1/10/2004
It Begins
The smearing starts:
"A senior administration official said O'Neill's 'suggestion that the administration was planning an invasion of Iraq days after taking office is laughable. Nobody listened to him when he was in office. Why should anybody now?' "Man, is this guy gonna get smeared, or what? I can hear Rove now, "Paul, I don't want to do this to you, but I have a reputation to maintain. It's business, not personal. If I let you get away with this, pretty soon every cabinet member or reporter will be telling what they know. It's business, Paul, not personal."
Let's hope Cheney doesn't die
Because according to the Constitution, if Cheney dies George W. Bush will become President!
Juan Cole on the Paul O'Neill interview.
Juan Cole on the Paul O'Neill interview.
Is It For Real?
Drudge has this report up: SAYS INVASION OF IRAQ WAS PLANNED IN THE FIRST DAYS OF THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION LONG BEFORE 9/11... (Second source here):
Update -This is serious shit. From the Nuremberg Indictments, Count 2, "Crimes against peace":
The Bush Administration began laying plans for an invasion of Iraq including the use of American troops within days of President Bush's inauguration in January of 2001, not eight months later after the 9/11 attacks as has been previously reported. That is what former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill says in his first interview about his time as a White House insider. O'Neill talks to Lesley Stahl in the interview, to be broadcast on 60 MINUTES Sunday, Jan. 11 (7:00-8:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.This is huge! If you combine this with the reports that Cheney's "secret energy task force" was meeting with oil companies to divide up Iraq's oil, long before 9/11, we have a criminal conspiracy to invade another country. And I don't mean in our own paranoid fantasies where we imagine the worst about this crowd, I mean for real.
[. . .] O'Neill, fired by the White House for his disagreement on tax cuts, is the main source for an upcoming book, "The Price of Loyalty," authored by Ron Suskind. Suskind says O'Neill and other White House insiders he interviewed gave him documents that show that in the first three months of 2001, the administration was looking at military options for removing Saddam Hussein from power and planning for the aftermath of Saddam's downfall, including post-war contingencies like peacekeeping troops, war crimes tribunals and the future of Iraq's oil. "There are memos," Suskind tells Stahl, "One of them marked 'secret' says 'Plan for Post-Saddam Iraq.'" A Pentagon document, says Suskind, titled "Foreign Suitors For Iraqi Oilfield Contracts," outlines areas of oil exploration. "It talks about contractors around the world from...30, 40 countries and which ones have what intentions on oil in Iraq," Suskind says.
Update -This is serious shit. From the Nuremberg Indictments, Count 2, "Crimes against peace":
All the defendants with divers other persons, during a period of years preceding 8 May 1945, participated in the planning, preparation, initiation, and waging of wars of aggression, which were also wars in violation of international treaties, agreements, and assurances.So this has got me re-reading the indictment from the start, and I have to say it is not all that unlike a description of what has been happening here. Like this:
(c) The Nazi conspirators conceived that, in addition to the suppression of distinctively political opposition, it was necessary to suppress or exterminate certain other movements or groups which they regarded as obstacles to their retention of total control in Germany and to the aggressive aims of the conspiracy abroad. Accordingly:Or how about accomplishing the same results by infiltrating and taking over Christian organizations, and telling the public that our leader is taking directions from God...(1) The Nazi conspirators destroyed the free trade unions...
(2) The Nazi conspirators, by promoting beliefs and practices incompatible with Christian teaching, sought to subvert the influence of the churches over the people and in particular over the youth of Germany.
Does any of this strike a familiar chord?(3) The persecution by the Nazi conspirators of pacifist groups, including religious movements dedicated to pacifism, was particularly relentless and cruel.etc...
1/09/2004
No Mystery: The Iraq War was a Fraud
Following Kenneth Pollack, Kevin Drum asks "Why were we so wrong about Iraq's WMD?"
The Iraq war was a successful fraud abetted by a hopelessly servile press and foreign-affairs establishment. Pollard played a key role.
The Rove administration fully believes that perception is more real than reality, and indeed, at crunch time very few people were corny, old-fashioned, or stodgy enough to stick out their necks and reject the hype. A lot of people who thought they were inside players turned out to be suckers. It happens all the time: "You can't cheat an honest man".
Adventurists are gamblers: "Let's take a shot at this and see what happens". Very few in the administration believed either the al Qaeda story or the WMD story; those stories were just PR. They figured that once the rubber hit the road, the combination of hysteria, gloating, and rabid patriotism would keep dissent intimidated.
The only thing that screwed them up was that the occupation turned out be a lot tougher than expected. They believed that everyone in Iraq hated Saddam (not true) and that once Saddam and his supporters were gone, all problems would disappear (also not true).
The official story changed several times, and not everyone cared. Up until recently (they aren't saying it much any more) the semi-offical line was "The details don't make any difference: WE WON, and that will be enough for the American people!"
It almost worked. And it might still, if they manage to find another crisis.
The Iraq war was a successful fraud abetted by a hopelessly servile press and foreign-affairs establishment. Pollard played a key role.
The Rove administration fully believes that perception is more real than reality, and indeed, at crunch time very few people were corny, old-fashioned, or stodgy enough to stick out their necks and reject the hype. A lot of people who thought they were inside players turned out to be suckers. It happens all the time: "You can't cheat an honest man".
Adventurists are gamblers: "Let's take a shot at this and see what happens". Very few in the administration believed either the al Qaeda story or the WMD story; those stories were just PR. They figured that once the rubber hit the road, the combination of hysteria, gloating, and rabid patriotism would keep dissent intimidated.
The only thing that screwed them up was that the occupation turned out be a lot tougher than expected. They believed that everyone in Iraq hated Saddam (not true) and that once Saddam and his supporters were gone, all problems would disappear (also not true).
The official story changed several times, and not everyone cared. Up until recently (they aren't saying it much any more) the semi-offical line was "The details don't make any difference: WE WON, and that will be enough for the American people!"
It almost worked. And it might still, if they manage to find another crisis.
Voting Machines Story
According to this Miami Herald story, New system no easy touch for 134 voters in Broward,
"In Tuesday's special election to fill state House seat 91, 134 Broward voters managed to use the 2-year-old touch-screen equipment without casting votes for any candidate.So one candidate "won" by 12 votes, but somehow 134 votes were not ocunted. And there is no paper trail to show what happened.
How so many happened to cast nonvotes remains a riddle. Unlike with punch cards or paper ballots, there's no paper record with electronic voting that might offer a clue to the voter's intent.
The percentage of nonvotes -- 1.3 percent -- is modest compared to the days of ''hanging'' and ''pregnant chads.'' But in Tuesday's race, every vote was crucial. In a seven-candidate field, Ellyn Bogdanoff beat Oliver Parker by just 12 votes."
A Comment I Left
Here's a comment I left to this post at Hullabaloo, talking about the Club For Growth's anti-Dean ad:
"The thing is, ANYthing that is repeated over and over, without being countered in time, will become accepted as a truth. Marketers do this because it works.
My favorite example is people saying they shouldn't switch to satellite TV because wind knocks over the dishes. And also, DSL is better than cable modems because cable modems are shared with lots of people. Both of these claims are just hogwash, of course, but the ads were repeated into a vacuum - an area where people had no other information but did have an interest in learning, and the claims sounded reasonable.
This stuff WORKS. If you can plant your message repeatedly before counter messages are out there you win. It is VERY difficult to counter a "conventional wisdom" once it has taken hold. The Right's marketing infrastructure operates on this principle.
One thing the Right has that moderates and progressives don't seem to understand very well, is marketing. I mean, the Right is populated by people with corporate backgrounds and a cynical view that you can sell air if you just market it right -- coming from tobacco company marketing people who were able to convince people to kill themselves while handing over their money to their executioners.
Marketing works. Repetition works. Repeating simple catch-phrases to the public works.
1/08/2004
THE MEATRIX
THE MEATRIX (found at CalPundit).
By the way, I'm not pushing vegetarianism. The article I posted before Thanksgiving on turkeys suggested buying family-farmed "heritage" turkeys. The Meatrix suggests family farms. And organic meats won't give you CJD. It is important to me that the animals have better lives.
By the way, I'm not pushing vegetarianism. The article I posted before Thanksgiving on turkeys suggested buying family-farmed "heritage" turkeys. The Meatrix suggests family farms. And organic meats won't give you CJD. It is important to me that the animals have better lives.
Mad Cow
Could Mad Cow Disease Already be Killing Thousands of Americans Every Year?:
"October 2001, 34-year-old Washington State native Peter Putnam started losing his mind. One month he was delivering a keynote business address, the next he couldn't form a complete sentence. Once athletic, soon he couldn't walk. Then he couldn't eat. After a brain biopsy showed it was Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, his doctor could no longer offer any hope. 'Just take him home and love him,' the doctor counseled his family.[1,2,3] Peter's tragic death, October 2002, may have been caused by Mad Cow disease."There are hundreds of "sporadic" cases of CJD in America, considered to arise on their own, not from eating meat. But now studies are showing that they arise in meat-eaters and may not be sporadic after all. The article is detailed, but worth reading.
Compared to people that didn't eat ham, for example, those who included ham in their diet seemed ten times more likely to develop CJD.[27] In fact, the USDA may have actually recorded an outbreak of "mad pig" disease in New York 25 years ago, but still refuses to reopen the investigation despite petitions from the Consumer's Union (the publishers of Consumer Reports magazine).[28]What it all boils down to is they ahve been feeding animals to other animals that shouldn't be eating animals, and the animals are getting or carrying this disease, and now it looks like people might be getting it, too.
Sporadic CJD has also been associated with weekly beef consumption,[29] as well as the consumption of roast lamb,[30] veal, venison, brains in general,[31] and, in North America, seafood.[32,33] The development of CJD has also, surprisingly, been significantly linked to exposure to animal products in fertilizer,[34] sport fishing and deer hunting in the U.S.,[35] and frequent exposure to leather products.[36]
We do not know at this time whether chicken meat poses a risk. There was a preliminary report of ostriches allegedly fed risky feed in German zoos who seemed to come down with a spongiform encephalopathy.[37] Even if chickens and turkeys themselves are not susceptible, though, they may become so-called "silent carriers" of Mad Cow prions and pass them on to human consumers.[38]
The recent exclusion of most cow brains, eyes, spinal cords, and intestines from the human food supply may make beef safer, but where are those tissues going? These potentially infectious tissues continue to go into animal feed for chickens, other poultry, pigs, and pets (as well as being rendered into products like tallow for use in cosmetics, the safety of which is currently under review[42]). Until the federal government stops the feeding of slaughterhouse waste, manure, and blood to all farm animals, the safety of meat in America cannot be guaranteed.Regular readers of Seeing the Forest already know about the problem in deer. Are we seeing the tip of an iceberg -- a new disease that will emerge in the next decades, thanks to deregulation and corporate greed?
The hundreds of American families stricken by sporadic CJD every year have been told that it just occurs by random chance. Professor Collinge, the head of the University College of London lab, noted "When you counsel those who have the classical sporadic disease, you tell them that it arises spontaneously out of the blue. I guess we can no longer say that."Just how bad might it be?
The most frequent misdiagnosis of CJD among the elderly is Alzheimer's disease.[55] Neither CJD nor Alzheimer's can be conclusively diagnosed without a brain biopsy,[56] and the symptoms and pathology of both diseases overlap. There can be spongy changes in Alzheimer's, for example, and senile Alzheimer's plaques in CJD.[57] Stanley Prusiner, the scientist who won the Nobel Prize for his discovery of prions, speculates that Alzheimer's may even turn out to be a prion disease as well.[58] In younger victims, CJD is more often misdiagnosed as multiple sclerosis or as a severe viral infection.[59]Still eating meat?
Over the last 20 years the rates of Alzheimer's disease in the United States have skyrocketed.[60] According to the CDC, Alzheimer's Disease is now the eighth leading cause of death in the United States,[61] afflicting an estimated 4 million Americans.[62] Twenty percent or more of people clinically diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease, though, are found at autopsy not to have had Alzheimer's at all.[63] A number of autopsy studies have shown that a few percent of Alzheimer's deaths may in fact be CJD. Given the new research showing that infected beef may be responsible for some sporadic CJD, thousands of Americans may already be dying because of Mad Cow disease every year.[64]
NPR Hates America
NPR : Measuring Costs of Iraq War:
NPR's Daniel Zwerdling reports on the number of wounded in Iraq. It's a number that is much higher than many think and also extremely difficult to come by. And of the close to 9,000 wounded, few details are available concerning their injuries.Keep in mind as you listen, these numbers are only for the Army.
What kind of disloyal, unpatriotic freak would try to report on our casualties. This guy should be locked up.
Thanks to Atrios.
Weekly New Unemployment Claims - UNadjusted
According to the ETA Press Release: Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report:
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 546,823 in the week ending Jan. 3, an increase of 30,431 from the previous week."
1/07/2004
Digby Says About Republicans
About the Plame affair:
"These guys control all branches of government and operate above the law in plain sight with no repercussions. They’ll keep the media merrily chasing decades-old rumors of gossip of whispers that say that as a Lt Governor, Howard Dean was once seen using the office telephone for personal use, which while not specifically illegal is nonetheless shockingly improper in its appearance of impropriety."
Credit crunch coming?
Are Americans facing a credit crunch?:
" The American Bankers Association (ABA) reported Tuesday that 4.09 percent of all credit-card accounts were delinquent in the third quarter, the highest rate on record, and said the weak job market was probably to blame.Shit hitting fan yet?
But Morgan Stanley senior economist Bill Sullivan suggested there may be another culprit -- the end of the mortgage refinancing boom.
"It is no coincidence that households found it more difficult to maintain current payment schedules just as the volume of refinancing activity began to dry up as the second half of the calendar year got underway," Sullivan wrote in a research note Wednesday.
The refinancing boom, triggered as mortgage rates fell to the lowest level in a generation, offered homeowners a ready source of cash. Most consumers plowed that cash back into their houses, for new washers and dryers, carpeting or to build that new deck.
But others used it simply to pay bills, including their credit-card bills. Shut off the refi spigot, and you may have shut off the ability of some cardholders to pay. "
Overcome At A Meeting
I was at a Dean precinct-walking organizing meeting last night. One woman attending the meeting raised her hand to speak, and started to say something concerning precinct walking, and then suddenly was in tears. She explained that she had been watching some news about Iraq earlier, and had been thinking about it, and in the middle of talking she was overcome by how terrible it is what is happening, and how great it was that she was able to attend a meeting in a room full of people who are trying to do something about it.
This wasn't a "latte-drinking, body-piercing, public radio listening" caricature that the Republicans have of their opponents. This was a corporate executive. What is happening in our country is NOT the usual "political cycle."
This wasn't a "latte-drinking, body-piercing, public radio listening" caricature that the Republicans have of their opponents. This was a corporate executive. What is happening in our country is NOT the usual "political cycle."
Best Anti-Bush Ad
Bush In 41.2 Seconds. Warning, this is a SATIRE of the MoveOn ads! In fact, it captures what I thought was wrong with many of the submissions. Some of the submissions were very good, but many were just angry blasts at Bush, guaranteed to turn off most Americans. Several of the finalists fall into this category.
To reach people, it's better to show images they will identify with at an emotional level, and people who are like them, expressing views that the viewer might express. You can use a negative message to undermine support, but it's better to plant a question than to blast anger. Don't just say "Bush lies." Say something that the viewer can relate to. Remember, the viewers are starting from an attitude of liking Bush and believing his message. So you are insulting them if you are just saying Bush is wrong, or Bush is lying. That's calling the viewer a fool.
In my opinion, the MoveOn finalists that are most effective are "Child's Pay," "What are we teaching our children?," "Imagine" (borderline), and "Human Cost of War" (for other reasons - it has an emotional impact). Unfortunately there were some excellent submissions that didn't make it to the finals. One of the best that I remember was women talking to each other over coffee.
To reach people, it's better to show images they will identify with at an emotional level, and people who are like them, expressing views that the viewer might express. You can use a negative message to undermine support, but it's better to plant a question than to blast anger. Don't just say "Bush lies." Say something that the viewer can relate to. Remember, the viewers are starting from an attitude of liking Bush and believing his message. So you are insulting them if you are just saying Bush is wrong, or Bush is lying. That's calling the viewer a fool.
In my opinion, the MoveOn finalists that are most effective are "Child's Pay," "What are we teaching our children?," "Imagine" (borderline), and "Human Cost of War" (for other reasons - it has an emotional impact). Unfortunately there were some excellent submissions that didn't make it to the finals. One of the best that I remember was women talking to each other over coffee.
Time To Boycott NPR
Read this at Eschaton, and be sure to read the references a Media Whores Online.
I think it is time for a very public boycott of NPR. I think we're seeing an example of NPR's response to the pressure from the right. Well, guess what, WE are Americans. too. OUR interests are just as legitimate as those of the right-wingers.
I think it is time for a very public boycott of NPR. I think we're seeing an example of NPR's response to the pressure from the right. Well, guess what, WE are Americans. too. OUR interests are just as legitimate as those of the right-wingers.
1/06/2004
The Nation: University of California's Institute for Labor and Employment under attack by Olin/Scaife funded "think tank"
[This arrived in my inbox via the LaborGreens mailing list. The line below prompted me to post:
"Yet the question indicates how far public discourse has moved since the National Labor Relations Act became the nation's basic law giving unions legal status."
The context is a discussion of whether it is appropriate for the taxpayer to fund anything that promotes the interests of labor [in this case, academic research]. The author highlights the fact that the government spend untold millions (tens of millions? hundreds of millions?) funding programs that promote the interest of business, and that (at least on paper), the official policy of the federal government, since 1936, has been to encourage (not merely permit) collective bargaining.
Again, appropos to the theme of this web log... this is an excellent example of how the far right has attempted to shift the ground on which public policy debates occur, and of how they do it (hundreds of thousands of dollars from in Olin and Scaife money to the Pacific Research Institute in this case), with the ultimate goal being to defund and disable institutions which support progressive action and the rights of the average working person. -Thomas]
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040112&s=bacon
Class Warfare
by David Bacon
in The Nation, January 12th, 2004
The best labor studies programs like to think of themselves as
activist-oriented--firmly grounded in the gritty world of workers.
They don't usually find themselves at the center of high-profile
political disputes. But in Sacramento cloakrooms, where lobbyists
normally whisper blandishments into legislators' ears, the University
of California's labor studies program is now being discussed in
language once reserved for reds, and worse. The program, lobbyists
say, not only organized meetings to stop the recall of then-Governor
Gray Davis, but last summer "union thugs" supposedly even left those
meetings to beat up recall petition circulators.
The accusations sound pretty wild, even considering California's usual
election histrionics, but they're more than just overheated rhetoric.
It's payback time in Sacramento. When newly elected Governor Arnold
Schwarzenegger unilaterally imposed draconian budget cuts on the state
just before Christmas, he wiped out this year's remaining funding for
the Institute for Labor and Employment. If he does the same thing with
next year's appropriation in March, the institute will be destroyed.
[...]
--Thomas Leavitt
"Yet the question indicates how far public discourse has moved since the National Labor Relations Act became the nation's basic law giving unions legal status."
The context is a discussion of whether it is appropriate for the taxpayer to fund anything that promotes the interests of labor [in this case, academic research]. The author highlights the fact that the government spend untold millions (tens of millions? hundreds of millions?) funding programs that promote the interest of business, and that (at least on paper), the official policy of the federal government, since 1936, has been to encourage (not merely permit) collective bargaining.
Again, appropos to the theme of this web log... this is an excellent example of how the far right has attempted to shift the ground on which public policy debates occur, and of how they do it (hundreds of thousands of dollars from in Olin and Scaife money to the Pacific Research Institute in this case), with the ultimate goal being to defund and disable institutions which support progressive action and the rights of the average working person. -Thomas]
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040112&s=bacon
Class Warfare
by David Bacon
in The Nation, January 12th, 2004
The best labor studies programs like to think of themselves as
activist-oriented--firmly grounded in the gritty world of workers.
They don't usually find themselves at the center of high-profile
political disputes. But in Sacramento cloakrooms, where lobbyists
normally whisper blandishments into legislators' ears, the University
of California's labor studies program is now being discussed in
language once reserved for reds, and worse. The program, lobbyists
say, not only organized meetings to stop the recall of then-Governor
Gray Davis, but last summer "union thugs" supposedly even left those
meetings to beat up recall petition circulators.
The accusations sound pretty wild, even considering California's usual
election histrionics, but they're more than just overheated rhetoric.
It's payback time in Sacramento. When newly elected Governor Arnold
Schwarzenegger unilaterally imposed draconian budget cuts on the state
just before Christmas, he wiped out this year's remaining funding for
the Institute for Labor and Employment. If he does the same thing with
next year's appropriation in March, the institute will be destroyed.
[...]
--Thomas Leavitt
Blurring the line between journalism and lobbying (from Washington Monthly).
[The item below arrived in my mailbox via the Politech mailing list, which all free thinkers and free speech advocates are highly advised to subscribe to. Thought it was appropriate to the theme of this web log. -Thomas]
Declan,
I thought you [and Politech] might enjoy this essay on the blurring line
between journalism and lobbying. The title is "Meet the Press", by
Nicholas Confessore from the December 2003 Washington Monthly.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2003/0312.confessore.html
[snip]
James Glassman and TCS have given birth to something quite new in
Washington: journo-lobbying. It's an innovation driven primarily by the
influence industry. Lobbying firms that once specialized in gaining
person-to-person access to key decision-makers have branched out. The new
game is to dominate the entire intellectual environment in which officials
make policy decisions, which means funding everything from think tanks to
issue ads to phony grassroots pressure groups.
[snip]
But TCS doesn't just act like a lobbying shop. It's actually published by
one--the DCI Group, a prominent Washington "public affairs" firm
specializing in P.R., lobbying, and so-called "Astroturf" organizing,
generally on behalf of corporations, GOP politicians, and the occasional
Third-World despot. The two organizations share most of the same owners,
some staff, and even the same suite of offices in downtown Washington, a
block off K Street. As it happens, many of DCI's clients are also
"sponsors" of the site it houses. TCS not only runs the sponsors' banner
ads; its contributors aggressively defend those firms' policy positions, on
TCS and elsewhere.
[snip]
--Thomas Leavitt
Declan,
I thought you [and Politech] might enjoy this essay on the blurring line
between journalism and lobbying. The title is "Meet the Press", by
Nicholas Confessore from the December 2003 Washington Monthly.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2003/0312.confessore.html
[snip]
James Glassman and TCS have given birth to something quite new in
Washington: journo-lobbying. It's an innovation driven primarily by the
influence industry. Lobbying firms that once specialized in gaining
person-to-person access to key decision-makers have branched out. The new
game is to dominate the entire intellectual environment in which officials
make policy decisions, which means funding everything from think tanks to
issue ads to phony grassroots pressure groups.
[snip]
But TCS doesn't just act like a lobbying shop. It's actually published by
one--the DCI Group, a prominent Washington "public affairs" firm
specializing in P.R., lobbying, and so-called "Astroturf" organizing,
generally on behalf of corporations, GOP politicians, and the occasional
Third-World despot. The two organizations share most of the same owners,
some staff, and even the same suite of offices in downtown Washington, a
block off K Street. As it happens, many of DCI's clients are also
"sponsors" of the site it houses. TCS not only runs the sponsors' banner
ads; its contributors aggressively defend those firms' policy positions, on
TCS and elsewhere.
[snip]
--Thomas Leavitt
Unprecedented In Modern Times
Reporter Mistakenly Covers Issues of Presidential Campaign @ Oliver Willis:
"The calm of the presidential campaign today was disrupted by an unprecedented event. White House press secretary Scott McClellan called the event 'disturbing', and promised it would 'be looked into at the highest levels of government'. At approxiamately 2:34pm (EST), reporter Mo Godwin of the Topeka News Tribune filed a story about the presidential campaign consisting only of perspectives on policy issues."How could this happen in America!
Prisoners Tortured?
CincyDemo blog asks: Is it true that Bush's occupation forces have tortured Iraqi POWs?.
"Ownership society" scam on the way
The good things in your life can be your own property, or they can be things which have a monetary value but aren't property in a legal sense (such as a good job with benefits, or Social Security and other entitlements), or they can be public goods such as safe neighborhoods or good public schools.
For various reasons Americans (compared to Swedes, for example) have always preferred property they can solely control to the good things which take other forms. Americans also tend to overestimate their own success and their prospects for future success. For these two reasons, Republican attempts to deliver big benefits to their rich contributers (e.g., the elimination of the "death tax") get an amazing amount of support from people who basically are fooling themselves. They think that they're property owners, but they're not. They're labor.
Almost all Americans are still labor -- dependent on their own or someone else's wages. Various legal fictions invented in order to bust unions or to evade taxes (such as declaring certain categories of workers to be "contractors" or "supervisors") obscure this fact. But if you can't live off your property but have to work for a living, you're labor. (Small businessmen are a borderline case).
Take a 45-year-old guy with a paid-up $100,000 home, a $50,000 / year job with good benefits and a pension plan (in addition to Social Security), and two kids 6 and 8 whom he plans to send to the pretty-good public schools in his neighborhood*. And suppose that he also has $30,000 on the stock market.
Because he's a home owner with money on the stock market, he might be tempted to think of himself as part of the investor class. But he's not. If he loses his job and can't get another one, he and his family will be destitute in three to five years. If his neighborhood decays, he won't be able to move. If the local schools decline, he won't be able to send them to private schools. A net worth of $130,000 really isn't very much.
But his property is his alone. He doesn't share it or depend on anyone else for it. The other goods are much more valuable all put together, but they are not his property and not in his control.
The present trend in fake Republican populism is to reduce taxes while converting various forms of government entitlements (Social Security, education, Medicare, etc.) into cash benefits or vouchers. Simultaneously, workers with piddling little stock market nest-eggs are encouraged to believe that now they've "made it". Both scams depend on the fact that money in the hand has a definite countable value and is controlled by the owner, whereas it's harder to put a dollar value on good public schools, which are a shared good.
In the vast majority of cases the guy with the money in his hand will end up worse off in the "ownership society". There is no intention to improve his life. He's being sold a pig in a poke, and once his signature is on the dotted line (i.e., once the bill passes Congress) he'll be dead meat.
There are people who will benefit from the "ownership society", of course. But they are not the ones who it's being sold to, but the ones who are selling it. That's the way scams work.
* NOTE: In large areas of the U.S. the public schools still are pretty good. Oddly, a lot of the outcry about "our failing public schools" comes from Southerners, whose schools have never been very good. You'd think they'd put their own house in order before preaching to others, but human nature doesn't work that way.
("The Rise of the Worker-Investor" by Rich Lowry of the National Review is a recent example of this scam).
Originally from this discussion on Brad DeLong
For various reasons Americans (compared to Swedes, for example) have always preferred property they can solely control to the good things which take other forms. Americans also tend to overestimate their own success and their prospects for future success. For these two reasons, Republican attempts to deliver big benefits to their rich contributers (e.g., the elimination of the "death tax") get an amazing amount of support from people who basically are fooling themselves. They think that they're property owners, but they're not. They're labor.
Almost all Americans are still labor -- dependent on their own or someone else's wages. Various legal fictions invented in order to bust unions or to evade taxes (such as declaring certain categories of workers to be "contractors" or "supervisors") obscure this fact. But if you can't live off your property but have to work for a living, you're labor. (Small businessmen are a borderline case).
Take a 45-year-old guy with a paid-up $100,000 home, a $50,000 / year job with good benefits and a pension plan (in addition to Social Security), and two kids 6 and 8 whom he plans to send to the pretty-good public schools in his neighborhood*. And suppose that he also has $30,000 on the stock market.
Because he's a home owner with money on the stock market, he might be tempted to think of himself as part of the investor class. But he's not. If he loses his job and can't get another one, he and his family will be destitute in three to five years. If his neighborhood decays, he won't be able to move. If the local schools decline, he won't be able to send them to private schools. A net worth of $130,000 really isn't very much.
But his property is his alone. He doesn't share it or depend on anyone else for it. The other goods are much more valuable all put together, but they are not his property and not in his control.
The present trend in fake Republican populism is to reduce taxes while converting various forms of government entitlements (Social Security, education, Medicare, etc.) into cash benefits or vouchers. Simultaneously, workers with piddling little stock market nest-eggs are encouraged to believe that now they've "made it". Both scams depend on the fact that money in the hand has a definite countable value and is controlled by the owner, whereas it's harder to put a dollar value on good public schools, which are a shared good.
In the vast majority of cases the guy with the money in his hand will end up worse off in the "ownership society". There is no intention to improve his life. He's being sold a pig in a poke, and once his signature is on the dotted line (i.e., once the bill passes Congress) he'll be dead meat.
There are people who will benefit from the "ownership society", of course. But they are not the ones who it's being sold to, but the ones who are selling it. That's the way scams work.
* NOTE: In large areas of the U.S. the public schools still are pretty good. Oddly, a lot of the outcry about "our failing public schools" comes from Southerners, whose schools have never been very good. You'd think they'd put their own house in order before preaching to others, but human nature doesn't work that way.
("The Rise of the Worker-Investor" by Rich Lowry of the National Review is a recent example of this scam).
Originally from this discussion on Brad DeLong
We want our jokes!
Ok, now. Neil Bush has admitted in court to suffering from herpes and to having had sex with an unknown number of mysterious women in two cities of Asia. His ex-wife is being sued for claiming that Neil was the real father of another man's child. So where are the jokes?
Leno and Letterman won't touch the story. Like all normal Americans, Leno and Letterman love scurrilous gossip. Herpes is funny. Whores are funny, especially if you don't know who's paying them. Libel suits about adultery are funny. We can all agree on that.
If any of these stories were about Bill, or Bill's no-good brother Roger, or Hillary (to say nothing of Chelsea!), we'd be having a regular laff riot right now.
So where are the jokes? Come on, guys, what's the problem? What are you afraid of? We want our jokes! We want our fun!
(Originally from a discussion on Atrios),
Leno and Letterman won't touch the story. Like all normal Americans, Leno and Letterman love scurrilous gossip. Herpes is funny. Whores are funny, especially if you don't know who's paying them. Libel suits about adultery are funny. We can all agree on that.
If any of these stories were about Bill, or Bill's no-good brother Roger, or Hillary (to say nothing of Chelsea!), we'd be having a regular laff riot right now.
So where are the jokes? Come on, guys, what's the problem? What are you afraid of? We want our jokes! We want our fun!
(Originally from a discussion on Atrios),
Introducing Zizka
Zizka here. Dave has invited me to be guest blogger here at Seeing the Forest, and I am very happy to accept his offer. Some of you may remember me from my own site, the final incarnation of which was here. I tried to kill my site for months, mostly because it took too much energy to update it often enough to keep the readers coming. Being a guest blogger will a real treat for me.
More very soon.
More very soon.
Blog Hero Award
I hereby grant the coveted Blog Hero Award to this post today: Whiskey Bar: Slander.
1/05/2004
Whiskey Bar: Deflation Nation
Whiskey Bar: Deflation Nation. I know it's long, but I feel like I'm giving everyone a heads-up if I suggest reading this. I'd feel guilty reading it and not passing it along.
The Finalists
Here are the finalists from MoveOn.org's Bush in 30 Seconds ad contest. I think they should run them all.
Stocks
Today's S&P 500 PE ratio is 30.6. See how this fits into a historical perspective here.
Update -A better chart, going back pre-1929 here.
Update -A better chart, going back pre-1929 here.
Bush Knew
William Rivers Pitt | Two Loud Words:
To put what the Repubicans are doing into perspective, think about this: Just the act of saying Republicans are better for protecting America than Democrats is a gross politicization of what happened, and is extremely divisive at a time when we should be sticking together. It weakens us. But the Republicans are going far, far beyond that. They accuse Democrats not only of lack of patriotism, but of actually "hating America" and supporting our enemies.
"George W. Bush is going to run in 2004 on the idea that his administration is the only one capable of protecting us from another attack like the ones which took place on September 11. Yet the record to date is clear. Not only did they fail in spectacular fashion to deal with those first threats, not only has their reaction caused us to be less safe, not only have they failed to sufficiently bolster our defenses, but they used the aftermath of the attacks to ram through policies they couldn't have dreamed of achieving on September 10. It is one of the most remarkable turnabouts in American political history: Never before has an administration used so grisly a personal failure to such excellent effect."We were attacked, and instead of dealing with the attack, the Republicans turned our grief and anger to their own political advantage. They passed tax cuts handing billions to campaign contributors, led us into pre-planned wars, and shamelessly set us against each other.
To put what the Repubicans are doing into perspective, think about this: Just the act of saying Republicans are better for protecting America than Democrats is a gross politicization of what happened, and is extremely divisive at a time when we should be sticking together. It weakens us. But the Republicans are going far, far beyond that. They accuse Democrats not only of lack of patriotism, but of actually "hating America" and supporting our enemies.
Donate To Disabled American Veterans
Juan Cole has a story about the large numbers of wounded in Iraq (11,000 medical evacuations). He suggests donating do the Disabled American Veterans.
1/04/2004
Dem Debate
A quick observation. Gephardt several times took past statements or positions by other candidates, distorts them, and then tries to claim this means the other candidate has a different position than that candidate really has, or that the candidate has somehow flip-flopped. He has done this several times. I like Gephardt -- a lot -- but this is the kind of thing that is so distasteful about "old politics." This is one of the tricks Republicans use.
Lieberman did this, about Dean's records. And now Kerry is doing this. What do they think they gain? The uninformed vote?
Who the hell is Michelle Norris, asking questions about "tax relief?" Tax RELIEF? She gets her questions from the Republican Party? From Lakoff:
Lieberman did this, about Dean's records. And now Kerry is doing this. What do they think they gain? The uninformed vote?
Who the hell is Michelle Norris, asking questions about "tax relief?" Tax RELIEF? She gets her questions from the Republican Party? From Lakoff:
"On the day that George W. Bush took office, the words "tax relief" started appearing in White House communiqués. Think for a minute about the word relief. In order for there to be relief, there has to be a blameless, afflicted person with whom we identify and whose affliction has been imposed by some external cause. Relief is the taking away of the pain or harm, thanks to some reliever.
This is an example of what cognitive linguists call a "frame." It is a mental structure that we use in thinking. All words are defined relative to frames. The relief frame is an instance of a more general rescue scenario in which there is a hero (the reliever), a victim (the afflicted), a crime (the affliction), a villain (the cause of affliction) and a rescue (the relief). The hero is inherently good, the villain is evil and the victim after the rescue owes gratitude to the hero. "
Brilliant
Madeleine K. Albright: Endangered friendships,
"The Republican strategy could play well among those persuaded by the administration's implicit claims that the invasion of Iraq was essentially a retaliatory measure for Sept. 11 and that attacking Saddam Hussein was simply another way of attacking Osama bin Laden.
Although unsupported by the facts - Bush himself has acknowledged that there is no evidence linking Iraq to Sept. 11 - this argument casts the war not as a subject for pragmatic discussion but rather as a moral test. The Germans and French failed this test, those advocates say, essentially deserting under fire.
The spectacle of the lone sheriff facing down the bad guys while the cowardly townspeople tremble in the background, crystalized in the classic film High Noon (1952), has deep resonance for the American electorate. Casting Bush as the rugged individualist taking on terrorists might well appeal to voters more than any Democratic insistence that the terrorist threat can be confronted and turned back only with the aid of old alliances and established institutions.
If the Republicans pursue an ideological campaign and win, the world will change in highly combustible ways.
It is one thing for an American administration to depart from traditional policies under stress and for a limited time, but it would be quite another for a president to win election with a mandate to make that departure permanent."
This Is How They Campaign For Office
This is how they do it: The following is from The Howard Dean implosion,
Here's the author's bio. Note this: "Rachel has served as a Director of a Washington, DC-based political think-tank". Try Googling her, and see how she's connected to "the movement." Go here to see the letters of praise from the White House and Ken Starr. "Thanks for everything you are doing, and have done, on behalf of the President's agenda." This is a professional, working for The Party.
Steel yourself, prepare yourself, get ready for a year of this, getting worse every single day. This is what is coming. This is what they do!
The way to fight it is to recognize that this is what they do, and not get confused by the words, and not get bogged down trying to refute each smear. Recognize that this is what they do, and tell everyone you can that this is what they do. Do your research, so you understand who is doing it and how it works. Talk to others. Write letters to newspapers. Call talk shows. Send e-mails to reporters. Demand that they stop it! And help others get angry at the perpetrators rather than fall for the scam.
"Dean's success amongst Democrats can be largely attributed to the fact that he has been able to galvanize and energize certain factions of the Democratic Party: namely the "new age hippies" and those who are seriously desperate for either a date or a party.This is not just an accidental, glib, throw-away wingnut hit piece. This is part of a coordinated, researched, tested, professional character assassination campaign that will phase in and ramp up between now and the election. This is the modern Republican Party. This is Norquist's Wednesday Meeting, and Karl Rove and the Wurlitzer, and cigarette company marketing people, and former CIA destabilization specialists all working together to do their job ON YOU! (Also see here.) This is George Bush "staying above the fray" while his subordinates engage in the nastiest kind of character assassination and voter manipulation -- spreading lying, humiliating, ridiculing smear after lying, humiliating, ridiculing smear until even YOU hate Dean! You'll see thousands of these smear jobs this year. You're going to see literally 10 or 20 of these every single day until the slime and humiliating and ridicule build up so deep that you even hate yourself just for thinking of voting.
[. . .] Essentially, it's a revamping of the "political love-in" from the '60s, where pot-smoking hippies would use politics as a guise for picking up dates. Now, Dean -- having "liberated" the gays of the state of Vermont by legislating civil unions, much in the same way he might imagine that Lincoln "liberated" the slaves -- is out to "free" every sex-starved, party-deprived Democrat and give them what they really want: a good time.
[. . .]Man, is this guy ever angry. I mean, seriously agitated. Then again, he is the poster boy for the same state (Vermont) that the Drug Enforcement Administration ranks No. 2 in the country in per-person Ritalin use, so perhaps his constant agitation is fitting.
Dean rants and raves and flings and flails so much during debates, events and appearances that I honestly don't know how anyone could picture this guy in the Oval Office, within an arm-fling's distance of the Big Red Button. It seems that once the blood gets flowing to Dean's reddened face, it all gets diverted directly from his brain, since he has a tendency of getting worked up and running off at the mouth with unsubstantiated, knee-jerk claims.
[. . .]Dean seems to have cornered the market on anti-war supporters -- the same ones who boo George W. Bush's and Ronald Reagan's names on liberal college campuses, yet cheer dictators like Saddam Hussein and Fidel Castro. If you wish Saddam Hussein was still in power, then Dean is your man.
[. . .]The obvious lesson here is if you want a safer world and a more secure America, vote for Bush; if you want Saddam Hussein and Kim Jong-Il in sensitivity training, then Howard Dean is quite clearly the guy for you."
Here's the author's bio. Note this: "Rachel has served as a Director of a Washington, DC-based political think-tank". Try Googling her, and see how she's connected to "the movement." Go here to see the letters of praise from the White House and Ken Starr. "Thanks for everything you are doing, and have done, on behalf of the President's agenda." This is a professional, working for The Party.
Steel yourself, prepare yourself, get ready for a year of this, getting worse every single day. This is what is coming. This is what they do!
The way to fight it is to recognize that this is what they do, and not get confused by the words, and not get bogged down trying to refute each smear. Recognize that this is what they do, and tell everyone you can that this is what they do. Do your research, so you understand who is doing it and how it works. Talk to others. Write letters to newspapers. Call talk shows. Send e-mails to reporters. Demand that they stop it! And help others get angry at the perpetrators rather than fall for the scam.
1/03/2004
Who Makes Policy For The United States?
Bush to Seek Immigrant Benefit Protection (washingtonpost.com):
The entire government functioninsolelyty to further the interests of the Republican Party and no other purpose.
Party over country, to an extent never before seen.
"The immigration plan is Bush's first policy announcement of his reelection year, and aides said it was calibrated by Bush's senior adviser, Karl Rove."Do you remember when Bush advisor DiIulio left, saying that the White House has no policy apparatus at all? Here's a reminder, EX-BUSH ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL TELLS ESQUIRE: NO SERIOUS CONSIDERATION GIVEN TO DOMESTIC POLICY IN WHITE HOUSE AT ALL:
"There is no precedent in any modern White House for what is going on in this one: a complete lack of a policy apparatus," DiIulio tells Esquire. "What you've got is everything—and I mean everything—being run by the political arm. It's the reign of the Mayberry Machiavellis."Think about what that meant: Bush in office with no intent to govern the country at all. And here is an example of this. When policies are announced, whose office do they come from? The POLITICAL advisor.
The entire government functioninsolelyty to further the interests of the Republican Party and no other purpose.
Party over country, to an extent never before seen.
Another Republican Smear Circulating -- Dean An Abortionist
I really didn't mean for this to be Howard Dean Smear Day (previously today this and this), but I keep coming across things ... like this, Is Dean An Abortionist?:
Is Bush going to be able to get away with this? Remember what they did to Clinton? They just made up story after story, accusation after accusation. Remember the stories about Vince Foster? Remember the stories about all the people Clinton had murdered in Arkansas? Remember the stories about crack pipes and dildos on the White House Christmas tree? THIS is what is going to happen, and after enough of it, people are just so disgusted and fed up... How many times have you heard reasonable people refer back to "the Clinton Scandals" as if there actually WERE any?! And after this, Bush runs for the White House on a theme of "restoring honor and integrity to the White House!" The nastiest, vilest, most disgusting lies were circulated -- and the ones responsible, like Ted Olson, were rewarded. Olson is now the Solicitor General of the United States! THIS is how Bush responded to that filth, using it to win the White House and rewarding the purveyors. The Republicans circulate that crap and then when the public environment is so polluted by it that the public is disgusted and turned off they USE IT to take over the government!
We just can't let them get away with it again. We just can't let this kind of tactic work for them. It demeans us all.
"But there is one area of the Dean bio that we find of particular interest, his medical degree. [. . .] Unlike many medical professionals - even former ones - Dean has a particularly strong affinity for that most controversial of medical procedures – abortion.or ... Dean's Planned Parenthood Ties Raise Questions About Abortion (a right-wing Christian site)
Listening to him in front of a women’s audience you would think abortion was his middle name.
It’s not surprising, really - Howard Dean served on the board of Planned Parenthood of Northern New England for five years. Planned Parenthood has made well over a billion dollars, profiteering on infanticide and members of the organization can be counted as among his strongest supporters. "
"The clinic where Dean interned and later worked as a contract physician began performing abortions in 1982, Silver said. It is unclear when Dean's work as a contract physician for Planned Parenthood ended.and this, Dr. Dean the Abortionist, and this at Heritage's TownHall, A Dean's list of questions,
While Dean has denied ever performing an abortion, one of his past opponents in the race for governor, Republican Ruth Dwyer, believes the Democratic presidential candidate may not be completely forthcoming."
"And speaking of controversial issues, is the Democratic Party ready to unite behind a leader who, as a med student, performed his OB-GYN rotation at a Planned Parenthood clinic? Vermont magazine reported on this in 1998, adding: "While he has never performed an abortion himself, he is strongly pro-choice and certainly understands the medical procedures involved." Which must rate as the medical equivalent of not inhaling."or this at National Right to Life, A Closer Look at Howard Dean, or this at LifeNews.com,
"Dean, who is viewed by some as the most pro-abortion presidential candidate because of the stint he performed at Planned Parenthood during medical school..."or this at PressRepublican.com, His record erodes trust,
"The only plausible explanation is that he is a political opportunist, saying and doing anything to curry the favor of some voters. It becomes clear that Gov. Dean does not believe in the dignity and sanctity of innocent human life, so how could he be trusted with deciding the destiny of people?"It is going to be a nasty campaign. The Bush family pattern is to stay above the fray while his campaign circulates the absolute nastiest character assassination imaginable. A year before the election and they are already saturating the country with rumors of every nasty accusation... and it doesn't matter how ridiculous each one is, they add up.
Is Bush going to be able to get away with this? Remember what they did to Clinton? They just made up story after story, accusation after accusation. Remember the stories about Vince Foster? Remember the stories about all the people Clinton had murdered in Arkansas? Remember the stories about crack pipes and dildos on the White House Christmas tree? THIS is what is going to happen, and after enough of it, people are just so disgusted and fed up... How many times have you heard reasonable people refer back to "the Clinton Scandals" as if there actually WERE any?! And after this, Bush runs for the White House on a theme of "restoring honor and integrity to the White House!" The nastiest, vilest, most disgusting lies were circulated -- and the ones responsible, like Ted Olson, were rewarded. Olson is now the Solicitor General of the United States! THIS is how Bush responded to that filth, using it to win the White House and rewarding the purveyors. The Republicans circulate that crap and then when the public environment is so polluted by it that the public is disgusted and turned off they USE IT to take over the government!
We just can't let them get away with it again. We just can't let this kind of tactic work for them. It demeans us all.
Lying Liars...
I almost never do this, but I had a few minutes with nothing to do, so I was clicking through the channels, and came across Beltway Boys on Fox News. They were talking about Howard Dean. What struck me was that (almost?) every single thing they said was either just false, or a gross distortion! Dean is the angry white male, while Bush is the positive, optimistic candidate. Dean's slips of the tongue are out of control. Dean said he is going to use Christianity politically, but only in the South. Dean said that Osama bin Laden shouldn't be found guilty. Dean "whined" that the other candidates are attacking him too much. Dean said he wouldn't let his supporters vote for other candidates if he doesn't get the nomination. And, of course, Dean said America is no safer with Saddam captured, which of course it is.
This is going to be a long, tough campaign, and the ONLY question is whether there will be a way to counter the lies, and reach the public past the corporate- and/or right-controlled media.
This is going to be a long, tough campaign, and the ONLY question is whether there will be a way to counter the lies, and reach the public past the corporate- and/or right-controlled media.
New Smear
Story: Reports: Dean was warned on lax Vermont security:
"Presidential hopeful Howard Dean, who accuses President Bush of being weak on homeland security, was warned repeatedly as Vermont governor about security lapses at his state's nuclear power plant and was told the state was ill-prepared for a disaster at its most attractive terrorist target."Dean was not just warned, but warned repeatedly:
"During Dean's final year in office in 2002, an audit concluded that despite a decade of repeated warnings of poor safety at Vermont Yankee, Dean's administration was poorly prepared for a nuclear disaster."So Dean's response?
""After September 11, Governor Dean decided the buck stops here in terms of security and personally ran this effort, creating a Cabinet-level agency," spokesman Jay Carson said."And,
"Dean responded by writing the head of the plant that the problems could "have an impact on the health and safety of the people of Vermont" and "it is my expectation that you will do all in your power to correct this declining trend." It was one of several such letters he wrote."Oh, well never mind, then.
Not Slick
The Former Governor: As the Race Turns Hot, What About Dean’s Collar?:
Later in the story,
"'Howard gets angry,' said one longtime friend, Thomas R. Hudspeth, a professor at the University of Vermont. 'He doesn't suffer people being unfair or duplicitous. In the heat of sports events with his kids, for instance, I can remember him yelling, red-faced, his neck muscles bulging,' if, as a spectator, he saw dishonesty among his children's opponents or poor calls by referees. 'And there were a couple of reporters who were always really good at getting his goat.'"In other words, not a slick, blow-dried, professional politician with carefully prepared, evasive non-answers guaranteed to offend no one. Oh dear! How can we allow THAT!
Later in the story,
"During the current campaign, with scrutiny heightened, the Dean temper has yet to show much of itself in public and, aides say, has appeared only a few times in private.Oh, well never mind then. Of course, why write the article in the first place?
"I never experienced his temper, but there are those who say he does have quite a temper," said John H. Bloomer Jr., a Republican who is minority leader of the Vermont Senate. "If anything, he's done well in controlling his thin skin in this campaign."
Character Assassination
Today's anti-Jewish character assassination smear-job from The Party: You've Got the Wrong Jesus, Howard.
Previous post on this subject, with previous example.
Update - A commenter in another post pointed out this similar smear.
Previous post on this subject, with previous example.
"It doesn't matter WHO the Democrats nominate, it matters how that candidate responds to Republican character assassination. That's what Republicans DO."And previous warning that this is what Republicans DO, in "Getting It":
""Getting it," in this election, means understanding the new political environment of a near-fascist right controlling the White House, the House of Representatives, the Senate, the Courts, the Justice Department, blocking any and all oversight or investigations into their abuses of power, using the FBI as their investigative arm, the military as their international enforcement arm, and the major broadcast and print media as their propaganda organ. It means understanding that smears, threats and intimidation are the favored tactic of The Party. Understanding that there is nothing The Party will not do, even politicizing the national tragedy of 9/11 and using it to justify a pre-planned war in an unrelated country, all the while using THAT to manipulate an election."These are trees. See the Forest. This is what Republicans DO. Don't listen to the words, they are only designed to confuse. Watch what they DO.
Update - A commenter in another post pointed out this similar smear.
1/02/2004
Hooray For Alterman!
MSNBC - Altercation:
"I don’t see why anybody on earth needs more than say $10 or $20 million. Anything above that should be given away, and not to some fancy private school where you are just paying for a monument to yourself. Anyone who can’t live on $10 or $20 million, well, I have to stop now..."
Donations
OK, for 2004 I resolve to make this weblog pay for itself! You wouldn't believe the time that I put into this. Not that you should care, but if you enjoy reading Seeing the Forest, please consider making a contribution once in a while to keep it going.
I have set up a PayPal "Make a Donation" button and an Amazon Honor System button, both visible on the left of this page. It's gotta be done. Please help out. I'll try to come up with better worded appeals, but fundraising has never been my specialty.
Thanks!
Updagte - I was thinking... (uh oh) ... if I can get 2 million people to give $100 each...
I have set up a PayPal "Make a Donation" button and an Amazon Honor System button, both visible on the left of this page. It's gotta be done. Please help out. I'll try to come up with better worded appeals, but fundraising has never been my specialty.
Thanks!
Updagte - I was thinking... (uh oh) ... if I can get 2 million people to give $100 each...
1/01/2004
12/31/2003
Is THIS Why We're Supposed To Hate France Now?
Will the French Indict Cheney?:
"One of France's best-known investigating magistrates, Judge Renaud van Ruymbeke--who came to fame by unearthing major French campaign finance scandals in the 1990s that led to a raft of indictments--has been conducting a probe of the Nigeria deal since October. And, three days before Christmas, the Paris daily Le Figaro front-paged the news that Judge van Ruymbeke had notified the Justice Ministry that Cheney might be among those eventually indicted as a result of his investigation."
It's Serious
The other day I wrote that I think this terrorist threat is serious because it came right after Dean said that catching Saddam has not made America safer. Since increasing the threat level validated what Dean said, I don't think they would do it when they did unless it was for real.
Another reason I think it is serious is that for several days the right-wing AM radio hosts have been talking about how al-Queda wants Bush out of office, and will use an attack on America as an attempt to accomplish that, and that if one does happen, all the pro-al-Queda Democrats will be criticizing Bush for letting it happen. This is before-the-fact immunizing Bush, and before-the-fact politicizing such an event against Democrats. If this is their marching orders, it means that The Party is pretty sure something is coming.
Another reason I think it is serious is that for several days the right-wing AM radio hosts have been talking about how al-Queda wants Bush out of office, and will use an attack on America as an attempt to accomplish that, and that if one does happen, all the pro-al-Queda Democrats will be criticizing Bush for letting it happen. This is before-the-fact immunizing Bush, and before-the-fact politicizing such an event against Democrats. If this is their marching orders, it means that The Party is pretty sure something is coming.
Leiberman
I saw Leiberman on some cable show last night, and listening to him go on and on about how terrible Dean would be for the country it came to me that at this point the only reason Leiberman is in the race is to keep Dean from becoming President after he wins the nomination! Leiberman knows he isn't going to get the nomination, and his campaign is entirely anti-Dean at this point, almost as a partner of Bush. He knows that everything he is saying is going to be used by the Republicans, and he is actively inventing new things to harm Dean with. But he is so resentful of the Democratic base for rejecting him, and is so married to this "Dean can't win" idea, that he is doing everything he can to make it so, just so he can say "I told you so" later.
If Bush Wins In 2004
Here's what's in store for us, and the world, if Bush wins. The Hawks tell Bush how to win war on terror: Syria, Iran, North Korea, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, France.
France? Yes. Read this: "we will have to pursue the war against terror far beyond the boundaries of the Middle East, into the heart of Western Europe"
The draft will be the least of our worries. This crowd is not just wingnuts, they are wingNUTS, and they're in charge now!
France? Yes. Read this: "we will have to pursue the war against terror far beyond the boundaries of the Middle East, into the heart of Western Europe"
The draft will be the least of our worries. This crowd is not just wingnuts, they are wingNUTS, and they're in charge now!
Is There A Terror Threat Or Not?
The Bush Administration has a habit of terrifying us with "terror alerts" and then acting like there really isn't anything to worry about. They won't fund cargo port inspections, they won't provide money for cities for terrorism preparedness, and worst of all they politicize the terrorism issue, dividing the country in half. There is no question that they used terrorism alerts politically to get the public stirred up for war with Iraq. (And then, after the invasion, didn't even bother for weeks to send teams to look for weapons of mass destruction.)
Now we have what they say is the most serious terror threat since 9/11, but they are encouraging people to gather in large numbers. Shouldn't we be afraid? At least one congressman is acting responsibly - a Republicans no less! Shays' comments draw fire:
Update - The Mayor of New York:targets people, into Times Square to "defy" the terrorists. Right.
Now we have what they say is the most serious terror threat since 9/11, but they are encouraging people to gather in large numbers. Shouldn't we be afraid? At least one congressman is acting responsibly - a Republicans no less! Shays' comments draw fire:
"Some New Year's-related comments from a Connecticut congressman are getting an angry reaction.If something happens tonite we're going to look back and wonder why they allowed half a million people to gather in Times Square with a terrorism alert in effect. What are they thinking? Is there even a little bit of concern for the public in their thinking, or is it all, all just political calculation?
Christopher Shays told a T-V station (W-V-I-T) that he wouldn't go to New York's Times Square 'for anything.' He also urged New Year's revelers not to go, citing terrorism fears.
Shays says it's irresponsible for federal officials to make people think they don't need to take precautions -- like avoiding packed crowds in New York City."
Update - The Mayor of New York:
"New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg accused the head of a House of Representatives panel on terrorism of lacking courage on Wednesday for shunning the traditional Times Square New Year's eve celebration because of security worries.Packing half a million
Bloomberg, appearing on morning television programs Friday, equated showing up for the street party with defying terrorists."
Initial Unemployment Claims
The headline, New Jobless Claims Lowest of Bush Tenure.
"The Labor Department (news - web sites) reported Wednesday that new applications filed for unemployment insurance dropped by a seasonally adjusted 15,000 to 339,000 for the week ending Dec. 27."The reality: ETA Press Release: Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report:
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 516,501 in the week ending Dec. 27, an increase of 91,785 from the previous week."I report, you decide.
12/30/2003
Why Liberals Are Angry
Column: Why Liberals Are Angry:
"Some say liberals are ticked because the rest of the country hasn't yet conceded that George W. is a duplicitous bumbler with emperor envy. Some say it's only because liberalism has suffered a long decline. Others say a stolen election, a seedy impeachment, an illegal war and the pack-mentality media account for liberal wrath.
All these are true. But there's a more seminal cause of liberal anger. In view of it, the only surprise is that the anger took so long to erupt."
What They're Going To Do
Here's what The Party has in store for us. They are going to get Democrats together in focus groups, and they're going to ask them, "If you learned that so-and-so happened, would this cause you to stop supporting Democratic candidates?" When they find some things that make enough Democrats answer "Yes," then you'll start seeing stories in the paper saying that whatever it was that caused them to say yes really happened. Then the stories will turn into whirlwinds and you'll be hearing the story from all directions. Years from now the press will be repeating the story as fact.
In other words, if they learn that Democrats will stop supporting their candidate if they learn that the candidate said that polar bears should be trapped and moved to France, then you are going to start hearing stories about how the candidate said that polar bears should be trapped and moved to France, even though the candidate never said any such thing.
This will happen over and over again between now and the election, made-up story after made-up story, until even you are so fed up with the Democratic candidate that you'll be thinking of not voting at all, maybe even voting for Bush.
Get ready for it. It will happen. It's what they do.
In other words, if they learn that Democrats will stop supporting their candidate if they learn that the candidate said that polar bears should be trapped and moved to France, then you are going to start hearing stories about how the candidate said that polar bears should be trapped and moved to France, even though the candidate never said any such thing.
This will happen over and over again between now and the election, made-up story after made-up story, until even you are so fed up with the Democratic candidate that you'll be thinking of not voting at all, maybe even voting for Bush.
Get ready for it. It will happen. It's what they do.
Bush Declares War On PBS
It's not enough that AM radio, TV and the newspapers are 24-hour-a-day, 7-days-a-week ads for The Party. Now Bush is trying to bring PBS under control. This from Common Cause:
Public Broadcasting Under Siege!
$800,000 buys two seats on the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's board!
The Bush Administration has awarded two major Republican donors seats on the nine-member board of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). Bush appointees Cheryl Halpern and Gay Hart Gaines and their families have given over $800,000 to Republican causes in recent years.
But just as troubling are the agendas that Halpern and Hart Gaines would bring to the CPB. Both have stated views or espoused causes that call into question their qualifications to service on a board whose mission is to promote and fund public television and radio programming.
Halpern, in her confirmation hearings, indicated that she would welcome empowering the CPB board members to intervene in program content when they felt a program was biased. And, Gaines was an ardent supporter of Representative Newt Gingrich (R-GA) who, as House Speaker in 1994, proposed cutting all federal assistance to public television.
Common Cause will not let this issue slip by without public scrutiny. We need your help to bring this to the public's attention.
We must not let partisan insiders wrest control of public broadcasting from balanced board members and threaten the integrity of the CPB from within.
Please send a generous contribution today to help us protect the fairness of public broadcasting!
Click here to find out more: http://www.commoncause.org/news/default.cfm?ArtID=270
Click here to donate to Common Cause: http://www.commoncause.org/support
12/29/2003
What They Think Of You
From a roundtable discussion of globalization, with corporate executives and venture capitalists participating:
The economists call it the reality of "globally competition." But the real reality is that this is what happens when you apply "market solutions" to a world with hundreds of millions of unemployed. In a purely market-driven world, NECESSARILY those lucky enough to get jobs will devolve to subsistence wages, the rest will starve off.
When you value people only as economic units, the humanity goes away. In "market" logic the sick or old person should be discarded as a drain on economic resources. In "market" logic there is no point in having a government that looks out for the interests of the public at large -- this "gets in the way" of competition. In "market" logic there is no point in recreation, except for its value in making the worker unit a bit more productive. In "market" logic there is no point in educating beyond what you need for your job. In "market" logic your only value to society is the extent to which you will serve the corporation.
A lot of people don't understand how much has already changed for Americans, with the globalization of the economy and the concentration of wealth. We seem prosperous, and we seem to have a stake in this economy, but it's all debt. The only reason there is a new SUV in that driveway, and a new family in that nice house, is they are still allowed to borrow money. This borrowing represents our living off of selling the public's assets -- assets sold by the George Bushes of the world to the Ken Lays of the world.
How long will the debt be sustainable? The day when they stop accepting our dollars is the day when America wakes up and realized what has happened to us. The fall of the dollar is a sign of what is happening.
We're going to have to re-think our concepts of "ownership" before this is all over. Why should the great masses of Americans be forced ever downward economically to the benefit of a few who "own" so much of our resources. With the concentration of wealth that is occurring, this problem is getting ever worse. We should re-think these concepts now, and discuss more equitable distribution of wealth, before things get bad enough that people take matters into their own hands. This is what has always happened in the past.
Who is our economy for? Who will love the people who have no use?
"There's something at an individual level that people in the [Silicon] Valley have to sign up to do, as well. In this globally competitive marketplace, you have engineers in China that go to work from 8 (a.m.) to 10 (p.m.). The company feeds them lunch, a great lunch. They have great facilities, equal to the Valley. They serve them a great dinner, and they work six days a week. They go home to be with their families during a month during Chinese New Year. But after that, they're working hard, and they're really dedicated to what they're doing.Got that? It couldn't be clearer. THIS is the corporate view of your job and your life in the future. You need to lose your "sense of entitlement" and get ready for a six day workweek, working 8am to 10pm, living in a barracks at the office, living only to serve to corporation and visiting your family once a year. (How soon will they be hatching superior workers in test tubes, and raising them from birth to be better workers for their selected job?)
And so we have to recover from the sense of entitlement. Individuals have to want to get retrained. They're going to have to want to work hard. Sometimes I wonder whether or not we've lost that in the Valley."
The economists call it the reality of "globally competition." But the real reality is that this is what happens when you apply "market solutions" to a world with hundreds of millions of unemployed. In a purely market-driven world, NECESSARILY those lucky enough to get jobs will devolve to subsistence wages, the rest will starve off.
When you value people only as economic units, the humanity goes away. In "market" logic the sick or old person should be discarded as a drain on economic resources. In "market" logic there is no point in having a government that looks out for the interests of the public at large -- this "gets in the way" of competition. In "market" logic there is no point in recreation, except for its value in making the worker unit a bit more productive. In "market" logic there is no point in educating beyond what you need for your job. In "market" logic your only value to society is the extent to which you will serve the corporation.
A lot of people don't understand how much has already changed for Americans, with the globalization of the economy and the concentration of wealth. We seem prosperous, and we seem to have a stake in this economy, but it's all debt. The only reason there is a new SUV in that driveway, and a new family in that nice house, is they are still allowed to borrow money. This borrowing represents our living off of selling the public's assets -- assets sold by the George Bushes of the world to the Ken Lays of the world.
How long will the debt be sustainable? The day when they stop accepting our dollars is the day when America wakes up and realized what has happened to us. The fall of the dollar is a sign of what is happening.
We're going to have to re-think our concepts of "ownership" before this is all over. Why should the great masses of Americans be forced ever downward economically to the benefit of a few who "own" so much of our resources. With the concentration of wealth that is occurring, this problem is getting ever worse. We should re-think these concepts now, and discuss more equitable distribution of wealth, before things get bad enough that people take matters into their own hands. This is what has always happened in the past.
Who is our economy for? Who will love the people who have no use?
Your Food Safety
I'm watching a "Mad Cow" press conference on C-Span.
Has the Bush Administration ordered an increase in testing for Mad Cow disease? No.
Has the Bush Administration ordered "downer" cows kept our of the food supply? No.
This would interfere with corporate profits. Who the f*ck do you think you are, anyway?
Update - Tuesday the government stopped allowing "downer" cows to be used as food.
Has the Bush Administration ordered an increase in testing for Mad Cow disease? No.
Has the Bush Administration ordered "downer" cows kept our of the food supply? No.
This would interfere with corporate profits. Who the f*ck do you think you are, anyway?
Update - Tuesday the government stopped allowing "downer" cows to be used as food.
Bush Campaigning On Local Radio
Bush's Campaign Finds Platform on Local Radio,
"While the Bush campaign maintains a low profile on the national campaign stage — content for now to watch the Democrats beat on one another — it is aggressively working the expansive hustings of Republican-friendly talk radio, priming the grass roots faithful for battle next year."But if any Democrat wants time on these stations to respond to the 24-hour-a-day, seven-days-a-week Republican Party ad, the answer is NO, we won't let you. Once upon a time WE THE PEOPLE licensed out the broadcast frequencies for the benefit of the public. Now the corporations have taken them over and are using them to push The Party on the public, full time. This is just like what's going on in the Congress, Democrats are just not welcome. Our country is only for Republicans now. Bush is President of the Republicans, not the country. The budget only goes to districts with Republican representatives. Government contracts only go to Republican campaign contributors. The things that we -- the ones who didn't vote for Bush and the ones who didn't vote at all -- more than half the country, care about, like the environment, the poor, health carwomen'sens' rights, gay rights, minority rights, civil rights, Social Security, the right to sue in court, public schools, even public parks, well, that's "a big Fuck You Democrat, we're in power now, get over it, dry up and die."
Is He Drinking Again?
uggabugga asks if George is drinking again. He never did AA or any other programs, and denies that he is an alcoholic, so it's more likely than if he had honestly dealt with it.
Jobless Count Skips Millions
Jobless Count Skips Millions:
"The nation's official jobless rate is 5.9%, a relatively benign level by historical standards. But economists say that figure paints only a partial — and artificially rosy — picture of the labor market.Don't forget the huge number of people in prisons now.
To begin with, there are the 8.7 million unemployed, defined as those without a job who are actively looking for work. But lurking behind that group are 4.9 million part-time workers such as Gluskin who say they would rather be working full time — the highest number in a decade.
There are also the 1.5 million people who want a job but didn't look for one in the last month. Nearly a third of this group say they stopped the search because they were too depressed about the prospect of finding anything. Officially termed 'discouraged,' their number has surged 20% in a year.
Add these three groups together and the jobless total for the U.S. hits 9.7%, up from 9.4% a year ago."
Crashes My Browser
Steve Gilliard's blog crashes Internet Explorer on my computer. I would love to read what he is writing. Anyone have any suggestions?
12/28/2003
Today's Google Experiment
For today's Google Experiment, let's learn about Chronic Wasting Disease in deer and other wildlife. Rumor has it that hunters are coming down with the human form of Mad Cow Disease from eating deer.
From the Colorado Division of Wildlife site:
From the Colorado Division of Wildlife site:
"Chronic wasting disease belongs to a family of diseases known as transmissible spongiform encephalopathies. Within this family of diseases, there are three predominant variants that affect animals: scrapie, which has been identified in sheep for more that 200 years; bovine spongiform encephalopathy in cattle (sometimes referred to as "Mad Cow Disease"); and chronic wasting disease in deer and elk. Within the family, there are also two main variants that affect humans: Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, which occurs naturally in about one out of every one million people; and Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, which has been linked to the large-scale outbreak of bovine spongiform encephalopthy in cattle herds in Great Britain. Through that outbreak and the fact that the British consumed nearly 750,000 infected cattle during a 10-year period, approximately 130 humans have died to date after contracting Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease."From the National Wildlife Health Center site:
"Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) is related to a group of diseases known as transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs). TSEs include such diseases as scrapie in sheep, bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in cattle (aka Mad Cow Disease) and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease of humans and are diseases of the nervous system that result in distinctive lesions in the brain. The causative agent is believed to be a modified protein (prion). These modified proteins are typically found in nervous and lymphatic tissues, but recent experimental evidence shows prions can occur in muscle tissue of mice [emphasis mine - DJ]. "Prions in muscle tissue! This is a federal site, and in the Bush/Orwell administration information like this is always temporary -- watch how fast the beef industry gets THAT taken down!
Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada, Alaska, Montana, Hawaii, Idaho, Guam
U.S. Expands Mad Cow-Related Beef Recall.
Following slaughter and processing, "The meat gets boxed up and cut and perhaps commingled with other products," Petersen said.If you live in Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada, Alaska, Montana, Hawaii, Idaho or Guam, and you ate hamburger recently, you'll find out in 5-15 years if you have Mad Cow Disease. Of course, what about the OTHER cows that were NOT tested?
12/27/2003
MY Meme! MINE!
Dept. of Who is the Economy For? over at Sideshow. That's MY meme! MINE! ME ME ME ME ME!
"We Are In Baghdad Now"
frontline: truth, war and consquences: introduction | PBS:
Other examples - taxes on the rich greatly reduced, others like the estate tax just eliminated; the taxes the rest of us pay are going out as contracts and payments to campaign contributors; Medicare gone in a few years; legislation is now entirely one-party; the massive deficits mean that our Social Security is already gone; environmental laws decimated; the courts taken over by the Federalist Society... All the words are just smokescreens for what they are accomplishing.
They are in Baghdad now.
"When asked if he feels any unease or discomfort at the fact that some Americans feel the United States was suckered into a war under the false pretenses of disarming Saddam of weapons of mass destruction, Chalabi replies, 'No. ... We are in Baghdad now.'"You've got to learn not to listen to anything they say, and look only at what they are actually doing. They are in Baghdad now.
Other examples - taxes on the rich greatly reduced, others like the estate tax just eliminated; the taxes the rest of us pay are going out as contracts and payments to campaign contributors; Medicare gone in a few years; legislation is now entirely one-party; the massive deficits mean that our Social Security is already gone; environmental laws decimated; the courts taken over by the Federalist Society... All the words are just smokescreens for what they are accomplishing.
They are in Baghdad now.
12/26/2003
What's The Difference?
Wampum has some funny "What's the difference?" examples up, in the post titled, "Half Full."
But before reading that, click at the top of the Wampum page to nominate your favorite lefty weblog for a Koufax award.
But before reading that, click at the top of the Wampum page to nominate your favorite lefty weblog for a Koufax award.
Parts of Patriot Act II Have Already Become Law
I can't believe this:
I'm at a loss for words folks. W's administration has now sunk to absolutely unparalleled depths of dishonesty -- they're now purposefully hiding legislation that curtails civil liberties from the public.
The author of this piece, David Martin, asks the right question:
My goodness.
I really don't know what else to say folks.
On December 13, when U.S. forces captured Saddam Hussein, President George W. Bush not only celebrated with his national security team, but also pulled out his pen and signed into law a bill that grants the FBI sweeping new powers. A White House spokesperson explained the curious timing of the signing - on a Saturday - as "the President signs bills seven days a week." But the last time Bush signed a bill into law on a Saturday happened more than a year ago - on a spending bill that the President needed to sign, to prevent shuttng down the federal government the following Monday.
By signing the bill on the day of Hussein's capture, Bush effectively consigned a dramatic expansion of the USA Patriot Act to a mere footnote. Consequently, while most Americans watched as Hussein was probed for head lice, few were aware that the FBI had just obtained the power to probe their financial records, even if the feds don't suspect their involvement in crime or terrorism.
By signing the bill on the day of Hussein's capture, Bush effectively consigned a dramatic expansion of the USA Patriot Act to a mere footnote.
The Bush Administration and its Congressional allies tucked away these new executive powers in the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2004, a legislative behemoth that funds all the intelligence activities of the federal government. The Act included a simple, yet insidious, redefinition of "financial institution," which previously referred to banks, but now includes stockbrokers, car dealerships, casinos, credit card companies, insurance agencies, jewelers, airlines, the U.S. Post Office, and any other business "whose cash transactions have a high degree of usefulness in criminal, tax, or regulatory matters."
I'm at a loss for words folks. W's administration has now sunk to absolutely unparalleled depths of dishonesty -- they're now purposefully hiding legislation that curtails civil liberties from the public.
The author of this piece, David Martin, asks the right question:
The Bush Administration has yet to answer pivotal questions about its latest constitutional coup: If these new executive powers are necessary to protect United States citizens, then why would the legislation not withstand the test of public debate? If the new act's provisions are in the public interest, why use stealth in ramming them through the legislative process?
My goodness.
I really don't know what else to say folks.
Quarantine? Don't They Know What Mad Cow Disease IS?
U.S. Quarantines Calves From Diseased Cow:
U.S. officials have quarantined two calves from the Washington cow with mad cow disease, even though transmission of the disease from mother to calf is considered unlikely.Quarantine? Mad Cow disease is not an infectious virus! Quarantining the cows doesn't do ANYTHING to prevent the disease from spreading. Are they trying to make the public think they're doing something about this? How about ACTUALLY doing something about it? How about banning the feeding of dead sick animals to other animals? How about banning the feeding of animals AT ALL to vegetarian animals?! DUH!
Good One
From Wealth Bondage:
Readers - you want to understand Wealth Bondage before you'll understand this post. Here's a clue, a comment left by the author:
"Seeing the Forrest: "We need to break up the rich white mens' club and get the money circulating again. The way to do that is to bring back very high taxes at the top, and estate taxes, and use the money to strengthen 'the commons' -- our public resources and human resources. Education, hospitals, health care, roads, infrastructure, arts and quality of life." I notice that this guy has a free piece of crap blogspot blog. Gotta tell you something about this loser's chances of success. Maybe we winners should take up a collection buy him a real blog. Sad, really. No wonder he is into income redistribution. I'd ship his job to China, if he had one."A collection to buy me things? Not a bad idea actually. I like it.
Readers - you want to understand Wealth Bondage before you'll understand this post. Here's a clue, a comment left by the author:
"Always a pleasure to see you gnash your teeth in impotent rage. My contribution to the greater good is setting an example for others to emulate. People look up to me, as they did to the Pope in the Dark Ages. I give them hope. Instead of alms, I strew my blessing. "Go little sheep gently to your pens that thou might be fleeced."In the spirit of the times, for sure.
12/25/2003
Everything I'm Reading
Everything I'm reading about our nation's meat inspection system and (lack of) efforts to prevent "mad cow" from infecting people tells me that profits not only came before concerns for public safety, but that profits were the only concern, and safety was no concern. These people running our government do not care about us at all. The people managing industries like the beef industry care only about tomorrow's profits. Their shortsighted greed may have destroyed their entire industry.
This story, for example, is worth reading. Expert Warned That Mad Cow Was Imminent,
This story, for example, is worth reading. Expert Warned That Mad Cow Was Imminent,
"Ever since he identified the bizarre brain-destroying proteins that cause mad cow disease, Dr. Stanley Prusiner, a neurologist at the University of California at San Francisco, has worried about whether the meat supply in America is safe.
He spoke over the years of the need to increase testing and safety measures. Then in May, a case of mad cow disease appeared in Canada, and he quickly sought a meeting with Ann M. Veneman, the secretary of agriculture. He was rebuffed, he said in an interview yesterday, until he ran into Karl Rove, senior adviser to President Bush.
So six weeks ago, Dr. Prusiner, who won the 1997 Nobel Prize in Medicine for his work on prions, entered Ms. Veneman's office with a message. "I went to tell her that what happened in Canada was going to happen in the United States," Dr. Prusiner said. "I told her it was just a matter of time."
The department had been willfully blind to the threat, he said. The only reason mad cow disease had not been found here, he said, is that the department's animal inspection agency was testing too few animals. Once more cows are tested, he added, "we'll be able to understand the magnitude of our problem."
This nation should immediately start testing every cow that shows signs of illness and eventually every single cow upon slaughter, he said he told Ms. Veneman. Japan has such a program and is finding the disease in young asymptomatic animals.
Fast, accurate and inexpensive tests are available, Dr. Prusiner said, including one that he has patented through his university.
Ms. Veneman's response (he said she did not share his sense of urgency) left him frustrated. That frustration soared this week after a cow in Washington State was tentatively found to have the disease. If the nation had increased testing and inspections, meat from that cow might never have entered the food chain, he said."
12/24/2003
If the fates allow
Tom reminds me of the only Christmas song I like.
Have yourself a merry little Christmas,
Let your heart be light
From now on,
our troubles will be out of sight
Have yourself a merry little Christmas,
Make the Yule-tide gay,
From now on,
our troubles will be miles away.
Here we are as in olden days,
Happy golden days of yore.
Faithful friends who are dear to us
Gather near to us once more.
Through the years
We all will be together,
If the Fates allow
Hang a shining star upon the highest bough.
And have yourself a merry little Christmas now.
Happy Holidogs!
Happy Holidogs from the Johnsons!
Top, left to right, Duke, Percy, Buddy, anonymous
Bottom, left to right, Espresso, anonymous, anonymous, Hannah
(Card by Sudeep)
Taking Over The Democratic Party
LiberalOasis talks about where to go from here, now that liberals seem to be getting control of the Democratic party again:
"We must phrase our arguments -- whether on TV, in the blogosphere, in letters to the editor, or in personal conversations – in ways that find common ground and speak to the fundamental concerns and hopes of non-liberals."This is something I've been thinking about lately. We have to recognize how far from our own thinking most Americans are at this point. As just one example, MOST Americans still think that Iraq was behind the 9/11 attack. How do we break through that? We don't do it by just repeating that Bush is a liar. We don't do it by expressing anger. We have to make a solid, positive case when talking to people who have had no source of information beyond Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and the corporate media. There's a lot of work to do.
Still Nothing
Now It's a Scandal - New evidence that a House GOP leader offered a bribe.:
By the way, what happened to the investigation of the White House outing an undercover CIA agent?
And Ken Lay, what's up with him? The worst corporate scandal in American history, and the guy is still running loose?
Oh yeah, what about Bush's insider trading at Harken Energy? And the inveswtigation of Cheney's corruption at Halliburton? And he's still getting payments from Halliburton -- isn't that against government ethics rules?
"What does a guy have to do to get a congressional bribe investigated? Even making allowances for slow readers, John Ashcroft's Justice Department is taking an awfully long time to decide whether to do anything about the (unsuccessful) attempt to bribe Rep. Smith. "More here.
By the way, what happened to the investigation of the White House outing an undercover CIA agent?
And Ken Lay, what's up with him? The worst corporate scandal in American history, and the guy is still running loose?
Oh yeah, what about Bush's insider trading at Harken Energy? And the inveswtigation of Cheney's corruption at Halliburton? And he's still getting payments from Halliburton -- isn't that against government ethics rules?
The Day Before Christmas
Typically this would be Friday news - buried over the weekend. But this is a BIG story, so it gets Christmas Eve. Administration Is Exempting Alaska Forest From Protection: (Washington Post version here, this link won't go away...)
Be sure to talk about this over Christmas dinner. (And don't eat the roast beef!)
"The Bush administration announced on Tuesday that the Tongass National Forest in Alaska, the largest in the country, would be exempted from a Clinton-era rule, potentially opening up more than half of the 17 million-acre forest for more development and as many as 50 logging projects."And how did this come about?
"The decision stems from the settlement of a lawsuit between Alaska and the federal government over the so-called roadless rule, which prohibited the building of roads in 58.5 million acres of undeveloped national forest across the country.Got that? It was a set-up. The right-wingers in Alaska sue the Bush government, the Bush government agrees to "settle," giving the Alaskan right-wingers everything they ask for. (Does this remind you of the Microsoft "settlement"?)
Environmental groups attacked the administration for the settlement in July, saying it was an underhanded strategy for circumventing the regulation. Conservation groups said the administration had failed to defend the roadless designation adequately. "
Be sure to talk about this over Christmas dinner. (And don't eat the roast beef!)
The Cloud Minders of River Oaks
I’m back from a trip to Bushland. I just returned from a family wedding in Houston over the weekend. Every time I visit my relatives in Houston it’s quite an interesting experience for me. (For my musings about last year's visit, go here.) My relatives in Houston have all become Republicans in the last twenty years or so. They were all Great Society liberals who supported LBJ in the 1960s but have since become, like most well-off white Texans, diehard Republicans who believe Bill Clinton is the anti-Christ. It’s a rather shocking transformation that has taken place during my lifetime.
My family in Houston often travels in some very interesting circles. The wedding was in the late morning on Saturday. It was followed by a jazz brunch reception at one of the hipper places in tony River Oaks. At one point I looked out at the bitter looks on the faces of the wealthy Houstonians eating Eggs Benedict. These folks had driven up in all manner of expensive cars (scores of BMWs, Mercedes, and Lexuses were on hand) and were clearly doing quite well financially. I thought to myself, “What a sour bunch!” My father said, almost as if reading my mind, “But these are the beautiful people.” I said, “Oh my goodness, really? They don’t look beautiful, they look unhappy.” He later wisecracked, “Besides everyone at this table, do you think Dean would get one vote out of the remaining fifty people in this room? These are the quintessential Bushies.” An interesting point, eh?
The next morning, as I still pondered the prior day’s experience, I watched an episode of Star Trek (the Original Series) entitled “The Cloud Minders.” In it, the Enterprise and its crew travel to a world in which there are two social classes, the ruling class that lives above the clouds in a city called Stratos and the worker class that worked extracting a mineral called zienite, on the planet‘s surface. The two classes have been separated for so long that they’ve evolved into very different groups of people who can scarcely talk with each other -- both viewing the other with extreme suspicion and, not surprisingly, no empathy whatsoever.
Later the same day I went to a family Christmas Party. Recently, a cousin and her husband bought two residences, each worth in excess of a million dollars. Unfortunately, they were forced to sell one of them because, shucks, they really couldn’t afford that second one! They apparently were teetering on the financial edge just a few short months ago. Over the last few months, I’ve listened to several very compassionate descriptions of their predicament from my relatives. Their situation, however, seemed like a ridiculous and quite preventable one to me. Those of us who have houses that cost under six figures often find such stories of woe hilarious actually. The funniest part was when the cousin in question passed by at the Christmas Party wearing a $10,000 Rolex watch. After seeing the watch, my wife leaned over and said “I’ve got an answer to their problems! Can you say “Pawn Shop?”
Other topics of conversation from the Christmas Party included David Letterman’s possible leftist liberal leanings and how trial lawyers are going to destroy the medical system in this country. (During this discussion, one of my aunts, a small business owner, stated rather matter-of-factly that she’d never paid for health insurance for any of her employees during the last twenty five years.) I also learned that the courts were just out there to harass good taxpaying citizens by allowing nuisance lawsuits. In short, while my relatives were apparently filled with compassion for my cousin (who I honestly believe doesn’t deserve it), they apparently had little compassion for, well anyone else, especially those who couldn’t afford medical insurance or anyone who might file a lawsuit.
So, what’s the point of this post? Well, the whole experience has really gotten me to thinking about how the social classes in American really don‘t have much contact with each other these days. Those of the higher classes therefore have very little compassion for anyone else. The policies of this current administration certainly drive this point home quite effectively. While happily cutting taxes and helping their rich friends and contributors with tax breaks and credits, members of this well-heeled administration has done very little for anyone else who isn’t from their privileged class.
This is not a new problem either. Through a rather bizarre quirk of fate, I study wealthy elites in the Gilded Age and I see the same phenomenon in that era over and over again. Those of you who read my blog know that I returned to this idea rather often. Just as it is today, wealthy elites who were then effectively in charge of the most morally bankrupt political era in our history approached government the very same way. There were always plenty of goodies for their contributors and buddies but very little for anyone else.
My rather depressing conclusion? While there are notable (and brief) exceptions like the Progressive Era and New Deal, genuine compassion for your fellow man is not something that I would say is really a hallmark of the upper classes in American history. As social classes have become more distinct and isolated from one another in this country over the last century, empathy from those at the top has truly become a rather rare phenomenon. It was possible for a patrician like Theodore or Franklin Roosevelt to understand the problems of the working-class. However, a century later, it has become harder for those at the higher echelons of American society today, suffering from several decades’ worth of indoctrination with the modern-day version of Social Darwinist ideology, to do the same.
Like the Cloud Minders of Stratos or the wealthy elites of the Gilded Age, Texans from W’s patrician class apparently lack empathy for the poor or anyone outside their class.
At the very least, this lack of empathy explains much about the world view of the Bushies and their domestic policies, doesn’t it?
My family in Houston often travels in some very interesting circles. The wedding was in the late morning on Saturday. It was followed by a jazz brunch reception at one of the hipper places in tony River Oaks. At one point I looked out at the bitter looks on the faces of the wealthy Houstonians eating Eggs Benedict. These folks had driven up in all manner of expensive cars (scores of BMWs, Mercedes, and Lexuses were on hand) and were clearly doing quite well financially. I thought to myself, “What a sour bunch!” My father said, almost as if reading my mind, “But these are the beautiful people.” I said, “Oh my goodness, really? They don’t look beautiful, they look unhappy.” He later wisecracked, “Besides everyone at this table, do you think Dean would get one vote out of the remaining fifty people in this room? These are the quintessential Bushies.” An interesting point, eh?
The next morning, as I still pondered the prior day’s experience, I watched an episode of Star Trek (the Original Series) entitled “The Cloud Minders.” In it, the Enterprise and its crew travel to a world in which there are two social classes, the ruling class that lives above the clouds in a city called Stratos and the worker class that worked extracting a mineral called zienite, on the planet‘s surface. The two classes have been separated for so long that they’ve evolved into very different groups of people who can scarcely talk with each other -- both viewing the other with extreme suspicion and, not surprisingly, no empathy whatsoever.
Later the same day I went to a family Christmas Party. Recently, a cousin and her husband bought two residences, each worth in excess of a million dollars. Unfortunately, they were forced to sell one of them because, shucks, they really couldn’t afford that second one! They apparently were teetering on the financial edge just a few short months ago. Over the last few months, I’ve listened to several very compassionate descriptions of their predicament from my relatives. Their situation, however, seemed like a ridiculous and quite preventable one to me. Those of us who have houses that cost under six figures often find such stories of woe hilarious actually. The funniest part was when the cousin in question passed by at the Christmas Party wearing a $10,000 Rolex watch. After seeing the watch, my wife leaned over and said “I’ve got an answer to their problems! Can you say “Pawn Shop?”
Other topics of conversation from the Christmas Party included David Letterman’s possible leftist liberal leanings and how trial lawyers are going to destroy the medical system in this country. (During this discussion, one of my aunts, a small business owner, stated rather matter-of-factly that she’d never paid for health insurance for any of her employees during the last twenty five years.) I also learned that the courts were just out there to harass good taxpaying citizens by allowing nuisance lawsuits. In short, while my relatives were apparently filled with compassion for my cousin (who I honestly believe doesn’t deserve it), they apparently had little compassion for, well anyone else, especially those who couldn’t afford medical insurance or anyone who might file a lawsuit.
So, what’s the point of this post? Well, the whole experience has really gotten me to thinking about how the social classes in American really don‘t have much contact with each other these days. Those of the higher classes therefore have very little compassion for anyone else. The policies of this current administration certainly drive this point home quite effectively. While happily cutting taxes and helping their rich friends and contributors with tax breaks and credits, members of this well-heeled administration has done very little for anyone else who isn’t from their privileged class.
This is not a new problem either. Through a rather bizarre quirk of fate, I study wealthy elites in the Gilded Age and I see the same phenomenon in that era over and over again. Those of you who read my blog know that I returned to this idea rather often. Just as it is today, wealthy elites who were then effectively in charge of the most morally bankrupt political era in our history approached government the very same way. There were always plenty of goodies for their contributors and buddies but very little for anyone else.
My rather depressing conclusion? While there are notable (and brief) exceptions like the Progressive Era and New Deal, genuine compassion for your fellow man is not something that I would say is really a hallmark of the upper classes in American history. As social classes have become more distinct and isolated from one another in this country over the last century, empathy from those at the top has truly become a rather rare phenomenon. It was possible for a patrician like Theodore or Franklin Roosevelt to understand the problems of the working-class. However, a century later, it has become harder for those at the higher echelons of American society today, suffering from several decades’ worth of indoctrination with the modern-day version of Social Darwinist ideology, to do the same.
Like the Cloud Minders of Stratos or the wealthy elites of the Gilded Age, Texans from W’s patrician class apparently lack empathy for the poor or anyone outside their class.
At the very least, this lack of empathy explains much about the world view of the Bushies and their domestic policies, doesn’t it?
New Jobless
"In the week ending Dec. 20, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 353,000, a decrease of 1,000 from the previous week's revised figure of 354,000."Here's the UNADJUSTED number: ETA Press Release: Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report,
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 423,782 in the week ending Dec. 20, an increase of 11,248 from the previous week."
12/23/2003
Blogs for Bush: TIME gets it right for "Person of the Year"
Over at Blogs for Bush they're complaining that Time included a black soldier on the cover, saying making the American Soldier "person of the year" was"probably the best choice, despite their politically correct cover."
Typical Republicans.
Typical Republicans.
U.S. Beef Industry To End Now?
Yahoo! News - Report: Japan Bans U.S. Beef Imports.
Things are going to happen fast now. By the time we wake up tomorrow there will be no beef industry in the US. This is because we have no real inspection system -- the corporations have bought off the government -- and our Agriculture Secretary is corporate lobbyist Ann Veneman.
Look what happens when we have put the corporations in charge of regulating themselves! NO ONE is going to trust anything the government says about this, and they shouldn't. And WE shouldn't, either! Are YOU going to eat beef now, or ever again in your life? (I haven't for years, of course.)
Here's an earlier post about the US beef industry. Sorry that you can't access the NY Times articles anymore.
Update - Korea.
Update - I'm going to elevate Richard's comment:
Morning Update - Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Russia, Ukraine and South Africa. "The 15-nation European Union has long banned the import of most U.S. beef because of health concerns over cattle treated with growth hormones, allowing in a limited quantity of the meat from the United States."
Things are going to happen fast now. By the time we wake up tomorrow there will be no beef industry in the US. This is because we have no real inspection system -- the corporations have bought off the government -- and our Agriculture Secretary is corporate lobbyist Ann Veneman.
Look what happens when we have put the corporations in charge of regulating themselves! NO ONE is going to trust anything the government says about this, and they shouldn't. And WE shouldn't, either! Are YOU going to eat beef now, or ever again in your life? (I haven't for years, of course.)
Here's an earlier post about the US beef industry. Sorry that you can't access the NY Times articles anymore.
Update - Korea.
Update - I'm going to elevate Richard's comment:
"Everybody remember this for when wingnuts complain about how bad regulation is for business: Putting corporate toadies in charge of regulation is BAD FOR BUSINESS. Not just bad, but catastrophic."Update - I just heard on the news that they slaughtered this cow and sent its meat to be used in animal feed before getting the test results. The idiots. The greedy fucking idiots set up the procedures to allow this to happen, for a few extra dollars. And in light of this I'm elevating a comment from Thomas' previous post below:
"The Swiss segment of my family has been dairy farmers forever and you don't slaughter a "downed" cow, you burn it and everything associated with it, and then you clorox the barn.Update - More here: USDA refused to release mad cow records,
You also warn your neighbors and don't ship milk until the vet tells you what happened. You may lose your herd, but if you ship tainted milk or meat, no one will ever buy from you again, so it doesn't make any difference.
Of course, my relatives are family farmers, not industrial milk factories."
"In addition, former USDA veterinarians tell UPI they have long suspected the disease was in U.S herds and there are probably additional infected animals.They let the fox guard the food inspection henhouse. Now we're all fucked. It DOES matter who you vote for!
[. . .] The USDA insisted the case is probably isolated and the US beef supply is safe. "I plan to serve beef for my Christmas dinner," Veneman said, "and we remain confident in the safety of our food supply."
Responded Friedlander: "She might as well kiss her (behind) goodbye, then.
Veneman went on to say she had confidence in the USDA surveillance system for detecting mad cow and protecting the public, noting the agency has tested more than 20,000 cattle for the disease this year.
This represents only a small percentage of the millions of cows in the U.S. herd, however, and experts say current procedures are unlikely to detect mad cow.
The Washington cow was tested because it was a so-called downer cow -- a cow unable to stand on its own -- which is a sign of mad cow disease. However, the United States sees approximately 200,000 of these per year or about 10 times as many animals are tested for the disease.
[. . .] Schwochert agreed with that, saying the USDA's sparse testing means they cannot say with any confidence whether there are additional cases or not."
Morning Update - Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Russia, Ukraine and South Africa. "The 15-nation European Union has long banned the import of most U.S. beef because of health concerns over cattle treated with growth hormones, allowing in a limited quantity of the meat from the United States."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)