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The Southern Poverty Law Center is just as relevant today as it was during the Civil Rights movement. I strongly encourage you to read their comments on the shootings in Arizona. Here’s an excerpt:

…With all the vitriol on the airwaves, it’s not surprising that someone has taken deadly aim at an elected official.

Tea Party darlings like Sharron Angle talk about using “second amendment remedies” to change the course of the country. The shameless Glenn Beck feeds the lunatic fringe with talk of the government herding Americans into FEMA concentration camps and of imminent violence from mysterious forces “from the left.” Sarah Palin uses phrases like “don’t retreat, reload” and shows the districts of various Democrats in Congress, including that of Tucson’s Gabrielle Giffords, in the crosshairs.

The problem isn’t so much a lack of politeness. We should expect sharp elbows and a healthy degree of ridicule to be thrown around by those in the political arena. The problem is the incendiary rhetoric, with its violence-laced metaphors, and the spinning of paranoid fantasies. The problem is the non-stop demonization one hears from political opportunists trolling for votes and their media allies trolling for ratings.

On the eve of the Sudan’s referendum, where voters will decide whether the country should split in two, the BBC has published a great set of seven maps, “Sudan, One Country or two?”

The New York Times published an article in December about Malian farmers being displaced from land purchased by the Libyan government. This was a few hours drive north of where I served in the Peace Corps, so it’s of obvious concern to me.

Across Africa and the developing world, a new global land rush is gobbling up large expanses of arable land. Despite their ageless traditions, stunned villagers are discovering that African governments typically own their land and have been leasing it, often at bargain prices, to private investors and foreign governments for decades to come.

It would be interesting to look at the history of this area. I recall that it was formerly occupied by other ethnic groups, and Bambara settlers have come to the area in the last generation or two. There is no official government system of managing land tenure–that has long been the province of village chiefs and councils. Looks like this is what happens when tradition and globalization clash.

Nicely done. They totally nailed what it’s like to be slightly dorky guy with a broadened world view.

Congress finally passed a financial reform bill, and BP finally stanched the gush of oil in the Gulf.

Of course, the experts say the bill was watered down, and there’s a chance the well could pop another leak.

Is this the beginning of the dreaded slippery slope to European-style socialist democracy? Sign me up! Perhaps we can capitalize on the momentum to get our troops home from the Middle East, reform the health care system, curb gun violence, and get corporate money out of politics.

It’s disconcerting how much blatant trickery is out there in the financial world, particularly in the area of home loans. It seems there’s an entire industry around trying to fool people into signing contracts or buying services that are against their own interest, and could ruinous to their finances. I think it’s time for Congress to create the long-awaited Consumer Financial Protection Agency…

The other day, our household received a letter from the so-called “Loan Payment Administration” in Murrysville, Pennsylvania with just such a lure. The letter looks official, and sounds like its from some federal agency.

But a cursory read through made me realize you would have to be a fool to even consider doing business with them. There is no value to their service whatsoever. They just take your money, hold it for a few weeks earning interest, then pass it on to your bank. And I bet they charge you a fee for the privilege of borrowing your money, under the guise of providing a service.

The letter says that their service can pay off your loan sooner and pay less interest. Wrong! The only way to do that is to increase the amount you pay the bank each month. And you can do this without an intermediary. Just write a check for more the minimum due, and write a note, “Please apply additional payment toward principal.”

How can they get away with a lie like this? Isn’t that “wire fraud” or “violation of interstate commerce laws” or something?

You’d be better off keeping your money than doing business with them. Even in a regular checking account, you can earn a few percent interest. And any bank worth its salt has a “bill pay” program these days, so you don’t need these con-men to do it for you.

I think a lot of people will be fooled by this, which made me wonder if this is even legal. How is this not a form of “predatory lending”? They’re trying to sell people a service they don’t want and don’t need.

Here is the complaint that I submitted to the California Attorney General:

We received an extremely deceptive mailing from this company, touting the benefits of using them as an intermediary to help pay our mortgage. They take an automatic debit from your bank account every two weeks, and then send a mortgage payment for you once a month.

Their official-sounding name might fool a lot of people into thinking they are a branch of the federal government. The way the letter is printed, with our bank’s name above our address, it seems they want it to look like they are approved by or affiliated with our bank.

It seems that their business model is to collect your money and hold it for two weeks, then simply pass it on to your bank. There is no mention of the fees or charges for this. Consumers wishing to set up an automatic debit or bill pay to their mortgage company can do that through nearly any bank these days.

This worthless service appears designed to bilk naive consumers. The Attorney General’s office should investigate the legality of this service in order to protect California consumers.

A friend emailed this to me:

You are responsible for spills

Energy expert Peter Asmus is among the many who have concluded that Prop 16 is bad and contrary to our interests. He also cites it as example of the of direct democracy gone awry.

LA Times columnist Michael Hiltzik agrees, writing that the state’s iniative process has become “a plaything of powerful interests using deception and misdirection to line their pockets.”

I’ve read a tiny bit of history by Kevin Starr, and it’s convinced me that the reformers in the early 20th century had good intentions. Despite being a dyed-in-the wool liberal today, if I’d been alive 100 years ago, I just might have been an anti-monopolist Republican.

Starr’s Inventing the Dream is great reading, accessible to a non-historian. Also, you would never guess from its title, but historian Robert Kelley’s 1998 Battling the Inland Sea is a surprisingly engaging account of how state water policy questions were shaped by party politics and the “big ideas” of the time.

Progressive Era reforms–the initiative, referendum, and recall–designed to wrest control from monopolists and railroad barons, have not fared well in the age of mass media. PG&E is spending millions in ratepayer money to reinforce a virtual monopoly. Paradoxically, the initiative process is serving those interests it was originally designed to protect us against.

Add to the mix our conservative Supreme Court’s notion of “corporate personhood” and unlimited campaign spending by corporations, and we have a system that no longer serves the interests “we the people.”

There are several thing that gall me about PG&E’s monopoly-protecting Prop 16. But the worst is their phony front groups.

The so-called “Coalition for Green Jobs” led by electrician Hunter Stern, and touted in the “Yes on 16″ ads is not a legitimate organization. It’s called Astroturf. Try finding any information about this so-called coalition. A blogger in Nevada County did a little research and uncovered how phony they are.

I want to ask PG&E, “Is this the best you could do with $46 million?” If you’re going to create a fake group, at least rent a small office and a phone line.

It angers me that they are trying to capitalize on the good image and good reputation established by legitimate organizations like Oakland’s Ella Baker Center, which runs a “Green Collar Jobs” campaign, and helps organize the California Green Stimulus Coalition.

I was disappointed last month when Malian kora player Madou Sidiki Diabaté cancelled his appearance in Berkeley. But it looks like he has a new album out, from upstart producer Kanaga System Krush.

I first saw the website a few months ago, and decided it was something to keep an eye on. Near as I can tell, they are based in Grass Valley, California, in the hills northeast of Sacramento, famous (to me) as a setting of one of Wallace Stegner’s brilliant novel Angle of Repose).

They’re apparently working on a film about Malian music. And they’ve got a half-dozen CDs for sale. Based on the samples, the recordings are first rate and the production is lean and minimal. As musician and critic Banning Eyre pointed out in the book, In Griot Time, it is baffling why so many talented Malian musicians ruin their recordings with cheesy synthesizers and awful drum tracks. Better to go acoustic and let the music through without interference.

Among the albums for sale is a release by the kora player I mentioned above, Madou Sidiki Diabaté. It’s “‘the best solo kora album to date,’ according to his older brother, Grammy-Award winner Toumani Diabaté. … Rarely recorded songs, modified tunings, and an extreme level of virtuosity distinguish this 71^st generation musician’s debut.”

There’s also an album from the incredibly talented Bamako Bluesman Lobi Traoré. Other gems include a disk by Zani Diabaté, who sounds like the heir apparent to “Kar Kar” Boubacar Traoré in a lot of ways: wonderful acoustic melodies, soulful singing, steeped in cultural heritage.

Update: It looks like most of the albums from Kanaga are also available on the fair-trade music service mondomix.com. Most of the albums that Kanaga sells for $14 plus shipping can be purchased as mp3 right away for $0.99 per song.