GOP Voters

American Sucker

The Draft Is Coming

U.S. struggling to find replacement troops:

"The Pentagon is scrambling to find enough fresh troops to begin an orderly rotation program that would bring home some of the 147,000 soldiers spread thinly across troubled Iraq.
...

The need for replacement troops is putting great strain on both the active and reserve forces already stretched thin meeting obligations in Iraq as well as in Afghanistan, South Korea, Bosnia, Kosovo, the Sinai - and a brigade-sized force of up to 5,000 troops expected to be deployed to peacekeeping duties in Liberia.

With only ten active duty divisions the 480,000-man U.S. Army has been stretched almost to the breaking point by the Iraq deployments. While Defense Secretary Donald L. Rumsfeld and his top civilian aides have talked in the past of chopping another two divisions out of that Army, some in Congress have begun urging an increase in the active Army by as much as 25 percent."

Media Underplays U.S. Death Toll in Iraq

Media Underplays U.S. Death Toll in Iraq:

"According to official military records, the number of U.S. soldiers who have died in Iraq since May 2 is actually 85. This includes a staggering number of non-combat deaths. Even if killed in a non-hostile action, these soldiers are no less dead, their families no less aggrieved. And it's safe to say that nearly all of these people would still be alive if they were still back in the States.

Nevertheless, the media continues to report the much lower figure of 33 as if those are the only deaths that count. "

More On That Pension Bill

U.S. House Panel Backs Pension Fix

Companies with underfunded pension plans would get relief for three years under legislation backed by the U.S. House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee on Friday, in an acrimonious session to which police were called.
...

Under the measure that the committee approved, traditional "defined benefit" pension plans would be allowed to assume a more generous return on investments based on an index of high-grade corporate bonds rather than the current formula based on 30-year U.S. Treasury bond yields.
...

But critics say changing the method of valuing the funds is an accounting device that doesn't address the shortfall.

Companies will be allowed to SAY they are getting higher returns on their pension savings than they really ARE making. And just how bad is the problem?

Total pension underfunding exceeds $300 billion at U.S. companies, with $60 billion in the auto industry, according to the agency that bails out troubled corporate pension plans.

That's right - the companies are $300 billion in the hole owed to pensions - but it is not on their books for purposes of evaluating investments in the companies. Hence the new stock market bubble.

Think about this - those companies that still give pensions don't have enough money saved up to PAY the pensions, and the Republicans are letting them off the hook here. Meanwhile, our Social Security money went away to pay for the huge Bush tax cuts! So the ENTIRE "baby-boomer" generation is losing its pensions, its Social Security and those lucky enough to have had jobs with 401Ks, well, half of that's gone, too. It MATTERS who wins elections!

And, by the way, how did the Republicans get this passed?

The measure was rushed through by the Republican majority as Chairman Bill Thomas of California called a voice vote while committee Democrats were conferring over last-minute changes in an adjacent library.

Dean's Questions for Bush

From Blog for America, these are Gov. Howard Dean's questions to President Bush:

"As the Niger uranium story has unfolded, what has become increasingly obvious is that there are many questions that must be answered about the way the Bush Administration led us to war, managed the conflict in Iraq, and failed to foresee the continuing resistance that our military is now confronting.

We must be clear: decisions regarding war and peace are the most serious and solemn that a Commander-in-Chief is called upon to make. There are now fundamental questions about President Bush’s leadership in taking us to war with Iraq.

There has been much discussion about the 16 words included in the State of the Union address. Today I call on the President to answer these sixteen questions to ensure that the American people can retain their trust in their government and to help ensure that the United States can retain its credibility as a moral force in the world.

1) Mr. President, beyond the NSC and CIA officials who have been identified, we need to know who else at the White House was involved in the decision to include the discredited Niger uranium evidence in your speech, and, if they knew it was false, why did they permit it to be included in the speech.

2) Mr. President, we need to know why anyone in your Administration would have contemplated using the Niger evidence in the State of the Union after George Tenet personally intervened in October 2002, to have the same evidence removed from the President’s October 7th speech. (The Washington Post, Walter Pincus and Mike Allen, 7/13/2003)

3) Mr. President, we need to know why you claimed this very week that the CIA objected to the Niger uranium sentence “subsequent” to the State of the Union address, contradicting everything else we have heard from your administration and the intelligence community on the matter. (Washington Post, Priest, Dana and Dana Milbank, 7/15/2003)

4) Mr. President, we urgently need an explanation about the very serious charge that senior officials in your Administration may have retaliated against Ambassador Joseph Wilson by illegally disclosing that his wife is an undercover CIA officer. (The Nation, Corn, David, 7/16/2003)

5) Mr. President, we need to know why your Administration persisted in using the intercepted aluminum tubes to show that Iraq was pursuing a nuclear program and why your National Security Advisor, Condoleezza Rice, claimed categorically that the tubes were “only really suited for nuclear weapons programs,” when in fact our own government experts flatly rejected such claims. (CNN, 9/08/2002, Knight Ridder News Service, 10/04/2002)

6) Mr. President, we need to know why Secretary Rumsfeld created a secret intelligence unit at the Pentagon that selectively identified questionable intelligence to support the case for war – including the supposed link to al-Qaeda – while ignoring, burying or rejecting any evidence to the contrary. (New Yorker, Seymour Hersh, 5/12/03)

7) Mr. President, we need to know what the basis was for Secretary Rumsfeld's assertion that the US had bulletproof evidence linking Al Qaeda to Iraq, despite the fact that U.S. intelligence analysts have consistently agreed that Saddam did not have a "meaningful connection" to Al Qaeda. (NY Times, Schmitt, Eric, 9/28/2002, NY Times, Krugman, Paul, 7/15/2003)

8) Mr. President, we need to know why Vice President Cheney claimed last September to have “irrefutable evidence” that Saddam Hussein had reconstituted his nuclear weapons program, an assertion he repeated in March, on the eve of war. (AP, 9/20/2002, NBC 3/16/2003)

9) Mr. President, we need to know why Secretary Powell claimed with confidence and virtual certainty in February before the UN Security Council that, “Iraq today has a stockpile of between 100 and 500 tons of chemical weapons agent. That is enough agent to fill 16,000 battlefield rockets.” (UN Address, 2/05/2003)

10) Mr. President, we need to know why Secretary Rumsfeld claimed on March 30th in reference to weapons of mass destruction, "We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat." (The Guardian, Whitaker, Brian and Rory McCarthy, 5/30/2003)

11) Mr. President, we need an explanation of the unconfirmed report that your Administration is dishonoring the life of a soldier who died in Iraq as a result of hostile action by misclassifying his death as an accident. (Time, Gibbs, Nancy and Mark Thompson, 7/13/2003)

12) Mr. President, we need to know why your Administration has never told the truth about the costs and long-term commitment of the war, has consistently downplayed what those would be, and now continues to try keep the projected costs hidden from the American people.

13) Mr. President, we need to know why you said on May 1, 2003 , that the war was over, when US troops have fought and one or two have died nearly every day since then and your generals have admitted that we are fighting a guerrilla war in Iraq. (Abizaid, Gen. John, 7/16/2003)

14) Mr. President, we need to know why your Administration had no plan to build the peace in post-war Iraq and seems to be resisting calls to include NATO, the United Nations and our allies in the stabilization and reconstruction effort.

15) Mr. President, we need to know what you were referring to in Poland on May 30, 2003, when you said, “For those who say we haven't found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons, they're wrong. We found them.” (Washington Post, Mike Allen, 5/31/2003)

16) Mr. President, we need to know why you incorrectly claimed this very week that the war began because Iraq would not admit UN inspectors, when in fact Iraq had admitted the inspectors and you opposed extending their work. (Washington Post, Priest, Dana and Dana Milbank, 7/15/2003)

If you can’t or won’t answer these 16 questions, Mr. President, I call on the Republicans in Congress to stop blocking efforts to create an independent, bipartisan committee to investigate what is a matter of the highest importance: whether your decision to go to war was sound and just.

The American public deserves answers to all of these questions. I urge you to lead with the honor and integrity that you promised as a candidate."

Blogs Today

skimble

skippy

Ruminate This

pfaffenBlog

Not Geniuses

Nathan Newman

Notes on the Atrocities

The Left Coaster

Brad DeLong

House Committee Approves $50 Billion Pension Bill (washingtonpost.com)

House Committee Approves $50 Billion Pension Bill. This is just another big ($50 billion) tax break that is only for the rich.

It's a bit complicated hot this one works, so I'll see if I can simplify it a bit. People who aren't rich need to use any money they have saved in retirement accounts, so this doesn't apply to them at all. When you take money out of a retirement account you have to pay income taxes. The government makes you start taking money out of a retirement account when you reach a certain age, as a protection against the money being sheltered forever and never subject to taxation. By increasing the age when one is required to take money out of a retirement account, they put off paying these taxes, and if the person dies, the money is inherited without paying taxes at all. Hence - another huge tax shelter just for the rich.

I wrote about how whole retirement account scam screwed workers out of their pensions in the post titled Screwing Workers.

How Does It Save Money?

News story: Republican Governors Studying Job Cuts

"Several Republican governors are studying ways to eliminate thousands of state jobs by turning the work over to private contractors, a strategy they say will save millions of tax dollars."

Let's see. You fire the state workers. They're hired by a private company. Private companies have higher overhead (example: CEO - $56 million). So how does this save money? Oh, wait, I get it - the workers are paid much less, and lose their health care, pensions, job safety protections, and other workers' rights.

This is good public policy? Of course, this is REPUBLICAN governors!

The Democrats Are Bad

Senate Defeats Call for Intelligence Probe. Republican Senator Mitch McConnell said of the Democrats, by calling for a look into what happened with the pre-war intelligence, "They've sacrificed the national interest on the altar of partisan politics. "

Party Over Country

Read this story in The Nation. The Bush people intentionally outed an undercover CIA agent, for the purpose of ruining her career, as punishment for her husband's role in letting the public know about Bush's lying.

Soon after Wilson disclosed his trip in the media and made the White House look bad, the payback came. Novak's July 14, 2003, column presented the back-story on Wilson's mission and contained the following sentences: "Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. Two senior administration officials told me Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate" the allegation.

The resulting damage to national security is serious. And who is responsible for this?

"The sources for Novak's assertion about Wilson's wife appear to be 'two senior administration officials.' If so, a pair of top Bush officials told a reporter the name of a CIA operative who apparently has worked under what's known as 'nonofficial cover' and who has had the dicey and difficult mission of tracking parties trying to buy or sell weapons of mass destruction or WMD material. If Wilson's wife is such a person--and the CIA is unlikely to have many employees like her--her career has been destroyed by the Bush administration. (Assuming she did not tell friends and family about her real job, these Bush officials have also damaged her personal life.) Without acknowledging whether she is a deep-cover CIA employee, Wilson says, 'Naming her this way would have compromised every operation, every relationship, every network with which she had been associated in her entire career. This is the stuff of Kim Philby and Aldrich Ames.' If she is not a CIA employee and Novak is reporting accurately, then the White House has wrongly branded a woman known to friends as an energy analyst for a private firm as a CIA officer. That would not likely do her much good. "

For Republicans it's ALL about the politics. NONE of it is about the security of the United States. Their methods are smears and intimidation. And, of course, lies.

This was a crime. An extremely serious one. So where is the investigation? Where are the headlines? Along these lines, yesterday the Republicans in the Senate defeated an attempt to start an investigation of the Iraq uranium story.

With Republicans closing ranks around President Bush, the Senate on Wednesday voted down a Democratic proposal to create an independent bipartisan commission to investigate the administration's use of secret intelligence to justify war with Iraq.

The interests of the country de damned! They conflict with the interests of The Party.

Good Sign

Not that kind of sign. A real sign.

Thinking It Through has a picture of a great sign on Interstate 5 somewhere.

It's Just A Campaign Issue

In this NY Times story, White House Tries to Dismiss Iraq Claim as Campaign Issue, the Republicans are all over the place talking about how this is all political.

The Republican National Committee issued a statement tonight asserting that "Democrats politicize war in Iraq," while party leaders declared that Democrats did not have the standing to challenge Mr. Bush on the subject.

What depth of cynicism is required to accuse the Democrats of politicizing the Iraq situation? What degree of irony is demonstrated in this statement? This from the people who forced a war vote just before the 2002 election, who moved their New York convention into September so their candidates can participate in 9/11 memorials, who pumped fear into the public to get them to vote their way.

They don't even get it, that this isn't about politics, or Democrats. They don't get it that the public is concerned with issues of war and peace, truth and honesty and integrity. They don't get it that the credibility of the country is diminished, and this is important and will have consequences. Truth, honesty and integrity are no more to them than words to use when focus groups show they are the best way to persuade a few more people to vote for The Party.

They aren't concerned with the substance, they're concerned with the politics. It's all they know. To them everything is politics, everything is The Party, everything is advancing their ideology. They don't even understand that people might be upset by what they did, upset that kids are dying, upset that we invaded a country with no reason, except to the degree that it comes up in a focus group, and then they'll design a "strategy" for "damage control" instead of answering the public's questions.

Light Blogging

I apologize that I have notbeen writing as much lately. I'll be back on the ball soon.

Bush Said WHAT?

Joe Conason writes about Bush's statement yesterday that we went to war not because Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, but because,

"We gave him a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn't let them in."

Joe asks the question, "What possessed the president to make an assertion that everyone on the planet knows to be untrue?" (Remember - Bush tried to prevent U.N. inspectors from going to Iraq, and then insisted they were taking too long.)

Go read it. It's astounding. Why isn't the press repeating this statement? Americans should know that their leader is seriously unhinged.

Court Denies Clintons' Request for Legal Reimbursement

A panel of judges turned down the Clintons' request for reimbursement of their legal costs for the Whitewater investigation.

So guess who the judges were?

The judicial panel, chaired by Judge David Sentelle of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, said the Clintons should be entitled to reimbursement of $85,312. Sentelle was part of a three judge panel that appointed Starr to the case.

The judicial panel also included Judge Thomas M. Reavley of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and Peter T. Fay of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit.

Peter T. Fay -- Senior appelate judge first appointed by Nixon later elevated to appeals court by Ford.

They just won't leave CLinton alone. They still have to do what they can to hurt him.

<...turningtables...>

Live, from Iraq...

CalPundit: Avoiding the Press

In CalPundit: Avoiding the Press, Kevin says the real reason Bush avoids foreign travel is because he has to actually answer questions from the press. And last week's news demonstrates what happens when Bush has to actually answer questions from the press.

What If ... ?

From the October, 2002 Joint Resolution to authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against Iraq:

Whereas Iraq both poses a continuing threat to the national security of the United States and international peace and security in the Persian Gulf region and remains in material and unacceptable breach of its international obligations by, among other things, continuing to possess and develop a significant chemical and biological weapons capability, actively seeking a nuclear weapons capability, and supporting and harboring terrorist organizations;
...

Whereas members of al Qaida, an organization bearing responsibility for attacks on the United States, its citizens, and interests, including the attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, are known to be in Iraq;
...

Whereas the attacks on the United States of September 11, 2001, underscored the gravity of the threat posed by the acquisition of weapons of mass destruction by international terrorist organizations;
...

Whereas Iraq's demonstrated capability and willingness to use weapons of mass destruction, the risk that the current Iraqi regime will either employ those weapons to launch a surprise attack against the United States or its Armed Forces or provide them to international terrorists who would do so, and the extreme magnitude of harm that would result to the United States and its citizens from such an attack, combine to justify action by the United States to defend itself;
...

Whereas United Nations Security Council Resolution 678 (1990) authorizes the use of all necessary means to enforce United Nations Security Council Resolution 660 (1990) and subsequent relevant resolutions and to compel Iraq to cease certain activities that threaten international peace and security, including the development of weapons of mass destruction ...
...

Whereas the United States is determined to prosecute the war on terrorism and Iraq's ongoing support for international terrorist groups combined with its development of weapons of mass destruction in direct violation of its obligations under the 1991 cease-fire and other United Nations Security Council resolutions make clear that it is in the national security interests of the United States and in furtherance of the war on terrorism that all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions be enforced, including through the use of force if necessary;
...

Whereas Congress has taken steps to pursue vigorously the war on terrorism through the provision of authorities and funding requested by the President to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such persons or organizations;
...

So ... what if Iraq DIDN'T participate in the Sept. 11 attack, and DIDN'T have weapons of mass destruction, and WASN'T working with al-Queda?

Deflation

Wholesale prices increased .5 percent in June. What really happened was that energy prices increased a bunch, and the most other prices went down.

I have heard some analysts say increasing energy prices are good, because it keeps the inflation rate up, which means the threat of deflation is lower. But this doesn't sound right to me. I'm not an economist, but isn't deflation - dropping prices - a symptom of the problem rather than the problem? The problem is reduced demand. So wouldn't increasing energy prices work to further reduce demand, as people and businesses divert more and more of their spending power into paying the higher energy bills? And wouldn't this make the problem worse instead of better?

The Fear

Do you remember the fear?

The theme of the 2002 elections was this: Terrorists are everywhere, and are about to do terrible things to us. The Democrats won't protect you, but the Republicans will.

The Republicans said that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11, had weapons of mass destruction - including and especially nukes - and was going to give those weapons to terrorists or use those weapons on us SOON unless we act. "Dirty bombs" might go off at any moment. Smallpox might hit any day. We must go to war to save ourselves. Those Democrats are against the war - are against protecting ourselves.

The threat was so imminent that we must take the unprecedented step of having a war vote just before the elections.

The Republicans campaigned that they would protect the public from this terrible, immediate, imminent, mounting threat, and the Democrats won't. Their campaign ads said Democrats are weak and wishy-washy and we must not risk delay at this time. Their radio stations and columnists said that liberals hate America (just like the terrorists), and "objectively" support Saddam. In the South they said that liberals are not good Christians; they are on the side of evil.

Remember how the terror threats were raised, and there was constant talk of the terrible dangers we faced? The public was pumped full of fear, day after day. The news was full of terrible stories about smallpox, and the horrific effects of nerve gas, even warnings about what to do if there is a nuclear explosion in your area.

But now - what happened? Where are the threats? They didn't find any weapons in Iraq, which could only mean that terrorists possess them now. Yet, the "threat level" is lowered. The budget for homeland security is reduced, but not discussed. The papers and radio and television are not warning us that terrorists will strike at any moment. What changed?

What happened to the fear?

This Changes Everything

Atrios points to Oliver Willis, who remind us:

Condi June 8, Meet the Press: "We did not know at the time - no one knew at the time, in our circles - maybe someone knew down in the bowels of the agency, but no one in our circles knew that there were doubts and suspicions that this might be a forgery."

Today's news:

"There was even some discussion on that specific sentence, so that it reflected better what the CIA thought and the speech was cleared," Rice said.
"Some specifics about amount and place were taken out...with the change in that sentence, the speech was cleared."

What are we talking about here? CBS News:

CIA officials warned members of the President’s National Security Council staff the intelligence was not good enough to make the flat statement Iraq tried to buy uranium from Africa.

The White House officials responded that a paper issued by the British government contained the unequivocal assertion: “Iraq has ... sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” As long as the statement was attributed to British Intelligence, the White House officials argued, it would be factually accurate. The CIA officials dropped their objections and that’s how it was delivered.

“The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa,” Mr. Bush said.

The statement was technically correct, since it accurately reflected the British paper. But the bottom line is the White House knowingly included in a presidential address information its own CIA had explicitly warned might not be true.

Put the pieces together. They changed the speech to say "The British government has learned," AFTER the CIA said the story was bogus. But on June 8, Rice said on Meet the Press, "We did not know at the time - no one knew at the time, in our circles - maybe someone knew down in the bowels of the agency, but no one in our circles knew that there were doubts and suspicions that this might be a forgery."

We now know that June 8 statement was a flat-out lie. As far as I know this is the first instance of indisputable documentation of a flat-out, indisputable lie on the part of the Bush administration on this issue. This changes everything. This is no longer a "He said, She said" dispute. It is now a matter of how much of this was a lie, a plot to influence the 2002 elections, a plot to manipulate data to gain support for the conquest of a country?

They Didn't Retract It

CBS News : Bush Knew Iraq Info Was False:

“The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa,” Mr. Bush said.

The statement was technically correct, since it accurately reflected the British paper. But the bottom line is the White House knowingly included in a presidential address information its own CIA had explicitly warned might not be true.

Today at a press conference during the President’s trip to Africa, Secretary of State Colin Powell portrayed it as an honest mistake.

“There was no effort or attempt on the part of the president or anyone else in the administration to mislead or to deceive the American people,” said Powell.

But eight days after the State of the Union, when Powell addressed the U.N., he deliberately left out any reference to Iraqi attempts to buy uranium from Africa.

“I didn’t use the uranium at that point because I didn’t think that was sufficiently strong as evidence to present before the world,” Powell said.

EVEN IF BUSH DIDN'T KNOW IT WAS A LIE, THEY NEVER RETRACTED BUSH'S STATEMENT! THEY LET THE COUNTRY GO TO WAR WITH THE AMERICAN PEOPLE BELIEVING - BECAUSE BUSH HAD SAID SO IN HIS STATE OF THE UNION SPEECH - THAT IRAQ WAS MAKING NUKES!

Strong Statement

Dean Says Those Who Misled Nation Should Resign :

Manchester, NH -- Governor Howard Dean issued the following statement today:
'Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld's statement yesterday -- that he only found out that the Niger documents were forgeries -- “within recent days” was stunning.

'What is now clear is that there are those in this administration that misled the President, misled the nation, and misled the world in making the case for the war in Iraq.

'They know who they are. And they should resign today.

'There will be investigations, and the truth will come out - the American people must know the truth - and those in this administration must be held accountable for their failure to give us the truth before we went to war.

'But we do not need to wait for the investigations to rid these people from our government - they can resign on their own today.

'I am now convinced more than ever that it was a mistake to have given this administration a blank check to engage in this war - as too many in Congress did when they supported the Iraqi war resolution.'"

They Knew It Was A Lie When They Went To War

In "Is there a plumber in the house?," over at Left Coaster, Mary points out that even if, as the White House is claiming, Bush didn't know that the Niger uranium story was a lie when he used it in the State of the Union speech, he DID know it was a lie when we went to war.

The public's support for the war (and the President) was based partly - if not mostly - on belief and fear that Iraq was developing nuclear weapons, a belief the public held because Bush had told them this story in the State of the Union speech. The story was not retracted until this week.

More Focus Group Language?

Bush again uses the "attempts to rewrite history" charge. I heard Rumsfield say the same the other day. Also on the right-wing radio shows. Focus groups and polls must have shown this to be a phrase that provides them some cover.

Greens - Go Take The Pledge!

Repentant Nader Voter...because Bush is so bad.

Tort Reform

If you are interested in tort reform, here is an index to the P.L.A. weblog's writings on this issue:

Missing Class Can be Costly

Juries

The Damages Cap

Defensive Medicine

Tort Reform and Frivolous Suits

Tort Reform Quiz

A Different Kind of Medical Malpractice Reform

No Pricing Power

More Tort Reform and the Damages Cap

Tort Reform Stalls In the Senate

Like a Good Neighbor

George Bush’s Perverse View of Juries

Eliminate Junk Science—A Tort Reform Proposal

Curbing Frivolous Lawsuits – A Tort Reform Proposal

Medical Malpractice – By the Numbers

Mort Zuckerman Gets Busted

Meetup Numbers

I was curious so I looked up the Meetup numbers for the different candidates as of today:

Dean 59,661
Kerry 5,467
Clark 3,910
Kucinich 1,025
Edwards 974
Gephardt 302
Leiberman 128
Graham 90
Sharpton 55
Mosley-Braun 55

All the candidates have Meetups. All of them have websites. All of them take contributions online. I don't think it's the Internet that is behind Dean's grassroots popularity. I think Dean's grassroots popularity is what is behind his Internet activity.

Fighting The Last War

Good post over at Situation Room. It seems we're fighting a fourth generation war with techniques designed for 2nd and 3rd generation wars.

Bush No Friend of Military

Take a look at The Salt Lake Tribune -- No friend of military

One of the most hypocritical sights I've ever seen was George W. Bush in full flight gear strutting around the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln at the end of the Iraq invasion. Given that he was AWOL from his National Guard post for over a year, Bush's actions were insulting to all former and present military personnel.
Now, according to The Army Times, we learn that the White House fought a proposal to double the $6,000 gratuity paid to families of troops who die on active duty, and it wants to roll back recent increases in monthly imminent-danger pay (from $225 to $150) and family-separation allowance (from $250 to $100) for troops getting shot at in combat zones.
The White House budget proposal for 2004 also cuts $1.5 billion of the $9.2 billion military construction request, ensuring that a lot of military housing will remain substandard. President Bush's fiscal year 2004 budget plan even proposes to cut Impact Aid funding by over $200 million, with the entire reduction to come from the portion designed to support the education of children of military personnel.
As hundreds of thousands of our sons and daughters are still in harm's way, his cuts are particularly offensive. Except for political show, President Bush is no friend of the military.

I encourage readers to write similar letters to the editors of your local papers.

Big Electronic Voting Machines Story

Scoop: Inside A U.S. Election Vote Counting Program.

This story says that votes can be changed in the software used at a county election headquarters, where the voting machines send their data after the election - and shows some evidence that suggests the software is set up for this!

Is It Legal?

GOP.gov? Is that even legal?

Precinct Work

There's a guest post at Interesting Times, talking about how to do precinct work. THIS is how you win elections! Please go read this, and start thinking about it.

If YOU could do this where YOU live, starting soon, getting your neighbors registered to vote, and then getting them to the polls on election day, it really can make enough of a difference to change the election results! This is the old-fashioned way, and it works.

It's Not Just The Information

In previous posts I have said that if more Americans were getting actual news they might change their opinion of President Bush and the far right. Recent polls showing that Americans still believe that Iraq was at least partly behind 9/11 are examples of beliefs based on lack of information or misinformation.

Today I was reading the comments over at tacitus' blog. In particular this post. And in particular there look for comments from "carter." Or, if you can stand it, go read any comments over at Free Republic on any given day. I think the problem is deeper than just information, it goes to the context for understanding the information. For some, simply being told (by the right people, with the right code words) that Bush is "a good Christian" is enough, and after that it simply does not matter what he does or says, they'll support him.

For others, knowing that Bush supports the correct policies of the right is enough, and it simply does not matter what else he does or says - even if he publicly says something completely opposite of what they know his position to be; the lying doesn't matter, doesn't bother them at all. An example of this is in the comments is AmeriCorps where the commenter faults Bush for starving AmeriCorps rather than killing it. So he understands that Bush is starving it - but in public Bush SUPPORTS AmeriCorps! I guess that's OK. That's something I have noticed - the lying is OK as long as you they think Bush is on "their side."

Virtual Journalist

Virtual Journalist

Gary Hart

Gary Hart on patriotism.

Big Mistake

In the Ideologues piece below I linked to the wrong article. What's interesting is that I linked to a Democratic Leadership Council (Lieberman supporters) piece where they call Dean supporters ideologues. I meant to link to a right-wing piece that called Democrats "ideologues," because I have been seeing more and more from the far right types calling people who oppose them "ideologues" which I thought was interesting. Inoculation - accusing someone of being what you are, to divert the public from seeing what you are up to. A favorite Republican tactic.

It's an interesting mistake, though.

Kucinich

Considering that MoveOn.org was started by people fed up with the impeachment drive against President Clinton, I wonder how Rep. Kucinich explains the following?

House Votes on the Impeachment Inquiry

Friday, October 9, 1998

Following are the 31 Democrats who voted with 227 Republicans yesterday to launch an impeachment inquiry of President Clinton:

Boswell (Iowa), Condit (Calif.), Cramer (Ala.), Danner (Mo.), Etheridge (N.C.), Evans (Ill.), Goode (Va.), Hall (Tex.), Hamilton (Ind.), John (La.), Kind (Wis.), Kucinich (Ohio), Lampson (Tex.), Lipinski (Ill.), Maloney (Conn.), McCarthy (N.Y.), McHale (Pa.), McIntyre (N.C.), Minge (Minn.), Moran (Va.), Peterson (Minn.), Pickett (Va.), Roemer (Ind.), Sisisky (Va.), Skelton (Mo.), Spratt (S.C.), Stenholm (Tex.), Tauscher (Calif.), Taylor (Miss.), Turner (Tex.), Weygand (R.I.).

I wonder how many MoveOn primary voters knew this?

Update - "I am happy that I was able to play such a key role in bringing about the formation of this fine organization." Does that work?

Update 2 - Seriously, I agree with almost all of Rep. Kucinich's positions and I respect him and recognize his courage and commitment in running for President. But the investigation and impeachment of President Clinton - and the terrible hounding of so many others who were dragged into that terrible witchhunt - was wrong, and was an entirely partisan act. Rep. Kucinich had no business lending any support to the Republicans on this, and should not have contributed his name to any claim the Republicans might have made of any degree of bipartisan support whatsoever for their attempted overthrow of our last legitimately elected President.

Voting Machines Article

Newsday.com - In Computerizing Voting, Memory Would Help.

I Feel A Draft

I feel a draft coming.

Bring Them On

Bring Them On. (High bandwidth necessary)

Howard Dean Is Not A TV Show

Now that Governor Dean is a front-runner, the press is spinning its conventional wisdom that he is a creation of the Internet. This is more of their just not getting it.

Saying that the Internet is behind Dean's popularity is like saying that Jerry Brown's 1992 grassroots surge was due to his having an 800 number. Dean's popularity comes from a public hungry for a leader who will take on Bush and the right, challenge the lies, and fight for them against the terrible right-wing assault that is going on.

My experience has been that people see Dean's speech to the California Democratic Convention, and they immediately are a Dean supporter. That is not because of the Internet, it is because of the appeal of finally knowing that there is a leader who is on their side. Watch the speech. (Watch it again, it's just great every time.) Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren wrote that "Quite a few of the delegates actually cried as they heard him speak." THAT is why people are supporting Dean - because of what he says and what he stands for.

Gov. Dean's campaign is not the usual Washington-based political phenomenon, which leaves many in the "establishment" bewildered. It is an honest grassroots campaign. His appeal is that he seems to understand what is happening in the country, wants to do something about it, and is not "spinning" what he says in an attempt to appeal to some imagined "voting block." There is no sense of a "wink and a nod" as the candidate says something that everyone is supposed to understand he does not really mean, but is saying it so he can get elected. That's how the "game" is supposed to be "played", but he just isn't going along with that. I had met both Gore and Clinton, as well as been to events, and there was a bit of a sense of understanding that there are some things they were saying because they have to, to get elected. Not that it was a bad thing - more of a feeling of a necessary evil. But I have NO sense of that with Dean, yet I come away with a feeling that he CAN (and will) get elected.

The cynical mainstream media and politicos say that Dean has "veered left" (as if an A rating from the NRA is a mark of a "leftist.") They say he is "positioning" himself to the left for the primaries, and will "move to the right" for the election. They can not comprehend a candidate who is not spinning, not positioning, not "portraying himself as...," and not saying what he needs to say instead of what he thinks. And they cannot seem to cope with a candidate who can't easily be pigeonholed with a label, like "leftist." Dean's supporters understand that it's not about being a "leftist" or a progressive to say you support "the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party" - it's about caring about your country, and wanting to stand up and challenge the corporate takeover, and the bush intimidation tactics, and the reluctance to exercise oversight responsibilities, and wondering why the leadership has been compromising with Bush on so many important issues!

The establishment also cannot grasp the possibility that Gov. Dean chooses his positions by analyzing the merits of the issues instead of looking at how his answer will make him "appear." So many in the Washington establishment just don't understand this because they are so used to looking for (and using) the gimmick, the "real" agenda, and they can't believe and won't accept that there could be a candidate who isn't doing that. It is outside of their experience. It is not something that is in their worldview.

Why are they so blind to what's really going on? I think because of the nature of their position in the media or the political structure they are in a controlled-perception zone. The right has put a great deal of effort into controlling the information environment of these people, because of their position as opinion leaders and their ability to influence legislation. The right knows how to generate "conventional wisdom" and project it to the right people. I wrote about this in Getting Rolled and I think it is a good read to help understand the Washington environment.

The phony Republican news events, the "independent" media playing along & following their script, the AM radio 24-hour-a-day Republican drumbeat pounding out the lies, the slurry of misleading or blatantly deceitful op-ed pieces filling the editorial pages, the dittohead letters to the editor (or "astroturf" - phony grassroots letters generated by a marketing firm), the pack of columnists writing according to instructions FAXed over from the Heritage Foundation ) [...], pretty soon all the news stories reflect the Republican line and repeat the Republican falsehoods.

It becomes a drumbeat of constant repetition of the same lines over and over and over until they become "conventional wisdom." "Everybody knows that" so-and-so is true so there's no point wasting your energy trying to say it ain't so. Polls then show that the public (deprived of any contrasting information) solidly favors the Republican position. Calls and letters flood in to Congressional offices (from Christian Coalition phone banks). Democrats start to worry about their chances of holding office if they oppose the Republicans on this one vote.

Manipulate their information sources and you control what they perceive.

So many of the Washington establishment gets their information secondhand instead of being out here where the people are, and listening to what people are saying. When you live your life through the filter of the media world you come to accept the premises of that world as the premises of life. This leads to a simplified way of looking at the world, with a need to place everything in a stereotyped category. Experiencing the rest of America through the TV brings acceptance of the premises of TV - everyone is playing a part, everything follows a preset script, everyone fits neatly into casting department view of how people behave.

Well Howard Dean is not a TV show! Get used to it.

Ideologues

Has anyone else noticed that the latest tactic of the far-right is to call Democrats "ideologues?"

Update - I linked to the wrong article! I really did not intend to link to the DLC piece (that calls Dean supporters ideologues.) I was reading a different article! I'll try to find it. Wow.

Jesse Tafero

Support the death penalty? Read The Innocent Are Victims, Too.

Nine Point Seven

From this story, Little relief in unemployment expected soon:

Furthermore, many of the people who do have jobs are working only part-time. According to the Labor Department, if you add all the workers "marginally attached" to the labor force -- out of work and not looking for work -- to all those working part-time and those unemployed and looking for work, the unemployment rate rises to 9.7 percent.
...

Not included in this group are the untold number of people who have had to take lower-paying jobs because they can't find work in their chosen profession.

Wow.

'Bring Them On'

President Bush wants Iraqis to continue to attack Americans. 'Bring Them On', says the cowboy.

I wonder if this phrase was tested by focus groups for maximum effect on the voting public?

Commonweal Institute News

Peter Coyote has joined Commonweal Institute's Board of Advisors. There are other items of interest at Commonweal's What's New page.

Check out Commonweal's collection of articles and reports discussing problems with electronic voting machines, and their collection of links to articles, reports and resources for learning about the right-wing movement, its history, how it is funded and how it operates. These are great resources for studying these issues.

Sign up for Comonweal Institute's free newsletter. The latest issue can be read here.

Screwing with Army Times?

Democratic Veteran might have caught the administration screwing with the Army Times for political purposes. An editorial that was critical of the Bush administration has disappeared from the Army Times website.

It's A Lie

When will the press call Bush on this, and call it what it is: a big, fat LIE?

Dana Milbank wrote the story for the Washington Post, and he IS the press, and he IS pointing this out. Good for him!

Thanks to Thinking It Through.

Prospect Gets It

The American Prospect Gets It. This is the first press story about Dean that I have seen that "gets it." Maybe its because the writer did some actual research - reading the comments at Dean's blog.

Bush Snubs Mandela

President Bush becomes the first world leader to visit South Africa and not visit Nelson Mandela.

Coulter's Book

In the Washington Post today Richard Cohen writes about Ann Coulter's book, "Treason", that he is "happy" that the book is so far over the edge:

My glee in reporting that Coulter is daft is predicated on the prediction that her book, like her previous one, will be a bestseller.
[...]

It is also good news for liberals. It suggests that the right, at least the hard right, has finally dumbed out. This is the predictable cycle for all movements. They start with a genuine grievance and proceed from there to the totally ridiculous -- or, in some cases, to the downright macabre.

Cohen doesn't get it about the right. He ALMOST gets it in the next paragraph,

In some ways, the nutso American brand of archconservatism mirrors traditional anti-Semitism. Jew-haters proclaim that Jews control the media, international finance and almost everything else of importance -- but, somehow, Jews have accumulated a 2,000-year history of expulsions, pogroms and, finally, the mass murder of the Holocaust.

Meanwhile, I'm listening to Thom Hartmann's radio show, and he DOES get it. He says this book is "dangerous." and I agree completely. He says the book reminds him of "Mein Kampf," and he draws a parallel between how the right talks about "Liberals" and how Germany's right talked about Jews.

The right has destroyed the civility of our society. They have made it OK to be nasty, insulting, mocking and dismissive of more than half of all Americans. And they are proud of it. Now this book takes their anti-civility campaign a lot further. The book accuses everyone left of the Christian Coalition of hating and conspiring to destroy America. The title of the book is "Treason."

And what is the punishment for treason? As I type this, a caller on the Hartmann show asks, "Quite frankly, what are they going to do with all of us treasonous liberals?"

A New Poll

Poll Says Most Believe Saddam-9/11 Link :

Seven in 10 people in a poll say the Bush administration implied that Iraq (news - web sites) and its leader Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) were involved in the Sept. 11 attacks against the United States.
And a majority, 52 percent, say they believe the United States has found clear evidence in Iraq that Saddam was working closely with the al-Qaida terrorist organization.

The number that believes this country has found weapons of mass destruction is 23 percent, down from 34 percent in May, according to a poll conducted by the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland.

Prewar assertions by the Bush administration about al-Qaida's ties to the Iraqi government have not been proven, and weapons of mass destruction have not been found since the invasion of Iraq.

In case I haven't mentioned it, it's obvious that people who get their news from the Internet - namely us - are getting a very different picture of reality. People who get their news from the corporate media - namely most of America - are not getting accurate information. This does not serve democracy.

Insider Trading at AEI

If you know who American Enterprise Institute is, go read this at TBOGG about insider trading at AEI!

If you don't know, go here first. And here. And here.

Blatantly Exploiting A Tragedy

Over at Eschaton they have a series of "Bait and Switch" pieces talking about what the Bush people have been scamming on us. I left this comment (edited to make me look better):

As blatantly as anything you have ever seen in your life you are watching the results of politicizing what happened to the country on 9/11.

9/11 is the reason no one is paying much attention to all the things Bush is doing to the country. 9/11 is the reason they are getting away with it.

They are USING 9/11 to push through this far-right agenda. They keep the public terrified and eager for war, which leaves little room to pay attention to the complicated details of legislation. Then they push through all of this extreme far-right agenda on us, using the tactic of overwhelming us - by the time anyone can build up public support for something it's too late, and they have moved on to 3 or 4 other attacks on us. And when we DO build up public support - like we did for the FCC rule changes - they just say, "fuck you" and go ahead with their agenda anyway.

Look how MUCH they have done to change the country since 9/11 and especially since they started their drumbeat for constant war. The tax cuts have effectively gotten rid of Social Security a few years from now. The FCC change effectively gets rid of the last bits of honest news. The hidden Medicare changes in the new "drug benefit" effectively get rid of Medicare soon after the new rules kick in. Etc. and on and on. (Gutting the Clean Air act. Gutting most other environmental laws and regulations. Gutting public education. Gutting Veterans' benefits. Gutting the AmeriCorps program. Etc.)

This is the most blatant politicization of a tragedy that I have ever heard of. And BECAUSE they are so shamelessly politicizing a tragedy they are getting away with it. Everyone is too stunned to deal with it all.

One thing you can do is get everyone you know - write to your relatives, etc. - to start getting their news online, like from BuzzFlash. It's important that more people start getting good information about what is going on - that is how we can fight this. The general public DOES NOT KNOW what is really going on, because they do not have sources of good information. Help people find good sources of information by letting them know where YOU get YOUR information.

Choosing a Candidate

Liberal Oasis has a great post on choosing a candidate to support.

As for me, I just got back from an excellent Dean house party.

Hate Mail

I've been getting some hate mail since posting this about the Green Party sign that disrupted Governor Dean's candidacy announcement.

A Comment I Posted

Over at Brad DeLong's, on the effects of the Bush tax cuts:

OK, so the effects of the tax cut are not what the Republicans said they would be. It isn't about creating jobs, etc.

With everything Republicans SAY these days, you have to put your hands over your ears, and look at the effect of their ACTIONS to discern why they are doing something. What they SAY is just a smokescreen - a diversion. The EFFECT of these tax cuts is that the government has to borrow perhaps $400 billion this year, and maybe even more, and continue to do this every year from now on. This means we won't be able to pay Social Security, Medicare, or do anything else the government needs to do. And it means we'll instead be paying out massive debt interest checks to ... well guess who! (Over $300 billion interest payments this year.)

Maybe what the tax cut DOES is why they DID it.

Corrupted Absolutely

Read this story to understand the extent of the absolute, flat-out, wide-open, blatant, bald-faced, unhidden, shameless, arrogant, complete and total corruption of the Republican Party.

God Said

Zeitgeist has a piece with an Israeli newspaper claiming a quote from Bush saying directly that God told him to strike al-Queda.

Income and Taxes

New York Times story, Very Richest's Share of Income Grew Even Bigger, Data Show:

The 400 wealthiest taxpayers accounted for more than 1 percent of all the income in the United States in the year 2000, more than double their share just eight years earlier, according to new data from the Internal Revenue Service. But their tax burden plummeted over the period.

But wait, there's more:

All of the I.R.S. data is based on adjusted gross income, the figure reported on the last line on the front page of individual income tax returns.

This is a very important point in any discussion of income and taxes. This is the ADJUSTED income AFTER DEDUCTIONS. Here is a bit about why this matters:

The figures do not include the incomes of the many wealthy Americans who use shelters to reduce their reported incomes below the level of the top 400.

In 1999 and 2000, for example, William T. Esrey - then the chief executive of Sprint, the telecommunications company - earned more than $150 million in stock option profits, lofting him onto many lists of the best-paid corporate managers.

That income might have put Mr. Esrey in the I.R.S.'s top 400 taxpayers. But, as later came to light, Mr. Esrey bought a tax shelter from Ernst & Young, the accounting firm, designed to let him delay reporting the profits for tax purposes until the year 2030. Sprint's board forced Mr. Esrey to resign in March after he acknowledged that the shelter was the subject of an I.R.S. audit.

Got that? This is the income that they could not hide from taxes. There could be a tremendous amount of income that is not included in reports like this one. So when you hear right-wingers complain that the poor, suffereing rich pay a high percentage of income taxes, remember that the share of income they receive is also high, and even the shocking studies showing that the very richest are bringing in extremely high incomes - an ever higher proportion of the country's wealth - don't report the income that is sheltered from the IRS. This report, for example, saying that only 400 people receive over 1% of all the income in the United States, is skewed because it only report SOME of the income they receive!

The concentration of wealth and how it is affecting the economy is a great subject for discussion.

Oh yeah, one more thing from the story:

A second report that the I.R.S. will make public today shows that the number of Americans with high incomes who pay no taxes anywhere in the world has reached a record. In 2000, there were 2,022 Americans with incomes of more than $200,000 who paid no income tax anywhere in the world, up from just 37 in 1977, when the report was first issued.

An E-Mail I Received

I received the following e-mail, and am passing it along:

As some of you already know, two weeks ago I turned in my official letter of resignation at work. Monday was my last day as a software engineer. What now, you might be asking?

I have never been a Democrat and I have never supported the local members of the Democratic party. I never cast a vote for Bill Clinton. Yet I, like many others in this nation, Republican and Democrats alike, feel the right wing ideologues currently in charge of our country have gone too far.

For the first time since 1929, the right wing of the Republican Party controls all three branches of the government. What have they given us? Fiscal conservativeness? A balanced budget amendment? No. They have given us the largest budget deficit in U.S. history so that the people who ran Enron can receive tax cuts. Rather than balancing the federal budget they are repealing the estate tax, which affects only the top 2% of America. When pressed to instead raise the bar for the estate tax exemption to $4 million permanently, they have instead chosen to repeal it altogether. They talk about Homeland Security, while at the same time their budget policies are forcing communities all over the country to lay off police officers and fire fighters. They talk of "No child left behind" while teachers across the country are being laid off due to lack of funding. They talk of the "Clear Skies Initiative" which allows polluters to dump more toxins into the air. They pass a "Patriot Act" that compromises the Constitution by eliminating "Due Process of the Law", gutting the 4th Amendment, and allowing the government to conduct surveillance of any U.S. citizen with reduced checks and balances. They talk about "revisionist history" while leading conservative pundit Ann Coulter releases a new book arguing that Senator Joe McCarthy was "misunderstood" and a saint!

Some of you may have heard about the recent FCC vote on media ownership. FCC Chairman Michael Powell, against the wishes of over 95% of the Americans who wrote in on the issue, voted to raise the restriction on ownership limits on television and media. Republicans often argue for free markets, yet this is not just another market. Media is the fundamental vehicle for our constitutional and human right of free speech. This is why moderate Republicans led by John McCain have teamed up with Democrats to fight to overturn this decision.

The Republican Party used to be the party of fiscal responsibility and patriotic duty. Although these people are members of the Republican Party, they ARE NOT REPUBLICANS.

Some of you may have heard of Howard Dean, the 12 year former Governor of Vermont, who yesterday officially announced his candidacy for President of the United States. As Dr. Dean said in his speech yesterday, 'President Kennedy challenged us to "pass the torch to a new generation of Americans." And so, we must issue that challenge again.'

For the next year and a half, I am going to be joining 38,000 volunteers from around the country who want our country returned to us. For too long, my generation has sat on the sidelines and not engaged in the political conversation in this country. We have avoided talking about politics with our friends, our family, and especially our parents, out of fear that they may not feel the way we do. It is time for this to end.

Some of you may have heard of Dean and support his ideas, yet do not believe he can win the nomination. Well, Governor Dean recently won the Wisconsin straw poll. He is a frontrunner in all of the major polls. Last Thursday, I witnessed the Governor giving a speech to the San Francisco Bar Association that left the entire 500+ attendance audience on their feet clapping and cheering. Dean is slated to win the online MoveOn.org primary, the leading online organization of my generation, by such a wide margin that the other candidates have begun to question its legitimacy for the sole purpose of discrediting its obvious significance.

And the media? Fox News reported there were 1500 people meeting up yesterday to support the Governor's declaration when there were really closer to 30,000. Newspapers around the country sought to de-legitimize our movement by reporting that "at least 2500 people" (AP) or "more than 1000" (LA Times) showed up for the declaration, when the Burlington fire marshal himself closed down the entrance to the square because the crowd had grown to over 5000. The Bush administration, sensing a growing political force, attempted to monopolized the media by holding a policy speech at precisely the same time that Governor Dean was announcing his candidacy.

The media is not going to educate us. They are not interested in promoting a civic debate. They are not going to help us maintain a vibrant democracy. Yet we have a weapon far stronger than they do: the Internet.

Please, read the Governor's speech and look into the issues yourselves. Get involved. Attend a local Meetup event. Make your own voice heard. If you are a member of MoveOn, vote for the Governor by the end of today.

We have the power to win this battle, but we must do it ourselves.

Chris Zychowski

Great letter. (Actually no one is expected to win the MoveOn primary.)

By the way - a few hundred readers are going to be asking -- just WHERE is that software engineer job opening up?

Dean On Meet The Press

I just watched the tape of Gov. Dean on MTP. I thought Russert was just fine, and did a good job. He was doing his job, getting answers for his viewers, asking tough questions, and nothing is wrong with that. I only wish that at least ONE reporter would have asked - or will EVER ask - Bush similarly tough questions! I think there is a scandal that they do not and the public is right to be demanding a press that does its job!

To me, Russert wasn't hostile, he was tough. I think if you are going to be on Meet the Press for an hour you ought to be prepared for the questions that opponents are throwing at you in the press. As they say, this is the big leagues. I don't think you should have stock-prepared answers that you repeat over and over, but I don't think you should be trying to find words to answer questions that obviously are going to come up. It is not unfair for Russert to ask about things people are writing, and because these things are appearing in the press - fairly or unfairly - Dean should be able to respond. This is nothing compared to what's coming from the Right and I have supported Dean because he said he is going to fight back.

In the military questions I think Russert asked appropriate questions and was fair. He said he was asking the questions to which people are going to want to know the answers, and he was right. I'm surprised if Dean does not have someone around him who anticipates questions like these and prepares him to answer. I think he has a great point that it is 6 months from the first Democratic primary - but on the other hand he has himself an hour on MTP to respond to the things that have been thrown at him lately, so he might have been better prepared. Bush was an ignorant guy who was finally convinced to do his homework on the campaign trail. I don't want Dean to get a rep as a smart guy who doesn't do his homework. (Also Dean missed a big opportunity to point out that Bush was aWol.)

His answer to the gay marriage question was the correct legal answer, which is good. But for a minute it looked like he was trying to avoid saying something that would alienate middle America rather than leading people toward the humane position. But he recovered and recovered well.

All that said, I think Dean did a good job, could have been better, and that he will learn from this. I understand the situation with his son had just occurred and that certainly cut into preparation time and threw him off balance a bit. There's 6 months before the first primary. I trust this guy, I agree with most of his positions. I feel that he is a natural leader. He even got me thinking about the death penalty with his answer on that question, so I respect his position. (I support the death penalty in only one circumstance - a person who has killed, is repeatedly violent in prison, and is obviously and seriously dangerous to the life of prison guards. I think the only ethical position there is to support the death penalty or guard that prisoner yourself. I could be convinced that I'm wrong.)

Candidates at MoveOn

I've been reading all the candidates' replies to MoveOn's questions. I have to say ALL of their answers are great, and informative! (Except Lieberman - see below.) Also, their statements to MoveOn members an be found by clicking on their pictures here.

There is a Lieberman statement but the page has this statement regarding his participation in the questions: "The Lieberman Campaign opted not respond to the MoveOn interview."

Byrd

A speech by Senator Byrd that every American should read. Send it to your friends and family.

It is in the compelling national interest to examine what we were told about the threat from Iraq. It is in the compelling national interest to know if the intelligence was faulty. It is in the compelling national interest to know if the intelligence was distorted.

Mr. President, Congress must face this issue squarely. Congress should begin immediately an investigation into the intelligence that was presented to the American people about the pre-war estimates of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction and the way in which that intelligence might have been misused. This is no time for a timid Congress. We have a responsibility to act in the national interest and protect the American people. We must get to the bottom of this matter.

...

Well, Mr. President, this is no game. For the first time in our history, the United States has gone to war because of intelligence reports claiming that a country posed a threat to our nation. Congress should not be content to use standard operating procedures to look into this extraordinary matter. We should accept no substitute for a full, bipartisan investigation by Congress into the issue of our pre-war intelligence on the threat from Iraq and its use.

And there is no possible reason an Amdinistration would not want to get to the bottom of what happened ... unless...

Please read the whole speech. We're witnessing history shaping up here.

Mr. President, the American people have questions that need to be answered about why we went to war with Iraq. To attempt to deny the relevance of these questions is to trivialize the people's trust.

The business of intelligence is secretive by necessity, but our government is open by design. We must be straight with the American people. Congress has the obligation to investigate the use of intelligence information by the Administration, in the open, so that the American people can see that those who exercise power, especially the awesome power of preemptive war, must be held accountable. We must not go down the road of cover-up. That is the road to ruin.

Gary Hart

Gary Hart has some good posts up.

But the war on terrorism is now the excuse for America to assume imperial powers and to employ those powers even when our traditional allies oppose our actions. The war on terrorism is fundamentally altering our global policies. We have discarded our half-century reliance on the Atlantic Alliance for collective security. We have marginalized the United Nations at the precise time it should have been empowered to undertake peacemaking roles. And we have alienated key regional powers, including Russia, China, and India, at a time when we should be encouraging them to assume greater responsibilities for regional stability.

All this has transpired in the space of a few months without congressional hearings or review, any comprehensive statement by the administration, serious editorial discussion, or public debate over this new foreign policy. Throughout American history major departures in foreign policy have been the occasion for lively, even contentious debate. This has not been the case as the war on terrorism morphed into the centerpiece of a new imperial foreign policy.

And a great supplement to what I wrote the other day:

Second, we've had satellite surveillance of Iraq for many years. Either destruction or movement of large quantities of weapons of mass destruction (many barrels; many trucks) would have been detected. Let's quit pretending that these weapons, at least in the quantities that we've been warned about (and not to say the delivery systems that were being urgently built, so we were told), have become part of an international shell game. No one in the intelligence community believes that, and neither should we.

Thanks to uggabuga, who got it from Roger Ailes, we find this in the Washington Post:

In a U.S. News & World Report column about frivolous lawsuits, owner Mort Zuckerman serves up a couple of doozies:

"A woman throws a soft drink at her boyfriend at a restaurant, then slips on the floor she wet and breaks her tailbone. She sues. Bingo -- a jury says the restaurant owes her $100,000! A woman tries to sneak through a restroom window at a nightclub to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. She falls, knocks out two front teeth, and sues. A jury awards her $12,000 for dental expenses."

Great stuff -- and, unfortunately for Zuckerman, totally bogus. Two Web sites -- StellaAwards.com and Snopes.com -- say the cases of the soda-slipping Pennsylvania woman and the window-wriggling Delaware woman are fabricated, and no public records could be found for them.

Zuckerman has plenty of company. A number of newspapers and columnists have touted the phantom cases since they surfaced in 2001 in a Canadian newspaper.

Ken Frydman, Zuckerman's spokesman, did not dispute that the pair of cases in the column two weeks ago were imaginary, but would not address whether the magazine will publish a retraction.

"These cases were reported in a variety of other reputable publications, such as the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and the London Telegraph, and Mr. Zuckerman could have cited dozens of other cases," Frydman says. "Few Americans would disagree with the proposition that there are far too many frivolous lawsuits filed."

In a letter to the magazine, Mary Alexander, president of the Association of Trial Lawyers of America, chides Zuckerman for using "phony, nonexistent lawsuits that have been widely exposed as 'urban myths' to justify his assault on our legal system."

Does anyone remember when President Clinton was accused of selling plots in Arlington Cemetery? (Especially read this.) When the story was shown to be fabricated (it was in a Moonie magazine - Insight) one pundit wrote that it was a justified story because it "sounded like something Clinton could have done."

Totally fabricated "news" reports are OK, because they fit the line that someone is paying to drive into the public mind. Would it be interesting if we learned that the same people (search for "tort") who are behind the anti-Clinton efforts were also funding the tort reform movement?

By the way, why is this Zuckerman story fabrication somehow different from that Blair did at the NY Times? Why are ANY of the reporters and pundits who went after Clinton still employed?

Dirty Tricks & Differences

I'm watching Governor Dean's declaration of candidacy on the web, and have to make one comment. I see that the Green Party is practicing Republican-style dirty tricks. They're trying to ruin his announcement by holding up a giant Vote Green sign right behind him, so it's the backdrop that everyone sees. Nasty. I think it says a lot about the Greens that they emulate the Republican model of no respect for others.

Another thing I notice is that there are no goons "escorting" the sign holder away from the camera's view. We all know what would happen if someone tried this at a Republican rally. I wonder what would happen if Dean peop-le tried this at a Green rally? We don't know because they haven't - in fact they have reached out to the Greens.

Update -OK, I was unfair to the Greens there. It was one or two people holding up that sign, not the Green Party. I was trying to provoke a couple of regular Green commenters I have here, but I was a little too harsh. Sorry. And the darn comments aren't even working today anyway.

How To Counter The Right

Over at The Left Coaster they're continuing the discussion of how to get a moderate/progressive message out. Go have a read and leave a comment.

Here's a comment I left: (EDMMLB -- Edited to make me look better.)

Reply to CTDem2 - "Toss a thousand coins, and 700 come up heads; the next thousand coins will probably bring the average closer to center."

Not if someone is catching the coins in the air and then placing them on the ground heads up. This is the analogy to what the right is doing to our society.

Societies do not self-regulate. In fact, once the mechanisms for moderation are removed - as has happened here with the right wing takeover of the press, the courts and the media, history shows that they become more extreme.

We're all going to have to donate our time, energy and money to combating the right and restoring moderating influences to our society. It isn't going to happen by itself.

Reply to comment from pessimist -- I don't think the fault lies with the Democrats. Politicians respond to the public. The right changed the PUBLIC, and that is how they took over the Republican Party. They were able to do this because Scaife and a few others stepped up to the plate and provided the money. On the moderate/progressive side our philanthropists are NOT funding the kind of organization that can make a difference - except in the case of Podesta's American Majority Institute. But while that is a very necessary component of what we need to do, it is a short-term, "hot issues" Washington-focused organization. This is much needed, but without working to change the broad, general public it is only going to fight a defensive action to try to hold back the onslaught.

What we need is for our philanthropists to step up to the plate and start funding organizations that work over the long term to change the public BACK to moderate/progressive principles. We need a Scaife of our own, and a few others, to start funding progressive ADVOCACY organizations, that work to change the broad, GENERAL public back to progressive principles of helping each other, supporting equality and democracy, respecting community, supporting collective bargaining, and other ways that people work together to combat the influence of money. This means things like working in the South and the Midwest and churches - advertising at auto races, football games, writing general-interest books, producing movies, etc.

It's a big task, but the model is in front of us. The right has been successful and we can look at how they did it. They build their system over time using a trial-and-error approach. By following the model they have developed we can take advantage of what they have learned and get this going in a much shorter time.

One thing we need to do is recognize just how broad the right-wing infrastructure is. The people you see speaking on TV are FUNDED. People like Bill Bennett are FUNDED. The organizations that promote their ideas are FUNDED. Their activists are FUNDED! And this is what WE need as well!

But there is MORE money on the moderate/progressive side - and there are MORE people. The problem is that our philanthropists are funding narrow-focus environmental programs, etc. This is great, but with the right's attack going on it's almost useless - a waste of money. If they would divert 10-20% of that funding to building a broad progressive infrastructure similar to the right's, developing public support of progressive principles in general, then this public support leads to progressive candidates getting elected - and even leads to environmental organizations, etc. having a broader base of funding support - all of which leads to the accomplishment of the very goals that the original narrow-focused programs were trying to achieve! It is an INVESTMENT and it will pay results. So the philanthropic community - the foundations, etc. - need to wake up and see that their money is wasted without building broad public support for progressive principles.

No Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

The Wurlitzer is trying out the focus-group tested "he hid them or moved them out of the country" excuse for no weapons of mass destruction (WMD) being found in Iraq. I want to remind you of something. Before the war, when the inspectors were still in Iraq, the Bush people were saying that they needed to be able to talk to scientists in private, with their families protected, so the scientists could feel safe telling them what they knew.

Well, now we control Iraq (mostly), and we're not only able to protect the scientists and their families, we're certainly offering unbelievable rewards to anyone who can bail Bush out and provide evidence of WMD. So far no scientists, no technicians, not even any anthrax-lab janitors have come forward to say that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. We haven't found any storage locations, not even recently emptied. We haven't found any labs. No trucks for moving them to war zones. No remotely guided aircraft. No soldiers who talk about having seen stockpiles of curiously guarded bombs or shells. No anything. Nowhere. Nothing.

Whatever the reason we got into this war - intelligence failure, people hearing what they want to hear, intelligence agencies ordered to manipulate information, manipulation of our entire intelligence process by Iraqi exiles, flat-out lying by fanatics intent on starting a war for geopopolitical conquest, or just an old-fashioned scam to seize the oil, loot the country and give lucrative construction contracts to cronies - we have invaded a country that did not threaten us, we're stuck there now with soldiers dying and this will go on for years, the world hates us, and the government and the administration have no credibility left.

It is urgent that we remove this President from office and begin attempts to repair the damage.

Why Bush Must Be Removed -- A Comment I Left

Here's a comment I left, to this post over at Daily Kos: (edited to make me look better)

When a President of the United States comes to the public and says there is a threat and he needs our support to deal with it, then we gotta go along. He might be right. He might know something we don't. It's the President's job, so we gotta trust him on this. It's our security, and our lives on the line.

So if a President abuses this, or even uses this incompetently, where does that leave us? Breaking down the trust between the public and Office of the President on this kind of thing it opens us up to doubt or cynicism if there is a next time. This endangers the country.

There is no question that the Office of the President was misused over the Iraq issue and over national security issues. Calling for a war vote before the election was an abuse - it necessarily brought politics into the issue when it could have been avoided. Creating the Department of Homeland Security the way they did was pure politics. Saying there was an imminent threat from Iraq when, at the very least, the intelligence did not support such a claim, opens the public up to doubt the next time a President needs to protect us from an ACTUAL threat.

This is why this President must be removed from office. He has broken the bond of trust between the public and the Office of the President on the most critical issue, and politicized the process, and this has placed us all in danger should there be an ACTUAL threat to our nation and our lives in the future.

Update - this continues in the post above titled, "No Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq."

Pundits and Blogs

I read the San Jose News on paper, then onto the web and read the NY Times and the Washington Post every morning. I read the professional high-paid pundits like David Broder. Usually, they are a yawn. (Krugman's never a yawn, but his day job isn't pundit.)

And then I read things like this post, Dwarves and Midgets by Steve Gilliard over at Daily Kos. Compare this GREAT piece to the tired inside-the-beltway crap you read from the professionals, who are pulling in hundreds of thousands a year. There just is no comparison. That's "old media." Blogs are new media.

Reading some of the great stuff I find on weblogs feels a bit like when Clinton won in 1992 and we all felt so good about a new generation taking over from the tired old politics-as-usual crowd. Blogging isn't a new generation, it's a new way of expressing opinions. New media. I think if Gilliard got a job as a pundit making hundreds of thousands he would probably become a tired boring David Broder. (Wow a number of bloggers are pissed at me now! They were hoping blogging would take them to the top-tier make-a-million level.)

Anyway, good post, Steve.

He's Baaaack

Digby's Back!

Part 203 In The Continuing Series Titled, "A Comment I Left"

Here is a comment I left, over at Atrios (edited to make me look better.)

I think the full impact of two recent events are going to take some time to dawn on all of us.

1) We just went to war with a country that did not threaten us. However we got there, that is a huge change in the nature of our country, and a huge change in the world order. As the world recedes from the fog of propaganda surrounding this war the consequences will begin to appear. I think it still has only barely started to dawn on everyone how big a deal it is that this happened - never mind how we got there.

2) We are only starting to wake up to the consequences of the Bush tax cuts. Before the tax cuts the administration was assaulting everything we care about, on many fronts at once, overwhelming our ability to gather a response. But the tax cuts - they have virtually destroyed the government a few years out. Aside from the international consequences of racking up that much debt there is the effect on the ability to pay for our government -- Starting a few years from now Social Security is gone, Medicare is gone, even fixing roads is gone! As I said, the consequences of ALL the money being gone are only beginning to dawn on us.

The Pop-Up Is Gone

OK, the Dean pop-up is gone. I couldn't stand it anymore, and readers were complaining. All of you who were annoyed are now ethically bound to go contribute to Dean so he can show a great quarter at the end of the money, and become the nominee, and get Bush out of the White House.

I actually think there is some validity to determining the viability of a candidate by how much money the candidate can raise early in the process. It is a gauge of whether the candidate is able to generate committed support, which is necessary to sustain a campaign for the White House. BUT I think it is just as important to look at the number of donors as it is to look at the amount. If a candidate is able to inspire a lot of people to send $100 checks, that says a lot. If a candidate is mostly raising $2000 check, that's a different story - that tells you how many rich people who don't CARE about spending $2000 the candidate attracts, and could lead to absurd pro-rich positions like supporting repealing the estate tax.

I think people who send $100 checks are almost always people for whom that $100 really matters. I think people who can send $2000 are more likely to be people to whom $2000 doesn't matter all that much.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying to send $100 if you CAN send $2000! Gov. Dean needs every penny if he's going to be able to go after Bush.

I will be writing about how I think we can beat Bush's money advantage. I've been percolating an idea.

Stolen Election Coin

Check out the Stolen Election Coin!

Bubbles and Disconnects

Paul Krugman starts his column today with:

"The big rise in the stock market is definitely telling us something. Bulls think it says the economy is about to take off. But I think it's a sign that America is still blowing bubbles ?— that a three-year bear market and the biggest corporate scandals in history haven't cured investors of irrational exuberance yet."

A news story this morning, Foreclosures Hit Record High in 1st Qtr:

Home loans in the process of foreclosure climbed to 1.2 percent of all mortgages in the first quarter, beating the previous high of 1.18 percent set in the fourth quarter of 2002, the Mortgage Bankers Association of America said.

Mortgages entering the foreclosure process rose in the quarter to 0.37 percent from 0.35 percent in the fourth quarter.

The percentage of all loans for one- to four-unit homes that were delinquent -- at least 30 days overdue -- slipped to 4.52 percent from 4.53 percent in the fourth quarter.

And a little story in this morning's San Jose Mercury News, Home sellers paring prices to speed deals:

"In general, homeowners are selling at lower prices, even in the lower-end ranges of homes,'' said Richard Calhoun, of Creekside Realty, who tracks Silicon Valley real estate data. "With increased inventory, buyers have more choice. And if a seller is not aggressive on pricing, the property doesn't sell.''
...

The drop in prices in May was steeper than in previous months this year, suggesting that sellers are accepting lower prices to close sales.

Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve sees a need to cut interest rates further,

All the debate in financial markets this week has been on exactly how much "insurance" the Fed will want to take out. Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan said recently that in the face of sluggish growth, insurance is cheap compared to the cost of disappointing growth that could eventually lead to deflation.

And the trade deficit, expected to decrease as the dollar falls, is rising, U.S. trade deficit swells,

The latest snapshot of trade activity reported by the Commerce Department Thursday shows that the mushrooming "current account" deficit in the first quarter was 5.8 percent larger than the previous record deficit of $128.6 billion set in the fourth quarter of 2002.

OK, the Federal Reserve is concerned enough about the economy that they are using up their last interest rate cut. The housing bubble looks like it could burst very soon. The Federal budget deficit is wildly, massively, unbelievably out of control. Japan is in deflation and Germany looks like it's there as well. The dollar has dramatically fallen, but the trade deficit is UP. And the jobs picture is still declining.

But the stock market is engaged in a major rally. What's up?

I think we're seeing one more part of what I will call a "disconnect society." This is the disconnect between the top tier of people who are doing well and managing things, and the rest of us. I think we are seeing the effects of a widening gap between the affluent and regular people, where the affluent lifestyle depends on greater and greater isolation from reality -- a reinforced head-in-the-sand view of the world.

In today's stock market rally we see a disconnect between the wealthy elite who manage the stock funds, and the real economy. They live well, they commute from the wealthy suburbs around New York into office buildings inhabited by other top tier elites, they don't know anyone who is hurting, they read the Wall Street Journal (written by other top tier elites) and they watch the world on TV. They think things are great, everyone THEY know is doing well, and we're in a "recovery" and heading for a prosperous Republican future.

We see the same disconnect in news reporting. Our local paper, the San Jose News, occasionally runs stories about how people live, and invariably picks people living in four-bedroom million-dollar houses, with six-figure incomes, and tells their readers how hard things are for them because their exclusive private school tuitions have risen. It is infuriating! The paper's managers, editors and reporters are well-paid and live in that top-tier world. The news anchors and reporters on the networks make seven figure salaries. The head of the companies they glorify make hundreds of millions! The politicians make six figures and live in the Washington yuppisphere - and say that people who talk like I am talking are on the "fringe."

And people in business are living this disconnect. Look what they expect people to be able to pay. Cable TV with a premium channel is $65-70 per month. A cable modem or DSL is another $40-50. (Cable modem is better.) A cell phone account for two is $65 or so. Then they show up with offers for internet or satellite radio for another $10-20 per month and think people can afford it - because THEY can. Never mind that they are moving YOUR job to India. I'm not talking about essential services here; my point is that they're trying to get customers and are pricing for a society that is living like they are. (Health insurance - $500 a month for a couple, minimum.)

I'll write more about this disconnect society. Leave a comment.