Link: http://www.alternet.org/teaparty/149937/tea_party_patriots_investigated%3A_%27they_use_you_and_abuse_you%27/

Pricey political consultants and fame-seeking leaders: A grassroots group cozies up to the DC establishment and alienates the activists who put it on the map.

Link: http://www.dailybulletin.com/ci_17396803?source=most_viewed

President Barack Obama's budget proposal that would cut $100 billion from Pell Grants and other higher education programs has some local university administrators concerned about how students will pay for their tuition.

Link: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1357056/Britains-1bn-aid-India-nation-3-times-billionaires-have.html

Britain is to give more than £1billion in aid to India over the next four years, even though it has almost three times as many billionaires as we do.

Link: http://healthfreedoms.org/2011/02/15/health-authorities-want-depression-causing-drugs-added-to-water-supply-2/

As if flouride and hexavalent chromium in public water supplies aren’t bad enough, health authorities are now pushing for the addition of drug statins as well. Drug companies claim that statins will lower cholesterol and prevent heart attacks and strokes, but researchers have proven that the drugs only benefit a quarter of people taking them. There are some very troubling side-effects, especially if there is no history of heart problems.

Link: http://www.aolnews.com/2011/02/15/17-victims-sue-pentagon-over-plague-of-sexual-violence/

WIt may become a landmark case to force the military to take rape and sexual assault seriously. Or it could be yet another failed attempt in a decades-long battle by women to be accepted in the armed forces.

Link: http://wsws.org/articles/2011/feb2011/pers-f15.shtml

On Monday, the Obama administration released its proposed federal budget for fiscal year 2012. After committing trillions in federal bailouts to the banks and billionaires, the White House is demanding cuts that will devastate the working class, and particularly its poorest and most vulnerable sections. The $1.1 trillion in cuts for the next decade proposed by the White House is to be only the starting point for further cuts, as spokesmen for both big business parties acknowledge. Senate Budget Chairman Kent Conrad, a Democrat, declared, “We’ve got to do substantially more than $1 trillion worth of deficit reduction in the next decade.” Republican House Speaker John Boehner said, “There’s no limit to the amount we’re willing to cut.”

Link: http://www.a-w-i-p.com/index.php/2011/02/15/zero-tolerance-policies-are-the-schools

“We end up punishing honor students to send a message to bad kids. But the data indicate that the bad kids are not getting the message.” -- Professor Russell Skiba. What we are witnessing, thanks in large part to zero tolerance policies that were intended to make schools safer by discouraging the use of actual drugs and weapons by students, is the inhumane treatment of young people and the criminalization of childish behavior.

Link: http://redactednews.blogspot.com/2011/02/spying-on-activists-greedy-lengths.html

Reminds of the lesser toxic side of COINTELPRO or SS lite, corporate style. Energy companies spying on activist groups, just what Obama appointee Cass Sunstein has been hired to do. Around the DC Metro area here, where the absurd visualized and manifested as a sick joke - the Maryland State Police infiltrated the local prison anti-death penalty group as a possible local terrorist threat.

Link: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/02/15/iraqi-defector-curveball-admits-to-wmd-lies-that-led-to-war/

An Iraqi defector, codenamed Curveball, who allegedly helped convince the Bush administration that Saddam Hussein had a secret stash of biological and chemical weapons, has admitted for the first time that he made it all up.

Link: http://socialistworker.org/2011/02/15/challenging-endless-cuts

Akasha Perez is an activist at San Francisco State University and a member of the SFSU chapter of CSU Students for Quality Education. She talked to David Elaine Alt about the impact of the budget cuts and fee hikes that have been imposed on California campuses--and the struggle ahead as activists prepare for a March 2 day of action to defend public education.

Link: http://socialistworker.org/2011/02/15/imperial-hypocrisies

THE DAY before Hosni Mubarak officially became Egypt's ex-president, John Negroponte, the U.S. diplomat who has been deployed to war zones from Honduras to Iraq, took to the airwaves to defend his community. The U.S. intelligence community, that is.

Link: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/feb/15/world-bank-warns-soaring-food-prices

A spike in global food prices has pushed millions more into poverty since last summer, said World Bank president Robert Zoellick. The World Bank has given a stark warning of the impact of the rising cost of food, saying an estimated 44 million people had been pushed into poverty since last summer by soaring commodity prices.

Link: http://bellaciao.org/en/spip.php?article20578

Meanwhile UK Judge Justice Holman forces Southampton residents to ingest fluoride in their water even though dentists and residents say it is forced medication, not necessary and dangerous.

Link: http://www.democracynow.org/2011/2/15/obamas_37_trillion_budget_calls_for

President Obama has unveiled a budget plan seeking to trim the federal deficit by cutting or eliminating some 200 federal programs, many dedicated to social services and education, while increasing military spending and funding for the construction of nuclear power plants. Announcing his $3.7 trillion proposal, Obama touted his previously stated pledge to freeze funding for domestic programs outside of the military for five years. Obama’s plan includes two modest tax hikes for banks and oil companies. It also calls for ending the Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans in 2013 and returning the estate tax to its higher 2009 levels. For analysis of Obama’s proposed budget, we are joined by John Nichols, Washington correspondent for The Nation magazine.

Link: http://www.counterpunch.org/prashad02152011.html

The Arab Revolt of 2011 is unabated. Protests continue in such unlikely places as Bahrain. On Valentine’s Day, a protest march in Manama had no love for the al-Khalifah royals. It wanted to deliver its message. “Our demand is a constitution written by the people,” the protestors chanted. Opposition leader Abdul Wahab Hussain told the press, “The number of riot police is huge, but we have shown using violence against us only makes us stronger.” The police fired rubber bullets and dispersed the as yet small crowd. “This is just the beginning,” Hussain said after he had been beaten off the streets.

Link: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/02/15-3

Memo to President Obama: Given the absence of intelligent intelligence and the inadequacy of your advisers’ advice, it’s not surprising that your handling of the Egyptian uprising has set new standards for foreign policy incoherence and incompetence. Perhaps a primer on how to judge the power that can be wielded by mass protest will prepare you better for the next round of political upheavals.

Link: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/02/15-6

Less than a month after making a show of reading the U.S. Constitution into the Congressional Record, the leaders of the Republican-controlled U.S. House enginnered a vote to extend the surveillance authorities that both the Bush and Obama administrations have used to conduct “roving surveillance” of communications, to collect and examine business recordsand to target individuals who are not tied to terrorist groups for surveillance.

Link: http://www.infowars.com/tea-party-caucus-leader-bachmann-votes-for-patriot-act/

Now that establishment Republicans have managed to steer the Tea Party into the political Borg Hive and run off the real patriots, it is time to get the neocon total war agenda back on track.

Link: http://www.socialistproject.ca/bullet/463.php

Since yesterday (11 February 2011), and actually earlier, middle-class activists have been urging Egyptians to suspend the protests and return to work, in the name of patriotism, singing some of the most ridiculous lullabies about “let's build new Egypt,” “Let's work harder than even before,” etc... In case you didn't know, Egyptians are actually among the hardest working people in the globe already.