Thanks to GM, People Are Being Displaced So Their Forests Can Become Offsets for SUVs

Mark Schapiro, Mother Jones

Environment: Should we focus on industries paying to preserve distant trees rather than reducing emissions closer to home? It's the question of the day in Washington and Copenhagen.

Out-of-Control Rick Perry Overrides Rare Clemency Vote, Executes Man Who Killed No One

Liliana Segura, AlterNet

Rights and Liberties: The TX Board of Pardons voted to spare the life of Robert Lee Thompson, who took part in a robbery that led to a murder. The killer is serving life. Perry chose to kill him anyway.

Pharmaceutical Giant Paid $500,000 to Psychiatrist Who Used Chicago's Poor as Guinea Pigs

Christina Jewett and Sam Roe, ProPublica

Health and Wellness: Dr. Michael Reinstein reaped a cool half million off his patients' misery.

What if People Actually Treated Religion as Just a Metaphor (Like Trekkies and Secular Jews)?

Greta Christina, AlterNet

Belief: It's possible to keep the good parts of religion -- like the music, rituals and pageantry -- and get rid of the sex-hating dogma, the belief in god and other troublesome aspects.

Hey Guys, Don't Want Kids? A Vascetomy Is Probably the Way to Go

Anna Clark, RH Reality Check

Sex and Relationships: Historically, the burden of family planning has almost always fallen on women. Isn't it about time for that to change?

Mystery of World's Worst Mass Arsenic Poisoning Finally Solved

AFP

Water: The culprit are tens of thousands of man-made ponds excavated to provide soil for flood protection.

Reagan Didn't End the Cold War -- Leftist Intellectuals Did

Stephen Zunes, AlterNet

World: Reagan was inspirational, but to claim he defeated Communism is a disservice to the millions of Eastern Europeans who struggled against great odds for their freedom.

How Limousine Liberals, Water Oligarchs and Even Sean Hannity Are Hijacking Our Water Supply

Yasha Levine, AlterNet

Water: A group of water oligarchs engineered a disastrous privatization scheme to make a fortune out of California's most precious natural resource.

Rachel Maddow Interview with Former Evangelist Frank Schaeffer: Christian Right Is 'Trolling for Assassins'

AlterNet

Rights and Liberties: Schaeffer: "There is a crazy fringe [receiving] messages that have been pouring out of FOX News ... talking about doing away with Obama, asking God to kill him."

Modern Life Is Probably Screwed by Peak Oil, But It's Not Too Late to Avoid Mass Starvation

George Monbiot, Monbiot.com

Food: The challenge of feeding 7 or 8 billion people while oil supplies are falling is stupefying. It'll be even greater if governments keep pretending that it isn't going to happen.

An Inside Look at Nepotism and Corruption in Karzai's Afghanistan

Pratap Chatterjee, Tomdispatch.com

World: An eye-opening inside look at how the system of nepotism and corruption in Afghanistan actually works.

Is House Health Care Bill a Threat to Our Constitution?

Barry W. Lynn, Americans United for Separation of Church and State

Rights and Liberties: The House health-care bill isn't just a threat to women's rights; with the Stupak amendment, it's a breach of the Constitution.

Do Yearly Mammograms Save Women's Lives?

Naomi Freundlich, Health Beat

Reproductive Justice and Gender: Controversial new recommendations on breast cancer prevention have caused a stir in the women's health community. But do yearly mammograms really change death rates?

'Precious': How a Film About an Obese Harlem Teenager Turned the Tables on Hollywood

Emily Wilson, The Women's Media Center

Reproductive Justice and Gender: The success of this harrowing new movie undermines the conventional wisdom about what audiences want to watch.

World's Biggest Polluters Strike a Deal: U.S. and China Agree to Comprehensive Clean Energy and Climate Plan

Joseph Romm, Climate Progress

Environment: The overall plan is much more ambitious in scope and depth than anticipated.

Hightower: Obscenely Rich Bankers Claim to Do God's Work -- They Can Go to Hell

Jim Hightower, AlterNet

Top executives were initially hurt by the public's moral outrage. But their sense of entitlement quickly kicked in, and now they claim they're the good guys.

For 12-Year-Old Without an Arm, Insurance Has Run Out

Danielle Ivory, The Huffington Post Investigative Fund

Health and Wellness: 12 year old Benjamin French lives in one of 33 states where insurance companies are allowed to set annual and lifetime caps on prosthetic coverage.

Stupak Amendment Could End Abortion Coverage -- For Everyone

Daniela Perdomo, AlterNet

Rights and Liberties: An independent study predicts that the Stupak amendment could end insurance coverage of abortions -- for everyone -- in the long-run.

Anti-Abortion Group to Protest Palin

Stephanie Mencimer, Mother Jones Online

Rights and Liberties: To liberals, she epitomizes the anti-choice far right of the GOP. But to American Right to Life, Sarah Palin is not pure enough.

Pick the Most Influential Progressives. Fill Out Our Survey. Maybe Win a Prize!

Don Hazen, AlterNet

We're eager to hear what you love, and what you might want to change about AlterNet.

When It’s Crunch Time at College, Students Turn to Adderall

Erik Hayden, Miller-McCune.com

DrugReporter: Can ADHD stimulants like Adderall be the answer for college students looking to increase academic performance? They think so.

How Far Right Must GOPers Lean to Please a Crazy Base?

Steve Benen, Washington Monthly

PEEK: Far enough to completely contradict themselves, apparently.

A Year After the 2008 Election Galvanized Young Voters and Organizers, Where Are They Now?

Elizabeth Méndez Berry, The Nation

Politics: Getting to the bottom of who the "Yes We Can" generation really is.

Still No Justice for Priests in Notorious El Salvador Massacre 20 Years Later

Norman Stockwell, AlterNet

World: In 1989, six Jesuit priests, their housekeeper and her daughter, were brutally murdered in El Salvador. Two decades later, the extent of U.S. complicity remains largely unspoken.

Why Won't Obama Give You a Job?

Joshua Holland, AlterNet

Politics: Wall Street's raking in massive profits and paying its execs and traders record bonuses, thanks in part to government cash. What about ordinary Americans?

Sarah Palin's Poison: The Secret of Her Right-Wing Success

Richard Kim , Betsy Reed, The Nation

Politics: Some may secretly relish the embarrassing spectacle that is Sarah Palin. But she's dangerous; the more we chuckle, the more indignant her army becomes.

What Makes a Young Person Embrace Death and Murder? Former Jihadists Speak Out

Johann Hari, Independent UK

World: Former radical Islamists share their tales of why they turned to extremism, and why they repented.

Why I'll Never Buy a Kindle

Benjamin Dangl, AlterNet

Media and Technology: Fancy new book readers save lots of trees, yes, but I'll pass.

Christian Bootcamp Seeks to Arm Home-Schooled Youths for "Spiritual Warfare"

Eleanor Bader, RH Reality Check

Rights and Liberties: "Life is not a playground," says Rev. Rusty Lee Thomas in The Kingdom Leadership Institute Manual. "It is a war zone."

Does Racism Drive Opposition to Health Reform?

Tom Jacobs, Miller-McCune.com

Rights and Liberties: In a recent study, prejudiced people were more likely to support the health plan when it was linked to Bill Clinton, than when it was linked to Obama.

Is BPA, a Chemical Commonly Found in Food Containers, Ruining Your Sex Life?

Elaine Shannon, AlterNet

Food: Erectile dysfunction and ejaculation problems were two side effects in a recent study of men exposed to high levels of bisphenol A, or BPA.

Sarah Palin Rules the GOP -- And She Will Destroy It

Max Blumenthal, Tomdispatch.com

Palin's influence on a party largely devoid of leadership is expanding. If she doesn't become the GOP's future queen, she may be its future king-maker -- and its destroyer.

Catholic Bishops Put Sex Obsession Ahead of Mission to the Sick and the Poor

Adele M. Stan, AlterNet

Sex and Relationships: First they threatened to take down health-care reform over abortion coverage. Now they're threatening services to the sick and poor of Washington, D.C., over same-sex marriage.

America Is One Big Clunker and No Amount of Cash Will Buy Us a New One

James Howard Kunstler, Kunstler.com

Environment: We continue to be childishly delusional about our dark economic and environmental prospects. Unfortunately, reality isn't amenable to lies and spin.

The New York Times Embraces 'Douche' as the Television Dirty Word of the Moment

Don Hazen, AlterNet

The NY Times has just discovered that "douche" is used as an insult in mainstream media. Why do they seem to see the spread of a term derogatory to women as progress?

Obama's Strongest Supporters Suffering the Most in Recession, While Elites Thrive

Bob Herbert, The New York Times

The young, the black and the poor are among those who are being hammered unmercifully in this long and cruel economic downturn that the financial elites are telling us is over.

Why We Need Bees and More People Becoming Organic Beekeepers

Makenna Goodman, Chelsea Green Publishing

Environment: Bees teach us how to live our life in a way that by taking what we need from the world around us, we leave the world better than we found it.

Decision to Try Terror Suspects in New York Draws Praise from Human Rights Activists

Willam Fisher, IPS News

Rights and Liberties: At the same time, the Justice Department is being strongly criticized for keeping the military commissions in place to try some suspects.