Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JERGBGOUIQk

On 9/11, the world watched as two airplanes crashed into the twin towers of the world trade center, both of which collapsed shortly after. This much we know for sure, but for some, the cause of the collapse is still not so clear. Michael T Donly is a part of a group that says the two planes that hit the WTC twin towers could not have destroyed them. (To get more - Join our new Youtube channels at http://www.youtube.com/RTAmerica and http://www.youtube.com/thealyonashow)

Link: http://wsws.org/articles/2010/feb2010/heat-f24.shtml

With the number of US households requesting home heating assistance reaching a record for the third consecutive year, state officials have warned that they may begin to refuse further applications unless Congress allocates more money for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP.

Link: http://www.democracynow.org/2010/2/24/anti_nuclear_activists_mobilize_to_oppose

The news in Vermont follows Obama’s announcement last week of $8.3 billion in loan guarantees for the construction of the first new nuclear power plants in the United States in close to three decades. The loan guarantees will help the Atlanta-based Southern Company build two more nuclear reactors in Burke County, Georgia, near the city of Augusta. We speak to Nuclear Watch South coordinator Glenn Carroll, who has been leading efforts against the construction of the new plants. [includes rush transcript]

Link: http://www.uruknet.info/index.php?p=m63606&hd=&size=1&l=e

Leaders of the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard University (WCFIA) have condemned and then defended statements by Martin Kramer, one of the center's fellows, which endorsed a cut off of UN food and other humanitarian aid to Palestinian refugee children besieged in the Gaza Strip as a means to reduce the Palestinian birthrate and thus the Palestinian population.

Link: http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/02/24-5

President Obama's health care proposal, preserving as it does a central role for the for-profit, private health insurance industry, is incapable of achieving the kind of universal, comprehensive and affordable reform the country needs, a spokesman for a national doctors' group said Wednesday.

Link: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/24/us-navy-lift-ban-women-submarines

One of the last male bastions in the US military is about to fall. The navy this week moved to lift a ban on women serving on submarines. The decision comes after more than a decade in which opponents argued it would be too difficult to have women crew members, citing lack of privacy on submarines, where living quarters are cramped and "hot-bunking" is commonplace.

Link: http://rawstory.com/2010/02/obamas-favorite-banker-turns-gop/

When it comes to financial matters, it's just good business to consider the enemy of your friend a potential ally in the future.

Link: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/New-home-sales-drop-11-apf-2245141272.html?x=0

Sales of new homes plunged to a record low in January, underscoring the formidable challenges facing the housing industry as it tries to recover from the worst slump in decades. The Commerce Department reported Wednesday that new home sales dropped 11.2 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted annual sales pace of 309,000 units, the lowest level on records going back nearly a half century. The big drop was a surprise to economists who were expecting a 5 percent increase over December's pace.

Link: http://www.cnbc.com/id/35564308

President Barack Obama launched a vigorous defense of his economic agenda Wednesday, rejecting critics who call his policies "socialism" and insisting he aims to boost U.S. competitiveness abroad.

Link: http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/article.asp?ID=12228

The BBC has faced fresh accusations of dumbing down over its extensive coverage of Tiger Woods's apology last week. Scores of viewers complained about the golfer being the top story on the day 1,600 workers lost their jobs as the North-East's last steel plant was shut down. Last Friday also saw British Gas report a 50 per cent profit rise despite the economic downturn, while it emerged that another British soldier had been killed fighting the Taliban. But rather than leading with these stories, the golfer's public apology for a string of extra-marital affairs was chosen as the headline story on BBC1's main evening bulletin.

Link: http://www.counterpunch.org/smith02242010.html

It's now more than a month since the earthquake that laid waste to Port-au-Prince, killing more than 200,000 people and thrusting millions of people into the most desperate conditions. But according to the U.S. government, Haitians have a lot to be thankful for.

Link: http://www.alternet.org/news/145793/heather_graham_and_moveon_team_up_for_huge_push_on_congress_to_pass_the_public_option

If you followed the cues sent by the White House, you'd think the public option was dead. But on the heels of polls showing strong public support for a government health care plan, activists are pushing back hard -- and getting results.

Link: http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/20368

Citibank’s recent announcement that it may require seven days notice prior to honoring withdrawals is just the latest small brushstroke on a much larger canvas being painted by the banking system and the US government. The broader picture is shocking for those watching as it comes into view. Americans must heed Martin Luther King’s warning, “today our very survival depends on our ability to stay awake.”

Link: http://www.paltelegraph.com/palestine/gaza-strip/4379-experts-predict-israeli-navy-will-try-to-stop-free-gaza-boats

While the government is keeping silent about an imminent activists' voyage to "break the siege of Gaza," the navy will undoubtedly react if the vessel closes in on the Gaza shore, which is under a navy blockade, experts said Sunday. As the Jerusalem Post reported last month, a group of American, European and Israel...

Link: http://thisis50.ning.com/profiles/blogs/geithner-stages-press?xg_source=activity

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner made an appearance alongside IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman at the Joe Stack crash site in Austin, Texas. Their purpose was straightforward– to grandstand over an attack on a government agency and to set the scene for demonizing “anti-government beliefs.” The event was tightly controlled. Despite Geithner’s being a public figure, and setting the location along a public roadway, real media outlets were kept away on the premise that is was a private event by “invitation” only. This meant that only trusted network news stations were welcomed through. The Treasury Department, who ran the event, placed further restrictions on media access by setting a registration deadline:

Link: http://uruknet.info/index.php?p=m63632&hd=&size=1&l=e

Martin Kramer revealed his true colors at the Herzliya Conference, wherein he blamed political violence in the Muslim world on population growth, called for that growth to be restrained, and praised the illegal and unconscionable Israeli blockade of civilian Gazans for its effect on reducing the number of Gazans. M. J. Rosenberg argued that Kramer's speech is equivalent to a call for genocide. It certainly is a call for eugenics. It is shocking that Kramer, who has made a decade-long career of attacking social science understanding of the Middle East and demonizing anyone who departs even slightly from his rightwing Israeli-nationalist political line, should be given a cushy office at Harvard as a 'fellow' while spewing the most vile justifications for war crimes like the collective punishment of Gazan children.

Link: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2010/feb/24/tea-party-protests-liberals

There is an astonishing lack of anger among liberals, progressives and radicals who have abandoned emotion to the right. Our role model continues to be not FDR, still less Malcolm X, but our "bipartisan" and apparently tone-deaf President Obama. In this second or third year of a devastating depression, not just recession, that has inflicted an epidemic of suffering on the lower half of the American nation, Obama is very busy being fluent and civil while being essentially untouched by the rage felt by so many of us. Our world, as we have known it, is being annihilated, and nobody in power shows signs of giving a damn.