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By Shermakaye Bass
Green Right Now

Some of today’s younger greensters may not realize it, but on April 22, Earth Day is officially two generations old. That’s older than many who are organizing and promoting the holiday’s global events this year — events that are expected to draw more than one billion participants world-wide, including a mass gathering on the National Mall on Sunday, April 25.

The purpose of the Washington, D.C. , demonstration, marking Earth Day’s 40th Anniversary, is to push Congress to pass a 21st century climate bill — which is bringing the holiday full circle, returning it with razor-sharp focus to what spawned the first celebration in 1970: a cry for long-term political change on American environmental policy.

Sen. Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin, a founder of Earth Day

That first Earth Day started at the end of a violent and disjointed decade, with a call from progressive legislator Wisconsin Sen. Gaylord Nelson (1916 to 2005). Most people agree that Earth Day grew out of Nelson’s observation of an oil spill on the beaches of Santa  Barbara in the summer of ‘69.  As archival material from Nelson’s 25-year-plus political career puts it, the senator saw college students staging Vietnam-related teach-ins and thought: Why not do that with environmental issues? Why not create awareness and eco-education platforms, backed by a grassroots community?

When the first Earth Day rolled around several months later, thousands of colleges and schools participated. In fact, an estimated 20 million Americans demonstrated in some form, whether among throngs of thousands in New York or Philadelphia or in some individual way, making it by many accounts the largest demonstration in U.S. history.

As Nelson marveled after the fact, Earth Day “organized itself. …”  The senator, who twice served as Wisconsin’s governor, had the innate savvy to make the Earth Day contingent a big tent, encouraging people to acknowledge the fledgling holiday ”in any way they want.”

That first Earth Day spawned a decade of ground-breaking policy change, including formation of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in December, 1970; and passage of the Clean Air (1970) Clean Water Act (1972) and the Endangered Species Act (1973). (Yes, these were the  Nixon years, a period of environmental advancements.)

Forty years later, activists and climate experts believe Americans are at a similar cross-roads. As pro-environment legislators and President Barack Obama strive to tighten environmental regulation and others try to thwart it, Earth Day organizers are promoting the holiday as a clarion call: a demand for policy change and political action.

They want a strong 21st century climate/energy bill that reduces greenhouse gas emissions to slow climate change and reduce demand for energy. They want it soon, from Congress, where the U.S. Senate is considering a controversial climate bill that seems in danger of pleasing neither environmentalists or climate change opponents.

Pushing for Climate Action…

Sen. Nelson hired Denis Hayes to help organize the first Earth Day

Passage of a strong bill that would seriously curb carbon emissions, remains the hope of environmentalists, youth groups and many others who want climate change addressed.  They see it is imperative that our country quit talking and sand-bagging and enact a comprehensive bill that will include ways to solve climate change, be that a cap-and-trade system, carbon taxing or other measures.

Climate activists point to rising carbon in the air, which scientists say is triggering chain reactions that will bring catastrophic consequences — the floods, drought, desertification and damage to water systems and oceans we’ve all heard discussed.

People like Earth Day co-founder and one-time national director Denis Hayes, along with many other veteran activists, believe that this particular president and Congress need to act now on climate change, despite a large degree of polarity in American society.

They hope this Sunday’s demonstration on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., brings a groundswell for change that goes well beyond recent years’ commemorations of the revered secular holiday (the most celebrated, according to multiple sources, in the world).

Traditionally, the event has been unifying and symbolic, an effective awareness campaign marked by local fairs and festivals. But this year’s intensity and intent are different.

Earth Day, 2010 won’t be just a quick feel-good moment of turning off the porch lights, unplugging coffeepots or forgoing the lawn sprinkler for a day. It’s a full-on push for legislation, action, say organizers.

As Hayes, director and CEO of the Seattle-based Bullitt Foundation , wrote on April 15 in a Yale University magazine, the environmental movement of the past few years (decades, even) has tiptoed around big-money interests and dirty-fuel purveyors, diluting the substantive non-partisan alliance that marked the movement in the early 1970’s.

This year’s Earth Day, then, is pretty much like no other.

Denis Hayes, still active in environmental issues

As Hayes puts it in the Yale Environment 360, the 2010 holiday coincides with the most serious Congressional climate-bill debate in years. The debate involves several options, including Hayes’ preferred path, the Cantwell-Collins bill (introduced to the Senate in December, 2009), as well as the better-known Kerry-Lieberman-Graham bill, now before the Senate (more detail below).

Not to dismiss the many global events occurring on April 22, but Sunday’s gathering on the National Mall is epic in its implications and its power to effect change.

Hayes and others who founded the movement say this election year, this era, is a game-changer — not just for the country at large, but for its elected officials.

“…The only way that Congress will act intelligently and boldly on this issue is if we give it no choice,” Hayes writes. “A large block of Americans must make the climate disruption issue an initial voting screen. If a candidate is okay on climate, then we will look at the rest of her record. To move this issue forward, our voices must be as loud as those hollering for the right to carry a Colt into Starbucks or for saving Granny from death panels. …”

….Effective Climate Action

Along with others who support genuine (as opposed to token) reform and no-holds-barred legislation, Hayes believes the best path is the Cantwell-Collins plan.

“Most experts I know agree, in private, that the Cantwell-Collins bill in the Senate is the best climate legislation that has yet been proposed. In fact, it is the only option under consideration that would make a meaningful dent in greenhouse gas emissions in the near term. It places an absolute cap on carbon where it enters the economy; auctions 100 percent of carbon permits; and returns the revenues to the public on a pro rata basis. Moreover, it’s just 40 pages long, while the competing bills contain another thousand pages of loopholes, special interest exceptions, and bad baggage.

“But the so-called eco-pragmatists have one powerful argument against it. They say it can’t be passed. A prominent green leader told me, ‘To pass any climate bill at all, we have to appease coal-state Democrats, shovel as much money as necessary to pro-nuclear Republicans, and buy off the electric utilities.’ That is an apt description of the Kerry-Lieberman-Graham bill now making the rounds in the Senate.”

Continues Hayes in the 360 article:

“This sentiment has been broadly, if reluctantly, embraced by most of the large, mainstream national environmental groups working on climate as well as by the Obama Administration. … But it appalls virtually every environmentalist who lives outside the Beltway. The environmental movement has spent more than a billion dollars trying to pass a cap-and-trade bill, and it is feeling some desperation. The people who contributed all that money expect some results. The pressure to pass something — almost anything — that arguably puts some sort of cap on carbon is intense.”

Hayes concludes that many in the environmental movement are tired of spending money, hope, faith and energy on broken promises, and watered-down legislation that tries to make everyone happy — but ends up disenfranchising almost everybody.

“. … Every draft of the climate bill is weaker than its predecessor,” he writes. “Every draft does a poorer job of putting a reasonable price on carbon. Every draft is larded with more taxpayers dollars for socialized, centralized nuclear power and for “clean coal.” Every draft carries more sweeteners for the utility industry, the automobile industry, the coal and oil industries, and the industrial farmers and foresters.. Politicians who try to ignore climate disruption — and that’s a whole lot of them — need to start losing their jobs next November,” Hayes declares in the opinion piece. “Instead of weakening the bill, we need to change the politics,” he says.

Like his mentor Sen. Nelson probably would have, Hayes (who became Earth Day’s national director in 1990 and took the holiday to global proportions) sees that Earth Day 2010 represents a completely different socio-political environment than existed during that first one in 1970.

Why Earth Day Circa 1970 Worked

Back then, Earth Day was able to unite political opposites and reconcile ideological polarities in the face of one, singular issue: cleaning up the mess that humans had made and passing legislation that would safeguard the environment, and people, for generations to come. Believe it or not, in 1970, members of conservative and liberal camps, rural lifelong naturalists and ivory-tower activists, union movements and corporate CEO’s, Native Americans and bonafide cowboys, if you will, all rallied behind Earth Day.

As Bill Christofferson Nelson’s biographer writes in the progressive Uppity Wisconsin blog’s fascinating history of Earth Day: “That was the genius of Earth Day – tapping the wellspring of environmental concern that was bubbling just below the surface of the national consciousness.”

“When it happened, “It was truly an astonishing grassroots explosion,” Nelson later said. “The people cared and Earth Day became the first opportunity they ever had to … send a big message to the politicians – a message to tell them to wake up and do something. It worked because of the spontaneous, enthusiastic reception at the grassroots. Nothing like it had ever happened before. While our organizing on college campuses was very well done, the thousands of events in our schools and communities were self-generated at the local level.”

“…Earth Day worked because of the spontaneous response at the grassroots level. We had neither the time nor the resources to organize twenty million demonstrators and the thousands of schools and local communities that participated. That was the remarkable thing about Earth Day. It organized itself,” Nelson said

Eventually Nelson achieved the highest honor an American civilian can receive. In 1995, he was awarded in the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Bill Clinton. Among  his many legislative achievements during an18-year tenure as U.S. Senator from Wisconsin, Mr. Nelson helped pass the following:

• The 2,000-mile Appalachian Trail Preserve

• Stronger government regulations and controls of mining, including strip mining.

• Fuel-efficiency standards for American automobiles

• Bans on the use of the poison DDT and the defoliant 245T, a.k.a. Agent Orange.

Granted, Sen. Nelson’s accomplishments took place over more than a decade, but the major federal bills he helped push through – – The Clean Air, Clean Water and Endangered Species Acts — were passed over three short years.

Earth Day organizers remind us that Nelson’s legacy is not just an indication of what can be done in relatively short order; it is proof positive that comprehensive change can happen quickly. Given that most international scientists now agree our globe is undergoing dramatic climate change (as Hayes describes it in his Yale Opinion, “we’re cooking the planet”), Earth Day’s 40th anniversary, and the mass demonstration planned for Sunday, April 25, can’t come a moment too soon.

We know from the past that such grassroots movements can be their own tipping point, pushing change far beyond anyone’s crystal ball could conjure. We also know that, 40 years after the first Earth Day, the world is facing an urgent issue that wasn’t even on the radar back then.

The lesson? Change is possible.

• More information about The Climate Rally this Sunday, April 25, at the National Mall can be found on our site and at the Earth Day Network website.

Copyright © 2010 Green Right Now | Distributed by GRN Network

by David Roberts

A portfolio approach to climate change—a price on carbon coupled with a suite of complementary policies—can serve as a net economic boost. Put more simply: tackling climate change can help the economy. As I lamented yesterday, however, this fact tends to be obscured by the political establishment’s excess focus on carbon pricing alone.

Part of the blame for this state of affairs lies with mainstream economics. You see, carbon pricing is relatively easy to model. A portfolio approach is not. So economists just … don’t. Nine times out of ten, when economists talk about the economic effects of climate policy, they’re just talking about the effects of carbon pricing. Problem is, carbon pricing without those complementary policies produces a hit to GDP growth, so economists end up providing ammunition for those who want to block climate legislation altogether.

This week provided a crystal clear example of the dynamic at work. As The Hill reports, Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) recently asked the Congressional Budget Office—the definitive authority on these matters—to estimate the year-to-year household impacts of the Waxman-Markey (ACES) climate/energy bill. passed by the House last summer. It’s pretty obvious what Smith is after: he wants a number he can use to bash climate legislation during the upcoming midterm elections.

Now CBO chief Doug Elmendorf has written Smith back [PDF]. Using the CBO’s standard modeling, the agency determined that ACES will cost the average household $90 worth of purchasing power in 2012. By 2030, that figure rises to $550 a year, and by 2050, $930.

Now, relative to the enormous growth in GDP and average household incomes these models assume, that amount of money is peanuts. (The program would shave 0.8 percent off GDP growth by 2050—by contrast, the recent financial crisis knocked off something like 5 percent in one fell swoop.) But still, Smith and the Republicans have gotten their ammo. “During the recession, with Americans hurting, the Democrats want to pass a bill that will hit every family squarely in the pocketbook, starting with $90 and rising every year!”

Dems’ only response will be, “Hey, $90 isn’t that much!” That’s not exactly a political winner.

But here’s the thing: the CBO is only modeling the cap-and-trade program in ACES—i.e., the carbon pricing system. What about the other two-thirds of the bill? There’s a whole efficiency title, which is quite strong (much stronger than the craptastic provisions in the Senate bill). There are electric car provisions, grid provisions, renewable energy provisions. These complementary policies serve to reduce per-capita energy use and stimulate innovation in clean industries; that is to say, they serve to drive down the cost of compliance with the cap.

What would happen if these policies were integrated into the economic modeling used by the CBO? I suspect that the outcome would be much more favorable.

Now, of course there’s a reason CBO doesn’t model the portfolio approach. It’s difficult to model how multiple policies interact. Economists are uncomfortable with that kind of uncertainty; they like statistical precision; they don’t like putting their professional credibility behind what amounts to a series of educated guesses. If you asked, Elmendorf would probably say that he is being up-front about what the CBO is doing and it’s up to policy makers what use they make of it.

But I don’t buy that. The CBO is perpetuating the myth that climate policy is all cost—a myth that makes decent climate policy less likely. It’s contributing to the surreal atmosphere in which the entire media and political elite act like nothing but carbon pricing exists. Somebody’s got to take responsibility for that sorry state of affairs. Somebody’s got to change it. It’s not going to help to have climate campaigners (and DFH bloggers) protesting it. Nobody in the Village takes them seriously. Economists need to step up.

Related Links:

U.S. military shrinking its carbon ‘boot print’

Raiding rainforest funds in climate legislation will turn cost projections into fantasy

Good news for Earth Day: We can reduce climate pollution and boost the economy, all at once

Financial reform is complicated. Understanding why we need it is not.

When President Obama makes his pitch for banking regulation Thursday in New York, he’ll have more than enough ammunition. Everybody felt the credit crunch’s tsunami, and everybody knows that the wave began on Wall Street. But whereas the motivation for reform is simple to understand, reform itself is infinitely complicated. Indeed Washington is seeking to regulate an industry whose very opaqueness was the cause of the recession. If Wall Street doesn’t understand Wall Street, how will Americans understand Wall Street reform?

The key is to keep things simple. In his weekly address last weekend, Obama broke down the case for financial reform into four pieces: (1) creating new consumer protections; (2) shining a harsh on shadow banking; (3) installing measures to end “too big to fail” and (4) giving more power to shareholders. If that address was a template for his Thursday address, here are four themes we can expect for this landmark address.

1. We have to fight for consumers.
The clearest case for reform is the consumers’ case, because we are an audience of consumers. Our sense of appropriate leverage ratios might be murky, but our sense of indignation is bottomless. Obama will say that Americans were repeatedly duped into the same devious schemes that eventually wiped out our savings. Even before 8 million workers were victims of the recession, millions more were victims of predatory lending practices, baffling financial products, devious interest rate policies lurking in fine print, and worse. This is the easy case to make. Today we have too many agencies with consumer protection as their fourth priority. What we need is one strong defender whose sole purpose is to make sane disclosure rules so that Americans understand what we’re paying for.

2. We have to drag the banks out of the shadows.
The power of light doesn’t end with consumer protection. We also need to make shadow banking more transparent. Summing up the origins of the recession, Obama will explain that the crisis began in the shadows, with complex financial instruments sloshing between banks and hedge funds who did not understand the risks they were taking. It’s said that what you don’t know can’t hurt you. But what Wall Street didn’t know hurt all of us. The implosion of the shadow banking industry brought down the worldwide financial system and sent our unemployment soaring more than 10 percent.

It’s easy to argue that we can’t prevent the next crisis without addressing the roots of the last crisis. But it’s hard to frame shadow banking reform in a way that won’t make Americans change the channel. We could hear something about “turning back the clock, returning to a simpler time,” and calling for banks to put a hard wall between their commercial operations and their proprietary trading desks. We could hear vague allusions an “open, free and thriving market,” which would mean posting complex financial instruments called derivatives on an exchange and trading them through a central clearinghouse to protect counterparties. The details here get very confusing very fast, so expect Obama to talk more about the need for shadow banking reform rather than the shape it will take.

3. Big is bad…
This is where Obama gets to break out the stick and whip bankers for “recklessness and irresponsibility.” Bankers gambled with Americans’ money. When they lost, they wound up with … well, Americans’ money. Not only does this story pique our natural sense of injustice, but also there’s bad policy at its heart. The implicit government support of large firms gives them unfair advantages in the market. There are two ways to fix this: end the implicit support, or make the firms smaller.

To the first solution, Obama might defend an “orderly liquidation fund,” which would help the government wind down failed banks in an orderly manner so that their implosion doesn’t create a black hole that swallows the financial sector with them. Last week Republicans attacked this fund for supporting permanent bail outs and the measure has lost some steam. If Obama goes to bat for it, expect something explicit like: “Let me make this clear, there will be no more
taxpayer bailouts.” Indeed, this “resolution” fund wouldn’t bail out the firm. It would stop the chaos.

To the second solution, Obama will likely announce capital requirements or “leverage ratios” that will force banks to either have more cash on hand or make safer bets with their capital. A “safe” leverage ratio is considered about 15:1 (that means for every one dollar of capital you have on hand, you’ve borrowed 14 more). When Bear Sterns went under, its leverage ratio was 36:1. Lehman’s was probably even higher. If we want to make banking less risky, one commonsense solution is to limit risk.

4. … but banks are not.
You can feel this one coming. It’s not in Obama’s DNA to attack his enemies with a steady stream of venomous invective. His style is more like what a pick-up artist would call “negging” and an investment banker would call hedging: a shrewd balance of criticism, compliments and to-be-sure concessions. (How many times have we heard something like: “The media is vapid, salacious and petty, but essential to the democratic spirit…?”) One should expect the same tone from Thursday’s speech. Look out for a penultimate graph along the lines of:

“The time has come for us to reform Wall Street, not because we seek to destroy it, but we seek to save it. Credit is the lifeblood of the economy. It helps businesses grow. It puts students through college. It puts food on our tables and keeps a roof over our heads. We need our banks. But just as urgently, we need to reform them.”

Two of last year’s WCIA Final Four return to square off as Bank of America, who thumped Time Warner Cable in the Elite 8, goes up against Ticketmaster, fresh off its victory over Anthem BCBS.

Which of these companies has earned a spot in the finals?

This is a post in our Worst Company In America 2010 series. The companies competing for this honor were chosen by you, the readers. Keep track of all the goings on at consumerist.com/tag/worst-company-in-america. Print the bracket, here.

With the increased screen real estate of the iPad, it’s the perfect device for playing board games. If you haven’t had a chance to browse some of the great titles available on the App Store, here’s some of our favorite board games to get you started.

Scrabble

Such a classic, Scrabble is awesome on the iPad platform. Enjoy playing against friends (or a computer) on a gorgeous large game board. If you have an iPhone, download the free Scrabble Tile Rack and arrange your letters on your own device. When it’s your turn, simply flick them towards the game board and they’ll appear, ready for you to place and score big. Similar to the iPhone version, you can play against your friends locally or over a local network. Scrabble is $9.99.

Words with Friends

If there’s one app at the moment that’s popular across social networks and mobile devices, it’s Words with Friends. Similar to Scrabble, this game allows you to play, turn based, against friends who are playing on their iPads, iPhones or Facebook accounts. The app supports push notifications to let you know when it’s your turn, and you can chat in-game with your friends. At $2.99, this is definitely a fun board game for those who enjoy playing against friends and don’t want to take the leap to Scrabble.

Game Table

One of the first game apps on the iPad, Game Table provides a virtual game board for a variety of games, like checkers, chess, poker and other card games. It’s not a traditional game in the sense that you’ll have scoring or rules and stuff. Instead, it’s simply all the pieces to play games without all the fuss so you can play them any way you want. For 99 cents this app is a great value and the developers have promised that additional game pieces for Backgammon, Go and Reversi will be added soon.

UNO HD

While UNO technically is more of a card game than a board game, I decided to include it because it’s a very fun experience on the iPad. It features all of the traditional UNO rules and actions, like Draw 2, Reverse and Wild cards. It also supports multiplayer (sharing one device or multiple on a Wi-Fi network) and features challenges allowing users to unlock additional themes to give the game a fresher look. UNO HD is $4.99.

Strategery

Strategery is an engaging game originally designed for the iPhone that has been optimized for the iPad as well. This game of world domination features you as leader of a “country” (think Civilization style) and you battle against your neighbors to gain/lose territory. It supports pass-and-play style multiplayer (with up to five players) or online battles with push notifications. The iPad version allows for much larger maps and a much more engaging experience if played like a traditional board game (a group of players gathering around the iPad). At $1.99, this app is a definite must-have.

Theme Checkers

Of all board games, Checkers (or Chess) was probably the most expected to debut on the iPad. There are a variety of both available now, but my favorite is Theme Checkers HD. Just like a real game, the movement is very fluid and natural. This game supports one and two player modes and regularly updated themes for unique checkers experience. Users can even create and install their own custom themes as well. Theme Checkers HD is 99 cents, so give it a spin and see what you think.

Board Box

If you’re looking for a little more than just checkers or chess, you should check out Board Box. Similar to some of the others I’ve mentioned, it includes checkers and chess, but this app goes further by including Reversi, Tic Tac Toe, Go, Draughts and more. Not only does it include the regular version of these games, but it also includes some variants. This app doesn’t support an automated second player, so you’ll either need to suffer from having a split personality or have a friend to play against. If there’s nobody local, you can play against friends through email. The developers of Board Box have promised that there will be no in-app purchases for this app so as they continue to update and add additional game boards and variants, the updates will be free. At $3.99, Board Box is a great investment.

Ludo

If you’re a fan of Parcheesi, you should definitely check out Ludo ($3.99). Supporting up to four players (both human or computer), the game plays like real Parcheesi, except with a fresh modern interface and smooth animations and sound effects. Though there are a few other Parcheesi variants on the App Store, this one is definitely the best for the iPad. Additionally, your game state is saved so you can start and stop the game as you please.

Moonlight Mahjong

If you’re one who loves playing mahjong, check out Moonlight Mahjong for 99 cents. Putting a literal spin on the traditional idea of mahjong, this version is 3D, allowing you to use touch gestures to tilt and turn and zoom in and out. There’s over 90 built-in board layouts. When you get bored with those, you can create your own and share them with others. Plus, it offers for support of multiple players (even across Wi-Fi or against an automated opponent). If you’ve never given mahjong a shot, this is an excellent game to reduce stress and relax.

Honey, That’s Mine!

This is a “sweet” board game where players compete against each other to collect the most honey. If playing on the iPhone or iPod touch, the game supports pass-and-play for multiplayer, but if you’re on the iPad, the larger screen makes it easy to just place your iPad on a table and play against your friends. The idea of the game is rather simple, but the options for computer opponents and difficulty variations give this game additional replay value. Honey, That’s Mine is available on the App Store for $1.99.

This is just a small sampling of some of the apps available for the iPad. If you’ve tried these or found others you like, share your thoughts in the comments below. Personally I’m thrilled to find replacements of my favorite board games on the iPad. Just imagine how many little pieces I don’t have to keep up with anymore!

Filed under: Sedan, Plants/Manufacturing, Chevrolet, GM

We first heard that General Motors might add production of the next-generation Chevrolet Malibu to its Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly plant back in December, and that news has been confirmed today. GM Chairman Ed Whitacre held a press conference this morning at which he announced the automaker had paid back the remaining $5.8 billion owed to the U.S. and Canadian governments a full five years ahead of schedule. He made the announcement at the company’s Fairfax plant in Kansas that currently builds the Chevrolet Malibu and Buick LaCrosse, a perfect venue to announce new plant investments for the next generation Malibu.

GM will spend a total of $257 million to get both the Fairfax and Detroit-Hamtramck plants ready for the new Malibu. The Kansas City plant will receive a $136 million investment and be the new car’s primary production site, while $121 million will be spent tooling up the Detroit plant to build the 2012 Malibu alongside the Chevrolet Volt.

The Detroit-HHamtramck plant currently builds the Cadillac DTS and Buick Lucerne, both of which are expected to end production some time in the next year. The Lucerne will likely be dropped from the lineup and the DTS will be replaced by the Cadillac XTS, which will likely be built in Oshawa.

[Source: Automotive News, sub. req.]

Continue reading GM investing $257M in Fairfax and Detroit plants to build next-gen Malibu

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Whether they’re gearing up for a competitive primary, adding personal wealth to their campaign coffers or simply raising more in individual donations, nine House candidates have outraised the incumbents they’re challenging, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

For three of the incumbents listed below, this is the second quarter in a row where their challengers beat them in total receipts: Dan Lungren (R-Calif.), Roscoe Bartlett (R-Md.)  and Tim Bishop (D-N.Y.). And several incumbents who outraised their challengers through last quarter failed to do so through this second quarter (through March 31): Ron Klein (D-Fla.), John Hall (D-N.Y.), Larry Kissell (D-N.C.), Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), Betty Sutton (D-Pa.) and Jim Gerlach (R-Pa.).

Two members who were outraised as of Jan. 31 have since turned things around: Florida Republican Bill Young and Washington Republican Dave Reichert. Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) was also outraised as of Jan. 31, but Murtha died in February.

Our complete list of House challengers who outraised incumbents:

Randy Altschuler (R-N.Y.): Democratic Rep. Tim Bishop raised a healthy $1.3 million through Mar. 31 and still found himself outraised overall by Altschuler. Altschuler, who is running against Bishop in New York’s 1st District, reported raising $2 million through Mar. 31. But Altschuler’s fundraising take isn’t indicative of donations — he loaned himself more than $1 million. Regardless of how he got the cash, Altschuler was also left with $200,000 more than Bishop after expenses. Republicans have long viewed Bishop as a potential target, due to GOP competitiveness in the district on the local and national levels. The party believes 2010 may be its time to strike because of the national climate and its well-funded challenger — and Altschuler plans to use Bishop’s support for the president’s health care reform plan against him.

Ami Bera (D-Calif.): Republican Rep. Dan Lungren finds himself outraised by first-time candidate Bera yet again in California’s 3rd District, according to the most recent campaign finance totals. Bera, a physician, raised $1.25 million total through March 31, including a $21,000 personal loan, and Bera reported $977,000 remaining in his campaign account after expenses. Lungren, who is serving his eighth term in the House (which includes a stint in the 80’s before he became state attorney general) raised $976,000 total and reported only $650,000 on hand. The district, located in the Sacramento suburbs, supported Barack Obama for president in 2008 while Lungren won re-election with less than 50 percent of the vote. The GOP contends Lungren is favored for re-election, but Democrats have already targeted the race and Bera’s totals are only bolstering their efforts.

Casey Clark (D-Md.): A $50,000 personal loan helped keep Clark ahead of Rep. Roscoe Bartlett (R-Md.) in total funds raised for the second quarter in a row. Clark reported $152,500 raised through March for his campaign in Maryland’s 6th District, and Bartlett raised $120,000. But Bartlett remains miles ahead of Clark on available cash. Bartlett reported $379,000 on hand while Clark had only $70,000 remaining at the end of March. That cash on hand advantage is one of several reasons why few are watching this 2010 race.

Tim D’Annunzio (R-N.C.): D’Annunzio has self-funded his way to the top in the race against Democratic Rep. Larry Kissell in North Carolina’s 8th District. After adding $850,000 in personal funds to his campaign, D’Annunzio reported $970,500 raised overall, placing him ahead of the other GOP candidates in the race as well as Kissell, who raised $676,000. A major bright spot for Kissell: D’Annunzio is spending virtually all the money in his account ahead of the competitive primary — D’Annunzio reported just $75,000 remaining at the end of March. Kissell reported $326,000 on hand. Republicans had been strongly recruiting for this race, and though they failed to secure their top-tier prospects, the district remains competitive.

Tom Ganley (R-Ohio): Ganley gave himself a whopping $2 million loan this past quarter, which easily made him the strongest total fundraiser in Ohio’s 13th District race. Ganley’s $2 million-plus total put him ahead of Democratic Rep. Betty Sutton, who raised a total of $504,000 through March. Ganley was previously running for Ohio Senate, but dropped out in February to challenge Sutton. Though Ganley’s wealth may complicate things for Democrats, the party’s edge in the district continues to bodes well for Sutton.

Nan Hayworth (R-N.Y.): Hayworth, an ophthalmologist, counts a $400,000 personal loan among her total receipts, which has put her ahead of incumbent Democratic Rep. John Hall in total campaign money raised for the New York 19th District race — $918,000 to $856,000. But it’s Hayworth, not Hall, who will need cash to endure a potentially difficult primary. Multiple Republicans are jockeying for the position, while incumbent Hall stands alone on the Democratic side. Hall reported $553,000 on hand and Hayworth reported $658,500 on hand.

Rich Iott (R-Ohio):
A $390,000 loan helped boost Iott’s campaign finance totals ahead of incumbent Democrat Marcy Kaptur in Ohio’s 9th District. Iott was able to report $399,000 raised through Mar. 31 while Kaptur reported $214,000 raised. But Kaptur saved an enormous amount of money from her last re-election bid. Kaptur boasts more than $1 million cash on hand and Iott reported just $179,000 remaining at the end of March. Republicans cast Kaptur, a 14-term incumbent, as vulnerable because of her support for health care reform, but she has a record of consistently winning past re-elections with ease.

Doug Pike (D-Pa.): And the last major self-funder on this list is Pike, who gave himself more than $1 million for a total of $1.6 million raised through March. That total beats out Pennsylvania’s 6th District Rep. Jim Gerlach (R) who reported raising $891,000. Gerlach is not new to competitive re-election races. He is a perennial  target because of his split district (voters their supported Barack Obama for president in 2008 by 17 percentage points while simultaneously re-electing Gerlach). Gerlach has never won an election by more than 52.1 percent.

Allen West (R-Fla.):
At the beginning of the cycle, it was Republican state House Majority Leader Adam Hasner who most worried Rep. Ron Klein’s (D) campaign. When Hasner declined to run, that left Klein’s unsuccessful 2008 challenger, West, in the race. But this cycle, West’s fundraising totals are beginning to overshadow Klein’s and additionally, Republicans have been offering West a national platform for his campaign. West raised more than $2 million through March, while Klein raised $1.9 million. Klein still has an advantage in cash on hand, reporting $2.65 million remaining as of Mar. 31 while West reported just over $1 million remaining. West has been employing the campaign services of BaseConnect, which has drawn scrutiny for its high direct mail costs. But West and other clients have defended the group’s tactics, noting that in addition to fundraising support, BaseConnect has increased his campaign’s visibility and his access to the party.

List of races originated from Center for Responsive Politics information. All fundraising totals were obtained from the Federal Election Commission.

Julissa Treviño contributed to this story.

This installment of “Taxpayer Calculator” will examine what it costs the military, and you, the taxpayer, to run two overseas wars.

President Obama announced in late 2009 a plan to send 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan. The administration sent its request for funds to Congress in February, but the bill hasn’t been voted on yet — even though more than half of the troops are already in place now.

Because the cost of the surge wasn’t factored in when lawmakers were hashing out the 2010 budget, President Obama had to ask for an additional $33 billion to fund the surge.

You can find out how much of your salary goes to fund this war supplemental by using our Taxpayer Calculator.

The bill is expected to pass, but the House has been slow in taking it up. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., says they plan bring it the floor before the Memorial Day recess.

The additional war spending is on top of the Defense Department’s base budget for 2010 of $661 billion. Asking for the extra cash separately is a move many commanders-in-chief, including President Bush during the Iraq surge, have done in the past.

A small fraction of that $33 billion supplemental request goes to projects in Iraq. The Iraqi Security Forces, for example, are set to receive $1 billion.

The military plans to draw down to 50,000 troops in Iraq by the end of the summer. Lt. Gen. William Webster of the Third Army in Iraq told Pentagon reporters earlier this month that the cost of moving out of Iraq will cost tens of billions of dollars.

At the rate we’re spending in Afghanistan in 2010, the Department of Defense is burning $4.5 billion a month.

Since September 11th, 2001, the Pentagon has spent $837 billion on all war related activities, according to its own calculations. In Afghanistan alone the U.S. has spent $191 billion. Also, the total cost for Iraq since the invasion in March 2003 is $620 billion.

OK, Canadian Motorola Milestone owners … Who’s ready for Android 2.1? It’s finally available, so you’re back to level ground with those of us with Motorola Droids down south in the U.S. (Yeah, you still have us beat on that health care thing.) Anyhoo, head to Motorola to snag what you need for the update (strangely, it’s not OTA), and here’s the official changelog (pdf). [via Mobilesyrup]

British Android users awoke this morning to find a slightly belated Easter egg from Google lying in their Google Maps. If you have Android 1.6 or 2.1 coupled with Google Maps 4.1.0 or 4.1.1 you should now be able to get your free turn-by-turn navigation on.

Everyone in the aforementioned section of the Venn diagram gets the turn-by-turn navigation with voice directions, but it would appear that only the Nexus One owners get the added bonus of being able to use speech recognition in Maps to say “navigate to” and the like.

So if you already have Maps installed you should just be able to pop it open and start zigging and zagging to the soothing tones of your Android navigator, if not get thee to the Market or hit the QR code above.

Unfortunately due to the ash cloud none of the Android and Me staff were able to fly over there and verify the functioning of the update in Britain so sound off in comments if you notice anything wonky going on or if you just want to give a little hip hurray for free navigation that’s cool too.

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An alleged terrorist accused in the grisly murders of four Americans appeared in court Wednesday in Iraq. But Ahmed Hashim Abed isn’t the one on trial. Instead, he was testifying against one of the Navy Seals who arrested him last September.

Petty Officer First Class Julio Huertas of Blue Island, Illinois, is being tried at a military base on the western outskirts of Baghdad. Huertas and two other Navy Seals face charges in connection with Abed’s arrest, during which the prisoner claims he was punched and kicked by at least one of his captors.

The case has prompted a huge outpouring of sympathy in the U.S., with thousands visiting websites in support of the Navy Seals. Many claim the four defendants should be hailed as heroes for capturing Abed instead of being court marshaled. At least 20 members of the U.S. Congress have urged Defense Secretary Robert Gates to drop all the charges.

In court Tuesday, Abed described the surprise raid on his home last year. He say he was with his wife at the time. He says he was blindfolded and taken to an unknown location and questioned. He told the court there was no abuse during the first questioning or at a second location where he was later taken. At a third location, however, Abed claims he was hit on his shoulders and back, then punched in to the stomach, causing him to fall on his face. While on the floor, he says he heard yelling and swearing.

The accused terrorist was handcuffed and blindfolded at the time and says he can’t identify anyone who might have hit him. He only remembers seeing someone wearing red shorts. Photos of Abed taken ten days after the alleged incident were also shown in court, but according to a Fox News representative inside the courtroom, the injuries did not look severe.

Petty Officer 2nd Class Matthew McCabe of Perrysberg, Ohio, is the only Navy Seal actually charged with assault in the case. His attorney, Neal Puckett, says on his website, “These terrorists are trained to claim abuse despite no physical evidence of such.” McCabe goes on trial May 3rd in Norfolk, VA.

Also in court in Baghdad, a Navy officer testified that he witnessed McCabe assaulting Abed. Petty Officer Third Class Kevin Demartino, who is not a Navy Seal, said he saw McCabe punch Abed in the stomach and saw blood coming from the prisoner’s mouth. Demartino was silent about the case at first, saying in court, “I wasn’t prepared to rat those guys out.” But after he learned there would be a formal investigation, he decided to cooperate with the prosecution.

McCabe is charged with assault, dereliction of duty and making false statements. Huertas is charged with dereliction of duty and impeding an investigation. A third Navy Seal, Jonathan Keefe of Yorktown, Pennsylvania, is charged only with dereliction of duty. He faces trial later this week in Baghdad.

It’s not exactly Bernie Madoff’s $65 billion, but the Securities And Exchange Commission has charged a Florida businessman with operating a $900 million Ponzi scheme, telling people they were investing — risk-free and at interest rates upward of 26% — in his grocery business, when in fact he was just using the money to fund his lavish lifestyle.

According to the SEC filing, Nevin K. Shapiro, the founder and president of Capitol Investments USA, Inc., “lured investors by falsely touting Capitol’s securities as a risk-free investment with extraordinarily high returns… He used his prominence and prestige to gain investors’ trust in funding Capitol’s grocery diverting business, but behind their backs he diverted their money to enrich himself.”

The SEC says that, in spite of the influx of investment money, Capitol began operating at a loss in 2004 and “had virtually no operations by 2005 when, in a classic Ponzi scheme manner, Shapiro began using funds from new investors to pay principal and interest to earlier investors.”

Here are some of the SEC’s allegations against Shapiro:

* He falsely told investors their funds would be used as short-term financing to purchase and resell groceries for Capitol’s business.

* He falsely touted Capitol’s financial success as well as his own.

* He falsely assured investors that their principal was secure because Capitol would not broker the sale of the goods without first obtaining a purchase order from a buyer.

* He falsely told investors that Capitol would pay the principal and interest from the profits it received when it resold the goods.

* He misappropriated at least $38 million of investor funds to enrich himself and finance outside business activities unrelated to the grocery business, including a sport representation business and real estate ventures.

According to the filing, Shapiro owned a $5 million home in Miami Beach, a $1 million boat, luxury cars, expensive clothes, high-stakes gambling, and season tickets to premium sporting events.

He has been charged with violating the antifraud provisions of the federal securities laws. The complaint seeks a permanent injunction, sworn accounting, disgorgement of ill-gotten gains, and financial penalties against Shapiro, who surrendered to authorities today.

SEC Charges Prominent Miami Beach Businessman in $900 Million Ponzi Scheme[SEC.gov]

It’s been a while since we’ve asked you a Question of the Day so we thought what better day to do it than on hump-day. Today, we’re asking you which Japanese brand you think has the best model lineup.

For this segment we’re staying away from luxury vehicles so you can pick from Nissan, Honda, Toyota and Mazda.

Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below and let us know which Japanese vehicle is your favorite.

– By: Kap Shah

Last seen in Hammersmith, London, England: a teenage boy’s pride. For now the whole world knows he’s no match for his kid sister. [GoogleSightSeeing via Twitter] More »

Among the many defining – and practical – tenets of the Primal Blueprint is the good old 80/20 Principle, the guideline that suggests we needn’t be 100% perfect 100% of the time to achieve great Primal health. It’s the sensible caveat, a functional motivator, the saving grace for many of us. It means we don’t guilt ourselves (or hand down punishing cardio sentences) when we indulge on a special occasion or get caught in circumstances that don’t allow for fully Primal conditions. It means shedding the traditional view of a “diet” and exercise program as a select list of actions we either ace or bomb. As I’ve said many a time, the PB doesn’t make the perfect the enemy of the good. Finally, the 80/20 Principle encourages us to wholly own every choice and respect the impact of our total lifestyle within our personal Primal commitments. An immensely empowering – but sometimes challenging – feature of the Primal Blueprint is its subjectivity. Although it offers plenty of solid guidelines, tips, lists and recipes (not to mention an incredible community of fellow adherents!), the day-in-day-out isn’t regimented into a set of check-off boxes. Bringing your honest intentions and Primal lens to each choice is usually enough to stay on track. While your Primal perspective each day is an earnest 100%, the practical execution trends toward 80% for most people, especially those new to the PB. But what happens when focus temporarily wanes or life circumstances become – well – more imperfectly “real”? How do you push back on the tendency of 80/20 to creep toward lesser ratios?

How It Happens

Life has a funny way of shifting the routine just when we get secure and comfortable. A new baby, a new job, a move, an illness, an injury, maybe just a month when the schedule picks up can throw a serious wrench in your finely tuned Primal practice. These transitions, whether they overhaul life or just make for some bumps in the road, shift everyday routines enough that suddenly the old schedule and habits don’t apply.

What used to be a “fallback” 20% gradually, insidiously gravitates toward 30%, even 40%. Instead of a margin of error, the concept of 20% takes on a new life of its own. Practical contingency gives way to self-justification. And so the cycle continues…. Primal focus and/or motivation wane, practical planning apparatus isn’t maintained, and daily habits begin to shift.

Maybe you used to make more elaborate Primal meals for lunch or dinner, but now can’t find the time. Perhaps you gave up your gym membership to save some hard earned money each month and now you struggle to get motivated enough for full workouts at home. You might have done a CSA last season, but chose not to participate this year and now feel wholly uninspired by the produce at the grocery store. A new job might include enough travel that you’re facing new challenges to keep up on your Primal eating, workouts and sleep. Maybe you moved to be closer to family, but now host so much that your meals mirror their tastes more than your Primal interests. Maybe you just feel like you’re in an overall slump and have been reverting lately to old pre-Primal habits.

How to Spot It

You might not realize you’re backsliding until you’ve been going that direction for a while. For some folks, the scale (or your trouser button) is the first to offer the suggestion. For others, it’s a delayed return to the gym only to find a downgrade on the lifting ability or new found post-workout soreness. There’s a million ways to take your Primal temperature, and I’d venture to say that most of us do it in some form consciously or unconsciously. Maybe just forgetting to do exactly that– or avoiding it – is indicator #1 that you’re indeed backsliding.

Do you find yourself more tired in the afternoon? Are you craving carbs suddenly? What’s your workout schedule these days? If you made a food journal, would you be afraid to read it? Do you ultimately feel like you’ve been investing in yourself lately? Where have things fallen short? Where have they stayed strong? Finally, what’s behind the change? Sometimes all it takes is some honest questioning. You just have to be willing to face the music.

How to Rein It In

So, how can 30 or 40 become 20 again? If you’ve been there before, trust that it will be easier to make it back than you think. The hard part will be shifting course. Once you start steering in the right direction and rebuild momentum, you’re good to go. Your Primal template might not look the same when you’re done (a good thing), but you’ll re-experience the advantages and wonder why you ever backslid in the first place.

The crux of the solution here is realizing what exactly needs to change. Life circumstances shift, and our routines need to transform with them. The Blueprint can be easily refitted to do exactly that. Whether the 30-40 lapse is related to a temporary disruption or a longer-term shift, it’s time for a healthy – and, I’d argue, periodically necessary – Primal renovation, so to speak. Choose your own metaphor: makeover, revolution, reconstruction, molting, what have you.

Examine your routine and see what still works – what fits your lifestyle and maintains your motivation. Then look at what needs a substitution, and lay out a plan for yourself. If it’s your schedule that’s got you struggling, consider the Primal for Busy People approach – food, weight loss, workout, sleep and stress management, and socialization.

Check out our past tips, and our good readers’ comments. If travel has you grappling for Primal ideas, brainstorm your plan of attack next time you have to head out into the wild blue yonder – with some help for how to forage in less desirable territory, and get a Primal worthy workout in the modest space of that beloved Microtel.

If the 20% drifted into higher territory because of motivation issues, it’s time to shake up your Primal life and get out of the box it’s narrowed to. Skip the gym and head out into the world. Go for broke with new recipes. Get out and play! Make your goal this: have some fun. Design a weekend’s Primal adventure – whether it’s in the kitchen, the mountains or your backyard. Go whole hog, and see how it makes you feel.

Finally, sometimes a brief lapse or longer slump suggests the need for reflection. Have patience and invest in that process.

Recommit to the Primal basics and do some thinking about what you want your lifestyle and overall health to look like. Examine what’s missing. Imagine what you want to take on. Re-envision. Recreate. Recommit – and Grok on.

Share your thoughts on facing – and turning around – a Primal backslide. Have you found yourself delving into fuzzy Primal math? How did you get back to the golden 80/20, and what does it mean for your Primal practice?

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Related posts:

1. 80/20 Principle
2. Fasting May Stave Off Jet Lag

WASHINGTON–Chicago Olympian speed skating star Shani Davis and other Olympians visit the White House and Capitol Hill on Wednesday. Davis–a Chicagoan who trained in Evanston will be meeting with Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and wil be at events with First Lady Michelle Obama.

Click below for details.

With First Lady Michelle Obama…..

(from the White House)

Prior to the afternoon event with Vancouver Olympians that the First Lady will co-host at the White House with President Obama, Mrs. Obama will highlight physical activity as a critical element of the Let’s Move! initiative with several Olympians and Paralympians Wednesday morning at the DC River Terrace School. She will be joined by 2010 Olympians Shani Davis and Hannah Kearney and 2010 Paralympians Alana Nichols and Heath Calhoun. In addition to promoting the need for kids to get 60 minutes of active play a day, the US Olympians will promote the Olympic philosophy of excellence, friendship and respect.

Background on Durbin meeting…..

The Shani Davis meeting is mostly a courtesy visit while he is in town. Durbin was often in communication with the USOC and the City of Chicago during the City’s bid for the 2016 Games (meeting with the Mayor, the Chicago 2016 organization and introducing a resolution in support of the bid). He also recently joined the Congressional Olympic and Paralympic Caucus, chaired by Senators Hatch, Bennet, Klobuchar and Isakson.

Desiree Filippone with the U.S.O.C will also be in the meeting. The USOC’s Independent Advisory Committee, led by former NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue, recently completed its report making recommendations on the Olympic Committee’s leadership structure. USOC Chairman Larry Probst appointed Tagliabue to lead the committee in the wake of Chicago’s failed bid for the 2016 Games.

[JURIST] The US Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled in Perdue v. Kentucky that calculation of an attorney’s fee based on the lodestar may be increased due to superior performance, but only in extraordinary circumstances. The US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit affirmed the lower court’s enhancement of attorney’s fees in a class action suit, finding that even though factors such as quality of performance and results obtained are already included in the lodestar calculation, they may appropriately be considered to enhance the fees. In reversing the lower court decision, Justice Samuel Alito wrote:
We have stated in previous cases that such an increase is permitted in extraordinary circumstances, and we reaffirm that rule. But as we have also said in prior cases, there is a strong presumption that the lodestar is sufficient; factors subsumed in the lodestar calculation cannot be used as a ground for increasing an award above the lodestar; and a party seeking fees has the burden of identifying a factor that the lodestar does not adequately take into account and proving with specificity that an enhanced fee is justified. Because the District Court did not apply these standards, we reverse the decision below and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.Justice Stephen Breyer filed an opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part, in which Justice John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Sonia Sotomayor joined. Breyer would not have reached the question of whether the fees were appropriately calculated in this case. Had he reached that question, he would have upheld the lower court’s decision.The lodestar calculation is used by courts in awarding attorney’s fees and is the product of reasonable hours worked and a reasonable hourly rate. The class action suit was filed on behalf of 3,000 children in the Georgia foster care system. After reaching a settlement, plaintiffs requested more than $14 million in attorney’s fees. Half that amount was based on the lodestar, and the other half was an enhancement for superior work and results.