Puerto Rico's Moment in the Sun

By MICHAEL JANEWAY
Published: May 22, 2008
PUERTO RICO, an afterthought trophy for the United States 110 years ago at the end of the Spanish-American War and an island in limbo since, has become an improbable player in the contest between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Its primary on June 1 could bolster Mrs. Clinton’s claim to a majority of the popular vote — the combined tally for all the Democratic primaries and caucuses held across the country over the past six months.

Puerto Rico’s formal role in the process is indeed weighty. Its 63 voting delegates — 55 elected ones and eight superdelegates — at the Democratic National Convention in Denver this summer will outnumber delegations from more than half the states (including Kentucky and Oregon) and the District of Columbia. Yet Puerto Rico does not have a vote in the Electoral College, nor will its 2.5 million registered voters cast ballots for president in November.
How in the world did this happen? From the beginning, the question of Puerto Rico has perplexed the United States. The island was essential to the defense of the Panama Canal, so we did not make it independent, in contrast to two other Spanish possessions we gained in the war, Cuba (which become independent in 1902) and the Philippines (1946). And we judged it foreign in language and culture — and worse, overpopulated — so New Mexico-style Americanization leading to statehood was out of the question.
Similarly, Puerto Ricans have never resolved their relationship with the United States. For almost 50 years after the Spanish-American War, Puerto Rican sentiment was divided between dreams of statehood and of independence. This ambivalence deterred the island from ever petitioning Congress for one or the other. And until mid-century, sporadic outbursts of violent nationalism haunted the scene.
Partly to put such extremism out of business, Congress in 1948 allowed Puerto Rico to elect its own governor and then in 1950 gave it an intricately designed, semi-autonomous “commonwealth” status short of statehood. Two years later, the island adopted its own Constitution, and Congress quickly ratified it.
Puerto Ricans elect their own Legislature, along with the governor. They enjoy entitlements like Social Security, but they do not pay federal income taxes. They retain their own cultural identity (Spanish is the prevailing tongue) but live under the umbrella of the American trade system and the American military. They have been citizens since 1917, but they have no vote in Congress or for the presidency. 5-23-2008
Adapted from http://nytimes.com/ Posted by davidsradiotv2000

Rev. Al: Cut off cop cash

Rev. Al Sharpton: Cut off cop cash
BY STEPHANIE GASKELL Stephanie Gaskell
Tuesday, May 13th 2008, 4:00 AM
The Federal government should withhold millions of dollars in funding to the NYPD unless the department can prove itdoesn't discriminate against blacks, the Rev. Al Sharpton said Monday.
"You gotta hit them in the pocket and let them know we mean business," Sharpton said during a community forum in lower Manhattan "Cut the money off, and they'll take you seriously."
The hearing, led by House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.), was billed as a community forum on law enforcement accountability in the wake of the verdicts in the Sean Bell case.
Bell was shot and killed by police on Nov. 25, 2006, as he left a strip club in Queens the morning of his wedding.
Sharpton said federal funding to police departments across the country should be contingent on their policies.
"They would have to explain why there's a continued racial disparity in stop-and-frisks, in arrests, in brutality claims, and why the top echelons of the NYPD are still disproportionately against what the population is," Sharpton said.
Bell's parents; his fiancée, Nicole Paultre Bell, and his friend Joseph Guzman attended the hearing, but made only brief remarks urging the panel to make changes to prevent another such shooting. --------nydailynews.com--posted by davidsradiotv2000 5-13-2008

Surplus U.S. food supplies dry up

By Sue Kirchhoff, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — As the farm economy collapsed in the 1980s, the U.S. Department of Agriculture was saddled with mountains of surplus cheese, corn and other foods that it socked away in warehouses and even caves.
As recently as 2003, the USDA had to buy so much powdered milk to support dairy prices that beleaguered officials shipped some to U.S. ranchers for cattle feed.
While the previous surpluses were costly and sharply criticized, much of the food found its way to the poor, here and abroad. Today, says USDA Undersecretary Mark Keenum, "Our cupboard is bare."
U.S. government food surpluses have evaporated because, with record high prices, farmers are selling their crops on the open market, not handing them over to the government through traditional price-support programs that make up for deficiencies in market price.
Worldwide, food prices have risen 45% in the past nine months, posing a crisis for millions, says the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization.
Because of the current economics of food, and changes in federal farm subsidy programs
designed to make farmers rely more on the markets, large U.S. reserves may be gone for a
long time.

The upshot: USDA has almost no extra food to supplement the billions in cash payments it
spends to combat hunger at home and in developing nations.
Friday 5-2-2008 USA Today