Heavy rain in the Indian Himalayas is not unusual, but human construction and deforestation turned it into a disaster.

Why Ecuador Would Be an Ideal Refuge for Edward Snowden.

Criminalizing libel is an injustice, but lots of countries do it, including the UK, France and Italy. A man was arrested in France just for saying "Sarkozy I see you" when he witnessed an injustice. We should campaign to abolish these laws, in whatever country suffers from them, but in the mean time this is no reason to condemn Ecuador.

The US Army is blocking access from its computers to the Guardian's coverage of the NSA spying scandal.

It is afraid that soldiers who see the unapproved side of the story will be tempted to take the people's side instead of the government's side.

If you know anyone in the US military, offer to show that person the pages that are blocked.

NYC fast food workers accuse their employers of stealing pay and obscuring it by making it hard to determine what what they were owed.

A Liberal like me responds to a mailing he received from Rand Paul.

I agree with most of his points, but I disagree on one of them. I don't think we should disparage abortion as "the last resort", because human population growth is a big danger to life on Earth. I encourage people to have an abortion rather than a baby.