There are none so blind as those who will not see.

It's been a while...

2005-10-26T12:59:00.000-06:00

I know it's been a while since I've posted anything, but sometimes I just have to step away. There is too much corruption, and rather than get discouraged and throw up my hands in despair, I lay low for a while until my threshold for pain is restored. ;-)

So, here is a link that I think is imperative for you to read. It's about the yellow cake uranium from Niger, and why it doesn't mean a hoot because Iraq already had a whole lotta uranium already - uranium signed and sealed by Bush Sr. himself, lying around. No kidding.

It also talks about just what it takes to have enough uranium to make a nuclear bomb, and how it would take a whole lotta time and a whole lotta patience to get even a little bit of weapons grade uranium out of yellow cake. The yellow cake was not only a lie, it was a red herring, designed to scare the pants off the American people but about as relevant to Hussein's actually seeking out nuclear weapons as legitimacy is to the Bush administration.

In another, completely unrelated note: while I know a lot of you are waiting with an anxious heart to hear exactly what Fitzgerald will do, let me remind you why revealing Plame matters. Not only does it endanger anyone who has ever come into contact with Valerie Plame and call their alliances into question, it also means that her entire network has been compromised, from the business fronts on down.

Also, as Larry Johnson asks, in this time when it's clear our country needs more human spies rather than technology, why anyone would dare to volunteer to spy or aid us, when it's clear they could potentially be fodder for the political machine? What kind of message does it send to all the other brave souls from the intelligence community that are out in the field, trying to serve America to the best of their ability while endangering their lives?

It seems to me the reoccurring theme for the Bush Administration is Ask Me No Questions And I Will Tell You No Lies. While that's fine in the playground, the world we live in today can't afford it. What kind of world leader refuses to see the truth, and is willing to endanger anyone who dares to disagree? The Bush kind, unfortunately. It's time we as Americans raised the level of expectations we place upon our political represenatives. And really, why would anyone *want* to have a beer with Bush, anyway?

Hopefully next time America will know better. The only way to negotiate through the treacherous waters which is the world today is with eyes wide open and a willingness to learn and grow. Those with a penchant for throwing temper tantrums need not apply.

Dear God...

2005-09-30T13:34:00.000-06:00

Is this really the one you want to represent you? Because between you and me, I'm getting mixed signals here. This is okay? Oh, and by the way? What's up with this obsession with what goes on in my bedroom? Cause I'm finding it a little weird that birth control isn't okay, but spreading The Word hand in hand with sex toys is. *blinks*

Amen.

Still Getting It Wrong

2005-07-28T15:30:00.000-06:00

I just had to post the exerpt Harpers Magazine has online of Bill McKibben's What it means to be Christian in America article. In its' way, it's like listening to The Tonight Show's Jay Walkers talk about the Atlantic Ocean being off the coast of California, and how Australians speak Australian.

The Christian Paradox

How a faithful nation gets Jesus wrong

Posted on Wednesday, July 27, 2005. What it means to be Christian in America. An excerpt. Originally from August 2005. By Bill McKibben.

Sources

Only 40 percent of Americans can name more than four of the Ten Commandments, and a scant half can cite any of the four authors of the Gospels. Twelve percent believe Joan of Arc was Noah’s wife. This failure to recall the specifics of our Christian heritage may be further evidence of our nation’s educational decline, but it probably doesn’t matter all that much in spiritual or political terms. Here is a statistic that does matter: Three quarters of Americans believe the Bible teaches that “God helps those who help themselves.” That is, three out of four Americans believe that this uber-American idea, a notion at the core of our current individualist politics and culture, which was in fact uttered by Ben Franklin, actually appears in Holy Scripture. The thing is, not only is Franklin’s wisdom not biblical; it’s counter-biblical. Few ideas could be further from the gospel message, with its radical summons to love of neighbor. On this essential matter, most Americans—most American Christians—are simply wrong, as if 75 percent of American scientists believed that Newton proved gravity causes apples to fly up.

Asking Christians what Christ taught isn’t a trick. When we say we are a Christian nation—and, overwhelmingly, we do—it means something. People who go to church absorb lessons there and make real decisions based on those lessons; increasingly, these lessons inform their politics. (One poll found that 11 percent of U.S. churchgoers were urged by their clergy to vote in a particular way in the 2004 election, up from 6 percent in 2000.) When George Bush says that Jesus Christ is his favorite philosopher, he may or may not be sincere, but he is reflecting the sincere beliefs of the vast majority of Americans.

And therein is the paradox. America is simultaneously the most professedly Christian of the developed nations and the least Christian in its behavior. That paradox—more important, perhaps, than the much touted ability of French women to stay thin on a diet of chocolate and cheese—illuminates the hollow at the core of our boastful, careening culture.

* * *

Ours is among the most spiritually homogenous rich nations on earth. Depending on which poll you look at and how the question is asked, somewhere around 85 percent of us call ourselves Christian. Israel, by way of comparison, is 77 percent Jewish. It is true that a smaller number of Americans—about 75 percent—claim they actually pray to God on a daily basis, and only 33 percent say they manage to get to church every week. Still, even if that 85 percent overstates actual practice, it clearly represents aspiration. In fact, there is nothing else that unites more than four fifths of America. Every other statistic one can cite about American behavior is essentially also a measure of the behavior of professed Christians. That’s what America is: a place saturated in Christian identity.

But is it Christian? This is not a matter of angels dancing on the heads of pins. Christ was pretty specific about what he had in mind for his followers. What if we chose some simple criterion—say, giving aid to the poorest people—as a reasonable proxy for Christian behavior? After all, in the days before his crucifixion, when Jesus summed up his message for his disciples, he said the way you could tell the righteous from the damned was by whether they’d fed the hungry, slaked the thirsty, clothed the naked, welcomed the stranger, and visited the prisoner. What would we find then?

In 2004, as a share of our economy, we ranked second to last, after Italy, among developed countries in government foreign aid. Per capita we each provide fifteen cents a day in official development assistance to poor countries. And it’s not because we were giving to private charities for relief work instead. Such funding increases our average daily donation by just six pennies, to twenty-one cents. It’s also not because Americans were too busy taking care of their own; nearly 18 percent of American children lived in poverty (compared with, say, 8 percent in Sweden). In fact, by pretty much any measure of caring for the least among us you want to propose—childhood nutrition, infant mortality, access to preschool—we come in nearly last among the rich nations, and often by a wide margin. The point is not just that (as everyone already knows) the American nation trails badly in all these categories; it’s that the overwhelmingly Christian American nation trails badly in all these categories, categories to which Jesus paid particular attention. And it’s not as if the numbers are getting better: the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported last year that the number of households that were “food insecure with hunger” had climbed more than 26 percent between 1999 and 2003.
This Christian nation also tends to make personal, as opposed to political, choices that the Bible would seem to frown upon. Despite the Sixth Commandment, we are, of course, the most violent rich nation on earth, with a murder rate four or five times that of our European peers. We have prison populations greater by a factor of six or seven than other rich nations (which at least should give us plenty of opportunity for visiting the prisoners). Having been told to turn the other cheek, we’re the only Western democracy left that executes its citizens, mostly in those states where Christianity is theoretically strongest. Despite Jesus’ strong declarations against divorce, our marriages break up at a rate—just over half—that compares poorly with the European Union’s average of about four in ten. That average may be held down by the fact that Europeans marry less frequently, and by countries, like Italy, where divorce is difficult; still, compare our success with, say, that of the godless Dutch, whose divorce rate is just over 37 percent. Teenage pregnancy? We’re at the top of the charts. Personal self-discipline—like, say, keeping your weight under control? Buying on credit? Running government deficits? Do you need to ask?

"The tyranny of a principal in an oligarchy is not so dangerous to the public welfare as the apathy of a citizen in a democracy." --Montesquieu, 1748

“The ignorance of one voter in a democracy impairs the security of all.” -- John F. Kennedy, 1963

A Vision for the Future I Want to See

2005-07-26T11:37:00.000-06:00

Here’s a portion of an article worth sharing. You can find the whole thing here.

It’s about the showdown at the AFL-CIO Convention, but says so much about what unions were created for in the first place, and really, what Democrats are fighting for.

What this author says truly is the anathema of Republicans in power far and wide. They’ve worked long and hard to make ‘union’ into a curse-word in much the same way ‘liberal’ has become. Before you allow misinformation campaigns to cause you to utter some knee-jerk denial for the need for unions, read below. How can this be a bad thing? Would you really rather not have this in your own workplace as well?

Looking into the middle distance, we can perhaps see that new wave of union evolution, gathering strength. Its predominant face is of color, and female. It is Spanish/English bilingual and capable in many languages. It is predicated on dignity, power, and living wages for service work -- our new industrial shop floor -- with an international structure, a non-imperialist culture, and worldwide standards for safety, health, and environmental integrity. And I like to think that, despite the current furor, most of us are eager to catch it, bending the arc of history toward justice.

For me, that means a world in which we all can live in dignity, mutual respect, and peace, sharing equitably in both resources and decision-making -- entitled to good air, food and water, housing, and healthcare from birth to death; a world in which we can grow to our full potential through education and work -- free to think, create, play, free to worship or not, free to sing what we want, and free to love whom we please -- provided we cause the least harm to other people, our planet, or our universe; and a world in which we use more consensus than coercion to accomplish these goals and always stretch ourselves to see that others have the same rights and privileges as we do.

We need to restore poetry to our politics, the meaning that strengthens the muscle. Bread and roses. It may be more than we bargain for, but for progressive labor, it's the real deal.

Not So Shocking News

2005-07-22T11:47:00.000-06:00

I'm putting this person's comments below because I feel they so beautifully summarize all that's currently wrong with the Republican party. They also succinctly explain just why Democrats are having as hard a time combatting the blatant corruption as they are. Truthfully, I'm honored to be a part of the party that cares about America and her citizens. However, while still being proud to be an American, I most certainly am ashamed of this administration.

"Each man must for himself alone decide what is right and what is wrong, which course is patriotic and which isn't. You cannot shirk this and be a man. To decide against your conviction is to be an unqualified and excusable traitor, both to yourself and to your country, let men label you as they may." ~Mark Twain

Stop letting Fox news tell you what the issues are, and start researching them for yourselves. It's your duty, as citizens, to seek out the truth and not blindly accept what you are told.

This is just a glimpse of another tendril of what we on the left refer to as VRWC, or Vast Right Wing Conspiracy. The breadth and depth of this amoral behavior goes straight to the crux of the neocon philosophy: there is no morality when fighting "enemies". The neocons view their cause as so overridingly just, so paramount to the salvation of the entire country, or the world, that any behavior becomes excusable.

This is "The Prince" writ large, and New Hampshire is only one small example. The pure evil that the neocon machines exhibit while blithely smashing any and every obstacle to their dominance should be a clarion call to all republicans, particularly honorable and moral conservatives, that they are sleeping with Satan and his minions, determined to loose as much misery on the planet as possible for the ultimate purpose of profit of a select few corporations that always profit from human misery, ever since they discovered this in the days leading up to World War Two.

That we cannot and will not fight back with our own brand of evil is at once our saving grace and our downfall. The left is happy with the moral high ground, but the result is that we end up prepared to play a spirited game of football while our enemies are preparing to kill us off in battle.

It's not about merely winning and gaining territory to these types, it's about complete elmination of the left's viewpoint from human thought by whatever means necessary. - by MikeHickerson on Jul 21, 2005 -- 01:45:31 PM EST

GOP Declares Any Sexual Positions Other Than Missionary Unconstitutional

2005-07-19T12:12:00.000-06:00

Catchy headline, isn’t it? Think it’s impossible? Think it can’t happen here in America? Think again. This is what our Senators are saying, and what they intend for you.

Senator Rick Santorum’s got some opinions to share, and I think it’s time you listen up and pay attention – before it’s too late.

How did this all start? Several “strands” of major Supreme Court decisions, bound together, have dismantled older constitutional understandings and enshrined the new morality. On the questions of marriage, family, and sex, that string begins with the 1965 Griswold decision. In that case, a Connecticut law that outlawed the use of contraceptives, even by married couples, was ruled unconstitutional. Now, before you jump to conclusions, let me clearly state that this law was badly written, and I would not have supported it or its intent. Nonetheless, it is in this case that the Court “discovered” a “right to privacy” in the U.S. Constitution. Of course, such a right does not appear anywhere in the text of the Constitution. Rather, the Court’s majority discovered — or invented — such a right from the “emanations” and “penumbras” of rights found in the First, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendments.

It is significant that what seems to have been decisive in the minds of some of the justices in the Griswold majority was actually something quite traditional in the common law: the notion that marriage was a privileged institution into which law should not interfere. The case involved Planned Parenthood dispensing contraceptives to a married couple, and throughout the decision, it was marital privacy that was discussed. So, an aspect of the traditional moral view was a motivation for the Court’s majority decision: But the jurisprudential novelty it established — the right to privacy — would quickly become a constitutional wrecking ball.

Justices Stewart and Black were scathing in dissent, observing that while both disagreed with the law personally (as do I), they could find nothing in the U.S. Constitution that prevented the Connecticut legislature from making such a law (which had been on the books in the state since 1879). The dissenting justices mocked the reasoning of the majority, which in some cases based itself not on the Constitution’s text, but rather on the “traditions and [collective] conscience of our people.” How, asked the dissenters, could the Court know the conscience of the people better than legislators? Did not such reliance lead only to the substitution of judges’ “personal and private notions” for the decisions of legislatures? “Use of any such broad, unbounded judicial authority would make of this Court’s members a day-to-day constitutional convention,” warned Justice Black. And so it has been! Finally, Justice Black observed that “privacy” is a “broad, abstract and ambiguous concept,” lacking the specificity of a genuinely constitutional rule. However traditional it may appear in the guise of marital privacy, which as a legislator I support, this novel right was bound to do harm in our jurisprudence.

And so it was and so it did. Just seven years later, in Eisenstadt v. Baird (1972), the Court struck down a Massachusetts law that made contraception legal only for married persons. The distinction between the married and unmarried was breached, and the “right of privacy” became unhinged, essentially protecting (heterosexual) sex, as such, from any moral regulation.

Again, although I disagree with the Massachusetts law and its intent, the Court’s solution to the problem presented by such a law was neither judicious nor prudent: The Court in effect codified the sexual revolution then underway — with the supremely powerful protection of a constitutional right. Marital privacy had now morphed into “the right of the individual, married or single, to be free from unwarranted governmental intrusion into matters so fundamentally affecting a person as the decision whether to bear or beget a child.” The arguably traditional marital dimension upon which the Court had discovered the new “privacy right” was simply dropped with respect to having heterosexual intercourse. Rather than encouraging the legislature to repeal an outdated law, the Court expanded further the ungrounded right to privacy.

The next step, of course, was Roe v. Wade, the abortion decision of 1973. Today, most honest constitutional experts agree that as constitutional law, this decision is a monstrosity, a pure act of judicial legislating with no warrant in the Constitution’s text. Having invented a “right to privacy,” a right with a special emphasis on sexual matters, the Court was driven by its new moral logic to extend protection to what was all too often the result of the new sexual ethic: unwanted pregnancies and their “termination.”

The Roe decision established an elaborate system of “trimesters” of pregnancy and delimited when the states might and might not have a “compelling interest” in protecting the life of the unborn, “balanced” against the “privacy right” of the mother. In immediately subsequent decisions, however, this elaborate system quickly became meaningless, a dead letter. By the Supreme Court’s lights, no legislative regulation of abortion was permissible, for abortion was, after all, a “fundamental right.” What could possible count as a legitimate weight in the balance against a “fundamental right”? In effect, Roe created a private license to kill a certain category of Americans, the unborn, and raised this license to a constitutional principle.

The strands of these Court cases had made the rope thick. The legal reasoning continued to evolve, and the right to (sexual) privacy approached its terminal point. In the 1992 case, Planned Parenthood of Southeast Pennsylvania v. Casey, the Court handed down a complex ruling on a Pennsylvania state law that sought to reduce the number of abortions by a whole set of restrictive measures. The Casey decision actually stepped back from some of the most extreme Court decisions that followed Roe: Certain measures to ensure “informed consent” are now ruled constitutional, for example. But finally, the Court would not allow any legislation in America that would actually prevent a woman from procuring an abortion she desired. That is the bottom line. And the reason for this is found in the so-called “mystery passage.” It formed the basis of the ruling: “At the heart of liberty,” Justice Kennedy wrote for the majority, “is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.” The privacy right had now been expanded to its philosophical extreme.

Moral capital involves shared moral aspirations and norms, which for most of our founders was our human, legislative effort to approximate a transcendent moral order. I have been arguing that such moral capital is part of the common good. Here, however, the court tells us that liberty must mean that there is no common good: Each of us is locked in the prison of our own self-created moral universe. We are, each of us, lords of the world, divine legislators. There is no transcendent truth, no common truth, just myriad individual truths.

Where does the right to privacy go from here? As our culture continues to “progress” and old inhibitions are cast off, what boundaries — what guardrails — will be left? In his 1995 book Rethinking Life and Death, Princeton professor Peter Singer liberates moral theory and practice from any truths that pose an obstacle to our will to power and control. In that book he champions “neonaticide” — that is, the legal destruction of newborn human beings with physical handicaps up through the 28th day after birth. Singer has been dubbed by his critics “Professor Death” — but he professes his views from a tenured chair at Princeton.

Is Singer alone in promoting such a radical “concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life”? Unfortunately, he is not. Steven Pinker, a professor of psychology at Harvard, suggests that

we need a clear boundary to confer personhood on a human being and grant it a right to life. . . . [T]he right to life must come . . . from morally significant traits that we humans happen to possess. One such trait is having a sequence of experiences that defines us as individuals and connects us to other people. Other traits include an ability to reflect on ourselves as a continuous locus of consciousness, to form and savor plans for the future, to dread death and to express the choice not to die.

Under his definition a newborn is not human, and therefore the reality Pinker constructs would allow for neonaticide as well. Pinker points to that conclusion himself: “[S]everal moral philosophers have concluded that neonates are not persons . . . and thus neonaticide should not be classified as murder.”

How long will it be before the Supreme Court “discovers” that voices like Singer’s and Pinker’s, coming as they do from some of our most elite educational institutions, represent the evolving “[collective] conscience of our people” and bring us yet another expansion of the right to privacy?

(bold and underline emphasis mine).

Are you getting the picture yet? He doesn’t just oppose abortion - he opposes birth control. He opposes the fundamental right to privacy between a man and a woman. These zealots have no problem intruding into your life and trying to force their own religious beliefs upon you, whether you agree with them or not. This isn’t an exaggeration.

What more needs to be said? They won’t stop at abortion. This is about a woman’s fundamental right to choose *when* it is the right time for her to have a family, and it is clear that to these people, the woman should have no say at all.

Now partner that thought with the new ‘abstinence only sex education’ Bush is desperate to push on our children, and the picture gets even uglier. They don’t want our children to know how to protect themselves from unwanted pregnancies, STDs, and AIDS.

That being said, I’d like to point out the dark truth of who these zealots really are. They *know* unwanted pregnancies are going to happen. They want them to. And as long as there are unwanted pregnancies, there will always be women desperate enough, or in dire enough circumstances to consider seeking out an abortion, whether it is illegal or not. These religious monsters don’t *care* that a woman’s life is at risk for being forced to go to an unsanitary, back-street butcher instead of a licensed medical doctor.

Right now, there are anti-abortion groups (some even funded by Bush) that masquerade as 'crisis pregnancy' centers. They pretend to be a women's health clinic but deliver heavy-handed anti-abortion messages and frequently outright lie when giving 'medical' information. They often use stall tactics to try to fool women into thinking they have more time to make their decisions than they really do.

Pharmacists are turning away rape victims from having access to emergency contraceptives and refusing to give their prescriptions back. All emergency contraceptives do is prevent ovulation or fertilization. They're refusing to even fill birth control prescriptions.

In February, another Texas pharmacist at an Eckerd drug store in Denton wouldn't give contraceptives to a woman who was said to be a rape victim. In the Madison case, pharmacist Neil Noesen, 30, after refusing to refill a birth-control prescription, did not transfer it to another pharmacist or return it to the woman. She was able to get her prescription refilled two days later at the same pharmacy, but she missed a pill because of the delay.

How is this the 'Christian' thing to do?

Considering the evidence I've presented above, who truly is the monster here? The woman who, when faced with the choice, tries to make the best decision for herself and her family, or the religious zealots who would rather their own children die of AIDS rather than use contraceptives? Fanatics who would rather a young girl bleed to death trying to get an illegal abortion rather than bear her father's child or the young girl herself?

A zygote matters more to these people than the woman who carries it.

It's that bad out there. You need to be paying attention. Remember all those sayings you used to hear? "A woman's place is in the kitchen." "All women should be barefoot and pregnant."

There are a powerful group of fanatics out there who have the ear of the president. They hold the highest political offices in this country - and they want those statements to be made true.

I've always advocated freedom of religion. It truly is a founding principle for America. Only now can I truly appreciate Jefferson's emphasis on freedom *from* religion as well. As the bumper sticker says, "God save me from your 'true believers'".

Definition of the Day

2005-07-15T15:06:00.000-06:00

Bush league

n : Anyone in league with the Bush administration. This means while claiming to be Republicans, George Bush and affiliates pursue a more self-serving agenda - at the rest of America's expense. Those identified as being in the 'Bush league' can be easily identified by their fervent desire to squelch dissenting voices at any cost.

Those in the 'Bush leagues' fall into three separate, yet distinct categories: a) Those who want what they want when they want it, and don't care who they have to hurt to get it; b) Those who wish to force their own oppressive religous beliefs on the populace, whether it wants it or not and; c) Companies and corporations willing to shell out the bucks to buy off public figureheads to become their personal advocates in affairs of the state.

[syn: robber baron]

A Blast from the Past

2005-07-13T16:26:00.000-06:00

This article was written in September of 2003 as a possible explanation for why Ambassador Wilson's wife was 'outed' for being a CIA operative. It's as plausible a reason as any I've read, and chilling enough to be worth reprinting in its' entirety.

The Truth is Puttin’ on its Shoes: An Inquiry Into the "Innocent" Mr. Rove

A BUZZFLASH GUEST COMMENTARY
by James C. Moore, Co-Author of "Bush’s Brain," The Political History of Karl Rove

"A lie can travel around the world
while the truth is just putting on its shoes."
Mark Twain

I am very tired of writing about Karl Rove. Lately, though, I have felt a kind of moral obligation, and almost a patriotic duty to remind people of the man who really runs the White House. Politically, and strategically, nothing has happened in the Bush Administration without Rove’s imprimatur. Reporters have discovered Rove’s steely control in the form of what they call a "leak proof" White House. Nothing comes out of the Bush White House without Rove’s approval. Generally, that means nothing comes out of the White House.

Until Karl Rove wants something to leak.

Rove’s temper has always been his weak spot. He cannot seem to control his anger. When Ambassador Joseph Wilson wrote in the New York Times that there was no truth to the allegations that Iraq had tried to purchase yellowcake uranium from Niger, Rove is said to have gone "ballistic." No one who has known Rove for any period of time doubts that Rove was the one who orchestrated the leak, which "outed" Ambassador Wilson’s wife as a CIA agent. Rove has always made sure that his enemies knew he will strike back, and swing with deadly power.

Rove wasn’t just trying to intimidate Ambassador Wilson. If, as many believe, he is responsible for the leak, Rove wanted to send a message to everyone in the intelligence community that they all needed to keep their mouths shut. As the war was being sold, intelligence cooked, and the media spun, Rove and the White House had informed intelligence operatives and scientists that they were not to publicly repudiate the phony claims about aluminum tubes, which the White House falsely argued were part of an Iraqi gas centrifuge to make enriched uranium. One national reporter told me that calls to scientists and intelligence operatives to ask about the aluminum tubes, which turned out to be rocket bodies, yielded the confession the scientists and intelligence agents had been ordered to say nothing.

"We are not having this conversation," the reporter was told.

But if he leaked Ambassador Wilson’s wife’s name, Rove was clearly trying to tell everyone in the intelligence community that they needed to toe the line, or they might also end up living at risk. This, of course, is a scurrilous, cowardly, and unpatriotic act. To believe that Karl Rove had no knowledge of this leak, or that he was not involved, it is necessary to ignore his absolute control of all things political in the White House, his Machiavellian nature, and attention to every sparrow flying under the Bush sun.

But how did it happen?

There are a few ways Rove might have planned to exact his revenge. He could have made calls himself, to high profile reporters, or ordered staffers and political intermediaries to contact journalists with the authorization that they were speaking for "senior White House officials." Not surprisingly, "senior White House official" is Rove’s nickname among many reporters because Rove asks that the description be used virtually every time he talks to a reporter. It enables him to get out his perspective, and White House spin, without giving away his identity, and self-serving agenda. Historically, Rove has been very adept at keeping a layer of denial, and other operatives, between himself and his political misdeeds. This means there is a strong possibility that a lower-level staffer will end up taking the blame for the leak.

In this case, though, there are some telltale signs that Rove was still at the controls. Because Robert Novak wrote the original story about Ambassador Wilson’s wife, those of us who know how Rove has leaked to Novak for years became immediately suspicious. Novak has denied that "White House officials called me with a leak." When this language is parsed, it becomes clear that Rove may have managed to get a tip to his friend Novak through an intermediary, and then the columnist called Rove for confirmation. According to the Washington Post, a half dozen reporters got phone calls about the Ambassador’s wife, and, yet, it was only Rove’s friend, Robert Novak, who wrote a story. The rationale for the story, a specious motivation, was that Ambassador Wilson got the assignment to go to Niger because his wife was a CIA agent, and she made the recommendation. Is that an important enough piece of information to justify blowing the cover of a CIA agent?

Rove’s relationship with Novak is widely known in the Washington press corps. During the presidential campaign, when the chorus of questions was being asked about Mr. Bush, and the Texas Air National Guard, reporters wanted to know where Mr. Bush went during his time on assignment in Alabama. His commander said the future president had never shown up for duty. Rove told the campaign reporters that they were "making too much of a few missed meetings." In 48 hours, the exact language was used on network television by Novak, who described the controversy of Mr. Bush’s missing years as "a few missed meetings." Novak was not on the press plane to hear Rove’s original comments.

An uncontrolled temper may be Rove’s only weakness as a political counsel. In Ron Susskind’s Esquire Magazine article on Rove, he described sitting outside the presidential advisor’s White House office hearing Rove scream into the phone, "Tell him we’ll f**k him. We’ll f**k him like nobody ever has." During the presidential campaign, Rove lost his cool in front of a few hundred people on the tarmac in Manchester, New Hampshire, as I stood and watched while Rove screamed at my colleague Wayne Slater about an innocuous story of mostly recycled information.

No one, though, knows Rove’s vindictiveness better than John Weaver. Were it not for Karl Rove, Weaver might still be a leading Republican political consultant. In Texas, Rove and Weaver had been successful partners, until Weaver chose to go out on his own and build a client list. A few months later, Weaver hired an employee away from Rove. Before too long, as competition grew between Rove and Weaver, disgusting rumors began to circulate about Weaver’s personal life, and reporters and potential clients wondered about Weaver’s judgment. The stories, which many reporters have said originated with Rove, dried up Weaver’s business, and he left Texas. Eventually, Weaver became the lead political strategist to Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign. After McCain lost the bitter primary battle, Weaver discovered he was squeezed out of party work by Rove, who was now in charge of all things Republican. Weaver became a Democrat, an advisor to the Democratic National Committee, simply because Rove was never content to leave him alone.

Similar stories are innumerable in Rove’s political march to power. Anyone who has watched Rove’s rise in presidential politics, and has reported on his machinations, is not surprised to learn that Ambassador Wilson suspects Rove as being the source of the leak, or, as a minimum, a senior administration official who condoned the leak. Washington reporters, who have learned of Rove’s political discipline, are also immediately suspicious of the presidential advisor. It fits his historical pattern of behavior.

The circumstantial evidence is already in. And it points at Karl Rove.

And if the Bush Administration is serious about protecting this country, if Rove committed this treasonous act, he needs to be prosecuted under the Patriot Act he has so ardently supported.

Do NOT let this happen to you!

2005-07-13T16:11:00.000-06:00

Subject: An addict's story

An addict's story

It started out innocently enough.

I began to think at parties now and then -- to
loosen up. Inevitably, though, one thought led to
another, and soon I was more than just a social
thinker. I began to think alone -- "to relax," I
told myself -- but I knew it wasn't true.

Thinking became more and more important to me, and
finally I was thinking all the time. That was when
things began to sour at home.

One evening I had turned off the TV and asked my
wife about the meaning of life. She spent that
night at her mother's. I began to think on the
job. I knew that thinking and employment don't
mix, but I couldn't stop myself.

I began to avoid friends at lunchtime so I could
read Thoreau and Kafka. I would return to the
office dizzied and confused, asking,
"What is it exactly we are doing here?"

One day the boss called me in. He said, "Listen,
I like you, and it hurts me to say this, but your
thinking has become a real problem. If you don't
stop thinking on the job, you'll have to find
another job."

This gave me a lot to think about. I came home
early after my conversation with the boss.

"Honey," I confessed, "I've been thinking..."

"I know you've been thinking," she said, "and I want
a divorce!"

"But Honey, surely it's not that serious."

"It is serious," she said, lower lip aquiver. "You
think as much as college professors, and college
professors don't make any money, so if you keep on
thinking, we won't have any money!"

"That's a faulty syllogism," I said impatiently.

She exploded in tears of rage and frustration, but
I was in no mood to deal with the emotional drama.
"I'm going to the library," I snarled as I stomped
out the door.

I headed for the library, in the mood for some
Nietzsche. I roared into the parking lot with
NPR on the radio and ran up to the big glass
doors...

They didn't open. The library was closed.
To this day, I believe that a Higher Power was
looking out for me that night. Leaning on the
unfeeling glass, whimpering for Zarathustra,
a poster caught my eye.

"Friend, is heavy thinking ruining your life?"
it asked.

You probably recognize that line. It comes from
the standard Thinker's Anonymous poster. Which is
why I am what I am today: a recovering thinker.
I never miss a TA meeting. At each meeting we
watch a non-educational video; last week it was
"Porky's."

Then we share experiences about how we avoided
thinking since the last meeting. I still have
my job, and things are a lot better at home.

Life just seemed... easier, somehow, as soon as
I stopped thinking. I believe the road to
recovery is nearly complete for me.

Today, I registered to vote as a Republican.

Quote of the Day

2005-07-07T10:52:00.000-06:00

Recent quote from the Sunday Oregonian’s

[Quote:]

“Other than telling us how to live, think, marry, pray, vote, invest, educate our children and die, I think the Republicans have done a fine job of getting government out of our personal lives.”

–Craig Carter

Bravo!

2005-07-06T12:19:00.000-06:00

Welcome aboard, born again Democrat! As the bumper sticker says, "If you're not horrified, you haven't been paying attention."

Sandra Day O'Connor

2005-07-01T13:09:00.000-06:00

So there you have it. It's official. The battle for the Supreme Court is on. I'm posting this link now for quick and easy reference.

Now is not the time to stay on the sidelines. Rehnquist is next. If you give a damn for women's reproductive rights, you need to get involved and stay involved.

As I read in a post, and I heartily agree with: "I'm too busy" doesn't fly.

It's Game On, ladies and gentlemen. The other guys have been making their voices heard, above our own, for entirely too long. It's time we show them we care just as much, and that we won't give up our freedoms without a fight.

It used to be America stood for freedom of religion. In these dark times, it's time to also add "Freedom FROM Religion" to the roster. A woman's right to choose is not religious, it's personal.

Quote of the Day

2005-06-13T13:42:00.000-06:00

Here's a gem for you:

"You work three jobs? ... Uniquely American, isn't it? I mean, that is fantastic that you're doing that." - George W. Bush, to a divorced mother of three, Omaha, Nebraska, Feb. 4, 2005

Downing Street memo buzz

2005-06-13T13:34:00.000-06:00

There's been a lot of hoopla, but no real repercussions regarding the Downing Street memo's release to the media. Why not?

For some people, I get the impression that the point is moot. We're in Iraq, the bed is made, and now we have to learn to sleep with bed bugs, right?

I disagree.

Clinton was impeached for lying under oath about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky. How can George W. Bush be any less accountable for lying to Congress? For going on national television and lying to American citizens? For slanting (and witholding) information in such a way as to lead people to believe he was telling the truth?

Is it because he didn't put his hand on a bible and swear?

What Bush has done is far more heinous. This, I argue, is exactly the problem. Bush did lie, and so far 1,702 Americans have died for his falsehoods. He not only should be held accountable, he must be held accountable. The fact he didn't have his hand on the bible is irrelevant. After all, this president says he acts on divine inspiration.

"God inspired me to hit al Qaeda, and so I hit it. And I had the inspiration to hit Saddam, and so I hit him. Now I am determined to solve the Middle East problem if you help. Otherwise the elections will come and I will be wrapped up with them." - taken from the minutes of a meeting among top level Palestinian leaders, including Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas and reported in the June 26th edition of Ha'aretz (Isreal's most respected newspaper).

I get the impression that the American public, while curious and unsurprised by what the Downing Street memos reveal, don't truly understand the full ramifications. For those of you a little hazy with the year 2002 (I include myself in this category), let me give you a refresher of things as they happened, and where the memo fits into this:

JULY 22, 2002 - The Downing Street memo is actually the minutes recorded by a high level British Intelligence official at that meeting.

"C reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. The NSC had no patience with the UN route, and no enthusiasm for publishing material on the Iraqi regime's record. There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action."

Doesn't that last sentence resonate? Remarkable. So what does this mean?

This means that prior to July 22, 2002, the British believed that Bush hadn't yet decided on a course of war in Iraq, but that AFTER this meeting, he had. Now on to the rest of the dates to understand its' place in the scheme of things:

January 29, 2002:

In Bush's state of the union speech, he identifies Iraq, along with Iran and North Korea, as an 'axis of evil' and vows that the U.S. 'will not permit the world's most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world's most destructive weapons.'

May 14, 2002:

The UN Security Council revamps the sanctions against Iraq (now eleven years old), replacing them with "smart sanctions" meant to allow more civillian goods to enter the country while at the same time more effectively restricting military and dual-use equipment (military and civilian).

June 2, 2002:

Bush publicly introduces new defence doctrine of preemption in a speech at West Point. In some instances, the president asserts, the U.S. must strike first against another state to prevent a potential threat from growing into an actual one.

"Our security will require all Americans... [to] be ready for preemptive action when necessary to defend our liberty and defend our lives" - Bush reminds at U.S. Military Academy Commencement, West Point, NY, 6/1/02

September 12, 2002:

Bush addresses the UN, challenging the organization to swiftly enforce its own resolutions. If not, Bush contends, the U.S. will have no choice but to act on its own against Iraq.

October 11, 2002:

Congress authorizes an attack on Iraq.

This is where Congress legalizes what Bush wants to do, but is not when Bush declares war. That is even later. However, let me bring your attention to the wording of the Iraq Resolution that Congress approved:

Whereas on September 12, 2002, President Bush committed the United States to `work with the United Nations Security Council to meet our common challenge' posed by Iraq and to `work for the necessary resolutions,' while also making clear that `the Security Council resolutions will be enforced, and the just demands of peace and security will be met, or action will be unavoidable'; Whereas the United States is determined to prosecute the war on terrorism and Iraq's ongoing support for international terrorist groups combined with its development of weapons of mass destruction in direct violation of its obligations under the 1991 cease-fire and other United Nations Security Council resolutions make clear that it is in the national security interests of the United States and in furtherance of the war on terrorism that all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions be enforced, including through the use of force if necessary; - 2002 Iraq War Resolution

Even then, Congress was trying to stipulate that Bush was supposed to work with the UN first. The resolution itself isn't as unanimous as the Administration would lead you to believe, either. Unfortunately, a lot of Congressional members got caught up, post 9/11, in trying to keep America united, even if they had their own reservations about what Bush was saying. Ironic, isn't it?

By the way, what I'm speaking of regarding the Downing Street memos doesn't begin to address the faulty information put before Congress by the Bush administration.

This post is strictly a timeline to remind you of a sequence of events. There's more, of course, in the dance the UN and the U.S. did prior to declaring war, but for the sake of brevity, I'll skip that, for now. Follow the links for more detailed information. Then keep in mind the following:

March 19, 2003:

This is when Bush declares war on Iraq.

This is why the rest of the world is in an uproar, and America should be, too.

The greatest irony is that a man who declares himself profoundly religious should prove to the most disasterous president this country has ever seen, both at home and abroad.

In a time when wearing the cloak of religious piety has become a near-requirement for membership to Republican Congress, the current President of the United States has become the greatest proof that religious belief is NOT a guarantee of personal intergrity.

Schlepping, Forrest Gump, and The Downing Street Memo

2005-05-24T13:06:00.000-06:00

I love this. I'm leaving the Nuclear Compromise to other, more well-versed bloggers and pointing out some of my favorite stories of the day. First, here's this gem:

Intern Briefing

The White House calls it a "press availability."

If that's the case, then why did so few members of the White House press corps show up for yesterday's question-and-answer session in the East Room with President Bush and Afghan President Hamid Karzai?

So few reporters were on hand, in fact, that the White House hurried to have White House interns fill the empty seats. "That way it wouldn't look bad for the cameras," says one White House insider.

What gives?

A member of the press corps we spoke to yesterday equated reporters at such staged White House functions with "props." He explained that because the president only takes four questions at each press availability -- two from U.S. wire service reporters and two from foreign scribes -- many in the press corps don't bother to show up.

"Since we can't ask questions, why schlep over there?" he reasons.

(Italics mine)

Is anyone out there taking notes? Hmmm? Hello? Bring in the interns!

Here's a definite quote of the day:

Run, Forrest, run

"Politicians remind me of Forrest Gump's box of chocolates. They're either firm, soft-centered or nutty."

So says Jan LaRue, chief counsel of Concerned Women for America, who remarked yesterday on the filibuster over Texas Supreme Court Justice Priscilla Owen -- President Bush's nominee to the U.S. Court of Appeals -- "You can't be sure what you'll get until it's time for them to vote."

Keep watch for in upcoming days for more on the Downing Street Memo. It's been speculated on, and spoken about for years now, that Bush never planned to use diplomatic options and intended to invade Iraq from the very beginning, despite what he told the public and Congress at the time.

Neo-cons have managed to beat down many of the credible news stories here in America, leaving the public with a sorry aftertaste on the war in Iraq at not having found any weapons of mass destruction, but with no attempt to begin formal inquiries. Hopefully, this memo will finally change that.

Bush has made serious attempts to identify supporting the troops with supporting him, but this is what he wants us to perceive, not what truly is. There needs to be accountability, and he needs to be held to task for the damage he has wrought to a country who was not harboring terrorists.

Too many American soldiers and innocent Iraqi civilians have died because of this Administration's obsession with Iraq. To investigate the Administration will be supporting our troops.

Let them at least have died so that this kind of manipulation of Congress and the American public cannot happen again - instead of dying for oil and poorly planned war mongering, which is what is happening now.

Lightness and Fluff from a group post

2005-05-16T10:08:00.000-06:00

A Senate staffer is taking a stroll around Capitol Hill when he meets a little girl carrying
a small basket with a blanket over it.  Curious, he says to the girl, "What's in the basket?"

She replies, "New baby kittens" and opens the basket to show him.

"How nice," he said. "What kind are they?"

The little girl says, "Republicans."

He smiles and pats the little girl on the head and he continues on.

About three weeks later, he and another member of the Senate staff are again strolling on
Capitol Hill when he sees the little girl again with the same basket.

He says to his colleague, "Watch this; it's very cute," and they approach the little girl.

He asks the girl how the kittens are and she says fine. 


He then says, "What kind of kittens are they?" and she replies, "Democrats."

Somewhat abashed, he says, "Three weeks ago you said they were Republican!"

"I know," she says, "but now their eyes are open."

Still Stupid After All These Years

2005-04-29T13:41:00.000-06:00

I just came across a fascinating article that I felt really needed to be shared. I'm sure by now everyone is aware of the hot button that comparing Iraq and Vietnam is. Neocons froth at the mouth at the mere mention. However, there are parallels, perhaps not in how we got there, but certainly in the uphill battle our soldiers face trying to do what our government asks of them.

However, I did not realize how many of the same players (or their progeny) have hands in the political side of the war in Iraq. It's definitely worth the read.

There are magnetic "We Support Our Troops" ribbons everywhere now, which is a welcome change from the cool greeting Vietnam veterans got. Americans today understand better that to disagree with our government is not to blame the returning soldier. Yet in every way that counts, our government is not supporting our troops, both abroad and once they return.

How dare we, one of the richest nations in the world, scrimp on armor, proper maps, devices to prevent detonations of makeshift bombs, etc.? For an Administration practically begging to give away tax breaks to the rich, they sure seem eager for America's men and women to die for their cause.

grrrrrr!

2005-04-29T10:53:00.000-06:00

It's Friday, so here's the cat photo of the day. While not mine own, cute kittens are always a welcome addition to any Cat Blog Day.

In the spirit of lighter topics, I highly recommend this link on how to create your own fake Town Hall Meeting. Thank you, Spocko, for both the link and your comments on it.

How ironic (and cynical) of Frank Luntz to reveal tricks of the trade on "The Daily Show" that are clearly applied to real life (and the Social Security Bushshit Tour). Yet the truth in jest is apparent, and I must thank Mr. Luntz for revealing to all and sundry the little man behind the curtain. Sadly, some people appear to be buying the dog and pony show. Luntz thinks it's funny, which is clearly why he agreed to participate at all.

What's even funnier? We're paying for this.

More Bushshit from Congress

2005-04-22T14:31:00.000-06:00

5% of Bush's judicial nominees have been fought against versus 35% of Clinton's. That's right. Of the 214 nominees Bush has brought to the Senate, 204 have been confirmed. So what's the problem?

In a word - Bush. The nominees that Bush is insistent should be confirmed have already been rejected. Instead of looking for more reasonable and less radical candidates, he simply re-nominates people who don't even represent most of the more conservative amongst us... Well, he either re-nominates them, or simply appoints them when Congress is in recess.

Unfortunately, in a play to his neo-conservative fundamentalist base, Senator Frist and his cronies are about to push for the 'Nuclear Option' to reward Bush's non-partisan, petulant behavior.

In a play for power as crass as his Schiavo statements were, Frist is gunning for a fight. Here's why:

Friday's Washington Post notes that Frist "risks the ire of key conservative groups that will play big roles" in the 2008 elections if he fails to gather enough votes to proceed with the nuclear option. Manuel Miranda, a former Frist staffer who now chairs the National Coalition to End Judicial Filibusters, repeated as much this weekend. Miranda called the battle over judicial filibusters "the first primary campaign between Bill Frist and John McCain," and opined that McCain – who opposes going nuclear – "will have no presidential hopes if he pursues this course."

That's right America. Frist isn't doing this for you. This is all about his political ambitions.

So, are you intrigued about the two who just cleared committee? The ones re-nominated by Bush for being too extreme who may be the ones to trigger Frist to 'push the button'? Their names are Judges Priscilla Owen and Janice Rogers Brown.

Let me present some of Janice Rogers Brown's own words for your reading pleasure:

My grandparents’ generation thought being on the government dole was disgraceful, a blight on the family’s honor. Today’s senior citizens blithely cannibalize their grandchildren because they have a right to get as much “free” stuff as the political system will permit them to extract...Big government is...[t]he drug of choice for multinational corporations and single moms, for regulated industries and rugged Midwestern farmers, and militant senior citizens. [IFJ speech at 2,3]

I would deny [the senior citizen] plaintiff relief because she has failed to establish the public policy against age discrimination “inures to the benefit of the public” or is “fundamental and substantial”...Discrimination based on age...does not mark its victim with a “stigma of inferiority and second class citizenship”....; it is the unavoidable consequence of that universal leveler: time [Dissenting opinion in Stevenson v. Superior Court, 941 P.2d 1157,1177, 1187 (Cal. 1997)]

As for Priscilla Owen, even Bush's own go-to Attorney, Alberto Gonzalez, has gone repeatedly head to head with this woman:

"As a principal architect of the Bush administration’s legal policy, which seeks to turn back the clock on a range of civil rights, environmental, and reproductive rights achievements and to pack the federal judiciary with right-wing ideologues, Alberto Gonzales is now praising Priscilla Owen’s record as a judge," said People For the American Way President Ralph G. Neas. "But the best evidence for his opinion of her record as a Texas Supreme Court Justice is what he wrote during the time he served with her on that court. As a Texas Supreme Court Justice, Gonzales repeatedly wrote or joined criticism of Owen’s aggressive right-wing judicial activism. Time and again, Justice Owen attempted to remake the law when it clashed with her ideology. We urge members of the Senate Judiciary Committee to carefully review Owen’s record on the Texas Supreme Court and to reject her confirmation to the federal appeals court."

Conservatives have led at least six filibusters during the Clinton years. In fact, Senator Frist himself, on 3/9/00, took part in a filibuster of Richard Paez, President Clinton's nominee to the Ninth Circuit.

Don't let their lies fool you. Frist is frothing at the bit to throw out our government's checks and balances that were designed to protect us from abusive power. He's the epitome of what's wrong with politicians today. They're so into the game, they forget who they're representing, and why.

And as for those 'liberalist activist judges' conservatives like to slam? According to the L.A. Times, 94 of the 162 active judges now on the U.S. appeals courts were chosen by conservative presidents. On 10 of the 13 circuit courts, conservative appointees "have a clear majority" AND, since 1976, "at least seven of the nine seats on the U.S. Supreme Court have been filled" by conservatives.

So let me propose a new word and its definition for you:

Bush-shit (n):

Foolish, deceitful, or boastful language shouted loudly to justify gross and abusive behavior.
Something worthless, deceptive, or insincere that is presented as something beneficial to the public (such as the "Clear Skies" Act, for example).
Insolent talk or behavior, typically used by Republicans to blame others for their own wrongdoings, designed to distract and focus attention away from themselves while they rob America blind .

[syn: lying windbag, Oedipus complex]

Where There's White Smoke, There's Fire

2005-04-19T13:09:00.000-06:00

It’s a bad sign when the new Pope has been called 'God's Rotweiler’ and the (former) Pope's 'Grand Inquisitor'.

At a time when Catholics could really use some fresh blood and new eyes, they appoint Cardinal Ratzinger, a man who speaks out often against divorce, gay marriage and isn’t even very well liked by his own countrymen for his stance against women priests, amongst other things.

But hey, he used to be more progressive. After being attacked by left-wing students who felt he wasn’t progressive enough, he evidently changed his mind… But that couldn’t be a personal reason, could it?

He was a member of Hitler’s Youth briefly when it became compulsory, but was able to leave because he was training in seminary. He enrolled in an anti-aircraft unit protecting a factory, but later deserted, and even spent a few weeks in a prisoner of war camp.

He’s said in later interviews that although he opposed the Nazis, he couldn’t resist openly – a point some historians disagree on.

I saw a movie a long time ago called Saving Grace, starring Tom Conti. He played a newly elected Pope who inadvertently ends up locked out of the Vatican and gets to see what life truly is like for some of his followers.

I’ve often wished that for a man like that to somehow become Pope (although let’s face it, if it happened, it would be a fluke *or a miracle*). He was a man who cared for those around him. In fact, he loved them, and subtly conveyed that he was honored to have the opportunity to get to know them.

Cardinal Ratzinger is described as uncharismatic, lacking in leadership skills and evidently isn’t even much interested in Rome’s inner administrative workings.

But he’s the Catholic Church’s man. God help us all.

Pave Paradise and Put Up a Parking Lot

2005-04-15T15:24:00.000-06:00

While I’ve always had strong political views, never have I cried for them until this year. There are many things that can happen in a person’s life that cause stress, but never before has the state of the nation distressed me as much as it does today.

I’ve always been proud to be American. It’s an honor. I’m in the land of the free. We may be a young nation, but our dreams are beautiful. Freedom and equality for all. Opportunities available for anyone willing to work for them.

As a little girl, I’d learn about third world countries and hear of what women endured, and think, “Thank God I’m American. That could never happen here.” My voice always counted. When I grew up, I could be anything I set my mind to be. Nothing was off-limits because I wasn’t a man.

I’d always believed in the sense of innate fairness that Americans stood for. It’s what makes us want the underdog to win, and justice to be done. Against overwhelming odds, this country has survived a host of scandals, and walked away wiser for having endured them. Hell, we used to be taught them in school.

They were the lessons upon which I based my own moral compass. McCarthy was a bad man, full of hate and fear, and transfixed the nation until a lone voice asked what many had been to afraid to say aloud, “Have you left no sense of decency?”

Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream – and it was a beautiful dream. It was where we all stood shoulder to shoulder… Not as whites, blacks, Hispanics, Asians – but as human beings and fellow Americans.

JFK represented America’s political Camelot, and FDR cemented a legacy of protections to keep us from having to again face the human tragedy that befell much of America during the Great Depression. The classic authors left a wealth of verbal pictorials for us to remind ourselves with… The Grapes of Wrath, anyone?

FDR understood how heavily poverty weighed on the soul, and believed that we as a nation had a responsibility to our smallest citizen to insure they would not starve, that they could have a roof over their head, and the freedom to hope.

World War II was a pivotal moment in our wartime history. There was a very real fear that we could lose, and never had there been such a clear case of good versus evil.

Vietnam has left a wealth of lyrical protest songs – soft voices questioning the right of the government to ask its’ young to die for an ever adjusting borderline drawn on some politician’s map. I was taught in school that these soldiers came back from insanity to face an unwelcoming and bewildered nation that had no concept of what they’d endured, still unclear why they'd had to go in the first place.

I hear those songs again now. They play a lot more frequently on the radio, and these voices from the past resonate in my heart. The past is alive here and now, and we are living in dark ages once again.

Buy your big screens now, because July 1^st the FCC requires all televisions over 36 inches to include digital receivers (the rest will be required to by 2007). Eventually, all digital TV transmissions will include a “broadcast flag” that will indicate shows that can’t be copied freely. Even the luxury of recording your favorite television show to watch at your leisure may soon be obsolete – unless you’re willing to pay extra.

If you need to file for bankruptcy, even if you’re facing extraordinary medical expenses or have been laid off, do it before October 12^th, 2005 (an estimated 180 days after Bush signs the bankruptcy bill into law, which will probably happen sometime today), or it’s likely that filing for bankruptcy will not only provide no economic relief, but you will end up having to pay additional legal fees as well. Paying credit card company debt will be able to compete with (and even surpass) a debtor’s child support payment obligations.

The GOP Leader Tom DeLay is so corrupt you need a website to graph out exactly who he’s in bed with, how much he’s profited, and who is in bed with him. Senator Bill Frist is gearing up to portray Democrats as “against people of faith” for blocking Bush’s judicial nominees… You know the ones – they were already rejected once.

The estate tax has just been permanently repealed. Who benefits? The super-rich. Have I mentioned that the U.S. National Debt Clock is at $7,801,824,563,532.62? We're still at war in both Iraq and Afghanistan, right? Why are we making tax cuts permanent again?

The Federal Budget is so outrageously out of balance that even religious leaders decry that it is a Moral Document, and as such fails on every count. We are America. How can our government favor military spending and tax breaks for the wealthy and corporations yet give the cold shoulder to the poor, the dispossessed, the infirm, and children?

The rich are getting super-rich, the poor are getting destitute, and just how much of the money I pay on gas ends up in Bush’s cronies’ pockets? Whatever it is our government has become, it’s not America.

As a little girl, I once visited the Sequoia National Forest. I remember standing at the base of one of these incredible trees as I tried to grasp the significance of how old they were. One of them, I read, nicknamed “General Sherman”, was already a few hundred years old when Jesus walked the earth.

I vividly recall listening to the woods creak and groan in the gentle breeze as I looked around, and for the first time I truly believed I stood in the presence of something sacred. I was amazed that anything living could last this long – untouched and unbent. Nature became something magical and mysterious to me, and it has been ever since. The Bush Administration wants to log it.

I have not been happy with the way things have been going in this country for a few years now. While I didn’t vote for him, I supported Bush after 9-11. I thought he could do a lot of good for this country, if he meant what he said. It turns out, he didn’t.

The more I learn, the more horrified I become. I keep waiting for the day when the rest of my fellow citizens raise their own eyes to see the truth as it stands before them, but it hasn’t happened.

I’m waiting for you, dear reader. Please, stop listening to the lies and take a good look around you. Believe your eyes. It’s as bad as it looks, and these are dark times indeed. We need all of your voices, raised in concert, to remind this government that it isn’t about money - it’s about people. It’s about the poor, the sick, the jobless and our children. It’s about caring for something other than the almighty dollar. There’s more to life than that. There’s more to America than that.

The State of the Union

2005-04-01T15:27:00.000-07:00

Mrs. Schiavo's death is a moral poverty and a legal tragedy. This loss happened because our legal system did not protect the people who need protection most, and that will change. The time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior, but not today. Today we grieve, we pray, and we hope to God this fate never befalls another. Our thoughts and prayers are with the Schindlers and with Terri Schiavo's friends in this time of deep sorrow. -- Tom DeLay

Read the above quote carefully. There is a reason why Tom DeLay is called the Hammer. This man has no scruples, no values, no ethics, and above all, is a hypocrit. He seized upon a woman's tragedy, and has been exploiting it to help revive his own career. Shame on you, Mr. DeLay. Or perhaps the question needs to be asked:

"Have you no sense of decency?"

April 1, 2005
Tom DeLay
Majority Leader
House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Majority Leader DeLay,

I was stunned to read the threatening comments you made yesterday against Federal judges and our nation’s courts of law in general. In reference to certain Federal judges, you stated: “The time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior.”

As you are surely aware, the family of Federal Judge Joan H. Lefkow of Illinois was recently murdered in their home. And at the state level, Judge Rowland W. Barnes and others in his courtroom were gunned down in Georgia.

Our nation’s judges must be concerned for their safety and security when they are asked to make difficult decisions every day. That’s why comments like those you made are not only irresponsible, but downright dangerous. To make matters worse, is it appropriate to make threats directed at specific Federal and state judges?

You should be aware that your comments yesterday may violate a Federal criminal statute, 18 U.S.C. §115 (a)(1)(B). That law states:

“Whoever threatens to assault…. or murder, a United States judge… with intent to retaliate against such… judge…. on account of the performance of official duties, shall be punished [by up to six years in prison]”

Threats against specific Federal judges are not only a serious crime, but also beneath a Member of Congress. In my view, the true measure of democracy is how it dispenses justice. Your attempt to intimidate judges in America not only threatens our courts, but our fundamental democracy as well.

Federal judges, as well as state and local judges in our nation, are honorable public servants who make difficult decisions every day. You owe them – and all Americans – an apology for your reckless statements.

Sincerely,
Frank R. Lautenberg

That's our President!

2005-03-25T11:16:00.000-07:00

I've heard several people reference this particular article, and felt it deserved a place here as a reminder of just how much of a hypocrit George Bush truly is.

This segment is pulled from Talk magazine's September 1999 article written by Tucker Carlson.

In the week before [Karla Faye Tucker's] execution, Bush says, Bianca Jagger and a number of other protesters came to Austin to demand clemency for Tucker. "Did you meet with any of them?" I ask.

Bush whips around and stares at me. "No, I didn't meet with any of them," he snaps, as though I've just asked the dumbest, most offensive question ever posed. "I didn't meet with Larry King either when he came down for it. I watched his interview with [Tucker], though. He asked her real difficult questions, like 'What would you say to Governor Bush?' "

"What was her answer?" I wonder.

"Please," Bush whimpers, his lips pursed in mock desperation,"don't kill me."

Now, Karla Faye Tucker never said those exact words. Tucker Carlson mentions later that the Larry King-Karla Faye Tucker exchange actually didn't happen. What she did do was:

"...imply that Bush was succumbing to election-year pressure from pro-death penalty voters. Apparently Bush never forgot it. He has a long memory for slights.

"Which is part of the problem with Bush's presentation of himself as a man so "comfortable in my soul" that he hardly cares whether he wins or loses. Anyone who has reached the Zen-master level of self-acceptance he describes would be unaffected by ordinary criticism. It's still pretty easy to get a rise out of Bush."

And this article is written by a former CNN Crossfire co-host and right-wing conservative pundit who was the Sancho to Robert Novak's Don Quixote (You know him, even if you don't realize it. He's the man who revealed a CIA operative in print and has yet to face any repercussions for it.)

For a President who is supposedly so obsessed with life, let me present a little refresher course on his track record. Of course, the awful irony is that while he and his cronies scramble for recognition by religious zealots over this one case, no numbers have yet to come out as to how many cognizant people will be hurt and could even die under Bush's brutal cuts to Medicare, the safety net of health care programs, which will hurt the most vulnerable in our country—seniors in nursing homes, poor children, and those most in need of catastrophic care.

This doesn't even scratch the surface, though, of the men and women in uniform he's maimed and killed with his unnecessary war in Iraq. Not to mention the innocent people he's held in custody unlawfully and sanctioned torture against. *tsk tsk* That's not very Christian, is it?

In the realm of those who are truly doing God's will, and those who would likely have crucified Jesus, I hereby put George W. Bush at the top of the later list. He is a classic example of a man who claims his being religious makes him a moral man, when in reality it is used as a shield to hide the ugliness underneath.

Thoughts on Christianity

2005-03-24T12:34:00.000-07:00

As Easter approaches and the last days of Christ are revisited in churches
across the country prior to his crucifiction, let us not forget just *who*
crucified him. It was not the sinners, the criminals, the sick or any of
the common populace. It was the religious 'authorities' of his time,
fearing for their own loss of influence who condemned him to death.

So blind and desperate was their grab for power that in the name of God they
crucified his Son.

It's a good thing to remember when so many claim they speak in *God's* name,
that motives must be questioned and deeds examined. If, couched within
their demands, a quest for power can be seen, then you are not in the
presence of a 'Godly' person, but more likely Jesus' executioners.

Another Quote of the Day

2005-03-23T15:01:00.000-07:00

I've been finding an abundance of good quotes lately. This latest is in regards to the Republican's exploitation of the Schiavo case, and why the rest of America isn't impressed. A crude if ironic observation, especially considering that over half of the polled respondents had been involved in making a decision concerning the termination of life support for a friend or family member.

Bush may have been able to sell America on the Iraq War, because the overwhelming majority of Americans have never met a Muslim. But, by gawd, they do know about in-laws.

-- found on American Street

2005-03-23T13:59:00.000-07:00

The passing of the torch.

This boy shouldn't have to face a future like this. Not for big oil. Not for a lie. People are being affected every day by the Bush Administration's bad decisions. It's time to hold them accountable for them.

2005-03-22T13:09:00.000-07:00

Quote of the Day:

In other news, the Environmental Protection Administration is protecting polluters from public health considerations, the Food and Drug Administration is approving drugs that kill you, the Social Security Administration is trying to wreck Social Security, the Bureau of Indian Affairs is stealing native Americans' money, our diplomats are lying to our allies, and the House Ethics Committee (sic) has been packed with donors to Rep. Tom DeLay.
It makes you nostalgic for blow-jobs in the White House.

-- Courtest of MaxSpeak

And this is where people are finding their values?

2005-03-18T16:09:00.000-07:00

How is this Christian? For shame, Catholics. Your hypocrisy is showing. Jesus would have buried this man. That I guarantee.

2005-03-18T16:05:00.000-07:00

'Nuff said.

Wounded Soldiers? What Soldiers?

2005-03-14T14:52:00.000-07:00

It is not just the 'Dover Test' that the government believes they will fail. They don't even want the press to see the wounded. The Bush Administration has a lot to be ashamed of. Our soldiers don't. Don't shuttle them covertly from place to place like they are lepers. They deserve better than that.

2005-03-11T15:10:00.000-07:00

Logan 5 and Jessica 6 joined President Bush at a townhall meeting in Louisville, Kentucky, to finally unveil the details of Bush’s plan to save Social Security. Under the new scheme, family members would begin receiving benefits when the primary provider reaches age 30.

I just had to bring this picture and the caption beneath it over. It was just too priceless not to share (although this dates me that I know the movie). If you want to see where I found it, scroll down this link and you will find it.

For those of you unfamiliar with who the two people are in the background, they are from Logan's Run, a 1976 sci-fi movie whose plot outline at imdb reads as follows:

"Life is pretty near perfect now, as long as you don't mind that nobody is allowed to live past the age of 30..."

'Nuff said. Have a great weekend!

A little humor for those, like myself, who need it

2005-03-10T10:32:00.000-07:00

For those of you who haven't heard, the bankruptcy bill passed, which means it is going to be even harder on middle and lower income Americans than ever before. I know Friday is normally Cat Blogging day, but I need a little humor *now*, so here you go. I hope you enjoy:

The following are purported to be actual lines out of U.S. Military OERs (Officer Efficiency Reports):

* Not the sharpest knife in the drawer.
* Got into the gene pool while the lifeguard wasn't watching.
* A room temperature IQ.
* Got a full 6-pack, but lacks the plastic thingy to hold it all together.
* A prime candidate for natural deselection.
* Bright as Alaska in December.
* Gates are down, the lights are flashing, but the train isn't coming.
* So dense, light bends around him.
* If brains were taxed, he'd get a rebate.
* If he were any more stupid, he'd have to be watered twice a week.
* Was left on the Tilt-A-Whirl a bit too long as a baby.
* Wheel is turning, but the hamster is dead.

British Military Officer Fitness Reports

The British Military writes OFRs (officer fitness reports).
The form used for Royal Navy and Marines fitness reports is the S206.
The following are actual excerpts taken from people's S206 reports:

His men would follow him anywhere, but only out of curiosity.

This officer is really not so much of a has-been, but more of
a definitely won't-be.

When she opens her mouth, it seems that this is only to change whichever
foot was previously in there.

He has carried out each and every one of his duties to his entire satisfaction.

He would be out of his depth in a car park puddl e.

This officer remindes me very much of gyroscope -- always spinning around at a frantic pace, but not really going anywhere.

This young lady has delusions of adequacy.

This medical officer has used my ship to carry his genitals from port to port,
and my officers to carry him from bar to bar.

Since my last report, he has reached rock bottom and has started to dig.

She sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them.

He has the wisdom of youth and the energy of old age.

This officer should go far, and the sooner he starts, the better.

Works well when under constant supervision and cornered like a rat in a trap.

This man is depriving a village somewhere of an idiot.

Drilling in Alaska

2005-03-07T17:26:00.000-07:00

As gas prices rise once again in the upcoming weeks, there is something I would like for you to keep in mind as you pay at the pump. First and foremost, if you are looking for someone to blame - let it be George W. Bush. Unfortunately, a primary contributor to the rising cost of oil in the world today is the United States, and more specifically, being caused by the war in Iraq.

The U.S.-led invasion has resulted in the loss of an average of 2 million barrels a day of Iraqi oil from world markets. That is a significant number with huge consequences for economies around the globe.

Oil prices stand at 20-year-high records with no relief in sight. Indeed, should the ongoing disruption of Iraqi oil exports be compounded with an interruption of production elsewhere — Russia, Africa, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela or any member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries — we could be looking at prices far above $50 a barrel, perhaps $60 or more.

Neo-cons went to war thinking Iraq could become America's own personal gas station, but that hasn't happened. The Bush Administration thought they could make Iraq pay for their own invasion and the subsequent rebuild, and that the United States could siphon off the profit.

With the gross mismanagement of the Iraqi War, the Bush Administration has managed to do completely opposite of what they intended. Instead of tapping Iraq's oil supply for themselves, they have destabilized the area enough that costs in neighboring regions are skyrocketing. Fear of terrorism is a major contributor to cost increases, and guess where the new hotbed of terrorism is? Iraq, of course.

Now Bush and his big oil cronies want to invade a small, 110-mile strip of coastline in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge that will take ten years to bring to market and *might* satisfy about six months of our national demand. A refuge that is this country's last major unspoiled arctic ecosystem. Despite what Bush says, there are plenty of documented negative effects due to drilling on both wildlife and habitat.

More than 90 percent of the coastal lands west of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge have already been opened up to drilling, and yet despite claims by big oil companies that they can drill responsibly on Alaska's North Slope (and have done so in the past), spills are commonplace.

At the Prudhoe Bay oilfield just sixty miles west of the refuge, reportable spills of oil products and hazardous substances happen every day. In 1999 alone, these spills released 45,000 gallons of crude oil, diesel fuel, propane and ethylene glycol, among other toxic substances.

Oil is also release into the environment through leaks in the Trans-Alaskan pipeline system. Remember the Exxon Valdez spill? That was North Slope crude oil. In addition, North Slope oil and gas operations generate enormous amounts of waste - all of it exempt from hazardous-waste regulations because of a loophole in the law. As a result, millions of gallons of oily liquids and sludge, toxic brine and other wastes are dumped into open pits, frozen into the permafrost or simply discharged into the environment.

Think the oil companies will only tap one place in the center of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and leave everything else alone? Think again. The oil isn't easy to extract because it isn't in one resevoir - it is scattered in small accumulations. This means miles and miles of pipelines, wells, and roads. Experts say this kind of widespread development will massively scar the land with garbage, pollution, and oil runoff.

What was sold to the American people as an extension of our war on terrorism was based on a lie. Why Iraq? Because of the money, honey. It's always about profit. Big oil has had its eye on Alaska for a long time, and this time they have a President on their side.

Isn't it ironic that Bush's own failed attempts to control oil have allowed this opportunity for the Administration to try to give big oil what it most wants? We don't need more drilling. We need aggressive policies that eagerly works towards alternative energy. We need less SUVs on the road, and we need vehicles that get more miles to the gallon.

George W. Bush may look upon mile after mile of oil fields and think it's beautiful. The rest of America doesn't. Don't believe the lies. Don't let Bush strip America of a national treasure. Speak up and make your voice heard. Write and/or call your Congressmen (and women) today.

Sound Familiar?

2005-03-03T10:02:00.000-07:00

Can we say "Social Security"?

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be lead to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.
H.L. Mencken (1880-1956)

The American Tight Rope

2005-02-28T10:49:00.000-07:00

It is the most commonly accepted, and least spoken aspect of life in the United States. Things aren't what they used to be. You hear it all the time from your parents and their parents, and as we all go to our various jobs, we KNOW it.

It's bred cynicism into us. We were taught that if you work hard and are reliable, your job is secure. If you stay at the same job, someday you'll be able to retire with a pension. If you're a good employee, you'll be rewarded.

That's not true any more, and it hasn't been for a long time. A fabulous series of articles was written that documents just how perilous times are, and how we got there. It's definitely worth the read.

Jobs are more tenuous now more than ever. Where I work, I've lived through four rounds of layoffs. It's the dreaded scheduled meeting on your calendar that no one else knows about. It's the moment your scan card no longer allows you into the building. It's the shame of having somehow 'failed', when you'd done all your parents taught you to do.

You worked the extra hours. You were the reliable one, and always went above and beyond. You always gave 110%, and made your family play second fiddle to the demands of the job, trying to insure that they were provided for. This was for you and your children's futures.

The problem is, the company you worked for didn't get the memo. Cuts were based by department, automation, out-sourcing, or how long you were with the company. Companies today use any number of factors for layoffs. Very rarely do they use merit.

The truth is, no one is safe in their job anymore. Being a good worker can no more protect you from being laid off than having straight teeth could. And once you are without income, the safety nets that used to be there for you aren't anymore. The retraining is harder to get in. The unemployment benefits don't last as long. Welfare, a thing so many are ashamed to need but must, is *very* short term, and unfortunately the retraining isn't. The scholarships and grants your children might have had access to for aid with ever-rising college tuition is drying up quickly.

Take a look at FDR's famous "Economic Bill of Rights". I happen to agree with them. Read through, and tell me if you see ANY of them being supported by the current Republican party, and give me a decent reason why they shouldn't be.

These are indeed perilous times for the American employee, and they shouldn't be. Yes, I'm well aware that life isn't fair. But this is no longer about fairness. This is about what is right. Regulations were put in place to keep the average citizen from being abused and taken advantage by those with means, and right now, very few of those protections are left in place.

Power corrupts. Turn on the news if you don't believe me. Democracy was founded as a means for everyone to be afforded the same freedoms and the same protections against abuse. It was also founded with the belief that the same opportunities should be available to everyone, not just those born into the right families.

The American Dream used to be that if you worked hard enough, were smart and diligent enough, that you can be anything you wanted to be. Isn't it about time we had that dream again?

“The Economic Bill of Rights”
Excerpt from President Roosevelt's January 11, 1944 message to the Congress of the United States on the State of the Union
It is our duty now to begin to lay the plans and determine the strategy for the winning of a lasting peace and the establishment of an American standard of living higher than ever before known. We cannot be content, no matter how high that general standard of living may be, if some fraction of our people—whether it be one-third or one-fifth or one-tenth—is ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill-housed, and insecure.

This Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the protection of certain inalienable political rights—among them the right of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. They were our rights to life and liberty.

As our nation has grown in size and stature, however—as our industrial economy expanded—these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.

We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. “Necessitous men are not free men.” People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.

In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all—regardless of station, race, or creed.

Among these are:

The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;

The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;

The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;

The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;

The right of every family to a decent home;

The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;

The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;

The right to a good education.

All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.

America’s own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for our citizens.

Methinks the President Doth Protest Too Much

2005-02-15T20:32:00.000-07:00

 
A person's sexual identity is not all they are as human beings,
but it is a part. Homophobia is running rampant in this country,
and the government is fueling it.

What is this, the McCarthy era?  There is such a thing as free
speech.  And guess what?  There are homosexuals in this world.
They are like all of us, striving to do the best they can with
what they've got.  They fall in love, they dream of better
futures - they are human beings, no less and no more than their
heterosexual brethren.

What is it that radical fundamentalists and the Bush
Administration want?  What is their ultimate aim?  
To strip anyone who is not heterosexual of all legal
rights and protections?

To make them less of a citizen?  What's next?  Who's next?

To vilify and try to dehumanize any sector of our society
goes against the Constitution.  More importantly, it is the
unChristian thing to do.  You who seek to persecute and
strip homosexuals of their basic rights -
I accuse you of doing far worse than them.

They have committed no sins.  They are attracted to others
who you judge to be unacceptable.  Who are you to judge?  
Who are any of us?

Homophobia has proven a convenient distraction provided by
the government to try to keep you from seeing that the Bush
Administration is losing the war in Iraq.

The decisions the President is making are hurting the economy,
not helping it, and he doesn't care one whit about the average
American.  He wouldn't just sell you out in a heartbeat -
he already has.  All you have to do is take a look at the
deficit and read the legislation he'd like to have pushed
through Congress to see that.

There are moments in American history when the population
at large finally opens its eyes to the truth that's been
there all along. We need one of those moments now.

We are taught as children the difference between
right and wrong.  Ostracizing little Johnny
for being different has always been wrong.  When did
the rest of you start thinking it was okay?
Hello colleagues and friends,

Recently, I was asked to help present a workshop on suicide
prevention among GLBT individuals, at the third in a series
of five regional conferences on suicide prevention in the
U.S. This particular conference covers Public Health Regions
9 and 10 (basically, the entire west coast). Following is a
statement my co-presenters and I have prepared outlining
recent chilling events surrounding our workshop. One
interesting thing to note the two previous conferences, one
in New Orleans and the other in Denver, contained workshops
very similar to ours and were not a problem. The difference?
Both were held PRIOR to the last election.

We give permission to forward this to whoever you believe
needs to read it:

Please distribute as widely as possible:


Statement of Concern and Protest

Government funders within the Bush Administration at SAMHSA
(Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration)
notified the Suicide Prevention Resource Center (SPRC) that
SAMHSA Administrator, Charles Curie, would not be allowed to
attend a SPRC regional conference on suicide prevention if
conference organizers went forward with a workshop title
that included the words "gay," "lesbian," "bisexual", and
"transgender". The conference is scheduled to take place in
Portland, Oregon, February 28-March 2. The original title of
the workshop was "Suicide Prevention Among Gays, Lesbians,
Bisexuals, and Transgender Individuals."

On January 31, Lloyd Potter, SPRC Center Director, contacted
workshop presenters Ron Bloodworth, Joyce Liljeholm and Reid
Vanderburgh and requested that we come up with alternative
wording for the workshop so that the words
"gay","lesbian","bisexual", or "transgender" did not appear
in the workshop title or descriptor.

We worked with SPRC to create alternative wording so that
the workshop could continue to be offered but we expressed
deep concern about government intrusion to remove any
reference to gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people
in the workshop title and descriptor. After agreeing to the
title "suicide Prevention in Vulnerable Populations", we
were told that the new title would be acceptable to SAMHSA
and that we could use the term "sexual orientation" in the
workshop descriptor but that the term "gender identity"
would "not fly with SAMHSA."

We are still planning to offer the workshop as originally
planned even though the workshop title and descriptor had to
be changed but we will not be quiet about the heavy handed
efforts of SAMSHA to render gay, lesbian, bisexual, and/or
transgender people invisible. The action of our government
in this regard is the very reason a workshop on suicide
prevention with gay,lesbian, bisexual, and/or transgender
individuals is needed. How ironic! The discriminatory and
intimidating actions of SAMHSA and the Bush administration
should not go unchallenged and should be of concern to all
Americans.

It's important to note that Oregon Senator Gordon Smith is
scheduled to attend the conference as part of his support
for suicide prevention efforts in the U.S. We urge you to
use the attached contact information to express your concern
to SAMHSA Administrator Charles Curie, Secretary of Health
and Human Services, Mike Leavitt, Oregon Senator Gordon
Smith, and other members of Congress from your state that
represents you.

Thank you for your concern and support.


Ron Bloodworth, MA, LPC, Portland, OR
Joyce Liljeholm, MEd, Portland, OR
Reid Vanderburgh, MA, Portland, OR

Contact Information for Government Officials:

Charles Curie
Office of the Administrator
SAMHSA
Rockville, MD 20850
Tel: 240-276-2000
charles.curie@samhsa.hhs.gov
Secretary of Health and Human Services
200 Independence Ave. SW
Washington, D.D. 20201
Tel: 202-690-7000
Fax: 202-690-7203

Senator Gordon Smith
404 Russell Bldg
Washington, D.C. 20510-3704
Tel: 202-224-3753
Fax: 202-228-3997
President George W. Bush
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20500
Comments: 202-456-1111
Switchboard: 202-456-1414
president@whitehouse.gov

A proposed budget breakdown the Administration doesn't want you to see.

2005-02-11T14:51:00.000-07:00

I pulled this from another group, but it's an excellent summary of exactly what Bush is proposing to do. You can find the link to the full article and graphs here.

As the person who posted this mentioned, pay special attention to how the Administration is hiding numbers they don't want the public to know and inflating others to make themselves look better.

Here's the short analysis of what's going on:

This short analysis examines the priorities reflected in the Administration's
budget, the effects of its proposals on the deficit, and some budget gimmicks it
contains.

The Priorities of the Budget

The budget makes very substantial cuts in domestic spending at the same time
that it calls for large additional tax cuts. If defense, homeland security, and
international affairs are funded at the levels the President proposes, then by
2010, funding for domestic discretionary programs (outside homeland security)
would have to be cut about $66 billion, or 16 percent, below the 2005 levels,
adjusted for inflation. These cuts hit programs - in areas such as education,
veterans' health care, and environmental protection - of importance to large
numbers of Americans.

The budget proposes new tax cuts costing $1.4 trillion over 10 years (a figure
that rises to $1.6 trillion when the resulting interest payments are added in),
even though the paucity of revenues is the main reason behind the rise in the
deficit. Revenues are now lower, as a share of the economy, than in any year
in the 1960s, the 1970s, the 1980s, or the 1990s. Yet the Administration's
budget would make its tax cuts permanent and add a number of new tax cuts on
top. It proposes, for example, a series of new tax cuts related to savings
that, according to an analysis by the Tax Policy Center of the Urban Institute
and the Brookings Institution, would go overwhelmingly to those with incomes
above $100,000. Furthermore, these savings proposals are designed around a
timing gimmick, so they produce increased tax revenues over the next five years
but lose massive sums in future decades. The Congressional Research Service has
estimated that these new tax cuts eventually cost the equivalent today of $300
billion to $500 billion over ten years.

Key low-income programs would be hit even though these programs have contributed
little to the return of the deficit, and since 2000, poverty has risen and the
number of Americans without health insurance has climbed. The number of poor
went up for the third straight year in 2003, the share of total income that goes
to the bottom two-fifths of households has fallen to one of its lowest levels
since the end of World War II, and the number of people lacking health insurance
rose to 45 million in 2003, the highest level on record. Yet the budget
proposes food stamp cuts that will eliminate benefits for approximately 300,000
people primarily in low-income working families and a five-year freeze on child
care funding that, according to tables in the Administration's budget, will
result in cutting the number of low-income children receiving child care
assistance by 300,000 in 2009. The budget also proposes to reduce Medicaid
funding by at least $45 billion over 10 years; such a proposal would almost
certainly push hard-pressed states to eliminate coverage for a substantial
number of low-income people, increasing the ranks of the uninsured and the
underinsured.

Effects on the Deficit

Despite cuts to scores of domestic programs, the Administration's budget
increases rather than decreases the deficit over the next five years. As shown
by its own figures, the effect of the Administration's budget is to increase
total deficits over the next five years from $1.364 trillion under current law
to $1.393 trillion. A main reason for this outcome is the tax-cut proposals
the Administration has included in its budget.

Over the longer run, by proposing to make its tax cuts permanent, the
Administration's budget proposals would dramatically swell the deficit. In 2015
alone, the Administration's tax proposals - including the cost of making the
2001 and 2003 tax cuts permanent - would reduce revenues by $287 billion. The
total effect on the deficit, including the related interest costs, would be $358
billion. The Administration's proposal to replace part of Social Security with
private accounts also would swell deficits further. It would add $1.4 trillion
to deficits in its first ten years (2019 to 2028) and another $3.5 trillion in
the decade after that. In 2015 alone, it would add $177 billion.

Budgetary Hide and Seek

For the first time since 1989, the budget fails to provide information about the
funding of specific discretionary programs beyond the upcoming budget year,
thereby hiding the impact of the large discretionary cuts it is proposing. The
budget fails to show how much the Administration proposes to provide for
individual discretionary programs - which include education, veterans' health
care, and many other programs - after 2006. This is notable since the budget
proposes a "hard freeze" on domestic discretionary spending (outside homeland
security) for five years, to be enforced by binding caps on discretionary
programs. As discussed, this would result in a $66 billion cut in these
programs by 2010 (compared to today's level, adjusted only for inflation). But
the budget omits the Administration's proposals for the specific cuts it
envisions to comply with these caps.

The Administration also proposes a new budget rule that would require that
legislation to make the tax cuts permanent be treated as if such legislation had
already been enacted. When CBO and OMB are asked to provide estimates of the
cost of legislation to extend the tax cuts or make them permanent, they would be
required to produce estimates showing the cost to be zero. This proposal is
significant: it would exempt legislation to extend the tax cuts, or make them
permanent, from any Congressional budget enforcement. Such budgetary
legerdemain would be unprecedented and shatter rules designed to promote some
modicum of fiscal responsibility.

The Administration insists on its practice of budgeting for only five years,
masking the full cost of its tax cuts, while it simultaneously insists on using
"infinite" or 75-year time horizons in other contexts. A principal reason the
Administration cites for providing only a five-year budget is that estimates of
the budget beyond the fifth year are too uncertain. Yet the Administration
contends that the traditional 75-year test of solvency used by the Social
Security actuaries and most social insurance experts is not long enough and that
Social Security solvency must be measured into eternity. The Administration
also proposes that cost estimates for major entitlement legislation be produced
for 75 years, although it wants the cost of tax bills estimated for only five or
ten years.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Read carefully. This is your future, and your children's future, that the Bush Administration wants to gut.

Take a fresh look at the Democratic party. They are for the everyday working man and woman.

Democrats care when you are laid off work and need retraining to find a new job, and want to provide access no matter what race or religion you are.

Democrats care that, even working two jobs, you don't earn enough money to support your family and live above the poverty level and want to do something about it.

If a member of your family gets sick, Democrats want them to be able to get the best medical attention possible.

If you need a helping hand to afford the ever-rising cost of a college education, Democrats want to insure you have all the opportunities that America's wealthy children have.

Democrats believe in the sanctity of quality public education.

Democrats want the air you breathe not to make you sick, and the water you drink not to cause birth defects in your children.

Democrats believe in good business, not big business.

The Republican party isn't about 'moral values'. It is morally corrupt.

It's not the rich who are in Iraq and Afghanistan fighting without proper equipment - it's the working class. It's not Democrats who are looking to cut funding to programs our returning veterans desperately need - it's Republicans.

Working America is bearing the brunt of the war in Iraq at terrible personal expense, but it is the rich who are profiting.

Corporations and the uber rich have bought and paid for the Republican party.

It's time for middle America to realize that Republicans are not 'good for business'. They're for big business, and it's at your expense.

Sometimes No News is also Bad News

2005-02-10T12:31:00.000-07:00

For whatever reason, I haven't seen much mentioned in the news about it, but Carl Rove was recently named White House deputy chief of staff in charge of coordinating domestic policy, economic policy, national security and homeland security.

Oh, I feel much better now. This is some of what Dallasnews has to say in their article nominating him "Texan of the Year":

As a College Republican, Mr. Rove got his start teaching seminars on dirty tricks. In Mr. Rove's political rise, critics have been quick to see an instinct for winning at any cost. A Rove campaign, they say, always follows a pattern: virulent whisper campaigns or damaging attacks from surrogate groups against his opponents, but never evidence that he was involved...
In 1994, when Mr. Bush ran for governor, incumbent Gov. Ann Richards says she was targeted by an astonishingly effective word-of-mouth campaign in East Texas over gays and lesbians in her administration.

Four years ago, Sen. John McCain says he was targeted in the Republican presidential primary by a group of veterans who questioned his temperament to be president – code for whether his prisoner of war experience had made him crazy – and by Bush supporters who spread vicious rumors about his personal life...

Campaigns, in politics or on the battlefield, are often won on a key decision. Mr. Rove's big decision was to target the GOP base, not depend on moderate swing voters to build a majority. The idea was to identify your reliable voters – religious conservatives, rural voters, white men, married women in suburbs, exurbanites and business-friendly Republicans – and get them to the polls in bigger numbers than four years ago.

Energizing Christian conservatives was an important part of the strategy. Churches conducted voter-registration drives. The campaign collected church membership directories and recruited volunteers in congregations. With the Bush team's encouragement, allies put proposals to ban gay marriage on the ballot in 11 states.

This attracted evangelicals and social conservatives in droves. In the pivotal battleground state of Ohio, a quarter of those surveyed in exit polls identified themselves as "white evangelical/born-again Christians" – and most of them voted for Mr. Bush.

The election machine that Mr. Rove and company built for the 2004 race was like nothing ever seen before in an American election. Two years before a vote was ever cast, the team began assembling an enormous list from voter files, magazine subscriptions, marketing lists, population trends, TV viewing habits, census data, demographic information – and created a computerized model capable of identifying their voters with extraordinary precision.

They studied how many of their likely voters were watching CSI on television in Cleveland. They placed ads on the Golf Channel. They discovered that although the president supported a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, many married Republican women – an important constituency – regularly watched the sitcom Will & Grace, which portrays gay life positively. In battleground states, Will & Grace became a favorite spot for Bush-Cheney TV ads...

(And by the way, over 20 years in Texas, Mr. Rove was instrumental in turning Democrat-dominated Texas into a state where the GOP today holds every statewide office and both Senate seats, as well as dominating the courts and the Legislature. When U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay spearheaded the successful drive to redraw congressional boundaries in Texas, he found a Legislature and state leadership friendly to his purpose – thanks in part to Karl Rove's handiwork.)

I feel so much better knowing this man has such a firm hand in our government, don't you?

Let me leave you with some parting thoughts on our new Deputy chief of staff, shall I?

"There is no precedent in any modern White House for what is going on in this one: a complete lack of a policy apparatus. What you've got is everything -- and I mean everything -- being run by the political arm. It's the reign of the Mayberry Machiavellis."
- John DiIulio, a former senior aide to President Bush said in 2002

By the way, the very day his bracing criticism of Rove and the White House made national news, he apologized to his former colleagues, twice. It was a strange, cringe-inducing spectacle, with language out of a Soviet show trial: He called his own criticisms, as quoted by Suskind, "groundless and baseless due to poorly chosen words and examples." Bush spokesman Ari Fleischer had earlier called his complaints "groundless and baseless," so his use of the same terms seemed rote and creepy, like he'd either been beaten up or lobotomized. "I sincerely apologize and I am deeply remorseful," he said in a statement.

Nice. So this is what a "moral majority" gets us?

Wise Words

2005-02-10T10:22:00.000-07:00

"In biology they made me dissect a fetal pig -- a skill I have never needed since. However, if they had made the class dissect a whole chicken -- now there's a life skill."
-Alton Brown

The Real Picture

2005-02-04T16:31:00.000-07:00

With all the campaigning the President is doing to try to convince America that Social Security is in trouble, he often points to other nations - with no specifics, mind - as models with which we should compare our own system.

The Wall Street Journal has done just that - examining Sweden, Bolivia, Singapore, Chile, and Britain to determine whether privatization has helped them or not. Guess what? As far as success stories go - they aren't looking too good.

It is such a bad idea, even the Chairman of the Ways and Means Subcommittee on Social Security, Rep. James McCrery (R) of Louisiana says Bush's privatization plan will weaken Social Security much further than doing NOTHING now.

Bill Gross, manager of the world's largest bond fund, had a pretty straightforward message for the President as well - It's the deficit, stupid!

Mr. President, you are no FDR, but you are so far gone in your own megalomaniacal delusions of grandeur that you haven't the sense to see it.

Campaign all you want. Bring Jeff Gannon to all your press conferences and only call on him. Your secret is out - you really don't care who you crush on your way to the history books. But know this: Your legacy will be how you pandered to the rich at the expense of the poor, how you exploited a national tragedy to the detriment of all, and how you actively sought to subvert the Constitution and everything this country is founded upon.

Won't it be the surprise when, many years later, the world remembers the era of your reign in much the same way the McCarthy era is remembered now? With shame and more than a little fear that it could happen again. That it Should Not happen again.

As we peer into society's future, we -- you and I, and our government -- must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.
- Dwight D. Eisenhower, the 34th President of the United States, and (just a reminder) a Republican.

A religious message worth repeating...

2005-02-03T17:37:00.000-07:00

Here is one minister's opinion of the administration...

Dr. Robin Meyers' Speech to students at OK University

As some of you know, I am minister of Mayflower Congregational Church in Oklahoma City, an Open and Affirming, Peace and Justice church in northwest Oklahoma City, and professor of Rhetoric at Oklahoma City University. But you would most likely have encountered me on the pages of the Oklahoma Gazette, where I have been a columnist for six years, and hold the record for the most number of angry letters to the editor.

Tonight, I join ranks of those who are angry, because I have watched as the faith I love has been taken over by fundamentalists who claim to speak for Jesus, but whose actions are anything but Christian.

We've heard a lot lately about so-called "moral values" as having swung the election to President Bush. Well, I'm a great believer in moral values, but we need to have a discussion, all over this country, about exactly what constitutes a moral value -- I mean what are we talking about?

Because we don't get to make them up as we go along, especially not if we are people of faith. We have an inherited tradition of what is right and wrong, and moral is as moral does.

Let me give you just a few of the reasons why I take issue with those in power who claim moral values are on their side:

1. When you start a war on false pretenses, and then act as if your deceptions are justified because you are doing God's will, and that your critics are either unpatriotic or lacking in faith, there are some of us who have given our lives to teaching and preaching the faith who believe that this is not only not moral, but immoral.

2. When you live in a country that has established international rules for waging a just war, build the United Nations on your own soil to enforce them, and then arrogantly break the very rules you set down for the rest of the world, you are doing something immoral.

3. When you claim that Jesus is the Lord of your life, and yet fail to acknowledge that your policies ignore his essential teaching, or turn them on their head (you know, Sermon on the Mount stuff like that we must never return violence for violence and that those who live by the sword will die by the sword), you are doing something immoral.

4. When you act as if the lives of Iraqi civilians are not as important as the lives of American soldiers, and refuse to even count them, you are doing something immoral.

5. When you find a way to avoid combat in Vietnam, and then question the patriotism of someone who volunteered to fight, and came home a hero, you are doing something immoral.

6. When you ignore the fundamental teachings of the gospel, which says that the way the strong treat the weak is the ultimate ethical test, by giving tax breaks to the wealthiest among us so the strong will get stronger and the weak will get weaker, you are doing something immoral.

7. When you wink at the torture of prisoners, and deprive so-called "enemy combatants" of the rules of the Geneva convention, which your own country helped to establish and insists that other countries follow, you are doing something immoral.

8. When you claim that the world can be divided up into the good guys and the evil doers, slice up your own nation into those who are with you, or with the terrorists -- and then launch a war which enriches your own friends and seizes control of the oil to which we are addicted, instead of helping us to kick the habit, you are doing something immoral.

9. When you fail to veto a single spending bill, but ask us to pay for a war with no exit strategy and no end in sight, creating an enormous deficit that hangs like a great millstone around the necks of our children, you are doing something immoral.

10. When you cause most of the rest of the world to hate a country that was once the most loved country in the world, and act like it doesn't matter what others think of us, only what God thinks of you, you have done something immoral.

11. When you use hatred of homosexuals as a wedge issue to turn out record numbers of evangelical voters, and use the Constitution as a tool of discrimination, you are doing something immoral.

12. When you favor the death penalty, and yet claim to be a follower of Jesus, who said an eye for an eye was the old way, not the way of the kingdom, you are doing something immoral.

13. When you dismantle countless environmental laws designed to protect the earth which is God's gift to us all, so that the corporations that bought you and paid for your favors will make higher profits while our children breathe dirty air and live in a toxic world, you have done something immoral. The earth belongs to the Lord, not Halliburton.

14. When you claim that our God is bigger than their God, and that our killing is righteous, while theirs is evil, we have begun to resemble the enemy we claim to be fighting, and that is immoral. We have met the enemy, and the enemy is us.

15. When you tell people that you intend to run and govern as a "compassionate conservative," using the word which is the essence of all religious faith-compassion, and then show no compassion for anyone who disagrees with you, and no patience with those who cry to you for help, you are doing something immoral.

16. When you talk about Jesus constantly, who was a healer of the sick, but do nothing to make sure that anyone who is sick can go to see a doctor, even if she doesn't have a penny in her pocket, you are doing something immoral.

17. When you put judges on the bench who are racist, and will set women back a hundred years, and when you surround yourself with preachers who say gays ought to be killed, you are doing something immoral.

I'm tired of people thinking that because I'm a Christian, I must be a supporter of President Bush, or that because I favor civil rights and gay rights I must not be a person of faith. I'm tired of people saying that I can't support the troops but oppose the war.

I heard that when I was your age--when the Vietnam war was raging. We knew that war was wrong, and you know that this war is wrong--the only question is how many people are going to die before these make-believe Christians are removed from power?

This country is bankrupt. The war is morally bankrupt. The claim of this administration to be Christian is bankrupt. And the only people who can turn things around are people like you--young people who are just beginning to wake up to what is happening to them. It's your country to take back. It's your faith to take back.

It's your future to take back.

Don't be afraid to speak out. Don't back down when your friends begin to tell you that the cause is righteous and that the flag should be wrapped around the cross, while the rest of us keep our mouths shut.

Real Christians take chances for peace. So do real Jews, and real Muslims, and real Hindus, and real Buddhists--so do all the faith traditions of the world at their heart believe one thing: life is precious.

Every human being is precious. Arrogance is the opposite of faith. Greed is the opposite of charity.

And believing that one has never made a mistake is the mark of a deluded man, not a man of faith.

And war -- war is the greatest failure of the human race -- and thus the greatest failure of faith.

There's an old rock and roll song, whose lyrics say it all:

War, what is it good for? Absolutely nothing.

And what is the dream of the prophets? That we should study war no more, that we should beat our swords into plowshares and our spears into pruning hooks. Who would Jesus bomb, indeed? How many wars does it take to know that too many people have died?

What if they gave a war and nobody came? Maybe one day we will find out.

More thoughts on a possible bait and switch

2005-01-21T16:05:00.000-07:00

The more I read about a possible bait and switch, the more I see two lines of distinction regarding beliefs about it. One faction believes it is a planned event. The other thinks that, while not a conscious bait and switch, if the Social Security Privatization scheme fails, this option (privatization on *top* of Social Security that could allow a whole slew of tax shelters only Norquist and the rich can truly appreciate) is a handy and entirely do-able fallback.

While reading this article by Noam Scheiber, one phrase in particular struck me:

Put that all together and what do you get? I think you get a Social Security bill that has lots of convoluted, Thomas-inspired, hand-waving--possibly including a change to the way Social Security benefits are funded (i.e., the payroll tax)--that creates private accounts but in a way that hides the fact that the numbers don't add up.

(bold emphasis mine)

So, follow this logic, and see if you agree with me on yet another possible route as to where this might be going. No one's talking about it yet, so I'm out on my own here.

Let me offer one more possibility to the conscious vs. serendipitous bait and switch Social Security privatization/tax shelter scenario. What if, by declaring that 'the sky is falling' in regards to Social Security, Bush declares, in yet another gesture of bipartisanship, to not privatize Social Security, but that where Social Security gets its' funds must be modified to fend off 'impending doom'?

To get the full scope of why this matters as much as it does, it is imperative to read Kevin Drum's article about it (the best, simplest explanation I've found yet), but I will also quote the section I'm referring to here to explain my point:

Social Security is funded by payroll taxes. In 1983, Alan Greenspan headed up a commission that recommended saving Social Security from imminent doom by raising those payroll taxes to cover expected increases in Social Security payouts. But there was a twist: Greenspan recommended raising payroll taxes above what was required to actually pay current benefits to retirees, with the resulting surplus used to buy treasury bonds that would be piled up each year in Social Security's trust fund. And since these bonds were sold to the trust fund by the federal government, this means that the federal government got a big chunk of extra money every year for use in the general fund.

Under this scheme, payroll taxes were sufficient to cover payouts plus bond purchases until about 2018. Then, from 2018 to 2042, when payroll taxes would no longer be enough to cover payouts, the difference would be made up by cashing in the bonds in the trust fund. In other words, the feds would tap into the general fund to give back all the money that Social Security had handed over between 1983 and 2018. This money would come from the same place all general fund money comes from: income taxes.

Still with me? Here's what this means:

Between 1983-2018, this plan calls for payroll taxes to be higher than they need to be to cover payouts to retirees. However, because the surplus payroll taxes are handed over to the feds, it means income taxes are lower than they would otherwise be.

Then, between 2018-2042, payroll taxes will be less than they need to be to pay benefits to retirees. However, the difference will be made up by higher income taxes, which will be used to pay off the trust fund bonds.

Payroll taxes are paid mostly by the middle class and the poor. Income taxes are paid mostly by the well off.

So: for 35 years the middle class and the poor pay excess payroll taxes and the well off get a break on their income taxes. However, for the following 24 years the middle class and the poor get a break on their payroll taxes and the well off finance it by paying higher income taxes.

Now, this may sound like a dumb idea to you, but that was the deal. The bottom 80% take it on the chin for a few decades, followed by a couple of decades in which the well off get socked.

But suppose — as conservatives are laying the groundwork for — that Bush decides the trust fund is a mirage, just a giant IOU from one part of the government to the other. And as part of his "reform" plan he proposes a complex scheme that, when stripped to its essentials, entails doing away with the flim flam of that illusionary trust fund and the higher income taxes it will require when 2018 finally rolls around. What would that mean?

It would mean that the middle class and the poor got suckered into overpaying their taxes for three decades, and then when the bill came due the well off ducked out of their end of the bargain.

(bold emphasis mine)

Wouldn't it be ironic if, by tenderizing the Congress and the public into being willing to do most anything to protect Social Security, Bush manages to insure that payroll taxes *continue* to pay for Social Security (and perhaps even increase the percentage) and that the income tax portion that the well off should begin paying in 2018 gets deferred, possibly indefinitely?

This means that Bush would insure that the poor and middle class would continue to pay into a program that the poor and middle class are most likely to need and depend upon, and that the rich, who won't need it because of their own financial surplus, also don't have to pay for it - ever? Tell me this isn't the classic 'rich getting richer, poor getting poorer' scenario.

Add insult to injury, and see how easily relieved Democrats give Bush privatization accounts on top of Social Security - yet another benefit truly appreciated by the rich, and you see yet another way to screw the average American.

Will this be how it plays out? Hopefully not. Is it possible? Anything can happen. The important thing for Democrats now is to stop being played and not let themselves get suckered. After all, anything Bush offers is likely to be no deal for FDR's New Deal legacy.

2005-01-21T10:32:00.000-07:00

In the midst of pompous circumstance, happy thoughts are even more essential, and what better than a Cat Blogging day to remind us that there is still good in the world? Happy Friday, everyone.

Next time you're feeling particularly bad about where your life is going, and about the things you might have been or done, remember this man. He waited 18 years for one moment, and when that moment came... Someone forgot to turn on the machine.

Ten years ago no politician would have dared say this. What does this say of the direction our country is heading?

2005-01-20T09:20:00.000-07:00

House Ways and Means Chairman Bill Thomas (R-California) ponders downwardly adjusting Social Security benefits for women because they tend to live longer. This offensive suggestion is unfortunately given more weight when looked at from the bigger picture: namely, that the Bush administration has been quietly removing reports from its Women's Bureau Web site.

It certainly falls in line with the Bush administration modus operandi - Yes, let's hide the statistics that reveal the sharp socio-economic inequalities between men and women so we can say they don't exist, shall we?

Sadly, the real hoopla with Thomas' announcement wasn't so much his comments about reduced benefits for half this country's population, but that he predicted that partisan warfare over Social Security would render Bush's plan "a dead horse".

So, this is a pretty big statement to make two days before Bush's inaugural speech. Why did Thomas put himself out there? Did he just blow it and will we see him come forth with a public apology within the next few days? (The tragic irony is that while it is likely to expect an apology for the "dead horse" comment, if women get any backhanded apologies about his suggestion to reduce women's retirement benefits, it won't be nearly as sincere.)

What is really going on here? Are Republicans getting nervous about Bush's plan and trying to give themselves more wiggle room or could this really be a bait and switch tactic? I cannot help but wonder if Kevin Drum isn't on to something.

Could Bush really be willing to blow all that money on Social Security propaganda in a way to soften up Congress and Democrats in particular for creating his first big 'unifying', bi-partisan gesture of leaving Social Security alone but putting private accounts on top of Social Security, thereby creating huge tax-sheltered savings accounts geared towards *gasp* the rich?

Either way is a win for Bush, sadly. Either conservatives get to dismantle the one program designed to protect Americans from the grinding weight of poverty that those who approved it - who had lived through the Depression and saw firsthand just how bad it could be, or Grover Norquist gets this year's tax cut despite the fact our deficit is out of control and the Iraqi war looks more and more like Vietnam every day.

My vote for the true sign of things to come goes to the fact that while only 9 percent of voters in the nation's capital voted for President Bush, already strapped Washington D.C. gets to pay $17 million for his security costs. Your inaugural message comes through loud and clear Mr. Bush.

2005-01-14T10:41:00.000-07:00

It's Friday again! Thank goodness!

And to end the week on a positive note: they have found a hidden laboratory of Leonardo da Vinci. How exciting is that?

In other news...

2005-01-13T16:35:00.000-07:00

So far, 5,500 men and women have deserted from the military since Bush's invasion of Iraq.

If you think America's soldiers all agree with Bush, you are wrong. Read more here.

And for a terrific summation of the state of Social Security, read on.

Truth is stranger than fiction

2005-01-07T14:23:00.000-07:00

Very nicely put. Happy New Year!

Your Vote Can Make a Difference

2004-12-22T12:06:00.000-07:00

How is this for proof positive that every vote counts?

Questions Worth Asking

2004-12-21T14:49:00.000-07:00

I learned something disturbing the other day. It doesn't sit well with me, and I want to pass it on to you.

My nephew is on active duty in the Reserves, and when I explained how pleased I was with the Operation Truth website, he frowned and said that from boot camp on he has been explicitly taught that you are not to speak *at all* about military life in Iraq or Afghanistan. Not just logistical locations or technical details, but about *anything*. The military reasoning is that you never know what the enemy will glean from what you say.

I disagree. While sensitivity to location and logistics can be essential, without the photos of Abu Ghraib, the American public would not have begun probing into how badly this Administration advocates violating the Geneva Conventions. Certainly enough evidence is coming to light that the Administration was well aware of what was happening in both Iraq and Afghanistan, and actively encouraged it.

While secrecy can be essential for an effective military campaign, it was not a campaign that Rumsfeld was defending when he banned digital cameras, camcorders, and cameras with cell phones. He was protecting himself and the Administration.

As the public is learning, the Administration was well aware that what they were doing was wrong, which is why they consulted with White House counsel Alberto Gonzales over two years ago about it.

It is never appropriate to torture another human being, however much one may feel the prisoner deserves it. To do so lowers them to their opponents level. We as a civilized nation have held ourselves to a higher code of ethics, and rightfully so. When we violate our own standards, all bets become off as to how our own American POWs are treated. What right have we to demand American POWs be treated better than their Iraqi counterparts? While the Bush Administration pushes for 'Do as I say, not as I do', the rest of the world (and the American public) isn't buying it.

The public still does not see its returning soldiers' flag covered caskets, not out of respect as the Department of Defense would lead you to believe, but because the Bush Administration knows that in order to hold public opinion, they need to keep the cost of war away from public scrutiny. I say that the Bush Administration cannot pass "The Dover Test", which is why they elect to bypass it altogether.

I too believe we need to look at the war in Iraq with clear eyes and understand the cost our soldiers pay for this Administration's decisions. Our government knows that photos can sway public opinion, for good or ill, which is why they don't want you to see what is really happening overseas. While I applaud my nephew's patriotic defense of the military's policies, I can't help but fear it is a harbinger of far more sinister things to come. After all, who is minding the minders?

Cat Blogging and a Thought for the Day

2004-12-17T10:35:00.000-07:00

Happy Friday!

For those of you who, like me, are disheartened by what is going on in government today, read this and take heart. It has happened before. It will happen again. These may feel like dark times, but this too shall pass. Thankfully it is the nature of Democracy, for good or ill, to bend with the winds of change. Our time will come again. Until then, chin up, Democrats!

Gotta love Josh Marshall

2004-12-16T10:44:00.000-07:00

Holy wow. That man is relentless when his curiousity is piqued. As the sordid details of Bernard Kerik's life continue to become public, more and more questions pop up. As Josh continues to investigate, I can't help but wonder, was no vetting done at all? I would like to think the White House investigates people's background a little before putting them in positions of incredible power, especially as Secretary of Homeland Security.

It's something to keep in mind, especially when considering Bush is having his "Conference for the Economy" today. Just who are his guests, and is single mother Sandy Jacques from Iowa really just your average American looking for some better answers? To find out about Bush's panel of guests, read this.

But on a separate note, Josh has set his eye on looking into just what privatization of Social Security means, and better how to prepare for the upcoming fight ahead. It's worth the read.

Paying the Piper

2004-12-15T11:59:00.000-07:00

I have wondered for a long time what Bush’s obsession with privatizing Social Security is all about? Is it really ideology? Is it that he’s obsessed with an ownership society? Or is this more of the same? That is to say: is this one more way to cut taxes?

Read this enlightening bit from Kevin Drum’s Political Animal, and you be the judge.

Social Security is funded by payroll taxes. In 1983, Alan Greenspan headed up a commission that recommended saving Social Security from imminent doom by raising those payroll taxes to cover expected increases in Social Security payouts. But there was a twist: Greenspan recommended raising payroll taxes above what was required to actually pay current benefits to retirees, with the resulting surplus used to buy treasury bonds that would be piled up each year in Social Security's trust fund. And since these bonds were sold to the trust fund by the federal government, this means that the federal government got a big chunk of extra money every year for use in the general fund.

Under this scheme, payroll taxes were sufficient to cover payouts plus bond purchases until about 2018. Then, from 2018 to 2042, when payroll taxes would no longer be enough to cover payouts, the difference would be made up by cashing in the bonds in the trust fund. In other words, the feds would tap into the general fund to give back all the money that Social Security had handed over between 1983 and 2018. This money would come from the same place all general fund money comes from: income taxes.

Still with me? Here's what this means:

Between 1983-2018, this plan calls for payroll taxes to be higher than they need to be to cover payouts to retirees. However, because the surplus payroll taxes are handed over to the feds, it means income taxes are lower than they would otherwise be.

Then, between 2018-2042, payroll taxes will be less than they need to be to pay benefits to retirees. However, the difference will be made up by higher income taxes, which will be used to pay off the trust fund bonds.

Payroll taxes are paid mostly by the middle class and the poor. Income taxes are paid mostly by the well off.

So: for 35 years the middle class and the poor pay excess payroll taxes and the well off get a break on their income taxes. However, for the following 24 years the middle class and the poor get a break on their payroll taxes and the well off finance it by paying higher income taxes.

Now, this may sound like a dumb idea to you, but that was the deal. The bottom 80% take it on the chin for a few decades, followed by a couple of decades in which the well off get socked.

But suppose — as conservatives are laying the groundwork for — that Bush decides the trust fund is a mirage, just a giant IOU from one part of the government to the other. And as part of his "reform" plan he proposes a complex scheme that, when stripped to its essentials, entails doing away with the flim flam of that illusionary trust fund and the higher income taxes it will require when 2018 finally rolls around. What would that mean?

It would mean that the middle class and the poor got suckered into overpaying their taxes for three decades, and then when the bill came due the well off ducked out of their end of the bargain.

Of course, that would be a brazen rip off of the middle class in order to give a break to the well off and the rich. George Bush would never do something like that, would he?

The “Illusionary” Trust Fund

(Emphasis mine)

Considering Bush’s obsession with tax cuts for the rich and his disregard for worrying about trivial things like the deficit, this fits, doesn’t it?

So how does he try to do this? By attempting to sell the public a bill of goods. Guess what? Social Security is not in crisis.

Some Find Strong Pulse in Social Security

How? By playing with the numbers to make them look dire when they’re really not, as the series of articles, again by Kevin Drum, explains.

Smoke and Mirrors

Smoke and Mirrors, Part 2

Social Security Doom Mongering

I'll continue to post little bits on Social Security as I go along. This is something that is important to understand. This is our future the Bush Administration is playing numbers games with.

Personally, I think this is one more way for the Administration to distract us from what they don't want us to see; primarily that the war in Iraq continues to spiral out of control and that our President and Congress has yet to do a thing to fulfill their campaign promises and get the deficit under control. The biggest irony is that this great distraction also furthers their agenda of irresponsible tax cuts at an incredible accrual of unnecessary debt.

Look overe there, indeed!

On a Positive Note

2004-12-14T07:56:00.000-07:00

I think that it’s time for some good news. How about this? I know a lot of people feel that all these recounts are really futile, so consider this a little positive feedback.

The Washington state recount has discovered 561 wrongly rejected absentee ballots in the highly Democratic King county, and it looks likely that the Canvass Board could amend the results of the November 2 election per King County Elections Director Dean Logan’s request.

Ballots Wrongly Denied in Washington Governor’s Race

Unfortunately, not all the news is good. Get ready to make your voices heard. It sounds like the Senate GOP has given their approval to plan on implementing the ‘nuclear option’ to prevent Democrats from using filibusters to block judicial nominees. See my previous post for more information on what the 'nuclear option' is and why 10 nominees blocked out of 229 just makes Republicans sound like whiners.

Senate Democrats want to retain the right to block judicial nominees

Bookmark this link, and be sure to write often!

Congress.org

Here's a delightful thought for the day made by NewDonkey.com:

Clouseau for Homeland Security

As the unanswered questions about now-abandoned Homeland Security Secretary nominee Bernard Kerik continue to mount, I've stopped thinking about Kerik and started thinking about the rich irony of an administration that can't seem to conduct a competent background check trying to appoint this guy as head of the department whose ability to conduct competent background checks is kind of important to the task of keeping the rest of us alive.

I mean, I don't know the ultimate truth about Kerik, and I gather he was a pretty good Top Cop, but Lord-a-mighty: forget the nanny stuff, which by now should be a basic part of the vetting process. You've got allegations of mob links, financial improprities, violations of ethics rules, threats against a former romantic interest, cronyism, and who knows what's next? And nobody was able to ferret out any of this damaging material, unless Kerik brought it forth himself?

Makes you wonder if the sleuthing model of this admninistration is Inspector Clouseau.

NewDonkey

Hitler was Christian, too

2004-12-13T15:34:00.000-07:00

On April 20, 1939, Orsenigo celebrated Hitler's birthday. The celebrations, initiated by Pacelli (Pope Pius XII) became a tradition. Each April 20, Cardinal Bertram of Berlin was to send "warmest congratulations to the Fuhrer in the name of the bishops and the dioceses in Germany with "fervent prayers which the Catholics of Germany are sending to heaven on their altars." - (Source: Hitler's Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII, by John Cornwell)

"I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord," Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf

"Many of those people involved with Adolph Hitler were Satanists, many of them were homosexuals--the two things seem to go together."--Pat Robertson, "The 700 Club," 1/21/93

Religious Fundamentalists bristle at being compared to Hitler, and rightfully so. His reign of inhumanity is one of the darkest periods in recent history, and oftentimes I myself have wondered: How could this have happened? How could an entire nation consent to genocide?

“God is With Us”: Hitler’s Rhetoric and the Lure of “Moral Values”

As it turns out, it is a slippery slope, and just as the woman who is abused by her husband says that it did not start that way, that it was a series of little things that simply escalated, so too do Germans who lived during those times make an effort to describe how it began, and how it could have evolved into what it ultimately became – a descent into barbarity and inhumanity. Below is a frighteningly real account into how such a thing could have happened. Is it happening again today?

They Thought They Were Free by Milton Mayer

Below is a link to quotes of things Hitler has said. Compare what you read to things you’ve heard, not just from Bush, although he is certainly at the top of the list, but from ardent and vocal supporters of Bush. Hitler’s words sound eerily familiar.

The Christianity of Hitler revealed in his speeches and proclamations

"I don't know that atheists should be considered citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God."-- George Bush

“Remain strong in your faith, as you were in former years. In this faith, in its close-knit unity our people to-day goes straight forward on its way and no power on earth will avail to stop it.” -Adolf Hitler, in a speech at Coburg on 15 Oct. 1937

"I want you to just let a wave of intolerance wash over you. I want you to let a wave of hatred wash over you. Yes, hate is good...Our goal is a Christian nation. We have a Biblical duty, we are called by God, to conquer this country. We don't want equal time. We don't want pluralism."--Randall Terry, Founder of Operation Rescue, The News-Sentinel, Fort Wayne, Indiana, 8-16-93

“I will never allow anyone to divide this people once more into religious camps, each fighting the other.... You, my Brown Guard, will regard it as a matter of course that this German people should go only by the way which Providence ordained for it when it gave to Germans the common language. So we go forward with the profoundest faith in God into the future. Would that which we have achieved have been possible if Providence had not helped us?” -Adolf Hitler, in a speech at Regensburg on 6 June 1937

"God told me to strike at al Qaeda and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam [Hussein], which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East. If you help me I will act, and if not, the elections will come and I will have to focus on them." --Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Abu Mazen quoting Bush when they met in Aqaba; reported in The Haaretz Reporter by Arnon Regular

“In this hour I would ask of the Lord God only this: that, as in the past, so in the years to come He would give His blessing to our work and our action, to our judgement and our resolution, that He will safeguard us from all false pride and from all cowardly servility, that He may grant us to find the straight path which His Providence has ordained for the German people, and that He may ever give us the courage to do the right, never to falter, never to yield before any violence, before any danger.... I am convinced that men who are created by God should live in accordance with the will of the Almighty.... If Providence had not guided us I could often never have found these dizzy paths.... Thus it is that we National Socialists, too, have in the depths of our hearts our faith. We cannot do otherwise: no man can fashion world-history or the history of peoples unless upon his purpose and his powers there rests the blessings of this Providence.” -Adolf Hitler, in a speech at Wurzburg on 27 June 1937

Want a more in-depth look at the similarities between Bush and Hitler?

Gott mit uns: On Bush and Hitler’s rhetoric

Hitler was not an Atheist

It truly is a slippery slope. We're not there yet, but all of this hatred against homosexuals, intellectuals, and anyone non-religious is certainly the beginning. For a party devoted to 'moral values', its' rhetoric is far more hate filled than makes this progressive comfortable.

I guess the Idaho Aryan Nation moved a little further south

2004-12-10T14:52:00.000-07:00

This is just too much not to bring to your attention.

One of Cary Christian School's booklets that students are reading repaints Southern slavery in a more positive light. The principal says he's only exposing students to different ideas: the 'Southern perspective' versus the 'Nothern perspective'.

Let me present you with some excerpts from Southern Slavery: As It Was:

* "Slavery as it existed in the South was not an adversarial relationship with pervasive racial animosity. Because of its dominantly patriarchal character, it was a relationship based upon mutual affection and confidence." (page 24)

* "Slave life was to them a life of plenty, of simple pleasures, of food, clothes, and good medical care." (page 25)

* "But many Southern blacks supported the South because of long established bonds of affection and trust that had been forged over generations with their white masters and friends." (page 27)

* "Nearly every slave in the South enjoyed a higher standard of living than the poor whites of the South -- and had a much easier existence." (page 30)

School defends slavery booklet

The authors of Southern Slavery: As It Was? None other than Idaho's own Douglas Wilson, a 'pastor' in Moscow, Idaho. Want to hear some other choice opinions of his?

The world as Wilson sees it is divided not by race but by religion — biblical Christians versus all others. As he says in one of his books, "[I]f neither parent believes in Jesus Christ, then the children are foul — unclean."

"Government schools" are godless propaganda factories teaching secularism, rationalism, and worse. Wilson's congregants are instructed to send their children to private Christian schools (like the one he started) or to home-school them.

Woman "was created to be dependent and responsive to a man," Wilson writes. Feminists seek "to rob women of their beauty in submission." Women should only be allowed to date or "court" with their father's permission — and then, if they are Christian, only with other Christians.

If a woman is raped, the rapist should pay the father a bride price and then, if the father approves, marry his victim.

Homosexuals, Wilson says, are "sodomites," "people with foul sexual habits." But the biblical punishment for homosexuality is not necessarily death, Wilson says in trying to distance himself from Reconstruction. Exile is another possibility.

Cursing one's parents is "deserving of punishment by death," Wilson adds. "Parental failure is not a defense." And Christian parents, by the way, "need not be afraid to lay it on" when spanking, he says.

Indeed, "godly discipline" would include spanking 2-year-old children for such "sins" as whining. (On a similar note, Dabney called opposition to whipping wrongdoing slaves "Godless humanitarianism.")

Taliban on the Palouse?

Of course, even in South Carolina, look who's been elected to the state board of education panel:

Neo-Confederate name to state education board

After reading all that, how about a nice look at a couple of sites devoted to fighting against hate and intolerance? Arm yourselves now with knowledge and the courage to stand by your convictions. It's going to be a bumpy ride.

Tolerance.org and the Southern Poverty Law Center

Social Security Privatization - The Red Herring of the Republican Party

2004-12-10T12:49:00.000-07:00

This is possibly the best, most concise reason for why privatizing our Social Security is such a bad idea.

Just remember, we don't want what happened to Argentina to happen to us. Bush has already put us in enough of a financial crisis.

Borrow, Speculate and Hope

Then, there's what other countries have tried.

Social Security Around the World

And finally, let's take a look at what Republicans are going to have to do to sell this sucker, as written by Peter Savodnik of The Hill:

Republicans are pushing to rewrite budget rules in an attempt to remove financial obstacles that threaten the GOP’s effort to reform Social Security.

Social Security Numbers Game

Rep. Bob Matsui (D-Calif.), ranking member on the Ways and Means subcommittee on Social Security, said rewriting budget rules to expedite adoption of a reform bill would imperil the country’s finances for decades to come.

“I’ve never even contemplated that anyone would come up with an idea like this,” Matsui said. “The whole idea and purpose of a budget and expenditures and revenues is to have an accurate accounting of where the federal government is in terms of fiscal policy and in terms of the overall economy. To take off $2 trillion and to say it doesn’t really exist because it’s a future debt, it really distorts the whole budget process.”

I know Fridays are supposed to be fluff and light, but this is one message I feel desperately needs to get out.

The Bush Administration is trying to sell the American public a bill of goods. Don't buy it.

2004-12-10T10:06:00.000-07:00

Happy Friday!

'Rice' Christians

2004-12-09T10:14:00.000-07:00

"The government [British Raj in India] allowed the Christian Missionaries in 1813 to spread their religion in India, and they did so with much zeal. Even the government supported their cause. Missionary schools were opened with this very object. During a severe famine in 1837 in Upper India, the relief work was left with the charitable institutions, and it gave an opportunity to the missionaries to undertake their prostelysing task, those who converted to Christianity were fed properly. [a practice that happened all over India and led to the term "rice Christians"] The Disabilities Act of 1856 guaranteed the rights over inheritance, even after conversion, but only to Christians."
(from a message on another list) - Author Unknown (to me)

Make no mistake about it, the Bush Administration is funding faith-based charities at the expense of other non-religious non-profits. Head Start? Forgetaboutit. He's cut it to the bone, and the administration sends out threatening letters every time the program speaks out in protest.

Parent Centers funded under IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education Act) narrowly dodged legislation that would have stated that non-profits that did any type of "federal relations" would be made ineligible from receiving parent center grants - something some parent centers see as a core part of their mission in educating the public and assisting those with disabilities. Here's more from OMB Watch on why the Castle bill was so troubling:

"Two factors added to the troubling nature of this provision. First, "federal relations" was not defined. The proposal specifically prohibited lobbying at the federal level on disability education issues, but added that "federal relations" would also have disqualified the organization from receiving grants. The inescapable conclusion is that "federal relations" must go beyond federal lobbying, and include activities like commenting on regulations or giving a Member of Congress a tour of a parent center. We cannot imagine what type of federal government interactions would not be considered "federal relations."
Second, when the bill was under consideration there were reports that a House staff member indicated that this model might be applied to grantees under other sections of IDEA. This would have affected an even broader set of nonprofits. It was clear that this was a slippery slope. If good for these grantees, why not for others?"

Freedom of speech by nonprofits is certainly under attack, and not just by conventional means. The threat of an audit by the IRS for speaking out is also a very real one . Just look at what the NAACP is facing for speaking out against Bush prior to the last election.

Call to stop IRS probe of NAACP

Certainly tax-exempt Roman Catholic groups that campainged heavily for propositions banning gay marriage have not come under IRS scrutiny. In fact, recall that the White House has already been caught asking churches to turn over membership directies for Bush to target for political campaigning. The zealot Christian Coalition even brags that it delivered 30 million "voter guides" to 80,000 churches for the 2004 election, yet there is no IRS probe there.

Unfortunately, I believe we will continue to see reproductive rights and AIDS/HIV non-profits fall under the heaviest attack. More from OMB Watch:

"Perhaps the harshest opinions are being voiced by those dealing with issues concerning reproductive rights and HIV/AIDS. Many have described their differences with the Bush administration as falling on one side or the other of the "safe sex" versus "abstinence" debate. Some claim that targeted audits are occurring to those to disagree with the administration's emphasis on "abstinence." Others, who fall on the "safe sex" side of the debate claim that they are being told not to apply for new grants since resources will be going to faith-based organizations more consistent with administration policies. Some claim that there is a blacklist being developed by agencies, such as the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), to insure that certain organizations do not get grants.

Some of these sentiments are based on oral communication with those in USAID and other government agencies, but have not been documented in writing. Some derive from written communications, such as a December 2, 2002 "action cable" to USAID mission directors regarding "implementation of USAID policies and programs on HIV/AIDS and trafficking." The final page of the action cable states. "all operating units should ensure that USAID-funded programs and publications reflect appropriately the policies of the Bush administration." It should be ensured that "USAID is not perceived as using U.S. taxpayer funds to support activities that contradict our laws or policies, including 'abortion.'"

The same action cable notes that "any websites fully or partially funded by USAID" must have materials reviewed before posting to the web. Many groups working on HIV/AIDS believe that USAID and others, such as NGO Watch (see below), are combing through websites to find code words and phrases that might lead to blacklisting. They say keywords, such as "condoms," are triggers. If this process is occurring, it raises questions about whether federal agencies are properly applying cost allocation rules that grantees are required to follow. Cost allocation rules, which were at the heart of the 1983 OMB Circular A-122 fight, state that activities deemed unallowable for federal reimbursement should be paid for with non-federal funds, but that grantees can properly allocate a portion of the allowable cost to the federal government.⁶ In this way, nonprofits do not need two copies, two offices, two executive directors, etc. However, the USAID action cable seems to suggest that if any federal funds are used for the website, then the entire website must follow federal standards. Thus, if a grantee, were to mention something about abortion or sexual activity it would "taint" the entire website, meaning no federal reimbursement would be allowed."

Bush is cynically using faith-based charity funding to further propogate his beliefs and promote his agenda rather than seeking to help his constiuents. He openly attacks those who oppose him and looks the other way for anyone that supports his administration.

An Attack on Non-Profit Speech: Death by a Thousand Cuts

Take a long hard look at using tax dollars to fund faith-based charities, especially at the expense of other nondemoninational ones. The next time you are laid off work or get sick, the only people who may be able to help you out could also require you to attend their services, read their faith based literature and possibly even someday convert. How's that for freedom of religion?

2004-12-08T16:21:00.000-07:00

Images your government doesn't want you to see. These are our soldiers. This is their homecoming.

News from abroad about America's hidden casualty toll

2004-12-08T15:19:00.000-07:00

And since it isn't likely you'll hear this on our local news, here's an appalling bit of information. The 1,000+ soldiers killed in action in Iraq as of today?

That number is likely much higher. Especially considering the body armor that this newspaper assumes our soldiers have that many still don't.

America's hidden battlefield toll

More about America's Heroes of Freedom

Conditions for Reservists in Iraq

2004-12-08T14:59:00.000-07:00

Sentiments of reservists currently in Iraq.

There are those out there who do not believe that families have been forced to send body armor to their sons and daughters in Iraq. This has been happening since before Bush’s re-election.

Why isn’t there an uproar about this? Wouldn’t you be furious to find out your child has been sent to Iraq to ‘defend democracy’ (remember – there were no WMDs) and found they did not even have adequate protection?

This is unconscionable, and this is not an urban legend. Case and point is the news story on CNN today. Our own soldiers *in* Iraq are asking Rumsfeld.

Rumsfeld faces tough questions from troops

and

U.S. Troops fire complaints at Rumsfeld

This certainly echoes the sentiment expressed by 19 Army reservists who balked at what they called a ‘suicide mission’ in Iraq when asked to drive tankers that were in disrepair and prone to breakdown 200 miles without armored guard or even bullet-resistant armor at a maximum speed of 40 miles an hour to deliver contaminated fuel that wasn’t even usable. Sound ridiculous? How about the fact that they’re being punished for refusing to do it?

Revolt in the ranks in Iraq

Hawks vs. Doves

2004-12-07T14:31:00.000-07:00

I hear conservatives argue repeatedly that progressives are soft because they don’t want war. While this is an ironic misstatement, since most progressives I know to this day still believe the war in Afghanistan was the right thing to do, there is merit to the argument that for progressives, war isn’t our first course of action. We believe, and rightly so, that it is a last resort.

For those who say that not wanting war is considered being ‘weak’, I argue that just because conservatives want war doesn’t make them good at it.

Case and point, of course, is Iraq. Read an excerpt from a “strategic communications” report written this autumn by the Defense Science Board, “a Federal Advisory Committee established to provide independent advice to the Secretary of Defense."

On “the war of ideas or the struggle for hearts and minds”, the report says, “American efforts have not only failed, they may also have achieved the opposite of what they intended”.

“American direct intervention in the Muslim world has paradoxically elevated the stature of, and support for, radical Islamists, while diminishing support for the United States to single digits in some Arab societies.”

Referring to the repeated mantra from the White House that those who oppose the US in the Middle East “hate our freedoms”, the report says: “Muslims do not ‘hate our freedoms’, but rather, they hate our policies. The overwhelming majority voice their objections to what they see as one-sided support in favour of Israel and against Palestinian rights, and the long-standing, even increasing support, for what Muslims collectively see as tyrannies, most notably Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Pakistan and the Gulf states.

“Thus when American public diplomacy talks about bringing democracy to Islamic societies, this is seen as no more than self-serving hypocrisy. Moreover, saying that ‘freedom is the future of the Middle East’ is seen as patronizing … in the eyes of Muslims, the American occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq has not led to democracy there, but only more chaos and suffering. US actions appear in contrast to be motivated by ulterior motives, and deliberately controlled in order to best serve American national interests at the expense of truly Muslim self-determination.”

The way America has handled itself since September 11 has played straight into the hands of al-Qaeda, the report adds. “American actions have elevated the authority of the jihadi insurgents and tended to ratify their legitimacy among Muslims.” The result is that al-Qaeda has gone from being a marginal movement to having support across the entire Muslim world.

Excerpt pulled from this link

dailyKOS has a more in-depth look at this report (and a link directly to it)

Certainly the belief by Muslims that US actions are based upon ulterior motives and controlled to best serve American national interests at other’s expense is a legitimate argument.

Josh Marshall has more follow-up here

Let us hearken back to the days of Vietnam. Professor Loren Baritz, who, in his cultural history of the Vietnam era, Backfire : A History of How American Culture Led Us into Vietnam and Made Us Fight the Way We Did (New York: W. Morrow, 1985), made the point that “an overwhelming sense of hubris led Americans, including members of the military, to the notion that as a nation we were both righteous and invincible.”

Pause for a moment here and reflect on this, please. Sound familiar? Okay. Let’s move on.

Col Harry G. Summers, Jr. (On Strategy: A Critical Analysis of the Vietnam War (Novato, Calif.: Presidio Press, 1982)’s central thesis was that a lack of understanding of the fundamentals of military theory and strategy, and a major disjunction in the relationship between military strategy and national policy fostered a flawed approach that ultimately led to America's defeat in Vietnam.

Adm. Ulysses S. Grant Sharp who, in 1978, published Strategy for Defeat, blamed policies devised by Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara for America's defeat in Vietnam.

Current Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, the subject of a recent report on Frontline which probes in-depth into Rumsfeld’s efforts to assert civilian control of the military can be found here:

Frontline

An archive of articles from The Washington Post that began January 12, 2001 and ends with a report dated October 18, 2004, chronicles his ongoing battle to ‘rebuild’ the military, can be found here:

Rumsfeld Washinton Post Archive

Progressives care more for their soldiers' welfare than monetary rewards and are more likely to insure competent, ethical warfare practice than our hawkish conservatives brethren, and would certainly take tremendous steps toward repairing our damaged image. Progressives without military experience wouldn’t presume to be experts on warfare and tap instead the vast knowledge and expertise available to them to allow for better planning and perhaps even *shock* an exit strategy or two.

We are what Communist U.S.S.R. used to be – aggressors struggling to promote our own beliefs at the expense of others. We’re losing the hearts and minds of not just the Iraqis, but the world.

The next time some conservative calls you a ‘dove’, argue that ‘hawks’ have done a marvelous job in Iraq. Oh, and by the way, progressives *can* be against the war in Iraq and still know there’s a lot we have to do to clean it up.

The Pottery Barn principle, as Kerry once said, applies here: You Break It, You Buy It. However, only progressives are willing to shell out the time, energy, manpower and effort to do it properly, while conservatives are busy trying to hide the proken pieces under the nearest rug.

Slow news day...

2004-12-06T12:19:00.000-07:00

Okay, I’ve perused through the news this weekend, looking for the traditional Bush bombs (for those not familiar with this, the Bush Administration frequently airs their bad news on Fridays, typically a slow news day and not as likely to be picked up), and found the following.

The US Consulate in the Saudi port city of Jeddah was stormed. Are you blasé about this? Why?

Because if it’s about the Middle East, it’s *all* bad news *all* the time these days. The fact that we *aren’t* batting an eye at this news story shows we’ve got a much bigger problem.

News on Jeddah

With our national debt still out of control and the value of the American dollar continuing to plummet, we are now affecting the economy in other countries. To this I say, “We had a surplus before Bush came into office. It’s not that America doesn’t have the money to pay for its’ debts, it’s that the Bush Administration and Republican majority choose not to. It’s time to go back to school, boys and girls. *We* the American people know how to balance a checkbook. Would you like some lessons?”

The Dollar's Double Whammy

Everyone’s getting ready to battle over the next round of Supreme Court Justice nominees. With the hubbub over Sen. Arlen Specter’s (R-Pa) comments and subsequent belly groveling, Bush’s promise to his fundamentalist core to nominate someone anti-choice, and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist’s (R-Tenn) comments last month before the Federalist Society that “one way or another, the filibuster of judicial nominees must end", we’re all getting a pretty clear picture that it’s going to be profoundly ugly. But before we proceed down a discussion of why filibusters are a good thing, let’s keep in mind one thing:

There were 10 – count ‘em – 10 blocked nominations out of more than 200 confirmed appointments. Ten blocked nominations, and the Republicans get their panties in a total twist. Doesn’t this sound oddly like a child throwing a tantrum about not getting their own way? It does to me.

Reality check: The Republicans didn’t win by 99%. They won by a little over half – barely. Filibusters are designed to protect the House Minority from having no voice at all. Deal with it.

“The filibuster is an important defense of minority rights, enabling democratic government to measure and respect not merely numbers but also intensity in public controversies. Filibusters enable intense minorities to slow the governmental juggernaut. Conservatives, who do not think government is sufficiently inhibited, should cherish this blocking mechanism. And someone should puncture Republicans' current triumphalism by reminding them that someday they will again be in the minority.” – George Will Newsweek

Shock and Awe in the Senate

More on both side’s strategies to promote/fight against potential nominees:

Getting Ready for Court Fight

I’ll put this out for you to decide. I haven’t researched this yet, but am wondering how much truth there is to it. According to several sources I read, the 9/11 intelligence reform bill throws in a great deal more than the 9/11 Commission report ever recommended. Follow this link to read more about what they’re saying:

Opposing the 9/11 Intelligence Reform Bill

To those of you interested in who may become the Democratic National Committee’s next Chairman, here is a list of candidates and a little bit about them:

Democrat's Pick for DNC Chairman Will Draw New Map for Party

Also, here’s a little bit more on Rosenberg, which I found interesting. It’s always nice to know more than just the name, isn’t it?

Simon Rosenberg

Of course, who can forget the Conservative’s attack against Howard Dean? After all, he’s a “tax-hiking, government-expanding, latte-drinking, sushi-eating, Volvo-driving, New York Times-reading, Hollywood-loving, left-wing freak show…” Wow. No venom there.

One final note – here’s something worth mentioning because I’ve discovered this is not an uncommon strategy for fundamentalists to apply.

They put a false spin on an issue and stir the public against, in this case a school, without providing all the facts. Actually, they use moderates to promote their extremist cause, which I find offensive.

Take a look at this article to get an idea for how they’re spinning this story, and keep it in mind the next time you read an article that claims someone is going too far against teaching religion in school, etc. It’s better to know all the facts before sending outraged email to someone who very well could be trying to uphold the very principles you hold dear. I’ve never liked being played.

Intimidation Campaign Against Stevens Creek Elementary School

2004-12-03T23:46:00.000-07:00

My second Cat Blogging Day!

For those of you who are curious what this whole Cat Blogging Day thing is all about, read the following article:

Cat Blogging Day!

Some links

2004-12-02T15:11:00.000-07:00

I just found a site where soldiers stationed both in Iraq and Afghanistan post.

Operation Truth

Take a look. Listen to what your soldiers are saying.

Pro Patria Morie (Kendall Connell)

We all see the "We support our troops" bumper stickers. How about doing something more, and making sure they get out of there?

************************************************************************

On a completely unrelated note, here's a link to an independant filmmaker looking to gather information about whether or not America is *really* polarized.

Red, White and Blue Survey

I took the survey. I'll be curious to see where this goes.

Pete and Repeat

2004-12-02T12:07:00.000-07:00

And now, ABC joins the ranks of those afraid to air UCC's ad.

The church quoted CBS as saying that the ad was rejected "because this commercial touches on the exclusion of gay couples ... and the fact that the executive branch has recently proposed a constitutional amendment to define marriage as a union between a man and a woman, this spot is unacceptable for broadcast."

However, CBS has accepted a second UCC commercial for airing. One can only wonder at what they required to be excluded before being willing to play it. No effeminate looking men? Only burly lumberjacks in flannel shirts? As for the women - absolutely no women 'in comfortable shoes', as Robin Williams once said in Good Morning Vietnam.

Kudos do go, by the way, to ABC Family, BET Discovery, Fox, Hallmark, TBS and TNT for all airing the ad. On a related note: Where's Bravo? I'm surprised not to see them here.

Where is all this going, you wonder? Look at the bigger picture. A GOP Legislature proposes to ban gay literature in public libraries. Not just gay romances, but anything with a gay protagonist in it, or that suggests homosexuality might be okay. The Color Purple, The Picture of Dorian Gray, and Brideshead Revisted would have to go. Rep. Gerald Allen, R-Cottondale, when asked, said Tennessee William's play 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof' couldn't be played in university theatre groups.

"I guess we dig a big hole and dump them in and bury them." - Rep. Gerald Allen replied when asked what to do with the banned books.

Chilling words, but even more chilling when looked at amidst the bigger landscape of proposed Constitutional Amendments specifically excluding homosexuals, and large television networks refusing to air television ads that preach for acceptance.

This shift towards hate is unacceptable, and we've seen where this road goes. Discrimination, I was taught as a child, was a thing of the past; a legacy that great leaders had the courage to stand up against. America is a better place now, and celebrates its' melting pot hodgepodge heritage. It's what makes America stronger, more innovative and dynamic. It is what gives America its edge.

We're losing our edge now. America is on the decline. This great society we live in is beginning to mirror the very Muslim fundamentalists our soldiers are right now fighting against.

There are those who would say America's decline is because of our loose morals and/or our corrupt citizens. To this I say, "You argue of morals, yet I see no evidence of scruples. You preach Christianity, yet vilify those who do not share your views. Your actions speak louder than words."

Remember that history will see the witch hunts of today as it has all others in times past, and those with the courage to stand up for what is right will be remembered. It may not be easy, but then, being right never is.

Oh, and one final cheery note. Go take a gander at what those wild and crazy abstinence-only programs have been teaching our children for three years now:

Some Abstinence Programs Mislead Teens, Report Says

Wake up America. We're better than this. We have to be.

Let's bury books instead of burning them...

2004-12-01T16:15:00.000-07:00

Check out this link and then tell me that hate mongering isn't rampant within our government:

Republican Alabama lawmaker proposes banning gay books from public libraries

Wake up, America! This is not our legacy! This is Nazi Germany's!

Straight (or not so straight g) Talk

2004-12-01T14:59:00.000-07:00

Both NBC and CBS refuse to air the United Church of Christ's commercial. You want to know what the controversy is?

In the commercial it shows two burly bodyguards picking and choosing who can attend church. Then, on screen, it reads: "Jesus didn't turn people away. Neither do we." The voice-over then says, "The United Church of Christ. No matter who you are, or where you are on life's journey, you are welcome here."

See the full commercial here:

UCC site

CBS says it "touches on the exclusion of gay couples and other minority groups by other individuals and organizations," and it is "unacceptable" because "the Executive Branch has recently proposed a Constitutional Amendment to define marriage as a union between a man and a woman." NBC just says it's too controversial.

Here’s a newsflash: There is no *liberal* media, and this above all else proves it decisively. A narrow-minded, bigoted, hate-mongering, vicious, and ridiculously well funded minority has subverted our First Amendment rights.

Or, in reference to *why* the First Amendment was created, read Stephen Mount, of USConstitution.net:

“Some of the first colonists of the nation for which the Constitution was written had been seeking to escape religious persecution. The constitutions of several of the states prohibited public support of religion. And above all, the many varying sects of Christianity in America required that to be fair to all, there could be preference to none. It would have been disgraceful for anyone to wish to leave the United States because of religious persecution. So they decided it best to keep the government out of religion. Now, this is not to say that the United States was not or is not a religious one. Religion plays a big role in the everyday life of Americans, then and now. But what they were striving for is tolerance... something I fear contemporary Americans are lacking.”

This quote is from the following site:

usconstitution.net

As is Jefferson’s original reference to the ‘separation of church and state’:

Jefferson's Wall of Separation letter

My thought for the day? Read up on your history and about what America’s forefathers were trying to achieve, and *why* they were trying to achieve it.

"History is a guide to navigation in perilous times. History is who we are and why we are the way we are." David C. McCullough (American author b.1933)

Something to be thankful for.

2004-11-24T10:41:00.000-07:00

While America regresses, Britain moves forward. The House of Lords have approved 251 to 136 to legalize Civil Partnerships for same-sex couples.

House of Lords backs Civil Partnerships

It warms my heart to hear of it.

Where once there were blinders, please let America begin to see as well!

Happy Thanksgiving!

A Quick Note of Interest

2004-11-23T10:43:00.000-07:00

You'll be intrigued to know that embedded within each color copy is a code that could be traced back to you:

Government uses color laser technology to track documents

Oh, and by the way? It's been in there for *years*.

Add to that the passage of the massive $388 billion omnibus spending bill, including a special provision that allows the Chairmen of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees or their "agents" to review any American's tax return with no restrictions whatsoever, and I'm starting to think Big Brother's already here!

Or, as the esteemed Joshua Marshall put it here:

Talking Points Omnibus recap

...

Specifically, none of the privacy law restrictions -- or the criminal and civil penalties tied to them -- would apply when the Chair or anybody he or she designates as his or her "agent" looked at your tax return.

The exact language of the provision is as follows ...

"Hereinafter, notwithstanding any other provision of law governing the disclosure of income tax returns or return information, upon written request of the Chairman of the House or Senate Committee on Appropriations, the Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service shall allow agents designated by such Chairman access to Internal Revenue Service facilities and any tax returns or return information contained therein."

The provision was slipped into the bill at the last moment. And, at least on the Democratic side, no one was told about it until some Dems caught it at the last moment.

Senate Republicans quickly backtracked, calling the provision a mistake or snafu and insisting they knew nothing about it. You can see some of the back-and-forth that took place on the Senate floor in this AP piece at CNN.

Sen. Stevens of Alaska, Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, originally blamed the provision on a 'staffer'. But later, according to the AP, Sen. Frist and "congressional aides" said it was inserted at the behest of Rep. Istook.

And in case you're wondering, Istook's staffers are apparently telling constituents that Rep. Istook had to step out of the room for a moment when the DeLay Rule was being voted on.

Maybe he had to finish reading over Ronnie Earle's tax return?

Who needs conspiracy theories?

My Hero!

2004-11-23T10:15:00.000-07:00

This is worth printing in its entirety. Travis County, Texas DA Ronnie Earle's response to Tom DeLay and his cronies' recent slanderous comments against him in regards to an ongoing investigation that has already indicted three people directly tied to him:

A Moral Indictment
By RONNIE EARLE

Published: November 23, 2004

Austin, Tex. — It is a rare day when members of the United States Congress try to read the minds of the members of a grand jury in Travis County, Tex. Apparently Tom DeLay's colleagues expect him to be indicted.

Last week Congressional Republicans voted to change their rule that required an indicted leader to relinquish his post. They were responding to an investigation by the Travis County grand jury into political contributions by corporations that has already resulted in the indictments of three associates of Mr. DeLay, the House majority leader.

Yet no member of Congress has been indicted in the investigation, and none is a target unless he or she has committed a crime. The grand jury will continue its work, abiding by the rule of law. That law requires a grand jury of citizens, not the prosecutor, to determine whether probable cause exists to hold an accused person to answer for the accusation against him or her.

Politicians in Congress are responsible for the leaders they choose. Their choices reflect their moral values.

Every law enforcement officer depends on the moral values and integrity of society for backup; they are like body armor. The cynical destruction of moral values at the top makes it hard for law enforcement to do its job.

In terms of moral values, this is where the rubber meets the road. The rules you apply to yourself are the true test of your moral values.

The thinly veiled personal attacks on me by Mr. DeLay's supporters in this case are no different from those in the cases of any of the 15 elected officials this office has prosecuted in my 27-year tenure. Most of these officials - 12 Democrats and three Republicans - have accused me of having political motives. What else are they going to say?

For most of my tenure the Democrats held the power in state government. Now Republicans do. Most crimes by elected officials involve the abuse of power; you have to have power before you can abuse it.

There is no limit to what you can do if you have the power to change the rules. Congress may make its own rules, but the public makes the rule of law, and depends for its peace on the enforcement of the law. Hypocrisy at the highest levels of government is toxic to the moral fiber that holds our communities together.

The open contempt for moral values by our elected officials has a corrosive effect. It is a sad day for law enforcement when Congress offers such poor leadership on moral values and ethical behavior. We are a moral people, and the first lesson of democracy is not to hold the public in contempt.

For more information on the current machinations within our current Administration, I suggest you read the following:

Welcome to the Machine

And just to let you know, DeLay has been trying for over a year to get Ronnie Earle out through dishonest means. DeLay has already used redistricting as a tool to consolidate power for the Republicans. It's time Congress was reminded it's against the law.

The next redistricting target: Ronnie Earle?

Wake Up, America!

2004-11-22T12:26:00.000-07:00

Women’s rights are under assault. We are facing the very real possibility of losing a woman’s right to choose whether or not to have an abortion.

The Fundamentalist movement that is currently in power has been zealous in their obsessive hatred of women’s reproductive rights, and we continue to be under attack. The most recent loss? An anti-abortion provision tucked right into the $388 billion just passed spending bill.

(Negotiators add abortion clause to spending bill)

We have let their diseased hatred of women’s reproductive rights infect our political system. We have voices, and need to speak out just as vehemently against anti-abortion nominees as the Pro Life groups do for them! We the people still have the power to threaten, cajole, encourage, and most importantly contact, and contact often, all of our Congressmen and let them hear *our* thoughts as well. We can make it too politically costly for our Congressmen and women to jump each time President Bush asks them to.

To do this we must be as devoted, dedicated, and determined to protect the rights of women in America as our opponents have been to strip us of them. And make no mistake about it, if ever there was a time to become politically active, it is now.

It is time to stop being Pro Choice and start being Pro Abortion. I am tired of avoiding conflict by not going toe to toe with rabid zealots just to avoid an argument; of being polite and conceding that ‘they’ have a right to have their opinion. They do not believe I have that right. Because this is considered such an emotionally ‘sensitive’ issue, we have danced delicately around it while they have bludgeoned us all.

I am here to speak a truth that no one dares utter. These Christian Fundamentalists care little for life – unless *you* are one of them. Think of all those individuals who have become heroes in their eyes for bombing abortion clinics or killing pro-abortion doctors. Hypocrites!

Mark my words: Fundamentalists know making abortion illegal will not stop desperate women in desperate circumstances from seeking them. But they will prevent them from finding a medically safe place to get them. They KNOW women will turn to back alley butchers, coat hangers, and other unsafe self-induced practices, and that up to fifty percent of women who undergo unsafe abortions have complications. Fifty percent!

It is estimated by the World Health Organization that 80,000 women die each year due to complications from unsafe abortions… These Christian Fundamentalists know these numbers as well, and DO NOT CARE.

They believe four zygotes are more important than a woman’s life. How are we not outraged?! How is this possible that our politicians are listening to them?! These zealots believe a woman SHOULD risk death or becoming sterile if she decides, whatever the circumstances, to have an abortion.

This is not the American way. Those who have the President’s ear are not the majority. Instead of being terrified at the upcoming four years, be ready to fight - fight long and hard! We have been silent too long, and look at where it has brought us. Wake up America, and get involved! Now is the time!

In this day and age, with the Internet at our fingertips making email access to members of Congress just a few clicks away, why have we not signed up to email our opinions every time we disagree with something that has been said?

Contact your local Planned Parenthood Federation of America, your local chapter of the National Organization for Women, your local Democratic party, and be prepared to not just donate: Be willing to commit time and energy, and not just in the upcoming months, but in the upcoming years. Set aside time each week, meet with each other, develop ideas and strategies, work within your community as well as nationally. We lost an election, but we cannot give up the war - we must not. Too much is at stake, and now more than ever we MUST be heard.

2004-11-19T15:24:00.000-07:00

It's my first official Cat Blogging Day!

A lovely quote to take heart from Garrison Keillor during 'A Prairie Home Companion'

2004-11-18T14:17:00.000-07:00

"A little patience, and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their spells dissolve, and the people, recovering their true sight, restore their government to it's true principles. It is true that in the meantime we are suffering deeply in spirit, and incurring the horrors of a war and long oppressions of enormous public debt......If the game runs sometimes against us at home we must have patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an opportunity of winning back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles are at stake."

--Thomas Jefferson, 1798

More on Tom DeLay's lack of principles later... *drum rolls and cymbals crash* Thank you, thank you. Be sure to tip your servers well. Ah, the irony of it all.

Follow-Up from previous post

2004-11-18T07:49:00.000-07:00

The New York Times has an article that sums up the issues I was putting forth in the previous post very nicely. Be sure to read it!

Lame Duck Confit

The Truth Will Set Us Free

2004-11-17T14:36:00.000-07:00

Ah, but what is the truth, you ask? Good question. To explore that question, I suggest looking at two separate angles of it.

The first and ultimately the most important question is: What is the ultimate goal of the current Administration agenda? What does cutting funding for government agencies and programs, allowing the deficit to continue to run rampant, and giving huge tax breaks year after year in the face of said deficit mean for us as the average citizen?

Tuck in the back of your mind the second question, which is “How are they accomplishing it?” Now, scroll down to the November 15th article written by Kevin Drum titled "Stealth Conservatism".

Political Animal

The author's point is: ""Republicans are mostly nibbling around the edges, not taking a chainsaw to liberal programs." And why is this a problem? Because it's hard to mobilize widespread opposition to conservative policies when they're put into place a little bit at a time. It's the old boiling frog problem."

For those of you unfamiliar with the term, it refers to putting (figuratively, not literally. No live frogs were harmed during the writing of this blog!) a frog in a pot of boiling water. Immediately the frog will struggle to escape.

However, if you place a frog in a pot filled with room temperature water and then slowly raise the heat, his internal survival mechanism will not be triggered and eventually he perishes.

This is certainly where we find ourselves today. The Emperor has no clothes, but his constituents are just as convinced he's clothed as he is. Who is the tailor, then? Carl Rove? Grover Norquist?

I highly recommend the following article:

Starving the Beast

In a nutshell, could the ultimate goal of such fiscal irresponsibility be aimed towards a specific end? Republicans appear terrified of government. Taken to its extreme, won't such reckless spending ultimately force shrinkage of government in its entirety without having to actually cut popular programs that Democrats and Republicans alike would fight for?

Who needs to take on the Environmental Protection Act, Social Security, OSHA or protecting civil rights when bankrupting the government into powerlessness will effectively do it for them?

The water’s boiling, dear Republicans, and I ask that you fight with me to get out of the pot. Government is not a bad thing. It keeps the water you drink clean, insures that your work environment (or home, for that matter) won’t kill you, and provides help when the catastrophic happens. Nip this harebrained philosophy in the bud before the damage requires generations to repair it rather than decades. This is not the Democratic way, and it certainly is not the Republican way. Our children will thank us for what we do today to stop this.

Take it to the people

2004-11-16T11:52:00.000-07:00

This is my first political post - the first of many, I'm sure.

I hear the argument over and over about where the Democratic message got lost, and the most reoccurring answer I have heard makes the most sense.

We *have* spent too much time defending. Defending false accusations and ridiculous labels. The truth hurts, and clearly our fellow citizens will go to great lengths not to see it. We have spent entirely too much energy defending against the most basic of children's strategies: "Look over there."

I have no doubt that the arrogance of the current Administration will at some point go too far and forever alienate itself from the American people. However, I had *hoped* that that tolernce level was already met by Abu Ghirab and the proof of neither weapons of mass destruction nor ties to Al Qaeda. November 2nd proved that hope false, so here I am today.

The greatest enemy of any citizen is apathy. My time as an armchair quarterback is at an end. The America I grew up in, the American dream I believe in, does not allow for intolerance, discrimination, and using hatred as a political party platform. It believes in not only equality, but equal opportunity for all of its' citizens.

I begin from the beginning, by reading the Constitution and listening to what this country's forefathers had in mind when they set in writing the groundwork of a nation.

For too long I've been silent in the face of opposition, too polite to argue with those who practically spit in my face in defence of their radical ideals. No more. Welcome to my world. Together may we change America for the better.

There are none so blind as those who will not see.

It's been a while...

Dear God...

Still Getting It Wrong

The Christian Paradox

How a faithful nation gets Jesus wrong

A Vision for the Future I Want to See

Not So Shocking News

GOP Declares Any Sexual Positions Other Than Missionary Unconstitutional

Definition of the Day

A Blast from the Past

Do NOT let this happen to you!

Quote of the Day

Recent quote from the Sunday Oregonian’s

Bravo!

Sandra Day O'Connor

Quote of the Day

Downing Street memo buzz

Schlepping, Forrest Gump, and The Downing Street Memo

Lightness and Fluff from a group post

Still Stupid After All These Years

grrrrrr!

More Bushshit from Congress

Where There's White Smoke, There's Fire

Pave Paradise and Put Up a Parking Lot

The State of the Union

That's our President!

Thoughts on Christianity

Another Quote of the Day

And this is where people are finding their *values*?

Wounded Soldiers? What Soldiers?

A little humor for those, like myself, who need it

Drilling in Alaska

Sound Familiar?

The American Tight Rope

Methinks the President Doth Protest Too Much

A proposed budget breakdown the Administration doesn't want you to see.

Sometimes No News is also Bad News

Wise Words

The Real Picture

A religious message worth repeating...

More thoughts on a possible bait and switch

Ten years ago no politician would have dared say this. What does this say of the direction our country is heading?

In other news...

Truth is stranger than fiction

Your Vote Can Make a Difference

Questions Worth Asking

Cat Blogging and a Thought for the Day

Gotta love Josh Marshall

Paying the Piper

On a Positive Note

Hitler was Christian, too

I guess the Idaho Aryan Nation moved a little further south

Social Security Privatization - The Red Herring of the Republican Party

'Rice' Christians

News from abroad about America's hidden casualty toll

Conditions for Reservists in Iraq

Hawks vs. Doves

Slow news day...

Some links

Pete and Repeat

Some Abstinence Programs Mislead Teens, Report Says

Let's bury books instead of burning them...

Straight (or not so straight *g*) Talk

Something to be thankful for.

A Quick Note of Interest

My Hero!

Wake Up, America!

A lovely quote to take heart from Garrison Keillor during 'A Prairie Home Companion'

Follow-Up from previous post

The Truth Will Set Us Free

Take it to the people

And this is where people are finding their values?

Straight (or not so straight g) Talk