We'd talked about it earlier in the week, but hadn't really made a definite decision to go. Then, Sunday morning I came downstairs to find this Washington Post story on the computer monitor.

On Wednesday, Oct. 7, 6-year-old Heaven Skyler Wilson dragged herself off the school bus that dropped her in front of her home on a rural road in Jetersville, just south of Richmond. The little girl, who had never had so much as an ear infection in her life, was pale and feverish and complained of an upset stomach.

The next day, Heaven's grandmother, Pat Sparrow, took her to a nearby clinic. Heaven, usually a bright, bubbly girl with blond pigtails, dimples and effusive energy, had a sore throat and a 103-degree temperature. The doctor swabbed her for the flu, and the test was positive.

It was just something going around, Sparrow said she was told. The doctor told Sparrow to take Heaven home, give her Tylenol and chicken broth, and let her rest.

By the next morning, Heaven couldn't breathe. Sparrow called 911.

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In pledging to push for congressional passage of a U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement, President Obama is showing his inexperience as well as the "no change we can believe in" attitudes of his economic advisers.

Like China, Korea has an export-led, neo-mercantilist economic growth strategy. Each time the United States has negotiated trade agreements with these kinds of economies, it has wound up with dramatically higher imports and only small, if any, gains in exports. This is because the U.S. and the export-led economic systems are asymmetrical and largely incompatible.

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A really smart student intern I’ve had the privilege of working with (Jonathan Flack, GWU 2010) asked a really stupid question. “Why,” he asked, “Do we give China everything it wants? Why don’t we challenge them?”

This intern knows what’s going on. He knows about our $2 trillion trade deficit, the manipulation of the Yuan, and dumping of steel pipes in the US markets. Of course, he also knows about human rights and Tibet. But most importantly, he knows that economically China is eating our lunch.

He wants to know why our government doesn’t do something about it. He wants to know why we don’t take them on, rather than giving them the Olympics.

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The Associated Press reports that China has criticized last week's U.S.-China Commission (USCC) report for asserting that Chinese spies are aggressively stealing U.S. secrets. Beijing warns that the report is "full of prejudice" and that it could damage U.S.-China relations.

This is laughable. Not only are China's espionage, cyber attacks, intellectual property theft, piracy, and counterfeiting all widely documented, but Alliance for American Manufacturing (AAM) Senior Analyst Kerri Toloczko can relate her own personal experiences with Chinese spying. A former USCC Comissioner, Toloczko's home computer has been hacked numerous times by China--just one consequence of her Congressional appointment to the USCC. Toloczko reports that other USCC Commissioners have also endured such hacking.

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When Sen. Joe Lieberman first announced he would filibuster any health care bill with a public option, I noted that he lied, falsely calling it an "entitlement program" that would be "trouble ... for the national debt," when in fact it is an "option" not an entitlement which would in fact help our federal government save money.

Yesterday on Meet The Press, Lieberman didn't exactly lie, but deployed -- as his Senate colleague Al Franken coined in his old radio program's "Wait, Wait, Don't Lie To Me" game show segment -- the "Weasel."

And Lieberman's Weasel brightly illuminates the blatant insincerity on the part of the crusaders against the public option.

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Today, President Obama meets with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, with the Copenhagen climate summit two weeks away and their two nations very far apart on any climate agreement. Any international agreement will require the US, India and China to find some common ground.

On Saturday's LiberalOasis Radio Show, airing on WHMP in Western MA, I discussed the international fault lines that must be overcome for a successful Copenhagen summit with David Roberts of Grist.org. Listen below.

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The daily Progressive Breakfast serves up what progressive movement members need to know to start their day

Talk Of Public Option Compromise After Initial Senate Vote

CQ sizes up the state of play on public option: "Four senators — independent Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut and Democrats Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas and Mary L. Landrieu of Louisiana — who voted to begin debate on the bill have said they will likely later oppose any move to end a filibuster and pass the measure unless the public option proposed by Reid is significantly altered or removed. On the other side of the issue, Bernard Sanders, an independent from Vermont, released a statement Sunday saying that there are a 'number of senators, including myself, who would not support final passage without a strong public option.' A compromise could emerge from talks on a proposal by Thomas R. Carper, D-Del. He has suggested a public option available only in states where private insurers fail to offer insurance plans that meet yet-to-be-defined cost standards, or in states that choose to offer a public plan in competition with private insurers."

Wonk Room's Igor Volsky notes that Sen. Lincolin's website still says she support public option: "Individuals should be able to choose from a range of quality health insurance plans. Options should include private plans as well as a quality, affordable public plan or non-profit plan that can accomplish the same goals as those of a public plan."

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Don't expect an answer from the ranters and ravers who frequent 'Tea Parties' — or the politicians who egg them on.

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During this week's edition of The Week In Blog on Bloggingheads.tv, Matt Lewis and I discussed blog reaction to the unveiling of the Senate's health care reform legislation, and how conservatives are responding to the Congressional Budget Office's projection of reduced deficits. Watch it below.

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Judge David. F. Hamilton was confirmed Thursday in the Senate to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals 59-39, after breaking a conservative filibuster Tuesday and persevering through a painstakingly delayed process. Senate Judiciary Chairman Leahy (D-Vt.) made the following statement:

“This is a nomination that should be confirmed and should have been confirmed months ago. David Hamilton is a fine judge and will make a good addition to the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit."

Judge Hamilton had the support of both his home state Senators – Senator Lugar, the longest-serving Republican in the Senate, and Senator Bayh, a well-respected moderate Democrat. He was rated “well qualified” by the American Bar Association, and his nomination cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee in June. But despite all this, conservatives had since prevented a final vote, arguing Hamilton was too liberal.

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The dispute over whether or not a Texas wind farm receiving federal subsidies would source its components from a Chinese manufacturer has come to a more agreeable solution, with the partnering companies agreeing to open a 1,000 person turbine factory in the US and offering as an explanation their intent all along to source 86 percent of the installation's components by weight from within the US.

The new turbine factory won't provide the parts for this particular wind farm, but it seems like a better solution than either cancelling a wind power array or going on as if nothing had happened. Considering how unresponsive corporations can be to public protests over their business practices, I'm taking this as a win and going home.

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Whether the Stupak amendment ends up in the final health care reform bill or is replaced by the more moderate compromises in the Senate bill, both the passage of the amendment and the almost immediate response that women and pro-choice progressives should "take one for the team" hold a lesson and a warning for both progressives and Democrats.

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There was a major victory for accountability this week in the financial reform fight, but there was also a demonstration that when it comes to protecting the profits of bankers at the expense of ordinary people, no institution does it better than the Party of No.

First the good news—and it is huge. Rep. Alan Grayson, D-Fla., working with Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, managed to get an "audit the Fed" amendment into financial regulation legislation (HR 3996) that is moving through the House Financial Services Committee.

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The daily Progressive Breakfast serves up what progressive movement members need to know to start their day.

Paul-Grayson Fed Audit Plan Clears Committee

NYT on House committee vote repudiating Fed: "Mr. Paul, a libertarian Republican who has called for abolishing the Fed entirely, has introduced a version of his bill in every session of Congress since the early 1980s and never made any progress. But the Fed’s trillion-dollar efforts to bail out major banks and rescue the financial system provoked a popular firestorm that ignited both right-wing Republicans and left-wing Democrats. Mr. Paul’s amendment would instruct the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, to carry out audits of all the Fed’s operations. Those include an array of emergency lending programs, bailouts of giant financial institutions, dealings with foreign central banks and the central bank’s efforts to drive down interest rates by intervening in bond markets. Mr. Frank had already agreed that the G.A.O. should be authorized to audit all of the Fed’s rescue programs, but he had wanted to wall off the Fed’s more basic job of setting interest rates to steer the economy."

Vote on overall financial reform package stalled by Black Caucus members demanding more action on economy. The Hill: "Frank delayed the panel’s final vote after Congressional Black Caucus members said they would withhold their votes. 'It has nothing to do with the underlying bill,' said Steve Adamske, Frank’s spokesman. 'It has to do with larger economic issues with the African American community.'"

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Representative John Kline (R-MN) and Senator Mike Enzi (R-WY) introduced legislation this week that keeps our broken student loan system in status quo, with corrupt private lenders and federal bank subsidies worth billions. This is a move directly against the Democrat-backed Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act (SAFRA) that ends the practice and moves to federal direct lending, thus avoiding the private sector middlemen.

The Republican legislation does nothing to aid students, but sure does resuscitate the private loan industry. The proposal extends the existing Ensuring Continued Access to Student Loans Act (ECASLA) that is the lifeline for the federally-guaranteed, subsidized lender program. ECASLA is set to expire in July 2010, so many in Congress want to make sure lenders’ profits stay fresh.

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