by Randy Shannon

by Randy Shannon

June 18, 2010

Some twenty concerned voters gathered at Cong. Jason Altmire’s Aliquppa, PA office at noon on June 16th for a Healthcare not Warfare vigil. The action was sponsored by Progressive Democrats of America and was held at the same time at over 100 Congressional offices across the country.

Local members of the PA 4th CD Chapter of PDA were joined by members of SOAR, the retired steelworkers, and members of the Western PA Coalition for Single Payer Healthcare.

Continue reading Voters Protest Medicare Cuts at Cong. Altmire’s Office →

Vigil at Cong. Altmire’s office on Wed. June 16th at noon. Hands off Social Security and Medicare.

The Blue Dogs are using the banker created deficit as their excuse to cut critical programs that will keep workers alive and well. Blue Dog Altmire needs to hear from the voters.

Whacking the Old Folks

The Democratic Party and Blanche Lincoln

By Glenn Greenwald
June 11, 2010

 Salon.

The run-off between Democratic Senate incumbent Blanche Lincoln and challenger Bill Halter, which culminated on Tuesday night in Lincoln’s narrow victory, brightly illuminates what the Democratic Party establishment is. Lincoln is supposedly one of those “centrist”/conservative/corporatist Senators who thwarts the good-hearted progressive agenda of the President and the Party. She repeatedly joined with Republicans to support the extremist Bush/Cheney Terrorism agenda(from the the Protect America Act to the Iraq War and virtually everything in between), serves the corporate interests that run Washington as loyally as any member of Congress, and even threatened to join the GOP in filibustering health care reform if it contained the public option which Obama claimed he wanted. Obama loyalists constantly point to the Blanche Lincolns of the world to justify why the Party scorns the values of their voters: Obama can’t do anything about these bad Democratic Senators; it’s not his fault if he doesn’t have the votes, they insist. 

Continue reading Arkansas Primary Exposes Obama as a Corporate Democrat →

Vigil to save Medicare and Social Security

Wednesday June 16 Noon

Office of Cong. Altmire – 2110 McLean St., Aliquippa, PA

In the months since our first vigil the attacks on progressive values and the principles of democracy, equality, and fairness have escalated dramatically.

Whether the “haves” have been emboldened by the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision or this is simply one more step to create an even greater gap between the rich and the rest of us, the machine is moving forward to make significant cuts in Medicare and Social Security to “restore fiscal balance.”

As progressives, we know that the better way toward fiscal stability is to stop spending money on unwinnable, expansionist-driven wars. But in the bubble of Washington, President Obama, Congress—Republicans and Democrats—and the media are expending a lot of energy—and money—on convincing Americans that cutting great, gaping holes into our social safety net will be good for the country.

July 30, 2010, will be the 45th anniversary of Medicare’s being signed into law, but without our action, Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security as we know them may not survive that long.

The June theme therefore is “Hands off Medicare and Social Security.” Let’s tell our communities and our representatives that cuts to Medicare and Social Security won’t balance the budget, but ending the wars assuredly will. We’ll see you at the Brown Bag Lunch Vigil at Congressman Altmire’s office.

Tell Congressman Altmire: “Hands off our Social Security and Medicare.” 

Congress Ignores Nation’s Job Crisis

Some 300,000 teachers face layoffs this coming year. Congress hasn’t even had a vote on legislation that would keep them employed. Teenage employment was at record lows last year — when the stimulus bill funded some summer jobs. It is June, the school year is ending, and a $1.4 billion bill to provide 500,000 jobs for the summer hasn’t gotten a vote. More than 24 million Americans are unemployed or underemployed, and the economy barely produced any private-sector jobs last month. And yet, the bill by California Democrat George Miller to put people to work can’t get a vote in the House.

What is Washington thinking? Losing a job is a human calamity. Families buckle under the pressure. Divorce, spousal abuse, child neglect soar. Homelessness increases along with malnutrition. Crime, drug addiction, depression, rising rates of suicide follow. Skilled workers lose their skills. Our society becomes more unequal, and far more brittle, as middle-class families descend into destitution. Our 10 percent unemployment is a national emergency, not an acceptable condition.

Continue reading Congress Ignores Nation’s Job Crisis →

Shale Gas Well Blowout Raises Specter of New BP: Energy Markets

June 07, 2010, 12:48 PM EDT

June 7 (Bloomberg) — A Pennsylvania natural gas well “blowout” last week helped drive prices to a 14-week high on concern that tighter restrictions on offshore drilling following BP Plc’s Gulf of Mexico spill will spread onshore.

The incident on June 3 at the project operated by EOG Resources Inc. shot natural gas and drilling fluids onto the ground and 75 feet (23 meters) into the air, the state Department of Environmental Protection said in a statement on June 4. The well is in the Marcellus Shale gas find in Clearfield County, about 122 miles northeast of Pittsburgh.

With offshore exploration curtailed, dependence on shale gas may grow, amplifying the impact of any disruptions. A “blowout” is the industry’s term for a surge of pressurized oil or gas that causes an eruption and is what caused the explosion and fire at BP’s Macondo well in the Gulf April 20, resulting in the biggest oil spill in U.S. history.

“The shale problem is a bullish factor in the market,” said Carl Larry, president of Oil Outlooks & Opinions LLC in Houston. “A lot of people are starting to worry about the Gulf production of gas. The more we cut back on Gulf production, the more we rely on shale production.”

Natural gas for July delivery climbed 3.6 cents, or 0.8 percent, to $4.833 per million British thermal units at 12:44 p.m. on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Gas rose 11 percent week last week, the biggest gain since the week ended Dec. 18.

Continue reading Clearfield County Shale Gas Blowout →

“GasLand” Movie, June 5

GASLAND is an American documentary film written and directed by Josh Fox. The film focuses on communities in the United States impacted by natural gas drilling and, specifically, a drilling method known as hydraulic fracturing.  ‘Fracking’ is being done in the Pittsburgh area and surrounding counties in the Marcellus shale formation and can cause serious health and environmental problems. 

“GASLAND”

A documentary about the thrills and perils
of Marcellus shale drilling
Saturday, June 5
Show time is 7:00 pm, doors open at 6:00 pm.
Byham Theater
6th Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15222
Free to the public

Organized and funded in large part by Clean Water Action, the event is also sponsored by Center for Coalfield Justice, Duquesne University’s Center for Environmental Research and Education and School of Leadership & Professional Advancement, GASP, Penn Environment, University of Pittsburgh’s Center for Healthy Environments and Communities, Sierra Club. and Three Rivers Waterkeeper.

Following the showing will be a Q & A session with Gasland Filmaker Josh Fox and Myron Arnowitt (Clean Water Action), David Levdansky (State Representative), Ned Mulcahy, (Three Rivers Waterkeeper), John Stolz (Center for Environmental Research & Education, Duquesne U.) and Dan Volz (Center for Healthy Environments and Communities, U. Pittsburgh)

When filmmaker Josh Fox discovers that Natural Gas drilling is coming to his area—the Catskillls/Poconos region of Upstate New York and Pennsylvania, he sets off on a 24 state journey to uncover the deep consequences of the United States’ natural gas drilling boom. What he uncovers is truly shocking—water that can be lit on fire right out of the sink, chronically ill residents of drilling areas from disparate locations in the US all with the same mysterious symptoms, huge pools of toxic waste that kill cattle and vegetation well blowouts and huge gas explosions consistently covered up by state and federal regulatory agencies. These are just a few of the many absurd and astonishing revelations of a new country called GASLAND