CBS officials have quietly issued a recall of a best-selling holiday toy, but have so far failed to use their mighty megaphone to actually inform consumers that there is a recall, or how to pursue a refund. Facing a storm of bad publicity, legal action, and government intervention, CBS has reportedly bowed to pressure from public health advocates and, after a delay of over three weeks, issued a quiet recall of its "CSI" Fingerprint Kit, after three independent labs confirmed that the best-selling holiday toy contains deadly asbestos. CBS Broadcasting has asked that all "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation Fingerprint Examination Kits" and "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation Field Kits" be pulled off toy store shelves nationwide. The toy is made in China, where many other recently recalled toys have been manufactured.

"If you want to make peace, you don't talk to your friends, you talk to your enemies."    Moshe Dayan

In his speech at Columbia University, Iranian President Ahmadinejad invited university faculty and students "to come and visit Iran, to speak with our university students":

"You're officially invited. University faculty and students that the university decides, or the student associations choose and select are welcome to come. You're welcome to visit any university that you choose inside Iran. We'll provide you with the list of the universities. There are over 400 universities in our country. And you can choose whichever you want to go and visit. We'll give you the platform. We'll respect you 100 percent. We will have our students sit there and listen to you, speak with you, hear what you have to say. Right now in our universities on a daily basis there are hundreds of meetings like this. They hear, they talk, they ask questions. They welcome it."  (translation from the Washington Post)

The topic below was originally posted in my blog, the Intrepid Liberal Journal as well as the Independent Bloggers Alliance, The Peace Tree, Wild Wild Left and Worldwide Sawdust.

To paraphrase former President Ronald Reagan, conservatism is not the solution to the problem; conservatism is the problem. In the recently published book, The Conservatives Have No Clothes: Why Right-Wing Ideas Keep Failing (Wiley & Sons), policy expert and journalist Greg Anrig indicts right-wing ideology and examines their legacy of insipid governance.

It's a familiar tale of woe for liberals at this point. The conservative method over simplifies problems such as terrorism with misguided fear mongering about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Domestically conservatives will distort the root causes of why inner city schools fail by demonizing the entire public school system or make false claims that Social Security is poised for imminent collapse. In terms of obtaining and holding onto power the conservative method of marketing distortion has been highly effective in most national elections since 1968.

Early in this 21st century it has become pertinent that humanists get involved in the promotion and propagation of human rights in Africa

Humanism is an outlook that affirms the dignity and worth of all human beings.
And human rights stand for the inalienable entitlement of all individuals by the virtue of their being human. And they include the right to life, liberty and security of persons, freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief.

Based on falling congressional approval ratings, Republicans have been publicly implying that Americans don't like Congress since the Democrats gained control in January. In fact, congressional Republicans have far lower approval ratings than Democrats.

Given the recent polling data, Republicans should stop speciously pointing fingers and start asking: 1) why do most Americans view us negatively, and 2) what can we actually do to change that?

Last week's Gallup poll found that more American's trusted Democrats over Republicans to do a better overall job and to handle national security and prosperity. The new Washington Post/ABC poll results contain similarly bad news for Republicans.