaska.  With a timeline like that, it is hard to understand how the polar bears aren’t already protected.

http://www.greenpeace.org/...

 Atlanta is looking pink! It is where the Democratic Socialists of America are having their two day convention (11-9 to 11-11)

At the root of our socialism is a profound commitment to democracy, as means and end. We are activists committed not only to extending political democracy but to demanding democratic empowerment in the economy, in gender relations, and in culture. Democracy is not simply one of our political values but our means of restructuring society. Our vision is of a society in which people have a real voice in the choices and relationships that affect the entirety of our lives. We call this vision democratic socialism - a vision of a more free, democratic and humane society.

It is time for ICCAT (International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas) to meet in Turkey from 11/9 to 11/18. The forum is "to ascertain sustainable management of East Atlantic bluefin tuna"

On what will largly be a protest vote.

MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) - Senator Bernie Sanders says he will vote against the confirmation of President Bush's choice for attorney general.

Sanders says nominee Michael Mukasey (myoo-KAY'-zee) holds views on presidential powers that are at odds with the intent of the Constitution.

The former judge from New York said that Congress may not have the authority to prohibit the president from conducting some surveillance without warrants.

http://www.wcax.com/...

A lot of people are aware of the many abject problems Native American's face- rampant poverty, diabetes, environmental degradation to name a few. The current social  problems are not isolated from the past several hundred years of colonalism & imperalism, or the United States Government legacy of broken treaties and exploiting sacred land. One of the dark marks of the spiritual scar on Native America, is suicide amongst Native American youth .

New England is a beautiful place to live it offers an ideal place to live a quiet & simple life. The landscape and the seasons offers such spiritual nourishment. But sadly due to global warming New England is poised to be hit very hard and its landscape is going to be altered.

If heat-trapping emissions are not limited now, global warming will change critical aspects of the Northeast's character and economy, finds a new report by the Northeast Climate Impacts Assessment, NECIA, a two year collaboration between the Union of Concerned Scientists, UCS, and a team of more than 50 scientists and economists.

source Environmental News Service

Billy 'let me make up shit' O'Reilly that is who!

Hopefully the world knows that Bill O'Reilly is a sexual creep. And whatver he has to say should be taken with less than a grain of a grain of salt.

My soul is wary-
Over the oppression women face.
The harassment of gays.
A war criminal for a President who continues to sink to new lows in both polls and his personal actions.
 Every day there is fresh new outrages as one reads about the victims of violence and war. There seems to be this endless supply of hatred, meanness and injustice...
And there seems to be this easy observable fact

Human beings, from the beginning of recorded history - and most likely before then - have always been violent, at war, bloodthirsty and murderous, and the tale of humanity so far is, for the most part, the story of one brutal, bloody carnage after another.

And, seeing that so many people in the world are still basically ignorant, mule-headed, small-minded, and yellow-bellied . . . this unfortunate state of affairs doesn't seem likely to change any time soon.

We know of the many problems facing American Indians on reservations such as high poverty rates, alcoholism & drug abuse, health problems, high suicide rates (with tragic stories like one). Another problem facing American Indian reservations are environmental problems using reservations as dump grounds.

(disclaimer--- I absolutely suck at writing diaries;)
I have been developing a closer interest in American Indian history. There is something radical and spiritual I love about American Indians. But I am careful to avoid any sort of romanticism; the treatment, abuse and brutality the Natives have experienced is utterly abject.
I have been reading the excellent book The Earth Shall Weep by James Wilson. The book is a testament of "the disastrous impact of white conquest on indigenous cultures".

Obviously the dark nature of colonialism, imperialism, and capitalism can lead to horrendous results. The war in Iraq being the latest example of the suffering of people and the exploitation of resources due to the desire to dominate and control. But Native Americans suffered most egregiously at the expanse of 'progress'.

I strongly disapprove of Bush and I believe he should be impeached. But does Bush deserve a punishment worse than impeachment? Noam Chomsky raises an interesting point--
Noam Chomsky in an interview said

Invading Iraq was the kind of crime for which Nazi war criminals were hanged at Nuremberg. They were hanged, primarily, for crimes against peace, i.e. aggression, the supreme international crime. Von Ribbentrop, foreign minister, was hanged. One of the main charges was that he supported a preemptive war against Norway. It’s kind of striking that at the end of the Nuremberg tribunal, the chief counsel for the prosecution Justice Robert Jackson, an American justice, made some pretty eloquent speeches about the nature of the tribunal. After the sentencing, he said, "We’re handing the defendants a poisoned chalice and if we sip from it we must be subject to the same charges and sentencing or else we’re just showing that the proceedings are a farce." So if they mean anything the principles have to apply to us.

I gave up the internet for lent. It's really difficult to digest the news with out the Daily Kos perspective. Anyways, I was about to post this interview before I realized Jon the AntiZionist Jew had already a diary on the Noam Chomsky interview by Michael Shank.
Well, I'll post it anyway! Chomsky is very interesting. Maybe some people missed it! Anyways, Chomsky does not believe America will attack Iran but does not underestimate a desperate Bush administration. As he says "It's very hard to predict the Bush administration today because they're deeply irrational."