Hullabaloo Link

Digby is linking to YOU Will Be Called A Terrorist, which has scrolled down.

And a comment. At Seeing the Forest we have a rule: If Republicans are accusing others of something, it is a damn good bet that they are the ones doing what they are accusing. The accusation is a tactic sometimes called "self-acquital" or "immunization." Also called "a good offence is the best defense" and a "smokescreen." It works because of the way people think: when you are being accused of something it looks pretty silly if you start accusing the accuser of the same thing. Another reason it works is by distraction and redirection -- the focus goes to the accused rather than on what is going on here.

There are so many examples of this ... Republicans accusing Democrats of excessive partisanship. Republicans accusing Democrats of negative campaigning. Republicans accusing Democrats of hating the military and avoiding service. Republicans accusing Democrats of wanting "big government" while growing the government faster than ever before. Just think back to all the cases where this tactic applies!

Wingnut Professors Not Just Left-Wing

In the post Noxious academics, Orcinus points out that there are right-wingnut professors, too, and provides examples:

"...there are a number of right-wing professors who could face similar academic firing squads if the punditocracy chose to raise their cudgels against them."

He asks the "conservatives",

So why are they not every bit as eager to expel these radical academics from our midst? Their silence has been longstanding; if anything, you'll find so-called mainstream conservatives actually defending thinkers like this (see, e.g., the long-running right-wing apologia for Charles Murray's repulsive theories about race.)

Personally, I think the principles of academic freedom are paramount in all these cases. But then, I'm not a right-winger.

Dean's In! Contribute To Show Support!

Howard Dean is officially Chairmand of the Democratic National Committee! Sond a contribution, even if it is only $1. Blogs have organized actblue.com for contributions to show our support. Enter an amount and click the following to contribute.

Contribution amount: $

Click here to see how much has been raised.

Right-wing Traitors

The truth isn't important during a smear campaign, but nevertheless:

Before 9/11, it was mostly the ultra-conservatives who were sucking up to Saddam, the Taliban and the Islamic fundamentalists. These two groups of true believers hated (and still do hate) many of the same people: feminists, homosexuals, atheists, liberals, secularists, modernists, progressives, socialists, cynics, and the press. They both believe that there should be no sex outside of marriage, that the husband and father should be the Lord and Master, and that the Holy Book is infallible.

Awhile back I collected a bunch of examples of Republican Islamofascist-symps: Ronald Reagan, Sen. Simpson of Wyoming, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Grover Norquist, Dana Rohrenbacher, the whole Bush family, Justice Scalia, William Bennett, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Daniel Pipes, Jude Wanninski, and John Sununu. Examples are of all different kinds: endorsements, alliances, business relationships, lobbying, and agreements in principle. Some examples are stronger than the others, but there's a ton of dirt there.

There's a pretty hefty contingent of liberal Democrats who have never at any time played ball with the Islamofascists, but we should just forget that, just as we should forget past Republican hanky-panky. Because now, anyone who fails to completely support Bush's plans for war is a traitor and an Islamofascist. Don't you see?

The interesting and painful thing for me is going to be watching formerly-respected individuals disgrace themselves by falling in with the smear. Somebody should keep track.

Bush Waits Until Late Friday To Release Specific Cuts In Children's and Law Enforcement Programs

The story is over at The Left Coaster: Bush Waits Until Late Friday To Release Specific Cuts In Children's and Law Enforcement Programs.

Spread the word.

Progressive Infrastructure

Commonweal Institute: Creating Progressive Infrastructure

And the document: Creating Progressive Infrastructure Now
An Action Plan for Reclaiming America’s Heart and Soul (PDF 75K)

Summary: The American conservative movement has succeeded in moving public attitudes steadily rightward over the last 30 years, with far-reaching consequences for the country’s political governance. This success has been achieved through a well-funded and well-coordinated organizational infrastructure that follows a long-term, disciplined communications strategy. In order for moderates and progressives to maximize the power of their own ideas and values, and to compete effectively with the right wing over the coming decades, they must develop, without delay, their own infrastructural capacity and practices. This paper suggests how to get started.

Sistani outsmarts Bush

Writing in the Toronto Star, Haroon Siddiqui explains why the apparent victory of Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, in Iraq’s elections is bad for Bush regardless of how the White House spins it. If Sistani’s party wins, they will install an independent (of Iran as well as of the US) government that will force the Americans to leave. After that, who knows? Sistani wants what is best for Iraq, and he gets things done, his way, according to Dr. Juan Cole of U. Michigan. US control over oil and military bases in Iraq, two of the three objectives of the war (the third being reconstruction contracts for Halliburton et. al.) are not guranteed.

Sistani was able to force Bush to ignore Iyad Allawi’s warnings that the Shia would win direct elections which they did because Sistani organized local committees to get out the Shia vote. The result will be either a tough, clever, Islamic-rooted regime that thwarts the US’s goals, or an Algeria-like situation with the Americans canceling an election whose outcome they cannot accept. My money is on the former with Bush denying he got outsmarted and rewarding Rumsfeld and Rice et. al. for a job well-done while Sistani’s government systematically erases the US influence in Iraq so many Americans and Iraqis died for.

CEO Prayer

Wealth Bondage: Don't Blame Me, I'm Born Again:

O I have been a bad bad girl. I raped the commons. I turned the airways into a river of filth. I seared Wealth Bondage into the brains of innocent children. I wrapped the wrists of pre-teens in Yellow Bracelets and led them by the nose. I freed polluters to poison the air and the water. I murdered thousand of species and wrecked God's Creation. I privatized folklore, song, dance, literature. I sold off the parks to my pals. I corrupted your legislators and stole your democacy. I have bankrupted the nation, and will now scuttle Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. No safety net for you. No taxes for me. Live in fear; live in Terror. Huddle for safety around my boots. I have grown so rich that none, but the massed fury of the multitude could tell me, No. But, hey, I feel bad about it. I'm born again so kiss my ass. Heaven is mine, saith the CEO.

What am I? I am the Goddess of the Market. God loves me. You should too. Don't blame me you are so completely fucked. It is the will of God. The Godless liberals did it. Blame them, Stupid. God and Market fuck you over in mysterious ways. Bretherin, let us pray.

From Wealth Bondage.

YOU Will Be Called A Terrorist

I think it is important to read Digby's post Death In Life. If I have ever asked my readers to read something before, this is more important. Please go read the post.

I'm going to reveal the ending here:

It is a law of human nature that if you build it, they will come. This infrastructure will be expanded and bureaucratized. It's already happening. And when they decide, as Professor Yoo has already decided, that an election is a sanctioning of anything the President chooses to do in the War on Terror, it is only a matter of time before internal political enemies become a threat.

And then it will be us.

And now I am going to quote from an e-mail I received today from the Heritage Foundation's TownHall. (The Heritage Foundation is the core of the Republican Party now. And The Party controls the state.)

Dear Conservative Friend,

[. . .] While most of our national discussion about Homeland Security has focused on threats from outside the United States, we’ve overlooked the dangerous threat of domestic terrorism. Since 1990, attacks by home-grown arsonists and bomb-throwers have caused over $150 million in damage. The FBI calls these animal-rights zealots and extreme environmentalists “the most dangerous and prolific domestic terrorists” in the United States today.

[. . .] If PETA were financially supporting Hamas, the Islamic Jihad, or Al Qaeda, it would be laughable to argue that it’s possible to bankroll terrorists without supporting terrorism.

[. . .] P.S. If you agree that PETA’s habit of funding domestic terrorists makes the group an unusual danger to American society, please help us spread the word. ...

I know you have heard right-wingers claiming that environmentalists are "terrorists." And now PETA are terrorists.

"And then it will be us."

Watch your backs.

Who Else and What Else?

By now you have read about the far-right militia-type who infiltrated the White House, using the alias "Gannon," and got hold of classified CIA documents - with help from someone in the White House.

I received an e-mail from the office of Rep. Louise M. Slaughter (NY-28), Ranking Member of the House Committee on Rules that includes this quote:

"This matter is growing more serious by the day. We now know that 'Jeff Gannon' had access to classified CIA documents that contained the identity of undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame. This is more than an issue of media manipulation by the White House... this is now an issue of national security," said Rep. Slaughter. "What is the White House hiding? This man, Mr. Gannon, should never have been admitted into the White House briefing room in the first place. Someone let him in day after day. Someone gave him access to classified CIA documents. Someone must answer for this. It is critical that we uncover the exact nature of the relationship between Gannon and this White House," added Slaughter."

Also,

In addition, Reps. Slaughter and Conyers wrote W. Ralph Basham, Director of the Secret Service, calling on his office to provide details on the security clearance of day pass holders in the White House briefing room as well as any and all information they can provide on Mr. Gannon.

This is REALLY serious stuff. The questions to ask are: who let this guy in and gave him classified CIA documents, what other kinds of documents was he given (tax records and addresses of prominent liberals and Bush opponents?), what other militia-types are getting into the White House and other parts of our government, and what kinds of classified information are they getting access to? (Maybe floor plans of government buildings - like the one in Oklahoma City?)

Question Of The Day

Democrats Ask Their Question of the Day on Social Security: $754 Billion?

With the Republican Medicare prescription drug bill now expected to cost more than $700 billion, are we certain that the Republican Social Security privatization plan will cost its reported $754 billion?”

Republican Privatization Plan Would Cost $5 Trillion. A Senior Administration Official stated in a briefing that the president’s plan would cost $754 billion over ten years. “These figures are misleadingly low. They are generated by using a ten-year budget window (2006- 2015) that includes only five years of the fully phased-in plan. The plan would not be launched until 2009 and not be in full effect until 2011. Over the first ten years that the plan actually was in effect (2009-18), it would add about $1.4 trillion to the debt. Over the next ten years (2019- 28), it would add about $3.5 trillion more to the debt. All told, the plan would add $4.9 trillion (14 percent of GDP in 2028) to the debt over its first 20 years.” [Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, “An Overview of Issues Raised by the Administration’s Social Security Plan,” 2/7/05 http://www.cbpp.org/2-2-05socsec4.htm]

Yes, I know, the wording is ... sort of ... Senatorial.

A Student Think Tank

Know any students? Tell them about The Roosevelt Institution, "the nation's first student think tank".

By the way, let me give you a hint. The mysterious "University A" is Stanford located in Palo Alto, California.

We Have Work To Do

Senate OKs Bill Curbing Class Action Suits,

In the end, 18 Democrats and one independent, Sen. James Jeffords of Vermont, joined 53 Republicans in passing the bill.

[. . .] Senate opponents poured scorn on the class action bill.

"This bill is one of the most unfair, anti-consumer proposals to come before the Senate in years," said Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada. "It slams the courthouse doors on a wide range of injured plaintiffs."

"It turns federalism upside down by preventing state courts from hearing state law claims. And it limits corporate accountability at a time of rampant corporate scandals."

The American Association of Trial Lawyers derided the bill as "dreadful public policy" sought by insurers, tobacco, drug, and chemical industries that spent millions on lobbying.

So there are still 18 Democratic Senators we have to oppose in the primaries, when they come up for re-election. We have work to do.

I know who one of them is. From a different report,

One Democrat who voted yes, Dianne Feinstein of California, said afterward that the bill was "not perfect" but that it addressed problems in the legal system.

And here are the heros:

Besides Senators Reid and Kennedy, the Democrats who voted no were Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, Barbara Boxer of California, Russell D. Feingold of Wisconsin, Debbie Stabenow of Michigan, Patty Murray of Washington, Max Baucus of Montana, Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia, Mark Dayton of Minnesota, Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware, Tom Harkin of Iowa, Carl Levin of Michigan, Frank Lautenberg and Jon Corzine, both of New Jersey, Richard Durbin of Illinois, John Kerry of Massachusetts, Daniel Inouye and Daniel Akaka, both of Hawaii, Paul Sarbanes and Barbara Mikulski, both of Maryland, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Bill Nelson of Florida.

Leave comments as you figure out who the rest of the 18 are. (I have to make dinner now.)

Update - THE LIST OF SHAME -- Democrats voting Yes:

Bayh (D-IN)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Carper (D-DE)
Conrad (D-ND)
Dodd (D-CT)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kohl (D-WI)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Lieberman (D-CT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
Nelson (D-NE)
Obama (D-IL)
Reed (D-RI)
Rockefeller (D-WV)
Salazar (D-CO)
Schumer (D-NY)

Demand a Special Prosecutor

At Democrats.com, a petition: We Demand a Special Prosecutor for "Jeff Gannon"

The Party In Control At Chamber of Commerce

Mary at Pacific Views discovers that The Party is in control now at the Chamber of Commerce.

Massive Progressive Blog Index

Did you bookmark the massive Massive Blog Index at The American Street the other day? Here's another chance.

Read It Again

In case you missed it, the other day Alternet posted one of the most important stories you'll read for some time. Go read The Right-Wing Express. Please.

The F-word

Chris at MyDD sums it up:

A new storm is rising. These are dangerous times for our country.

Go ready why. Watch your backs.

Great Line

On the same subject as my previous post on Bush saying US Government Bonds are worthless, Matthew Yglesias has a great line:

"When I was living in Russia, the family I stayed with, like many Russian families, actually did save money by accumulating rolls of dollar bills and sticking them at the bottom of a dresser drawer."

Born to Lose

Over the course of the past several years, we’ve been troubled by the liberal web’s failure to focus on sound-bites that matter—the sound-bites that actually drive our debates. Some of you are deeply offended that we would dare to say such a thing. Born to lose, we say in reply. The Democratic Party is too inept to form a winning set of messages, and the mainstream press corps is store-bought, asleep. The liberal web must take the lead if liberals and centrists will form useful messages. Next week, we’ll note a few of the basic ways we think we have all failed to do that.

(Daily Howler February 10, 2005)

Bob Somerby is the sharpest guy on the web. He has documented the careers of the most influential political media people for the last six or eight years, and when he gets on someone, he's able to cite chapter and verse. (And so can you, using his searchable archive).

Everybody should read Somerby daily anyway, but especially next week.

Bush Says US Bonds Are Worthless!

From the important and excellent There Is No Crisis, Bush Implies National Default: (I'm just going to snarf the whole thing, but go visit the site)

Mr. Bush says the Trust Fund doesn't exist:

Some in our country think that Social Security is a trust fund -- in other words, there's a pile of money being accumulated. That's just simply not true. The money -- payroll taxes going into the Social Security are spent. They're spent on benefits and they're spent on government programs. There is no trust. We're on the ultimate pay-as-you-go system -- what goes in comes out. And so, starting in 2018, what's going in -- what's coming out is greater than what's going in. It says we've got a problem. And we'd better start dealing with it now. The longer we wait, the harder it is to fix the problem.

As we've explained previously, saying there's no trust fund is the same thing as saying the government will default on its debt. There is a trust fund, filled with government bonds, the safest asset that has ever existed. Saying those bonds are worthless means that the full faith and credit of the US isn't worth anything. Now what political leader would say that?

So Bush says that US bonds are worthless! In fact, the basic argument for his whole scheme is that stocks are somehow a better investment than bonds. Now, keep in mind that Bush himself has most of HIS money in government bonds, AND that he plans to finance his whole privatization sceme by selling ... wait for it ... here it comes ... you're going to be surprised ... yes, it's ... GOVERNMENT BONDS!

And Josh Marshall weighs in:

Following up on our earlier posts about the president's apparent desire to default on the US Treasury notes held by the Social Security Administration, two points ...

First, most of President Bush's personal wealth appears to be tied up in bonds. Do his get honored? Or is he out of luck too?

Second, what the president said today almost certainly violates his oath of office in which he swears to "preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States."

That would be the Constitution which reads (Am.XIV, Section 4): "The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned."

Such statements are designed to reinforce a "narrative," or "bigger story." MOST people don't pay attention to details, and "hear" only a bigger picture kind of story. In this case that bigger story is that "Social Security is going broke and we have to 'fix' it." THAT is why Bush and the others feel they can get away with repeating such trash. But at what point do Bush's lies and contradictions reach public conciousness and outweigh the "narrative"? It just might be starting to happen.

Shut This Company Down

Wal-Mart to close store aiming for 1st union contract:

"Wal-Mart Stores Inc. said Wednesday it will close a Canadian store where about 200 workers are near winning the first union contract from the world's largest retailer."

Canada is a bit different from the United States. It is rumoured that the corporations do not yet completely control the Canadian government and the people still have a degree of input. So here is a test: Will Canada shut this outlaw corporation down?

And YOU aren't shopping at Wal-Mart are you? Ever? Please don't, this is serious.

Warning After Warning

Tomorrow (Tuesday) morning you are going to learn that Bush knew EVEN MORE than you thought he knew. 9/11 Report Cites Many Warnings About Hijackings:

In the months before the Sept. 11 attacks, federal aviation officials reviewed dozens of intelligence reports that warned about Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda, some of which specifically discussed airline hijackings and suicide operations, according to a previously undisclosed report from the 9/11 commission.

This was withheld from us before the election:

The Bush administration has blocked the public release of the full, classified version of the report for more than five months, officials said [. . .] the declassified version provides the firmest evidence to date about the warnings that aviation officials received concerning the threat of an attack on airliners and the failure to take steps to deter it.

Among other things, the report says that leaders of the F.A.A. received 52 intelligence reports from their security branch that mentioned Mr. Bin Laden or Al Qaeda from April to Sept. 10, 2001. That represented half of all the intelligence summaries in that time.

And Rice was confirmed as Secretary of State without the public being told of this.

Wanna Bet?

Court Rejects $15 Mln Award in Kansas Smoker Case.

OK, no more facts are available yet, but how much do you want to bet this is Federalist Society judges?

Living In The Past

Bush: World Must Speak with One Voice on Iran Nukes:

"The Iranians just need to know that the free world is working together to send a very clear message: Don't develop a nuclear weapon,' Bush said."

The "free world?" And I suppose they're the Soviets?

This Is Serious

Over at Kos, this question:

" Why should we care about Jeff Gannon?

A potential male prostitute gets White House credentials using a fake name, provides McClellan a welcome ideological lifeline during press conferences, and somehow gets access to classified CIA documents that outs an undercover CIA operative. "

National Security means NOTHING to these people. It is all about Party control of the State at this point.

When I write "National Security" there, I am talking about the safety of you and me. Seriously. We've got Moonies in positions of influence (and the Federal Government handing them "faith-based" checks for millions). We've got militia types and serious crazed wingnuts getting important jobs in the government. We've got a CIA agent who was in charge of keeping WMDs from reaching terrorists, who is outed in a political retaliation -- which means her work ends and all of her contacts in other countries potentially tracked down and jailed or killed. And we've got the President participating in the cover-up of that because it would embarrass The Party. We've got an illegal invasion of a country based on lies about WMDs, and then when we invade WE DON'T EVEN GUARD THE SUPPOSED WMD SITES so they get looted of tons of very dangerous high explosives!!!

I mean, ALL KINDS of stuff like this is going on, and no mechanisms remain for doing something about it! All controls have been removed to protect The Party. No one in the government will investigate because it would harm the interests of The Party, and those controlling the Congress won't investigate for the same reason. (Has there been even ONE Congressional oversight hearing looking into ANY wrongdoing by this administration? Has even ONE Justice Department investigation of wrongdoing by ANY Republican reached a conclusion? And all those involved in the Congressional Ethics Committee that scolded DeLay have been removed and punished.) Meanwhile we have Federalist Society judges infiltrating the courts to protect The Party. And don't even ask about the mainstream press... There are no controls or checks or balances in place now to protect us.

I wrote about this in my depressing piece at American Street earlier today... This is serious.

Also, Kos added this:

Update: "Gannon" claims he quit because he was receiving death threats. Coward. For the record, I've been getting such threats for years amongst all the hate mail I get. It's an unfortunate part of being a partisan writer, but a reality nonetheless. Probably every partisan writer in this country gets scary emails. It comes with the territory.

This is just bullshit. The "death threats" lie is intended to make him a victim. This is standard RW propaganda. Just like when that Homeland Security nominee had to quit, and said it was because the liberals were going to be "politically correct" because he had an illegal immigrant working for him, and it turned out that was just another lie. There was no nanny. Propaganda to make people think he is a victim and promote hatred of liberals. And now we're told this guy Gannon quits because he's the victim of liberals, not because he's a RW operative caught infiltrating the White House. (I guess "infiltrating" is the wrong word when the RW operatives RUNNING the White House got him in...) THEY JUST LIE.

Watch your backs.

Another Gallup Poll With More Republicans Than Democrats

Steve at Left Coaster is on this one, too: Yesterday's Gallup Poll Showing Bush Approval At 57% Had 9% More Republicans Than Democrats.

Get Depressed

I have a depressing new piece at American Street, titled The Party In Control Now.

More White House Manipulation of News

If you are a regular blog reader you know the story of a supposed "reporter" with access to the White House who turns out to be an operative of the Right. Steve at Left Coaster puts it in perspective: The Left Coaster: The Blogosphere Exposes Another Fraudulent White House Media Operation:

Apparently Gannon would sit in on the press gaggles each day and when needed steer the direction of the press briefings away from troubling areas when reporters started to lock onto vulnerabilities in what [Press Secretary] Scott McClellan was saying.

[. . .] This sorry episode, so soon after the propaganda debacle with Armstrong Williams among others, leads me to question what else is the White House doing to manufacture news and news coverage?

Wal-Mart Fact Checker

Spread The Facts On Wal-Mart.

(thanks to skippy)

Elevator Speech

Frameshop: Elevator Speech. Worth reading.

Responding to the Right's Machine

I wrote a diary entry at DailyKos titled, Responding to the Right's Machine. Excerpts,

This infrastructure of organizations does almost everything for the Republican Party. I'll go as far as to say that this "infrastructure" of organizations IS the Republican party now. It provides education and training, issue research, message development, constant outreach to the general public, materials and talking points for candidates and media pundits, and other services too numerous to put in this short post. One key feature I would like to point out is that they employ thousands of well-paid political operatives, which all by itself gives them an advantage.

[. . .] The Right talks to the general public, pushing their UNDERLYING ideology, and only then tying specific issues to it. Progressives need to learn to do this as well.

Go read. (And remember to "recommend" by clicking the button in the right column.)

Update - changed from MyDD to DailyKos after MyDD elevated the diary to the front page.

The Right-Wing Express

AlterNet: MediaCulture: The Right-Wing Express:

[. . .] Consider that the conservative political movement, which now has a hammerlock on every aspect of federal government, has a media message machine fed by more than 80 large non-profit organizations ? let's call them the Big 80 ? funded by a gaggle of right-wing family foundations and wealthy individuals to the tune of $400 million a year.

And the Big 80 groups are just the "non-partisan" 501(c)(3) groups. These do not include groups like the NRA, the anti-gay and anti-abortion groups, nor do they include the political action committees (PACs) or the "527" groups (so named for the section of the tax code they fall under), like the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, which so effectively slammed John Kerry's campaign in 2004.

[. . .] Stein describes how the message machine works. If Rush Limbaugh wants something on vouchers – it's immediately in his hands; if Fox News' Bill O'Reilly needs a guest to talk about the "death tax," he's got him from one of the think tanks. Stein estimates that 36,000 conservatives have been trained on values, issues, leadership, use of media and agenda development. These are not the elected officials, but rather the cadre of the conservative network. Stein figures that the core leaders of the Big 80 groups he studied are about 2,000 people who make between $75,000 and $200,000 and have all been trained in the Leadership Institute.

And, evaluating "our side" in light of this competition,

[. . .] "Our major obstacles are atomization, balkanization and minimalization of our grassroots and national groups, our donors and our political operations," Stein adds. "We have very few effective strategic alliances among existing organizations (more this time electorally than ever before); very few organizations with the scale necessary to make a major impact; too few passionately progressive, politically motivated individual donors who know one another and work together; lack of long-term strategic thinking; lack of appropriate and necessary coordination and discipline; to name a few."

Go read the rest.

If you find this subject interesting and important, I'd like to put in a good word for some of the people who have done a lot of the background research that helps bring this to light. Much of my own work and the work of people like Rob Stein (from the linked article) was made possible by the information collected and put online over at Cursor's Media Transparency. (I am on their Advisory Board.) Go over there and scroll down through the articles they have been putting up. Then click on the Movement button and read for a while. It's all there.

So what I'm getting at here is that it takes money to be able to continue work like this. Think about helping them out by contributing. Small amounts are OK, because there are a lot of us.

Over at Hullabaloo

Since I'm not coming up with anything spectacular today, go read Witnessing History over at Hullabaloo.

Roemer Drops Out of DNC Race

The Left Coaster: Dean Now Unopposed For DNC Chair As Roemer Drops Out.

Yes, I know that was hours ago, but I was in Santa Cruz at the dentist.

Here we go again

Instapundit took an inflammatory three-year-old speech at a third-rank college which someone sent him and alleged that it was in some way an embarassment to the Democrats -- without giving any evidence that Churchill was a Democrat, which he probably is not. Then Bill O'Reilly relayed the story to millions of people. This is the same old lying game of taking crazies who are NOT DEMOCRATS and using them to smear Democrats.

I've heard that Prof. Reynolds is no longer teaching and is a full-time internet guy now. I'm sure that his income is all legitimate (well, not really), but he's on the gravy train now, and he knows who he has to please in order to get the speaking engagement. What he did was dishonorable and slimy, but he's not going to apologize. There's nothing to be surprised about -- that's his job now.

Alas, on DeLong and elsewhere a lot of people are defending Churchill. I just don't see how you can explain away the phrase "little Eichmanns". There's really no context that could make that OK, unless you think that every non-Native American in the U.S. should be killed.

I've had a lot of contact with ultra-leftists and used to be one myself. In that world you're always wondering who the provocateur is -- no one talks about provocateurs more than ultra-leftists do. Provocateursare paid by various police and intelligence agencies, and their job is to split and confuse left groups and make the left look bad to the public. Provocateurs have the loudest and most violent voices -- though sometimes sincere crazies do the provocateurs' work for them.

And many self-publicizing ultra-leftists, whether provocateurs or not, carve out little personal niches for themselves, doing pretty well without being politically effective. I can't be sure that Churchill is a provocateur, but it seems like a sure thing that he's running a game. Most of academic identity politics is merely futile, but Churchill's "little Eichmanns" zinger did actual harm. (Incidentally, Churchill makes ultra-leftists look bad, too. He's really in a class by himself.)

In this context, the doubts about Churchill's tribal membership are relevant. Recent decades have brought us a lot of fake Indians who go around pimping white guilt, and if Churchill is one of them, as far as I'm concerned that clinches it. (That doesn't mean, however, that if he really is a Native American everything's cool.)

The facts are this: his splitoff faction of AIM has been denounced by the original group. (This doesn't necessarily prove anything, since splits happen in lots of political groups). There are also accusations that he has changed his story about which Indian nation he belongs to. And the Keetoowah band of Cherokee in which he claims membership denies that he is a member. (Apparently he got listed as some kind of honorary member at one point, based on work he was doing for the tribe).

Churchill isn't the real issue at all. There's always going to be someone somwhere, sincere or not, shooting off their mouth saying dramatic and stupid stuff. The rightwing Wurlitzer has people who make their living scavenging up the worst of the worst, and others who make their living broadcasting it.

Except for the publicity machine, Churchill has little or nothing to do with the Democrats. Few Democrats had even heard of him before Instapundit did his dirty work,and that's the reason why he hadn't been denounced before. Denouncing him now, at Instapundit's command, doesn't do any real good, because that's how smears work. But there's certainly no reason to defend him.

"A lie travels around the world while the truth is putting its pants on" -- Mark Twain. "You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time" -- Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln and Mark Twain were both Republicans, but today's Republicans twist the meaning of these words. They were not meant to be operating instructions.

watch whose money you pick up

Old advice:

Beware of whores who say they don't want money. The hell they don't. What they mean is that they want *more* money; much more, these are the most expensive whores what can be got.

If you're doing business with a religious son of a bitch, get it in writing; his word isn't worth shit, not with the good lord telling him how to fuck you on the deal.

[. . .] Avoid fuck-ups. Fools, I call them. You all know the type -- no matter how good it sounds, everything they have anything to do with turns into a disaster. Trouble for themselves and everyone connected with them. A fool is bad news, and it rubs off -- don't let it rub off on you.

Do not proffer sympathy to the mentally ill; it is a bottomless pit. Tell them firmly, "I am not paid to listen to this drivel -- you are a terminal fool!" Otherwise, they make you as crazy as they are.

Above all, avoid confirmed criminals. They are a special malignant strain of fool.

From someone who saw Bush coming a mile away.

Huge Blog List

The Unveiling of States Writes: the Progressives' Peer Directory from the American Street

Donnie Fowler Blogs at MyDD

MyDD :: Dean for Change! Thoughts on Exiting from Donnie Fowler

Why They Win II

In Why Republicans Win, I wrote,

The way out of this is to understand that we need to EDUCATE AND PERSUADE THE GENERAL PUBLIC about the fact that core Progressive ideas and values are good for them. What we are instead doing now is spending a LOT of money on narrow-interest environmental and other kinds of interest organizations that largely talk to the converted. Environmentalists have to combine forces with civil justice advocates, consumer litigation advocates, peace activists, etc. and all together go after the Right AS ONE.

Today, in the Washington Post, there's an example of what I'm talking about. From the article, A Quiet Revolution In Business Lobbying:

"The chamber is at the forefront of a quiet revolution in business lobbying. Corporate groups now raise big money to advance broad issues, largely to help the Republican president enact his fiscal agenda. That's a long step away from what trade associations traditionally did: concentrate on narrow concerns while shunning partisan spats.

[. . .] For the 2004 elections, the chamber dispersed 215 political operatives to 31 states, mailed 3.7 million letters to targeted voters, made 5.6 million phone calls and sent 30 million e-mails to persuade pro-business voters to go to the polls."

Even the narrow interests of the Right understand now -- advance the larger cause, and you get what you want because it gets your side in and THEN you can ask for what you want.

We don't really have lots of wealthy businesses on our side, but we do have a number of well-funded organizations working on environmental, peace, women's and many other "causes." The problem is each of these addresses their narrow interest, and talks mostly to their own audience. What is needed now is a pooling of interests, with each kind of organization joining with others who would classify as "Progressives" to advance a united front, explaining to the broad, general public why Progressive values are superior and will benefit THEM, and why they should therefore elect Progressive candidates. We need to take the country back. THAT is how we will save the environment, and protect a woman's right to choose, and get guns under control in urban areas, and help animal rights, and bring back the right to unionize, and save public schools, and raise the minimum wage, and protect Social Security, and get national health insurance, and all the other things that are so important to all of us. If you are giving money to any of these kinds of organizations you need to understand that your money is largely wasted now, because these organizations are stil largely trying to advance their own narrow interests instead of working together to advance our comon UNDERLYING ideals to the GENERAL PUBLIC in every state. Think about giving money to organizations that work to explain to the general public why they should support Progressive values in general.

Education, Fire BAD!

BoBo says the problem with Deocrats is that they are educated.

Serious Takedown

Juan Cole does a serious takedown of Jonah Goldberg. The overused term bee-atch slap applies.

My favorite line:

If Jonah Goldberg had asserted that he could fly to Mars in his pyjamas and come back in a single day, it would not have been a more fantastic allegation than the one he made about Iraq being a danger to the United States because of the nuclear issue. He made that allegation over and over again to millions of viewers on national television programs, to viewers who trusted his judgment because CNN and others purveyed him to them.

And this raises a question. Why do networks like CNN feel that their own credibility is not damaged when they put liars on the air, and then, after the lies are exposed, put them on again?

I'll quit nagging when people quit being stupid

(I posted the below at Matt Yglesias. I've become sort of a one-note-Johnny on this issue, but Democrats seem to be having trouble figuring out what's going on. One of the house conservatives over there was using Ward Churchill and the Berkeley left to slam the Democrats. I begin with one of the characteristically weenie Democratic responses.):

"But there is in fact a small number of truly anti-Western, anti-democratic, leftists who tend to be rather loud and obnoxious and sometimes drag well-meaning liberals into the gutter with them. "

Instapundit was being deliberately misleading in trying to smear the Democratic Party with these people -- people who all hate the Democratic Party. That's the main point here -- some of us want to correct the record, and some of us want to echo the smear.

On a binary up-and-down single-issue vote, politics does make strange bedfellows. That's where the ANSWER problem came from.

Compare: the Republicans agree with the American Nazi Party on affirmative action. But they've also been very successful in keeping the racists within the party -- in 2000 the right-wing parties got .7% of the vote, and you know that there are more rightwing loonies than that. (Nader got 2.7%. Switch the numbers and Gore wins solidly).

The neo-Confederates, Armageddonists, WW-IV hawks, and anti-tax anarchists are members in good standing of the Republican Party, and they comprise a significant proportion of its support. I doubt seriously that Churchill is even a Democrat at all.

When Instapundit, and Robert Conquest, and Armed Liberal, and John Hinderaker, and Andrew Sullivan make these kinds of accusations, they are disgracing themselves by launching a classically deceptive smear campaign. The way to combat this is NOT to say "Well, you know, they do have a point"

They do not have a point. What they do have is an advantage (since Dubya's re-election), and while they have that advantage they are going to use lies to try to destroy their political opposition entirely (which Grover Norquist has stated as a goal).

The liberal tendency to discuss everything reasonably, and say "yes, but" and "the truth is somewhere in between", etc., etc., does not work when you're confronted with an ideological goon squad. I'm not sure that the Democrats of today will ever be able to learn that lesson. It's a different ball game than it used to be, and people aren't getting the word.

PS:

"Cookie" in the comments reports that Churchill has been blackballed by the AIM and is suspected of having been a undercover agent for years., and also that his tribal membership with the Keetoowah Cherokee has been questioned. I'm not able to judge the facts here, but it's pretty clear that Churchill represents only himself (plus whoever actually chooses to endorse his views.)

Another Wurlitzer scam. Instapundit is a liar.

Dog Question

Last Saturday night, about 3am, our 9-year-old 70 lbs dog Buddy woke us up pacing, shaking and panting. This kept up for 2-3 hours. He had no fever or other apparent problems. In the morning he was fine, happy, energetic and ate normally. Each day since he has seemed fine during the day, but at night he has been getting us up very late, and panting and shaking for a while.

I took him to the vet Monday and they couldn't find anything wrong. He had a blood test which was normal. Today he had an ultrasound check of his adrenal gland for any growth and it was normal.

Tonite about 8:45pm he got off his bed and came over, shaking. This lasted about 15 minutes.

Does anyone have any suggetions?

Update - Thanks for the responses. Please keep leaving suggestions! Buddy slept on the bed last night and didn't wake us up, and wasn't panting or shaking as far as we know.

An interesting Buddy fact -- Buddy was the first picture of a dog ever blogged from a national political convention.



One I've been saving for a "Sunday Buddy Blog" but we'll make it a Saturday Buddy Blog:

Just so the other dog doesn't feel left out, this is Espresso:

Positive Suggestion #1

I have a reputation for negativism, and I've earned it. That's cool with me -- someone has to be the bad guy. But here's a positive suggestion, for a change.

Buy the biggest, tallest, most powerful ratio station in Oklahoma and use it to broadcast Air America (with Ed Schulz and Bartcop replacing some of the regulars.)

Out in the flats one station can cover an enormous area -- when I was a kid in Minnesota I listened to KOMA, an Oklahoma station, all the time. A station like that could cover fifteen or twenty states.

In that part of the country, the ambient political opinion is ultra-conservative. 20-30% of the electorate picks its political opinions out of the air (from free TV and radio), and where conservatives have a lock on the airwaves, that kind of voter ends up as default conservative. In some parts of the Southwest, you can go your whole life without hearing a liberal point of view.

By itself, the new radio station wouldn't win Kansas for the Democrats, but it would change the ball game -- maybe some of those states would even quit being Republican gimmes. The wingnut control of information flow around there approaches Stalinist levels, and this is something that we've got to change. (We wouldn't have to match the right wing station for station -- one single liberal Democratic station would break the monopoly.)

See? Positive thinking is easy.

We will now return to our regularly scheduled programming.

Is there anyone in the Democratic Party, or in the Democrat blogosphere, or among the Democratic sugar daddies, who would be interested in something like that?

No.

Radio is too tacky for Democrats, and so is Oklahoma.

P.S. "Grannyinsanity" writes:

"I inquired about a radio license sometime in the last two years and was promptly denied on the grounds that they just weren't issuing any more then.

That's the thing, you can't do anything without one and Clear Channel tries to gobble them all up. Not for the resale market, just to keep a monopoly on our democracy."

In other words, at least in some parts of the country the government is enabling and enforcing a private, virtually-unregulated near-monopoly of the crucial political communication media. Sounds Stalinist to me.

The name of the radio station has been corrected from KAAY to KOMA. I listened to both, but KAAY is from Arkansas.

The Judges

Bloggered Again Again Again -- Blogger isn't letting me in to edit posts. I want to update the post below about the $280 billion gift to tobacco companies, adding some background on the two judges responsible. One is David Sentelle. You may recognize the name. He is one of the far-right judges who appointed Ken Starr to go after Clinton. The other is a Stephen Williams, a Federalist Society judge also known for attending "retreats" where they teach about how environmentalism is anti-capitalism, then ordering the EPA not to enforce the Clean Air Act.

Judge Appointments: BIG Payoff!

The Right got a BIG payoff today from their judicial appointments. $280 BILLION!

Court Rejects U.S. Claim on Tobacco Lawsuits,

A federal appeals court ruled Friday that the Justice Department cannot seek $280 billion it alleges the tobacco industry earned through fraud, an enormous victory for American cigarette makers.

[. . .] The government has described the $280 billion as an estimate of money the companies earned illegally through fraudulent activities such as marketing to children and denying doing so.

THIS is what it is all about.

And what are the odds that the Bush administration will refuse to appeal?

The Attack on Liberals

"One who calls himself a liberal is nowadays diversely called by others a traitor, coward, parlor-pink, eclectic, jelly-fish, a selfish or muddy thinker who wants both to have his cake and eat it, rationalist, skeptic, conservative, radical…. But there is unanimity of opinion on one thing, namely, that liberalism is essentially negative, paralytic, and disintegrative. It’s boasted open-mindedness is nothing more than axiological anemia.”

Leslie Page, “Liberalism, Dogmatism and Negativism”, Journal of Social Philosophy, 5 (1940), p. 346; quoted in John Gunnell, The Descent of Political Theory, Chicago, 1993, p. 136

The illiberals have always been around. The above quotation is now 65 years old, and hatred of Roosevelt even before then had been virulent enough to motivate an abortive coup attempt. Most of the big Roosevelt haters are dead by now, but illiberalism is the political philosophy of the dominant wing of the Republican Party. I doubt that anyone would have guessed, even a decade ago, that Social Security would be on the chopping block, but it is. (We seem to be winning that fight, but it's hard to take any comfort in that; we're fighting in our last ditch.)

As part of this attack have come a flurry of accusations that liberals are allied with Islamic terrorism. I'm not going to link, but these accusations have come from Instapundit, Andrew Sullivan, John Hinderaker, Robert Conquest, and the fraudulently named Armed Liberal. None of these are marginal figures or populist talk-radio hosts; they represent the conservative mainstream.

The facts do not support the charge. Before 9/11, American sympathy for Islamic fundamentalism came mostly from the right wing, as I have documented here. Conservatives and Islamic fundamentalism share a bitter hatred of atheism, feminism, gay rights, sexual liberation, and secularism, and many or most Islamic fundamentalists are economically conservative..

Illiberalism has been charged up by Bush's re-election, and they're going to shoot for the moon. The gloves are off. Things that Oliver North and Michael Savage were saying five years ago are going to go mainstream. The hapless, bought media will whimper occasionally, but they aren't capable of fighting.

I really don't think that most Democrats have figured out what's going on yet. I've thought for a long time that the controlling majority of the Republican Party is acting entirely in bad faith, and that we have to treat this as a street fight rather than as a faculty-lounge debate. The so-called rational conservatives and moderate Republicans, if they aren't playing malicious games, are a hopeless, craven rabble which will never do anything. (Yes, John McCain, I mean you.)

Going around the left blogosphere I really feel that people haven't gotten the word yet. All the things people are saying in response to these attacks are nice and reasonable, but when you're accused of treason, a reasonable response is not appropriate. (The egregious Armed Liberal made a joke of this on the Crooked Timber comments, expressing surprise that the CT people were being all huffy, and not rational like him!)

This is looking like another Dukakis moment. When Dukakis was asked a hypothetical question about someone raping his wife, he made the mistake of thinking that he was in a rational forum and gave a detached, correct, policy answer about the death penalty. The problem wasn't that he said the wrong thing about the the death penalty. The problem was that he should have taken it personally. What he should have said was something like "You son of a bitch, don't you drag my wife into this!"

The sons of bitches are calling us traitors, and we need to take it personally. There are no good Republicans or conservatives except the ones who openly denounce this kind of smear. The rest of them are not fit to talk with. Rational discussion about this kind of thing will just make us look like weenies, and the Armed Liberals of the world will laugh at us.


(Written in part in lieu of a comment to this Crooked Timber post, since their comments are down.

I have fixed the bad link to the story of the coup attempt against FDR. It's worth following. This forgotten episode of American history deserves more attention than it gets.)

Simon Rosenberg Drops Out Of DNC Race

Statement from Simon Rosenberg on the Campaign for DNC Chair

"Effective today, I am ending my campaign for chair of the Democratic National Committee. I am grateful for the opportunity I have had to share my vision with Democrats around the country, and I remain encouraged by the depth and thoughtfulness DNC members have brought to this important process of picking our next chair.

Today, I am endorsing Governor Howard Dean to be the next Chairman of the DNC. While we have not always agreed on every issue, I believe his passion for our Party, his remarkable fighting spirit, his direct and powerful way of speaking, and his commitment to bringing regular people back into our Party will allow him to revitalize our Party and help us win again in the 21st century.

I call upon my supporters, and Democrats from all parts of the Party and all parts of the country, to join me in supporting Governor Howard Dean as the next DNC chair.

Though my campaign is ending, my work and my commitment to the Party that I love will continue at NDN. There I will continue to focus on the three priorities for our Party that I spelled out in the campaign - crafting a better agenda for our Party, investing in and building a better infrastructure for our politics, and leading a new national commitment to nurturing the grassroots. If we can do these three things and do them well in the years ahead, we can once again become a vibrant, dynamic and winning Party.

Finally, I want to thank my staff and my supporters across the country. Their faith in me inspired me each day to fight just a little harder in this important and tough race."

It's Dean.

Dear Abby

An e-mail I received:

DEAR ABBY,

My husband has a long record of money problems. He runs up huge credit card bills and at the end of the month, if I try to pay them off, he shouts at me, saying I am stealing his money. He says pay the minimum and let our kids worry about the rest, but already we can hardly keep up with the interest. Also he has been so arrogant and abusive toward our neighbors that most of them no longer speak to us. The few that do are an odd bunch, to whom he has been giving a lot of expensive gifts, running up our bills even more. Also, he has gotten religious in a big way, although I don't quite understand it. One week he hangs out with Catholics and the next with people who say the Pope is the Anti-Christ. And now he has been going to the gym an awful lot and is into wearing uniforms and cowboy outfits, and I hate to think what that means. Finally, the last straw. He's demanding that before anyone can be in the same room with him, they must sign a loyalty oath. It's just so horribly creepy!

Can you help?

Signed, Lost in DC

Dear Lost: Stop whining, Laura. You can divorce the jerk any time you want. The rest of us are stuck with him for four more years!

Was GHWBush "Deep Throat"?

Poynter Online - Forums:

"From ADRIAN HAVILL: In my 1993 biography of Woodward and Bernstein, 'Deep Truth,' I argued that Deep Throat had to be a composite portrayal. No more. Yesterday's unveiling of Woodstein's notes at the University of Texas is an appropriate time to let Poynter's reader know -- based on recent events and my own research at the National Archives in College Park, Maryland -- who I believe DT is and why.

[. . .] Certainly nearly everyone who reads Poynter was mystified when George W. Bush -- a President who arguably hates the press -- gave Bob Woodward seven hours of interviews which became the core of two best-selling and largely laudatory books. He also urged his cabinet to cooperate with Woodward and many did. The explanation: George Herbert Walker Bush, the president's father, is Deep Throat.

[. . .] Did Bush have motivation? You bet. It was Richard Nixon who urged Bush to leave a safe seat in Congress, hinting there would be a position as assistant Secretary of the Treasury waiting for him if he failed. When Bush lost, Nixon reneged and asked him to take the U.N. slot but teasing him by hinting he would be the replacement for Spiro Agnew in 1972. Instead, he was given the thankless task of heading the Republican National Committee. The elder Bush got his revenge in the end, standing up at a cabinet meeting in August of 1974 where he became the first person of note to ask the President to resign. [. . .]"

Learn What Happens When You Order Your Next Pizza

Go watch ACLU - Pizza.

(From TalkLeft)

New Enron Tapes

There is a new batch of Enron tapes out. Transcripts are here. I haven't looked at them yet - more later.

Bush loves Lieberman, torture lover

As Bush walked the Senate reception line, he greeted most senators with a smile or handshake. But when he got to Joe Lieberman, Bush puckered his lips and gave him a big KISS!

Why was Bush so grateful? We note that earlier in the day, Lieberman had (as he usually does) deserted his party and voted for the pro-torture Gonzales' confirmation.

Lieberman - DINO (Democrat In Name Only)

Surprise (Not)

Go read The Left Coaster: Everyday Iraqi Actually A Right-Wing Supported Associate of Allawi and Chalabi.

If you remember the run-up to the first Iraq war, and the story about Iraqis dumping babies out of incubators, and the story behind that story, you won't be surprised. But if you watch Fox News you'll ... think an average Iraqi woman was introduced last night.

Important To Understand This Lie

Among all the other lies in Bush's speech I see one that has not been widely explained. This is the lie that people would build up money in the private account that they can keep and pass on to heirs.

Bush said, "...you can build a nest egg for your own future," and "...you'll be able to pass along the money that accumulates in your personal account, if you wish, to your children or grandchildren."

So you have this account (if the stock market hasn't gone down), and you're supposed to live off of it until you die. Question for you: How much should you take out each month? Remember, if you take out too much you will run out of money and have nothing to live on.

The way a situation like this is usually handled is you use the money to buy an annuity -- a guaranteed monthly amount paid to you each month until you die. The amount is figured by calculating the average life expectancy of someone your age. It works because half of the people die early, leaving enough money to continue paying the other half of the people who die late. If you buy an annuity and die a month later, your money goes to cover the person who lives to be 112.

And, of course, the company you buy the annuity from keeps a healthy commission. (They gots to pay their CEO his $200 million each year.)

So this "pass along the money" idea is just another lie -- words that sound nice and are used to trick you into thinking this is a good deal. It is a lie because you have to give the money to an annuity company or risk having nothing left to live on. And it's worse than you think. The lifespan calculations that decide the annuity payments are calculated by professionals who do this and only this and know what they are doing. The Bush plan leaves everyone on their own to figure out for themselves how much to take out each month. This means that it is possible for every person to miscalculate and run out of money.

I Just Couldn't

Sorry. I just could not bring myself to watch the speech. And I just can't write about it. I read the speech in advance. Lies. I went to a DFA Meetup, and heard a minute of it on the way. UGH!

But I did read Senator Reid's speech, and it was masterful! Excellent!

Reminder

There is a lot of great stuff in the left and right columns here. On the left is a blogroll that links to many, many great bloggers. It is always fun to explore the blogs on this list. I suggest trying to make your way down by looking at five new blogs each day.

On the right there are, of course, some ads. Today there are two from the United Nations that I think everyone here would want to click on to learn more. The United Nations is under attack from the right and needs your support! (I don't make money if you click on them but I do make some money every time someone clicks one of the items in the Google ads.)

Down the right side a ways are current headlines from BuzzFlash, Media Matters, Smirking Chimp and "Privatize This" from the DCCC. It's always a good idea to check these.

And, finally, clicking on the little picture of an envelope at the end of each post lets you send the post to a friend.

Join A There Is No Crisis Conference Call

Even if you are not having or attending a house party tonite (click here to find one near you) you can join the conference call. See this post: Social Security: There Is No Crisis - Join Our Conference Call with Atrios:

"We're having a post-State of the Union conference call at 11pm for bloggers and house party leaders. On the call will be Duncan Black and representatives from the Campaign for America's Future and the Center for American Progress.

Email me at sotu.speech@gmail.com if you'd like to be on the Conference Call at 11pm Eastern. Also, leave questions and comments on this thread about the SOTU.

We will be liveblogging the SOTU and the call.

Also, to ward off too much Bush exposure, here's a nice drinking game: www.drinkinggame.us

And this is a reminder to all Presidents and non-Presidents alike that they shouldn't drink and drive."

Dean Remix

If you want to get revved up about Howard Dean as head of the Democratic Party, go listen to this. It will bring it all back.

Update - Go listen to it anyway. It's great.

The Power of Words

I have a new post at American Street, The Power of Words.

Just Making Shit Up

The new Think Progress weblog has a post about the Washington Times just making shit up about liberals who are "silent" about the Iraqi election.

"For instance, Lakely suggests that Iraq’s election stunned “left-wing filmmaker” Michael Moore into silence. “The last posting from Mr. Moore on his Web site is dated Jan. 10,” Lakely notes, “and concerns ‘Fahrenheit 9/11? being named best dramatic movie in the People’s Choice Awards.” Somehow Lakely fails to mention that Moore’s site has posted twenty-six updates about Iraq and election fallout since Sunday."

My question is, why would anyone read a newspaper run by the Moonies and shown again and again to lie early and often? In fact, the same could be said about most of the Right's "noise machine." Limbaugh, Fox, etc. At what point does credibility start to matter?

Social Security Myths v. Reality

eRiposte has been busy putting together info on Social Security Myths v. Reality. One of the most useful sections is the list of Social Security Front Groups.

Cupertino Parents Blast Fox for Disinformation

Daily Kos :: Cupertino Parents Blast Fox for Disinformation.

Go read.

I'm still being gloomy

(Below is a comment I made on Brad DeLong's site, considerably revised).

I guess I'll go back to pointing out, as I haven't for awhile, that we've been in let's-pretend never-never land for several years now. An effective majority of Americans have renounced analytic thought.

As a leftist I used to be the anti-economist in most groups, arguing against market-worship, but now conservative cornucopians (Lomborg's own self-description) are the ones rejecting economic analysis. Case in point, Luskin's most recent Krugman-bash).

Ultimately, when the contradictions become impossible to ignore, things have to get really ugly. I think that the Bush core constituency's uncritical "Will to Believe", and their absolute personal trust in one man, are totalitarian without any exaggeration. We're now in the grace period when totalitarian methods aren't yet necessary (probably toward the end of it), but there has to be a day of reckoning sometime. And a lot of the Armageddon neo-Confederate WW-IV free-market absolutists are looking forward to the day when they can bash heads.

Marxists tell me that this is all a masterful, rationally-planned scheme, but my feeling is that a minority within the monied class has been swept up by anger and ideological madness, and that most of the rich aren't thinking except in terms of short-term advantage. Scaife, Moon, the Koch brothers, and Murdoch aren't the richest Americans, but they're by far the most influential politically because they dish out the money. Two of the five of them, are probably mentally ill, and the other three are nasty pieces of work, but Americans are not bothered by that.

I have to wonder about the seemingly-rational people who are playing along for the money, and even more so about the relatively-intelligent unpaid conservatives and moderates, seem to be entirely oblivious to what's actually happening. They are the people responsible for reelecting Bush, and when they figure out what they did, there won't be much that they can do.

Networks Refuse Ads Opposing "Tort Reform" / Bush Gets Free Hour

4 Networks Reject Ad Opposing Bush on Lawsuits.

Tomorrow night the same networks will give President Bush a free hour and a half to push his right-wing agenda, including "tort reform," which is nothing more than a huge government bailout of insurance companies, drug companies, and other corporations that have harmed people for profit. Asbestos companies, for example. Selling Vioxx while knowing that it can cause heart attacks and strokes.

HOST A HOUSE PARTY To Help Save Social Security

(Earlier post moved to top of page)

Help save Social Security! Join up and SIGN UP TO HOLD A HOUSE PARTY WEDNESDAY the night of the State of the Union address!

There will be a conference call when the speech ends, which will include question and answer time, so your guests will learn about how to help fight back about Bush's drive to phase out Social Security.

This website is being developed as I write, so sign up now, but check back at the site regularly.

Update - FLYERS for handing out at your party or otherwise.

Iraq Vote

If the turnout reports are accurate (i.e. not propaganda) this is a great day for Iraq and for all of us. Congratulations to the Iraqis!

On the other hand, I'm a bit concerned by the early turnout reports. Somehow the American mainstream media's crowing about massive turnout reminds me of the story of the JFK "Oswald did it" assassination headline running an hour before the assassination.

"In the heart of the so-called Sunni triangle, a total of just 300 ballots were cast in the town of Al-Ramadi, many of them by police officers and soldiers."

I love some of the headlines, like Bush critics admit turnout triumph, and High turnout a win for White House.

Dean Supporters

Dear Dean Supporters -

Threatening to destroy the Democratic Party if your guy doesn't win is probably not a super strategy for convincing DNC members that your guy is a dedicated and committed supporter of the party. Think about that.

Update - The day after their executive committee voted to back Fowler, State Democrats back Dean for DNC post. This represents a lot of votes on the DNC. Comes close to clinching it.

Stabbed-in-the-back

I've been waiting for the stabbed-in-the-back talk to start getting serious. I had expected it to begin about January 21, so it's a little late -- I guess the operatives took a well-earned break right after the inauguration. Here's Instapundit:

When Ted Kennedy can make an absurd and borderline-traitorous speech on the war, when Michael Moore shares a VIP box with the last Democratic President but one, when Barbara Boxer endorses a Democratic consultant/blogger whose view of American casualties in Iraq is "screw 'em," well, this is the authentic face of the Left. Or what remains of it.

There was a time when the Left opposed fascism and supported democracy, when it wasn't a seething-yet-shrinking mass of self-hatred and idiocy. That day is long past, and the moral and intellectual decay of the Left is far gone. Link

Here's John Hinderaker:

John H. Hinderaker, founder of Time Magazine's "Blog of the Year," and clearly a reasonable, rational person, was just on WABC-AM with Larry Kudlow. After calling the Iraq elections a "bombshell" (interesting word choice) for the Middle East, he went on to say that it was "pretty clear" that in our country, "the Left had lined up behind the terrorists." Link

These are not marginal figures, but two of the most respected conservatives on the net. Basically, they've taken over the Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler's message and cleaned up his language a bit.

I really don't think that Democrats are prepared for what's coming. This isn't going to be business as usual, especially when they start getting public opinion ready for war against Iran.

National Conference for Media Reform

Carolyn Kay of Make Them Accountable just notified me of the 2005 National Conference for Media Reform to be held from May 13 to May 15, 2005, in St. Louis, Missouri. Al Franken, Robert McChesney, Amy Goodman, and a lot of other good people will be there.( More information here. Early registration ends March 31.)

It looks good, but it's just the usual suspects - I don't see any signs of money people. My estimate is that it will cost about $500,000,000 to redress the media balance in this country, making sure that every American has free-media access to the liberal point of view, the way every American is already automatically exposed to the wingnut point of view. Many people just accept the ambient opinion, and in today's world the majority of them end up Republicans.

I don't think any more that this can be done by voluntarism. So if any of my readers is able to unload ten million bucks or more, now is the time for them to do it.

Defined benefits and defined contributions

Guest-poster Camilo Wilson lives in Monterey, California. He has had a long, long career in computers and software, including writing the popular VolksWriter word processor and publishing Correct Grammar and the American Heritage Dictionary. He is the founder of his very privately held cogix.com. He studied political philosophy in Berkeley in the 60's and incorporated that world view into a self-designated fiscally responsible liberal in 1980. He likes living in the forest.

Currently, Social Security pays a predictable amount until the end your days, just like a "defined benefit plan". The privatization proposals take 2/3 of employee contributions and invest them in a classical "defined contribution plan".

This terminology is important, as many people who care about retirement understand the difference perfectly well. A defined benefit spells out what you're going to get, and it is the government/employer's problem how it will meet its obligations, not yours. A defined contribution plan relieves that burden from the government/employee and transfers it squarely onto you, who now must make wise investment choices to make the money last until the end of your days.

The need to invest aggressively guarantees that people will make poor choices, and makes them specially vulnerable to greedy promoters. With the privatization option, you're giving up a rock solid, predictable pension for the rest of your life in return for a small amount of money you can gamble put to work today.

There Is No Crisis

There Is No Crisis is liveblogging the Senate Democratic Policy Committee hearing on Social Security.

Who are the "Rational Conservatives"?

(As most STF readers know by now, since the election I've been alternating between fairly reasonable posts, and gloom and doom. This one is gloom and doom. I originally posted it, in somewhat different form, on the Crooked Timber comments, where some classic illiberals were defiantly holding the fort .)

Since the election I believe more than I ever did that all significant political debates in the US are now just matters of affiliation. Bush is in the driver’s seat, and people can affiliate for him or against him.

The otherwise-rational conservatives who remain on Bush’s team remain there on the basis of a personal anti-liberal existential commitment that they made after some life-changing experience, perhaps after rehabbing from drugs while blaming liberalism for all their problems. (The pro-conservative aspect of that kind of rehab is always weaker than the anti-liberal one).

For them to cease to be illiberals now would require a second existential crisis, and most people don’t want to have too many of those in one lifetime.

It’s not just Iraq. There still are many who, flying in the face of 24 years of political reality, call themselves fiscal conservatives and for that reason absolutely refuse ever to vote for a Democrat. Their politics is like their body type, changable only with major surgery.

The starve-the-beast Armageddonist neo-Confederate World War Four advocates are influencing policy now, and we aren’t -- and neither are the hapless rational conservatives who continue to support Bush. We’re just watching, and so are they (whether they know it or not.)

People are pleased that Bush’s attempt to destroy social security seems to be failing, but that’s sort of as though Boston, all alone, were making a stout defense against the forces of Robert E Lee. Bush has the Democrats fighting in their last ditch.

And no, I don’t think that I am the irrational one here. The Bush loyalists are a bunch of very sick puppies. Arguing with them is pointless.

Update: Corrected from New York City to Boston per Lizardbreath.

Arnold No Moderate

Just look at what he is doing!

California regulators suspend wireless customer protections:

"California utility regulators on Thursday suspended an 8-month-old crackdown on abusive practices in the wireless telephone industry, rebuffing the protests of consumer activists and the state's top law enforcement officials.

[. . .] the PUC's makeup has changed with the terms of two commissioners expiring. [. . .] ...first week on the job after being appointed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger last month. Schwarzenegger has appointed high-tech entrepreneur Steve Poizner to fill the PUC's remaining board seat.

[. . .] "I fear what we are going to start to hear is that what's good for business is necessarily good for consumers, and we know that's just not so," said Robert Finkelstein, executive director for The Utility Reform Network.

[. . .] The decision also provoked objections from consumer groups, state Attorney General Bill Lockyer and all 58 district attorneys in California.

The district attorneys say widespread consumer complaints about the wireless phone industry are diverting their attention from other law enforcement issues. "

You get the picture. Consumers of California, vuck ovv! Big corporations rule!

Iraqifying Social Security

Our Rule

Remember the Seeing the Forest rule: when you see a Republican accusing others of something, it means they are probably doing that thing. So we have a Republican reporter, (the same one mentioned in an earlier post) saying,

"the press corps, which, of course, deserves to be gone around because they're not telling the truth about Social Security reform. They continue to work off of the talking points provided them from the opposition."

Got that? He's accusing "the press corps" of using Liberal talking points. So a little research uncovers ... wanna guess? Oh yes! Talon News "reporter" lifts from GOP documents.

Simon Rosenberg For DNC Chair

I am a reform Democrat. My endorsement for the DNC Chair race goes to Simon Rosenberg first, second to Howard Dean, third to Donnie Fowler. I'd be very happy if any of these three win, and the Party will benefit greatly. (I also have some comments on Dean at the end of this post.)

My endorsement of Simon is based on his plan, "Renewing the DNC: Simon's Plan". Regardless of your own choice for a DNC Chair, please read his plan. Information about Simon is available online at SimonForChair.org. Info on Dean for Chair is available at DeanForChair.org. Info on Fowler is available at ChangeTheParty.org.

I'll let Simon's plan speak for itself. From his plan, (and regular readers will understand that this is close to my heart):

"A New Commitment to Persuasion, Advocacy, and Mobilization

One of the greatest tasks in the next four years will be to move all the parties into the 21st century communications era. My background as a successful television writer and producer, veteran of the Clinton War Room, manager of the 31 state Clinton communications operations in 1992, technologist, often-quoted spokesperson, and seasoned message-crafter makes me uniquely qualified among the candidates for Chair to take on this challenge. I come from the successful Clinton school that built our politics around a powerful, optimistic vision for our nation, and believe that we must make modern advocacy a more important core competency of our parties in the years ahead.

At the core of the new politics of advocacy are changes in media and technology. We are leaving a 50 year-long run of the broadcast era of political communications, where the model was a single message centrally managed and broadcast out to many. The new era we are entering requires a much more distributed, real time, personal, and intimate type of communications. The vital investment by Terry McAuliffe in the DNC Datamart has given all of us the opportunity to build a new politics for a new era of communication that will require us putting people once again at the very center of our Party.

To facilitate our adoption of new techniques and learning, I will create a New Politics Institute at the DNC. The NPI will be charged with bringing in some of the top technologists, social networkers, netroots and community activists and media executives to help us together imagine and implement a new 21st century politics built up from people and databases using the very latest technology.

In the years ahead, succeeding at the new politics and countering the conservative machine also will require the party?s willingness to partner with think tanks, policy shops, commentator/bloggers, interested academics, and governments that Democrats control. Having worked at a think tank, and as a veteran of the successful Clinton policy years, I can bring concrete expertise in forging these vital national and state links. For more details on how I plan to utilize the ?blogosphere,? please visit my web site at www.simonforchair.org."

Naturally a lot of readers will wonder why I endorse Simon over Dean when I was an enthusiastic support of Dean for President? My reason is that the DNC Chair is primarily a "behind-the-scenes" nuts-and-bolts position. I agree with Dean that reform of the party is badly needed, but I believe this will actually be better accomplished by electing Simon Rosenberg. If you read Simon's plan you will see the level of detail that is behind his run for DNC Chair. This guy has thought it through.

I also believe that Howard Dean would be a GREAT candidate for President in 2008. But becoming DNC Chair means pledging not to run for President in 2008. I have heard many Dean supporters say that after everyone sees how well Dean does as DNC Chair, they'll ask him to run anyway. I don't see where the idea of taking a pledge not to run in 2008 means running in 2008, and I trust that he means it! And this brings in the issue of party unity. Dean represents a wing of the party. I support that wing. But I remember how the Dean people felt when we thought the DNC was opposing Dean. I can imagine how this could be usable as a wedge to divide all the other parts of the Democratic Party coalition during the next election. And, finally, what becomes of Dean's organization Democracy for America should he become DNC Chair? This is one of the most vital, valuable movement organizations I have seen, and I think it is very important that it retains its independent-of-the-party role. This would be hard to do with its leader serving as DNC Chair.

So if you are a voting DNC member, please consider Simon Rosenberg to be Party Chair.

(Other Seeing the Forest writers might have other preferences.)

What do YOU think? Leave a comment.

Update - this MyDD diary.

Press Conferences From Now On

Earlier today I linked to a story about how government employees will soon be paid according to the level of service they are performing in the effort to consolidate the power of The Party. I have previously posted links to stories about people being fired for opposing Bush, or doctors refusing to see them as patients anymore, or getting tickets for having bumper stickers opposiing Bush... All ovre the blogosphere we are reading stories about reporters being intimidatred for using "private accounts" language even though the President used the same wording as recently as last week.

Now we have a glimpse of what to expect from the press in the future. Chris at MyDD has a post about a MEMBER OF THE PRESS prefacing a question to the President with the following,

"[H]ow are you going to work with people [Democratic leaders] who seem to have divorced themselves from reality?"

Watch your backs.

Fraud In Ohio

The Sideshow has a story about possible fraud in the Ohio recounts.

Troll Policy

Many Progressive bloggers have been noticing a recent increase in "trolls" -- right-wingers showing up and disrupting the comments. The recent trolls also seem more sophisticated. Whatever the reason for the increase, I'm not going to let them disrupt Seeing the Forest.

If you want to have a discussion in the comments here, that is encouraged. In fact I have even invited commenters with opposing viewpoints to be guest posters here.

If you (are a right-winger and) insult other people in a comment, your comment will be deleted and you will be banned, which means you will be unable to post comments here from then on. (Left wingers are free to insult right-wingers at will in the comments.) If you insult me or another Seeing the Forest writer, or say anything even remotely unpleasant about the blog, your comment will be deleted and you will be banned. If I even catch a whiff that you are a professional, or that you are a skilled volunteer familiar with the current right-wing talking-points and tactics, constructive comments or not, you will be banned and won't get your bonus.

Democrats Fired, Not Hired

Now that the Party has merged withthe State, new employent policies will be in effect. From the story,

"A raise or promotion -- moving up in a pay range or rising to the next one -- will depend on receiving a satisfactory performance rating from" ... the Party.

Ted Turner compares Fox to Nazis

MediaLife reports that Ted Turner, founder of CNN, compared Fox News to the Nazis during his address to the National Association for Television Programming Executives conference in Las Vegas yesterday. He conceded that Fox News has passed CNN in terms of viewers, but also pointed out that Adolph Hitler got the most votes when he was elected to run Germany before World War II. Ted called Fox News the “ Bill O’Reilly network” and said it is “a propaganda tool for the Bush administration, and while that may be legal, it’s bad for our democracy.” Fox said it is sour grapes on Ted’s part because FNC has surpassed Turner network CNN in the ratings. However, Turner is not the only TV notable to compare Fox to the Nazis this week.” “Gilmore Girls” executive producer Amy Sherman-Palladino called Fox network show “American Idol” “like the Nazis marching through Poland. You just got to let them go. Get out of the way. We’re kind of France going, ‘You know, just don’t burn down Paris, that’s all we’re asking.’”

During my own experience with Ted in launching an environmental program on TBS and socializing at CNN parties when my wife was VP at CNN, Ted told a story about the time he and Rupert Murdoch, Chairman of Fox, once went skiing on Ted’s ranch. “There we were on our skies, stopped on a cliff overlooking the valley. Just one little shove from me, and ….” May have something to do with Ted's oft- stated reason for selling Turner Broadcasting System to Time-Warner...he was afraid Murdoch would get it in a hostile takeover.