Four from Truthout:

Paul Krugman | For Alan Greenspan, Redemption, and Wisdom, Remain Elusive
Paul Krugman, Krugman & Co.: "Mr. Greenspan is an ex-maestro. His reputation is pushing up the daisies, it has gone to meet its maker, it has joined the choir invisible. He's no longer the Man Who Knows; he's the man who presided over an economy careening to the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression - and who saw no evil, heard no evil, refused to do anything about subprime, insisted that derivatives made the financial system more stable, and denied not only that there was a national housing bubble, but that such a bubble was even possible."
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Report: Big Profits Drove Faulty Ratings at Moody's, S&P
Kevin G. Hall, McClatchy Newspapers: "Profits at both companies soared, with revenues at market leader Moody's more than tripling in five years. Then the bottom fell out of the housing market, and Moody's stock lost 70 percent of its value; it has yet to fully recover. More than 90 percent of AAA ratings given in 2006 and 2007 to pools of mortgage-backed securities were downgraded to junk status. Wednesday's report provided greater detail about the behavior of Brian Clarkson, the president of Moody's at the time of his departure in mid-2008, when the financial crisis was in full bloom."
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The Planet Strikes Back
Michael T. Klare, TomDispatch: "To grasp our present situation, however, it's necessary to distinguish between naturally recurring planetary disturbances and the planetary responses to human intervention. Both need a fresh look, so let's start with what Earth has always been capable of before we turn to the responses of Eaarth, the avenger. Our planet is a complex natural system, and like all such systems, it is continually evolving. As that happens - as continents drift apart, as mountain ranges rise and fall, as climate patterns shift - earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis, typhoons, prolonged droughts, and other natural disturbances recur, even if on an irregular and unpredictable basis."
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Radioactive Human Embryos: Our Nuclear Legacy?
Dr. Brian Moench, Truthout: "In the 1940s, many of the world's premier nuclear scientists saw mounting evidence that there was no safe level of exposure to nuclear radiation. This led Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the atom bomb, to oppose development of the hydrogen bomb. In the 1950s, Linus Pauling, the only two-time winner of the Nobel Prize, began warning the public about exposure to all radiation. His opinion, ultimately shared by thousands of scientists worldwide, led President Kennedy to sign the nuclear test-ban treaty."
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