Where Our Defense Money Goes

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Bob Edgar and Bill Goodfellow
August 5, 2009 - The Boston Globe

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By threatening to veto the defense appropriations bill if it included money for more F-22 stealth fighter planes, President Obama signaled that he was going to put an end to the way business has been done in Washington. We applaud the president's announcement, but so far it is more symbolic than real.

The same week the Senate voted to cut funding for additional F-22s, for a savings of $1.75 billion, the Senate Armed Services Committee added another $9 billion in earmarks to the 2010 defense authorization bill. Earmarks direct money to a specific program or company in a member's district for something that has not been requested by the Pentagon and has not been subject to any public review or hearing. It is a gift from a member to a constituent, a gesture that usually is repaid with a generous campaign contribution.

Even if the president succeeds in blocking additional funding for the F-22 and for other programs Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has identified as unnecessary, core defense spending for next year will actually increase by $21 billion. And to make matters worse, every dollar spent on the military is a dollar borrowed from the Chinese or Japanese governments, a dollar that must be repaid with interest. Including costs assigned to other departments, total United States spending on the military approaches $1 trillion a year.

The defense budget is no longer just about defense. Rather, it has become a system of corporate welfare driven by jobs and campaign contributions, the military-industrial complex that President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned about in his 1961 farewell address.

Congress has moved to make the earmark process more transparent. But ever-resourceful members of Congress have found a way around tighter reporting rules. The biggest portion of money doled out by the Senate Armed Services Committee was $4.3 million for "no member request'' earmarks, a blatant move to circumvent rules requiring members of Congress to disclose the earmarks they have given out.

Last week the House had its turn at the trough. The Defense Appropriations subcommittee's bill included 1,116 earmarks added by House members worth $2.75 billion. When the bill came to the House floor on July 30, Republican Congressmen Jeff Flake of Arizona and John Campbell of California offered amendments to strip 553 earmarks worth $2.7 billion from the bill. Their amendments were overwhelmingly defeated.

Bipartisanship is the name of the game when it comes to earmarks. Because they control key chairmanships, Democrats have an edge in the current Congress, but should the Republicans regain majorities in either chamber, rest assured they will give their Democratic colleagues a run for the money.

The pay-to-play aspect of earmarks has embarrassed members of Congress, as well it should, but each year they continue to give out literally thousands of earmarks, and almost half are added to the Defense Department funding bills. In 2008, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, members of Congress added 11,234 named earmarks totaling $14.8 billion to congressional funding bills. Another $3.5 billion in earmarks were added with no sponsor identified.

In April, Democratic congressman Paul Hodes of New Hampshire introduced legislation that would break the link between earmarks and campaign contributions. His bill would prohibit a member of Congress from taking a contribution from any person or company that has gotten an earmark from that member. It is very straightforward and it would go a long way toward ensuring that our defense policy is not driven by the defense industry's spending on lobbying and campaign contributions.

So far, Hodes has gotten only six Democrats and three Republicans to cosponsor his bill, which is hardly encouraging. Both Obama and his Republican challenger, Senator John McCain, railed against earmarks during the 2008 campaign, but neither has endorsed the Hodes bill.

McCain strongly backed Obama's threat to veto the defense bill if it contained money for additional F-22s. The next logical step would be for both McCain and Obama to get behind Hodes's bill. Until they do, it is still business as usual in Washington.

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Bob Edgar, a former member of Congress, is president of Common Cause. Bill Goodfellow is executive director of the Center for International Policy.

Psychologists repudiate gay-to-straight therapy

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David Crary
August 5, 2009 - AP

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The American Psychological Association declared Wednesday that mental health professionals should not tell gay clients they can become straight through therapy or other treatments.

Instead, the APA urged therapists to consider multiple options — that could range from celibacy to switching churches — for helping clients whose sexual orientation and religious faith conflict.

In a resolution adopted on a 125-to-4 vote by the APA's governing council, and in a comprehensive report based on two years of research, the 150,000-member association put itself firmly on record in opposition of so-called "reparative therapy" which seeks to change sexual orientation.

No solid evidence exists that such change is likely, says the report, and some research suggests that efforts to produce change could be harmful, inducing depression and suicidal tendencies.

The APA had criticized reparative therapy in the past, but a six-member task force added weight to this position by examining 83 studies on sexual orientation change conducted since 1960. Its comprehensive report was endorsed by the APA's governing council in Toronto, where the association's annual meeting is being held this weekend.

The report breaks new ground in its detailed and nuanced assessment of how therapists should deal with gay clients struggling to remain loyal to a religious faith that disapproves of homosexuality.

Judith Glassgold, a Highland Park, N.J., psychologist who chaired the task force, said she hoped the document could help calm the polarized debate between religious conservatives who believe in the possibility of changing sexual orientation and the many mental health professionals who reject that option.

"Both sides have to educate themselves better," Glassgold said in an interview. "The religious psychotherapists have to open up their eyes to the potential positive aspects of being gay or lesbian. Secular therapists have to recognize that some people will choose their faith over their sexuality."

In dealing with gay clients from conservative faiths, says the report, therapists should be "very cautious" about suggesting treatments aimed at altering their same-sex attractions.

"Practitioners can assist clients through therapies that do not attempt to change sexual orientation, but rather involve acceptance, support and identity exploration and development without imposing a specific identity outcome," the report says.

"We have to challenge people to be creative," said Glassgold.

She suggested that devout clients could focus on overarching aspects of religion such as hope and forgiveness in order to transcend negative beliefs about homosexuality, and either remain part of their original faith within its limits — for example, by embracing celibacy — or find a faith that welcomes gays.

"There's no evidence to say that change therapies work, but these vulnerable people are tempted to try them, and when they don't work, they feel doubly terrified," Glassgold said. "You should be honest with people and say, 'This is not likely to change your sexual orientation, but we can help explore what options you have.'"

One of the largest organizations promoting the possibility of changing sexual orientation is Exodus International, a network of ministries whose core message is "Freedom from homosexuality through the power of Jesus Christ."

Its president, Alan Chambers, describes himself as someone who "overcame unwanted same-sex attraction." He and other evangelicals met with APA representatives after the task force formed in 2007, and he expressed satisfaction with parts of the report that emerged.

"It's a positive step — simply respecting someone's faith is a huge leap in the right direction," Chambers said. "But I'd go further. Don't deny the possibility that someone's feelings might change."

An evangelical psychologist, Mark Yarhouse of Regent University, praised the APA report for urging a creative approach to gay clients' religious beliefs but — like Chambers — disagreed with its skepticism about changing sexual orientation.

Yarhouse and a colleague, Professor Stanton Jones of Wheaton College, will be releasing findings at the APA meeting Friday from their six-year study of people who went through Exodus programs. More than half of 61 subjects either converted to heterosexuality or "disidentified" with homosexuality while embracing chastity, their study said.

To Jones and Yarhouse, their findings prove change is possible for some people, and on average the attempt to change will not be harmful.

The APA task force took as a starting point the belief that homosexuality is a normal variant of human sexuality, not a disorder, and that it nonetheless remains stigmatized in ways that can have negative consequences.

The report said the subgroup of gays interested in changing their sexual orientation has evolved over the decades and now is comprised mostly of well-educated white men whose religion is an important part of their lives and who participate in conservative faiths that frown on homosexuality.

"Religious faith and psychology do not have to be seen as being opposed to each other," the report says, endorsing approaches "that integrate concepts from the psychology of religion and the modern psychology of sexual orientation."

Perry Halkitis, a New York University psychologist who chairs the APA committee dealing with gay and lesbian issues, praised the report for its balance.

"Anyone who makes decisions based on good science will be satisfied," he said. "As a clinician, you have to deal with the whole person, and for some people, faith is a very important aspect of who they are."

The report also addressed the issue of whether adolescents should be subjected to therapy aimed at altering their sexual orientation. Any such approach should "maximize self-determination" and be undertaken only with the youth's consent, the report said.

Wayne Besen, a gay-rights activist who has sought to discredit the so-called "ex-gay" movement, welcomed the APA findings.

"Ex-gay therapy is a profound travesty that has led to pointless tragedies, and we are pleased that the APA has addressed this psychological scourge," Besen said.

'The Cove:' Japan Has a Dark Secret It Hopes the World Will Never See

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Tara Lohan
August 6, 2009 - AlterNet

Suspenseful and shocking film exposes the slaughter of tens of thousands of dolphins and the billion-dollar industry that profits from selling them.

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Ric O'Barry almost looks crazy. He is driving a car, with a mask over his mouth, crouching low in his seat, hoping not to be recognized.

If the authorities catch him, there's no telling what will happen to him. He's cruising through the misty streets of Taiji, Japan, a small town with a really big secret, he says. And it's a secret that the town's fishermen want to hide from the rest of the world at all costs.

This is how the documentary, The Cove, opens. And it turns out O'Barry is not crazy, he's on a mission -- probably one of the most important in the history of conservation. And it's personal.

He used to be a world-famous dolphin trainer. He captured and trained the five dolphins who played Flipper in the hit TV show of the same name. The show's popularity sparked a dolphin craze that has continued since the 1960s and has grown into $2 billion industry in the U.S. alone.

But while places like Sea World might be raking in the cash, O'Barry has spend the last 35 years trying to end dolphin captivity -- having had a change of heart after the tragic suicide of one of the main dolphins in Flipper. (If you want to know how a dolphin can commit suicide, you'll have to see The Cove.)

It turns out these intelligent and charismatic creatures don't do well in captivity -- half of all captive dolphins die within two years. They're used to swimming 40 miles a day, diving hundreds of feet deep and hanging out with their close-knit pod. Apparently jumping through hoops and swimming with tourists in a pool just isn't an adequate substitute.

But that hasn't stopped the plethora of marine theme parks and the horrific industry that has grown to support it. It has, however, inspired O'Barry to expose some of the worst of it, which is why he's hiding out in Taiji.

In this quaint fishing village, each fall, tens of thousands of migrating dolphins are captured, some of which are sold into captivity (for up to $150,000 a piece), and the rest are taken to a secret cove and slaughtered (to be sold for their meat -- sometimes falsely described as whale meat).

O'Barry wants the world to see what's happening in Taiji, and that means staying out of reach of the authorities and the local fishermen, who would very much like him arrested, deported, or worse. It also means trying to get into the secret cove with a camera.

The film kicks off with O'Barry joining forces with filmmaker Louis Psihoyos and the Ocean Preservation Society to put together a dream team of sorts that will get them into the cove and capture the horror on film.

It's reminiscent of Oceans 11 to be sure -- there are underwater sound and camera experts, special-effects artists to hide microphones in fake rocks, marine explorers and world-reknown free divers who help get the gear into place, and unmanned drones.

There are secret night-time missions, viewed on film with military-grade thermal cameras, where the crew is constantly dodging either the police, the Japanese mafia or irate fishermen.

It's a thriller. You're perched on the edge of your seat wondering if they'll get the footage they need or if they'll get nabbed. Sometimes it's so engaging, you forget to wonder if you actually want to see what they're trying to tape. And that's the film's greatest accomplishment.

Mixed in to the night-vision goggles and camouflage narrative are the images and interviews that make you realize why these people are risking their lives to make a movie: to save some dolphins.

These creatures are incredible. And the filmmaking is incredibly beautiful -- like Winged Migration with cetaceans. If they get the footage, you're going to want to see it, you're going to have to, because of the injustice of it.

There's also another layer of complexity to the film. There's the political stuff. Commercial whaling was outlawed in 1986, but dolphins -- members of the same family -- aren't protected.

The International Whaling Commission deems them "small cetaceans" and, apparently, therefore worthy of slaughter. Japan, which has tripled its dolphin killing since the ban, kills 23,000 dolphins each year, and thousands more are sold into captivity.

The country is also trying to overturn the whaling ban, and as the film shows, it is offering financial support to small, bankrupt nations to get folks on their side.

And there's also some serious health issues. Dolphins, sadly, are toxic-waste dumps these days. Their meat has been shown to have up to 1,000 times the allowable level of mercury. Eating their meat could be hazardous to a person's health, but often consumers may not know they're eating it.

The Cove shows that dolphin meat is sometimes passed off as whale meat -- and was even being served in school lunches in Taiji.

All this might seem a little depressing. And in some ways, it is. But you won't notice until after the film, because you'll be so blown away by what's on screen. It will captivate you, it will break your heart, and hopefully, it will make you jump out of your seat and help.

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Movie trailer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYKNCN1ESZM