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French journalists were freed last week, ten months after they went to
Syria to cover the civil war there, and were captured..though we still
don’t know by whom...or how they
got released. Dozens of journalists still remain captives of one group
or another.
Syria
is the most dangerous country in the world for reporters. 121 died
covering the war in 2012, and between 2007 and 2012, 430 journalists
died...so you could read a small
paragraph in the Lexington paper, or a twenty second voice-over report
on the local TV.
The
U.S. keeps saying it is trying to limit injuries to civilians in our
drone strikes, but in Yemen last week, a drone killed nine suspected
(not confirmed, just suspected)
al-Qaeda militants…but also killed and wounded some civilians,
including, reportedly, children.
50
years ago, April 24, 1964, LBJ sat on the front porch of a poverty
couple in Inez, Ky., as he announced his war on poverty. The couple, as
with the War on Poverty, did
not fare well. After a brief boom, coal jobs decreased drastically in
E. Ky., and the family suffered additional health problems. Both of them
have since died…and recent statistics show the growing disparity
between high and low income groups in the US..with
CEOs being paid more and paid without any relationship to their firm’s
stock or achievements..and more families entering poverty.
GM
waited years to recall another group of its cars that had serious
defects. This time the Saturn defects were known to a government auto
safety agency, which failed to
issue a recall.
And
a provision of the auto industry bail-out may exempt GM from liability,
even for deaths caused by its defective cars. Congress wrote such a
provision into the bail-out
law...and now those chickens, and amputations, and life long health
problems...and deaths...are coming home to roost.
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