Thank you to Eric Dolan at Raw Story for bringing attention to this. 100 years after the Triangle Shirtwaist fire which I wrote about here, we're still seeing these abusive conditions in sweatshops around the world. We got rid of them here and just outsourced our slavery so we didn't have to look at it.

Young women continue to die locked in sweatshops, labor group warns:

As the 100th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire approaches, the Institute for Global Labor and Human Rights urged the United States to pass legislation to prevent multi-national corporations from violating internationally recognized worker rights standards, such as no child or forced labor, decent working conditions, freedom of association and the right to organize a union.

The Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire resulted in the death of 146 female workers, who were locked inside the factory by their managers, on March 25, 1911. The women worked 6 days a week, often 14 hours shifts, and earned the meager wage of 14 cents an hour. (The equivalent of $3.18 an hour in 2011, adjusted for inflation.)

After the death of workers in a Bangladesh sweatshop, the Institute for Global Labor and Human Rights said now was the time to hold corporations accountable to respect labor laws and pass the Decent Working Conditions and Fair Competition Act.

The Decent Working Conditions and Fair Competition Act was introduced by a bipartisan group of senators in 2007, but never made it out of House and Senate committees. The bill would have prohibited the import, export, and sale of goods made with sweatshop labor.

More there on how we failed to get any legislation through the Congress here in the US to put a stop to this, so go read the rest of the article. And as he referred to in his article, here's more from the Institute for Global Labor and Human Rights.

Triangle Returns: Young Women Continue to Die Locked in Sweatshops:

Institute for Global Labour and Human Rights Releases Explosive New Video and Report for the 100th Anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire

Triangle Returns on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=noL8nFSzsDc

Triangle Returns - broadcast quality: http://www3.usw.org/download/triangle_race_to_the_bottom_r2.mov

Report: Triangle Returns: Young Women Continue to Die Locked in Sweatshops: http://www.nlcnet.org/admin/reports/files/Triangle-Returns.pdf

Supplemental footage: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJG_o94mWqA

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O’Reilly made an appearance on Bill Maher’s Real Time on HBO and the two of them exchanged jabs over Maher’s treatment of Christine O’Donnell, tax cuts for the rich and the budget deficit, whether or not President Obama is a “leftist” as O’Reilly likes to paint him and climate change.

They also got into it over Fox’s push of the phony story claiming that the Obama administration is planning on spending $200 million a day for his trip to India. O’Reilly’s defense of his fellow Fox “commentator” Sean Hannity amounted to saying that Hannity doesn’t have to report facts because he’s an “opinion” guy.

I guess Bill thinks being entitled to your own opinions means being entitled to your own facts as well, which seems to be pretty much the standard at Fox.

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Rachel Maddow takes us on a tour of right-wing world where everything that is on the Internet is true and Obama sent 34 warships off of the coast of Mumbai and spent $200 million a day on his trip to India. The right is having themselves a nice little freakout over this malarkey today and as Paul Krugman wrote, The Fake Scandals Begin.

Fact Check has more on this latest made-up scandal by the right.

It's going to be a long next two years, folks.

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CNN's Anderson Cooper attempted to get some answers from Rep. Michele Bachmann about what cuts to the budget Republicans want to make to balance the budget and instead of getting a straight answer out of her, she accused the Obama administration of taking a $200 million a day trip to India. This is the kind of crap we're going to get to look forward to once Bachmann starts some of her "investigations" after Republicans take over the House.

Looks like this is the latest Fox/right wing meme of the day since Hannity was attacking the White House for this as well. Media Matters has more on where this attack came from, and surprise, surprise, Drudge was involved along with a bunch of the other right wing screechers out there.

Welcome to this wingnut along with her buddy Darrel Issa and what we get to look forward to from Republican committee hearings in the House America.

COOPER: Congresswoman Bachmann, congratulations on your -- on your big victory last night.

You have campaigned on -- on cutting the deficit, cutting spending, not raising taxes, like a lot of Republicans, a lot of Tea Party candidates. There haven't been a lot of specifics, though, about what programs you would want to cut to really get the kind of savings that we need.

Republican Paul Ryan has suggested sharp cuts in Medicare and Social Security. Are you willing to make cuts there?

BACHMANN: Well, I think we know that, just within a day or so, the president of the United States will be taking a trip over to India that is expected to cost the taxpayers $200 million a day. He's taking 2,000 people with him.

He will be renting out over 870 rooms in India. And these are five-star hotel rooms at the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel. This is the kind of over-the-top spending. It's a very small example, Anderson.

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: But don't all presidents take overseas trips and stay in hotels where there's security?

BACHMANN: Not -- not -- not at this level. We have never seen this sort of an entourage going with the president before.

And I think this is an example of the massive overspending that we have seen, not only just in the last two years, really in the last four. That's what we saw at the ballot box last evening.

COOPER: But the -- excuse me -- the...

BACHMANN: The American people are asking us to take a look at this, and not have the sort of extravagant spending anymore.

COOPER: The White House is saying that idea that this is a $200 million, you know, boondoggle is just -- is completely overstated, that the -- that number, it's wildly inflated, those -- those numbers.

BACHMANN: And -- and that may be what the White House is stating. But, again, we have never seen a trip at this level before, of this level of excess.

COOPER: How -- how...

BACHMANN: And I think it's not a good signal to send to the American people, when the American people are, quite frankly, struggling right now with high job losses.

COOPER: But how -- but you know the president needs security overseas. You wouldn't begrudge...

BACHMANN: Certainly.

COOPER: ... begrudge any president that. And, frankly, they...

BACHMANN: Of course not.

COOPER: No one -- no one really knows the cost, because, for security reasons, they don't disclose the cost. So, this idea that it's, you know, $200 million or whatever is simply made up.

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From The PBS Newshour Jan. 1, 2009. Why does it look like India is doing a better job of taking care of their poor with making sure they have eye care than we are in the United States? This reminds me of the free health clinics that used to be reserved for third world countries going on across the country here. How pathetic is it that the richest country in the world is not doing a better job of tending for those who are the most in need instead of those profiting off of the sick?

I can only imagine what the Republicans would be calling a similar system that grew as large as this one in the U.S. Maybe a socialist plot to make sure old people don't go blind? Who knows. I'm sure of one thing. If an outfit got this big and was cutting into industry profits, they'd be finding a way to demonize them. And they’d be aided and abetted by their Conserva-Dem cohorts who are just as bad.

Friday on the NewsHour, a second look at a Fred de Sam Lazaro report from India on the Aravind system of eye hospitals and clinics, the largest such system in the world. These clinics subsidize sight-restoring surgery for impoverished patients and provide top-of-the-line care for patients who can pay.

Founded in 1976, Aravind has treated some 27 million patients and operated on 3.4 million, mostly to reverse blindness caused by cataracts. The primary surgery now costs just a few dollars more than a meal at McDonald's.

Transcript via PBS.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Aravind is the largest eye care center in the world. The surgical facilities are as modern, the error rate as low as any place in America.

The big difference with Aravind is that its patients are among the world's poorest people, who rarely get treated for eye diseases. Globally, 45 million people have preventable or reversible blindness. Twelve million are in India alone, where the extreme sun and genetics are blamed.

Many people lose their sight and livelihood by their early 50s. Aravind's business success and social mission have long made it a model in public health textbooks. Twenty years ago, this much younger reporter came to the ancient temple city of Madurai, where Aravind was founded by Dr. Govindappa Venkataswamy. Everyone called him Dr. V.

He retired from a government hospital in 1976 and set out to tackle what he called disabling cataract blindness.

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December 18, 2009 BBC World News

The bear and its owner, an impoverished Kalandar nomad, were discovered in southern India, and persuaded to travel to a sanctuary where the bear will be treated for facial and dental injuries and the owner retrained as a wildlife park keeper.

His agreement to abandon bear dancing marked the end of a five year campaign in which more than 600 bears were rescued throughout India.

International Animal Rescue's British chief executive Alan Knight last night said he and his colleagues were overjoyed to have played a part in ending the "cruel practice".

He said it had been possible by the generous response of Daily Telegraph readers who had donated thousands of pounds to the project after reading about the project.

It told the story of a British dentist travelling to India to perform root canal treatment on rescued dancing bears whose teeth had been smashed with iron bars. The Indian sloth bears had also had several holes seared into their noses to allow their keepers to tether them with rough ropes.

The animals were in great pain, suffering from skin and mouth infections and psychologically damaged after years of being burned and beaten as part of their 'training' to perform dance routines. Even after they are rescued, some continue to make 'weaving' movements if they hear whistling sounds. Most of the bears had been trained to perform specific dances to individual tunes, like pretending to strum a guitar. Read more at Telegraph UK

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Mr. Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Iran who never found a war he didn't like John McCain thinks we should not be talking about a timeline to withdraw from Afghanistan. McCain also apparently thinks that the eight years we've already spent in Afghanistan hasn't been long enough to "break the enemy's will" so we can "win". I would like for Sen. McCain to explain how anyone "wins" an occupation. Of course that would require him admitting that's what we're doing there, which is never going to happen.

DAVID GREGORY: We're back with Senator John McCain. Welcome back to the program. A lot to discuss here. A lot to react to. Let's get to your big issue this week. The issue of withdrawal. You heard Secretary Gates say here today, "July 2011 is a date certain for the beginning of the withdrawal." Do you have a problem with that?

SENATOR JOHN MCCAIN: Yes. But let me also say-- David, I support the President's decision. I think it's the right decision. I think that it can lead to success. It's a tough decision on his part to send young Americans into harm's way. As Secretary Gates said, casualties will go up, tragically. But I think he made the right decision. And I think that-- he is-- the reality is, he's not only-- a tough decision to send young Americans into harm's way. But is-- significant elements of his own party are-- are opposed.

So, I strongly support the decision. The problem with the date certain now is that not only there's a problem with that itself, but there's-- a significant contribution between what Secretaries Gates and Clinton were saying and what the President--

DAVID GREGORY: Contradiction. Contradiction.

SENATOR JOHN MCCAIN: Contradiction.

DAVID GREGORY: Yeah.

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According to President Bush's former press secretary, the former president's refusal to sign the Kyoto climate change deal in 2005 set the stage for current climate change negotiations in Copenhagen.

"Because [Bush] declined to go forward with Kyoto, which is ultimately the right thing to do because the major economies like China and India weren't at the table, he worked to get them at the table and now this meeting is the next logical step in that process," Perino told Fox News' Chris Wallace Sunday.

July 20, 2009 FOX News

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July 02, 2009 BBC World