Clemsy's Corner

A Short Walk

2011-07-09T12:06:00.000-04:00

I left the restaurant and headed up East 70^th Street. The challah bread French toast was particularly good and unavailable at home. A minor detail I will always miss about New York City. Challah bread. I’m sure there’s some upstate somewhere, but finding it would be a mission requiring some planning and it’s not quite that important. This particular visit inspired more reflection than usual.

Perhaps because the garden is full of weeds.

I’d left the house at 3:30 a.m. to make my 8:00 appointment and arrived with time to spare. I was pleased to see Maria enter the waiting room. She called my name and gave me an affectionate hug. I hadn’t seen her for about two years. She was always the attending nurse for the procedure back when I was making this trip every three months. We’d gotten to know each other well as she prepped me for the doctors poking and prodding. But now, seven years later I’m on an annual schedule and the past two visits had me in another’s hands.

We can skip the details. I’m fine. Hopefully I’ll see Maria again next year.

I passed a man walking a Chihuahua, then a woman walking a Welsh corgi. I realized that all the dogs I’d seen that morning were small dogs, tiny dogs who wished they had longer legs. You could tell. They were made for lying on laps, not trying to keep up. Besides, they used to have longer legs. In my memory, dogs in Manhattan were big dogs; German shepherds, boxers, English sheep dogs. They matched their owners. Now they don’t. The man with the Chihuahua should have had a Labrador, the woman with the Welsh corgi an Afghan. No one in the city has big dogs anymore; a consequence, I guess, of the law that changed the street signs from “Curb Your Dog” to “Clean Up After Your Dog.”

One had to watch where one stepped before that. No longer. That’s good, I guess. The city is lessened without big dogs, though.

I brought up some older memories for inspection and comparison. Not adult memories, not adolescent memories, but color-faded, childhood memories of Manhattan. The street lamps were wrought iron and ornate. The cars were big and rounded. They were not brightly colored, or even lightly colored. They were dark, except for the checker cabs. (You could fit a piano in the back of a checker cab. There were two folding seats in front of the bench, so you could fit a full dozen people back there. At least that’s how big it is in memory.)There were mail boxes, phone booths and big dogs. All the women wore skirts below the knees. All the men wore hats.

The memories look like a black and white movie. Humphrey Bogart cups a match with his hands and lights a cigarette on the corner. He flicks the match confidently into the gutter.

Everybody smoked cigarettes. Littering hadn’t been invented yet.

Back in the present I looked for what was changeless. At 10:00 a.m. on a warm Wednesday morning, the street was moderately filled with people walking at the pace New Yorkers walk. They don’t stroll. People on vacation stroll. All these people had schedules and destinations. Walking amongst them is a graceful slalom, unlike Midtown where walking is more like driving in traffic or, sometimes, swimming in the opposite direction of a school of fish. This has always been the case. Walking in Midtown as a small child had always been a little frightening. A sudden current could rip you from your mother’s hand. This was a real and present danger and your mother was just as aware of it as you were. When the current was strong she grabbed your wrist and cut off the circulation. You didn’t mind because you couldn’t swim.

The people I pass are mostly fit. America, we are told, has a weight problem. I don’t know about other cities, but Manhattan does not, although certain sections of the “outer boroughs” may. Why this may be is an interesting question. Every fourth or fifth person I pass is an attractive young woman. I can’t help noticing that. I also can’t help noticing I am older than most of the pedestrians. This makes me sad for a moment, then it goes away.

I passed (I like the previous paragraph in the present tense, in case anyone with a red pen notices.) a small dry cleaners and wondered for a moment how a dry cleaners could afford the rent on the Upper East Side. The answer, of course, is that I can’t afford that dry cleaners.

Across the street from the dry cleaners is a center for seniors. All the elderly people are concentrated in this place. One man with a cane is bent and angular in a manner I have never seen before. I wondered what his story is. I assumed I am many times blessed by comparison.

I walked up 70^th to 3^rd Ave., turned the corner and walked back down 69^th to the parking garage near 1^st Ave. There are certain experiences the City will provide you with every visit. I was given three of them in double measure.

One cannot walk in Manhattan without walking under scaffolding at least once. This morning, the Upper East Side seemed to be under scaffolding with its attendant sounds: portable generators, wood banging on wood, metal banging on metal, the occasional obscenity. On 70^th, not one but two fire engines turned the corner from 2^nd Ave., lights glaring, sirens wailing, air horns blasting to wake the dead even though they were going to have to wait for the light to change on 1^st along with everyone else.

On 69^th there was the requisite jackhammer. In memory, jackhammers are worked by men with jiggling beer bellies. This one was handled by a young man of nineteen or twenty as fit as the pedestrians completely ignoring his racket (just as they had ignored the double dose of fire trucks). He was working at removing a parking meter and he was not having fun about it. The parking meter is probably the best constructed artifact of all time. The quarters are safer than in a bank, and they do not come out of a sidewalk without a determined man with a jackhammer.

A young woman wearing a low cut sundress (Again, I can’t help it.) on a bicycle confidently signals her way in front of a taxi to avoid a double parked car. That jackhammer would have caused someone from Queens to hit the double parked car.

There was more scaffolding and another jackhammer before I reached the garage. This one, however, was working away out of sight, four or five stories up. That was new.

Back in my car, I accessed my Manhattan driving gear. You need patience with an edge to drive in the City. The patience has you wait for the right moment. The edge has you slip into another car’s air cushion in a manner that gains respect from the other driver. It’s a skill. New Yorkers are very good at it. Unlike Boston, there are rules for driving in Manhattan. I am reassured I still know them.

The traffic cop on 62^nd and York signaled me with one finger, down low, onto the ramp to the FDR Drive. I raised my index finger from the steering wheel in response.

Response to David Brooks: Stop Drinking the Kool-Aide

2011-07-01T11:00:00.001-04:00

The following is a reply posted to David Brooks column, which wildly misrepresents Diane Ravitch's stand on education reform, in today's NY Times titled "Smells Like School Spirit."

I just want to stress one point here, David. The new New York State English Regents, taken in the 11th grade, consists of 25 multiple choice questions(1 point apiece), two written paragraphs (scored 0-2 for a 4 possible points) and an essay (scored 0-6). Now pay attention: as long as a student gets more than 20 multiple choice questions correct, at least a 1 on each of the paragraphs and a 3 on the essay, that student passes. Right. A student who writes what is basically a failing essay is good enough for New York State standards.

Here, however, is where it gets interesting. Senior year, these students will write the most important essay of their lives. No one will ever care how they scored on the Regents exam, but college admissions offices will be very interested in their personal essays, a style of writing the New York State Board of Regents does not care about... otherwise one would be on the Regents exam.

Do teachers focus on the Regents tasks at the expense of personal writing? You bet they do. The pressure is enormous and getting stronger. The state does not care about personal writing. The state only cares about critical analysis, writing exercises that have nothing to do with the student. Not that they aren't important. They are. Very much so.

But if you want the "average" student to actually care about writing that student has to feel some connection to the process. More importantly, personal writing allows students to explore their own experiences, tell their own stories and help them find out who they are. The focus on mechanical, formulaic writing is pumping out mechanical, formulaic, hollow people.

But don't you tell me that teachers should be doing personal writing anyway. When? What gets left out? Catcher in the Rye? Romeo and Juliet? The pressure to prepare these students for these tests is profound and corrupts the atmosphere of every school building.

Humanize the process instead of treating our young people like standardized parts.

Note: I ran out of characters at that point, but I would have continued with the following:

It is important also to note here that the new English Regents was constructed because of a snow storm. The old Regents was a two day, six hour affair consisting of fewer multiple choice questions and four essays. The change had nothing to do with student performance and everything to do with the loss of tax dollars due to an inconvenient January snowstorm which cancelled the second day of the test. One can compare two items on the old and new test (actual scores from a high school which will remain nameless): average score on the critical lens essay and average overall score. The last of the old exams rendered an average score of 3.5 on the essay and an overall exam average of 69. The new test rendered an average score of 3.6 on the essay and an overall average of 75.

Hmmm...

Please understand that these scores include those of special education students, many, not all but many of whom are victims of reverse discrimination by being expected to "race to the top" as if they were no different than anyone else.

Which, of course, is the point. The testing environment assumes no student is fundamentally any different than any other. They are, as I said above, standardized parts.

Let's add some irony here. Due to budget problems, the January Regents exams have been eliminated altogether. Not that I would want to go back to the old test. Both tests are fundamentally flawed and the old one more so.

Humanize the system from Kindergarten on up. Let teachers teach children, not subjects. Nurture self-discovery and reflection, then encourage analysis of objective material that is relevant to children's levels of development.

And most importantly, encourage a culture of effort. That, my friends, will require a social revolution way outside the walls of school buildings because the primary problem in American education isn't even poverty. It's a society in which getting by is good enough and being wrong is getting caught.

It's a culture in which a few can rape a nation's economy, then convince everyone that firing 'bad teachers' will fix what they've done.

Seems to me that ensuring we continue to produce mechanical, formulaic, hollow people incapable of reflection and critical thinking will ensure they get to do it all over again when the conditions are right.

So. Who's winning?

America, Libya, and Economic Stupidity

2011-04-03T12:06:00.000-04:00

I have no doubt the Powers That Be consider the Libyan uprising an opportunity to rework North African geo-politics. Tunisia, Egypt and Libya? So, sure, the Libyan rebels were going to get slaughtered, and, as usual, some untold number of noncombatants.

Maybe the humanitarian thing would actually work this time! And there's that influence on the new government that will just happen to be sitting on the largest oil reserves in N. Africa. Two for the price of one!

Of course, the assumption here is that the rebellion was inspired by the same spontaneous, Facebook/Twitter, fairly young and democratically minded demographic as the rebellions next door. I hope that's the case.

I have no problem with the intervention. I may have a problem with what it becomes. My biggest problem with it is that the United States has no business spending the money, any money, on it.

People generally don't know what killed the Soviet bear. It wasn't Ronald Reagan. It was their military and foreign policy budget. It sucked the empire dry. Ronnie just hit the fast forward button by forcing them to spend even more by increasing our defense budget.

Right now the whole dialogue on the American economy is being driven by crazy people who believe the only thing our taxes should be paying for is defense.

The rest of us can go back to the 18th century. If it was good enough for the Founding Fathers, it's good enough for us.

Oh. By 'us' I mean the middle class, working class and the poor.

At the heart of all of this is a little something called American Exceptionalism.

The term, if you listen to it used on Fox News, is really synonymous with chauvinism: zealous and aggressive patriotism. This idea needs to be countered passionately. Yet, the current atmosphere reminds me of Yeats', "The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity."

The U.S. is headed toward some pretty serious social unrest. You don't hear about it on the news, but labor rallies are sprouting all over the country. The next year or so is going to be pretty interesting.

But the bottom line is that the U.S. has to let go of the military super power thing and let the rest of the world step up.

Reagan sped up the arms race and forced the Soviets into early retirement. By cutting taxes and not planning for two wars in the federal budget, George Bush had us doing the same thing to ourselves.

Obama just grabbed the baton from him and kept running. When the Tea Party right (who most of the country disagree with but that doesn't seem to matter) spooks people who should know better into cutting spending even more (on programs that don't put a dent in the federal deficit but who cares?), does Obama step up or go belly up?

That's a rhetorical question.

I sincerely hope the Libyan people can get the kook off their backs and keep out any kooks waiting in the wings.

But here in the U.S.... we need to learn how to do some pretty simple math before it's too late, and that doesn't include firing teachers (Talk about the politics of distraction!). The cost of one cruise missile could pay a teacher's salary for about fifteen years. The U.S. has launched over one hundred in the Libya campaign so far.

That's my Sunday morning commentary for this week.

Diane Ravitch Responds

2010-11-21T10:21:00.000-05:00

I sent President Ianuzzi's letter and my response to Diane Ravitch. She fired off a reply within minutes:

Dear Michael,

I agree with you. The campaign to destroy the teaching profession is in full swing, as witness the story in yesterday's NY Times where Bill Gates says that seniority and tenure are problems and teachers should not be rewarded for experience or for master's degrees. This is all so wrong. The one thing that these actions would surely guarantee is an end to the teaching profession. And we would have a steady influx of inexperienced teachers, who stay for a year or two and move on; and inexperienced principals; and inexperienced superintendents. How would this improve American education? These trends should be resisted, not accepted.

Diane Ravitch

(The one line from the Gates article that really got my attention is this: "He (Gates) also urges an end to efforts to reduce class size." Hey Bill! Why didn't you ask me how to write a decent OS when Windows Vista headed south?

That's a rhetorical question.)

President Ianuzzi Responds and I Reply

2010-11-20T13:24:00.000-05:00

The following is from Richard Ianuzzi, President of New York State United Teachers (NYSUT) in response to my letter of October 31. My reply follows.

Michael:

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, and I apologize for the delayed response--I write these myself! Having spent 34 years in an elementary classroom, I appreciate the endless piles of papers--at least mine included some "artistic" projects!

I understand your uneasiness about test scores. Without getting into the fine line between raw scores, growth models and value added, suffice to say there is much uncertainty. A Task Force (with one third practitioners) is working on how the multiple factors impacting scores should be considered. Their recommendations are to guide the Regents in setting regulations, currently scheduled for July. What is clear is that value-added will not be in place in NY for several years and only then if it is a model that accurately addresses factors impacting the classroom. While in theory the model has potential, needless to say, it does not exist today.

You have every right to be skeptical about those who claim to embrace reform when their actions don't show a real appreciation for what goes on in the classroom. For this reason, NYSUT was careful to significantly limit the role of standardized test scores (20%) and to leave additional multiple measures to local collective bargaining (which may or may not include testing) for an additional 20%. It is also the reason we used our leverage to move the process into legislation and away from unilateral decisions from the Board of Regents.

You are right, our profession is under attack by both parties. While their is much to distrust, taking a lead in reform instead of waiting for bad "reform' to happen was our strategy.

I hope this sheds some light on our thinking.

Again, thanks for your thoughts!

Regards,

Dick

11/16/10

Hi Dick,

Thanks for your reply. While I am encouraged by what you say, I remain concerned over the lack of response to the current framing of the American teacher and the teacher's unions. I've been in the classroom for 26 years and the climate has never been this bad. Bad isn't the right word, though. The climate is vicious. Andre Agassi in the November 22 issue of Time Magazine said this when asked who he would choose as 2010 person of the year:

"The nominee is: the American student. I deserve better. Far better. I need my teachers to be better trained and held accountable for their performance. I want you to expect excellence from me. My future is at stake, and I'm not equipped for a 21st century world. If you all lay aside your agendas, you can create a groundswell that will lift me to college and beyond. If only there were a children's union."

The absolutism in his remark reflects the absolutist attitude the country has bought: teachers are bad and the union (made up of teachers) is to blame.

To every anti-teacher and anti-union talking point, there has been zero response. We are political pawns and the Democratic Party has thrown us under the bus in its cowardly shift to the right.

Unionism is built on passionate action. Where's the passion? Where's the action? This is a game of perception management and we're losing because we're not playing. When I read the union magazines I see all this great stuff that's going on. But we're talking to ourselves while too many people on the street believe unions and teachers aren't just the problem; teachers, not just some, are incompetent and the union is evil.

The union's assets can respond to "Waiting for Superman," and the political and editorial framing. If every local was involved in a carefully crafted letter writing campaign our voices would reach the public ear. I'm sure there's any number of other activities that would put, at least, some doubt where there is so much certainty. Not everyone buys the current propaganda. We still have supporters out there.

Why aren't we hitting back at the NY Times? Why has that newspaper's editorial board turned so rabidly against us? Why haven't they said anything about the disaster that Klein and Bloomberg made of the NYC school system, as was brilliantly reported by Diane Ravitch in her book? Where is this, supposedly liberal, media agenda coming from?

All the legislative dealing in the world won't save us from public opinion, and the corporatists and privatizers are in the ascendancy. I'm starting to worry that we're getting to the point where the ladder won't reach the top of the hole because when all these reforms also fail, and they will because a child is not a standardized part on an assembly line, we will still be stuck with the blame. Especially if we're seen as a passive, easy target.

As Diane Ravitch said, "Since we can't fire poverty, we can't fire students, and we can't fire families, all that is left is to fire teachers."

Let's fight back. Our target is the corporate model that dehumanizes our students into hollow test takers.

Most sincerely.

Michael Lambert

Gloversville Teacher's Association

11/20/10

Diane Ravitch's Response

2010-11-02T18:42:00.000-04:00

I sent a copy of my letter posted October 31st to Diane Ravitch. She responded:

Dear Michael,

You are right on target. The public schools are now the focus of an intense privatization campaign. Using invalid measures like VAA/VAM to assess "teacher quality" is a central tenet in this campaign, which will turn all teachers into at-will employees, with no tenure, no job rights, no seniority, subject to the whim of administrators or whoever "owns" the school.

Unions should be fighting this campaign, not compromising with those who would destroy public education and privatize it.

Diane Ravitch

The Democratic Party, Andrew Cuomo and the Death of a Thousand Cuts

2010-10-31T11:50:00.001-04:00

The following is a letter I just sent to NYSUT United, the magazine of New York State United Teachers:

Dear Editor:

I'm taking some time this morning, before spending the rest of my Sunday grading a pile of practice college application essays, to share a deep concern.

Something about President Iannuzzi's essay, "Courage in the Classroom", in NYSUT's October magazine, didn't sit well with me. His explanation that using "multiple measures," including teacher effectiveness, to account for student test scores seems reasonable. But what are those factors? How will they be accounted for?

There is a term for the type of measuring I believe President Iannuzzi is referring to; "value added modeling" or VAM. According to the Economic Policy Institute (www.epi.org) there are concerns, discussed in an August, 2010 briefing paper titled "Problems with the Use of Student Test Scores to Evaluate Teachers," in utilizing this model:

"For a variety of reasons, analyses of VAM results have led researchers to doubt whether the methodology can accurately identify more and less effective teachers. VAM estimates have proven to be unstable across statistical models, years, and classes that teachers teach. One study found that across five large urban districts, among teachers who were ranked in the top 20% of effectiveness in the first year, fewer than a third were in that top group the next year, and another third moved all the way down to the bottom 40%. Another found that teachers’ effectiveness ratings in one year could only predict from 4% to 16% of the variation in such ratings in the following year. Thus, a teacher who appears to be very ineffective in one year might have a dramatically different result the following year. The same dramatic fluctuations were found for teachers ranked at the bottom in the first year of analysis. This runs counter to most people’s notions that the true quality of a teacher is likely to change very little over time and raises questions about whether what is measured is largely a “teacher effect” or the effect of a wide variety of other factors." (Baker, Barton, et al)

I am highly skeptical about the origin of both Washington D.C.'s and Albany's impulse toward education reform, and my skepticism was firmly justified the moment Education Secretary Arnie Duncan and President Obama endorsed the wholesale firing of teachers at Rhode Island's Central Falls High School back in February. That was a milestone, and should have been a profound wake up call for every chapter of every union across America.

But it wasn't.

Historically, the Democratic Party has been a staunch supporter of public schools and progressive education. The Party's candidates have depended on our support for one successful election campaign after another. But now something insidious is happening, and no good will come of it.

Why did President Obama select Arnie Duncan secretary of education? According to Diane Ravitch, in her excellent The Death and Life of the Great American School System, he was not Obama's first choice:

"...For a brief time, it appeared that the new president might pick his main campaign advisor on education, scholar Linda Darling-Hammond of Stanford University. This prospect alarmed the champions of corporate-style reform, because Darling-Hammond was known as an advocate of teacher professionalism and a critic of Teach for America; the new breed of reformers thought she was too friendly with the teachers' unions. Consequently, writers in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, and other publications warned President-elect Obama not to choose Darling-Hammond, but to select a "real" reformer who supported testing, accountability, and choice. True reformers closed low-performing schools and fired administrators and teachers. True reformers opposed teacher tenure. Never mind that these had long been the central tenets of the Republican approach to education reform.

...The same views might as well have appeared in conservative journals, such as National Review or the Weekly Standard. Slogans long advocated by policy wonks on the right had migrated to and been embraced by policy wonks on the left." (Ravitch)

Once President Obama was sworn into office, a well organized opposition campaign began delivering body blows to him, his administration and the Democratic Party. Using well written talking points distributed widely and delivered on the Sunday morning news programs, the political right backed the Democratic Party, which to this day hasn't a clue how to respond to a well organized opponent, into a corner. Rather than push back, the Democrats began, incrementally, co-opting those talking points in a cowardly attempt to maintain its constituency, much of which assumed that no aggressive defense must mean the Republicans were right... no matter how absurd the claim. This is why the Republicans are poised to make political gains on November 2nd.

This is why the Democrats have abandoned the teachers' unions. This is why Andrew Cuomo, as President Iannuzzi states in his November column, supports a property tax cap, changes to the pension system and holds across the board, anti-union positions.

For two years the mainstream press and both political parties have been hammering our profession. It is my own perception that the teachers' unions have, at every level, instead of standing up and pushing back hard with facts, been drawn into the Democrat's slipstream to the right.

We do this at our own peril. The Republican agenda includes the elimination of the Department of Education, the extinction of the teachers' unions and the privatization of the public school system.

Yes, we can do much to improve our effectiveness and police our own ranks. This should be done. There are other ways that will actually work. But in the meantime, I have 140 students. During open house, eight parents showed up. I hope this doesn't shock anyone. If all parents hear is "teacher accountability," why should they assume any accountability on their part? If the problem is defined as the "bad teachers," fueling the anti-teacher sentiment running rampant across America right now, why should students feel accountable?

There is irony in my next task for the day. So much emphasis is placed on test performance that many of my seniors cannot write a competent college application essay, the most important writing product of their lives. They are uncomfortable writing about themselves. The focus on formulaic, test prep writing is so ingrained I have to start the school year with a crash course on personal writing.

This is the tragedy in our high stakes testing environment. We need to ask ourselves if, in our individual classrooms, we have bought into it by allowing the assembly line testing machine to rip the heart out of our profession. Are we allowing the testing madness to force us into creating hollow men and women who have no idea who they are because all we do is train them to perform on tests that have no relevance to their lives?

Are the current crop of "reformers" actually forcing us into destroying ourselves? If so, we are, indeed, "going gently into that dark night."

Sincerely,

Michael Lambert

Gloversville Teachers' Association

Fertile Ground

2010-09-11T12:28:00.002-04:00

“Where is it?” she asks.

I point. The hole in the skyline really isn’t obvious. Most of the buildings around the former site of the World Trade Center are blocked from view from our spot on Canal Street. The Millenium Hilton Hotel, and other glass box skyscrapers were visible to the left, but the buildings to the right, north of the site, are shorter and older. From where we stand, the empty air looks normal.

Manhattan is long and narrow. Keeping a mental map is easy, even in the Village and Tribeca where the streets are named instead of numbered. The WTC was on the southwest corner of the island, give or take, snuggled close to the Hudson River. Just walk that way.

We had started from our hotel on 54th Street and 7th Avenue. A vacation indulgence in a favorite pastime, walking in The City, eventually turned into a pilgrimage of sorts. We meandered downtown, cross town and back, through Greenwich Village and SoHo. The further south we went, the more sure our eventual destination became.

We are both from the NYC area, my wife from the Island, myself from Queens. Though we had transplanted ourselves into the forest of upstate New York fifteen years earlier, the events of 9/11 had the added dimension for us of being a personal hometown violation. Neither of us had visited the site yet.

We had put almost ten miles on our feet by the time we hit the roadblock on West Broadway. Hardhats. Machinery. A block further on, there is a wide open space. Manmade. Unnatural. We walk a block over to Church Street, make a right and approach the hole in the city from the northeast corner.

A wide sidewalk, punctuated by new subway entrances that haven’t changed in style for half a century or more, bordered on the right by a high, steel fence. Beyond the fence, a construction site, wide and deep. Opposite, to the south, stands a skyscraper shrouded in black

The pilgrim/sightseers move along the fence, taking pictures, straining to see... what? Not much from here; construction workers, pick-ups purposely moving up and down ramps from the new metal platform on the east side of the site. Further in and deeper down is hidden from view.

Moving south. Occasional panels hung on the fence document the history of the area, followed by panels documenting the names of the victims.

The Cross took me by surprise. I had heard the story. Two days after the 11th, construction workers found these cross shaped beams in a pit in the rubble. It had subsequently been mounted and blessed. I am conflicted by this image. This event can be owned by no religious entity. I don’t believe this cross is proof of anything other than the laws of probability.

But its symbolism is stunning, nevertheless, and the step past it was like a step through a door.

A sense of unreality creeps into my peripheral vision: tourists taking pictures, an Asian film crew trying to gain admittance at an access ramp, a line of off duty firefighters posing for a photograph, souvenir vendors hawking little acrylic figures of the Twin Towers, tourists turned pilgrims gazing through the fence, the summer sun’s heat radiating off the sidewalk.

To the other side, a vast space surrounded by buildings somewhat healed of their outer wounds. Somewhat. One on the north has plywood for windows. Its neighbor, forever missing its top five floors, has scaffolding hanging here and there where work continues repairing the stone damaged by I-beams turned into missiles by an exploding 747. To the south the shrouded building; 40 stories, ominous, and its neighbor; stone, empty-eyed, vacant but with a huge heart painted on its side in the colors of the American flag. To the west, the World Financial Center and east, the Millenium Hotel, Century 21 Department Store and the Liberty Tower, structures of the crystalline city, sparkling like a vision of Oz.

Turn the corner and follow the fence along the south side of what was once Tower 2. The depth of the site opens up, revealing in the far side wall six stories of what looks to have been a parking lot, below street level. The area crawls with people, trucks and heavy machinery busy with the work of resurrection. Behind us the shrouds of 130 Liberty Street sway in the breeze, revealing utility lights within a wall-less erector set of a building.

We reach the end of the fence and the heart of Ground Zero, a man named Harry Roland. At first I ignore him, like a true New Yorker, and am content to examine the notes left on the plywood around the base to the walkway over the West Side Highway. Notes from all over the country. Most asking for God’s blessing on America. Some poetry. References to Bible chapters. The voice to my left keeps a constant monologue interspersed with practiced slogans meant to gain attention. My wife approaches him. I follow.

Harry is not an official presence here. He is dressed casually, looks to be about forty, is muscular, clear eyed and well spoken. He has a set script he launches into when his loud, “This is history! Don’t let it be a mystery!” gathers at least one listener. He speaks with intensity, his delivery is fresh. He holds eight by ten laminated color photos and a fistful of informational printouts he gives away for free. There’s no cup or hat to drop a dime into. He doesn’t want your money, just your attention.

Harry seems to know every detail of the World Trade Center. Every detail of its life and its death. He will make sure you know that of the nine buildings destroyed, “seven, yes seven, were World Trade Center buildings. Bet your teacher doesn’t know that, young man. You can go to school next month and teach your teacher something.” Harry looks you in the eye. When he speaks, he speaks to you. He wants you to ‘get it’. He needs you to ‘get it’.

Harry was a tour guide in the World Trade Center. Harry was late for work on September 11th, 2001, because he had to take his son to his first day of kindergarten. He, like so many fortunate others, just wasn’t here that day.

Sometimes, however, not being there has its downside: “Why me?”

That day marked him, marked him powerfully enough to keep him coming back to the same spot six days a week, six hours a day, for two years and counting. Now, not only still giving his tour, but compulsively giving testimony, like some living combination of John the Baptist and the Ancient Mariner.

He directs our attention to 130 Liberty Street, standing watch over Ground Zero like a widowed mourner. Harry tells us the building has to come down and is being dismantled by hand. It can’t be imploded because of the subway running beneath. There is concern, he says, because one strong Nor’easter can blow that building, still standing forty stories high, down. It will take a year, through another stormy winter, to finish the job.

People tend to consider events in discreet blocks of time. September 11th, 2001, as a physical event, had a beginning, a middle and an end. Yet that tower belies this idea, and stands as a reminder that the pace may have slowed, but it’s not over yet. A significant thought, that.

We leave Harry and take some of his mark with us.

The rest of our pilgrimage continues to be filled with jarring contrasts: The World Financial Center with its granite, marble, wide staircases and Winter Garden, an enormous atrium containing sixteen fully grown palm trees looking out on the Hudson River; back past Ground Zero and Harry to the Liberty Street Farmer’s Market; finally to St. Paul’s Chapel, oldest building in Manhattan and relief center for heroes in the days following 9/11.

The Chapel, with its old cemetery once buried in ash, dust, glass, spreadsheets, emails and sticky notes, doubles as a museum now, with exhibits of artifacts, video displays, and signed banners from around the country hanging from the gallery. There, also, on the side, is a box with one chair and bench; the private seat of George Washington, President of the United States, while the nation’s capitol resided in New York City. Exhausted firefighters slept on that bench in the harried days after the fall of the towers.

Over the box hangs the first painting of the Great Seal, that carefully crafted symbol of the Presidency: a great eagle grasping thirteen arrows to the left, and an olive branch with thirteen leaves to the right. That eagle has been looking toward the olive branch for two hundred years.

I consider the significance of that, and wonder who we are. I consider the jumble of images and symbols absorbed this day, a veritable pool of nascent myth, and wonder who we are becoming.

~Michael Lambert, 2003

(Now, meet Harry Rowland. This video is fine. However, Harry also inspires intimidating questions not discussed in this video. If you're interested, just Google his name and look around..The Guide Still Standing, Part 2.)

Liberals in Limbo?

2010-05-15T09:47:00.000-04:00

This is a response to Charles Blow's column in today's NY Times, Liberals in Limbo.

There is no left in the United States. If you compare today's government with the Democratic administrations of the 60's and 70's, where do the Clinton and Obama Administrations stand by comparison? Center-right. There is only that and the extreme right. The true left withered in the face of the unrelenting propaganda that began during the Reagan years, rose in volume with the Gingrich Congress and became a positively Orwellian drop down the rabbit hole during the Bush-Cheney nightmare.

I mean really. Where was the Tea Party when Bush shoved the Patriot Act down everyone's throats, bloated the deficit by astronomic proportions and increased the size of the federal government more than any president in history?

The imaginary left is blamed for everything and enough get pulled along by the nose-ring because if nonsense is yelled at them enough it becomes truth.

Now we have the likes of Sarah Palin talking from the other side of the looking glass and Glenn Beck catering to people's fears.

And people listen.

Liberals just never got the hang of Republican style propaganda and have, for all intents and purposes, ceased to exist in the public square. There's a couple true libs left in the Democratic Party, but the great ones, like Paul Wellstone and Ted Kennedy are gone forever.

Calling Obama a socialist is very amusing to socialists... who no one bothers to talk to.

America today lacks vision and imagination and is wrapped up in conservative hyperbole and magical thinking. It's all the fault of Obama, teachers and illegal immigrants. In the meantime, those who destroyed the economy are busy counting their ill gotten gains.

A testimony to the politics of distraction.

I just hope this inexorable drag to the right doesn't take us off a cliff.

Drumbeat against teachers takes a toll

2010-05-02T11:43:00.000-04:00

By MICHAEL LAMBERT
First published: Sunday, May 2, 2010
Jon Stewart of Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" and Fox News' Bernard Goldberg recently had an interesting exchange about the media that prompted me to think about teachers.

Goldberg made the point that the media, by focusing on fringe elements and nut jobs, has mischaracterized the tea party movement. It's unfair, Goldberg said, to stereotype the whole movement based on the behavior of a few.

Stewart agreed and contended that Fox News tends to mischaracterize anyone with left leaning views in pretty much the same way. Goldberg admitted that this is, indeed, the case.

This inspired a thought: If the media does, knowingly or not, manipulate the public perception of groups by stereotyping, isn't the same thing happening to teachers?

Here are some headlines from the first page of a Google News search on "teachers": "Poor teachers may hamper good students: U.S. study," "How should teachers be fired?," "'The Cartel' sees teacher unions' grip as crippling," "Held hostage by teachers."

The March 15 cover of Newsweek magazine was particularly pointed. "The Key to Saving American Education" appeared in the middle of the page with a chalk board background covered with "We must fire the bad teachers. We must fire the bad teachers. We must fire the bad teachers."

This has been going on for months.The impact on the public perception of educators has been palpable: Education is stuffed with incompetent and greedy teachers protected by a union that doesn't care about students. Any teacher, no matter how competent, is guilty by association for defending tenure or the teacher's union.

When President Barack Obama endorsed the firing of every teacher at Rhode Island's Central Falls High School, he reinforced the perception that even the best of educators aren't worthy of job security.

But the problem isn't tenure, a system that is flawed but easily remedied, or the union, whose protection educators need now more than ever.

The problem is the corporate model that is the foundation of both the George W. Bush and Obama administrations' education reform. It has turned schools into dehumanized testing factories.

But don't take my word for it. Diane Ravitch, education historian and an architect of the No Child Left Behind Act, outlines the defects of this "reform" model in her highly acclaimed book, "The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice are Undermining Education." She says:

"Testing, I realized with dismay, had become a central preoccupation in the schools and was not just a measure but an end in itself. I came to believe that accountability, as written into federal law, was not raising standards but dumbing down the schools as states and districts strived to meet unrealistic targets."

Politicians have been "reforming" education for more than a century. That alone should raise an eyebrow. No sooner has one reform, whether well- or poorly conceived, been instituted before the next one comes along demanding change. "Reform," unfunded mandates that transfer more and more of the responsibility for children from families and communities to the schools, layoffs resulting in larger class sizes and an endless litany of other societal pressures are compromising teachers' ability to fulfill their mission.

Yet the vast majority of educators continue to do everything they can -- every day, after school, on weekends and often during the summer -- to do the best they can for their students.

When Obama's misguided corporate education "reform" also fails, who will be responsible? The teachers. Always the teachers. They are the safest and easiest of political targets. There's a word for that: scapegoat.

And the news media eats it up. Hold teachers to a higher standard than everyone else in society, especially parents, and crucify them when they don't measure up. It's sensational and sexy, and the public loves it.

Wanting to be a teacher has become a catch-22. Today, you'd have to be nuts and therefore not qualified.

Michael Lambert, a Greenfield resident, is a Capital Region high school English teacher.

An Open Letter to New York United Teachers

2010-04-24T16:45:00.001-04:00

We are losing the battle for public opinion. Badly. The blog responses in today's New York Times, a consistently anti- teacher's union newspaper, to a story titled "Last Teacher In, First Out? City Has Another Idea" are very telling. Interestingly, any political story's blog responses will come out strongly on the progressive side in this paper. This story? Two to one against the union. Two to one.

Why isn't the union mobilizing its membership to counter what is the ugliest education climate in my 26 year career? Why not ask each local to commit to a letter writing campaign to their local papers? Why isn't NYSUT hammering back at the New York Times on a regular basis? The economic crisis is being used against us. We're greedy. We're only out for ourselves. We don't care about the students, only the best retirement package we can get. We have become the "other" responsible for society's ills. Before we know it, tenure will be gone and seniority along with it. The testing madness will shift into a higher gear to determine which of us merits a pay increase.

And this union will be rendered impotent, which is definitely the Republican Party's dream and sure seems to be Obama's too.

We need to fight back. War has been declared on us. That's the only way to look at it. Read Diane Ravitch's, The Death and Life of the Great American School System. Her's seems to be the only effective voice out there supporting us. Let's at least get behind her and push.

But we need to do something before the definition of teacher is changed to 'sacrificial scapegoat tied to a stake.'

Michael Lambert

Gloversville Teacher's Association

An Open Letter to Richard Iannuzzi, President of New York State United Teachers

2010-03-13T12:07:00.000-05:00

Dear Mr. Ianuzzi,

I am writing to you to express my profound exasperation over President Obama's education policy, his recent actions and the current media focus on teachers.

Never before in my 26 year career as an educator have I been this concerned. It seems everywhere you look, the sole theme of education reform is that getting rid of 'bad teachers' is the golden solution to all that is wrong with the world. Newsweek's recent edition (Cover: What's Wrong with Education? Fire the bad teachers, fire the bad teachers, fire the bad teachers...), the New York Times constant harping on 'bad teachers' and most unnervingly the President's endorsement of the wholesale slaughter of teachers in Rhode Island have created a witch-hunt atmosphere in which no teacher, even the best of us, can feel safe.

I have always had doubts about Obama's education policy and his choice of Arnie Duncan as Education Secretary. I never imagined that all that could be wrong with America's educational system, real and imagined, would be put at our door by this supposedly liberal administration. What are we supposed to think? That Obama is pro-labor while he is so obviously trying to break the backs of the NEA and AFT? That Obama is pro-teacher while ignoring the fact that NCLB has had us tied to the whipping post for the past eight years, and that now real education reform is under way? No mention of community and parental responsibilities. No mention of the impossible urban working conditions and teacher turnover. No mention of building administration, social malaise, electronic distractions, unfunded mandates, higher class sizes and the testing madness that has dehumanized the entire system? Why would anyone of even mediocre intelligence want to enter the profession under these conditions? Every day there is a headline. This is from today's AP: "President Barack Obama is promising parents and their kids that with his administration's help they will have better teachers in improved schools..."

I guess "parents and their kids" are not a factor. Just us. How politically expedient.

How many veteran teachers who would otherwise keep working are considering retirement? Who will replace them, especially under New York's new Tier 5? I'm four years from retirement and I would feel a lot safer if it was closer.

What steps are the unions, at all levels, going to make to push back? The President needs to know he cannot take our support for granted. I, personally, will not vote for him again given that his polices look to make Bush's seem like the good old days.

Please tell me NYSUT, the NEA and AFT are crafting a strategy to counter this propaganda that can only do more harm to our profession, our students and our nation.

Most sincerely,
Michael Lambert
Gloversville Teacher's Association

I Said That. Didn't I Say That? I Think I Did.

2009-05-06T09:28:00.006-04:00

A Sarcastic Comment from the Rabbit Hole

(Just because Bush is gone doesn't mean Alice has found her way home.)

Pakistan may overshadow Afghanistan in Washington talks

Well! People are getting nervous now? Nothing like waiting to the last minute to worry about the Taliban and al Qaeda getting close to nuclear weapons! After all, so many more people get to die in the last minute scramble to keep that from happening! Or to fail to keep that from happening!

Whatever!

Just don't say, "Well, who would have predicted this?"

Me. I did. And since I'm no one particularly special, probably lots of other not so particularly special people did too!

It's the particularly special people who are being particularly stupid.

Step into Clemsy's Flashback machine!

Friday, November 02, 2007

A Little Nudge from the Rabbit Hole

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Nov. 1 — For much of the last century, the mountainous region of Swat was ruled as a princely kingdom where a benign autocrat, the wali, bestowed schools for girls, health care for everyone and the chance to get a degree abroad for the talented. Now the region is the newest front line in the battle between Islamic militants, who are sympathetic to the Taliban and Al Qaeda, and Pakistan’s nervous security forces. For the first time, heavy fighting has moved beyond Pakistan’s tribal fringe and into more settled areas of the country. LINK

Okay, here's the chain of events as i see it:

1) 9/11

2) Invade Afghanistan... don't get bin Laden... push him and Taliban into Pakistan...

3) Invade Iraq (no wmd... no democracy... lots of chaos... dead end...)

4)(Taliban and Al Qaeda grow stronger in Pakistan)

5) U.S. worries about Iran maybe, maybe even probably, getting nukes 10 years from now. Lunatics call for bombing of Iran.

6) (Taliban and Al Qaeda grow stronger in Pakistan)

7) Kurdish militants kill lots of Turks in Turkey. Turkey threatens cross border action into Iraq (Predicted in this blog long ago.)

Slow motion slide into some deep level of Dante's inferno? The recent events in Pakistan show the growing confidence and power of the Islamic militants in that country spreading like a cancer.

Hello? Hello? Anyone home?

Pakistan has nuclear weapons. (Never mind that iceberg! The passengers in 'A' lounge need more caviar!)

Post of July 15, 2007:

It's Pakistan, Stupid.

Al Qaeda has regrouped. They are poised, once again to strike the West. However, while the Bush Administration continues to talk about how our big problem in Iraq is Al Qaeda (which is a big lie... al Qaeda in Iraq ranks fifth as a threat), al Qaeda and the Taliban, allowed to move into the rugged terrain on the Pakistani-Afghanistan border by "I'll Get Him Dead or Alive Later" Bush, is making life miserable not only for Afghanistan but is also starting military operations against Musharrif's government in Pakistan.

Britain's most senior generals have issued a blunt warning to Downing Street that the military campaign in Afghanistan is facing a catastrophic failure, a development that could lead to an Islamist government seizing power in neighbouring Pakistan. LINK
Pakistan has a nuclear arsenal, no?

But Iraq is a bigger threat?

Boom.

Happy Solstice, Merry Christmas

2008-12-21T10:26:00.002-05:00

Beyond Christmas

Life in the country has presented me with a deeper contrast to that of the city than I ever would have expected. The round of the seasons is marked by much more than the calendar and change of temperature. The slow rhythm of the year beats around me, and I have fallen into step with it beyond putting the snow tires on the car.

Atrium doors look out to the West from my home. The property had been logged in the past and the new forest has not yet filled in the view to the ridge where the Adirondack Mountains begin. Behind that ridge the sun will set this evening at the furthest southern point of its yearly march, a progression of about 50 degrees from its northernmost setting six months ago. I never expected so great a change, or the slow shadow play back and forth. The inspiration for a Stonehenge is comprehensible to me now and the accuracy of those standing stones no great mystery, just careful observation. Tomorrow, the sun will set just a tick of the compass to the north.

So we celebrate. What a wonderful and human thing to do for the Solstice marks a paradox. On the one hand, the light is returning. There will be spring and summer beyond. On the other, the world has leaned from the sun for six long months, and its effect will take that long again to counter. Now is the dark time for those of northern climes. For much of our history and beyond, these would be months of siege. Our great grandfathers would have watched this evening’s sun set with trepidation, for the coming spring would shine on the freshly dug graves of those laid low by the scythe of King Death: Winter.

So we celebrate. So we thumb our noses at our greatest fear and look beyond to our greatest hope: a warm sun and a harvest good enough to put on weight and strength to stem the following winter. What a wonderful and human thing to do.

Many find this a time of deep melancholy and depression. Theirs may be Christmases remembered of other’s joy and cheer. But if we part the veil behind ‘Jesus is the reason for the season’, we find a deeper, primal reason that goes beyond Jesus, to the root of the inspiration for all myths associated with this, the darkest day of the year. We light the night in defiance of the Dark, we raise our voices in song and cheer and renew our filial bonds because only together as families and communities can the Dark be endured and Hope renewed.

It is from this spring that Christmas draws its power. One need not be Christian to drink from it.

A joyous Solstice and Christmas to you, your families, friends and communities.

Peace,
Clemsy

Sarah Palin: No Second Thoughts

2008-11-16T10:29:00.009-05:00

Remember when Sarah Palin said she didn't even blink when asked if she would accept a place on the McCain ticket? Of course she didn't! That metaphorical blink indicates rolling a question around in your head, looking at it from all angles, comparing it to what you actually know about the subject.

You know, thinking about the question.

So basically she said, "I had no second thoughts." I believe her. I don't think she has any second thoughts.

I mean, "Seeing Russia from Alaska" as a basis for foreign policy experience? An enlightened society would have gently guided her off the stage, smiling and using a soothing tone of voice.

In the attempt to inspire my high school students to think a bit deeper than the words going by on a page, I offered them the following model (I have to admit, I took the idea right out of one of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels.):

There are your first thoughts: the thoughts that acknowledge the words coming into and going out of your head. However, your first thoughts don’t really do much with those words, or care where they go. The ones coming in get filed in some part of your brain labeled “Oblivion,” while the ones on their way out, either through your mouth or your pen, are very likely to read or sound like the twisted wreckage of a fogbound highway pile up.

Or like Sarah Palin’s folksy, wink punctuated syntax:

I know that John McCain will do that and I, as his vice president, families we are blessed with that vote of the American people and are elected to serve and are sworn in on January 20, that will be our top priority is to defend the American people.

(Above diagram courtesy of Kitty Burns Florey at Slate, who's opinion of this sentence goes like this: "I had to give up. This sentence is not for diagramming lightweights. If there's anyone out there who can kick this sucker into line, I'd be delighted to hear from you.")

Second thoughts are necessary to sift out the meaning of words coming in and construct meaning for words going out. Without second thoughts, even flipping burgers can be dangerous.

So, when asked to become vice-president of the United States to a 72 year old guy with a cancer history, Palin's second thoughts should have gone something like this:

"Wow. I didn't ask myself if I'm even qualified. I should probably blink and think about this."

(There’s also third thoughts, and I suspect that people who can function at that level are those ‘intellectuals’ we've all been warned about. Horrors.)

I think this model gives us a valid tool for answering the question, “What do the people who are enamored by Sarah Palin have in common… with Sarah Palin?”

One solution is to check the certification of the all the teachers in Real America.

Or the drinking water.

Or something.

A Little Advice for the Republican Party

2008-11-08T09:39:00.009-05:00

But first...

From electing (arguably) and supporting the most dangerously incompetent, ideologically bankrupt administration in the history of the United States, to electing a black man by the largest margin a Democrat has won by since 1964, the American electorate has my head spinning.

I'm all red spotted and bruised from continually pinching myself.

Of course, there's the exasperating fact that Americans continually and consistently wait until after the sudden stop before opening the chute, but whathehell... Obama will at least take the shovel out of the hands of George Bush (who will certainly be digging furiously between now and January twentieth.)

One just hopes that the ladder reaches the top of the hole. Hard to tell from down here and we won't know until we either reach the surface or run out of ladder.

Now to what's important:

Hey! Republican Party! Jettison your damn base!

This election completely rejected your lizard brain. You know, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, James Dobson, Richard Land, Ann Coulter, etc., etc., ad nauseum. Those folks wouldn't know a decent civil liberty if it bit them on the face. The only one they recognize is the one that says they can define everyone else's because they're right and everyone else are traitors, communists, atheists, intellectuals, eat sushi, drink red wine and live in some part of unreal America (aka "the city").

And that particular civil liberty? They made it up. It doesn't exist. It's neither self-evident nor inalienable. It's also not in the Bill of Rights.

This is the demographic of any culture that's always more than ready to don their brown shirts and start making the kind of history we say "Will Never Happen Again" when the fires are finally out. They want everyone to wear the flag on their lapel, throw away their birth control pills, walk in straight (certainly not gay) lines, enjoy getting trickled on (Oooh... Kinky but economically counterintuitive), allow the poor to go stuff themselves (unless they accept their white and heavily armed version of Jesus) and most importantly get the damn war with Iran underway so it can spiral out of control and bring about the Second Coming and the End of Days.

Let's stress that last point. They want to bring about the end of the world. Okay? They're crazy! But they have a right to be that crazy and I'll always defend that right. They do, after all, play an important role here.

Your base (You know how you say that in Arabic? Al qaeda. Isn't that a hoot?) is the barometer of the health of the American Revolution. Bush and Company have utilized them very cleverly in order to generate some nationalist fervor and frighten the squeaky liberal mice into the woodwork. They've been so successful the past eight years they've started to think they can really take over the country and convince us that Thomas Jefferson was actually a Southern Baptist.

Can we put the genie back in the bottle now please? It's really only fair since the left turned it's back on their base a long time ago. Indeed, it's been so long since anyone other than a lefty has heard from Howard Zinn or Noam Chomsky they might as well be on another planet. Dennis Kucinich hasn't been taken seriously since... Has he ever been taken seriously? Paul Wellstone is dead. The really and truly far lefties are so pissed off they burned their Democratic Party membership cards years ago and laugh uncontrollably when they hear Barack Obama described as anything near liberal.

All that's left of the Democratic electorate is a bunch of underinformed moderates who McCain could have won over if he (or his Keepers... I still can't believe he chose her. Damn but didn't he look like he'd finally escaped the evil kidnappers at his concession speech?) hadn't chosen Sara Palin. I mean, that was a stunning mistake. Leo Strauss certainly would have approved the intention, but he was probably smart enough to realize that the American people weren't that stupid.

So, c'mon. Left-wing extremists are making a lot of noise, but they're well outside and far away in their free speech zone and everyone else is making believe they don't even exist. So will you please put a cork in your crazies? It's your only hope as a party.

They consider Barack Obama the enemy and really resent him undoing their little coup. They'll start undermining his presidency just as rabidly as they did Clinton's (who lefties also consider 'not one of them') in the hope that something like an illicit blow job will shake out.

Because he's not legitimate, just like anyone else who doesn't believe in their well ordered, narrow minded, positively medieval little world.

Wake up Republicans. Tell your crazies to go home and get back on the meds.

Please.

You had your chance and you blew it in every way and at every level conceivable.

Let us have a turn.

The Presidential Debate and The Limits of Power

2008-09-27T09:59:00.003-04:00

I watched the debate last night and thought McCain looked like a crotchety old curmudgeon and Obama played a prevent defense. Seems just about everyone agrees it was a draw which really gives the night to Obama, who now has the momentum and isn't weighted by the most ludicrous, if not dangerous, running mate choice in the history of American politics.

However, afterward I watched Bill Moyer's Journal. He interviewed Andrew J. Bacevich, author of THE LIMITS OF POWER: THE END OF AMERICAN EXCEPTIONALISM.

During the 1990s, at the urging of politicians and pundits, Americans became accustomed to thinking of their country as "the indispensable nation." Indispensability carried with it both responsibilities and prerogatives.

The chief responsibility was to preside over a grand project of political- economic convergence and integration commonly referred to as globalization. In point of fact, however, globalization served as a euphemism for soft, or informal, empire. The collapse of the Soviet Union appeared to offer an opportunity to expand and perpetuate that empire, creating something akin to a global Pax Americana.

The indispensable nation's chief prerogative, self assigned, was to establish and enforce the norms governing the post-Cold War international order. Even in the best of circumstances, imperial policing is a demanding task, requiring not only considerable acumen but also an abundance of determination. The preferred American approach was to rely, whenever possible, on suasion. Yet if pressed, Washington did not hesitate to use force, as its numerous military adventures during the 1990s demonstrated.

What ever means were employed, the management of empire assumed the existence of bountiful reserves of power — economic, political, cultural, but above all military. In the immediate aftermath of the Cold War, few questioned that assumption. The status of the United States as "sole superpower" appeared unassailable. Its dominance was unquestioned and unambiguous. This was not hypernationalistic chest- thumping; it was the conventional wisdom.

The discussion rendered the debate a ludicrous sideshow, a true image of rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. The man voiced thoughts that have haunted me for years. Everyone needs to watch it. Then buy and read the book.

Then mail it to their congressional representatives.

Imagine if just a few thousand did that?

Sarah Palin is No Pig

2008-09-13T13:45:00.002-04:00

I take my figurative language seriously and demand that it be used accurately and efficiently. The recent use of "putting lipstick on a pig" by Barak Obama is a case in point.

No, I don't believe he was referring to Sarah Palin, although I'm sure his campaign people are chuckling at the shit storm it created. In fact, Obama was probably referring to exactly what he was talking about: John McCain and the Republican Party. Now he could have used Sarah Palin in this regard, but he didn't.

No. It's the republican reaction, and a few deranged Clinton supporters who believe McCain/Palin is the next best thing to Hillary Clinton, who have accused Obama of referring to Palin as the pig.

That's inaccurate and shows poor comprehension skills at best.

The image does work, however, in the following way:

The metaphor works well because the of the pig's reputation of wallowing in mud, being greedy and engaging in all manner of immoderation (Is that a word? Should be.) So, we call people who act like that pigs. Fair enough.

Now, what should we call a political party that indulges in economic orgies like unregulated piss-on-everyone-down-below economics, unnecessary war that reaps profits upon profits, and panders to corporations, especially Exxon-Mobile and such, like cheap whores looking for a date?

Of course! They're pigs!

Sarah's not the pig, dammit! Get that straight.

She's the lipstick.

Now, whether or not putting lipstick on a pig, as in smearing Sarah Palin on the Republican party, actually works remains to be seen.

Up Next: The Last Straw

2008-09-09T21:05:00.002-04:00

You know, a couple nights ago I woke up at about 2 a.m. and the thought crept into my head, "McCain may actually win." From there it grew into a sleep eating monster and that was it.

I gotta say, while Obama ain't no savior, he's also not a republican, blind faith, magical thinking nightmare. Twice, enough votes were stolen, and enough third party votes cast to make the difference.

That's the nature of America today: about half blind faithers, willful ignorants and FDA's (the D stands for dangerous, figure the other two out for yourselves), about half people who actually know what's going on, and a bunch who get their opinions from ads and talking heads.

This election is the threshold. If the repubs get four more years, Jefferson's American ideal is done with. Did you see that sea of white faces at the RNC? They believed what they were hearing and saying. Of course they did. They weren't talking to you or me.

They couldn't care less if we live or die. We aren't part of their tribe. Of course Palin is forgiven and protected for her daughter's indiscretion. (Imagine if it were Obama's daughter) Of course O'Riley's are ignored and forgiven. Of course Limabaugh's drug addiction is dismissed. They're on the inside.

We're nothing. We're other. To them, we're not even Americans.

Consider this: If the Dems were so much the same as the repubs, we'd be eating moldy bread in some camp in the desert. Now. Today.

Don't think so? Look at what they've already done.

More of us will die if McCain gets elected. Lots and lots and lots. One way or another.

I swear I will delete politics from my life if the Republicans win this time. I've had enough.

As for Obama, let me quote Howard Zinn:

"...Yes, there are candidates who are somewhat better than others, and at certain times of national crisis (the Thirties, for instance, or right now) where even a slight difference between the two parties may be a matter of life and death.

I’m talking about a sense of proportion that gets lost in the election madness. Would I support one candidate against another? Yes, for two minutes—the amount of time it takes to pull the lever down in the voting booth.

But before and after those two minutes, our time, our energy, should be spent in educating, agitating, organizing our fellow citizens in the workplace, in the neighborhood, in the schools. Our objective should be to build, painstakingly, patiently but energetically, a movement that, when it reaches a certain critical mass, would shake whoever is in the White House, in Congress, into changing national policy on matters of war and social justice."

It is a matter of life and death. No question. Vote for Obama. Please. THEN KICK HIS ASS THE DAY AFTER HE WINS.

If the unthinkable happens, my slogan becomes "Go, lemmings! Go!"

And mood stabilizers do become an option.

Sarah Palin: God, Guns, Abortion Rerereredux

2008-09-06T11:01:00.002-04:00

America has been given yet one more intelligence test.

Yes, I'm concerned.

Fool me once, shame on you.

Fool me twice, shame on me.

Fool me three times, just shoot me.

The Palin choice is purely political, and rather cynically so. I recall, back in his 'maverick' days, when John McCain called the religious right 'agents of intolerance.' Then, because he needed the demographic, he went to Jerry Falwell and shook his hand. He's been pandering to them ever since and Palin is quite simply part of that. A new gas pipeline is 'God's will' she says. The Iraq war is 'God's war' she says.

Great. Her's is an oil/war god. Just what we need.

Given that John is 72, has a cancer history and a family history of heart problems, the probability that she would wind up in the driver's seat is higher than with any other prospective administration that I can think of.

Her acceptance speech was largely written before she was even nominated, and she fumbled when the teleprompter glitched.

The campaign is keeping journalists away from her. Prepared statements only.

She can lock and load and thinks shooting wolves from a chopper is great fun.

She gave birth to a child with Down Syndrome. If you listen to the narrative, this is because she is anti-abortion. As if Pro-choice automatically means pro-abortion, and anyone who is pro-choice would have automatically aborted in such a situation.

The Republican party has brought god, guns and abortion front and center once again in a marvelous display of perception management worthy of the Hollywood they claim to despise. (Like the corporations that fund Hollywood are all run by white, Jewish, liberals from Long Island, instead of white Republicans who will sell whatever people are willing to buy.)

I personally don't believe McCain wanted this one... he wanted Lieberman. If he wins and dies in office, the machine currently running the show will own Palin.

I'll be honest: I admire Obama. He embodies everything a parent would desire a child to aspire to. (The Republicans have framed this as a flaw: above average intelligence-bad, average-good, below average-best.) However, his record and his rhetoric are nowhere near as progressive as I'd like him to be. If you visit the real, red-meat liberal websites and read the comments, they can't stand him. Indeed, the further to the left some are, the less they can even see a difference between the candidates.

The Republicans will frame him as 'liberal' as they did Clinton (both of them), who is no liberal. These are people who hang out just left of center (which used to be very centrist if not a bit conservative) and have allowed the constitution to be 'modified' in the name of 'security' and the power of the presidency to be elevated to a rather frightening degree.

I'll vote for Obama, no question. His administration may slow the decline of America. Mccain-Palin will have us continuing the current free-fall.

It all boils down to how many independents in the mythical 'center', who really aren't sufficiently informed and make decisions based on speeches, sound bites and TV ads, buy into the propaganda flung into their faces.

Palin is such a shallow bit of casting.... but the mediocrity of the American mind (See above intelligence break down.)may buy it.

And what those who brought you the last eight years want more than a McCain victory, is a McCain death soon thereafter.

So if you find yourself in a deep state of depression after election day, back up your hard drives, ziplock your family photos, update your passports and carefully plan a quick getaway for when it really hits the fan.

What? Again?

2008-05-16T22:23:00.003-04:00

Well, having devolved from skeptical to cynical and fully expecting the Democratic Party to screw this up in spectacular fashion, recent events force me to conclude with all certainty that Hillary Clinton will be chosen as Obama’s running mate.

“Why?” you ask.

February 6, 2004, an election year, a typically liberal state ruled to allow gay marriage.

"Oh great," I remember thinking. "Couldn't this have waited until after the election?"

May 15, 2008, an election year, a typically liberal state ruled to allow gay marriage.

Again? Could this be a... a... coincidence?

Damn but the Bush years have rendered me distrustful and sardonically suspicious!

I’ve no problem at all with the recent California conservative, Republican-dominated Supreme Court ruling, but, let’s see… what can be done to energize the disenchanted Republican base… hmmmm… Gay marriage! And… and… Hillary Clinton! Of course! Obama may have gotten in the way of the Democratic Party committing the dumbest act in its history, nominating Hillary Clinton as the presidential nominee, but they can still get her on the ticket, by damn!

Perfect storm! Hillary Clinton and a not really Muslim, but we can make believe he is, black man named Barack Hussein Osama, er, I mean Obama.

Giving full voice to my paranoia I also must ask, “Rove, you insidious bastard! How did you pull this off?”

(Disclaimer: I fully approve of gay marriage. Yahoo! But couldn’t it wait until Christmas?)

The Hillary Hatred Factor

2008-02-09T08:43:00.000-05:00

Just remember boys and girls: A Clinton nomination brings the rabid, vitriolic, unreasoning Clinton haters out of the woodwork. Swift Boating will be brought to new and terrible heights. The right will love it and McCain will kick her ass even if he stays home in bed.

I'm not overly fond of Obama either, but America is hungry for 'new'... so take your pick.

Ask yourself what McCain will do to the Supreme Court during his reign.

This is nuts. The Democratic Party doesn't have a brain worth a damn. Like her or dislike her, just don't forget how much the right wing absolutely despises both Hillary and Bill. Running them (and it is a 'them') is a self inflicted gunshot wound to the head.

My bumper sticker will read, "Don't Blame me! I knew He Would Kick Her Ass!"

Duh.

Conversations With Kurt: The Lost Revolution

2007-12-09T08:57:00.000-05:00

Clemsy sits at his dining room table drinking far too much coffee, tapping his fingers, scrunching his eyebrows and seriously trying to wrap his head around a thought or two while not noticing Riley, big yellow and Lab, giving definite signals of his need to visit his favorite tree.

"Dang," he mumbled. "That many people can't be that wrong, can they?"

He lookes back down at the coffee stained document.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

"Hmmm. 'Self-evident.' That might be the problem."

"May have a point there, boy," said Kurt looking over Clemsy's shoulder. He sat down to Clemsy's left. "I think your dog is trying to tell you something."

"Inna minute," Clemsy replied. "What's my point?"

"Well, what does 'self-evident' mean?"

"It means... er.... hmmm. Lessee..." Clemsy opens his laptop and clicks dictionary.com, a link that, if it had been an actual button, would have appeared worn and barely readable. Entering the term he reads:

clear enough to need no proof

"Well, that's easy enough."

"You'd think. Overestimating people's intelligence is a species character flaw. Now, what does 'unalienable mean?'"

"Haven't a clue." Clemsy refers back to his computer.

Not to be separated, given away, or taken away

"Okay, let me get this straight. As Americans this is what we should think, right? We have no-brainer rights that no one can take away."

"Now you're catching on. Sounds great doesn't it? Too bad it's a load of shit."

"What?!"

"Sure, it's correct when you think about it, but what the hell's the point when people don't have the vocabulary of a chipmunk and all those spelling and vocabulary lists you supposedly memorized in school aren't worth a damn. You get a vocabulary by reading and writing at home. Who thinks about what they read and write in school? How about this little word: among,' as in 'among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.' What does that mean?"

"Well," Clemsy draws his eyebrows together looking for a trap. "Seems simple enough. The list of rights is longer than just those three things."

"Good boy. And the rest of them are no-brainers also right?"

"Right!"

"Wrong!"

"Wrong?"

"Right!"

"What?"

"Listen. Thomas Jefferson was making some god awful assumptions here, the dolt. 'Self evident?' What was he thinking? The only things self evident to a chipmunk are food, sex and the fox trying to eat him. People are chipmunks. They need things spelled out for them as in 'please tell me how to think and what to believe so I can concentrate on food, sex and foxes.' The Founders really did know this. If not, what's the point of the Bill of Rights?"

"To make sure we know what our rights are?"

"Right. Kind of like saying, 'Look moron. You should already know this but if history is any guide you're going to let the republic ride the great swirl in a hurry unless we give you directions. Here are the most important rights we could think of. Read them carefully. Eventually you're going to elect people who will try to take them away from you. Don't let them. They're also going to try to tell you that these are the only rights you have. Not true. You're going to have some holy rollers who resent no longer being able to hang witches tell you that the Constitution is like the Bible, read it literally or burn in hell. These are your rights. No additions, deletions or, most importantly, interpretations. So if the Bill of Rights says nothing about birth control, then you have no right to it. And if you're not a citizen, than you have no rights at all because the Constitution only applies to U.S. citizens. In fact, if you behave in a manner we define as against the greater good, than you forfeit all those rights."

"Whoa! Hold on! That doesn't say that anywhere!"

"Right. So what? If 'We the People' listen to them, then it becomes true."

"Sound like religion to me."

"Now you're being clever. Exactly! One nation under God, lad! And now a nation based on a Revolution that says things about 'all men,' 'self evident' and 'inalienable' acts like an Old Testament, xenophobic religion. So torture is fine if you're from another tribe or get kicked out of this one. We don't have to count casualties if they're not American. Well, they don't count, do they? Now that's self-evident."

"But, but... but," Clemsy stuttered.

"Eloquent. Further, you know the Christians have done the same thing to Christ that's been done to Jefferson. For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But, often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that’s Moses, not Jesus. I haven’t heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere.

'Blessed are the merciful' in a courtroom? 'Blessed are the peacemakers' in the Pentagon? Give me a break!"

"Wait a bit!" Clemsy shouted. "I know we can do something to turn things around! Got to!"

"Well, here's the big problem as I see it. There is a tragic flaw in our precious Constitution, and I don’t know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be president.

But, when you stop to think about it, only a nut case would want to be a human being, if he or she had a choice. Such treacherous, untrustworthy, lying and greedy animals we are!

I was born a human being in 1922 A.D. What does “A.D.” signify? That commemorates an inmate of this lunatic asylum we call Earth who was nailed to a wooden cross by a bunch of other inmates. With him still conscious, they hammered spikes through his wrists and insteps, and into the wood. Then they set the cross upright, so he dangled up there where even the shortest person in the crowd could see him writhing this way and that.

Can you imagine people doing such a thing to a person?

No problem. That’s entertainment, and entertainment is the opiate of the masses, and as long as everyone's more concerned about who's winning on Survivor or American Idol or who Paris Hilton is having sex with, then they won't be reading and writing and improving their vocabulary so they can know what easy words like self-evident or inalienable mean.

I know I'm mixing metaphors, but the chickens have elected Colonel Sanders, you know."

"But is there anything I can do, Kurt?"

"Sure. Write this conversation down and publish it in your blog. At least you'll be able to say you did something. And btw, as they say today, good thing I'm dead. Your dog just peed on my leg."

"Dang."

(Author's note: There are some actual Vonnegut quotes up there.)

One More Quote From the Rabbit Hole

2007-11-24T08:31:00.000-05:00

Clemsy sips his morning coffee as his eyes scan the text on his computer monitor. "Here's a little something," he thinks. "That doofus McClellan has written a book. Now let's see.... What the hey?"

...The most powerful leader in the world had called upon me to speak on his behalf and help restore credibility he lost amid the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. So I stood at the White House briefing room podium in front of the glare of the klieg lights for the better part of two weeks and publicly exonerated two of the senior-most aides in the White House: Karl Rove and Scooter Libby.

There was one problem. It was not true.

I had unknowingly passed along false information. And five of the highest ranking officials in the administration were involved in my doing so: Rove, Libby, the vice President, the President’s chief of staff, and the president himself

"Dang!" he exclaims. "This should ripple the pond but good!" He slams his cup down, sloshing coffee over his AT&T bill, puts on his Yankee cap and drives into town.

The parking lot is suspiciously empty. Not a good sign. He rushes to the corner of Broadway and Lake, looks around and sees... people shopping. Looking at their watches. Petting their dogs.

Shoulders slumped and shaking his head, he walks dejectedly back to his car. Then, the shade of Kurt Vonnegut taps him on the shoulder.

"C'mon Clem," he says. "Lighten up! You didn't think a little event like the former White House Press Secretary claiming the top people in the American government were complicit in blowing the cover of an intelligence agent in order to slap back her husband was going to make any big difference, did you? If you listed all the things people, (Okay fine... important people who were usually reliable and believed up until they said something about His Grace the VP and his fool the Pres) said, that back in the day would have had the collective drawers of Congress and We the People all in a bunch, the list would be a mile long. If anyone takes notice of this one, that'll mean everyone's been an idiot for the past six years. People hate feeling that way about themselves. Will go to amazing lengths to avoid it." He puts his ghostly arm around Clemsy's shoulder as they walk up to his car.

"Nope," he continues. "Unless someone gets them on video tape talking about all this stuff while some intern is having sex with a goat in the background for everyone's amusement, and that'll be the kicker, it's all just one more ho hum in the mountain of shit. One more dropping? Who cares? Now you go on home and keep writing like a good boy. It's therapeutic. Look what it did for me!"

Clemsy sighs and straightens his shoulders. "Thanks, Kurt. Don't know what I'd do without you."

"Either kill yourself or take a happy pill and go back into the Matrix where it's nice and warm and cozy, I'm sure."

After a While, Falling Down the Rabbit Hole Becomes the Norm

2007-11-16T05:53:00.000-05:00

The Bush administration’s days are numbered. But the damage it has done to the balance of powers could be long-lasting. LINK

Every so often I find little comments like this buried in the editorial page of some newspaper or blithely mentioned in some column. After all, editorials and columns are the place of reasoned public discourse, right?

However, lines like the above read like some reporter calmly indicating the wall of water rushing at him from the horizon.

"...Those on the left side of the issue, however, say the tsunami will cause untold hardship. Now back to you, Brian."

"Thanks, Roger. We'll be right back." [cut to commercial]

"Will your home owner's insurance cover the cost of an unexpected disaster?" [backdrop: people standing on roofs awaiting helicopter rescue.]

Long lasting damage to the balance of powers? Shouldn't that be followed by "and the possible end of America as we know it?"

Executive privilege. Unitary presidency. Signing statements. Secrecy. Ignored subpoenas. "Enhanced" interrogation.

We'll continue the list after a word from our sponsors. [cut to commercial]

What if America Died and No One Noticed?

2007-11-11T09:43:00.000-05:00

In the six years of compromising our principles since 9/11, our democracy has so steadily been defined down that it now can resemble the supposedly aspiring democracies we’ve propped up in places like Islamabad. Time has taken its toll. We’ve become inured to democracy-lite. That’s why a Mukasey can be elevated to power with bipartisan support and we barely shrug.

...Wrong track is a euphemism. We are a people in clinical depression. Americans know that the ideals that once set our nation apart from the world have been vandalized, and no matter which party they belong to, they do not see a restoration anytime soon.

Thank you Frank Rich for pointing out the elephant in the living room, and the dead donkey he's sitting on.

The idea of America is dying. Patriots who point this out are labeled defeatists at best or, at worst, traitors while nationalists, seen as a dangerous flaw in any other nation except our own, are seen as patriotic.

The Bush Administration declares our country at war against a strategy, and uses this to justify the accumulation of powers a la Lincoln and Roosevelt.

In other words, a few thugs armed with box openers are equivalent to Japanese imperial aggression and the Nazi blitzkrieg.

Our reaction? Turn on Survivor and pass me a beer.

That's It. I Quit. Chuck Schumer is Charlie Brown.

2007-11-10T09:08:00.000-05:00

For most of my political life I was an ardent, if not militant, independent. When George Bush and the lock-stepped Republican majority showed they had every intention of setting the world on fire in the wake of 9/11, when a wise leader could have done something new with the global sentiment at the time, I became a Democrat in the hope that enough of us would add a little backbone to a party of handwringing wimps.

Almost doesn't count. Now that Mukasey has been sworn in as attorney general, allowed by Democratic senators like Schumer and Feinstein who just don't get it no matter how many times they've been jacked like Charlie Brown believing that Lucy won't pull the football this time, I can no longer take the embarrassment of being associated with these people.

However, I will grit my teeth and hold on just long enough to vote in the primary against every candidate who decided to take the invertebrate route by not even showing up to vote for or against a man who "has publicly backed the administration’s broad interpretation of powers granted it under the Patriot Act" and who refused to take a stand on a procedure defined as "controlled drowning."

That would be every democratic senator now running for the office of President.

Independence here I come.

Domino Theory Validated

2007-11-03T10:36:00.000-04:00

So it took 40 years.

So Osama bin Laden knocked over the first tile: America.

America knocks down Iraq and Afghanistan which is in the process of knocking down Nuclear Pakistan.

Brilliant!

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Nov. 3 — The Pakistani leader, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, declared a state of emergency about 6 p.m. local time today, Pakistani television reported.

...Just after 5 p.m. signs that a state of emergency would be declared started to emerge. All television stations were blocked as news media were reporting a meeting of General Musharraf and his top aides in the president's office.

A Pakistani intelligence official said that a list had been prepared of prominent Pakistani journalists and opposition politicians who would be detained. LINK

Who falls next?

A Little Nudge from the Rabbit Hole

2007-11-02T05:48:00.000-04:00

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Nov. 1 — For much of the last century, the mountainous region of Swat was ruled as a princely kingdom where a benign autocrat, the wali, bestowed schools for girls, health care for everyone and the chance to get a degree abroad for the talented.

Now the region is the newest front line in the battle between Islamic militants, who are sympathetic to the Taliban and Al Qaeda, and Pakistan’s nervous security forces. For the first time, heavy fighting has moved beyond Pakistan’s tribal fringe and into more settled areas of the country. LINK

Okay, here's the chain of events as i see it:

1) 9/11
2) Invade Afghanistan... don't get bin Laden... push him and Taliban into Pakistan...
3) Invade Iraq (no wmd... no democracy... lots of chaos... dead end...)
4) (Taliban and Al Qaeda grow stronger in Pakistan)
5) U.S. worries about Iran maybe, maybe even probably, getting nukes 10 years from now. Lunatics call for bombing of Iran.
6) (Taliban and Al Qaeda grow stronger in Pakistan)
7) Kurdish militants kill lots of Turks in Turkey. Turkey threatens cross border action into Iraq (Predicted in this blog long ago.)

Slow motion slide into some deep level of Dante's inferno? The recent events in Pakistan show the growing confidence and power of the Islamic militants in that country spreading like a cancer.

Hello? Hello? Anyone home? Pakistan has nuclear weapons. (Never mind that iceberg! The passengers in 'A' lounge need more caviar!)

Quote from the Rabbit Hole

2007-10-28T13:44:00.000-04:00

“They’re all ways of evading the terrible choice we have to make which is to either let them get the bomb or to bomb them.” ~Norman Podhoretz on Iran

Thoughts from the Rabbit Hole

2007-10-27T11:29:00.000-04:00

Reading blogs here and there and comments on my favorite lefty websites like CommonDreams and Buzzflash, seems some folks, rolling their eyes and shaking their heads at the continued terminal ineffectiveness of the majority party, would like a popular revolt. Great idea. I would like a popular revolt.

One problem… Enough people would have to be informed for the ‘popular’ part to work. Most Americans are news skimmers and haven’t a clue as to what’s going on.

Too many Americans still think of America in a magical way: can’t happen here, Americans don’t do things like that, America is a Christian Nation (Oh, my favorite, that one), the Constitution is still keeping things in check (insert rolling eyed emoticon HERE)...

I could go on.

And things have gone so far the country’s ability to confront itself is even further disabled. We’re torturing people in a concentration camp for Christ’s sake. The rhetoric about Iran is taken right out of the "Let's Invade Iraq" play book.

America stands, either frozen in the headlights or smilingly ignoring the symptoms that a quick trip to the doctor will reveal there's just a few weeks left to live.

Remember Zaphod Beeblebrox in Douglas Adam’s Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy? He wore glasses that got darker and darker as things got bleaker and bleaker…

I’ve gotten to the point between “Go, lemmings go!” and waiting, like Alice, for the fall down the rabbit hole to end.

Exactly what do you do when you’re trapped in a Kurt Vonnegut novel?

I really don’t know anymore.

But I bet I can mix a bunch more metaphors! There's so much material to work with.

It's Pakistan, Stupid.

2007-07-15T10:57:00.000-04:00

Al Qaeda has regrouped. They are poised, once again to strike the West. However, while the Bush Administration continues to talk about how our big problem in Iraq is Al Qaeda (which is a big lie... al Qaeda in Iraq ranks fifth as a threat), al Qaeda and the Taliban, allowed to move into the rugged terrain on the Pakistani-Afghanistan border by "I'll Get Him Dead or Alive Later" Bush, is making life miserable not only for Afghanistan but is also starting military operations against Musharrif's government in Pakistan.

Britain's most senior generals have issued a blunt warning to Downing Street that the military campaign in Afghanistan is facing a catastrophic failure, a development that could lead to an Islamist government seizing power in neighbouring Pakistan. LINK

Pakistan has a nuclear arsenal, no?

But Iraq is a bigger threat?

Boom.

The Libby Commutation and Other Sordid Treasons

2007-07-02T18:36:00.000-04:00

On September 7th, 2002, quoting an nonexistent IAEA report claiming Iraq would have a nuke within six months, George Bush, Autocrat of the United States of America, said, "What more evidence do we need."

So here we are. "Scooter" Libby, responsible for protecting Dick Cheney from being accused of outing a covert CIA Agent whose job was monitoring the acquisition of rogue nations, like Iran, of nuclear weapons, has had his sentence for obstruction of Justice commuted.

Of course Cheney outed Plame. Everyone not drowning in Fox News kool-aid knows this. Doesn't matter. He got away with it. He's getting away with it. He will get away with it.

Of course Libby obstructed Justice. He was convicted. An appeals court, a republican appointed appeals court, upheld the conviction and sentence.

With a waive of his autocratic hand, George Bush commuted his prison term.

You see, there is a different "Justice" at the high, rarefied strata of the privileged and powerful.

Same as it's always been.

But here they used to camouflage it with finesse, loopholes, smoke and mirrors. The wrappings of "Democracy" had meaning: "All men are created equal," and "are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights," "Equal justice under the law."

Yeah... it's that last one especially that sits at the bottom of the stomach like rotten meat.

They don't hide it anymore. They don't care. They have the brass ring and you don't. They have the power.

And you don't.

They stole it, you see. We let them. We pretend the rules are still the same and they're playing a different game.

Impeach?

Fat chance. That's one of the old rules. What do these people have to do to prove theirs is an illegitimate, totalitarian government that has been, is, and will be the antithesis of everything we say we believe in.

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

"What? No revolution yet?"

"What more evidence do we need."

Fear! Fire! Foe!

Wake the fuck up!

Bill Moyers: Finally Putting It All Together and the Slow Death of American Journalism

2007-04-28T10:09:00.000-04:00

Bill Moyers is back and is he pissed. Watch Buying the War online. An excellent documentary on the failure of the media on the run up to the war. The only flaw is that he had to leave so much out (otherwise it would have had to be a mini-series.)

Four years ago on May 1, President Bush landed on the aircraft carrier USS Lincoln wearing a flight suit and delivered a speech in front of a giant "Mission Accomplished" banner. He was hailed by media stars as a "breathtaking" example of presidential leadership in toppling Saddam Hussein. Despite profound questions over the failure to locate weapons of mass destruction and the increasing violence in Baghdad, many in the press confirmed the White House's claim that the war was won. MSNBC's Chris Matthews declared, "We're all neo-cons now;" NPR's Bob Edwards said, "The war in Iraq is essentially over;" and Fortune magazine's Jeff Birnbaum said, "It is amazing how thorough the victory in Iraq really was in the broadest context."

How did the mainstream press get it so wrong? How did the evidence disputing the existence of weapons of mass destruction and the link between Saddam Hussein to 9-11 continue to go largely unreported?

Watch it and feel the wind changing.

Edit: Right on the heels of Moyers show is this report from Greg Palast:

IN AN E-MAIL uncovered and released by the House Judiciary Committee last month, Tim Griffin, once Karl Rove's right-hand man, gloated that "no [U.S.] national press picked up" a BBC Television story reporting that the Rove team had developed an elaborate scheme to challenge the votes of thousands of African Americans in the 2004 election...

"That guy is a British reporter who accepted some false allegations and made a story up," he said.

Let's get one fact straight, Mr. Griffin. "That guy" is not a British reporter. I am an American living abroad, putting investigative reports on the air from London for the British Broadcasting Corp.

I'm not going to argue with Rove's minions about the validity of our reporting, which led the news in Britain. But I can tell you this: To the extent that it was ignored in the United States, it wasn't because the report was false. It was because it was complicated and murky and because it required a lot of time and reporting to get to the bottom of it. In fact, not one U.S. newsperson even bothered to ask me or the BBC for the data and research we had painstakingly done in our effort to demonstrate the existence of the scheme.

The truth is, I knew that a story like this one would never be reported in my own country. Because investigative reporting — the kind Jack Anderson used to do regularly and which was carried in hundreds of papers across the country, the kind of muckraking, data-intensive work that takes time and money and ruffles feathers — is dying.

Good Quote from Salon

2007-03-14T08:50:00.000-04:00

The Coulterization of the American right

It is a truism that American politics is won in the middle. For a magic moment, helped immeasurably by 9/11, the GOP was able to convince just enough centrist Americans that extremists like Coulter and Limbaugh did in fact share their values. But the spell has worn off, and they have been exposed as the vacuous bottom-feeders that they are.

It will be objected that Coulter, Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Michael Savage and their ilk are just the lunatic fringe of a respectable movement. But in what passes for conservatism today, the lunatic fringe is respectable. In the surreal parade of Bush administration follies and sins, one singularly telling one has gone almost entirely unremarked: Vice President Dick Cheney has appeared several times on Rush Limbaugh's radio show. Think about this: The holder of the second-highest office in the land has repeatedly chummed it up with a factually challenged right-wing hack, a pathetic figure only marginally less creepy than Coulter. Imagine the reaction if Al Gore, when he was vice president, had routinely appeared on a radio show hosted by, say, Ward Churchill. (The comparison is feeble: There really is no left-wing equivalent of Limbaugh, just as there is no left-wing equivalent of Father Coughlin or Joe McCarthy.) The entire American political system would melt down. Beltway wise men would trip on their penny loafers in their haste to demand Gore's head. Robert Bork would come out of retirement to call for a coup to restore the caliphate, I mean the Judeo-Christian moral law in America. Yet the grotesque Cheney-Limbaugh love-in doesn't raise an eyebrow. We're so inured to the complete convergence of "respectable" conservatism and reactionary talk-radio ravings that we don't even deem it worthy of comment.

The Long Awakening

2007-03-07T14:17:00.000-05:00

Americans are peculiar people.

Dependable, but peculiar. You can depend on them to realize there is ...something wrong. You can depend on them to put off doing anything about it until the last minute. Then you can depend on them to consider the situation for fifty-nine seconds. They're somewhere in that last minute right now. I'd say, around thirty seconds and counting.

About time.

Nine-Eleven put Americans to sleep. While asleep they were fed their worst nightmares, told where to look, what to see.

Fear, fear everywhere: cliff edges, monsters, imminent oblivion dressed in black veils wrapped in explosives, bearded, smiling. At his feet another illusion, a construct, a hyperbole, fauning, fooled, weak, liberal: the source of American failure and impurity. The Devil and his Familiar. The source of all our sorrow.

In their nightmare, bin Laden morphed into Hussein and the pin was pulled from Iraq.

Boom.

But a nightmare can last only so long before the brain says, "Enough." Last November, Americans said, "Enough."

About time.

The other day Ann Coulter called John Edwards a faggot and Americans noticed, as if this were the first time she'd said anything reprehensible, as if she'd never "joked" about assassinating a president or poisoning a supreme court justice or bombing Mideast cities, killing their leaders and converting their people to Christianity or that she never had much use for the first amendment. This is a good one:

"Liberals hate America, they hate "flag-wavers," they hate abortion opponents, they hate all religions except Islam (post 9/11). Even Islamic terrorists don't hate America like liberals do. They don't have the energy. If they had that much energy, they'd have indoor plumbing by now."

When she made her comment about Edwards, the audience applauded. Americans are also human so tend toward human behavior. They often forget that. There will always be a portion who will desire comforting uniformity and the identification of a well defined enemy. Fear cements them together in a waking nightmare with no ending where the only pleasure is watching the annihilation of the "Other".

When the Beast touches down on Earth, they are here to worship at its feet with the sacrifice of millions. Coulter, Savage, Limbaugh... they are the muezzin of xenophobic Americanism; a pseudo-religion walking the road to death camps and mass graves. A long road, perhaps, but a road defined by its destination. Americans have decided they don't want to hear it anymore.

About time.

But they are still somewhere in that last minute. Thay are still in the process of waking up and seeing past the shadows fed into their brains. The end of the story is yet to be written.

Don't expect some "happily ever after." I'll be satisfied with, "Whew! That was a close one!"

The Nuke Factor Revisited

2007-02-24T10:40:00.000-05:00

On September 7th, 2002, George Bush citing an "IAEA report", stated unequivocably that Iraq was within six months of developing a nuclear weapon. "What more evidence do we need," was the quote of the day. Twenty days later, Joseph Curl of the Washington Times reported (distastefully I'm sure, and nowhere near the front page) that according to the IAEA no such report existed.

The Washington Times. The rest of the 'liberal' mainstream media didn't seem to find the story worthy of verification. (This is Clemsy's favorite Bush Peeve. See HERE.)

The following month, and apparently clueless of the above, Congress (Hillary, do you hear me?) voted George Bush a free hand on setting the Iraq aflame.

Today we hear from the same 'honorable men' that Iran is busy pursuing nuclear weapons. The CIA and other U.S. agencies have intel about these programs. Says today's Guardian:

However, most of the tip-offs about supposed secret weapons sites provided by the CIA and other US intelligence agencies have led to dead ends when investigated by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors, according to informed sources in Vienna.

"Most of it has turned out to be incorrect," a diplomat at the IAEA with detailed knowledge of the agency's investigations said. Link

Will someone please take George's keys before he drives yet another car into the ditch?

...And get Dick "Shotgun" Cheney out of the vehicle also.

Duh.

Someone Please Slap William Kristol

2007-01-15T10:43:00.000-05:00

Willy will never get confused with Billy. Willy is so not funny. As a top ranker at the PNAC, Editor of the Weekly Standard and overall co-architect and cheerleader for every inch of the Iraq misadventure, you'd think the guy would have to have a few brain cells to rub together. But when asked why Lt. Gen. David H. Petraeus wasn't rushed off to the Mideast as the new boss with a little more urgency replied:

Because it's the Bush administration. Maybe you haven't noticed -- they're not the most competent at executing the war. LINK

What? Not the most competent at executing the war?

Well, golly, isn't that an inconvenience.

I thought these morons were supposed to have this 'corporate model of the government' thing going.

"Oh well. The CEO just isn't that competent." shoulder shrug "Whatyagonnado?"

Just when you think you know what 'dumbass' means, someone takes it to a whole new level.

What More Evidence Do We Need?

2007-01-12T05:50:00.000-05:00

Iraq is at a violent and "precarious juncture," while al-Qaeda is significantly expanding its global reach, effectively immune to the loss of leaders in battle...

...the Taliban is mounting a vigorous insurgency in Afghanistan...

Pakistan has become a safe haven for top terrorists...

Iran's growing regional power is threatening Middle East stability.

In their annual worldwide threat assessment before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Negroponte and other top intelligence chiefs provided a bleak assessment of regions and conflicts at the center of President Bush's foreign policy agenda.

Lt. Gen. Michael D. Maples said Iraqi security forces have been thoroughly infiltrated by Shiite militias and "are presently unable to stand alone against Sunni insurgents, al-Qaeda in Iraq" or the militias themselves. LINK

I used to have a special education student during my days in a behavior management classroom. This cute little kid was getting busted constantly for shoplifting, running away, truancy and everything else his 11 year old impulsive head could come up with. He'd go to court, the judge would say, "If I see you in my courtroom one more time..."

The kid said to me one day, "Mr. Clemsy, what do I have to do for them to put me away?"

The statements in the above quote are from the annual worldwide threat assessment before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. They all boil down to two words: failed policy.

Make that three words: wretchedly failed policy. Disgracefully, dreadfully, unforgivably, and reprehensibly also work well to describe this failure.

"What more evidence do we need?" George Bush said on September 7th, 2002 after falsely claiming Iraq was within six months of developing a nuclear weapon.

What more evidence do we need that George Bush is the most incompetent administrator in the history of the United States? How far does a CEO have to go before the Board of directors fires his ass.

What does this man have to do for us to put him away? Become the worst administrator in the history of the world?

If we wait that long, there may be no future, which at least saves him from a poor legacy.

AEI, McCain and Leiberman

2007-01-06T10:01:00.000-05:00

Watch as Bush's "New Way Forward" in Iraq parallels the American Enterprise Institute's plan authored by Frederick W. Kagan. The plan calls for a long term increase of troops by at least 25,000.

Sharing munchies at the plan's unveiling were John McCain, who has proven himself to be just another political prostitute, and Joe Lieberman. Personally, I think the Democratic majority in the Senate will have a short life span, as Lieberman will find he might as well be a Republican if he's going to hang out at the think tank responsible for most of the Bush Administration's policy decisions.(Note:AEI and the PNAC are best friends.)

I would expect a firestorm of protest over Lieberman's involvement in this madness. After all, the only effective tactics against insurgencies are those employed iron fisted rulers.

You know, like Hitler, Stalin, Hussein, the Roman emperors, etc. The tactics were simple: wholesale slaughter.

In the meantime, George will behave in the manner dictated by his psychology: any change in course requires going faster in the same direction.

Looks like Bush is headed for an early confrontation with the new Congress.

The Chilling Story of Jose Padilla

2007-01-03T20:03:00.000-05:00

This story, heard on the way to work with Mrs. Clemsy, really drives home how close to the edge we are in America. Jose Padilla, unsavory character though he may be, is an American citizen.

Kudos to Nina Totenberg and NPR for running this story and posting the transcript on its website. Read this. If you are justly chilled, click the link and read the whole thing.

It'll freeze you solid.

from U.S. Faces Major Hurdles in Prosecuting Padilla

The prosecution faces major problems in the trial. The defense has asked the judge to throw the entire case out, asserting that the government's treatment of Padilla has been "so outrageous as to shock the conscience."

According to court papers filed by Padilla's lawyers, for the first two years of his confinement, Padilla was held in total isolation. He heard no voice except his interrogator's. His 9-by-7 foot cell had nothing in it: no window even to the corridor, no clock or watch to orient him in time.

Padilla's meals were delivered through a slot in the door. He was either in bright light for days on end or in total darkness. He had no mattress or pillow on his steel pallet; loud noises interrupted his attempts to sleep.

Sometimes it was very cold, sometimes hot. He had nothing to read or to look at. Even a mirror was taken away. When he was transported, he was blindfolded and his ears were covered with headphones to screen out all sound. In short, Padilla experienced total sensory deprivation.

During length interrogations, his lawyers allege, Padilla was forced to sit or stand for long periods in stress positions. They say he was hooded and threatened with death. The isolation was so extreme that, according to court papers, even military personnel at the prison expressed great concern about Padilla's mental status.

The government maintains that whatever happened to Padilla during his detention is irrelevant, since no information obtained during that time is being used in the criminal case against him.

Padilla's lawyer, Andrew Patel, rejects that premise. The assumption, says Patel, is that the U.S. government can do anything it wants to an American citizen as long as it does not use any information it extracts in a court of law.

Even former Justice Department spokesman Corallo concedes that in hindsight, Padilla was a bit player. Corallo says the government faces a problem over its ever-changing claims about what Padilla did and whether he could be prosecuted in a civilian court.

"It's going to make it difficult moving forward, because we were inconsistent," Corallo says.

Too Mentally Damaged to Stand Trial?

Another dilemma faces the government as well. Padilla's lawyers contend that as a result of his isolation and interrogation, their client is so mentally damaged that he is unable to assist in his own defense. He is so passive and fearful now, they maintain, that he is "like a piece of furniture."

Even at this late stage, after dozens of meetings with his lawyers, Padilla suspects that they are government agents, says Andrew Patel, who is on the legal team. Padilla may believe that the lawyers assigned to represent him are in fact "part of a continuing interrogation program."

The situation has become impossible, defense lawyers say; they've hired two psychiatric experts to examine Padilla. Both have often testified for the prosecution in criminal cases. This time they have sided with the defense.

After spending more than 25 hours with Padilla, both psychiatric experts have concluded that his isolation and interrogation have resulted in so much mental damage that he is incompetent to stand trial.

Where's CNN? Where are the Big Three Networks? Where's the NY Times? The Washington Post?

Where are the Democrats?

Where the hell is everybody? Anybody?

Our new Congress will try to play a nice, safe political game with the Republicans when they should be turning the spotlights on the Stalinistic horror show going on in our name with our tax dollars.

I hope the heat given the Democrats by us so-called left-wing extremists makes the Republicans think they had a luke warm bath by comparison.

And the Comedians Shall Lead Them

2006-11-22T08:36:00.000-05:00

One area of competence for the Bush Administration has been in the muting of popular dissent. Embedded journalists and censored news (filming returning coffins 'violates the privacy of the families') kept the images out of our living rooms. Avoiding conscription, much to their consternation I would assume, kept the college campuses tear gas free and music lyrics focused on love, sex and the angst of youth.

Intimidating the recording industry and owning the airwaves helped with that one: Get outta town, Dixie Chicks.

As for the tried and true songs of the 60's revolution, well, Thundercap Newman's "Something in the Air" is selling Direct TV and The Who sells CSI. (The reviews are quite good on their new album, the release of which coincides with Daltry's appearance on the show. Remember the Who's Next album cover?) There are too many examples of 'how times have changed.'

You get the picture.

This isn't to take away from the fairly recent splash from Neil Young and the work by Dave Matthews, Bruce Springsteen, Green Day and others against the war and this administration, but this ain't 1970.

No. It's been the comedians who have been brave enough and, well, smart enough to show us the painfully obvious about the imperialist imbeciles who have been running the country and who all belong in some nice, safe institution where they can play Risk all day.

Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Bill Maher, David Letterman, Blly Crystal etc. have been practically in bliss, having been blessed with so much ignored material.

Ignored.

The brilliance of The Daily Show lay in its simplicity, and of The Colbert Report in its easy irony.

For example:

At a New York Times lunch, when Stewart was asked how his show did such a good job digging up clips catching the president and other officials contradicting themselves, the comedian shot back, "A clerk and a video machine." LINK

Are you paying attention American "53rd in the World" Press?

If you haven't caught Billy Crystal's routine in Comic Relief, this one, folks, is a moral imperative.

No. It's not funny. Crystal stands there in front of a mock up of a post-Katrina New Orleans street holding a clarinet. He plays an old musician displaced by the storm. His mannerisms and facial expresions make you wonder why it's not a trumpet in his hands, so well is he being Louis Armstrong.

The monologue is brilliant and puts the disaster, mercilessly, at the feet of George Bush. But it's not mean spirited. It's sad. It's tragic.

It's genius.

I'd like to personally thank all of those people who make us laugh, and who have especially made us laugh at ourselves, question ourselves and have shown us the irony of America: Who we are as compared to who we think we are.

Now that the Democrats have taken control of Congress, with no small part played by those mentioned above, I look forward to their grilling, hot and spicy, every night at eleven.

Keep'em honest you guys. Show them no mercy.

Light at the End of the Tunnel (and a few quotes)

2006-11-11T08:59:00.000-05:00

Two years ago, people were talking about permanent right-wing dominance of American politics. But since then the American people have gotten a clearer sense of what rule by movement conservatives means. They’ve seen the movement take us into an unnecessary war, and botch every aspect of that war. They’ve seen a great American city left to drown; they’ve seen corruption reach deep into our political process; they’ve seen the hypocrisy of those who lecture us on morality.

And they just said no. ~Paul Krugman

It will be interesting to watch the coming months roll by, as we've been released from the 'faith based reality' of those who claimed to have onmipotent power to shape the world in their image.

Nothing like 'reality based reality'. Negotiating our way out of the labyrinth will take fine minds and fancy footwork.

But the corner has been turned in American politics. We've shrugged off the pompous and arrogant ideology of the most unimaginative leaders who have ever found, or stolen, their way into office.

A severe test of human wisdom is upon us. Watch, as history unfolds....

Clemsy Quotes!

I am joining the Democratic Party. After twenty-nine years of considered, even militant, political non-affiliation I find myself pushed, literally coerced by the Bush Administration, into taking sides. ~June, 2003

To learn even the basic facts of what is really going on in this continuing “war”, one has to take responsibility for obtaining information. No one’s going to hand it to you. ~July, 2003

More than half the country voted for Al Gore. The Bush administration should remember that. ~August, 2003

If you don’t know about The Project for the New American Century, then you don’t know the government of George W. Bush. ~September, 2003

While many Americans need to believe their president to be the most competent, I need to believe that Americans hold their president to the very highest personal standards. We cannot tolerate a glib, dogmatic, uncurious, ill informed, conventional thinker as Commander in Chief in a time of war. President Bush’s relationship with God does not make him a saint, nor did September Eleventh make him an FDR. He is simply a man in a position for which he is unqualified. ~October, 2004

If the CIA screwed up on WMD in Iraq, leaving Bush and Co. squeaky clean victims of its incompetence, then why, on September 7th, 2002, did George Bush cite an International Atomic Energy Agency (that’s IAEA, not CIA) report that Iraq would have a nuke within six months, a report that the IAEA later said didn’t exist? ~April, 2005

Make no mistake and don’t be a stupid American, this mess was never about terrorism, WMD or spreading “freedom”. It was about a large, permanent military presence in the region and control of a large supply of oil. What’s it about now? Does BushCo even know? Or are they making it up as they go along? Things certainly aren’t going according to plan. ~May, 2005

What does liberalism mean?

If the first thing to come to mind is “welfare queen”, Ted Kennedy, Bill Clinton, atheism, homosexuality, New York City, bestiality, flag-burning, traitor, or thinking George Bush is a moron then you are the victim of the most successful propaganda campaign in recent history. ~May, 2005

Traditional conservatives need to be enlisted against this administration which pretends to be conservative. Small government? Fiscal sanity?

Show them the numbers and remind them: "Where's Osama?" ~June, 2005

Why is Iran so happy? Why are Iraqi women so sad? ~August, 2005

I think we should build even more industries important to the health of the economy in hurricane zones, don't you? ~September, 2005

Who needs Monty Python when you have George Bush? ~October, 2005

Poor Repubs. Thought they had the brass ring. Turned out to be fools gold. Instead of a minor deity with a direct line to God, they've found themselves in bed with the very devil. (Imagine that? The devil isn't Bill Clinton!) ~November, 2005

I've heard this interesting word quite a lot lately on NPR. Read it in a bunch of articles. All of a sudden. Out of nowhere. Just within the past week or so.

The word is "Kurdistan." ~December, 2005

We should be at war against a dysfunctional and incompetent government that is busy doing more damage to our republic than Osama bin Laden could ever dream about. ~January, 2006

We allowed ourselves to be cowed by our fear while "the crazies" played the Incompetent Conqueror until creating the perfect FUBAR situation. ~February, 2006

Absent their own Renaissance and Enlightenment, liberal democracy in essentially religious theocracies is doomed to bloody failure. ~March, 2006

Do you think Bush realizes how happy he makes Jon Stewart every time he says something precious like, "I'm the decider"? ~April, 2006

War on terror. A fairy tale to scare children at night. A sound bite for votes. ~May, 2006

I'd love nothing more than to flush our entire political structure down the drain and start from scratch. So few are genuine. So many can only utter scripted, manicured drivel meant to address poll numbers or adviser-perceived trends. ~June, 2006

Ah. Frozen embryos are too sacred to use for medical research, but innocent civilian lives are worth trading for 'clarity,' whatever the hell that means. ~July, 2006

September 11, 2001 unhinged the American psyche allowing madness to radiate out of the Bush Administration like a nuclear meltdown. ~August, 2006

Can Anyone Be This Stupid?

2006-11-03T19:42:00.000-05:00

U.S. Web Archive Is Said to Reveal a Nuclear Primer

Last March, the federal government set up a Web site to make public a vast archive of Iraqi documents captured during the war. The Bush administration did so under pressure from Congressional Republicans who had said they hoped to “leverage the Internet” to find new evidence of the prewar dangers posed by Saddam Hussein.

But in recent weeks, the site has posted some documents that weapons experts say are a danger themselves: detailed accounts of Iraq’s secret nuclear research before the 1991 Persian Gulf war. The documents, the experts say, constitute a basic guide to building an atom bomb.

Last night, the government shut down the Web site after The New York Times asked about complaints from weapons experts and arms-control officials. A spokesman for the director of national intelligence said access to the site had been suspended “pending a review to ensure its content is appropriate for public viewing.”

Officials of the International Atomic Energy Agency, fearing that the information could help states like Iran develop nuclear arms, had privately protested last week to the American ambassador to the agency, according to European diplomats who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the issue’s sensitivity. One diplomat said the agency’s technical experts “were shocked” at the public disclosures. LINK

I was incredulous when I saw this link from Buzzflash. I was horrified when I heard the story discussed on All Things Considered on NPR.

So right wing whackos couldn't come to terms with the fact that Iraq had no WMD, so strong armed Negroponte into uploading documents captured in Iraq into the World Wide bloody Web.

Problem: The docs are in arabic, a language our "intelligence" agencies don't know very well.

Arabic. Fucking arabic.

The docs in question detailed and diagrammed triggering mechanisms. Nuclear detonators.

So the correspondent was asked, "Does Iran have this stuff?"

Answer, "No."

Those docs were up for weeks. The feds shut the site down last night.

Iran has them now. So does anyone else with an interest. (Osama, laughter will be the death of you. We certainly won't be.)

Appreciate the irony. People convinced our supposed "enemy" had WMD have almost made sure our real enemies will.

If this doesn't sweep these stupid people out of power, people who are busy right now trying to convince us that a vote for the political opposition is a vote for the terrorists, We the People deserve everything we get.

The rest of the world, however, doesn't deserve the fallout.

Cheers,
Clemsy

The Silliness of George Bush

2006-09-16T08:24:00.000-04:00

President Bush on the 'problem' he's having getting his terror bill through the Senate, and the comments made by Colin Powell:

If there's any comparison between the compassion and decency of the American people and the terrorist tactics of extremists, it's flawed logic. It's just _ I simply can't accept that.

Who's comparing American behavior with terrorists, George? The comparison is between the behavior you're promoting and how Americans should behave.

Big difference, dude.

Another wonderful quote:

There was a stark change between the culture of the ’50s and the ’60s — boom — and I think there’s change happening here. It seems to me that there’s a Third (Christian) Awakening.

Bush told a group of conservative journalists that he notices more open expressions of faith among people he meets during his travels, and he suggested that might signal a broader revival similar to other religious movements in history. LINK

Every so often the Messiah in the man comes out, no? Poor George. If he'd only allow other than his loyal sycophants anywhere near him, he know how absurd a statement this is.

Visit Mother Jones for Lie by Lie: Chronicle of a War Foretold: August 1990 to March 2003

The Hightower Lowdown

2006-08-23T19:20:00.000-04:00

Need some factoids to feed your local unwitting political idiots? Check THIS courtesy of everyone's favorite populist, Jim Hightower. You can even download a pdf poster of the data.

Pass it around!

Thanks Jim!

Swirling Further

2006-08-04T20:30:00.000-04:00

O judgment! thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason. -Shakepeare

Here's a little thought that should have you reaching for some happy pills: The fate of the world rests in the hands of Osama bin Laden. That's right. The one guy personally responsible for the chain of events leading to the train wreck in Iraq, Afghanistan and probably Lebanon can, with the lift of a finger, send the world to hell.

Let me explain.

September 11, 2001 unhinged the American psyche allowing madness to radiate out of the Bush Administration like a nuclear meltdown. Five years later it still goes on, but there are many indications the linchpin of American reason is finding its way back into place. The monolithic nightmare that our one-party government has become are giving many to pause and think, and the coming November elections may, just may, signal troubling times for Bush's final two years in office.

Osama bin Laden, the man responsible for the deaths of 3,000 Americans and a forever heartbreaking hole in the New York City skyline, has only to say the word "go" and any hope of a return to reason will disappear.

All it will take is one big hit on any number of targets the Bush Administration has refused to secure. One event, and all voices of reason, restraint, common sense will be lost in a furious gale of mindless war that will sate itself in countless deaths, inconceivable destruction and a new world map.

World War III. There are already voices calling for it, urging it on, tempting the caged beast to come and eat your children.

The crisis in Lebanon has shifted the world's perspective. The carnage in Afghanistan and Iraq seemed singular, isolated within the boundaries of those two countries. Lebanon feels like a progression leading to a wider conflict involving the whole region.

The pieces are set. All it will take is one move.

Osama bin Laden, the man, the criminal, the murderer allowed to escape is crafty and patient. He'll know the right moment to act, and as long as the most incompetent government in American history is in power it should be "a cakewalk". The Bush government will provide precisely what the Terrorist wants: carnage and chaos.

Then watch the world get sucked into the Middle East sinkhole. Watch America, the America you knew, the America you believed in, the America of Washington, Franklin and Jefferson, die to be reborn as the America of Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld.

Perhaps one day I'll look back on this and be grateful I was wrong.

But what do you think bin Laden is doing?

Dark Clemsy

The Slow Swirl

2006-07-25T08:33:00.000-04:00

I haven't blogged much lately due to a period of misanthropic, go-lemmings-go, disgust. Ladies and gentlemen, we deserve what we allow and the longer we allow the certifiable psychosis currently infecting both the United States Government and most of the Middle East to continue, the greater our just deserts.

We may not achieve the end of that continuum of just deserts (species extinction), mind you, but we don't have to get too close to it for it to be pretty damn nasty.

But then, if American End Timers are behind the U.S. thumb twiddling on the Israel-Lebanon issue, maybe species extinction is an option. Wouldn't it be a shame if that will be what we deserved? On the bright side, the planet would be relieved of a momentary itch. (I told you I was in a misanthropic funk.)

Consider:

Israeli air strikes are taking a tremendous toll on the civilian population in southern Lebanon, with an attack Sunday on a bus filled with women and children that left three dead and 13 injured, many of them severely. LINK

Well, according to White House counselor Dan Bartlett, President Bush 'mourns the loss of every life. Yet out of this tragic development, he believes a moment of clarity has arrived.' (Has arrived?)

Ah. Frozen embryos are too sacred to use for medical research, but innocent civilian lives are worth trading for 'clarity,' whatever the hell that means.

So the carnage continues in Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel and Lebanon. The temperature keeps rising as Americans whine about the price of gas and the intolerable heat which, of course, has nothing to do whatsoever with global climate change. You know what I think about? World War I. You see, that piece of stupidity tops the list of unnecessary wars. Europe was armed to the teeth and pretty much just in the mood. They passed a threshold and bingo: death and destruction.

Who's 'in the mood' today? Well, the U.S. is a given (Duh). Hmmm. Israel. Hezbollah. Iraqi 'insurgents', Iraqi Shi'ites, Iraqi Sunnis, Iraqi Kurds, Afghan Taliban.

Iran?

Yes, indeedy.

How far will it go? Any military person will tell you there is a threshold beyond which the slide to all out conflict can't be stopped. The clock is ticking and let me state the obvious by telling you there are parties on all sides of this foolishness which would love to see it go all the way. 'All the way' has the whole region riding the swirl. The whole region includes chemical and nuclear weapons.

(Do Pakistan's nukes worry you? They should.)

At the risk of mixing metaphors, stupid people play chicken with an oncoming bus. Psychotic people deny the bus exists. There isn't a Darwin Award big enough for this situation.

How far down the swirl do you think we'll go? Place your bets!

Cheers,
Clemsy

Blurbs

2006-07-14T10:09:00.000-04:00

Haven't blogged in a bit due to well earned vacation time and other assorted projects. Saddening to find, upon my return, that the world is still waving the FUBAR flag high and proud.

Spent some time near Kennebunkport, Maine recently where stories about Dubya's indiscreet younger days are legend in the area. One day there may be historical markers where George failed sobriety tests.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Will someone please tell the Israelis and Palestinians Ben Franklin's definition of insanity.

Might as well tell clueless George also.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Speaking of George "700+ signing statements and counting" Bush, it should now be apparent to everyone that he feels the need for more executive authority to prosecute his "War on Terra" than FDR required to fight Japan and Germany. In fact he wants, well, all the power. I can understand people desiring the "please take care of me Daddy" security of a military dictatorship. I really can. Probably comes out to something like 30% of the population... right around where George's poll numbers have been hanging out, no?

But George? C'mon. You're kidding, right?

Hmmmm. There seems to be a theme in this post.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Don't forget: "Detainees" get tortured and tell interrogators exactly what they want to hear. This allows the president to grab more power to protect us. You see? Torture works.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Quote of the week: "'End times' religious groups want apocalypse sooner than later, and they're relying on high tech -- and red heifers -- to hasten its arrival."

Interesting religion that wants everyone, and I mean everyone, dead.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Here's another goody: "House Republicans are pushing new legislation that could wipe out the ability of California and other states to ban or strictly limit the use of pesticides and toxic industrial chemicals that can jeopardize human health." LINK

You realize, of course, that the world is currently quite a loony place. Please make sure to relax and watch a sunset or something.

Cheers,
Clemsy

Beggars at the Gates

2006-06-26T09:59:00.000-04:00

Throughout history the war veteran was all too often relegated to the streets with a begging bowl. Today's war veterans are no different, for all the lofty but empty "support the troops" rhetoric gushing from the president, politicians and flag worshippers.

"...as the Iraq war continues with no end in sight, an increasing number of returning American soldiers are finding it tough merely to put a roof over their heads." LINK

"The U.S. government estimates several hundred vets who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan are homeless on any given night across the country, although the exact number is unknown." LINK

"Veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts are now showing up in the nation's homeless shelters." LINK

"When the single mother was discharged in April, after her second tour in Iraq, she was 24 and had little money and no place to live. She slept in her son's day-care center." LINK

"'The Iraq vets are showing up now [in homeless shelters], and asking for help now,' said Yogin Ricardo Singh of the Brooklyn, N.Y.-based Black Veterans for Social Justice. 'What surprises me is how young they are.'" LINK

Support the troops. Forget the veterans.

One more reason those responsible for this godforsaken military adventure belong on a chain gang picking up garbage on the side of a desert road.

Clemsy

Trust No One

2006-06-24T09:38:00.000-04:00

...except people you know.

I'd love nothing more than to flush our entire political structure down the drain and start from scratch. So few are genuine. So many can only utter scripted, manicured drivel meant to address poll numbers or adviser-perceived trends.

I'm sick of it. Why are the Democrats suddenly trying to get some kind of Iraqi debacle exit strategy out of the Bush Administration and the Republican Congress? Because some bright star noticed that the polls gave them permission.

Yet how many voted for either Democrat bill?

Either bill. Yup. The Democrats once more make the Republicans look good in their monolithic, uniform mindset allowing the fool who put the car in the ditch to drive the tow truck.

The Republicans, as usual and with style, are building a campaign to put themselves right back on track to maintaining control of Congress in November.

Reminds me of a fire-works display building to a climax.

First the gay marriage distraction, then the illegal immigration/ English language noise, followed by the death of Zarqawi and Bush's visit to the Green Zone.

Now we have the conveniently timed Sears Tower Terror Plot, all over just before the vote on a Flag desecration amendment.

Makes me wonder what's on tap for the summer. Feeling as I do about Karl "Slicker than Willie" Rove, maybe it's time to evacuate New York City.

Cheers,
Clemsy

Repub Propaganda Machine Resurgent

2006-06-16T06:04:00.000-04:00

My bullshit detector is clanging like mad. First, Iraq finally finishes fleshing out its government (of the Green Zone.) Then, Second Most Wanted al Qaeda leader (assuming, arguably, Osama is number one), Zarqawi, is killed in an air strike. (Looked pretty good after two five hundred pound bombs hit him in the head, no?) Next, Bush makes a super-secret surprise, feel-good, Daddy is here, visit to the Green Zone (our one successfully invaded spot in Iraq). After that an "al Qaeda document" is found supposedly bemoaning the state of the insurgency (as if al Qaeda is more than just a slice of the insurgency pie).

Now Congress is "debating" the Iraq war, in which the Repubs have resurrected with gusto the Iraq = the Global War on Terror = September Eleventh, so shut up and get behind the president you stupid, traitorous, whiny liberals.

Smells like Rovian, substance free, election year politics to me.

Cheers,
Clemsy

The Signing Statement

2006-06-10T09:39:00.000-04:00

One concern over the behavior of George Bush is that, even if he is the wisest of philosopher kings, doing all in the name of the common good which only he can see clearly, he is establishing precedents that will allow some future president elbow room for completely dismantling the republic.

Aren't the Republicans worried at all about Hillary Clinton? Just kidding.

However, George, alas, isn't the wisest of philosopher kings. George is a fraud. From saying that Saddam would develop a nuke within six months, to claiming the Social Security Trust Fund was only pieces of paper in a file cabinet (intimating that U.S. Treasury Bills are worthless) to declaring heterosexual relationships need protection from activist judges, George has time and time again proven he is willing to say anything to achieve his political ends.

We don't need to wait for some future Napoleon to utilize the doors George has opened. He's here. He's George. George, who is single handedly ripping the substance from the term "balance of powers". When he's done, the vocabulary of democracy will be a thin veneer of cheap paint renewed in campaign speeches and Saturday morning radio addresses.

Evidence? The signing statement.

President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office, asserting that he has the power to set aside any statute passed by Congress when it conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution.

Among the laws Bush said he can ignore are military rules and regulations, affirmative-action provisions, requirements that Congress be told about immigration services problems, ''whistle-blower" protections for nuclear regulatory officials, and safeguards against political interference in federally funded research. LINK

Spooky, no? Now here's where I get completely befuddled:

...one of the laws the president chose to ignore was the one establishing the special inspector general post for Iraq. What the president did was write a so-called "signing statement" on the side (unpublicized of course), saying that the new inspector general would have no authority to investigate any contracts or corruption issues involving the Pentagon. LINK

This particular signing statement keeps anyone from investigating where, say, $21 billion dollars of Iraqi reconstruction money might be. No one seems to know.

Why aren't fiscal conservatives going mad? Hell, why aren't social conservatives having a fit. What happened to "Thou Shalt Not Steal, especially my tax dollars!"

Has someone slipped something in the water? Are too many Americans on anti-depressants?

George Bush has declared he is above 750 laws. Investigations into domestic surveillance has been stifled for "national security" reasons. He added a signing statement to the McCain amendment banning torture. Torture. George reserves the right to torture people.

auÂ·toÂ·crat n.

1. A ruler having unlimited power; a despot.
2. A person with unlimited power or authority

Ladies and gentlemen, we deserve what we allow.

Hey. There's a bumper sticker for you.

Cheers,
Clemsy

Priorities

2006-06-09T06:00:00.000-04:00

Like a rock band out of hits and fated to nostalgic, small venue tours with other used-to-bees, the Republican Party is dusting off three classics in time for the congressional elections: illegal immigration, gay-marriage and flag desecration.

The rhetoric runs high and hot while politicians waste time trying to convince the electorate these are worthwile, nay, critical, issues more threatening to America than terrorists or even the Dixie Chicks.

Meanwhile, and of dramatically less importance, the depressing news out of Iraq continues unabated. As one reads stories of sectarian violence and intimidation, one wonders whether that poor country is only setting the board for civil war.

The ethnic cleansing thing comes first.

Baghdad's central morgue received more than a thousand bodies each month this year, a doctor has revealed. The body count here gives a more accurate picture of the story in Baghdad than any official statistics. LINK

Perhaps Congress is positioning us to bring the troops home from the mess. After all, we need to "man the borders", guard the flags and protect heterosexuals from the gay menace.

Finally, we're straightening out our priorities.

Sheesh.

Garrison Rings the Bell

2006-06-07T08:45:00.000-04:00

Garrison Keilor lines up a few good quotes:

"Somewhere in the quiet, leafy recesses of the Bush family, somebody is thinking, 'Wrong son. Should've tried the smart one.'"

"You might not have always liked Republicans, but you could count on them to manage the bank. They might be lousy tippers, act snooty, talk through their noses, wear spats and splash mud on you as they race their Pierce-Arrows through the village, but you knew they could do the math. To see them produce a ninny and then follow him loyally into the swamp for five years is disconcerting, like seeing the Rolling Stones take up lite jazz. So here we are at an uneasy point in our history, mired in a costly war, a supine Congress granting absolute power to a president who seems to get smaller and dimmer, and the best the Republicans can offer is San Franciscophobia? This is beyond pitiful. This is violently stupid."

Read the whole article HERE.

Thanks Garrison.

"Illegal" Immigration + English Our "Official Language" = Bait and Switch Number... Oh My God I've lost Count!

2006-05-20T12:24:00.000-04:00

Last month ago I asked the question, "Immigration? Where the hell did this issue come from all of a sudden?" Now I can ask the question, "Legislation to make English our official language? Where the hell did that come from?" Answer:

The Senate on Thursday approved an immigration-bill amendment sponsored by Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) that would declare English the national language. ~The Chicago Tribune

In other words, the same place: The Republican Party. Why?

Answer: The Democrats (God help them. Please.) are positioned to spank the Republicans in November, although there's more than enough time for the Demos to tangle their tongues in their feet.

...And by taking this foolishness seriously they are well on their way to doing just that.

Let's look at some defining Republican issues:

1) Fiscal conservatism. The only way the Bush Administration can make the federal deficit look halfway acceptable is to over-project then be pleased as punch at the lower increase. No one, however, is buying. Also, China has passed Japan in floating our national debt which Bush is pushing into numbers only astronomers use.

2) Smaller Government: This from the CATO Institute in 2003, "...we have mounting deficits because George W. Bush is the most gratuitous big spender to occupy the White House since Jimmy Carter. One could say that he has become the "Mother of All Big Spenders." LINK

3) Roe v. Wade: It's still there.

4) Marriage "Protection" Amendment: It's still not there.

5) School prayer: Not yet.

Now some Republican problems:

1) Iraq: No flowers. No WMD. No oil. Big mess.

2) Katrina and Rita: Big bumble. Big mess.

3) Jack Abramoff: So much for good, conservative Christian values.

4) Tom DeLay: See Jack Abramoff.

5) Lewis Libby (and maybe Karl Rove? Maybe... Big Dick "Shoot Before You Look" Cheney?): Indictments for perjury and obstruction in a case about outing a covert CIA agent working on WMD and Iran? Ouch!

6)Randy "Duke" Cunningham: See Jack Abramoff, but add one defense contractor named Brent Wilkes hosting weekly parties at the Watergate Hotel (oh delicious irony) with friendly poker games, hookers and bribes with one Kyle “Dusty” Foggo (number three man at the CIA) and you get one CIA Director, Porter Goss, suddenly deciding to spend more quality time with his family.

Did I leave anything out? Of course I did. I'd need staff to get it all down straight before the sun burns out.

So what does the Republican Party have left? Poor, Spanish speaking Mexicans crossing the border to do things like take care of rich Republican's children, manicure their lawns or pick fruits and vegetables.

Of course, these people carry "Spanish" like a disease that's likely to make even you speak with an accent any day now.

This is all, of course, called "changing the subject." It's all the Repubs have left while their beautiful world crumbles around them, and people, especially the all important independents, are buying it.

What no one is asking anywhere is why those who hire these people aren't being taken to task. No. The criminals are poor people trying to send some bucks home to their families.

Those are the kind of conservative, Christian values they can depend on every time.

But more important, the public discussion over all those other big mess issues has been diluted.

Come on, America. Stop being the idiot they take you for.

Cheers,
Clemsy

PS: Does this mean George is going to have to learn English now?

QUOTE OF THE WEEK:

You want to shut down illegal immigration? You want to use the military as police? Make it illegal to hire undocumented workers and put the National Guard into enforcing that. Then rewrite the North American Free Trade Agreement and invest in Mexico.

Meanwhile, further proof that the GOP is cuckoo comes to us with the passage of another $70 billion tax cut for the rich. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities says the average middle-income household will get a $20 tax cut, while those making more than $1 million a year will get nearly $42,000. ~Molly Ivins from The Politics of Lunacy

QUOTES FROM THE HIVE MIND

The president has never supported making English the national language. ~Alberto Gonzales

As you know, there were actually a couple of amendments that came up yesterday, an Inhofe amendment and also a Salazar amendment. And what has come out of that is a description of English as the national language. And I think — and we have supported both of these. ~ White House Press Secretary Tony Snow

OCCUPATION: IRAQ

The state of Iraq now resembles Bosnia at the height of the fighting in the 1990s when each community fled to places where its members were a majority and were able to defend themselves. ~The Independent (Thank you Gertrude Bell.)

RELIGION

Evangelical Christians are not all white people living in the suburbs and only concerned with abortion and same-sex marriage. ~Jack Pannell, spokesman for Sojourners (Thank god.)

Trawling for Leakers Part 2

2006-05-16T20:14:00.000-04:00

FBI Acknowledges: Journalists' Phone Records are Fair Game

"It used to be very hard and complicated to do this, but it no longer is in the Bush administration," said a senior federal official.

This wouldn't be a problem if so many people in the intelligence community didn't think what is going on is so horribly wrong.

Do we give a corrupt government free reign to control what we hear because we've let them convince us of some phony war on terror?

Do we believe their transparent lies about the legality of their behavior?

Bush sends the National Guard to the Mexican border. How about having them inspecting shipping containers in New York Harbor? Or guarding chemical depots?

War on terror. A fairy tale to scare children at night. A sound bite for votes.

If he believed in it he'd start conscription. If we believed in it we'd let him.

There's your proof. As long as someone else is fighting and dieing, "Bring it on!" No sacrifice here. No rationing. No raising taxes to pay for the troops.

War on terror. It's a war on our minds.

Phone tapping reporters is a big step toward brown shirts and jackboots. When it's too late what are you going to do?

I'll tell you what you'll do. You'll say, "Keep quiet and go along with them. It's safer."

As long as George Bush stays in office, we are a nation of cowards.

Zeig heil, George.

Trawling for Leakers

2006-05-16T06:00:00.000-04:00

A senior federal law enforcement official tells ABC News the government is tracking the phone numbers we (Brian Ross and Richard Esposito) call in an effort to root out confidential sources.

"It's time for you to get some new cell phones, quick," the source told us in an in-person conversation. LINK

So you thought the NSA was just looking for terrorists? The above story is a significant tick of the clock that will turn America into a fascist state on the stroke of midnight. Of particular note are the comments posted to this story. There's one or two horrified posts followed by a string of winger "all you reporters belong in jail" fascist blather. A little lower down there's this comment by one Dawn Howard:

You do realize people are being paid by the Bush administration to attack the press publically on comment pages like this. I personally was offered a job doing it.

Look at the similarities in the comments.

She's quite right about the similarity of the comments. I'd be surprised if this is a White House operation. More likely the RNC or some other right-wing group that wouldn't know liberty from a hangman's noose.

Cheers,
Clemsy

National Guard to Chase Mexicans Through Desert

2006-05-12T05:50:00.000-04:00

Desperation (n.): Sending the National Guard to protect the country from poor Mexicans coming across the border to pick tomatoes.

How about sending them to the Port of New York to inspect shipping containers?

Not that our Guard wouldn't prefer the American desert to the Iraqi desert!

Basically the president's poll numbers have reversed. Toward the end of 2003, his approval hovered around 70%, now they're flirting with the 30% mark.

That 40% that blows with the wind? Hitler depended on them to get a good grip on Germany during the 1930's. I'm sure they all mean well and are very patriotic, but the grouch in me keeps thinking,

"Morons."

The 30% who still support Bush contains a few, stubborn Blind Faithers and Willful Ignorants and all the FDA's in the country, impatiently awaiting permission to don brown shirts.

Cheers,
Clemsy

QUOTES OF THE WEEK:

We all hope nothing happens to Arlen Specter, the Republican head of the Senate Judiciary Committee, cause he might be all that stands between us and a full blown dictatorship in this country. ~Jack Cafferty, CNN

Many Americans have simply lost faith in the administration's ingenuity. Only a quarter of those polled had much confidence in W.'s ability to handle a crisis; a mere 9 percent are sure he can successfully end the Iraq war, and a paltry 4 percent think the administration has a clear plan to keep gas prices down. ~Maureen Dowd

If Democrats and, for that matter, Republicans let a president with a Nixonesque approval rating install yet another second-rate sycophant at yet another security agency, even one as diminished as the C.I.A., someone should charge those senators with treason, too. ~Frank Rich

THE ENVIRONMENT

While Washington Slept

These are just some of the reasons why David King wrote in Science in 2004, “Climate change is the most severe problem that we are facing today—more serious even than the threat of terrorism.” King’s comment raised hackles in Washington and led a top press aide to Tony Blair to try to muzzle him. But the science adviser tells me he “absolutely” stands by his statement. By no means does King underestimate terrorism; advising the British government on that threat, he says, “is a very important part of my job.” But the hazards presented by climate change are so severe and far-reaching that, in his view, they overshadow not only every other environmental threat but every other threat, period.

RELIGION

So let me suggest that we take back the word Christian while giving the religious right a new adjective: Christianist. Christianity, in this view, is simply a faith. Christianism is an ideology, politics, an ism. The distinction between Christian and Christianist echoes the distinction we make between Muslim and Islamist. Muslims are those who follow Islam. Islamists are those who want to wield Islam as a political force and conflate state and mosque. Not all Islamists are violent. Only a tiny few are terrorists. And I should underline that the term Christianist is in no way designed to label people on the religious right as favoring any violence at all. I mean merely by the term Christianist the view that religious faith is so important that it must also have a precise political agenda. It is the belief that religion dictates politics and that politics should dictate the laws for everyone, Christian and non-Christian alike.

That's what I dissent from, and I dissent from it as a Christian. I dissent from the political pollution of sincere, personal faith. I dissent most strongly from the attempt to argue that one party represents God and that the other doesn't. I dissent from having my faith co-opted and wielded by people whose politics I do not share and whose intolerance I abhor. The word Christian belongs to no political party. It's time the quiet majority of believers took it back. ~Andrew Sullivan

Help your government! Make a phone call today!

2006-05-06T18:52:00.000-04:00

Doesn't matter to whom or to where. Your assistance is required in aiding the National Security Agency compile the "largest data base in the world of every phone call ever made."

Although they are not necessarily recording your calls, it is strongly recommended that you trust the NSA with your deepest darkest secrets. Please don't feel threatened in any way, or consider using some 'code' to discuss personal matters you erroneously feel is none of the NSA's business as such behavior may bring you undesirable attention from men in suits wearing dark glasses.

Read all about it: NSA has massive database of Americans' phone calls

Also, praise the Lord! The NSA has finally gotten that childish Justice Department probe off its back:

The government has abruptly ended an inquiry into the warrantless eavesdropping program because the National Security Agency refused to grant Justice Department lawyers the necessary security clearance to probe the matter. LINK

There! Don't you feel safe and secure knowing Big Daddy (who needs a Big Brother?) is watching?

Those of you who do may find this quote from Judgement at Nurenberg enlightening.

But this trial has shown that under the stress of a national crisis, men - even able and extraordinary men - can delude themselves into the commission of crimes and atrocities so vast and heinous as to stagger the imagination. No one who has sat through this trial can ever forget. The sterilization of men because of their political beliefs... The murder of children... How easily that can happen. There are those in our country today, too, who speak of the protection of the country. Of survival. The answer to that is: survival as what? A country isn't a rock. And it isn't an extension of one's self. It's what it stands for, when standing for something is the most difficult. Before the people of the world - let it now be noted in our decision here that this is what we stand for: justice, truth... and the value of a single human being.~Spencer Tracy as Chief Judge Dan Haywood in Judgement at Nurenberg

>

At the risk of repeating myself let me end with:

What? No revolution yet?

Cheers,
Clemsy

QUOTE OF THE WEEK:

So, I’m saying today, I was wrong to have voted for George W. Bush. In historic terms, I believe George W. Bush is the worst two-term President in the history of the country. Worse than Grant. I also believe a case can be made that he’s the worst President, period. After five years of carefully watching George W. Bush I’ve reached the conclusion he’s either grossly incompetent, or a hand puppet for a gaggle of detached theorists with their own private view of how the world works. ~Doug McIntyre, right-wing radio host in LA

WOOPS! OF THE WEEK

SOME 200,000 guns the US sent to Iraqi security forces may have been smuggled to terrorists, it was feared yesterday.

The 99-tonne cache of AK47s was to have been secretly flown out from a US base in Bosnia. But the four planeloads of arms have vanished. LINK

For Gays, Iraq Returns to the Middle Ages

2006-05-06T10:23:00.000-04:00

One item ignored in the lead up to the Iraqi invasion was the type of government Iraq was hardwired to form with the elimination of Hussein's secular, Stalinist regime. Two years a go the local NPR affiliate asked, during a call-in segment, whether or not the U.S. should pull its troops out immediately. I said something to the effect that I felt as if troop withdrawal shouldn't be precipitous, but that I also felt that regardless of how quickly the troops are withdrawn the question is really how many people will die before Iraq becomes an Islamist state (and possibly a few Islamist states) to one degree or another.

A quick look at the Iraqi constitution confirms this:

SECTION ONE: FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES

Article 1:

(The Republic of Iraq is a single, independent federal state with full sovereignty. Its system of government is republican, representative 61/27Parliamentary63/47 and democratic. This Constitution is the guarantor of its unity)

Article 2:

First: Islam is the official religion of the State and it is a fundamental source of legislation:

A. No law that contradicts the established provisions of Islam may be established.

B. No law that contradicts the principles of democracy may be established. LINK

We are already seeing signs of the easily expected conflict between 2A and 2B. I offer for your consternation:

Iraqi police 'killed 14-year-old boy for being homosexual'
By Jerome Taylor
Published: 05 May 2006

Human rights groups have condemned the "barbaric" murder of a 14-year-old boy, who, according to witnesses, was shot on his doorstep by Iraqi police for the apparent crime of being gay.

Ahmed Khalil was shot at point-blank range after being accosted by men in police uniforms, according to his neighbours in the al-Dura area of Baghdad.Campaign groups have warned of a surge in homophobic killings by state security services and religious militias following an anti-gay and anti-lesbian fatwa issued by Iraq's most prominent Shia leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

Ali Hili, the co-ordinator of a group of exiled Iraqi gay men who monitor homophobic attacks inside Iraq, said the fatwa had instigated a "witch-hunt of lesbian and gay Iraqis, including violent beatings, kidnappings and assassinations".

"Young Ahmed was a victim of poverty," he said. "He was summarily executed, apparently by fundamentalist elements in the Iraqi police."

Neighbours in al-Dura district say Ahmed's father was arrested and interrogated two days before his son's murder by police who demanded to know about Ahmed's sexual activities. It is believed Ahmed slept with men for money to support his poverty-stricken family, who have fled the area fearing further reprisals.

The killing of Ahmed is one of a series of alleged homophobic murders. There is mounting evidence that fundamentalists have infiltrated government security forces to commit homophobic murders while wearing police uniforms.

Human rights groups are particularly concerned that the Sadr and Badr militias, both Shia, have stepped up their attacks on the gay community after a string of religious rulings, since the US-led invasion, calling for the eradication of homosexuals.

Grand Ayatollah Sistani recently issued a fatwa on his website calling for the execution of gays in the "worst, most severe way".

The powerful Badr militia acts as the military wing of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), which counts Ayatollah Sistani as its spiritual leader. Another fatwa from the late and much revered Ayatollah Abul Qassim Khoei allows followers to kill gays "with a sword, or burn him alive, or tie his hands and feet and hurl him down from a high place".

Mr Hili said: "According to our contacts in Baghdad, the Iraqi police have been heavily infiltrated by the Shia paramilitary Badr Corps."

Mr Hili, whose Abu Nawas group has close links with clandestine gay activists inside Iraq, said US coalition forces are unwilling to try and tackle the rising tide of homophobic attacks. "They just don't want to upset the Iraqi government by bringing up the taboo of homosexuality even though homophobic murders have intensified," he said.

A number of public homophobic murders by the Badr militia have terrified Iraq's gay community. Last September, Hayder Faiek, a transsexual, was burnt to death by Badr militias in the main street of Baghdad's al-Karada district. In January, suspected militants shot another gay man in the back of the head.

The US State Department has yet to document the surge in its annual human rights reports. Iraq's neighbours, however, such as Iran, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, are often criticised for their persecution of gays.

Darla Jordan, from the US State Department said: "The US government continues to work closely with our Iraqi partners to ensure the protection of human rights and the safety of all Iraqi citizens." LINK

One wonders whether the wonder boys who helped create this care or not given 'Enduring Bases' and the somewhat elaborate embassy under construction.

Perhaps all this chaos is the perfect screen for other plans? In my more cynical moments I wonder if everything is going precisely according to plan.

Cheers,
Clemsy

...'Enduring'. I wonder how much spinning synonyms at the Pentagon pays?

Wow. That's Big.

2006-04-30T09:02:00.000-04:00

Time to clear the boards in prep for Clemsy's Corner's Anniversary Edition, coming up as soon as it's done. In the meantime, the question below is worth a thousand words, at least half a billion dollars, your outrage and consternation and serves as proof positive for exactly how long the U.S. plans to hang around Iraq.

Cheers,
Clemsy

QUESTION OF THE WEEK

What covers 104 acres, cost about $600,000,000 and, when completed, will be bigger than Vatican City and, according to architects, visible from orbit? ANSWER (Sit down with a drink. A strong drink. Tequila will do.)

QUOTES OF THE WEEK:

You've performed so poorly I'm surprised that you haven't given yourself a medal. You're a catastrophe that walks like a man. Herbert Hoover was a shitty president, but even he never conceded an entire city to rising water and snakes. On your watch, we've lost almost all of our allies, the surplus, four airliners, two trade centers, a piece of the Pentagon, and the City of New Orleans. Maybe you're just not lucky. I'm not saying you don't love this country. I'm just wondering how much worse it could be if you were on the other side. ~Bill Maher

Three years later we know, courtesy of the Army Corps of Engineers, that our corrupt, Enron-like Iraq reconstruction effort has yielded at most 20 of those 142 promised hospitals. But we did build a palace for ourselves. The only building project on time and on budget, USA Today reported, is a $592 million embassy complex in the Green Zone on acreage the size of 80 football fields. Symbolically enough, it will have its own water-treatment plant and power generator to provide the basic services that we still have not restored to pre-invasion levels for the poor unwashed Iraqis beyond the American bunker. ~Frank Rich

Here's a few precious quotes from Stephen Colbert's routine at White House Correspondent's Dinner, coutesy of Editor and Publisher:

I believe that the government that governs best is a government that governs least, and by these standards we have set up a fabulous government in Iraq.

...reality has a well-known liberal bias.

When the president decides something on Monday, he still believes it on Wednesday - no matter what happened Tuesday.

You should spend more time with your families, write that novel you've always wanted to write. You know, the one about the fearless reporter who stands up to the administration. You know-- fiction. (Directed at the press.)

[Here I am] surrounded by the liberal media who are destroying this country, except for Fox News. Fox believes in presenting both sides of the story — the president’s side and the vice president’s side.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Once the reality of the president's claimed lawbreaking powers starts to be truly discussed in our national political dialogue, I believe there will finally be accountability for what this administration has done. ~Glenn Greenwald (Yes, but should I hold my breath or not?)

QUOTES FROM THE HIVE MIND

The Security Council is the primary and most important institution for the maintenance of peace and stability and security, and it cannot have its word and its will simply ignored by a member state. ~Condi Rice (When did we give the U.N. that job? I thought that was our job.)

PICK OF THE WEEK

Our monarch, above the law by Scot Lehigh

HAS GEORGE W. Bush come to believe he's king?

That's the question that springs to mind upon reading Charlie Savage's front-page report in Sunday's Globe detailing the president's sotto voce assertion that he can disregard laws if he thinks they impinge on his constitutional powers.

Distractions, Distractions

2006-04-26T20:07:00.000-04:00

When will they learn? When will the feckless democrats learn to stay on message? They are as distractable as a ten year old off his meds. Immigration? Where the hell did this issue come from all of a sudden? And isn't it just eating up the airwaves!

Goodness! Someone's singing the national anthem in spanish! Such a disgrace! Someone should pass a consitutional amendment!

Hey, I'm sure Mexicans slipping over the border is a problem. When wasn't this a problem? I do recall that back during the Clinton era (the good old days) a bill strengthening penalties against companies who hired 'illegals' was defeated by the Republican controlled Senate, pretty much telling us that such people were legal at work (working for slave wages and no bennies), but illegal out on the street.

Now it's a BIG issue. Republicans NOW need to CRACK DOWN. The President has to come up with an ACCEPTABLE ANSWER. Immigrants far and wide are marching in the streets against possible draconian legislation and are planning to shut down major American cities on May 1st, which will inconvenience those typically liberal cites and incite typically conservative, xenophobic racism out in the 'heartland'.

People should take to the streets. All of us. The streets of Washington D.C. That's the city that needs to be shut down.

The politics of distraction. Republicans trawling for better poll numbers on a divisive domestic issue.EVERYBODY LOOK OVER HERE NOW! Not at Iraq. Not at the same behavior toward Iran we saw leading up to the invasion of Iraq. Not toward all those pissed off generals wanting Rumsfeld's head on a platter for misusing the military and getting too many people dead and maimed.

...And not at the oil problem. Not at the one issue that hits everyone right where it hurts: their ability to pay their monthly bills. Don't consider that the cost of everything is going to skyrocket. Don't worry about there not being any magic fix, no new quick fix oil gushers, no viable alternative energy sources on the horizon.

According to James Kunstler, we all need to prepare for some major changes, such as no longer planting McMansions on subdivided farmland which we'll need to feed ourselves when economies become quickly local due to the cost effectiveness of mass produced, long hauled goods going out the window.

Meaning desert cities like Las Vegas and Phoenix will need to no longer exist.

I know, I know, this is all alarmist. Relax. It won't be an issue until it's too late so why worry? We need to keep all those low paying jobs for documented minorites. That's the problem.

Of course, the price of diesel will eventually put truckers out of work, so those too expensive for anyone to buy tomatoes will no longer have to be picked by people coming over the border.

In fact, the price of oil will likely cure America of its illegal immigration problem, once there are no jobs for them to come to.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Now, if anyone's curious as to what may be happening in that part of Iraq now known as Kurdistan...

Shiite Militias Move Into Oil-Rich Kirkuk, Even as Kurds Dig In

Rice warns Turkey to keep out of Iraq

Cheers,
Clemsy

QUOTES OF THE WEEK:

It was the biggest profit ever posted by the Texas-based oil behemoth in the first quarter, but it still fell short of Wall Street forecasts. ~Reuters (See George's amusing quote below.)

The Bush people and the oil people are indistinguishable. Condoleezza Rice, a former Chevron director, even had an oil tanker named after her. ~Bob Herbert

President Bush on Friday rejected calls by some lawmakers for a tax on oil company windfall profits, saying the industry should reinvest its recent gains into finding and producing more energy. ~ABC News (Translation: Taxes bad. Finding more oil good.)

With gasoline at over $3 a gallon in some areas, Bush said there was "no evidence" of price-gouging of consumers. ~ABC News (Translation: The oil industries obscene profits, corporate salaries and retirement packages are just good old American capitolism at work, even if it drives the economy into the ground.)

Report says that 11,000 attacks worldwide shows the war has become driving factor for extremists. ~Times Online (Good going, George. Keep up the good work. Sheesh.)

QUOTES FROM THE HIVE MIND

This administration will not tolerate manipulation. ~George Bush, referring to the oil industry (Where's that laughing-out-loud emoticon?)

The key issue is oil, and a regime change in Iraq would facilitate an increase in world oil. ~Laurence Lindsey – President Bush’s senior economic advisor in 2002 (...and lower oil prices and an improved economy and they will all live happily ever after. The End.)

Midweek Quotes and a Few Snide Comments

2006-04-22T13:05:00.000-04:00

Republicans Anxious as Midterm Elections Approach
Facing loss of majority in Congress, inevitable investigations, arrests, prosecutions, convictions, prison sentences, hard time in dank, rat-infested cells. ~Ironic Times

Shiite Militias Move Into Oil-Rich Kirkuk, Even as Kurds Dig In (Whose side are we on, anyway?)

...Mr. Bush feels that kicking out Mr. Rumsfeld would mean "open season" on the administration. ~Insight (Hunting license optional.)

If $75 a barrel of oil and a $3 average for a gallon of gasoline isn't a wake-up call, then what will be? ~Sen. Chuck Schumer (Answer: Getting heatstroke while hitchhiking to work in January.)

The Trust for America's Health, a nonprofit group focused on public health and disease prevention, recently gave the federal government a D+ for emergency preparedness. ~U.S.News & World Report (Hey, that's a passing grade.)

In time, one wearies of foolishness, but not soon enough. ~Garrison Keillor

I want to be able to buy my vodka without having to look left and right. I want to be able to walk with my girlfriend in the street while holding hands together without people glaring at me. Is this TOO MUCH to ask? ~Zeyad, Iraqi dentist

QUOTES FROM THE HIVE MIND

I based a lot of my foreign policy decisions on some things that I think are true. One, I believe there's an Almighty, and secondly, I believe one of the great gifts of the Almighty is the desire in everybody's soul, regardless of what you look like or where you live, to be free. ~George (Except sometimes, dang it all, ya give some folks democracy and they, like, elect bad people, like Hamas, and the Lord doesn't like Hamas, so ya have to sorta erase all that, and start, you know, from scratch, til ya get someone I, er, I mean the Lord, likes. That's freedumb. ;)

PICKS OF THE WEEK:

Shifting Footprints and Messianic Missions: Staying In Iraq 'Till Kingdom Come
by Maureen Farrell

Nuts 'n Crazies

2006-04-22T11:00:00.000-04:00

People move along in their daily routine as if what the BIG PEOPLE do will have, at most, minimal effect on their lives. The lights will stay on, food will be delivered to the stores and TV will continue to fill our brains with sludge.

Well, the Cuban Missile Crisis didn't result in a nuclear winter, did it? Sane people eventually disentangled us from the human catastrophe that was the Vietnam War. Christ, even Hitler and godless Soviet communism were stopped!

Why worry? Be happy! It all works out. All the time. Pass the popcorn. Tom Cruise is a daddy! Like, are Brad and Angelina still together or what?

La dee da.

Me? I'm cursed with an unavoidable impression that if someone doesn't grab the shovels from the crazies at the top of the power pyramid, We The People are going to slam into a significant population correction.

NUTSHELLS (cont.)

Hmmm. I wonder if buying stock in Pfizer, think Zoloft here, isn't a damn good idea.

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The price of oil is over $75 a barrel. Gasoline has been going up 2 to 3 cents a gallon every day for about 3 weeks. I'm profoundly relieved at the urgent call for conservation, the auto industry rapidly moving to smaller, fuel efficient hybrids, the offering of tax credits for the installation of photovoltaics, which has finally become a household word, plans for renovating our rail system for the long distance transport of goods, and the national decision that we'll get used to windmills mucking up our scenic views.

Did you believe all that for a moment? Didn't it feel good?

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Do you think Bush realizes how happy he makes Jon Stewart every time he says something precious like, "I'm the decider"?

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Let's see, Rummie and Co. shut General Shinseki down for calling for a few hundred thousand troops to stabilize Iraq. Shinseki was right. Rummie was wrong. People are dead.

You're fired.

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Here's a logic train headed for disaster: Osama does 9/11, inspiring Bush to invade Afghanistan and Iraq (plus Gitmo, Abu Graib, etc.) which leads to the world hating America which makes Osama very happy.

Therefore, Osama likes George as much as he hates him.

Okay, 9/11 allows BushCo to maximize political, economic and military power.

So, George likes Osama just as much as he hates him. (After all, we never did "get him dead or alive".)

BushCo is in serious trouble.

If you were Osama, what would you do?

(Hint: George won't need to nuke Iran.)

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I mean, think about it: Ancient Rome was relentless in its pursuit of whatever it wanted. Architecture, territory, pesky rebel band... it was always just a matter of time. Yet here we are, claiming to be the most powerful nation the world has ever seen and we can't find one diabetic hiding in the mountains.

Unless he's a piece more valuable on than off the board.

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Exxon/Mobile's profits for last year were $36,000,000,000.
Exxon/Mobil's chairman Lee Raymond's retirement package is $400,000,000.
Exxon/Mobile's revenue has increased to $97,000,000 per day.

More tax breaks for Exxon/Mobile I say!

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"GM officials say they even plan a small increase in Hummer production to keep pace with demand for the large SUV." LINK

We're insane.

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Seize the day, folks.

Cheers,
Clemsy

QUOTES:

"We said: 'Well, what about the intel?' And they said: 'Well, this isn't about intel anymore. This is about regime change'." ~Tyler Drumheller, who headed CIA covert operations in Europe during the run-up to the Iraq war

There was understandable reluctance in the Congress to begin a serious investigation of the Nixon presidency. Then there came a time when it was unavoidable. That time in the Bush presidency has arrived. ~Carl Bernstein

On May 29, 2003... President Bush proclaimed a fresh victory for his administration in Iraq: Two small trailers captured by U.S. and Kurdish troops had turned out to be long-sought mobile "biological laboratories." ...A secret fact-finding mission to Iraq -- not made public until now -- had already concluded that the trailers had nothing to do with biological weapons. Leaders of the Pentagon-sponsored mission transmitted their unanimous findings to Washington in a field report on May 27, 2003, two days before the president's statement. ~NY Times

Sooner or later, should Bush go unpunished, somebody in power is going to try to cancel a presidential election. When they do, they'll cite national security and the need for stable and experienced political leadership in a time of war, and when they do, they'll cite the precedents set by George Bush and permitted by the Congress, courts, and American public of his day. And our country's long, mostly successful experiment in representative democracy will be over. ~Geov Parrish

As it happens, rumors of a new war coincide with the emergence of evidence that appears to confirm our worst suspicions about the war we're already in. ~Paul Krugman

I now regret that I did not more openly challenge those who were determined to invade a country whose actions were peripheral to the real threat — Al Qaeda. ~Lt. Gen. Gregory Newbold

I have a sneaky feeling this Bush won't be punished any more than his Dad or Grandad were. ~Tony Hendra

So, Who's Holding the Football?

2006-04-20T20:32:00.000-04:00

Speaking of China floating the U.S. national debt, check this out:

China has kept up its share of the economic compact by accumulating a gigantic treasure chest of U.S. dollars from its export sales and reinvesting most of those dollars in U.S. Treasuries and corporate bonds.

The recycling of dollars, though less visible and less publicized than the trade deficit, is just as essential in the economic relationship because it provides U.S. consumers and businesses with the credit they need to keep on buying Chinese and other goods...

...China recently surpassed Japan to become the largest holder of dollar reserves, with a war chest of $833 billion. Most of that is thought to be invested in U.S. instruments. Altogether, Japan, Russia, China and other Asian countries hold two-thirds of the world's dollar reserves, which they have amassed through years of large trade surpluses with the United States. (LINK)

Somehow this situation reminds me of....

Thanks whaleshaman, for that Wash. Times link.

Washington Times? Hey! They do good stuff! ....Just don't put the good stuff on the front page. Remember this oldie but goodie?

Cheers,
Clemsy

Nationalism: Better Than Sex But More Expensive

2006-04-20T09:10:00.000-04:00

How can these fools who have bungled Iraq so badly even think that targeting Iran would be a good idea? How can this administration, in the face of Nixonian poll numbers, damning criticism by respected former military leaders, and relentless, if overdue, excoriation in the press continue to act as if he has unlimited "political capital"?

Easy.

Political or military commentators, like astrologers, can survive almost any mistake, because their more devoted followers do not look to them for an appraisal of the facts but for the stimulation of nationalistic loyalties. ~George Orwell

Please note that as of the beginning of April, Bush was still adored by about 80% of the Republican Party, a bunch of folks who get jollies by having their nationalistic loyalties fondled.

If the U.S. had a parliamentary government, Bush would have been "disappeared" some time ago. As it is, the flaws in our so-called republic are currently glaring. After all, a 60% disapproval rating should indicate that our elected representatives have the go-ahead to punish the president, tooth and nail.

No, no. Not yet. We must wait for something really awful. Like, you know, oral sex and semen stained dresses.

In the meantime we continue on the downward swirl. When Clinton left office, the national debt was around 5.3 trillion dollars, an increase of a little over one trillion over the course of his administration. At the moment, the debt stands at 8.4 trillion (LINK ), and increases at a bit over one hundred thousand dollars per second, or about 2.2 billion dollars a day.

About 50% of the Bush increase is due to tax cuts, 30% due to military expenditures. About 5% are due to entitlement programs.

This number works out to around $28,000 for every man, woman and child in the country.

At this point, China holds five hundred billion dollars of that debt. Japan holds one trillion.

No matter. Just tickle my nationalistic loyalties a little more, George. It's just like sex without all that Christian guilt. Following the metaphor a little further, nuking Iran would be one hell of an....

Clemsy

Ahhh, Sweet Relief

2006-04-18T19:07:00.000-04:00

Stocks soared Tuesday on news that Federal Reserve policymakers believed their run of interest rate hikes is likely nearing an end, propelling the Dow Jones industrials up nearly 200 points. The report helped offset the effects of oil prices that passed $71 a barrel. LINK

Gosh. Don't you feel much better? I mean, if I don't consider that the skyrocketing gasoline prices will only result in skyrocketing prices for EVERYTHING, which will only and royally screw the economy, then I can believe everything is just dandy.

I'm going to sleep so well tonight.

Nutshells

2006-04-09T23:00:00.000-04:00

Abortion in America will always be an issue because the so-called Right to Lifers do not only want to regulate conception and birth but also contraception and sex. Their reasons for this are fundamentally religious in nature because...

Every sperm is sacred.
Every sperm is great.
If a sperm is wasted,
God gets quite irate. ~Monty Python

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The coming tsunami of retiring baby-boomers is a profound threat to the American economy. The Bush Administration's solution to this, if you're paying attention and reading between the lines, is simple if not draconian: make them work longer and die sooner.

Whether this is for God and Country or payback for the sixties is open to interpretation.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Question: As long as "health care" is a "for profit" industry, it's primary mission won't be "health care."

Is this socialism, common sense or a comfy combination of the two?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Why is the United States the only two-party republic on the planet? Why is a parliamentary system good for everyone other than us?

Well, everyone other than Iraq, apparently.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I'm concerned that if the Democrats win back a majority in November, they'll act like a dog that's finally caught a car.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Nationalism and religion will be the death of us.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Geronimo's skull is adorning the Skull and Bones "tomb" at Yale University. Apparently Dubya's grandpappy, Prescott, had a hand in getting it there.

My, that doesn't sound very good: The President's grandfather was a grave robber.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

QUOTES OF THE WEEK:

No Child Left Behind Law Forcing Out Study of History, Science From Schools
Just like in White House. ~Ironic Times

'Neoconservative' is used by the American right to describe a radical policy doctrine, while the European left uses it as a handy alternative to 'Yankee imperialist pig-dog'. ~The Observer

But the former senior intelligence official said the attention given to the nuclear option has created serious misgivings inside the military, and some officers have talked about resigning after an attempt to remove the nuclear option from the evolving war plans in Iran failed, according to the report. ~Yahoo News (Serious poll numbers require serious actions, I guess.)

Martino told me that if he was able to obtain a copy of a contract then he would have earned a lot of money from an unspecified ‘intelligence’ organisation. ~Laura Montinim assistant to the Nigerian ambassador (Anyone for a slice of yellowcake?)

For the second time in two weeks, a former general has called for the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld over what both generals described as serious mistakes made in the war in Iraq. ~The New York Times

Succumbing to scandal, former Majority Leader Tom Delay intends to resign from Congress within weeks... ~Associated Press (Finally, some good news.)

Despite the unsettled time and the obvious importance of intelligence both in investigating the 2001 attacks and preventing new ones, Bush, hewing to a practice of other presidents, stocked the [Intelligence Oversight Board] not only with former senior government officials but also with political insiders and wealthy campaign donors with no evident intelligence expertise. ~Chicago Tribune

Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, and other top officials chose to pump up al-Qaeda into a global enemy worthy of a new Cold War, a generational struggle that might comfortably be filled with smaller, regime-change-oriented, "preventive" hot wars against hopelessly outgunned enemies who -- unlike in those Cold War days -- would have no other superpower to call on for aid. ~Tom Engelhardt

The Pentagon has revealed that coalition forces are spending millions of dollars establishing at least six "enduring" bases in Iraq - raising the prospect that US and UK forces could be involved in a long-term deployment in the country. It said it assumed British troops would operate one of the bases. ~Independent (Enduring = Permanent. Clever fellows.)

Some military analysts wonder if 20 or so years from now the US will still have costly "enduring" bases in Iraq. ~The Christian Science Monitor

I've stood too many times with my feet in an inch of blood. ~Capt. Carl Impastato, an Air Force nurse

Why would a man universally described as kind and intelligent suddenly start acting like a dodo? Presidential ambition, of course. ~Joe Klein on Bill Frist

Today, a leading power such as the United States approaches theocracy when it meets the conditions currently on display: an elected leader who believes himself to speak for the Almighty, a ruling political party that represents religious true believers, the certainty of many Republican voters that government should be guided by religion and, on top of it all, a White House that adopts agendas seemingly animated by biblical worldviews. ~Kevin Phillips

By counting golf course ponds and ornamental lakes as wetlands, the federal government announced Thursday a massive gain in the number of wetlands nationwide, the first such gain ever reported. ~St. Petersburg Times

This administration has taken us on a path to nowhere replete with hyped intelligence, macho slogans and an incredible failure to see the obvious. ~Wesley Clark

THE ADMINISTRATION LEAKS ON AMERICA

So there it is. We have Bush authorizing the disclosure of classified information, and we have that disclosure taking place for no other reason than to discredit an administration critic. ~William Rivers Pitt

US President George W Bush authorised the leak of secret intelligence to a newspaper to help defend the Iraq war, a former White House aide has said. ~BBC

But I want to tell you something -- leaks of classified information are a bad thing. And we've had them -- there's too much leaking in Washington. That's just the way it is. And we've had leaks out of the administrative branch, had leaks out of the legislative branch, and out of the executive branch and the legislative branch, and I've spoken out consistently against them and I want to know who the leakers are. ~George Bush (Though a hive mind queen, I felt this George quote deserved to follow the one above, no?)

Much of the information that the administration leaked or declassified, however, has proved to be incomplete, exaggerated, incorrect or fabricated. ~The Mercury News

QUOTES FROM THE HIVE MIND

If these issues are not addressed, you'll see values voters stay home by the millions. And then the Republicans and others who have been the beneficiary of the values vote are going to lose. ~Rev. Rick Scarborough

The good news is Democrats don't have much of a plan. The bad news is they may not need one. ~GOP pollster Tony Fabrizio

Our goal is to balance safety and security, rerouting doesn't mitigate the risk, it simply moves it to another location. ~Darrin Kayser, spokesman for the Transportation Security Administration (In other words, routing a tanker of chlorine gas around rather than through a major city is a waste of time.)

Q: What is the biggest lesson you have learned from the Iraq war?

A: The ingratitude of the Iraqis for the extraordinary favor we gave them — to release them from the bondage of Saddam Hussein’s tyranny. They have rapidly interpreted it as something they did and that we were incidental to it. They’ve more or less written us out of the picture. ~Daniel Pipes

This is something I've been working on for twenty-two years. I mean, we got it. ~Tom DeLay on the stopping of the 2000 Florida recount, in which he had a significant role.

PICK OF THE WEEK:

Intelligence watchdog slow to bite

When a privacy-rights group requested records to show how many times a secretive presidential oversight board had asked the Justice Department to investigate possible violations of intelligence-gathering laws since 2001, the answer that came back last month was as simple as it was startling.

Zero.

The Next Level

2006-04-01T13:00:00.000-05:00

Knowledge is power, and while the truth may be spurious and slippery and messy and deep, the pursuit of it is just about the only thing we have left. Give that up, and all that's left is spiritual numbness, emotional stasis and death. So what are you waiting for? ~Mark Morford

Facts, links, quotes... rehashing a swirl of data skimmed with a personal spin from the top of the Web available to anyone so inclined to look. To those not so inclined, it all seems dug from deep beneath the thick crust of paying bills, getting to and from work and getting a new pair of baseball cleats for the kid's new shoe size. To those it's all either shocking or unbelievable. The venom of fair and balanced gives everything another side as if there were no facts, only perception.

Joseph Goebbels would have been so much more successful today, don't you think? He would have had ample opportunity to voice his side of the Jewish Question.

The surface of data is fogged with rhetoric. Lies, half-truths and denials drown facts and reinforce whatever one needs to believe to keep the crust of the planet beneath one's feet stable.

If what's shallow to one is deep to another, what then when one goes even deeper?

A confluence of events, stories and quotes demands a deeper look into the churning magma that drives the continents across the face of the planet. A look into a world in which one shrivels in such utter insignificance as to justify a retreat into the comforting arms of blind ignorance. Or blind faith.

This is where we're going today, gentle readers.

Liberty. Wonderful word. How many truly know what it means? How many of the five freedoms can you name? A recent poll reveals that about 22% of Americans polled could name all five Simpsons. How many knew all five freedoms? One out of one thousand or .1%.

Remember Willful Ignorants and Blind Faithers?

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Corporations are supposed to be public servants and the wealthy kept in check by taxing the hell out of them (after which they are still wealthy). While this has slowly been reversed, the oxymoronic term 'corporate citizen' found its way into the language.

Roll this one around your pre-frontal lobes: "Exxon is a good corporate citizen but it does not work for the welfare of the country. (LINK)"

Bizarre enough to consider a profit driven entity entitled to all the rights of a person, but to consider this in a global economy renders it just plain absurd, and the daily stock market report a flagrant slap in the face to anyone who has to walk down Main Street.

K Street steers the country. The Abramoff scandal won't bring it down. Our legislature won't allow that.

And K Street is Big Money.

K Street is the military industrial complex President Eisenhower warned us of.

K Street is Exxon/Mobile, the "good corporate citizen" that "does not work for the welfare of the country."

K Street is where democracy is turned into a bad joke and the sound of patriotism becomes the bleating of sheep and the lowing of cattle.

History is a narrative punctuated by the powerful who use people like a carpenter uses nails. Here's the simple lesson Blind Faithers and Willful Ignorants refuse to learn: More often than not, the powerful couldn't care less about the people they use to achieve their goals. We ride the bloody, frothy crest of the wave of that narrative. The nails are being pounded in Iraq. The nails are being pounded on the Gulf Coast of America.

The powerful don't care, or have convinced themselves that your sacrifice is justified by their goals and objectives.

Goals and objectives that benfit who?

September Eleventh

Were three thousand nails pounded on 9/11?

What? Oh no Clemsy, don't go there!

Too late. Look. Go on and look. Read the whole damn thing. I've avoided the questions. Good questions. Uncomfortable questions. Questions like:

Why did the towers fall as they did?

Why were large amounts of American and United Airline stock moved the day before the attacks?

Why did NORAD and the FAA fail so miserably that day?

Who benefitted from the result? Who benefitted?

There are more questions. All the theories illustrated in the linked article aren't credible, but to walk away from it without the least bit of discomfort would be... common. Like I said, blind faith is comfortable and your puny, insignificant existence can't do a damn thing about it anyway.

Baaa. Mooo.

Global Warming

I've always considered the narrow environmental parameters within which humanity thrives to be worthy of erring on the side of caution. Is that a no-brainer or what? But that's not what we're doing is it? This is another area where keeping your head under the covers and not thinking about it is just so easy.

This week's Time Magazine's cover story is titled, Polar Ice Caps Are Melting Faster Than Ever... More And More Land Is Being Devastated By Drought... Rising Waters Are Drowning Low-Lying Communities... By Any Measure, Earth Is At ... The Tipping Point

Sucker punch of a title, isn't it? The first paragraph kicks you while you're down:

No one can say exactly what it looks like when a planet takes ill, but it probably looks a lot like Earth. Never mind what you've heard about global warming as a slow-motion emergency that would take decades to play out. Suddenly and unexpectedly, the crisis is upon us.

Here, let me ruin your day a little more:

By one recent measure, several Greenland ice sheets have doubled their rate of slide, and just last week the journal Science published a study suggesting that by the end of the century, the world could be locked in to an eventual rise in sea levels of as much as 20 ft. Nature, it seems, has finally got a bellyful of us.

I heard one scientist say that if such a change in sea level occurred over thousands of years, we would naturally adjust to it. However, he continued, if it takes only a couple centuries, as it now seems, then we would have to start moving population centers. Now.

Twenty feet turns Florida from a thumb to a pinky. Twenty feet eliminates New York City, Washington D.C., LA, Boston, San Franciso... Almost every coastal city on the planet.

Here's a new story: Significant Warming of the Antarctic Winter Troposphere

New Orleans? We're rebuilding New Orleans?

Why does America continue to act like it has all the time in the world? Back to those Powerful Few. Why should they care? Won't they always be okay? Won't they, and their families, always have the resources to turn such adversity into an economic benefit? Don't think so? Look HERE.

Baaa. Mooo.

Make no mistake, George Bush and Company aren't the problem, just an insultingly obvious symptom of a runaway situation. They keep the attention of the sheep and cattle on the convenient "terrorists" and state with straight faces that "we're at war" so everybody LOOK OVER THERE and pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.

Look up, people. They have a hammer over your head.

What can you do? Not much, but even that is better than nothing. Go back to the opening quote. Read What Every American Should Know About Who's Really Running the World. Convince some sheep and cattle that the slaughterhouse isn't the best of all possible destinations.

No need to run for the Paxil, although it may be tempting. There is something larger than ourselves no? Call it what you will, but it's where hope resides. The Arthurian Tradition gives us the view that it is up to us to venture into the Dark Forest alone to find our way to the Grail.

If enough of us take up the challenge, just by who we then become, we may provide our children with a way through whatever is heading our way.

Cheers,
Clemsy

QUOTES OF THE WEEK:

Report: Cheney Gets All His Information From Fox News
Which gets all its information from Cheney. ~Ironic Times

...A small group of extremists -- many of whom have worked together before -- are redesigning the mechanics of this country. They are trying to redraw the world, and they are shrinking our rights in the process. The media has stopped holding the powers that be accountable for this action, and the legislature, where many extremists now hold powerful seats, is an arena where some are trying to upset the balance of power -- including attempts to disempower the courts. And meanwhile, lying is so common it's nearly acceptable, and those who point out the lies are drowned out by official denials. We're losing the truth, we're losing perspective, we're losing the original ideals of this country and our birthrights are vanishing with them. ~Melissa Rossi

The men were taken away and the women were screaming and crying, and I just remember thinking: this was exactly what Saddam used to do - and now we're doing it. ~Michael Blake, veteran

We have no real idea how to address global warming, the draining of jobs overseas, the influx of illegal immigrants, our growing indebtedness to foreign lenders, our addiction to petroleum, the rise of Islamic terror... To put it bluntly, we don't know what to do, and so we do nothing. ~Jay Bookman

Faced with the unappetizing reality of Iraq, Bush and Rove are relying on that grand old reliable strategy—attack the media. It doesn’t play as well as it used to. Everyone who wants an alternative reality is already watching Fox News. The rest of the country is worried. ~Molly Ivins

Keeping our attention on Iraq has allowed this administration to do what it came to do under cover of darkness. ~William Rivers Pitt

Nixon's illegal surveillance was limited; Bush's, it is developing, may be extraordinarily broad in scope. ~John Dean

Our neoconservative policy makers are still willing to risk the U.S. Army in a mad Middle East imperial scheme that composed the real reason for the Iraq war in the first place. ~Gary Hart

We're losing because the cavemen in the Bush administration don't understand the difference between strength and bellicosity, and they don't understand that increased bellicosity will only compound the already grave threat of terrorism. ~Rosa Brooks

Americans aren't against the war in Iraq because it is wrong; they are against it because we are losing. ~Scott Ritter

QUOTES FROM THE HIVE MIND

Yes, I know we have made tactical errors, thousands of them. ~Condoleezza Rice

HEADLINES

'If you start looking at them as humans, then how are you gonna kill them?'

They are a publicity nightmare for the US military: an ever-growing number of veterans of the Iraq conflict who are campaigning against the war. To mark the third anniversary of the invasion this month, a group of them marched on Katrina-ravaged New Orleans.

Area Still Unprepared for Terror Attacks, Senate Panel Is Told

Nearly five years after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the Washington region still lacks a strategic plan to guide preparations for any future attacks or to effectively spend hundreds of millions of homeland security dollars, federal and local officials told a U.S. Senate panel yesterday.

Justices Hint That They'll Rule on Challenge Filed by Detainee

As the justices of the Supreme Court took their seats Tuesday morning to hear Osama bin Laden's former driver challenge the Bush administration's plan to try him before a military commission, one question — perhaps the most important one — was how protective the justices would be of their jurisdiction to decide the case.

McCain Woos the Right, Makes Peace With Falwell

He assured Falwell, however, that if the federal courts were to strike down state bans on gay marriage, McCain would back a federal amendment defining marriage as a union between one man and one woman. McCain's outreach to conservatives on marriage is politically important because of the way he sharply denounced a federal constitutional ban on gay marriage when it was considered in 2004. (Did McCain just lose the independent vote for a marriage of convenience?)

Conservatives' new books have Bush in crosshairs

Conservatives who charge President George W. Bush has imposed a theocracy, risked US bankruptcy and fanned flames of anti-Americanism are flooding US booksellers with their irate tomes.

BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING

FBI records show terrorism focus includes activists

The FBI, while waging a highly publicized war against terrorism, has spent resources gathering information on anti-war and environmental protesters, and activists who feed vegetarian meals to the homeless, the agency's internal memos show.

SCANDAL CORNER

Bush Was Set on Path to War, Memo by British Adviser Says

In the weeks before the United States-led invasion of Iraq, as the United States and Britain pressed for a second United Nations resolution condemning Iraq, President Bush's public ultimatum to Saddam Hussein was blunt: Disarm or face war. (NY Times is a few months late on this story.)

OCCUPATION: IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN

U.S., Canadian soldiers die as Afghan violence surges

Violence has intensified in Afghanistan in recent months and the Taliban have vowed to launch a spring offensive as part of their campaign to oust foreign forces and the Western-backed government.

Iraq parties demand U.S. cede control

Iraq's ruling parties demanded U.S. forces cede control of security on Monday as the government launched an inquiry into a raid on a Shi'ite mosque that ministers said saw "cold blooded" killings by U.S.-led troops.

Wave of Violence Kills at Least 81 Iraqis

Police found 30 more victims of the sectarian slaughter ravaging Iraq _ most of them beheaded _ dumped on a village road north of Baghdad on Sunday. At least 16 other Iraqis were killed in a U.S.-backed raid in a Shiite neighborhood of the capital.

OPINION

Fool Me Twice
By Joseph Cirincione

Does this story line sound familiar? The vice president of the United States gives a major speech focused on the threat from an oil-rich nation in the Middle East. The U.S. secretary of state tells congress that the same nation is our most serious global challenge. The secretary of defense calls that nation the leading supporter of global terrorism. The president blames it for attacks on U.S. troops.

When Democracy is Theocracy in Disquise

2006-03-26T13:00:00.000-05:00

Good news! The Afghan authorities have dropped charges against Abdul Rahman, citing 'lack of evidence'. They haven't quite let him go yet, however. In fact, at the time of this writing he is in Policharki Prison, "a notorious maximum-security prison outside Kabul that is also home to hundreds of Taliban and al-Qaida militants." You see, detainees where he was before threatened his life, so one hopes he's in solitary at Policharki. Any Taliban will joyfully slit his throat.

Indeed, it is expected that he will leave the country after his release as "some Islamic clerics had said Rahman would face danger from his countrymen."

If he had gone to trial and found guilty he could have been executed.

Child molester? Cartoonist? Writer? No, something much worse: Christian convert.

It's not illegal to be Christian, you see, but for a moslem to convert to Christianity is a capitol offence under Shari'a law. One may assume, then, that such jurisprudence is part of Afghanistan's constitution.

This situation is something of an embarrassment all around. Hamid Karzai found himself in the middle of a political storm between Western outrage and concern about reactions from Islamic conservatives if he was seen to be caving in to infidel pressure. Eventually one started to hear that Rahman's mental state was in question, a good indication that people were jockeying for a way out. So Rahman's only worry after being released is that someone, at some time, will probably try to murder him.

Please appreciate how bizarre this reads to Western eyes. It is a concrete indication of the profound differences between the various Middle East Islamic cultures and the secular West. There are those who say "liberty is liberty" no matter who you are or where you are. Well, from one perspective that may very well be and if so liberty is severely compromised by religious intrusion in those areas where we are so busily and ignorantly trying to spread liberal democracy.

Here's article two from the Iraqi Constitution: Islam is the official religion of the state and is a basic source of legislation. (LINK)

Hmmm.

I propose that the term "official religion of the state" and democracy are mutually exclusive. The former profoundly attenuates the legitimacy of the latter.

At least that was what the Founding Fathers thought.

Religious law dominated Europe for the better part of a thousand years, and saw its zenith in the various Inquisitions meant to keep the Christian faith pure. Of particular interest is the Roman Inqusition of the 16th century, the purpose of which was partially a reaction to the Renaissance. The Renaissance being that period of unbridled questioning and artistic expression that was a direct result of the rediscovery of classical thought, which had been preserved, ironically, by Islam.

You could have been burned at the stake for saying the sun was the center of the solar system. Just ask Galileo, who declined the invitation and recanted his views. One Giordano Bruno, however, was incinerated for just that in 1600.

Thankfully, the Renaissance was unstoppable and gave birth to the Enlightenment which, in turn, gave us Jeffersonian Democracy. Getting hereditary aristocracy off our backs was only one part of this development. Getting religion out of the halls of government was the other.

As long as a culture looks to the unquestionable dictates of divine revelation for the only definition of society, democracy is not only unlikely but its imposition can only result in reactionary religious conservatism.

Absent their own Renaissance and Enlightenment, liberal democracy in essentially religious theocracies is doomed to bloody failure.

But we don't have to look very far to see the dangers of such medieval magical thinking. We have our own proponents of such a society, although Bible based, right here.

And they are very cheeky lately.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So George Bush signed into law a bill that didn't pass in the House. Wow, I wonder what the Consitution will look like after George is done with his black Sharpie.

He's already blacked out the Fourth Amendment. Seperation of church and state is certainly weakening.

Reminds me, at a Q & A the other day in Cleveland, the President was asked the following question: My question is that author and former Nixon administration official Kevin Phillips in his latest book, "American Theocracy," discusses what has been called radical Christianity and its growing involvement into government and politics. He makes the point that members of your administration have reached out to prophetic Christians who see the war in Iraq and the rise of terrorism as signs of the Apocalypse. Do you believe this, that the war in Iraq and the rise of terrorism are signs of the Apocalypse? And if not, why not?

Now, I heard his response. One part of his answer was, "First, I've heard of that, by the way." (LINK)

The White House transcript is a bit different: "The first I've heard of that, by the way." (LINK)

I didn't hear him say that.

Cheers,
Clemsy

QUOTES OF THE WEEK:

President Calls on Americans to Show Patience Regarding Iraq
But none regarding Iran. ~Ironic Times

You know, I've lived in somewhere around 15 dictatorships in my life, negotiated and threatened dictators in Africa and the middle east right to their faces. Given that, it's really kind of hard for me to take seriously a trio of clowns named Dick, Karl, and Scooter. I mean, c'mon. ~Joseph Wilson

But what is different is when Shiites get killed by suicide bombs, everyone comes together to fight the Sunni terrorists. When Shiites kill Sunnis, there is no response, because much of this killing is done by militias connected to the government. ~Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish member of the Iraqi Parliament

Republicans are evoking an obscure Supreme Court ruling from the 1890s to suggest that a bill does not actually have to pass both chambers of Congress to become law. ~Jonathan Weisman (Streamlining government right past the need for a constitution. Isn't that special?)

We have fomented civil war in Iraq. We have probably fomented internecine war in the Muslim world between the Shias and the Sunnis, and I think Bush may well have started the third world war, all for their own personal policies. ~Command Sergeant Major Eric Haney (ret), Delta Force founding member

A Kurdish writer was sentenced to one year and a half in prison on Sunday for accusing Kurdish leader Masoud Barzani of abuse of power. ~Reuters

ACROSS the U.S. capital, lawmakers are scurrying from pillar to post in a frantic effort to put lipstick on a pig. ~Philadelphia Daily News

Last year David Kuo, the White House deputy director for faith-based initiatives, resigned with a statement that "Republicans were indifferent to the poor. ~Sidney Blumenthal

Its a good thing he [Bush] wasn’t President when the Japanese attacked Pearl harbor, we’d still be in Argentina. ~Olephart

The president's apologists rationalize even his most obvious and egregious illegalities, mendacities and bungling with straight faces and earnest demeanor and the rest of us are left posturing for history, trying to make certain that when the official record is written, we are not indicted by our silence. ~Leonard Pitts Jr.

We're beyond the American people buying into public relations offensives. ~Senate Foreign Relations Committee member Chuck Hagel, R-Neb

If this is not civil war then God knows what civil war is. ~former prime minister of Iraq, Ayad Allawi

Some positive signs do not mitigate this administration's gross miscalculations and stunning incompetence in Iraq. ~Rep. Steny Hoyer

The only people who want us in Iraq are Iran and al-Qaida. ~Rep. John Murtha

The president contradicts US ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, while the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, General Peter Pace, and the US commander in Iraq, General John Abizaid, contradict the president. At the same time, secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld blithely contradicts the joint chiefs on the entire strategy. ~Sidney Blumenthal

Don't worry, Mr. President. We have Kansas surrounded. ~FBI Deputy Director Bruce Gebhardt to President Bush concerning "a suspected terrorism threat in Kansas."

Our problem now is that we're not fighting the people who attacked us — they're still running around on the Afghan-Pakistan border while we battle Iraqis who don't like us occupying their country. ~Molly Ivins

In my more than three decades in the government I've never witnessed such restrictions on the ability of scientists to communicate with the public. ~James Hansen, head of NASA's top institute studying climate.

If your starting point for evaluating the world around you is the firm belief that this nation is somehow endowed by Providence with unique qualities that make it morally superior to every other nation on Earth, then you are not likely to question the President when he says we are sending our troops here or there, or bombing this or that, in order to spread our values—democracy, liberty, and let’s not forget free enterprise—to some God-forsaken (literally) place in the world. ~Howard Zinn

QUOTES FROM THE HIVE MIND

This may be what failure looks like. But it may also be what success looks like. If we're going to succeed, it's going to look bad for a while. ~Frederick Kagan, a conservative scholar at the American Enterprise Institute (Oh. My. God.)

Now the Iraqi leaders are working together to enact a government that reflects the will of the people, and so I'm encouraged by the progress. George Bush, trying to keep the lemmings on track.

More Iraqis are dying from the militia violence than from the terrorists. ~Zalmay Khalilzad (sounds like civil war to me)

It continues to improve day by day. Those are the facts on the ground. That's the reality. ~Dick Cheney (...because reality is what I say it is.)

Turning our backs on postwar Iraq today would be the modern equivalent of handing postwar Germany back to the Nazis. ~Donald Rumsfeld (That ridiculous Germany analogy again. besides, how many troops were in postwar germany? Millions and millions.)

...a consistent understanding has developed that the president has inherent constitutional authority to conduct warrantless searches and surveillance within the United States for foreign intelligence purposes. ~from "a little-noticed white paper submitted by Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to Congress on January 19 justifying the legality of the NSA eavesdropping"

I don't think he's going to do it for political reasons, but if he did do it for political reasons, you'd do it in October. ~Pat Buchanan on invading Iran

The terrorists seem to recognize that they are losing in Iraq. ~Donald Rumsfeld

How many Iraqi women and children have been killed by insurgents who have been emboldened by the American left? ~Rush Limbaugh

PICKS OF THE WEEK:

A Time for Heresy by Bill Moyers

When Dean Bill Leonard asked James Dunn to join him here at Wake Forest’s new Divinity School, my soul shouted “Yes!” These two men personify the honesty and courage we need to meet the challenge of faith in the fundamentalist dispensation of the 21st century as radical interpretations of both Islam and Christianity seek, in the words of C.Welton Gaddy of the Interfaith Alliance, “to take over the government and use cause structures to advance the ideology, hierarchy, and laws” of their movement.

Iraqis think U.S. in their nation to stay

The U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, and other U.S. officials disavow any desire for permanent bases. But long-term access, as at other U.S. bases abroad, is different from "permanent," and the official U.S. position is carefully worded. (Italics mine. 'Long term access' vs. 'permanent'. You say tomato I say tomahto.)

Gestures of conscience bring solace

Late last year, John Conyers Jr., Democratic congressman from Michigan, proposed impeaching the president of the United States. The proposal received scant attention in the media mainstream, though it was picked up with glee by liberal bloggers and provided a rallying point for the president's supporters.

The Letter of the Law

In the dark days after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, a small group of lawyers from the White House and the Justice Department began meeting to debate a number of novel legal strategies to help prevent another attack. Soon after, President Bush authorized the National Security Agency to begin conducting electronic eavesdropping on terrorism suspects in the United States, including American citizens, without court approval. Meeting in the FBI's state-of-the-art command center in the J. Edgar Hoover Building, the lawyers talked with senior FBI officials about using the same legal authority to conduct physical searches of homes and businesses of terrorism suspects--also without court approval, one current and one former government official tell U.S. News. "There was a fair amount of discussion at Justice on the warrantless physical search issue," says a former senior FBI official. "Discussions about--if [the searches] happened--where would the information go, and would it taint cases.

THE IRAQ WAR: Three years
White House no longer sees quick end to difficult war

When the U.S.-led coalition attacked Iraq three years ago, the Bush administration was brimming with confidence that this would be a war only in the sense that a lot of bombs would be dropped and the military would seize, temporarily, a foreign capital. It was going to be swift, high-tech, clean.

HEADLINES

Bush shuns Patriot Act requirement

When President Bush signed the reauthorization of the USA Patriot Act this month, he included an addendum saying that he did not feel obliged to obey requirements that he inform Congress about how the FBI was using the act's expanded police powers.

U.S. War Spending to Rise 44% to $9.8 Bln a Month, Report Says

Spending will rise to $9.8 billion a month from the $6.8 billion a month the Pentagon said it spent last year, the research service said. The group's March 10 report cites ``substantial'' expenses to replace or repair damaged weapons, aircraft, vehicles, radios and spare parts.

Losing Ground

A bitterly divided electorate gives President George W. Bush an approval rating of only 36 percent in the latest NEWSWEEK poll, matching the low point in his presidency recorded last November. His image as an effective leader in the war on terror is tarnished, with less than half the public (44 percent) approving of the way he’s handling terrorism and homeland security. Despite a series of presidential speeches meant to bolster support for the war in Iraq, as well as the announcement of a major military offensive when the poll was getting under way, only 29 percent of the people questioned approved Bush’s handling of the situation in Iraq. Fully 65 percent disapprove.

Iraqi Leaders `Making Good Progress,' Bush Says

President George W. Bush said Iraqi political leaders are ``making good progress'' toward forming a unity government, and that recent violence in the country has spurred them to set aside their differences. (Not very many tunes in his repertoire is there?)

‘Impeach Bush’ chorus grows

THE movement to impeach President George W Bush over the war on terror began with a few tatty bumper stickers on the back of battered old Volvos and slogans such as “Bush lied, people died” on far-left websites. But as Democrat hopes rise of gaining control of Congress this autumn, dreams of impeaching Bush are no longer confined to the political fringe.

BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING

DOJ: NSA Could've Monitored Lawyers' Calls

The National Security Agency could have legally monitored ordinarily confidential communications between doctors and patients or attorneys and their clients, the Justice Department said Friday of its controversial warrantless surveillance program.

Bush Okayed Warrantless Searches - Oregon Lawyer Says His Office Was Illegally Searched

US News says President Bush’s authorization of warrantless domestic spying went beyond wiretapping to include physical searches of businesses and residences inside the United States — an apparent violation of the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits “unreasonable” searches and seizures by the government.

OCCUPATION: IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN

US envoy urges crackdown on Iraq militias

The U.S. ambassador urged Iraq's divided leaders to rein in militias on Saturday as political blocs failed again to break a deadlock on forming a unity government that they hope can avert civil war.

At Least 51 Killed in Iraqi Violence

At least 51 people were killed by insurgents and shadowy sectarian gangs, police reported _ continuing the wave of violence that has left more than 1,000 Iraqis dead since the bombing last month of a Shiite Muslim shrine.

Bush Asks U.S. to Look Past Iraq Bloodshed

Beginning the fourth year of an unpopular war, President Bush defended his Iraq record on Monday against skeptical questioning. He said he could "understand people being disheartened" but appealed to Americans to look beyond the bloodshed and see signs of progress.

Before and After Abu Ghraib, a U.S. Unit Abused Detainees

As the Iraqi insurgency intensified in early 2004, an elite Special Operations forces unit converted one of Saddam Hussein's former military bases near Baghdad into a top-secret detention center. There, American soldiers made one of the former Iraqi government's torture chambers into their own interrogation cell. They named it the Black Room.

RELIGION

Apocalyptic President

In his latest PR offensive President Bush came to Cleveland, Ohio, on Monday to answer the paramount question on Iraq that he said was on people's minds: "They wonder what I see that they don't." After mentioning "terror" 54 times and "victory" five, dismissing "civil war" twice and asserting that he is "optimistic", he called on a citizen in the audience, who homed in on the invisible meaning of recent events in the light of two books, American Theocracy, by Kevin Phillips, and the book of Revelation. Phillips, the questioner explained, "makes the point that members of your administration have reached out to prophetic Christians who see the war in Iraq and the rise of terrorism as signs of the apocalypse. Do you believe this? And if not, why not?"

Afghan Christian convert could face death

An Afghan man detained for converting to Christianity could face the death penalty if he refuses to become Muslim again, police and a judge said on Sunday.

OPINION

America's Blinders by Howard Zinn

It seems to me there are two reasons, which go deep into our national culture, and which help explain the vulnerability of the press and of the citizenry to outrageous lies whose consequences bring death to tens of thousands of people. If we can understand those reasons, we can guard ourselves better against being deceived.

Bush Didn't Bungle Iraq, You Fools
THE MISSION WAS INDEED ACCCOMPLISHED by Greg Palast

And what did the USA want Iraq to do with Iraq's oil? The answer will surprise many of you: and it is uglier, more twisted, devilish and devious than anything imagined by the most conspiracy-addicted blogger. The answer can be found in a 323-page plan for Iraq's oil secretly drafted by the State Department. Our team got a hold of a copy; how, doesn't matter. The key thing is what's inside this thick Bush diktat: a directive to Iraqis to maintain a state oil company that will "enhance its relationship with OPEC."

The 'Long War'? Oh, Goodie by Molly Ivins

President Bush has once more undertaken to explain to us "Why We Fight," which is also the title of an excellent new documentary on Iraq. According to the president, "Our goal in Iraq is victory." I personally did not find that a helpful clarification.

Who Are These people?

2006-03-18T12:00:00.000-05:00

Okay, so Bush's numbers are diminishing nicely pretty much as expected, at least over the long term. He's lost the independent camp, again as expected, as the "we'll give you the benefit of the doubt" folks have gotten pretty well fed up with the three-card monte game BushCo relentlessly plays with the truth.

Without the independents, Bush in particular and the repubs in general, are toast.

The Democrat numbers are as expected, but even though the repub numbers have fallen (by 13 points since March 2005 according to a recent Fox News Poll), approval among Republicans is still a significant 74%.

Ever since the global and economic boredom of the Clinton era ended on 9/11/01 (budget surplus, National Guard and Reserve personnel wearing suits and dresses), one has struggled over the stark disparity in world view between the majority of Republicans and, as of now, mostly everyone else... on the planet.

Given that the facts are exasperatingly obvious for all to see, how can so many people still remain dedicated to this train wreck of an administration? One is tempted to lump them all into one lock-stepping category as they are mostly represented by one bar on the graph. However, we all know Bush supporters. We're related to them (sigh), work with them, live next door to them and for the most part they pretty much all bend their knees when they march, no? So what gives? So many have just thrown up their hands and given up ignoring the elephant in the living room. What's with everyone else?

Succumbing to the habit of categorizing people, I've come up with three groups who are all snugly between the sheets: The Blind Faithers, Willful Ignorants and FDA's.

Blind Faithers: Even though the likes of Jefferson, Madison, et al, warned us quite plainly that trusting political leaders is the greatest threat to the republic, many people find it difficult to not believe in others best intentions even when there isn't a best intention in sight. There is a certain degree of skepticism necessary in the maintenance of a liberal democracy. One must always bear in mind that power does indeed corrupt and that those who tend to desire positions of power usually exhibit behaviors we don't tolerate in children. Remain vigilant, the Founders warned, not of foreign threats, but of our own very human and historically evident tendencies.

Part of the problem with this group is the Myth of America, the symbols and slogans and songs and Superman standing, in black and white, before a dramatically waving Old Glory to a soundtrack of "Truth, Justice and the American way." We don't repeat the mistakes of the past. It could never happen here. We're us. We're better.

But this is a subtle mindset, unwilling to actually admit that we are somehow morally superior to everyone else. There is something arrogant about such an admission, no? Something dangerous. But it's there, and it's magical and it allows one to let go of responsibility in the knowledge that, because he is an American who constantly invokes democratic vocabulary, George Bush is a trustworthy man.

Willful Ignorants: The demarcation between Blind Faithers and Willful Ignorants can be fuzzy. Indeed, one imagines that being willfully ignorant helps maintain blind faith. However, there are those who just don't have much of a clue as to what's going on and are more than willing to let whoever the hell is in charge take care of things. Again, the Founders maintained that in order for the republic to survive, the electorate had to be well informed (as opposed to Fox informed). When the wolf arrives at their own door, of course, they start whistling a different tune.

One assumes the shifting numbers contain reformed Willful Ignorants.

FDA's: As hard as I tried I just couldn't come up with a label that was more viscerally satisfying than this one. But as it is rather crude I will just say that the 'D' stands for 'Dangerous' and leave the 'F' and the 'A' up to your imagination.

You may not know one personally, but they are out there and their knees don't bend when they march. These add the monolithic, dogmatic, "or else" flavor to the Republican stew. Their enemy isn't our enemy. Their enemy isn't terrorism or terrorists. Their enemy is us. These are the folks the left is talking about when they raise the cry of fascism. These are the folks who use the word 'treason' for anyone who dares say something outside the hive mind. They are rhetorically violent and feed those within their ranks who would be more than willing to be physically violent. Make no mistake, they are the Beast. They represent that human element that touches down on earth occasionally to everyone's horror. It's visited Germany. It's visited Rwanda. As any Native American can tell you, it's visited the United States.

The FDA's are bubbling in America. They are threatening the lives of judges including Supreme Court Justices (see below). They refer to any opposition in dehumanizing terms... They've turned 'liberal' into a dehumanizing term. They fill the American ear with bile through talk shows. They sell out auditoriums where they can hear the likes of Ann Coulter 'joke' about assassinating a former president or poisoning a Supreme Court judge, who once proclaimed she "never had much use for the First Amendment."

After all the Blind Faithers and Willful Ignorants finally give it up and desert George Bush, the FDA's will remain staunchly behind him. They are the Bush Administrations true base. George Bush's al qaida.

What amazes me, is that the Blind Faithers and Willful Ignorants can be so blind and so ignorant about who they're sharing their bed with.

Cheers,
Clemsy

QUOTES OF THE WEEK:

State Dept. Report: Democracy No Guarantee of Human Rights
Just a wide choice of breakfast cereals. ~Ironic Times

Soon after the September 11, 2001 terror attacks, lawyers in the White House and the Justice Department argued that the same the same legal authority that allowed warrentless electronic surveillance inside the US, could also be used to justify physical searches of terror suspects homes & businesses without court approval. ~U.S. News & World Report

In actuality, the supposed "culture of life" is a culture of disease and death. ~Jeffrey Hart

It's always been a civil war. ~John F. Burns, NY Times Baghdad Bureau Chief

The American people need to wake up now, the evidence is all there. Our president and vice president have started a war of aggression defined by Nuremberg as a supreme international crime. ~Ray McGovern

The nation's three worst counties for child poverty at the time of the last census were all in South Dakota, according to the Children's Defense Fund. Buffalo County, home to the Crow Creek Indian Reservation, was dead last. ~Washington Post (i.e. pro-life concern ends at birth)

You cannot win against an insurgency that springs from the population. There's never been an insurgency that doesn't prevail against a mighty power. ~Jack Valenti, former special assistant to President Lyndon B. Johnson

How much reform can you do simultaneously with fighting a war? ~Henry Kissinger

It's time for some straight talk about John McCain. He isn't a moderate. He's much less of a maverick than you'd think. And he isn't the straight talker he claims to be. ~Paul Krugman

Senator Russ Feingold is an embarrassment to the US Senate, which makes him an authentic hero of the Republic. ~William Greider

I canÂt see a damn soul in D.C. except Russ Feingold who is even worth considering for President. The rest of them seem to me so poisonously in hock to this system of legalized bribery they canÂt even see straight. ~Molly Ivins

I'm amazed at Democrats, cowering with this president's numbers so low. The administration just has to raise the specter of the war and the Democrats run and hide... Too many Democrats are going to do the same thing they did in 2000 and 2004. In the face of this, they'll say we'd better just focus on domestic issues... ~Russ Feingold

We have an out-of-control President whose arrogant and, now, illegal behavior is running our country into the ditch. It's time to rein him in. ~Sen. Tom Harkin (Way past time, Senator.)

You cannot in my opinion just impose a democratic form of government on a country with no history and no culture and no tradition of democracy. ~Sen. Chuck Hagel (R)

QUOTES FROM THE HIVE MIND

I had the impression that indicating lack of support for our commander in chief--as congressional Republicans did so conspicuously, and appropriately, during the 1999 Kosovo war--was a constitutional right and sometimes a patriotic duty. ~Steve Chapman

Some of the most powerful IEDs we're seeing in Iraq today includes components that came from Iran. ~George Bush

With respect to people, it's very difficult to tie a thread precisely to the government of Iran. ~Donald Rumsfeld

I do not, sir. ~Marine Corps Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the military's Joint Chiefs of Staff, when asked "whether the United States has proof that Iran's government was behind these developments." LINK

The president believes in open government, and that the presumption ought to be on providing citizens with as much information as possible about their government. ~Scott McClellan (Liar.)

PICKS OF THE WEEK:

Right-Wing Blocks Funding For Port Security, Disaster Preparedness

I kid you not. Read this little ditty from Think Progress. Money for 'Missile Defense' was deemed important. Lots and lots of money.

A Peculiar Politician

Senator Russ Feingold is an embarrassment to the US Senate, which makes him an authentic hero of the Republic. The Wisconsin senator gets up and says out loud what half of the country is thinking and talks about every day. This President broke the law and lied about it; he trashed the Constitution and hides himself in the flag. Feingold asks: Shouldn't the Senate say something about this, at least express our disapproval? He introduces a resolution of censure and calls for debate.

Dictatorship is the danger

A Reagan-appointed supreme court justice voices her fears over attacks on US democracy

He's a right-wing ideologue, not a true conservative By Jeffrey Hart, former speechwriter for presidents Reagan and Nixon

WILLIAM F. Buckley Jr. has defined conservatism as "the politics of reality." Ideology is the enemy of conservatism because it edits, omits or ignores reality. George W. Bush is an ideologue.

Dash to Baghdad Left Top U.S. Generals Divided

The war was barely a week old when Gen. Tommy R. Franks threatened to fire the Army's field commander. (Incompetence defined.)

W.'s Mixed Messages by Maureen Dowd

Homeland Security's protection of the ports is a joke. The goof-off Michael Chertoff is remarkably still in charge. The swaggering of the president and vice president on national security has been exposed as a sham, with millions spent shoring up our defenses wasted, with the Iraq war aggravating our danger, and with anti-Muslim feeling swelling among Americans and anti-American feeling swelling among Muslims.

HEADLINES

House OKs birth control funding ban

The Missouri House voted Wednesday to ban state funding of contraceptives for low-income women and to prohibit state-funded programs from referring those women to other programs. (If the poor stop having babies will the rich cease to get richer?)

Rallies Mark Third Anniversary of Iraq War

Thousands of anti-war protesters marched in Australia, Turkey and Asian countries at the start of global demonstrations Saturday, as campaigners marked the third anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq with a demand that coalition troops pull out.

32 US Reps Want Bush Impeachment Inquiry

32 US House Representatives have signed on as sponsors or co-sponsors of H. Res 635, which would create a Select Committee to look into the grounds for recommending President BushÂs impeachment, Atlanta Progressive News has learned.

Bush Approval Falls to 33%, Congress Earns Rare Praise

In the aftermath of the Dubai ports deal, President Bush's approval rating has hit a new low and his image for honesty and effectiveness has been damaged. Yet the public uncharacteristically has good things to say about the role that Congress played in this high-profile Washington controversy.

Supreme Court Justice Reveals Death Threats

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said she and former Justice Sandra Day O'Connor have been the targets of death threats from the "irrational fringe" of society, people apparently spurred by Republican criticism of the high court.

Security Clearance Rules May Impede Gays

The Bush administration last year quietly rewrote the rules for allowing gays and lesbians to receive national-security clearances, drawing complaints from civil rights activists.

Washington Considering 'Pharmacist Refusal' Proposal

Pharmacists who object to Plan B want to be able to deny filling a prescription on moral, ethical or religious beliefs.

Iraq drives Bush's rating to new low

Growing dissatisfaction with the war in Iraq has driven President Bush's approval rating to a new low of 36 percent, according to a CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll released Monday.

Polls: Public Worried About Gov't Secrecy

Two new polls gauging Americans' views on government openness found a majority believe the federal government leans more toward secrecy than openness, while eight in 10 are convinced that an open government is necessary for an effective democracy.

BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING

Police Memos Say Arrest Tactics Calmed Protest

In five internal reports made public yesterday as part of a lawsuit, New York City police commanders candidly discuss how they had successfully used "proactive arrests," covert surveillance and psychological tactics at political demonstrations in 2002, and recommend that those approaches be employed at future gatherings.

FBI spied on Pittsburgh pacifists, papers show

FBI anti-terrorism agents spied on a peace group simply because it opposed the Iraq war, part of an "unprecedented campaign" to spy on innocent citizens, the American Civil Liberties Union said on Tuesday.

OCCUPATION: IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN

U.S., Iraqi troops press sweep in Operation Swarmer

U.S. and Iraqi troops pressed their sweep through a 100-square-mile swath of central Iraq on Friday in a bid to break up a center of insurgent resistance, the U.S. military said. No resistance or casualties were reported. (Military operation or PR stunt?)

Iraq Edges Closer to Open Civil Warfare

Iraqi authorities discovered at least 87 corpses _ men shot to death execution-style _ as Iraq edged closer to open civil warfare. Twenty-nine of the bodies, dressed only in underwear, were dug out of a single grave Tuesday in a Shiite neighborhood of Baghdad.

Baghdad Police Find 65 Bodies in 24 Hours

Police found at least 65 bodies in Baghdad in the past 24 hours, including 15 men bound and shot in an abandoned minibus, in a gruesome wave of apparent sectarian reprisal attacks, officials said Tuesday.

Death squads operated from inside Iraqi government, officials say

Senior Iraqi officials Sunday confirmed for the first time that death squads composed of government employees had operated illegally from inside two government ministries.

At least 40 die in Shia Âsafe zoneÂ in Baghdad

More than 40 people died in BaghdadÂs main Shia area on Sunday after a number of bombs and mortar strikes that seemed designed to follow up on last monthÂs bombing of a Shia shrine and provoke civil war.

OPINION

The Right's Man by Paul Krugman

The bottom line is that Mr. McCain isn't a moderate; he's a man of the hard right. How far right? A statistical analysis of Mr. McCain's recent voting record, available at www.voteview.com, ranks him as the Senate's third most conservative member.

A blank check for snoops

LIKE THE CAVALRY RUSHING to the aid of the wrong troops, four Republican senators who had earlier declared battle against the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping have now proposed to give the surveillance program five years of near-bulletproof protection.

The Bush Administration: Suddenly Wrong

2006-03-11T11:30:00.000-05:00

But it's not like anyone was previously right about BushCo being wrong. Not like some of us won't lose the urge to say "Told ya so" while repressing, just barely, the urge to slap a few heads.

But lets appreciate the ever stark contrast between the true believers and those who seem to have had their nice little faith-based universe overwhelmed by reality.

Let's open with a Rummy quote:

We do know, of course, that al-Qaeda has media committees. We do know that they teach people exactly how to try to manipulate the media. They do this regularly. We see the intelligence that reports on their meetings. Now I can't take a string and tie it to a news report and then trace it back to an al-Qaeda media committee meeting. I'm not able to do that at all. LINK

'Never-Say-Die' Rumsfeld is, if nothing else, at least consistent. However, smokescreens, like the above foolishness, won't hide a damn thing in a strong breeze. So the bad news from Iraq is al-Qaeda propaganda. The mountain of dead bodies in Baghadad morgues are figments of media imagination. We're all bin Laden fools.

Right. General Peter Pace, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and a guy who should know a thing or two, says about the Iraqi situation, "I wouldn't put a great big smiley face on it, but I would say they're going very, very well from everything you look at."

But the guy who should know a thing or two certainly also knows what tends to happen to those whose comments don't reflect the party line, so sticking with the fairy-tale reality has its perks.

And when the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq puts a somewhat different spin on the situation: "We have opened Pandora's box and the question is, what is the way forward?"

...One is left wondering if Dr. Khalilzad is just about ready to 'spend more quality time with his family'.

Opened a "Pandora's box"? Letting out what? Ethnic and sectarian tensions that have been building for decades? Really? So now that what smarter people expected to happen is happening, it's up to the stupid people that started it to fix it? Or is Dr. Khalilzad, born in Afghanistan and, one would assume, liable to have a pretty good perspective on the situation, hinting that a 'way forward' would be to clean house in D.C. and start from scratch?

One watches in amazement. Francis Fukuyama, a PNAC (Project for the New American Century) homeboy, jumps ship and now Khalilzad, a signatory to the PNAC Statement of Principles, makes a positively off-the-reservation-comment in direct contradiction to Rumsfeld's and Pace's position.

Conservative and neo-conservative pundits are rethinking their positions and up-for-election Republicans are biting their nails over November elections.

But you won't hear a damn one of them say, "Okay Krugman, Ivins, Blumenthal, Kerry, Kennedy, Kucinich, Hartmann, Pitt, Boxer, Byrd, Dowd, Rich, Herbert, Clarke, O'Neil, Shinseki, Zinni, Scowcroft, etc., etc., lefty and righty ad ininitum, you were right. I was not only wrong but responsible for an unnecessary bloody mess."

Not likely. But I'm sure there are a lot of "buts" following their reversals. Here's one:

But the certainty of some today that we have failed is as dubious as the callow triumphalism of yesterday. War is always, in the end, a matter of flexibility and will. And sometimes the darkest days are inevitable--even necessary--before the sky ultimately clears. ~Andrew Sullivan

"War is a matter of flexibility and will." Fool. War is, in the beginning, the middle and end, a matter of the psychological and physical mutilation of men, women and children.

Regardless, the wind is shifting. There's something to be said for reality, which some are realizing, as Robin Williams once said, is quite a concept.

Cheers,
Clemsy

QUOTES OF THE WEEK:

U.S., India in Atom Pact
We'll supply them fuel for nuclear weapons, they'll help us with our AOL dial-up connection. ~Ironic Times

Born-again Bush-bashers like Mr. Bartlett and Mr. Sullivan, however churlish, are intellectually and morally superior to the Bushist dead-enders who still insist that Saddam was allied with Al Qaeda, and will soon be claiming that we lost the war in Iraq because the liberal media stabbed the troops in the back. ~Paul Krugman

President Bush is great at sales, but he cannot deliver a product — time after time. ~The Seattle Times

[W]hen an envelope with suspicious powder was opened last fall at Homeland Security Department headquarters, guards said they watched in amazement as superiors carried it by the office of Secretary Michael Chertoff, took it outside and then shook it outside Chertoff's window without evacuating people nearby. ~Yahoo News

If the election were held today, it would be a bloodbath for the Republicans, who would probably lose the House. ~said a Republican campaign strategist, who spoke on the condition of anonymity

He (Bush) is clearly losing some of his base on Iraq. When I looked at the [polling results] last night, he was at 51 percent among born-again Christians, down from 71 percent, and under 45 percent among veterans, gun owners and married voters. ~John Zogby

God, am I tired of having my country being run by an eighth-grader. ~Geov Parrish

We're in a civil war now; it's just that not everybody's joined in. ~retired Army Maj. Gen. William L. Nash

The right-wing hijacking of religion's public role in our political discourse is as undeniable as it is inappropriate, and represents one of liberalism's most serious problems. ~Eric Alterman

85% (of U.S. troops in Iraq) said the U.S. mission is mainly “to retaliate for Saddam’s role in the 9-11 attacks. ~Zogby Poll

‘War on Terror’ is more than just a phrase. It is a carefully constructed concept--a set of magic words--created by highly-paid consultants to help the Republicans claim the mantle of national security. ~Jeffrey Feldman

QUOTES FROM THE SCHIZOPHRENIC HIVE MIND

If Bush were running today against Bill Clinton, I'd vote for Clinton. ~Bruce Bartlett, former aid to Ronald Reagan

If this was a European parliamentary system, it would have been a vote of no-confidence. ~Ed Rollins, a top political adviser to President Ronald Reagan, on House vote on ports deal

What are you benching, buff guy? ~George Bush to Jack Abramoff (according to Abramoff)

I wouldn't put a great big smiley face on it, but I would say they're going very, very well from everything you look at. ~Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on Iraq

We have opened the Pandora's box and the question is, what is the way forward? ~U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad ( I guess he should start with a small smiley face.)

Hollywood is controlled by secular Jews who hate Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular. ~William Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights

While the Democrats will impeach Bush for the wrong reasons, I can't deny that in a righteous country that honored and lived up to its Constitution, Bush would surely deserve to be impeached. ~Joseph Farah of Worldnet Daily

A real-life description to me would be a rape victim, brutally raped, savaged. The girl was a virgin. She was religious. She planned on saving her virginity until she was married. She was brutalized and raped, sodomized as bad as you can possibly make it, and is impregnated. I mean, that girl, could be so messed up, physically and psychologically, that carrying that child could very well threaten her life. ~State Sen. Bill Napoli, R-Rapid City on a situation in which abortion can be an option. (If she wasn't a religious virgin, she would just get a great, big scarlet letter, right Bill? Sure, and dunk her a few times for good measure.)

PICKS OF THE WEEK:

The Conservative Epiphany by Paul Krugman

Human nature being what it is, I don't expect Mr. Bartlett to acknowledge his about-face. Nor do I expect any expressions of remorse from Andrew Sullivan, the conservative Time.com blogger who also spoke at the Cato forum. Mr. Sullivan used to specialize in denouncing the patriotism and character of anyone who dared to criticize President Bush, whom he lionized. Now he himself has become a critic, not just of Mr. Bush's policies, but of his personal qualities, too.

Rupert Cornwell: At last, the warmongers are prepared to face the facts and admit they were wrong

It has taken more than three years, tens of thousands of Iraqi and American lives, and $200bn (£115bn) of treasure - all to achieve a chaos verging on open civil war. But, finally, the neo-conservatives who sold the United States on this disastrous war are starting to utter three small words. We were wrong. (Click HERE for some telling quotes.)

Iraq through the prism of Vietnam By William E. Odom

Those who say Iraq is nothing like Vietnam have another guess coming, says retired Gen. William Odom. He lists striking similarities and asserts that only after it pulls out of Iraq can the U.S. hope for international support to deal with anti-Western forces.

Frameshop: The Message Is Not the Frame

[F]raming is not a magic bullet, but a set of tools that empowers progressives to take control of the debate--first by seeing the broad ideas that trap us in a losing position, and then by re-framing the issues in moral terms that speak to ideals of the American people. Framing, in other words, makes us better readers, better listeners, and better participants in day-to-day politics, thereby enabling us to become the kind of citizens that are most effective in the culture of media driven politics.
A key area where the Democrats need to use framing is national security.

Dave Zweifel: Another Iraq story gets debunked

"The story of Saddam training foreign fighters to hijack airplanes was instrumental in building the case to invade Iraq," a detailed report in the March-April issue says. "But it turns out that the Iraqi general who told the story to the New York Times and 'Frontline' was a complete fake a low-ranking former soldier whom Ahmed Chalabi's aides had coached to deceive the media."

America Anesthetized

The new Zogby poll gauging the opinions of American troops in Iraq has drawn attention mostly because it finds that 72 percent believe the United States should withdraw in a year or less and only 23 percent favor George W. Bush’s plan to “stay the course.”

They Came for the Chicken Farmer
A case of mistaken identity's turning an innocent person into a prisoner-for-life was supposed to be impossible. President Bush told Americans to trust in his judgment after he arrogated the right to arrest anyone, anywhere in the world, and toss people into indefinite detention. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld infamously proclaimed that the men at Guantánamo Bay were "the worst of the worst."

But it has long been evident that this was nonsense, and a lawsuit by The Associated Press has now demonstrated the truth in shameful detail.

3/6/06 - Kurt Vonnegut's "Stardust Memory"

On a cold, cloudy night, the lines threaded all the way around the Ohio State campus. News that Kurt Vonnegut was speaking at the Ohio Union prompted these “apathetic” heartland college students to start lining up in the early afternoon. About 2,000 got in to the Ohio Union. At least that many more were turned away. It was the biggest crowd for a speaker here since Michael Moore.

HEADLINES

Poll: Bush Approval Rating Hits New Low

More and more people, particularly Republicans, disapprove of President Bush's performance, question his character and no longer consider him a strong leader against terrorism, according to an AP-Ipsos poll documenting one of the bleakest points of his presidency.

Forty-Four Percent of Americans Strongly Disapprove of Bush

The Feb. 28 to March 1 poll finds 38% of Americans approving and 60% disapproving of Bush's job as president, within a point of his lowest approval rating and tied for his highest disapproval rating.

House Renews USA Patriot Act; Bush to Sign

The 280-138 vote Tuesday evening passed by just two votes more than needed under House rules requiring a two-thirds majority for legislation handled on an expedited basis.

Guards Fault Homeland Security Protection

The agency entrusted with protecting the U.S. homeland is having difficulty safeguarding its own headquarters, say private security guards at the complex.

Bush poll numbers alarm the GOP

President Bush will have to reassure his Republican base that the United States is winning the war in Iraq and the economy is improving before his anemic poll numbers begin turning upward, election pollsters and strategists say.

As Crisis Brews, Iran Hits Bumps in Atomic Path

According to the analysts, the Iranians need to do repairs and build new machines at a prototype plant before they can begin enriching even modest quantities of uranium. And then, for a decade, they would have to mass produce 100 centrifuges a week to fill the cavernous industrial enrichment halls at Natanz. What is more, the gas meant to feed those machines is plagued by impurities.

BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING

Pentagon admits errors in spying on protesters

The Department of Defense admitted in a letter obtained by NBC News on Thursday that it had wrongly added peaceful demonstrators to a database of possible domestic terrorist threats. The letter followed an NBC report focusing on the Defense Department’s Threat and Local Observation Notice, or TALON, report.

Senate Republicans Choose Bush Over Country on Domestic Spying
The GOP-controlled Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday voted against a formal Congressional investigation of George W. Bush’s domestic spying program, despite almost-certain knowledge that the White House has violated key provisions of Foreign Intelligence Security Act (FISA) laws over the last four years.

G.O.P. Plan Would Allow Spying Without Warrants

The plan by Senate Republicans to step up oversight of the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance program would also give legislative sanction for the first time to long-term eavesdropping on Americans without a court warrant, legal experts said on Wednesday.

SCANDAL CORNER

Vanity Fair: Bush Had Ties to Abramoff

Convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff says President Bush knew him well enough to joke with him about weightlifting. "What are you benching, buff guy?" Abramoff said Bush asked him. The president has said he doesn't know Abramoff.

Army to Begin New Probe Into Tillman Death

The Army said Saturday it will launch a criminal investigation into the April 2004 death of Pat Tillman, the former professional football player who was shot to death by fellow soldiers in Afghanistan in what previous Army reviews had concluded was an accidental shooting.

OCCUPATION: IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN

Official Says Shiite Party Suppressed Body Count

Days after the bombing of a Shiite shrine unleashed a wave of retaliatory killings of Sunnis, the leading Shiite party in Iraq's governing coalition directed the Health Ministry to stop tabulating execution-style shootings, according to a ministry official familiar with the recording of deaths.

Envoy to Iraq Sees Threat of Wider War

The top U.S. envoy to Iraq said Monday that the 2003 toppling of Saddam Hussein's regime had opened a "Pandora's box" of volatile ethnic and sectarian tensions that could engulf the region in all-out war if America pulled out of the country too soon.

23 Bodies Found in Iraq; Bombings Kill 4

An American military patrol investigating a report of a suspicious vehicle found 18 bodies late Tuesday in an abandoned minibus in west Baghdad, Iraqi police and U.S. forces said. The victims — all men — had been handcuffed, blindfolded and either hanged or shot to death, police Lt. Maitham Abdul-Razzaq said.

'14,000 detained without trial in Iraq'

US and UK forces in Iraq have detained thousands of people without charge or trial for long periods and there is growing evidence of Iraqi security forces torturing detainees, Amnesty International said today.

U.S. faces latest trouble with Iraqi forces: Loyalty

For much of the war in Iraq, U.S. military commanders have said their most important mission here was to prepare Iraqi security forces to take over the fight against the Sunni- led insurgency. But with the threat of full-scale sectarian strife looming larger, they are suddenly grappling with the possibility that they have been arming one side in a prospective civil war.

Senior Iraqi General Killed in Ambush

The top commander of the Iraqi army division in Baghdad was killed Monday when his car came under small-arms fire while traveling through the capital, the U.S. military said.

Expert on Iraq: 'We're In a Civil War'

As Pentagon generals offered optimistic assessments that the sectarian violence in Iraq had dissipated this weekend, other military experts told ABC News that Sunni and Shiite groups in Iraq already are engaged in a civil war, and that the Iraqi government and U.S. military had better accept that fact and adapt accordingly.

General's Assessment of Iraq Questioned

"Why would I believe him?" asked Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., a major critic of the Bush administration's handling of the war. "This administration, including the president, (has) mischaracterized this war for the last two years."

RELIGION

Praise the Lord and Pass the Petition

If you are waiting for a religious left to emerge to offset the power of the religious right, it may already be in your own neighborhood at a local church or synagogue. I stumbled across a branch of the religious left quite by accident recently, in Texas of all places, though the folks I met would say I was guided to them by the Lord.

MOLLYFEST

Enough of the D.C. Dems by Molly Ivins

Mah fellow progressives, now is the time for all good men and women to come to the aid of the party. I don’t know about you, but I have had it with the D.C. Democrats, had it with the DLC Democrats, had it with every calculating, equivocating, triangulating, straddling, hair-splitting son of a bitch up there, and that includes Hillary Rodham Clinton.

The Progress Myth in Iraq by Molly Ivins

It was such a relief to me to learn we are making “very, very good progress” in Iraq. As the third anniversary of our invasion approaches, I could not have been more thrilled by the news reported by Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on a Sunday chat show. Vice President Dick Cheney’s take was equally reassuring: Things are “improving steadily” in Iraq.

The Towering Solons of Abortion By Molly Ivins

South Dakota is so rarely found on the leading edge of the far out, the wiggy, the California-esque. But it has now staked its claim. First to Outlaw Abortion This Century. The state legislature of South Dakota, in all its wisdom and majesty, a legislature comprised of sons and daughters of the soil from Aberdeen to Zell, have usurped the right of the women of that state to decide whether or not to bear the child of an unwanted pregnancy. They will decide. Women will do what they decide.

Dubai Ports World: How Predictable

2006-03-04T11:20:00.000-05:00

Let us revisit that wonderful quote from David Frum's The Right Man:

He has many faults. He is impatient and quick to anger; sometimes glib, even dogmatic; often uncurious and as a result ill informed; more conventional in his thinking than a leader should be.

He's talking about George, of course.

Whenever something demonstrably dumb slips out of this administration and splashes itself across the media, I always think of this quote. It really defines the lot of them, doesn't it? As regards 9/11 even Clinton can be lumped under it, but at least his terrorism czar had a cabinet level position. George sent Richard Clarke down a level to staff, where his memos had some difficulty percolating up through the food chain.

A lack of imagination is what the 9/11 Commission called it.

For example...

"My belief is we will, in fact, be greeted as liberators," said Dick.

Which wasn't what he said when he was George H.W.'s Defense Secretary. That administration imagined... well, exactly what's happening in Iraq now.

This 'faith-based' reality running the show at the highest levels of our government would be just fine if its 'faith' had the slightest connection to how people will obviously respond to a given situation. Even Francis Fukuyama, the former neo-con darling, is now saying that the policy of spreading liberal democracy through military intervention (which he called a 'bait and switch' operation in terms of Iraq) is ill conceived if not downright Leninist.

Imagine an airline run this way?

"Dang! Lost another one! Stay the course!"

What will eventually prove their downfall is their inability to imagine that the American people can be toyed with for only so long. Too long, maybe, but for only so long.

A recent Fox poll has Bush's approval rating at 39%. This represents a 5 point drop from the previous sample. I wonder why...

The Dubai Ports World deal.

I mean really. The ports are about as naked as can be to begin with, and now port operations on the east coast are offered to an Arab company. Even if there wasn't anything intrinsically wrong with this it still excites a reflexive defense response similar to the one that made it 'okay' to imprison thousands of Japanese-Americans during World War II. We are 'at war' aren't we?

That response should have been anticipated.

Can one say, "Duh!"

Now, on top of this, we receive information like:

The Central Intelligence Agency did not target Al Qaeda chief Osama bin laden once as he had the royal family of the United Arab Emirates with him in Afghanistan, the agency's director, George Tenet, told the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks on the United States on Thursday. LINK

And: "[T]he FBI has also concluded that the UAE's banking system filtered much of the money used for the operational planning before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, and many of the hijackers traveled to the United States through the UAE (United Arab Emirates). ...the UAE has been regarded as the place for materials used to make a nuclear weapon to be transferred among rogue hands." LINK (That's a Fox News link, folks.)

Additionally, we now know that al Qaida informed the UAE, "You are well aware that we have infiltrated your security, censorship, and monetary agencies along with other agencies that should not be mentioned." LINK

And Dubai Ports World is a state owned company.

Nothing racist about the concern. It just makes about as much sense as offering a Czech company control of American Ports in 1962.

This doesn't mean there isn't a racist response to the deal. We all know where the radical right wing kill-all-the-raghead-Ann-Coulter-for-King loonies stand.

And they are the core of Bush's al qaida... a word that means 'base' in arabic.

Thus those poll numbers.

Couldn't predict the reaction?

Imagine that.

Cheers,
Clemsy

QUOTES OF THE WEEK:

Administration Reclassifies Thousands of Historical Documents
Move meant to thwart terrorist time travelers. ~Ironic Times

Despite significant progress on the political front, the Taliban-dominated insurgency remains a capable and resilient threat. ~Lt. Gen. Michael D. Maples

That President George W. Bush comes to power with the intention of invading Iraq is a fact not open to dispute. ~Lewis H. Lapham

...[T]he show reveals an essential truth about Washington: being humiliated on national television can be better than not being on national television at all. ~The NY Times on the Colbert Report

Is the law a law or is it a piece of toast? ~Garrison Keillor

QUOTES FROM THE HIVE MIND

Dubai cannot be trusted. ~Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.)

Paul [Wolfowitz] was always of the view that Iraq was a problem that had to be dealt with, and he saw this as one way of using this event [9/11] as a way to deal with the Iraq problem. ~Colin Powell to the 9/11 Commission

I think actually these attacks on Shia shrines can be attributed to the potential success of the Bush strategy. ~Terry Jeffery, editor of the conservative weekly Human Events,

As long as I serve on the Supreme Court I will keep in mind the trust that has been placed in me. ~Samuel Alito in a letter to James Dobson

We are telling you that Saddam is gone and it is not regrettable because he was a tyrant and enemy to God and his prophet. He was gone at the hands of his American masters, but we ask God that you will be eliminated by our hands and swords. And we hope this will be soon. ~Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi to Iraqi Shi'ites

MR. RUSSERT: The Washington Post asked the American people about Saddam Hussein, and this is what they said: 69 percent said he was involved in the September 11 attacks. Are you surprised by that?

VICE PRES. CHENEY: No. I think it’s not surprising that people make that connection.

MR. RUSSERT: But is there a connection?

VICE PRES. CHENEY: We don’t know. ~Meet the Press, 9/14/03

I believe that a prosperous, democratic Pakistan will be a steadfast partner for America, a peaceful neighbor for India and a force for freedom and moderation in the Arab world. ~George Bush (Unfortunately, Pakistan is not an Arab country. Sheesh.)

PICKS OF THE WEEK:

The Case for Impeachment By Lewis H. Lapham.

On December 18 of last year, Congressman John Conyers Jr. (D., Mich.) introduced into the House of Representatives a resolution inviting it to form “a select committee to investigate the Administration's intent to go to war before congressional authorization, manipulation of pre-war intelligence, encouraging and countenancing torture, retaliating against critics, and to make recommendations regarding grounds for possible impeachment.”

Francis Fukuyama on Neo-Cons, Foreign Policy

Fukuyama talks with Steve Inskeep about the legacy of neo-conservatism and its impact on U.S. foreign policy. He says the promotion of democracy abroad has become far too militarized. (Listen to the interview. The "bait and switch" comment on Iraq is particularly interesting.)

Pillar to press: Don't get fooled again

The 9/11 Commission established as its goal the generation of enough public support to enact a reorganization of the intelligence community. Pursuit of that goal led it to produce a selective and misleading account of strategic intelligence on terrorism, obscuring the actual reasons US counterterrorist policy took the course it did prior to 9/11. The press was remarkably acquiescent in this; as Judge Richard Posner noted in his critique of the commission's work, a combination of political circumstances paralyzed criticism of the commission and led its report to be accepted unquestioningly as "holy writ." The politics of the Congressional intelligence committees have led them to delay repeatedly any public appraisal of how the administration used intelligence on Iraq (in the case of the Senate committee) or not even to attempt to address the subject (in the case of its House counterpart). The commission investigating intelligence on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction produced an otherwise useful report, but its White House provenance constrained it from exploring all the ways in which policy preferences affected the intelligence.

What Bush Was Told About Iraq

Two highly classified intelligence reports delivered directly to President Bush before the Iraq war cast doubt on key public assertions made by the president, Vice President Cheney, and other administration officials as justifications for invading Iraq and toppling Saddam Hussein, according to records and knowledgeable sources.

HEADLINES

Gallup: 2 Out of 3 Americans Want U.S. Pull Out from Iraq

While newspaper editorials remain virtually silent on the subject, the American public seems to have made up its mind. A new Gallup/CNN/USA Today poll out tonight shows that 2 out of 3 adult Americans now want U.S. troops to start to come home from Iraq. And 55% call the decision to attack Iraq in 2003 a "mistake."

Report: Bush thinks bin Laden tape helped re-election bid

President Bush said his 2004 re-election victory over Sen. John Kerry was inadvertently aided by Osama bin Laden, The Washington Examiner newspaper reported Tuesday.

Poll: Bush Ratings At All-Time Low

The latest CBS News poll finds President Bush's approval rating has fallen to an all-time low of 34 percent, while pessimism about the Iraq war has risen to a new high.

Plan B Battles Embroil States

More than 60 bills have been filed in state legislatures already this year, and that follows an already busy 2005 session on emergency contraception. The resulting tug of war is creating an availability map for the pill that looks increasingly similar to the map of "red states" and "blue states" in the past two presidential elections -- with increased access in the blue states and greater restrictions in the red ones.

BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING

Gonzales Seeks to Clarify Testimony on Spying

Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales appeared to suggest yesterday that the Bush administration's warrantless domestic surveillance operations may extend beyond the outlines that the president acknowledged in mid-December.

When Big Brother Gets Under Your Skin

"Can a microscopic tag be implanted in a person's body to track his every movement? There's actual discussion about that. You will rule on that -- mark my words -- before your tenure is over." -- Sen. Joseph Biden, to Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, Sept. 2005.

OCCUPATION: IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN

Baghdad official who exposed executions flees

Faik Bakir, the director of the Baghdad morgue, has fled Iraq in fear of his life after reporting that more than 7,000 people have been killed by death squads in recent months, the outgoing head of the UN human rights office in Iraq has disclosed.

Ex-Official: Iraq Abuses Growing Worse

Human rights abuses in Iraq are as bad now as they were under Saddam Hussein, as lawlessness and sectarian violence sweep the country, the former U.N. human rights chief in Iraq said Thursday.

Toll in Iraq's Deadly Surge: 1,300

Grisly attacks and other sectarian violence unleashed by last week's bombing of a Shiite Muslim shrine have killed more than 1,300 Iraqis, making the past few days the deadliest of the war outside of major U.S. offensives, according to Baghdad's main morgue. The toll was more than three times higher than the figure previously reported by the U.S. military and the news media.

Intelligence agencies warned about growing local insurgency in late 2003

U.S. intelligence agencies repeatedly warned the White House beginning more than two years ago that the insurgency in Iraq had deep local roots, was likely to worsen and could lead to civil war, according to former senior intelligence officials who helped craft the reports.

Growing Threat Seen In Afghan Insurgency

The director of the Defense Intelligence Agency told Congress yesterday that the insurgency in Afghanistan is growing and will increase this spring, presenting a greater threat to the central government's expansion of authority "than at any point since late 2001."

Iraq's death squads: On the brink of civil war

Hundreds of Iraqis are being tortured to death or summarily executed every month in Baghdad alone by death squads working from the Ministry of the Interior, the United Nations' outgoing human rights chief in Iraq has revealed.

OPINION

The Most Dangerous Days By William Rivers Pitt

Vice President Dick Cheney spoke at the 46th Annual American Legion Washington Conference on Tuesday to let everyone know that all is well in Iraq. "This nation has made a decision," said Cheney. "We will stand by our friends and engage our enemies with the goal of a victory. And as the president said in the State of the Union, 'We are in this fight to win, and we are winning.'"