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Saturday, December 31, 2005
Friday, December 23, 2005
No Anti-Gay Amendment to Constitution
Urge your representatives in Washington to oppose any language amending the U.S. Constitution to define marriage as strictly between a man and a woman, which would as well invalidate all the protections that many families currently enjoy.
Amending the Constitution is an extreme act. The proposed amendment before Congress would deny the right to marry to gay and lesbian couples and also obliterate the family rights that many same-sex couples- and unmarried heterosexual couples -- and their families now have. Revising the Constitution to incorporate discrimination against anyone in America is wrong and should be rejected.
These proposed, so-called 'reforms' are unnecessary and wrong. Even though the country has periodically struggled with the question of marriage -- the last law prohibiting people of different races from marrying was overturned only 35 years ago-we have never taken the step of amending the Constitution to define marriage. Now is not the time to begin to use the Constitution as a tool for discrimination. Congress certainly has more important issues to consider.
Attempts to amend the Constitution defining marriage as between a man and a woman rejects American traditions of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It would reverse the constitutional tradition of protecting individual freedoms. None of our constitutional amendments restrict individual freedoms. In fact, the amendments to the Constitution have been the source of most of the Constitution's protections for individual liberty rights. The proposed amendment, by contrast, would deny all protection for the most personal decisions made by millions of people in committed long-term relationships.
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Amending the Constitution is an extreme act. The proposed amendment before Congress would deny the right to marry to gay and lesbian couples and also obliterate the family rights that many same-sex couples- and unmarried heterosexual couples -- and their families now have. Revising the Constitution to incorporate discrimination against anyone in America is wrong and should be rejected.
These proposed, so-called 'reforms' are unnecessary and wrong. Even though the country has periodically struggled with the question of marriage -- the last law prohibiting people of different races from marrying was overturned only 35 years ago-we have never taken the step of amending the Constitution to define marriage. Now is not the time to begin to use the Constitution as a tool for discrimination. Congress certainly has more important issues to consider.
Attempts to amend the Constitution defining marriage as between a man and a woman rejects American traditions of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It would reverse the constitutional tradition of protecting individual freedoms. None of our constitutional amendments restrict individual freedoms. In fact, the amendments to the Constitution have been the source of most of the Constitution's protections for individual liberty rights. The proposed amendment, by contrast, would deny all protection for the most personal decisions made by millions of people in committed long-term relationships.
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Tuesday, December 20, 2005
Monday, December 19, 2005
The Grinch is in Washington
Congress is considering imposing an across-the-board spending cut to ALL programs. There are any number of bills they may try to slip the cuts onto as Congress rushes to finish its business and leave town for the year. Our country is better than this - we can't allow further cuts to the programs that millions of vulnerable Americans count on. Across-the-board budget cuts deserve an "up or down vote" on their own merits not by trying to slip them in by adding them to popular, “must pass” bills.
Contact your congresspeople and ask them to fight the inclusion of across-the-board cuts in ANY bill. This is NOT the way to cut deficits on the backs of poor and at-risk Americans while giving billions away in tax cuts to the rich and corporations!
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Contact your congresspeople and ask them to fight the inclusion of across-the-board cuts in ANY bill. This is NOT the way to cut deficits on the backs of poor and at-risk Americans while giving billions away in tax cuts to the rich and corporations!
Go to the sidebar resources and get their email addresses and phone numbers!
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Thursday, December 15, 2005
Friday, December 09, 2005
Moyers Exposes Obsessive Bush Administration Secrecy
In a speech today before the National Security Archive on its 20th Anniversary (covered by CSPAN), longtime investigative journalist Bill Moyers exposed the extensive attempts and successes of the Bush administration at keeping government and its operations secret. The evidence presented exposed the Bush administration as the most obsessively secret in American history.
His speech, one of a series given at different venues of late, not only slams the present administration with stiffling programming at PBS (the facts of which has become well known in 'mainstream' press recently with the expose' of the shennanigans of the Bush administration in appointing political cronies and hacks to the PBS board of directors, and their attempts to influence programming to reflect their right wing agenda); but by giving a brief history of the attempts by such figures as Donald Rumsfeld and Anthony Scalia, in previous incarnations, conducting similar activities in trying to undermine the Freedom of Information Act.
He outlined a long litany of mostly successful Bush administration secret attempts (though many now exposed through whistleblowers, etc.) to gut the scientific community's influence in the Interior Dept., the EPA, the Institutes of Public Health and other agencies; replacing scientific facts and recommendations with the wishes and dogmatic assertions of right wing and fundamentalist christian supporters. The result has been that administration policy in many of these areas is based on falsified reports and papers, ranging from global warming to reproductive health.
------------------------------------------------
These disturbing facts, in conjunction with the revelations of secretive administration efforts to falsify intelligence in the lead up to the Iraq War, and the subsequent inept coverup, lead to the frightening reality of an administration gone awry amidst paranoia and an overwhelming reluctance to submit its fantatical ideology to valid argument and evidence.
Nixon Redux- with a bit of fanaticism and lack of competence thrown in!
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(permalink- Daily Kos)
His speech, one of a series given at different venues of late, not only slams the present administration with stiffling programming at PBS (the facts of which has become well known in 'mainstream' press recently with the expose' of the shennanigans of the Bush administration in appointing political cronies and hacks to the PBS board of directors, and their attempts to influence programming to reflect their right wing agenda); but by giving a brief history of the attempts by such figures as Donald Rumsfeld and Anthony Scalia, in previous incarnations, conducting similar activities in trying to undermine the Freedom of Information Act.
He outlined a long litany of mostly successful Bush administration secret attempts (though many now exposed through whistleblowers, etc.) to gut the scientific community's influence in the Interior Dept., the EPA, the Institutes of Public Health and other agencies; replacing scientific facts and recommendations with the wishes and dogmatic assertions of right wing and fundamentalist christian supporters. The result has been that administration policy in many of these areas is based on falsified reports and papers, ranging from global warming to reproductive health.
------------------------------------------------
These disturbing facts, in conjunction with the revelations of secretive administration efforts to falsify intelligence in the lead up to the Iraq War, and the subsequent inept coverup, lead to the frightening reality of an administration gone awry amidst paranoia and an overwhelming reluctance to submit its fantatical ideology to valid argument and evidence.
Nixon Redux- with a bit of fanaticism and lack of competence thrown in!
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(permalink- Daily Kos)
Sunday, December 04, 2005
Friday, December 02, 2005
Bush Justice Dept. Cronies Gut Voting Rights Act
Under the Voting Rights Act of 1965, Texas and other states with a history of discriminatory elections are required to submit changes in their voting systems or election maps for approval by the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division.
Justice Department lawyers concluded that the landmark Texas congressional redistricting plan spearheaded by Representative Tom DeLay, Republican of Texas, violated the Voting Rights Act, according to a previously undisclosed memo obtained by the Washington Post. But senior [political appointee] officials overruled them and approved the plan.
''The State of Texas has not met its burden in showing that the proposed congressional redistricting plan does not have a discriminatory effect," the memo concluded.
The 73-page memo, dated Dec. 12, 2003, unanimously endorsed by six lawyers and two analysts in the department's voting section, said the redistricting plan illegally diluted black and Hispanic voting power in two congressional districts. It also said the plan eliminated several other districts in which minorities had a substantial, though not necessarily decisive, influence in elections. Lawyers who worked on the case were subjected to a gag rule. (The memo was provided to the Post by a person connected to the case who is critical of the adopted redistricting map.)
Because a federal three-judge panel rejected a Democratic Party challenge to the redistricting plan, the case is on appeal to the US Supreme Court.
--edited from an article by Dan Eggen, Washington Post December 2, 2005
----------------------------------------------------
It is no wonder that with a corrupt political environment like this at Justice, career lawyers and professionals there are leaving in droves.
Among other things, this new information adds to evidence that the Bush administration let's its fundamentalist right wing ideology be final arbiter in decisions covering science to civil rights, whether or not the facts warrant. It looks as though this decision may come back to bite them legally, though. For one thing, slimey Tom Delay's fingerprints are all over it and Justice Dept. career officials, who are entrusted with making decisions in this area, are totally against the decision. It will be interesting to see how the 'new' Supreme Court sees it.
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Justice Department lawyers concluded that the landmark Texas congressional redistricting plan spearheaded by Representative Tom DeLay, Republican of Texas, violated the Voting Rights Act, according to a previously undisclosed memo obtained by the Washington Post. But senior [political appointee] officials overruled them and approved the plan.
''The State of Texas has not met its burden in showing that the proposed congressional redistricting plan does not have a discriminatory effect," the memo concluded.
The 73-page memo, dated Dec. 12, 2003, unanimously endorsed by six lawyers and two analysts in the department's voting section, said the redistricting plan illegally diluted black and Hispanic voting power in two congressional districts. It also said the plan eliminated several other districts in which minorities had a substantial, though not necessarily decisive, influence in elections. Lawyers who worked on the case were subjected to a gag rule. (The memo was provided to the Post by a person connected to the case who is critical of the adopted redistricting map.)
Mark Posner, a longtime Justice Department lawyer who now teaches law at American University, said it was ''highly unusual" for political appointees to overrule a unanimous finding such as the one in the Texas case. ''In this kind of situation, where everybody agrees at least on the staff level . . . that is a very, very strong case," he said. ''The fact that everybody agreed that there were reductions in minority voting strength, and that they were significant, raises a lot of questions as to why it was" approved, he said.
Because a federal three-judge panel rejected a Democratic Party challenge to the redistricting plan, the case is on appeal to the US Supreme Court.
--edited from an article by Dan Eggen, Washington Post December 2, 2005
----------------------------------------------------
It is no wonder that with a corrupt political environment like this at Justice, career lawyers and professionals there are leaving in droves.
Among other things, this new information adds to evidence that the Bush administration let's its fundamentalist right wing ideology be final arbiter in decisions covering science to civil rights, whether or not the facts warrant. It looks as though this decision may come back to bite them legally, though. For one thing, slimey Tom Delay's fingerprints are all over it and Justice Dept. career officials, who are entrusted with making decisions in this area, are totally against the decision. It will be interesting to see how the 'new' Supreme Court sees it.
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Thursday, December 01, 2005
UN Report: US Poverty a Human Rights Violation
From the UN Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights in Geneva:
"Poverty is not only deprivation of economic or material resources, but a violation of human rights, too. . .No social phenomenon is as comprehensive in its assault on human rights as poverty. . .Poverty erodes or nullifies economic and social rights such as the right to health, adequate housing, food, safe water, and the right to education."
". . . the [limited] reach of the assistance programs and social discrimination [in the United States] has aggravated the problems in many situations, resulting in poverty clearly seen as a violation of human rights," Dr. Arjun Sengupta stated in his official report to the OHCHR. This was after an extensive fact finding visit to the United States last month. "If the United States government designed and implemented the policies according to human rights standards much of the problem of poverty could be resolved," he added.
Dr. Sengupta, a top expert on human rights and extreme poverty of the OHCHR, also said, "The case of the United States was particularly interesting as it presented an apparent paradox: as the wealthiest country on Earth, with higher per capita income levels than any other country, the United States has also had one of the highest incidences of poverty among the rich industrialized nations,".
The official findings, released in his OHCHR report on poverty in the United States:
"Poverty is not only deprivation of economic or material resources, but a violation of human rights, too. . .No social phenomenon is as comprehensive in its assault on human rights as poverty. . .Poverty erodes or nullifies economic and social rights such as the right to health, adequate housing, food, safe water, and the right to education."
". . . the [limited] reach of the assistance programs and social discrimination [in the United States] has aggravated the problems in many situations, resulting in poverty clearly seen as a violation of human rights," Dr. Arjun Sengupta stated in his official report to the OHCHR. This was after an extensive fact finding visit to the United States last month. "If the United States government designed and implemented the policies according to human rights standards much of the problem of poverty could be resolved," he added.
Dr. Sengupta, a top expert on human rights and extreme poverty of the OHCHR, also said, "The case of the United States was particularly interesting as it presented an apparent paradox: as the wealthiest country on Earth, with higher per capita income levels than any other country, the United States has also had one of the highest incidences of poverty among the rich industrialized nations,".
The official findings, released in his OHCHR report on poverty in the United States:
*12 percent of the United States population--or about 37 million people--lived in poverty in 2004, with nearly 16 percent--or about 46 million--having no health insurance.
*38 million people, including 14 million children, are threatened by lack of food.
*Ethnic minorities are suffering more from extreme poverty than white Americans. Compared to one in ten Whites, nearly one in four Blacks and more than one out of every five Latinos are extremely poor in the United States.
*Incidence of poverty, including food insecurity and homelessness, has been on the rise during the Bush administration.
*High costs of healthcare, inadequate access to quality education and vocational training, low wages, limited protection of tenants, and lack of low-cost housing are major factors posing "serious obstacles" to people struggling to get out of poverty.*
-Edited from the 11/15/05 press release of the UN Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights.
*This report corresponds beautifully with the recent report of the Census Bureau, both ignored by Republican Washington and it's lapdog press.
***
--THE UNITED STATES IS A FIRST WORLD COUNTRY WELL ON IT'S WAY TO THIRD WORLD STATUS (WE DO LOVE OUR BANANAS, DON'T WE?). . .SAD, SAD, SAD.
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-permalinked with planet patriot diary at Daily Kos, click on link. . .
-permalinked with planet patriot diary at Daily Kos, click on link. . .
Tuesday, November 29, 2005
Speechwriting for W. . .
--Published in The New Yorker October 18, 2004
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Failed Progress on All Fronts in Iraq
Most honest observers know the counter-insurgency and nation-building efforts in Iraq have failed.
The unwarranted American aggression in Iraq and it's incompetent management have created chaos which will not be solved by continued occupation. The Iraqis are going to fight it out amongst themselves one way or another, eventually.
There is no longer reason to hope for progress in Iraq. The time for America to get out and out of the way is now!
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The security situation is worse and worse as few will be surprised to hear. This remains true even if one looks below the surface at more detailed indicators, like increasing civilian casualties and an enormous increase in the crime rate, than just the daily military death count.
The economic situation is still bad news overall. No new salient infrastructure (despite America's huge investment- where has all the money gone?), no jobs and growing poverty. Any progress here and there has been too slow to help defuse the insurgency, at all.
The political situation is in greater confusion than since the end of official war. Various opinion polls show that public optimism, in terms of Iraqis' views about their personal and country's future, has greatly diminished. The referendum process has estranged Sunni Arabs even further. They still form the core of the insurgency, and bringing them into a national government seems more unlikely than ever.
The unwarranted American aggression in Iraq and it's incompetent management have created chaos which will not be solved by continued occupation. The Iraqis are going to fight it out amongst themselves one way or another, eventually.
There is no longer reason to hope for progress in Iraq. The time for America to get out and out of the way is now!
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Monday, November 28, 2005
Tuesday, November 22, 2005
Support McCain Amendment Against Torture
The Senate did the right thing when it passed Senator McCain's anti-torture amendment (S. Amdt. 1977) to the FY 2006 Defense Appropriations Bill (H.R. 2863) by a bipartisan vote of 90-9, including 46 Republican "yeas." The amendment would prohibit the inhumane treatment of prisoners in the "war on terrorism".
Urge everyone to stand up against torture by doing everything in their power to ensure that Senator McCain's amendment is included in the final FY 2006 Defense Appropriations Act. Vice President Cheney is urging key representatives to allow exceptions to a clear condemnation of torture.
We all need to make sure that when the final bill is passed, the United States will be able to assure the rest of the world that we will stand for freedom and human dignity, not torture.
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Opposing torture is not a partisan cause. The practice of torture so fully embraces evil it dehumanizes both the torturer and its victim. No just cause can be won if it relies on torture to succeed.
Urge everyone to stand up against torture by doing everything in their power to ensure that Senator McCain's amendment is included in the final FY 2006 Defense Appropriations Act. Vice President Cheney is urging key representatives to allow exceptions to a clear condemnation of torture.
We all need to make sure that when the final bill is passed, the United States will be able to assure the rest of the world that we will stand for freedom and human dignity, not torture.
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Monday, November 21, 2005
Same old, same old.
I just had to make a quick comment on the VEEP's speech today:
This guy is a real pip. He begins by saying how his speech the other day was misunderstood, then he proceeds to spew the same old vitriole and skewed truth. Goebbels would be proud. This administration learns nothing, knows nothing and has nothing left to offer on Iraq.
We need to get out of Iraq, just to save this administration from botching it up more than it already has!
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This guy is a real pip. He begins by saying how his speech the other day was misunderstood, then he proceeds to spew the same old vitriole and skewed truth. Goebbels would be proud. This administration learns nothing, knows nothing and has nothing left to offer on Iraq.
We need to get out of Iraq, just to save this administration from botching it up more than it already has!
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GOP in Disarray
For years Bush's White House and party enforcers like indicted Tom DeLay have kept repubs in line with an iron fist. The repub Congress slavishly accepted the Bush line, even his revolting conservative contradictions like his massive budget deficits. Dissidence was quelched by the threat of punishment!
Karl Rove connived and Delay enforced adherence has changed, it seems. Lately, the repubs look like the old dems when they were in power. House repubs this past week rebelled against huge budget cuts to the welfare state, including Medicaid, student loans, etc. Tax cuts for the rich were again on the table, particularly in the Senate where repub moderates joined dems to block them.
Undoing the savage inequalities of the Bush regime is in the wind. After recent election defeats and extremely low Bush polls, the repubs are beginning to fear the reality of a dem rout in 2006! Bush can no longer be relied upon as an asset for repub incumbents.
--inspired by an editorial in The Nation
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(Click on the LINK for a corresponding post at Daily Kos)
Karl Rove connived and Delay enforced adherence has changed, it seems. Lately, the repubs look like the old dems when they were in power. House repubs this past week rebelled against huge budget cuts to the welfare state, including Medicaid, student loans, etc. Tax cuts for the rich were again on the table, particularly in the Senate where repub moderates joined dems to block them.
Undoing the savage inequalities of the Bush regime is in the wind. After recent election defeats and extremely low Bush polls, the repubs are beginning to fear the reality of a dem rout in 2006! Bush can no longer be relied upon as an asset for repub incumbents.
--inspired by an editorial in The Nation
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(Click on the LINK for a corresponding post at Daily Kos)
Friday, November 18, 2005
Daily Kos
Permalinked to a corresponding comment in Planet Patriot's diary at DAILY KOS!
Just CLICK ON THE LINK in this post.
TAKE THE POLL, TOO!
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Just CLICK ON THE LINK in this post.
TAKE THE POLL, TOO!
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Wednesday, November 16, 2005
No to Alito!
For liberals and moderates in the Senate, voting against Alito is an easy decision:
Judge Alito's has a 15-year history of judicial decisions that have advanced the cause of the radical right, by 'legislating' from the bench. Among his many alarming rulings and opinions are those that have made it harder for Americans to:
*sue for sex or race-based discrimination in the workplace.
*fight back against companies that violate landmark anti-pollution laws like the Clean Water Act.
*ban private ownership of machine guns.
He really is the classic 'activist' judge, as defined by the right wing themselves!
And there are more disturbing things about Alito that should raise serious concern. For instance, his close affiliation with the Federalist Society and his 'personal' legal opinion about the right to abortion.
If confirmed to the Supreme Court, Samuel Alito has shown that he's anything but restrained when it comes to interpreting our nation's most important legislative protections and legal precedents. He is a danger to our civil rights and liberty.
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Judge Alito's has a 15-year history of judicial decisions that have advanced the cause of the radical right, by 'legislating' from the bench. Among his many alarming rulings and opinions are those that have made it harder for Americans to:
*sue for sex or race-based discrimination in the workplace.
*fight back against companies that violate landmark anti-pollution laws like the Clean Water Act.
*ban private ownership of machine guns.
He really is the classic 'activist' judge, as defined by the right wing themselves!
And there are more disturbing things about Alito that should raise serious concern. For instance, his close affiliation with the Federalist Society and his 'personal' legal opinion about the right to abortion.
If confirmed to the Supreme Court, Samuel Alito has shown that he's anything but restrained when it comes to interpreting our nation's most important legislative protections and legal precedents. He is a danger to our civil rights and liberty.
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Sunday, November 13, 2005
Civil Rights under Attack at Justice
This is the real agenda of the Bush administration!
Read the following article excerpt from The Washington Post, then Click on the LINK for the full story:
The Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, which has enforced the nation's anti-discrimination laws for nearly half a century, is in the midst of an upheaval that has driven away dozens of veteran lawyers and has damaged morale for many of those who remain, according to former and current career employees.
Nearly 20 percent of the division's lawyers left in fiscal 2005, in part because of a buyout program that some lawyers believe was aimed at pushing out those who did not share the administration's conservative views on civil rights laws. Longtime litigators complain that political appointees have cut them out of hiring and major policy decisions, including approvals of controversial GOP redistricting plans in Mississippi and Texas. . .
Read the following article excerpt from The Washington Post, then Click on the LINK for the full story:
The Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, which has enforced the nation's anti-discrimination laws for nearly half a century, is in the midst of an upheaval that has driven away dozens of veteran lawyers and has damaged morale for many of those who remain, according to former and current career employees.
Nearly 20 percent of the division's lawyers left in fiscal 2005, in part because of a buyout program that some lawyers believe was aimed at pushing out those who did not share the administration's conservative views on civil rights laws. Longtime litigators complain that political appointees have cut them out of hiring and major policy decisions, including approvals of controversial GOP redistricting plans in Mississippi and Texas. . .
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Friday, November 11, 2005
Huffington Has It Right. . .
Ariana Huffington is such a breath of fresh air and honesty on the Judy Miller subject. Everyone else (journalists, pundits, etc.) seems to have an agenda aside from just the straight truth.
It is a shame that you have to be a woman to attack the self-righteous nonsense of a Judy Miller. There is obviously so much more we don't know, and with few exceptions most seem afraid to find out- she surely isn't going to tell us willingly. . . makes one really wonder what goes on between reporters and 'sources' in Washington. It's seems almost incestuous.
Click on the link to read her entire article.
Also, catch her on Democracy Now this week. She is as always delightful and insightful!
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It is a shame that you have to be a woman to attack the self-righteous nonsense of a Judy Miller. There is obviously so much more we don't know, and with few exceptions most seem afraid to find out- she surely isn't going to tell us willingly. . . makes one really wonder what goes on between reporters and 'sources' in Washington. It's seems almost incestuous.
Click on the link to read her entire article.
Also, catch her on Democracy Now this week. She is as always delightful and insightful!
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Wednesday, November 09, 2005
NEW Media on the Sidebar Player
CHECK IT OUT! Great New Liberal Media on the Playlist:
*New animations, New news clips- some really great, funny stuff
for the liberal with a sense of humor!
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*New animations, New news clips- some really great, funny stuff
for the liberal with a sense of humor!
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Tuesday, November 08, 2005
A Must Read about VP Cheney:
Columnist Dan Froomkin of The Washington Post has written a frightening expose entitled, Cheney's 'Dark Side' Is Showing.
Just Click on the link to read it in its entirety-- frightening stuff!
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Just Click on the link to read it in its entirety-- frightening stuff!
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Saturday, November 05, 2005
NEW Liberal Media!
Our play of the week:
A news clip on the successful Democratic 'stunt' in the Senate. . .
More LIBERAL MEDIA now playing on the sidebar!
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A news clip on the successful Democratic 'stunt' in the Senate. . .
More LIBERAL MEDIA now playing on the sidebar!
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Wednesday, November 02, 2005
A Lebanized Iraq
The Bush administration has 'Lebanized' Iraq. It is ironic that a political structure that has worked so poorly for Lebanon is now the template for Iraq.
Some experts believe that a civil war in Iraq is already underway, even if it is not yet a full-blown conflict. . . If accounts from the ground are to be believed, there is already some ethnic cleansing going on in some neighbourhoods and some areas within Iraq. The reason is clear: Iraqis have looked for the constitution to be a national pact, and the general perception now is that it's not!
The most important parts of the 'approved' constitution -- or at least those to which the Sunnis are most strongly opposed -- were worked out between the Kurds and the major Shiite parties to the explicit exclusion of the Sunnis, despite U.S. efforts to the contrary. . .
. . .The Iraqi people (as it would likely be to other oppressed and war ridden peoples around the world) appear to see things in the black and white, desperate and frightening reality of death and degredation. The US is the obvious cause and target of their angst. Whether we leave now or later will change nothing.
Its true that perpetuating a century old arbitrary border flies in the face of our notions of self-determination, but trying to enforce some unwanted federation does just the same. The barely checked belligerent behavior of Iraqis from all groups tends to support this in spite of the desperate efforts of a American puppet government, of newly returned exiles of dubious backgrounds and political beliefs.
The best that can be hoped for in the present American model: An Iranized shia south; a no man's land sunni center; and an inevitably belligerent kurdish north (hopefully kept in check by an ever watchful and fearful Turkey).
Change the names of indigenous groups and outside instigators and influences-sounds like Lebanon, huh.
A federation becoming a reality in Iraq is a dubious one, at best.
All credible reportage has the country already in civil war, at whatever level you choose to put it. The central and south has come under the grip of a pervasive, dangerous, fascist religiosity on the street. The secular bathists, with their fascist tenets in common, have teamed up with them in outright defiance of a terribly weak, utterly corrupt govt. These are just facts, not hyperbole.
Unlike early after the 'end' of official war, westerners cannot even get about in Baghdad anymore, let alone the rest of the country without heavy guard or military. The infrastructure of the country, both public and private is worse than it has ever been by insurgent fiat! Iraq is an outright disaster area. . .
. . .Remember the lessons of history, particularly that of Britain who faced a similar circumstance in Iraq last century. Bottom line- occupation ended due to an uncontrollable and increasingly violent insurgency of the people of Iraq against it (not just outside infiltrators). The imposed govt collapsed with the vacuum filled eventually by an Arabic version of national socialism. Unfortunately, something similar will be Iraq's fate again. This time more likely religious fundamentalist govt than a secularist one.
Be skeptical of the present pro-occupation position of the dominant shia parties in the Iraq govt. Their longtime cultural identification and loyalties lie with Iran, intensified and ingrained in them by their experience under Saddam. More than suspicion is they are glad to have American largess continue to fill their Swiss bank accounts as long as it flows their way, and so for now are pliant to Bush administration wishes.
As for the Kurds. The sure bet is they are just waiting for the moment to close their border to a country and culture with which they have little in common. They will turn their attention north to Turkey to aid their kurdish brothers in their longtime insurgency for the creation of a greater Kurdistan. They are also glad for American aid in the meantime as it serves their purpose. The only outcome can be war or civil war with the Turks, depending on your point of view.
A federal republican state cannot be solution in Iraq. How does it really serve the self-perceived interests of the Iraqis. There is no experience with democracy as a solution to major political differences. As great as the differences between the three main Iraqi ethno/religous groups are, the old sure and tried middle eastern way of imposing one's will and gaining one's ends; at the point of a gun will prevail.
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Some experts believe that a civil war in Iraq is already underway, even if it is not yet a full-blown conflict. . . If accounts from the ground are to be believed, there is already some ethnic cleansing going on in some neighbourhoods and some areas within Iraq. The reason is clear: Iraqis have looked for the constitution to be a national pact, and the general perception now is that it's not!
The most important parts of the 'approved' constitution -- or at least those to which the Sunnis are most strongly opposed -- were worked out between the Kurds and the major Shiite parties to the explicit exclusion of the Sunnis, despite U.S. efforts to the contrary. . .
. . .The Iraqi people (as it would likely be to other oppressed and war ridden peoples around the world) appear to see things in the black and white, desperate and frightening reality of death and degredation. The US is the obvious cause and target of their angst. Whether we leave now or later will change nothing.
Its true that perpetuating a century old arbitrary border flies in the face of our notions of self-determination, but trying to enforce some unwanted federation does just the same. The barely checked belligerent behavior of Iraqis from all groups tends to support this in spite of the desperate efforts of a American puppet government, of newly returned exiles of dubious backgrounds and political beliefs.
The best that can be hoped for in the present American model: An Iranized shia south; a no man's land sunni center; and an inevitably belligerent kurdish north (hopefully kept in check by an ever watchful and fearful Turkey).
Change the names of indigenous groups and outside instigators and influences-sounds like Lebanon, huh.
A federation becoming a reality in Iraq is a dubious one, at best.
All credible reportage has the country already in civil war, at whatever level you choose to put it. The central and south has come under the grip of a pervasive, dangerous, fascist religiosity on the street. The secular bathists, with their fascist tenets in common, have teamed up with them in outright defiance of a terribly weak, utterly corrupt govt. These are just facts, not hyperbole.
Unlike early after the 'end' of official war, westerners cannot even get about in Baghdad anymore, let alone the rest of the country without heavy guard or military. The infrastructure of the country, both public and private is worse than it has ever been by insurgent fiat! Iraq is an outright disaster area. . .
. . .Remember the lessons of history, particularly that of Britain who faced a similar circumstance in Iraq last century. Bottom line- occupation ended due to an uncontrollable and increasingly violent insurgency of the people of Iraq against it (not just outside infiltrators). The imposed govt collapsed with the vacuum filled eventually by an Arabic version of national socialism. Unfortunately, something similar will be Iraq's fate again. This time more likely religious fundamentalist govt than a secularist one.
Be skeptical of the present pro-occupation position of the dominant shia parties in the Iraq govt. Their longtime cultural identification and loyalties lie with Iran, intensified and ingrained in them by their experience under Saddam. More than suspicion is they are glad to have American largess continue to fill their Swiss bank accounts as long as it flows their way, and so for now are pliant to Bush administration wishes.
As for the Kurds. The sure bet is they are just waiting for the moment to close their border to a country and culture with which they have little in common. They will turn their attention north to Turkey to aid their kurdish brothers in their longtime insurgency for the creation of a greater Kurdistan. They are also glad for American aid in the meantime as it serves their purpose. The only outcome can be war or civil war with the Turks, depending on your point of view.
A federal republican state cannot be solution in Iraq. How does it really serve the self-perceived interests of the Iraqis. There is no experience with democracy as a solution to major political differences. As great as the differences between the three main Iraqi ethno/religous groups are, the old sure and tried middle eastern way of imposing one's will and gaining one's ends; at the point of a gun will prevail.
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Tuesday, November 01, 2005
NEW Media Player!
LIBERAL MEDIA-
New on the sidebar at PLANET REVOLUTION. . .
Choose from a list of various Liberal Media, updated regularly:
*short animations
*news clips
*political ads
*music and audio
*much more . . .
Enjoy!
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New on the sidebar at PLANET REVOLUTION. . .
Choose from a list of various Liberal Media, updated regularly:
*short animations
*news clips
*political ads
*music and audio
*much more . . .
Enjoy!
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Sunday, October 30, 2005
What We Don't Know
Does the Plame leak investigation end only with VP Chief of Staff, Libby indicted--not for participating in the leak but for lying about his pre-leak actions? That's possible. And the prosecutor, US Attorney Fitzgerald refused to reveal any information about the case that was not included in the indictment. Who were Novak's sources for the leak? Fitzgerald wouldn't say. Is Official A a new name for Mr. X--the term used by reporters to refer to Novak's original source? Fitzgerald didn't say. Might Rove be Official A? Fitzgerald didn't say. Why did the leak refer to Valerie Wilson by her maiden name of Plame? Fitzgerald didn't say. What sort of cooperation did Fitzgerald receive from Novak? Fitzgerald didn't say. Was Cheney in cahoots with Libby regarding the latter's false testimony? Fitzgerald didn't say. How much damage was done to the CIA and its operations by the leak? Fitzgerald didn't say. Then, what about George W. Bush? What did he know and when did he know it?
--edited from an article in The Nation
More to come!
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--edited from an article in The Nation
More to come!
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Saturday, October 29, 2005
Thursday, October 27, 2005
Interesting Discussion on Iraq at Daily Kos
*Just click on the link to read and/or participate in an interesting discussion on the situation in Iraq at Daily Kos.
--Please add your comments here, there and everywhere. . .
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--Please add your comments here, there and everywhere. . .
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Monday, October 24, 2005
Bush's Impoverished America
The day after Hurricane Katrina hit, exposing much of the public to the tragic conditions of poverty in America, the Census Bureau conveniently and quietly released its annual report entitled, "Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States." It provided a context to the pockets of poverty common to New Orleans and other cities. Despite another of President Bush's infamous lies last month that, "Americans have more money in their pockets," more and more people from the middle class are falling into abject poverty.
The report indicates that in 2004 there was no increase in average annual household incomes for black, white, or Hispanic families- the first time since the Census Bureau began keeping records that household incomes failed to increase for five consecutive years! Check out the sadly and demonstrably uncompassionate results of Bush's economic policy:
*The average annual household family income has declined by $2,572, approximately 4.8 percent.
*Black families had the lowest average income last year, at $30,134 (the average income for white families was $48,977).
*The average pretax family income for all racial groups combined was $44,389 (the lowest it has been since 1997).
*The portion of the total national income going to the bottom 60 percent of families did not increase last year (the portion going to the wealthiest five percent of families rose by 0.4 percent).
*The average inflation-adjusted family income of middle-class Americans declined by 0.7 percent in 2004 (the wealthiest five percent of families enjoyed a 1.7 percent increase).
*Men working full-time had their annual incomes decline 2.3 percent in 2004, down to an average of $40,798 (the largest one-year decline in 14 years).
*Women saw their earnings decrease by 1 percent, with an average income of $31,223 (the largest one-year decline in nine years).
*Women earned only 77 cents for every dollar earned by men last year in all major sectors (e.g. in management women earned 54 cents for every dollar earned by men; 57 cents in finance and industry; and 60 cents in scientific and technical services).
Most telling:
*There were 37 million (12.7 percent) people living in poverty in 2004 (an increase of 1.1 million people since 2003). This was the fourth consecutive year in which poverty has increased. Since Bush took office, 5.4 million more people, including 1.4 million children, have fallen into poverty. There were 7.9 million families living below the poverty level in 2004, an increase of 300,000 families since 2003!
*Those covered by employer-sponsored health insurance declined from 60.4 percent in 2003 to 59.8 percent in 2004. Approximately 800,000 more workers found themselves without health insurance last year (the fourth consecutive year in which employer-sponsored health insurance coverage declined).
*A total of 45.8 million Americans are now without health insurance (the uninsured rate in 2004 was 11.3 percent for whites, 19.7 percent for blacks, and 32.7 percent for Hispanics).
--The report by the Census Bureau reveals, which was sadly symbolized by the plight of many poor residents of New Orleans, that most Americans are working harder, earning less, and without the benefit of health insurance. It's easy to understand why the Bush administrated had the report released a day after the largest natural disaster in a century, when much of the country was distracted.
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The report indicates that in 2004 there was no increase in average annual household incomes for black, white, or Hispanic families- the first time since the Census Bureau began keeping records that household incomes failed to increase for five consecutive years! Check out the sadly and demonstrably uncompassionate results of Bush's economic policy:
*The average annual household family income has declined by $2,572, approximately 4.8 percent.
*Black families had the lowest average income last year, at $30,134 (the average income for white families was $48,977).
*The average pretax family income for all racial groups combined was $44,389 (the lowest it has been since 1997).
*The portion of the total national income going to the bottom 60 percent of families did not increase last year (the portion going to the wealthiest five percent of families rose by 0.4 percent).
*The average inflation-adjusted family income of middle-class Americans declined by 0.7 percent in 2004 (the wealthiest five percent of families enjoyed a 1.7 percent increase).
*Men working full-time had their annual incomes decline 2.3 percent in 2004, down to an average of $40,798 (the largest one-year decline in 14 years).
*Women saw their earnings decrease by 1 percent, with an average income of $31,223 (the largest one-year decline in nine years).
*Women earned only 77 cents for every dollar earned by men last year in all major sectors (e.g. in management women earned 54 cents for every dollar earned by men; 57 cents in finance and industry; and 60 cents in scientific and technical services).
Most telling:
*There were 37 million (12.7 percent) people living in poverty in 2004 (an increase of 1.1 million people since 2003). This was the fourth consecutive year in which poverty has increased. Since Bush took office, 5.4 million more people, including 1.4 million children, have fallen into poverty. There were 7.9 million families living below the poverty level in 2004, an increase of 300,000 families since 2003!
*Those covered by employer-sponsored health insurance declined from 60.4 percent in 2003 to 59.8 percent in 2004. Approximately 800,000 more workers found themselves without health insurance last year (the fourth consecutive year in which employer-sponsored health insurance coverage declined).
*A total of 45.8 million Americans are now without health insurance (the uninsured rate in 2004 was 11.3 percent for whites, 19.7 percent for blacks, and 32.7 percent for Hispanics).
--The report by the Census Bureau reveals, which was sadly symbolized by the plight of many poor residents of New Orleans, that most Americans are working harder, earning less, and without the benefit of health insurance. It's easy to understand why the Bush administrated had the report released a day after the largest natural disaster in a century, when much of the country was distracted.
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Thursday, October 13, 2005
Bush; Try Again
No crones, I mean cronies, on the Supreme Court!
--from a letter to the editor of The St. Augustine Record
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--from a letter to the editor of The St. Augustine Record
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Lose-Lose Situation in Iraq
Edited from: Inter Press Service, Washington
Five days before Saturday's referendum on Iraq's proposed constitution, the U.S. foreign policy elite appears both anxious and gloomy, increasingly worried that win or lose, the process will bring Iraq one step closer to civil war and, with it, the possible destabilisation of the wider region. The constitution's approval, in the view of many experts, will likely further alienate the Sunni population from the political process. . .
. . . "A defeat of the constitution [by Sunnis] could deepen Sunni-Shiite-Kurd divisions, and many observers fear that the odds of Shiite retaliation would increase," wrote Noah Feldman, a New York University law professor who advised the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in Iraq, in the New York Times Sunday Magazine this week. "The fact that Shiites have not retaliated systematically (against Sunni attacks) is the only thing now standing between Iraq and a major civil war," he warned.
Some experts believe that a civil war is already underway, even if it is not yet a full-blown conflict. . . If accounts from the ground are to be believed, there is already some ethnic cleansing going on in some neighbourhoods and some areas within Iraq. The reason, according to top U.S. military officers in Iraq, is clear enough. "We've looked for the constitution to be a national pact, and the perception now is that it's not," Gen. George Casey, the commander of U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq, told lawmakers here last week. Indeed, the most important parts of the draft charter -- or at least those to which the Sunnis are most strongly opposed -- were worked out between the Kurds and the major Shiite parties despite U.S. efforts [to the contrary]. . .
The Sunnis' main concerns include provisions that could be used to discriminate against ex-Baathist Party members, ambiguous language about how the country's oil wealth will be divided between the national and local governments, and, most important, the constitutional mandate that permits the establishment of a nine-province, highly autonomous region for the predominantly Shiite south, as well as a less controversial, three-province Kurdish region in the north. Sunnis object to this confederal structure because it would both severely weaken the central government, which Sunnis had dominated since the Ottoman Empire, and possibly exclude the predominantly Sunni western provinces from getting a proportional share of Iraq's oil wealth, which is produced only in the northern and southern parts of the country. In addition, Sunnis express concerns that an autonomous Shiite south will be dominated by neighbouring Iran, which is believed to provide material and other support to the Shiite parties there. Even some supporters of the U.S. invasion have complained about the result. . . that approval of the constitution could provoke civil war. . .
*****************************
The United States has 'Lebanonised' Iraq. It is ironic that a structure that worked so poorly for Lebanon is now the template for Iraq.
Five days before Saturday's referendum on Iraq's proposed constitution, the U.S. foreign policy elite appears both anxious and gloomy, increasingly worried that win or lose, the process will bring Iraq one step closer to civil war and, with it, the possible destabilisation of the wider region. The constitution's approval, in the view of many experts, will likely further alienate the Sunni population from the political process. . .
. . . "A defeat of the constitution [by Sunnis] could deepen Sunni-Shiite-Kurd divisions, and many observers fear that the odds of Shiite retaliation would increase," wrote Noah Feldman, a New York University law professor who advised the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in Iraq, in the New York Times Sunday Magazine this week. "The fact that Shiites have not retaliated systematically (against Sunni attacks) is the only thing now standing between Iraq and a major civil war," he warned.
Some experts believe that a civil war is already underway, even if it is not yet a full-blown conflict. . . If accounts from the ground are to be believed, there is already some ethnic cleansing going on in some neighbourhoods and some areas within Iraq. The reason, according to top U.S. military officers in Iraq, is clear enough. "We've looked for the constitution to be a national pact, and the perception now is that it's not," Gen. George Casey, the commander of U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq, told lawmakers here last week. Indeed, the most important parts of the draft charter -- or at least those to which the Sunnis are most strongly opposed -- were worked out between the Kurds and the major Shiite parties despite U.S. efforts [to the contrary]. . .
The Sunnis' main concerns include provisions that could be used to discriminate against ex-Baathist Party members, ambiguous language about how the country's oil wealth will be divided between the national and local governments, and, most important, the constitutional mandate that permits the establishment of a nine-province, highly autonomous region for the predominantly Shiite south, as well as a less controversial, three-province Kurdish region in the north. Sunnis object to this confederal structure because it would both severely weaken the central government, which Sunnis had dominated since the Ottoman Empire, and possibly exclude the predominantly Sunni western provinces from getting a proportional share of Iraq's oil wealth, which is produced only in the northern and southern parts of the country. In addition, Sunnis express concerns that an autonomous Shiite south will be dominated by neighbouring Iran, which is believed to provide material and other support to the Shiite parties there. Even some supporters of the U.S. invasion have complained about the result. . . that approval of the constitution could provoke civil war. . .
*****************************
The United States has 'Lebanonised' Iraq. It is ironic that a structure that worked so poorly for Lebanon is now the template for Iraq.
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Friday, September 30, 2005
The DARKSIDE
The dark soul of modern American-style fascism, more commonly known in it's latest orwellian denotation- 'compassionate conservatism', exposes itself occasionally and unintentionally (albeit subconciously) to the light. . .
Consider the recent comments of conservative darling Bob Bennett about blacks and crime, on his right-wing radio talk show. Regarding the implications of a controversial new book 'Freakonomics', which concerns statistics, economic data and their manipulation to enhance most any end or argument apparently (something the right-wing in America has gotten very good at doing), he let slip the stuff of what serious, right thinking, good ol' boy republicans no doubt talk about among themselves all the time. That is: How to ignore, marginalize, persecute or 'eliminate' blacks, browns, gays, emancipated women or any other group not acceptable or inconvenient to their authoritarian, christian fundamentalist, corporate-owned catachism. All of these groups are more and more undermined and attacked by the rightwing through legislation, the courts or even on the streets by the least among them. The fervent success of the right-wing in this area has only gotten more strident, blatant and painfully effective as their grip on power has increased.
Bennett's quick, in same sentence retraction of the notion of aborting all blacks to reduce crime (no doubt ONLY based in a guilt ridden catholicism), was eerily like the myriad discussions among the Nazis over the course of their stay in power of the 'final solution' and its political and moral implications. The very fact that the discussions occurred at all was indicative that the Holocaust that followed was inevitable, especially when the Nazis' power to do so was unassailable. Carl Jung would agree surely. This obsession and developed hatred of all that is communal, non-christian and non-white middle, upper class by the new reich of the new right-wing in America can only follow a similar slide into the dark abyss where fascist thought and action has historically flowed. . .
Their god is not who they believe he is!
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Consider the recent comments of conservative darling Bob Bennett about blacks and crime, on his right-wing radio talk show. Regarding the implications of a controversial new book 'Freakonomics', which concerns statistics, economic data and their manipulation to enhance most any end or argument apparently (something the right-wing in America has gotten very good at doing), he let slip the stuff of what serious, right thinking, good ol' boy republicans no doubt talk about among themselves all the time. That is: How to ignore, marginalize, persecute or 'eliminate' blacks, browns, gays, emancipated women or any other group not acceptable or inconvenient to their authoritarian, christian fundamentalist, corporate-owned catachism. All of these groups are more and more undermined and attacked by the rightwing through legislation, the courts or even on the streets by the least among them. The fervent success of the right-wing in this area has only gotten more strident, blatant and painfully effective as their grip on power has increased.
Bennett's quick, in same sentence retraction of the notion of aborting all blacks to reduce crime (no doubt ONLY based in a guilt ridden catholicism), was eerily like the myriad discussions among the Nazis over the course of their stay in power of the 'final solution' and its political and moral implications. The very fact that the discussions occurred at all was indicative that the Holocaust that followed was inevitable, especially when the Nazis' power to do so was unassailable. Carl Jung would agree surely. This obsession and developed hatred of all that is communal, non-christian and non-white middle, upper class by the new reich of the new right-wing in America can only follow a similar slide into the dark abyss where fascist thought and action has historically flowed. . .
Their god is not who they believe he is!
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Tuesday, September 20, 2005
What's Conservative about the Pledge of Allegiance?
--Edited from an article by Gene Healy, senior editor at the Cato Institute.
(suggested by Julie Johnson)
It seems there's no escaping America's culture wars for the Supreme Court: On Tuesday, Oct. 14, the Court announced that it would hear Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow, a case on the constitutionality of the Pledge of Allegiance. Newdow arose out of a California parent's attempt to get the phrase "under God" stripped from the Pledge, on the grounds that it represents an establishment of religion.
The Newdow case is a Republican campaign strategist's dream. It gives G.O.P. candidates a grand old opportunity to position themselves as defenders of tradition against militant atheists and liberal judges. But any conservatives so inclined should think about what they're defending.
Very little, as it turns out. From its inception, in 1892, the Pledge has been a slavish ritual of devotion to the state, wholly inappropriate for a free people. It was written by Francis Bellamy, a Christian Socialist pushed out of his post as a Baptist minister for delivering pulpit-pounding sermons on such topics as "Jesus the Socialist." Bellamy was devoted to the ideas of his more-famous cousin Edward Bellamy, author of the 1888 utopian novel Looking Backward. Looking Backward describes the future United States as a regimented worker's paradise where everyone has equal incomes, and men are drafted into the country's "industrial army" at the age of 21, serving in the jobs assigned them by the state. Bellamy's novel was extremely popular, selling more copies than other any 19th century American novel except Uncle Tom's Cabin. Bellamy's book inspired a movement of "Nationalist Clubs," whose members campaigned for a government takeover of the economy. A few years before he wrote the Pledge of Allegiance, Francis Bellamy became a founding member of Boston's first Nationalist Club.
After leaving the pulpit, Francis Bellamy decided to advance his authoritarian ideas through the public schools. Bellamy wrote the Pledge of Allegiance for Youth's Companion, a popular children's magazine. With the aid of the National Education Association, Bellamy and the editors of Youth's Companion got the Pledge adopted as part of the National Public School Celebration on Columbus Day 1892.
Bellamy's recommended ritual for honoring the flag had students all but goosestepping their way through the Pledge: "At a signal from the Principal the pupils, in ordered ranks, hands to the side, face the Flag. Another signal is given; every pupil gives the Flag the military salute--right hand lifted, palm downward, to a line with the forehead and close to it... At the words, 'to my Flag,' the right hand is extended gracefully, palm upward, towards the Flag, and remains in this gesture till the end of the affirmation; whereupon all hands immediately drop to the side." After the rise of Nazism, this form of salute was thought to be in poor taste, to say the least, and replaced with today's hand-on-heart gesture.
Hands on their hearts, more than 100 Republican members of Congress gathered on the steps of the Capitol to recite the pledge shortly after the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled for Newdow in June 2002. It was an effective photo-op, allowing the G.O.P. to cast itself as the defender of tradition. But not every tradition deserves defending. Though no one can be legally compelled to salute the flag, encouraging the ritual smacks of promoting a quasi-religious genuflection to the state. That's not surprising, given that the Pledge was designed by an avowed socialist to encourage greater regimentation of society.
Regardless of the legal merits of Newdow's case -- which rests on a rather ambitious interpretation of the First Amendment's Establishment clause -- it's ironic to see conservatives rally to such a questionable custom. Why do so many conservatives who, by and large, exalt the individual and the family above the state, endorse this ceremony of subordination to the government? Why do Christian conservatives say it's important for schoolchildren to bow before a symbol of secular power? Indeed, why should conservatives support the Pledge at all, with or without "under God"?
-Never expect the religious right to be rational!
BLOG ON. . .
(suggested by Julie Johnson)
It seems there's no escaping America's culture wars for the Supreme Court: On Tuesday, Oct. 14, the Court announced that it would hear Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow, a case on the constitutionality of the Pledge of Allegiance. Newdow arose out of a California parent's attempt to get the phrase "under God" stripped from the Pledge, on the grounds that it represents an establishment of religion.
The Newdow case is a Republican campaign strategist's dream. It gives G.O.P. candidates a grand old opportunity to position themselves as defenders of tradition against militant atheists and liberal judges. But any conservatives so inclined should think about what they're defending.
Very little, as it turns out. From its inception, in 1892, the Pledge has been a slavish ritual of devotion to the state, wholly inappropriate for a free people. It was written by Francis Bellamy, a Christian Socialist pushed out of his post as a Baptist minister for delivering pulpit-pounding sermons on such topics as "Jesus the Socialist." Bellamy was devoted to the ideas of his more-famous cousin Edward Bellamy, author of the 1888 utopian novel Looking Backward. Looking Backward describes the future United States as a regimented worker's paradise where everyone has equal incomes, and men are drafted into the country's "industrial army" at the age of 21, serving in the jobs assigned them by the state. Bellamy's novel was extremely popular, selling more copies than other any 19th century American novel except Uncle Tom's Cabin. Bellamy's book inspired a movement of "Nationalist Clubs," whose members campaigned for a government takeover of the economy. A few years before he wrote the Pledge of Allegiance, Francis Bellamy became a founding member of Boston's first Nationalist Club.
After leaving the pulpit, Francis Bellamy decided to advance his authoritarian ideas through the public schools. Bellamy wrote the Pledge of Allegiance for Youth's Companion, a popular children's magazine. With the aid of the National Education Association, Bellamy and the editors of Youth's Companion got the Pledge adopted as part of the National Public School Celebration on Columbus Day 1892.
Bellamy's recommended ritual for honoring the flag had students all but goosestepping their way through the Pledge: "At a signal from the Principal the pupils, in ordered ranks, hands to the side, face the Flag. Another signal is given; every pupil gives the Flag the military salute--right hand lifted, palm downward, to a line with the forehead and close to it... At the words, 'to my Flag,' the right hand is extended gracefully, palm upward, towards the Flag, and remains in this gesture till the end of the affirmation; whereupon all hands immediately drop to the side." After the rise of Nazism, this form of salute was thought to be in poor taste, to say the least, and replaced with today's hand-on-heart gesture.
Hands on their hearts, more than 100 Republican members of Congress gathered on the steps of the Capitol to recite the pledge shortly after the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled for Newdow in June 2002. It was an effective photo-op, allowing the G.O.P. to cast itself as the defender of tradition. But not every tradition deserves defending. Though no one can be legally compelled to salute the flag, encouraging the ritual smacks of promoting a quasi-religious genuflection to the state. That's not surprising, given that the Pledge was designed by an avowed socialist to encourage greater regimentation of society.
Regardless of the legal merits of Newdow's case -- which rests on a rather ambitious interpretation of the First Amendment's Establishment clause -- it's ironic to see conservatives rally to such a questionable custom. Why do so many conservatives who, by and large, exalt the individual and the family above the state, endorse this ceremony of subordination to the government? Why do Christian conservatives say it's important for schoolchildren to bow before a symbol of secular power? Indeed, why should conservatives support the Pledge at all, with or without "under God"?
-Never expect the religious right to be rational!
BLOG ON. . .
Thursday, September 08, 2005
Revolution No. 9
1- 1841 soldiers dead in Iraq as of 8/12/05.
2- $300 Billion spent on Iraq war as of 8/12/05.
3- 0 is the number of wmds found in Iraq.
4- $240 Billion is the yearly surplus Clinton left Bush.
5- $350 Billiion is the current yearly deficit under Bush.
6- 1 in 5 is the number of American children in poverty (up 15% since Bush took office).
7- 5 Million is the number of people who have lost health insurance since Bush took office.
8- 0 is the number of mistakes of any kind admitted by the Bush administration.
9- 4 is the multiple by which N. Korea has increased its nuclear weapons since Bush took office.
--and then there is the handling of the Katrina catastrophe (no numbers yet available). . .
REVOLUTION ANYONE?
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2- $300 Billion spent on Iraq war as of 8/12/05.
3- 0 is the number of wmds found in Iraq.
4- $240 Billion is the yearly surplus Clinton left Bush.
5- $350 Billiion is the current yearly deficit under Bush.
6- 1 in 5 is the number of American children in poverty (up 15% since Bush took office).
7- 5 Million is the number of people who have lost health insurance since Bush took office.
8- 0 is the number of mistakes of any kind admitted by the Bush administration.
9- 4 is the multiple by which N. Korea has increased its nuclear weapons since Bush took office.
--and then there is the handling of the Katrina catastrophe (no numbers yet available). . .
REVOLUTION ANYONE?
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Wednesday, August 31, 2005
Kissing Saudi Ass
The only evidence you need that President Bush is losing the "war on terror" is this: On Sunday, the foreign minister of Saudi Arabia said that relations with the United States "couldn't be better."
Tell that to the parents of those who have died in two wars defending this corrupt spawning ground of violent extremism. Never mind the ugly facts: We are deeply entwined with Saudi Arabia even though it shares none of our values and supports our enemies. Yet on Friday, Bush senior and VP Cheney made another in a long line of obsequious American pilgrimages to Riyadh to assure the Saudis that we continue to be grateful for the punishment they dish out.
"The relationship has tremendously improved with the United States," Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al Faisal told a news conference in Riyadh. "With the government, of course, it is very harmonious, as it ever was. Whether it has returned to the same level as it was before in terms of public opinion [in both countries], that is debatable."
Well, score one for public opinion. It makes sense to distrust the mercenary and distasteful alliance between the United States and Saudi Arabia. We protect the repressive kingdom that spawned Osama bin Laden, and most of the 9/11 hijackers, in exchange for the Saudis keeping our fecklessly oil-addicted country lubricated.
Yes, it has stuck deep in the craw of many of us Americans that after 9/11, Washington squandered global goodwill and a huge percentage of our resources invading a country that had nothing to do with Al Qaeda, while continuing to pander to this dysfunctional dynasty. After all, Saudi Arabia is believed to have paid bin Laden's murderous gang millions in protection money in the years before 9/11, and it lavishly funds extremist religious schools throughout the region that preach and teach anti-Western jihad.
"Al Qaeda found fertile fundraising ground in the kingdom," noted the 9/11 commission report in one of its many careful understatements. The fact is, without Saudi Arabia, there would be no Al Qaeda today! (from THE NATION)
--WHAT A FRIEND!
Tell that to the parents of those who have died in two wars defending this corrupt spawning ground of violent extremism. Never mind the ugly facts: We are deeply entwined with Saudi Arabia even though it shares none of our values and supports our enemies. Yet on Friday, Bush senior and VP Cheney made another in a long line of obsequious American pilgrimages to Riyadh to assure the Saudis that we continue to be grateful for the punishment they dish out.
"The relationship has tremendously improved with the United States," Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al Faisal told a news conference in Riyadh. "With the government, of course, it is very harmonious, as it ever was. Whether it has returned to the same level as it was before in terms of public opinion [in both countries], that is debatable."
Well, score one for public opinion. It makes sense to distrust the mercenary and distasteful alliance between the United States and Saudi Arabia. We protect the repressive kingdom that spawned Osama bin Laden, and most of the 9/11 hijackers, in exchange for the Saudis keeping our fecklessly oil-addicted country lubricated.
Yes, it has stuck deep in the craw of many of us Americans that after 9/11, Washington squandered global goodwill and a huge percentage of our resources invading a country that had nothing to do with Al Qaeda, while continuing to pander to this dysfunctional dynasty. After all, Saudi Arabia is believed to have paid bin Laden's murderous gang millions in protection money in the years before 9/11, and it lavishly funds extremist religious schools throughout the region that preach and teach anti-Western jihad.
"Al Qaeda found fertile fundraising ground in the kingdom," noted the 9/11 commission report in one of its many careful understatements. The fact is, without Saudi Arabia, there would be no Al Qaeda today! (from THE NATION)
--WHAT A FRIEND!
blog on. . .
Sunday, August 14, 2005
PAINE-ful Times!
THESE are the times that try men's souls. . . Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us. . . it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated. [America]. . ., with an army to enforce her tyranny, has declared that she has a right (not only to TAX [all but the rich]) but "to BIND us in ALL CASES WHATSOEVER [as in the 'patriot act']," and if being bound in that manner, is not slavery, then is there not such a thing as slavery upon earth. Even the expression is impious; for so unlimited a power can belong only to God [?]. . .
I have as little superstition in me as any man living, but my secret opinion has ever been, and still is, that God Almighty will not give up a people to military destruction, or leave them unsupportedly to perish, who have so earnestly and so repeatedly sought to avoid the calamities of war, by every decent method which wisdom could invent. Neither have I so much of the infidel in me, as to suppose that He has relinquished the government of the world, and given us up to the care of devils; and as I do not, I cannot see on what grounds the [American President]. . .can look up to heaven for help. . .: a common murderer, a highwayman, or a house-breaker, has as good a pretence as he. . .
'Tis surprising to see how rapidly a panic will sometimes run through a country. All nations and ages have been subject to them. . .Their duration is always short; the mind soon grows through them, and acquires a firmer habit than before. But their peculiar advantage is, that they are the touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy, and bring things and men to light, which might otherwise have lain forever undiscovered. In fact, they have the same effect on secret traitors, which an imaginary apparition would have upon a private murderer. They sift out the hidden thoughts of man, and hold them up in public to the world. . .
But, before the line of irrecoverable separation be drawn between us, let us reason the matter together: [President Bush] your conduct is an invitation to the enemy. . . [The enemy] is as much deceived by you as the American cause is injured by you. . .Your opinions are of no use. . .
America did not, nor does not want force; but she wanted a proper application of that force. Wisdom is not the purchase of a day, and it is no wonder that we should err at the first setting off. From an excess of tenderness, we were unwilling to raise an army, and trusted our cause to the temporary defence of a well-meaning militia [but not that of it's Commander]. A summer's experience has now taught us better; yet with those troops, while they were collected, we were able to set bounds to the progress of the enemy. . .I turn with the warm ardor of a friend to those who have nobly stood, and are yet determined to stand the matter out. . .
My own line of reasoning is to myself as straight and clear as a ray of light. Not all the treasures of the world, so far as I believe, could have induced me to support an offensive war, for I think it murder. . .There are cases which cannot be overdone by language, and this is one. There are persons, too, who see not the full extent of the evil which threatens them. . . It is the madness of folly, to expect mercy from those who have refused to do justice; and even mercy, where conquest is the object, is only a trick of war; the cunning of the fox is as murderous as the violence of the wolf, and we ought to guard equally against both.
-edited from:
The American Crisis No. 1
COMMON SENSE by Thomas Paine
December 23, 1776
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I have as little superstition in me as any man living, but my secret opinion has ever been, and still is, that God Almighty will not give up a people to military destruction, or leave them unsupportedly to perish, who have so earnestly and so repeatedly sought to avoid the calamities of war, by every decent method which wisdom could invent. Neither have I so much of the infidel in me, as to suppose that He has relinquished the government of the world, and given us up to the care of devils; and as I do not, I cannot see on what grounds the [American President]. . .can look up to heaven for help. . .: a common murderer, a highwayman, or a house-breaker, has as good a pretence as he. . .
'Tis surprising to see how rapidly a panic will sometimes run through a country. All nations and ages have been subject to them. . .Their duration is always short; the mind soon grows through them, and acquires a firmer habit than before. But their peculiar advantage is, that they are the touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy, and bring things and men to light, which might otherwise have lain forever undiscovered. In fact, they have the same effect on secret traitors, which an imaginary apparition would have upon a private murderer. They sift out the hidden thoughts of man, and hold them up in public to the world. . .
But, before the line of irrecoverable separation be drawn between us, let us reason the matter together: [President Bush] your conduct is an invitation to the enemy. . . [The enemy] is as much deceived by you as the American cause is injured by you. . .Your opinions are of no use. . .
America did not, nor does not want force; but she wanted a proper application of that force. Wisdom is not the purchase of a day, and it is no wonder that we should err at the first setting off. From an excess of tenderness, we were unwilling to raise an army, and trusted our cause to the temporary defence of a well-meaning militia [but not that of it's Commander]. A summer's experience has now taught us better; yet with those troops, while they were collected, we were able to set bounds to the progress of the enemy. . .I turn with the warm ardor of a friend to those who have nobly stood, and are yet determined to stand the matter out. . .
My own line of reasoning is to myself as straight and clear as a ray of light. Not all the treasures of the world, so far as I believe, could have induced me to support an offensive war, for I think it murder. . .There are cases which cannot be overdone by language, and this is one. There are persons, too, who see not the full extent of the evil which threatens them. . . It is the madness of folly, to expect mercy from those who have refused to do justice; and even mercy, where conquest is the object, is only a trick of war; the cunning of the fox is as murderous as the violence of the wolf, and we ought to guard equally against both.
-edited from:
The American Crisis No. 1
COMMON SENSE by Thomas Paine
December 23, 1776
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Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Oppose Roberts Nomination!
After listening to Nina Totenberg's reportage on NPR of Robert's past legal writings while holding various positions at various times in repub White Houses and Justice Depts., it is more than clear that this guy is off the deep right wing end of the political pier! As already right wing his repub bosses were, he again and again urged them to take extreme hard line positions against affirmative action, environmental laws, voting rights and more. . .
We know more than enough to know that this guy is the wrong guy for the Supreme Court. We can't afford to have another right-wing ideologue on our nation's highest court.
Click on the Move On link on the sidebar to send your Senators a message opposing Roberts.
We know more than enough to know that this guy is the wrong guy for the Supreme Court. We can't afford to have another right-wing ideologue on our nation's highest court.
Click on the Move On link on the sidebar to send your Senators a message opposing Roberts.
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Wednesday, July 13, 2005
Rove Revelations
We now know White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove revealed the identity of a CIA operative, proving that he can’t be trusted with classified information. For the sake of national security and to protect America’s defenders in the line of fire, President Bush needs to revoke his security clearance and get him out of the White House before he leaks another secret.
Background:
In his State of the Union message in 2003, George Bush said that Saddam Hussein was trying to get uranium from Niger. In the following weeks, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson disclosed that he was sent to Niger by the CIA to look into this and had reported to top administration officials months before the speech that there was no Niger-Iraq uranium connection. In a discussion with a reporter at Time magazine about Wilson’s disclosure, Rove said that Wilson’s wife was the CIA operative who sent him to Niger. Three days later columnist Robert Novak published the fact that Plame was a CIA operative thus ending her career, possibly endangering her life and ending an important operation.
Knowing what we all do about the ethical laxity of Karl Rove, it can be assumed he was punishing Wilson for embarrassing the President. Yet, if Rove exposed Wilson’s wife, a covert member of the CIA’s weapons of mass destruction team, it would be an act of treason. Rove’s lawyer counters that he didn’t know she was a covert operative and didn’t mean any harm (yah right) . Either way his disclosure was dangerous to national security!
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Background:
In his State of the Union message in 2003, George Bush said that Saddam Hussein was trying to get uranium from Niger. In the following weeks, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson disclosed that he was sent to Niger by the CIA to look into this and had reported to top administration officials months before the speech that there was no Niger-Iraq uranium connection. In a discussion with a reporter at Time magazine about Wilson’s disclosure, Rove said that Wilson’s wife was the CIA operative who sent him to Niger. Three days later columnist Robert Novak published the fact that Plame was a CIA operative thus ending her career, possibly endangering her life and ending an important operation.
Knowing what we all do about the ethical laxity of Karl Rove, it can be assumed he was punishing Wilson for embarrassing the President. Yet, if Rove exposed Wilson’s wife, a covert member of the CIA’s weapons of mass destruction team, it would be an act of treason. Rove’s lawyer counters that he didn’t know she was a covert operative and didn’t mean any harm (yah right) . Either way his disclosure was dangerous to national security!
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Wednesday, June 29, 2005
More Bush BS
As predicted, Bush’s latest Iraqi 'policy' (word used loosely) speech was actually a rehashing of the same tired material he’s been using on Iraq for years and we're not going into that crap again here.
He even invoked the name of Osama Bin Laden (heretofore seemingly forgotten by him) two distinct times. More shockingly, yet expectedly, he played the unsubstantiated 9/11-Iraq card, not once, but twice, thrice. . .five mentions in all for the terrorist attack that everyone else knows but him apparently, had absolutely nothing to do with the war in Iraq. This administration just doesn't know how NOT to lie.
Sadly- no new policy, no new strategy. . .
--Bush gets the prize for including more bullshit and lies in a single 'foreign policy' speech than any other president since Richard Nixon!
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He even invoked the name of Osama Bin Laden (heretofore seemingly forgotten by him) two distinct times. More shockingly, yet expectedly, he played the unsubstantiated 9/11-Iraq card, not once, but twice, thrice. . .five mentions in all for the terrorist attack that everyone else knows but him apparently, had absolutely nothing to do with the war in Iraq. This administration just doesn't know how NOT to lie.
Sadly- no new policy, no new strategy. . .
--Bush gets the prize for including more bullshit and lies in a single 'foreign policy' speech than any other president since Richard Nixon!
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Wednesday, June 22, 2005
Stop FDA Appointment!
Bush has nominated another rightwing Christian fundamentalist kook- Lester Crawford, who has helped block attempts to improve women's access to birthcontrol, for the top job at the FDA. One major example: during his tenure as acting commissioner, the FDA has ignored the recommendation from its own scientific and medical experts and blocked an application to make the morning-after pill available without a prescription.
Take action today to block his appointment to FDA:
Click on the Link in this post and speak out with Sens. Patty Murray from Washington and Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, who are holding up his nomination until the FDA acts on the application.
Also, urge your senators to join Sens. Murray and Clinton and oppose Crawford!
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Take action today to block his appointment to FDA:
Click on the Link in this post and speak out with Sens. Patty Murray from Washington and Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, who are holding up his nomination until the FDA acts on the application.
Also, urge your senators to join Sens. Murray and Clinton and oppose Crawford!
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Wednesday, June 15, 2005
Frist Follies
Sen. Frist has proven to be no better a doctor than he has a majority leader!
Note this from Salon Magazine:
The results of Terri Schiavo's autopsy are in, and they make one Senate Majority Leader look very foolish. According to Pinellas-Pasco, Florida medical examiner Jon Thogmartin, Schiavo's brain had suffered massive and irreversible damage; it "weighed 615 grams, roughly half of the expected weight of a human brain." Thogmartin also refuted assertions from Shiavo's parents and some members of the GOP that Schiavo could have recovered: "This damage was irreversible, and no amount of therapy or treatment would have regenerated the massive loss of neurons."
But the kicker for those who tuned in to the footage of Schiavo seeming to follow the movement of helium balloons with her eyes is that the autopsy results show that "the vision centers of her brain were dead." In other words, Schiavo was blind!
. . .[It] is pretty much the opposite of what Bill Frist said in his "diagnosis" of Schiavo's condition back in March. Speaking from the Senate floor during a special late-night session, Frist disputed Schiavo's doctors' diagnosis of persistent vegetative state. "I question it based on a review of the video footage which I spent an hour or so looking at last night in my office," he said in a lengthy speech in which he quoted medical texts and standards. "She certainly seems to respond to visual stimuli [lol]."
-I take back a recent post asking readers to call Congress for a doctor's appointment. . .
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Note this from Salon Magazine:
The results of Terri Schiavo's autopsy are in, and they make one Senate Majority Leader look very foolish. According to Pinellas-Pasco, Florida medical examiner Jon Thogmartin, Schiavo's brain had suffered massive and irreversible damage; it "weighed 615 grams, roughly half of the expected weight of a human brain." Thogmartin also refuted assertions from Shiavo's parents and some members of the GOP that Schiavo could have recovered: "This damage was irreversible, and no amount of therapy or treatment would have regenerated the massive loss of neurons."
But the kicker for those who tuned in to the footage of Schiavo seeming to follow the movement of helium balloons with her eyes is that the autopsy results show that "the vision centers of her brain were dead." In other words, Schiavo was blind!
. . .[It] is pretty much the opposite of what Bill Frist said in his "diagnosis" of Schiavo's condition back in March. Speaking from the Senate floor during a special late-night session, Frist disputed Schiavo's doctors' diagnosis of persistent vegetative state. "I question it based on a review of the video footage which I spent an hour or so looking at last night in my office," he said in a lengthy speech in which he quoted medical texts and standards. "She certainly seems to respond to visual stimuli [lol]."
-I take back a recent post asking readers to call Congress for a doctor's appointment. . .
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Tuesday, June 07, 2005
Apology to Edwards
In a recent post, "Wannabe Dem Preses Out of Touch!", I criticized Mr. Edwards for seemingly criticizing Dean's latest slam against the rich repubs. I am afraid I took Mr. Edwards remarks out of context (as did the newspaper where I got the quote!).
At the One America Committe Blog I read the whole of his remarks in response to a comment to my post above, directing me there. It is clear Edwards is quite 'sympatico' with the Dean statement, clarifying and identifying with it in less clumsy language than Dean's, perhaps. It's nice to know Mr. Edwards is still on the side of the poor and working class and isn't afraid to say so!
KEEP UP THE GOOD FIGHT EDWARDS!!! (Click on the Link to read the entire text and this response!)
-my post's remarks about Biden STAND-
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At the One America Committe Blog I read the whole of his remarks in response to a comment to my post above, directing me there. It is clear Edwards is quite 'sympatico' with the Dean statement, clarifying and identifying with it in less clumsy language than Dean's, perhaps. It's nice to know Mr. Edwards is still on the side of the poor and working class and isn't afraid to say so!
KEEP UP THE GOOD FIGHT EDWARDS!!! (Click on the Link to read the entire text and this response!)
-my post's remarks about Biden STAND-
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Pres Bush TOTALLY Out of Touch!
"A clear majority of Americans say President Bush is ignoring the public's concerns and instead has become distracted by issues that most people say they care little about, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.
The survey found that 58 percent of those interviewed said Bush is mainly concentrating in his second term on problems and partisan squabbles that these respondents said were unimportant to them. Four in 10--41 percent--said the president was focused on important problems--a double-digit drop from three years ago.
. . .According to the poll, nearly eight in 10 Democrats say Bush is not concentrating on issues they personally view as vital while three out of four Republicans disagree.
Ominously for Bush and the Republicans, a strong majority of self-described political independents--68 percent--say they disagreed with the president's priorities. That suggests Bush's mixed record in the second term on issues the public views as critical--particularly on Iraq and the economy--may be as much a liability for GOP candidates in next year's mid-term election. . .
Overall, the president's job approval rating stood at 48 percent, virtually identical to where it was last month. Currently 52 percent of the public disapproves of the job Bush is doing as president, the highest negative rating of his performance since taking office.
Continuing violence in Iraq continues to fuel negative views of the White House. Four in 10 Americans currently approve of the job that Bush is doing in Iraq while 58 percent disapproved. It marked the 13th consecutive month that less than half of the country approved of Bush's handling of the situation in Iraq.
A total of 1,002 randomly selected adults were interviewed June 2-5 for this survey. Margin of sampling error for the overall results is plus or minus 3 percentage points."
-from the Washington Post
What can I say?
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The survey found that 58 percent of those interviewed said Bush is mainly concentrating in his second term on problems and partisan squabbles that these respondents said were unimportant to them. Four in 10--41 percent--said the president was focused on important problems--a double-digit drop from three years ago.
. . .According to the poll, nearly eight in 10 Democrats say Bush is not concentrating on issues they personally view as vital while three out of four Republicans disagree.
Ominously for Bush and the Republicans, a strong majority of self-described political independents--68 percent--say they disagreed with the president's priorities. That suggests Bush's mixed record in the second term on issues the public views as critical--particularly on Iraq and the economy--may be as much a liability for GOP candidates in next year's mid-term election. . .
Overall, the president's job approval rating stood at 48 percent, virtually identical to where it was last month. Currently 52 percent of the public disapproves of the job Bush is doing as president, the highest negative rating of his performance since taking office.
Continuing violence in Iraq continues to fuel negative views of the White House. Four in 10 Americans currently approve of the job that Bush is doing in Iraq while 58 percent disapproved. It marked the 13th consecutive month that less than half of the country approved of Bush's handling of the situation in Iraq.
A total of 1,002 randomly selected adults were interviewed June 2-5 for this survey. Margin of sampling error for the overall results is plus or minus 3 percentage points."
-from the Washington Post
What can I say?
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Monday, June 06, 2005
Wannabe Dem Preses Out of Touch!
DNC Chairman Howard Dean said Thursday that perhaps Republicans can wait in line to cast ballots because a "lot of them have never made an honest living in their lives."
Asked whether Dean is doing the party any good, Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del) said, "Not with that kind of rhetoric. He doesn't speak for me with that kind of rhetoric. And I don't think he speaks for the majority of Democrats. . . . I wish that rhetoric would change."
John Edwards, the party's vice presidential nominee last year, said at an annual party fundraising dinner Saturday in Nashville that he disagreed with Dean's comment. "The chairman of the DNC is not the spokesman for the party," Edwards said, according to the Associated Press. "He's a voice. I don't agree with it."
Asked whether Dean is doing the party any good, Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del) said, "Not with that kind of rhetoric. He doesn't speak for me with that kind of rhetoric. And I don't think he speaks for the majority of Democrats. . . . I wish that rhetoric would change."
John Edwards, the party's vice presidential nominee last year, said at an annual party fundraising dinner Saturday in Nashville that he disagreed with Dean's comment. "The chairman of the DNC is not the spokesman for the party," Edwards said, according to the Associated Press. "He's a voice. I don't agree with it."
-Biden and Edwards, two of the wannabe dem candidates for pres in 08 are just out of touch! It's why if they continue to equivocate and fence sit on attitudes and issues important to the dem party base- they will lose. America already has a repub party. If its a choice between two of them, they will choose the original- guaranteed!
Dean's remarks reflect not only reality, but the heartfelt opinions of the dem party base and working America in general. It is the touch of reality a dem candidate of the people should 'feel the pain' of- like the last successful dem candidate for pres did.
It's time dem leaders and wannabe pres candidates stopped worrying about offending the rich and start defending the rest of us. Otherwise, we are consigned to another round of repub plutocrat rule!
PLANET PATRIOT
Tuesday, May 31, 2005
President Protests Amnesty Report TOO Much
Despite the President's protestations to the contrary, Amnesty International's condemnation of the American military's torture of 'detainees' both here and abroad, is damning and factually based! Note this from their report:
Hundreds of detainees continued to be held without charge or trial at the US naval base in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Thousands of people were detained during US military and security operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and routinely denied access to their families and lawyers. Military investigations were initiated or conducted into allegations of torture and ill-treatment of detainees by US personnel in Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and into reports of deaths in custody and ill-treatment by US forces elsewhere in Iraq, and in Afghanistan and Guantánamo. Evidence came to light that the US administration had sanctioned interrogation techniques that violated the UN Convention against Torture. Pre-trial military commission hearings opened in Guantánamo but were suspended pending a US court ruling. . .
More on this and a complete rundown of abuses of civil rights in the U.S. can be found at the Amnesty Internation website. Just click on the link.
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Hundreds of detainees continued to be held without charge or trial at the US naval base in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Thousands of people were detained during US military and security operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and routinely denied access to their families and lawyers. Military investigations were initiated or conducted into allegations of torture and ill-treatment of detainees by US personnel in Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and into reports of deaths in custody and ill-treatment by US forces elsewhere in Iraq, and in Afghanistan and Guantánamo. Evidence came to light that the US administration had sanctioned interrogation techniques that violated the UN Convention against Torture. Pre-trial military commission hearings opened in Guantánamo but were suspended pending a US court ruling. . .
More on this and a complete rundown of abuses of civil rights in the U.S. can be found at the Amnesty Internation website. Just click on the link.
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-Just Click on the banner link at the top of the sidebar and make your own posts on topics important to you!
-Interact with others of similar interests!
-Debate, Critique, Inform (or get informed)!
*Help make it another success in the GOOD FIGHT*
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-Interact with others of similar interests!
-Debate, Critique, Inform (or get informed)!
*Help make it another success in the GOOD FIGHT*
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Friday, May 27, 2005
What We're Up Against. . .
--Just a reminder of what we're really up against. How hard can it be? (Then again, ignorance is a tough thing to overcome.)
Keep up the good fight!
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Thursday, May 26, 2005
Truth to Power
Anyone who has the power to make you believe absurdities has the power to make you commit atrocities. -Voltaire
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Heartless HUNTER!
In their trademark hypocritical style, House Republicans are blocking affordable health care for National Guard members and reservists during a war which has caused the Army to fall short on its recruiting goals!
House Armed Services Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., has employed a rarely used authority to strike a provision in the committee-passed $441.6 billion defense authorization bill that would have opened the military's Tricare health care system to all National Guard members and reservists. The bill is scheduled for floor consideration Wednesday.
It's fine to debate just how much the military should incentivise enlistment, but affordable National Guard and reservist medical coverage falls far outside the bounds of a simple enlistment incentive. Medical coverage for reservists should be expected, and it's amazing to see anyone - especially the chair of the House Armed Services Committee - oppose it. At a time when the Army feels it's necessary to offer an unheard of 15-month enlistment option, anything that could be considered an incentive - even if it should be a permanent, obvious benefit - should be seriously considered if only for the fact that it may ease some recruitment problems.
-inspired by a post at the Democratic Party Blog
*A reasonable person would agree with one of the two questions here:
1) You either believe in offering reasonable incentives to increase recruitment during this crisis;
2) You believe in offering affordable health care coverage to National Guard members and reservists.
--You can agree with merely one or with both, but agreeing with neither is rather amazing, and I don't think opposing one is enough to warrant opposition to the plan on whole given the obvious good that comes from the other. Hunter says his opposition stems from the concern that employers of reservists would drop them from their employer-paid healthcare systems in order to shift the burden to the government. If that was Hunter's true concern, one would think that he'd see little opposition if he was to add a provision that prohibited employers from doing just that.
So why doesn't he? Heartless ideological hubris!
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House Armed Services Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., has employed a rarely used authority to strike a provision in the committee-passed $441.6 billion defense authorization bill that would have opened the military's Tricare health care system to all National Guard members and reservists. The bill is scheduled for floor consideration Wednesday.
It's fine to debate just how much the military should incentivise enlistment, but affordable National Guard and reservist medical coverage falls far outside the bounds of a simple enlistment incentive. Medical coverage for reservists should be expected, and it's amazing to see anyone - especially the chair of the House Armed Services Committee - oppose it. At a time when the Army feels it's necessary to offer an unheard of 15-month enlistment option, anything that could be considered an incentive - even if it should be a permanent, obvious benefit - should be seriously considered if only for the fact that it may ease some recruitment problems.
-inspired by a post at the Democratic Party Blog
*A reasonable person would agree with one of the two questions here:
1) You either believe in offering reasonable incentives to increase recruitment during this crisis;
2) You believe in offering affordable health care coverage to National Guard members and reservists.
--You can agree with merely one or with both, but agreeing with neither is rather amazing, and I don't think opposing one is enough to warrant opposition to the plan on whole given the obvious good that comes from the other. Hunter says his opposition stems from the concern that employers of reservists would drop them from their employer-paid healthcare systems in order to shift the burden to the government. If that was Hunter's true concern, one would think that he'd see little opposition if he was to add a provision that prohibited employers from doing just that.
So why doesn't he? Heartless ideological hubris!
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Sunday, May 22, 2005
Sage Advice
"Throughout history, it has been the inaction of those who could have acted; the indifference of those who should have known better; the silence of the voice of justice when it mattered most that has made it possible for evil to triumph."
--Haile Selassie I
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--Haile Selassie I
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Thursday, May 19, 2005
American Generals Dejected about Iraq
This week, five high-ranking officers, speaking separately at the Pentagon and in Baghdad, and through an e-mail exchange from Baghdad with a reporter in Washington, were unusually candid about problems confronting the war effort. The generals' remarks, emphasized the insurgency's success and resilience (quite an admission). They said the buildup of Iraqi forces has been more disappointing than previously acknowledged (contributing to the absence of any Iraqi forces when a 1,000-member Marine battle group mounted an offensive last week). It confirmed that the 160,000 Iraqis now trained and equipped in the $5.7 billion American effort to build up security forces are still (after 2 years) "behind" in their ability to shoulder a major part of the war effort (way behind, it seems). They grumbled about the fact that Iraqi generals and police officials will not even go before the press out of fear for their lives, thus leaving it to American generals and others to do so- keeping an all American face on the war effort.
-edited from a New York Times article
The so-called Iraqi govt hasn't even been able to formally organize yet- and exerts no real authority. The strains between Suni, Shiite and Kurd factions grow by the day. Civil War seems just around the corner!
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-edited from a New York Times article
The so-called Iraqi govt hasn't even been able to formally organize yet- and exerts no real authority. The strains between Suni, Shiite and Kurd factions grow by the day. Civil War seems just around the corner!
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Monday, May 16, 2005
Reid Needs to Take Initiative in Senate
Following the present Senate rules, Reid could do the following himself and totally rout the radical repubs:
-Motion on the Senate floor to change Senate rules to disallow filibusters on judicial nominees
-Move towards a vote on said motion, which would require a 2/3 majority of senators.
-Defeat the proposed rule change by preemption on the Senate floor, under present rules.
I emphasize: This scenario is perfectly within the present Senate rules! Write Senator Reid of Nevada and encourage him to go forward with this maneuver as soon as it is clear that the repubs are going forward with their 'nuclear option'.
Click HERE or go to the Contact Congress link under CRITICAL RESOURCES to find out how to contact him directly.
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-Motion on the Senate floor to change Senate rules to disallow filibusters on judicial nominees
-Move towards a vote on said motion, which would require a 2/3 majority of senators.
-Defeat the proposed rule change by preemption on the Senate floor, under present rules.
I emphasize: This scenario is perfectly within the present Senate rules! Write Senator Reid of Nevada and encourage him to go forward with this maneuver as soon as it is clear that the repubs are going forward with their 'nuclear option'.
Click HERE or go to the Contact Congress link under CRITICAL RESOURCES to find out how to contact him directly.
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Saturday, May 14, 2005
Progressive Perspective
"Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservatives."
--- John Stuart Mill
(i realize this is a repeat of a quote made on this blog at an earlier date, but due to some recent encounters with 'conservatives' I felt it deserved repeating.)
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PLANET PATRIOT
--- John Stuart Mill
(i realize this is a repeat of a quote made on this blog at an earlier date, but due to some recent encounters with 'conservatives' I felt it deserved repeating.)
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PLANET PATRIOT
Saturday, May 07, 2005
Check out NEW Iraq War Cost Ticker- Sidebar!
Found this great resource that ticks off the outrageous costs of the Iraq War.
Click on the link to get detailed info and direct costs to you and your community!
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PLANET PATRIOT
Click on the link to get detailed info and direct costs to you and your community!
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PLANET PATRIOT
Latest Poll Result:
WHAT LIBERALS THINK
The results of the latest poll:
Will Social Security Be Successfully Privatized this Year?
yes, totally- 5 (11%)
yes, partially- 10 (22%)
not at all- 27 (61%)
don't know- 2 (4%)
It looks like our readers have followed public opinion generally. Thankfully, doesn't look like the repubs are going to mess much with SS this year (and likely not next year with elections and all)-- the public is wise to them on this, it seems.
**Check out the new poll on the sidebar. Thanks for your participation!
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PLANET PATRIOT
The results of the latest poll:
Will Social Security Be Successfully Privatized this Year?
yes, totally- 5 (11%)
yes, partially- 10 (22%)
not at all- 27 (61%)
don't know- 2 (4%)
It looks like our readers have followed public opinion generally. Thankfully, doesn't look like the repubs are going to mess much with SS this year (and likely not next year with elections and all)-- the public is wise to them on this, it seems.
**Check out the new poll on the sidebar. Thanks for your participation!
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Friday, May 06, 2005
Minority Rights or Tyranny!!
"No political truth is certainly of greater intrinsic value, or is stamped with the authority of more enlightened patrons of liberty, than that on which the objection is founded. The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny."
- James Madison, Federalist #47
This succint explanation of the importance of the minority right to object in whatever form (such as the filibuster) to the will of the governmental majority by the 'father of the constitution', has conveniently been ignored by repub right. In their fanatical rush to rewrite the rules of government and of history in the image of their warped christianity, they have trampled on their longstanding commitment to constitutional 'strict construction' and 'original intent' of the founders . Admittedly, these 'conservative' credos have oft been distorted and misapplied by them. Still, they unabashedly toss these notions aside as it no longer suits their frightening powerlust to subscribe to them .
)Click on the link to my post at Huffington Post)
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- James Madison, Federalist #47
This succint explanation of the importance of the minority right to object in whatever form (such as the filibuster) to the will of the governmental majority by the 'father of the constitution', has conveniently been ignored by repub right. In their fanatical rush to rewrite the rules of government and of history in the image of their warped christianity, they have trampled on their longstanding commitment to constitutional 'strict construction' and 'original intent' of the founders . Admittedly, these 'conservative' credos have oft been distorted and misapplied by them. Still, they unabashedly toss these notions aside as it no longer suits their frightening powerlust to subscribe to them .
)Click on the link to my post at Huffington Post)
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Planet Patriot
Thursday, May 05, 2005
Call Congress for Doctor Appointment!
Nearly 50 million Americans are still living without health insurance!
According to the Center for American Progress, that number means that for every working physician in the country, there are nearly 150 people without medical coverage. Facing such a dire medical crisis, Americans need to know who is fighting for them in Washington.
In the past, Democrats and progressive politicians led the fight for a more equitable healthcare system. In the mid 1940s, President Truman asked Congress to develop a universal health insurance program. After nearly 20 years of debate on the issue, President Johnson authorized two less comprehensive government-sponsored healthcare programs, Medicare and Medicaid. Hillary Clinton tried to promote something close to Truman's vision of universal medical coverage in 1993, but was thwarted. In 2004, Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry proposed a plan to greatly expand government health programs, but lost to an incumbent under whom the number of uninsured Americans has soared.
Last month, however, everything changed. With Terri Schiavo's life was on the line, the GOP suddenly became the party of government-sponsored health care. In fact, a few Republicans went even farther than Democrats had dared to go: from the comfort of their Capitol Hill offices, two physicians in Congress saw fit to offer free and comprehensive medical advice to a sick American!
With nothing but a short videotape to aid them, Senator Bill Frist (R-TN), a heart and lung surgeon, and Representative Dave Weldon (R-FL), an internist, were able to rebut the diagnoses of neurological specialists who claimed Mrs. Schiavo was in 'a persistent vegetative state.' The Congressmen contended from their film viewing that she 'seemed to respond to visual stimuli.'
--from The Nation
With a short letter or email describing your symptoms, we expect that the pair would be glad to diagnose your ailment as well. --'Click' on the Contact Congress link under CRITICAL RESOURCES to get their addresses!
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According to the Center for American Progress, that number means that for every working physician in the country, there are nearly 150 people without medical coverage. Facing such a dire medical crisis, Americans need to know who is fighting for them in Washington.
In the past, Democrats and progressive politicians led the fight for a more equitable healthcare system. In the mid 1940s, President Truman asked Congress to develop a universal health insurance program. After nearly 20 years of debate on the issue, President Johnson authorized two less comprehensive government-sponsored healthcare programs, Medicare and Medicaid. Hillary Clinton tried to promote something close to Truman's vision of universal medical coverage in 1993, but was thwarted. In 2004, Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry proposed a plan to greatly expand government health programs, but lost to an incumbent under whom the number of uninsured Americans has soared.
Last month, however, everything changed. With Terri Schiavo's life was on the line, the GOP suddenly became the party of government-sponsored health care. In fact, a few Republicans went even farther than Democrats had dared to go: from the comfort of their Capitol Hill offices, two physicians in Congress saw fit to offer free and comprehensive medical advice to a sick American!
With nothing but a short videotape to aid them, Senator Bill Frist (R-TN), a heart and lung surgeon, and Representative Dave Weldon (R-FL), an internist, were able to rebut the diagnoses of neurological specialists who claimed Mrs. Schiavo was in 'a persistent vegetative state.' The Congressmen contended from their film viewing that she 'seemed to respond to visual stimuli.'
--from The Nation
With a short letter or email describing your symptoms, we expect that the pair would be glad to diagnose your ailment as well. --'Click' on the Contact Congress link under CRITICAL RESOURCES to get their addresses!
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Thursday, April 28, 2005
No Thanks!
The new pope has begun to expound on what seems will be a major theme of his reign:
-the unifying Christian roots of Europe. . .
Is this guy for real or has he just been sniffing incense too long?
- First of all, the roots of Europe are hardly Christian. Christianity was imposed by a disintegrating empire through it's minion missionary monks late in its development.
-Secondly, Christianity has been at the root of centuries of disunity in Europe. This in the form of political instability, oppression and bloody war after bloody war.
Europeans get it:
They have, despite the negative influence of Christianity, begun to form a union that will mean no more war in a secure, affluent culture covering the entire continent. The fact is that most modern Europeans barely tolerate Christianity. It has been relegated to the museum curators, historians and tourists. The EU (see its proposed constitution), pointedly excludes Christianity from involvement in its affairs. To that end, the Vatican has been purposely univited to participate in its deliberations.
So much for the unifying Christian roots of Europe.
Mr. Benedict! You don't get it:
Oppressing women, sexual minorities and the poor are not acceptable policies in the modern democratic society of Europe (or anywhere else).
The third world where you lord it over still may not yet be able to break your repressive hold as Europe has. But, the time will come and not a moment too soon!
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-the unifying Christian roots of Europe. . .
Is this guy for real or has he just been sniffing incense too long?
- First of all, the roots of Europe are hardly Christian. Christianity was imposed by a disintegrating empire through it's minion missionary monks late in its development.
-Secondly, Christianity has been at the root of centuries of disunity in Europe. This in the form of political instability, oppression and bloody war after bloody war.
Europeans get it:
They have, despite the negative influence of Christianity, begun to form a union that will mean no more war in a secure, affluent culture covering the entire continent. The fact is that most modern Europeans barely tolerate Christianity. It has been relegated to the museum curators, historians and tourists. The EU (see its proposed constitution), pointedly excludes Christianity from involvement in its affairs. To that end, the Vatican has been purposely univited to participate in its deliberations.
So much for the unifying Christian roots of Europe.
Mr. Benedict! You don't get it:
Oppressing women, sexual minorities and the poor are not acceptable policies in the modern democratic society of Europe (or anywhere else).
The third world where you lord it over still may not yet be able to break your repressive hold as Europe has. But, the time will come and not a moment too soon!
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PLANET PATRIOT
Wednesday, April 27, 2005
QUOTE FOR THOUGHT:
"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross."
--Sinclair Lewis
PRESCIENT!!!
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--Sinclair Lewis
PRESCIENT!!!
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Monday, April 25, 2005
Join the Common Cause Crusade
Common Cause is working hard to make sure that the serious problems revealed in our election system, such as hours-long lines, malfunctioning machines, and absentee ballots that never arrived, are fixed and not forgotten.
To help us keep the story alive as we push for reforms, two award-winning documentary filmmakers, Erin and Conrad Stanley of Los Angeles, produced a compelling two minute video. It is entitled, "Never Forget November 2nd". Click on the link in this post to view.
Please invite everyone you know who is concerned about our flawed election system to see it (click on the link in this post to view- the video is set to play in your windows media player at low (264k) broadband speed)!
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Politics
To help us keep the story alive as we push for reforms, two award-winning documentary filmmakers, Erin and Conrad Stanley of Los Angeles, produced a compelling two minute video. It is entitled, "Never Forget November 2nd". Click on the link in this post to view.
Please invite everyone you know who is concerned about our flawed election system to see it (click on the link in this post to view- the video is set to play in your windows media player at low (264k) broadband speed)!
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PLANET PATRIOT
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
Need for FDA Action
In some states, legislators are pushing laws that would explicitly grant pharmacists the right to refuse to dispense drugs related to contraception or abortion on moral grounds. Others want to require pharmacies to fill any legal prescription for birth control, much like Governor Blagojevich's emergency rule in Illinois, which requires pharmacies that stock the morning-after pill to dispense it without delay. And in some states, there are proposals or newly enacted laws to make the morning-after pill more accessible, by requiring hospitals to offer it to rape victims or allowing certain pharmacists to sell it without a prescription.
Some of the bills could become moot if the Food and Drug Administration approves the morning-after pill for over-the-counter sale by pharmacists, something advocates for women's reproductive rights and several Democratic senators have pressured the agency to do.
If over-the-counter sales are allowed, experts on the issue say, pharmacists who do not want to provide the pill on moral grounds could simply decide not to stock it, which current state laws already allow them to do. If a large drugstore chain decided to stock it, but an individual pharmacist in the chain objected, such a dispute might be governed by the employment agreements between the chain and the pharmacist.
-from nytimes.com
-it is obvious that the FDA needs to act now to provide over the counter access to the 'morning-after' pill. It will go a long way toward taking away the power of denial by fanatical employee pharmacists, and the media forum it provides for them and their 'christian' right backers.
The 'christian' right says that requiring pharmacists to dispense contraceptives against their religious beliefs is a violation of their civil rights. This is like a 60s diner owner in the south claiming that forcing him to allow blacks to eat in his restaurant against his racial beliefs (usually based on religious beliefs) violated his civil rights. How absurd!
*I have changed the link on this post to reference a similar and relevant newer post at bopnews.com- just click on the link!
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Some of the bills could become moot if the Food and Drug Administration approves the morning-after pill for over-the-counter sale by pharmacists, something advocates for women's reproductive rights and several Democratic senators have pressured the agency to do.
If over-the-counter sales are allowed, experts on the issue say, pharmacists who do not want to provide the pill on moral grounds could simply decide not to stock it, which current state laws already allow them to do. If a large drugstore chain decided to stock it, but an individual pharmacist in the chain objected, such a dispute might be governed by the employment agreements between the chain and the pharmacist.
-from nytimes.com
-it is obvious that the FDA needs to act now to provide over the counter access to the 'morning-after' pill. It will go a long way toward taking away the power of denial by fanatical employee pharmacists, and the media forum it provides for them and their 'christian' right backers.
The 'christian' right says that requiring pharmacists to dispense contraceptives against their religious beliefs is a violation of their civil rights. This is like a 60s diner owner in the south claiming that forcing him to allow blacks to eat in his restaurant against his racial beliefs (usually based on religious beliefs) violated his civil rights. How absurd!
*I have changed the link on this post to reference a similar and relevant newer post at bopnews.com- just click on the link!
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Friday, April 15, 2005
Row over UN Oil Scandal
Mr Annan becomes embroiled in the oil-for-food scandal:
The US and Britain have rejected allegations by UN chief Kofi Annan that they turned a blind eye to oil smuggling by Saddam Hussein's regime. Mr Annan had suggested the two had inadequately policed UN sanctions against Iraq, enabling the regime to earn huge amounts in illegal deals.
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said the charges were "inaccurate", while Washington was also dismissive.
The UN has itself been under fire over the so-called oil-for-food programme. The $60bn (£32bn) programme allowed Saddam Hussein's Iraq to sell oil in order to buy civilian goods - including medicine - and therefore ease the impact of UN sanctions imposed after Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait.
Actually, the bulk of the money Saddam Hussein made was from smuggling under the 'watchful' eyes of the Americans and British.
US Senate investigators have alleged that the Iraqi regime received some $4bn (£2.13bn) in illegal payments from oil companies involved in the programme.* But this figure is dwarfed by the $14bn (£7.5bn) that allegedly came from "sanctions-busting" - illegally selling oil to neighbouring states such as Jordan and Turkey.
"The bulk of the money that Saddam [Hussein] made came out of smuggling outside the oil-for-food programme, and it was on the American and British watch," Mr Annan said. Iraq made billions of dollars from illegal oil sales and bribes. He added, ". . . they were (US and Britain) the ones who knew exactly what was going on, and that the countries themselves decided to close their eyes to smuggling to Turkey and Jordan because they were allies."
--(edited from an article by the BBC)
*This leaves out the fact that the the oil company bribes came from corporations with very close ties to the administration, e.g. Chevron and other Texas based companies. It looks like the real scandal has come home to roost!
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The US and Britain have rejected allegations by UN chief Kofi Annan that they turned a blind eye to oil smuggling by Saddam Hussein's regime. Mr Annan had suggested the two had inadequately policed UN sanctions against Iraq, enabling the regime to earn huge amounts in illegal deals.
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said the charges were "inaccurate", while Washington was also dismissive.
The UN has itself been under fire over the so-called oil-for-food programme. The $60bn (£32bn) programme allowed Saddam Hussein's Iraq to sell oil in order to buy civilian goods - including medicine - and therefore ease the impact of UN sanctions imposed after Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait.
Actually, the bulk of the money Saddam Hussein made was from smuggling under the 'watchful' eyes of the Americans and British.
US Senate investigators have alleged that the Iraqi regime received some $4bn (£2.13bn) in illegal payments from oil companies involved in the programme.* But this figure is dwarfed by the $14bn (£7.5bn) that allegedly came from "sanctions-busting" - illegally selling oil to neighbouring states such as Jordan and Turkey.
"The bulk of the money that Saddam [Hussein] made came out of smuggling outside the oil-for-food programme, and it was on the American and British watch," Mr Annan said. Iraq made billions of dollars from illegal oil sales and bribes. He added, ". . . they were (US and Britain) the ones who knew exactly what was going on, and that the countries themselves decided to close their eyes to smuggling to Turkey and Jordan because they were allies."
--(edited from an article by the BBC)
*This leaves out the fact that the the oil company bribes came from corporations with very close ties to the administration, e.g. Chevron and other Texas based companies. It looks like the real scandal has come home to roost!
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Thursday, April 14, 2005
GOP Leaders Threaten Courts!
Seventy-four percent of Americans surveyed by CBS News said Congress intervened in the Terri Schiavo right-to-die case to advance a political agenda, not because they cared what happened to the Florida woman whose last days took center ring in a grotesque national media circus. The people called it accurately, as right-wingers on Capitol Hill confirmed with incendiary reactions to Schiavo's death. "The time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior,'' snarled House majority leader Tom DeLay; GOP Senator John Cornyn wondered aloud on the Senate floor whether there was a connection between the "perception" that judges are making political decisions and the fact that "some people...engage in violence." Both DeLay and Cornyn took some appropriate hits for playing to the worst instincts of a country where in recent months judges and their families have been the targets of violence. But few in Washington were confused about the meaning of DeLay's warning: While he might muse about impeaching federal jurists, his real passion is for removing barriers to the Bush Administration's campaign to pack the courts with right-wing judicial activists.
(from an article in The Nation- 'click' link)
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(from an article in The Nation- 'click' link)
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Monday, April 11, 2005
Only Symptom of Problem
GAS PRICES SOAR AND SOAR. . .
. . . all the while the white house and congress do nothing- they won't even talk about it (except to spout renewed support for their pro-corporate energy law). Hmm, how could that possibly be?
Gas and oil prices, even adjusted for inflation, haven't been this high in over 25 years. There has been no overt action by OPEC this time or any real oil shortage otherwise.. The white house promised us that 'freeing' Iraq would be a great step towards stabilizing America's oil supply (as well as pay for the war there- lol). Contrarily, the 'free' markets have gone off the deep end on a massive speculation spree.
The sad fact is we are beginning to feel the results of a white house hands off policy towards corporate behavior at the expense of the general welfare. Those the white house really represents- international corporations, especially those in the oil (can't imagine where that connection comes from- lol), pharmaceutical and financial industries, have been given unprecedented leeway by law to rape and pillage (metaphorically, of course) to their hearts' and bank accounts' content- damn the rest of us.
There have been absolutely no efforts by this administration to moderate the massive rise in oil prices- even though they have it well within their power to do so (there is the strategic reserve and the influence of the treasury bond market), because it would not be in the interests of those whom they truly represent. Look next for similar corporate rape by the pharmaceuticals when the pro-corporate medicare law really kicks in. And, we will no doubt see a similar effect with the implementation of the pro-corporate bankruptcy law. Then there is the push for pro-corporate tort 'reform'. Will it never end?
Americans are seeing a massive shift of wealth upward, unprecedented since the days of the nineteenth century robber-barons. The laissez-faire policies of the repubs are creating a nation of real have and have-nots- not just a politically rhetorical one. Where is the morality?
(link is to published article by me in Indymedia. us)
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. . . all the while the white house and congress do nothing- they won't even talk about it (except to spout renewed support for their pro-corporate energy law). Hmm, how could that possibly be?
Gas and oil prices, even adjusted for inflation, haven't been this high in over 25 years. There has been no overt action by OPEC this time or any real oil shortage otherwise.. The white house promised us that 'freeing' Iraq would be a great step towards stabilizing America's oil supply (as well as pay for the war there- lol). Contrarily, the 'free' markets have gone off the deep end on a massive speculation spree.
The sad fact is we are beginning to feel the results of a white house hands off policy towards corporate behavior at the expense of the general welfare. Those the white house really represents- international corporations, especially those in the oil (can't imagine where that connection comes from- lol), pharmaceutical and financial industries, have been given unprecedented leeway by law to rape and pillage (metaphorically, of course) to their hearts' and bank accounts' content- damn the rest of us.
There have been absolutely no efforts by this administration to moderate the massive rise in oil prices- even though they have it well within their power to do so (there is the strategic reserve and the influence of the treasury bond market), because it would not be in the interests of those whom they truly represent. Look next for similar corporate rape by the pharmaceuticals when the pro-corporate medicare law really kicks in. And, we will no doubt see a similar effect with the implementation of the pro-corporate bankruptcy law. Then there is the push for pro-corporate tort 'reform'. Will it never end?
Americans are seeing a massive shift of wealth upward, unprecedented since the days of the nineteenth century robber-barons. The laissez-faire policies of the repubs are creating a nation of real have and have-nots- not just a politically rhetorical one. Where is the morality?
(link is to published article by me in Indymedia. us)
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Wednesday, March 23, 2005
Sick Saga!
Here in cloudy Florida, the Schiavo Saga continues:
This afternoon, the far right wing, born-again 'catholic' christian governor with total disregard of the Constitutional authority of the courts, which he well knows, inserts his religious views in the Schiavo's private tragedy with his executive authority. This time, again, in vocal support of the far right wing, born-again christian legislature's possible new 'save shiavo' bill, with total disregard of the Constitutional authority of the courts, which they well know, inserting religious views again with its legislative authority in the Schiavo's privage tragedy; and by implying that the welfare authorities may take poor Mrs. Schiavo into their custody (who since they don't do much else for the poor and disabled here, will at least have something to do, perhaps), while investigation ensues. . . (to be continued)
Oh, and this is after the unduly constituted authority of the federal court, forced upon it by the far right wing, born-again christian federal legislature, with total disregard of the Constitutional authority of the state courts, inserted its religious views with a statue requiring the federal court to review the Shiavo case; decides at the appeals level that the Schiavo matter had no standing in their jurisdiction. . . (to be continued)
--This is straight out of some 18th century comedy of errors with better production values.
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This afternoon, the far right wing, born-again 'catholic' christian governor with total disregard of the Constitutional authority of the courts, which he well knows, inserts his religious views in the Schiavo's private tragedy with his executive authority. This time, again, in vocal support of the far right wing, born-again christian legislature's possible new 'save shiavo' bill, with total disregard of the Constitutional authority of the courts, which they well know, inserting religious views again with its legislative authority in the Schiavo's privage tragedy; and by implying that the welfare authorities may take poor Mrs. Schiavo into their custody (who since they don't do much else for the poor and disabled here, will at least have something to do, perhaps), while investigation ensues. . . (to be continued)
Oh, and this is after the unduly constituted authority of the federal court, forced upon it by the far right wing, born-again christian federal legislature, with total disregard of the Constitutional authority of the state courts, inserted its religious views with a statue requiring the federal court to review the Shiavo case; decides at the appeals level that the Schiavo matter had no standing in their jurisdiction. . . (to be continued)
--This is straight out of some 18th century comedy of errors with better production values.
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Sunday, March 20, 2005
GAG ME
Ethically, is there any difference between refusing to insert a feeding tube into a person who will die without it (a decision insurance companies make all the time for economic reasons) and withdrawing a feeding tube from a person in a persistent vegitative state?
The right wing shouts that the latter is murder, but it's purchased its political power and voice with huge campaign contributions from insurance companies, for whom "defending life" is a value only when there's money in it.
The denial of health care for economic reasons is morally depraved, and it's done all the time without troubling our vacationing president, who cut short his Crawford nap so he could get to D.C. and sign the Schiavo bill. "This is about defending life," his spokesman said.
But how can a congressionally mandated coma be moral?
The moral midgets in the White House and Congress would suffer political death if we withdrew the Big Insurance feeding tube from their throats. We should, because it's us who are gagging on it.
-from bopnews.com
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The right wing shouts that the latter is murder, but it's purchased its political power and voice with huge campaign contributions from insurance companies, for whom "defending life" is a value only when there's money in it.
The denial of health care for economic reasons is morally depraved, and it's done all the time without troubling our vacationing president, who cut short his Crawford nap so he could get to D.C. and sign the Schiavo bill. "This is about defending life," his spokesman said.
But how can a congressionally mandated coma be moral?
The moral midgets in the White House and Congress would suffer political death if we withdrew the Big Insurance feeding tube from their throats. We should, because it's us who are gagging on it.
-from bopnews.com
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Saturday, March 12, 2005
QUOTE FOR THOUGHT:
"Every war when it comes, or before it comes, is represented not as a war but as an act of self-defense against a homicidal maniac."
--George Orwell
Think about it!
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--George Orwell
Think about it!
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Thursday, March 10, 2005
RIGHT off the deep end!
Conservatives, newly drunk with power, are reaching critical hypocritical mass hysteria. Sane people from other countries think Americans, specifically social conservatives, have gone completely mental. The same people who see the Virgin Mary in a grilled cheese sandwich are suddenly seeing threatening gay images everywhere.
The latest is Buster, the animated rabbit from PBS's Postcards From Buster, taken to task by the new secretary of Education for having the nerve to show a normal legally united Vermont family headed by lesbians, who threatens federal funding for the show. Then there is James Dobson of Focus on the Family, decreeing that SpongeBob SquarePants is sending out subliminal gay messages to unsuspecting toddlers. The Family Research Council has on its payroll a Homosexuality Detection Expert (no joke), whose duties include informing us that words like 'tolerance' and 'diversity' are part of a coded language that is regularly used by the homosexual community to undermine their idea of the American family. We can't forget Alan Keyes--one of the most sanctimoniously obnoxious politicians in history, whose entire presidential and recent senate campaign was based on 'moral values'-- who was revealed to have a gay daughter, and responded by using his 'moral values' to kick her out of the house and withhold her college tuition. What do his fellow conservatives have to say? Nothing! Just like the Cheneys, who vocal on all other issues known to man, say nothing about their gay daughter--her sexuality being 'private.'
This would be hilarious enough if it wasn't for the recently revealed, wildest disconnect between what the right wing says and what they do-- the Jeff Gannon scandal. In this case, a fake reporter who used an alias, on behalf of a fake news organization that was nothing but a Republican propaganda outlet, who regularly wrote antigay articles, had a White House press clearance endowed by the Secret Service and used it to regularly ask the president softball questions. He was also a $200-an-hour (or $1,200-a-weekend) hustler, complete with X-rated Web photos revealing just how endowed he is. What do his fellow conservatives have to say? Nothing (oh right, there is conservative Ann Coulter, who knows a propaganda-spreading fake-reporter whore when she sees one, rushing to the defense of “Jeff,” saying that hypocritical liberals are going after him simply because he is gay)!
Have conservatives suddenly taken 'don’t ask, don’t tell' to an absurd extreme? Are they strong on terrorists but soft on gay hookers? You would expect James Dobson, Alan Keyes, or any of the other moral watchdogs to go ballistic over this guy. There has to be a logical reason why a call boy with online money shots and a White House clearance gets a fraction of the attention as SpongeBob or Buster the rabbit, but one can’t expect logic with these guys.
Apparently homosexuality is a 'private' concern if you’re a conservative Republican in lockstep with the Bush crowd, who dutifully stays in the closet, but not if you’re a Democrat, a lesbian from Vermont, an out gay American, or a sponge. And it doesn’t matter if you’re an ex-Marine gay whore; it just matters whose whore you are.
-edited from an article in The Advocate
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The latest is Buster, the animated rabbit from PBS's Postcards From Buster, taken to task by the new secretary of Education for having the nerve to show a normal legally united Vermont family headed by lesbians, who threatens federal funding for the show. Then there is James Dobson of Focus on the Family, decreeing that SpongeBob SquarePants is sending out subliminal gay messages to unsuspecting toddlers. The Family Research Council has on its payroll a Homosexuality Detection Expert (no joke), whose duties include informing us that words like 'tolerance' and 'diversity' are part of a coded language that is regularly used by the homosexual community to undermine their idea of the American family. We can't forget Alan Keyes--one of the most sanctimoniously obnoxious politicians in history, whose entire presidential and recent senate campaign was based on 'moral values'-- who was revealed to have a gay daughter, and responded by using his 'moral values' to kick her out of the house and withhold her college tuition. What do his fellow conservatives have to say? Nothing! Just like the Cheneys, who vocal on all other issues known to man, say nothing about their gay daughter--her sexuality being 'private.'
This would be hilarious enough if it wasn't for the recently revealed, wildest disconnect between what the right wing says and what they do-- the Jeff Gannon scandal. In this case, a fake reporter who used an alias, on behalf of a fake news organization that was nothing but a Republican propaganda outlet, who regularly wrote antigay articles, had a White House press clearance endowed by the Secret Service and used it to regularly ask the president softball questions. He was also a $200-an-hour (or $1,200-a-weekend) hustler, complete with X-rated Web photos revealing just how endowed he is. What do his fellow conservatives have to say? Nothing (oh right, there is conservative Ann Coulter, who knows a propaganda-spreading fake-reporter whore when she sees one, rushing to the defense of “Jeff,” saying that hypocritical liberals are going after him simply because he is gay)!
Have conservatives suddenly taken 'don’t ask, don’t tell' to an absurd extreme? Are they strong on terrorists but soft on gay hookers? You would expect James Dobson, Alan Keyes, or any of the other moral watchdogs to go ballistic over this guy. There has to be a logical reason why a call boy with online money shots and a White House clearance gets a fraction of the attention as SpongeBob or Buster the rabbit, but one can’t expect logic with these guys.
Apparently homosexuality is a 'private' concern if you’re a conservative Republican in lockstep with the Bush crowd, who dutifully stays in the closet, but not if you’re a Democrat, a lesbian from Vermont, an out gay American, or a sponge. And it doesn’t matter if you’re an ex-Marine gay whore; it just matters whose whore you are.
-edited from an article in The Advocate
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Friday, March 04, 2005
A Quote for Thought:
"Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservatives."
--- John Stuart Mill
(i realize this is a repeat of a quote made on this blog at an earlier date, but due to some recent encounters with 'conservatives' I felt it deserved repeating.)
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--- John Stuart Mill
(i realize this is a repeat of a quote made on this blog at an earlier date, but due to some recent encounters with 'conservatives' I felt it deserved repeating.)
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