Why wasn't Greenspan so direct when supporting the Bush tax cuts?

How Precarious a Lid on Inflation? Sunday, June 20, 2004; Page F02 Washington policymakers don't often admit that they might be wrong. Yet that has been the noteworthy message from the some of the Federal Reserve's biggest brains in recent weeks. Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan said last week that he and his central bank colleagues believe that "inflationary pressures are not likely to be a serious concern in the period ahead." And so, they think it "very likely" that they can raise interest rates slowly "over the quarters ahead." But before investors could reach for their party hats, the chairman cautioned that "forecasts are subject to error," and if the Fed's judgment "turns out to be mistaken, we will change." That followed the admission two weeks earlier by Donald L. Kohn, a Fed governor and 34-year veteran of the central bank system, that "there is much about the inflation process that we do not understand, and I have been surprised at the extent of the pickup in core inflation this year…Given our limited understanding of price determination, we must keep a close watch on actual inflation outcomes." So if these two don't know exactly how inflation works, how could anybody else?
A concerted series of attacks on Saudi and Iraqi oil pipelines would play hell with the financial markets. And current interest rates don't leave Greenspan much head room.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 20, 2004 - 12:40am :: Economics
 
 

The truth keeps causing the Republicans problems

Quote of note:
Many Republicans are furious about the commission -- though its members are evenly split between the two parties and it is chaired by a Republican appointed by Bush. They say that Bush was right to oppose the commission in the first place, and that House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) was right this year when he unsuccessfully fought an extension of the commission's deadline.

9/11 Panel's Findings Vault Bush Credibility To Campaign Forefront By Dana Milbank Washington Post Staff Writer Sunday, June 20, 2004; Page A01 The White House's swift and sustained reaction last week to the preliminary findings of the Sept. 11, 2001, commission showed the potential threat the 10-member panel poses to President Bush's reelection prospects. After the commission staff released its findings Wednesday that there was no "collaborative relationship" between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda -- challenging an assertion Bush and Vice President Cheney have made for the past two years -- Bush declared again that there was, in fact, a relationship. …Bush aides have sought to blunt the Democratic offensive not by challenging the commission's findings but by arguing that Kerry and the media have mischaracterized the findings. The White House issued a 1,000-word document titled "TALKING POINTS: 9-11 Commission Staff Report Confirms Administration's Views of al-Qaeda/Iraq Ties." "The 9/11 commission came to the same conclusion as the administration regarding ties between Iraq and al Qaeda," campaign communications director Nicolle Devenish said. She said this is Kerry's "desperate attempt to put a negative spin on what was broad consensus between the administration and the commission." Similarly, Cheney, on CNBC, said the media had been irresponsible in reporting the commission's findings. "What they [the commission] were addressing was whether or not they [Iraq] were involved in 9/11," he said. "They did not address the broader question of a relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda in other areas, in other ways." In fact, commission spokesman Al Felzenberg on Friday confirmed that the commission was addressing the broader relationship. "We found no evidence of joint operations or joint work or common operations between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein's government, and that's beyond 9/11," he said. [P6: emphasis added] One reason for this sensitivity can be found in a poll last week by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center. The poll found improved support for Bush and for the Iraq war -- in large part because Americans have been paying less attention to the war and more to other issues, such as the death of Ronald Reagan. The commission, however, has helped to return national attention to the disputed justifications for the Iraq war. In particular, the poll showed that Americans are beginning to decouple the war in Iraq from the war on terrorism -- a belief that could be aided by the commission's dismissal of cooperation between Iraq and al Qaeda. Still, Andrew Kohut, who directs the poll, predicts Bush will be able to keep al Qaeda and Iraq tied in the public's mind; about half believe such a connection has been proved, various polls indicate. "So many people believe it because he's saying it," Kohut said. "Bush's hanging tough on this gives him the credibility he has."
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 20, 2004 - 12:31am :: Politics
 
 

Given this particular change, I'd hold off on the hyperventilating for a minute

Saudis Search for Slain Hostage's Body Jun 19, 8:55 PM (ET) By SALAH NASRAWI RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) - Saudi security agents searched homes in the capital and surrounding deserts Saturday for the body of slain American hostage Paul M. Johnson Jr., while Saudi officials hailed as a victory their slaying of his executioner, the top al-Qaida figure in the kingdom. But the U.S. ambassador said he doubted the death of Abdulaziz al-Moqrin during a Friday night shootout would stop the ongoing violence against Westerners in Saudi Arabia. Militants initially denied that al-Moqrin was killed, but late Saturday the al-Qaida cell in Saudi Arabia confirmed his death in an online statement. The group also vowed to continue its "jihad," or holy war. Saudi officials initially said Johnson's body was found Friday dumped on the capital's northern outskirts, hours after his captors killed and decapitated him and posted Web photos of his severed head. But officials backtracked Saturday. "We haven't found the body yet," said Adel al-Jubeir, foreign affairs adviser to Crown Prince Abdullah, in Washington. "We think we know the area where it is." Saudi security officials said on condition of anonymity they were searching desert areas around Riyadh and dwellings they suspect were used by militants.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 20, 2004 - 12:00am :: War
 
 

I think Ray is out of luck

Titles aren't copyrightable.
Moore Film Title Angers Author Bradbury Sat Jun 19, 5:52 AM ET By PAUL CHAVEZ, Associated Press Writer LOS ANGELES - Ray Bradbury is demanding an apology from filmmaker Michael Moore (news) for lifting the title from his classic science-fiction novel "Fahrenheit 451" without permission and wants the new documentary "Fahrenheit 9/11" to be renamed. "He didn't ask my permission," Bradbury, 83, told The Associated Press on Friday. "That's not his novel, that's not his title, so he shouldn't have done it." The 1953 novel, widely considered Bradbury's masterpiece, portrays an ugly futuristic society in which firemen burn homes and libraries in order to destroy the books inside and keep people from thinking independently.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 11:56pm :: Seen online
 
 

The victim mentality

Latest Texas education whine: suburban victimhood By RUBEN NAVARRETTE / The Dallas Morning News From school finance to desegregation to affirmative action, Texans make education policy more complicated than it needs to be. For instance, who knew that attending an elite high school could be considered a disadvantage? That's how some wealthy and well-connected parents see it now that their children have suffered the indignity of being ranked below the top 10th percentile of their graduating class. That sort of thing matters in a state with a "10 percent plan." In Texas, students who graduate in the top 10 percent of their high school class are guaranteed admission to the public college or university of their choice. That's simple enough, but getting even this far was anything but simple. After the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals Hopwood decision banned racial preferences at the University of Texas, legislators dreamed up the 10 percent plan to maintain racial and ethnic diversity. It worked. Now UT officials say that the incoming freshman class is more diverse than any other since before the decision. But there are new protests. Wealthy parents insist that it's not fair that kids who went to rural and inner-city schools are admitted to the University of Texas or Texas A&M while their own children, who they say attend more competitive public and private schools, are turned away. The parents claim that their kids are being unfairly penalized for going to "better schools." I've heard it all now. I understand people being discriminated against because of race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation. But are we now expected to believe that someone can be discriminated against because their own academic achievements put them outside the top 10 percentile?
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 9:09pm :: Race and Identity
 
 

It would all be fine if not for those outside agitators

Phyllis Powell: Junking affirmative action would cost us Less-prepared graduates,fewer federal dollars will result from ballot move What really happens if affirmative action is eliminated in Michigan? The Michigan Court of Appeals recently overturned an earlier ruling and will allow a petition drive to put on the ballot a plan to end affirmative action at public universities and other agencies. Eliminating affirmative action would devastate education and business in Michigan. We need to educate our students to work in a global economy. We cannot afford to do less.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 9:06pm :: Race and Identity
 
 

I think within the next ten years Church and State will be cloven or merged

Court's door open for more voucher cases The Supreme Court says federal courts can review a state tax plan benefiting parochial schools. By Warren Richey | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor WASHINGTON – The US Supreme Court has set the stage for a new round of contentious litigation over the constitutionality of providing public tax revenue to parochial schools. Two years ago in a landmark decision, the high court upheld a school voucher program in Cleveland against allegations that it violated the separation of church and state. This week, the justices opened the door for what may become the next major test of the high court's emerging jurisprudence dealing with government aid to religious schools. The case involves a federal court challenge to a tax-credit program that primarily benefits parochial schools in Arizona. At issue in Hibbs v. Winn was whether federal courts have jurisdiction to hear cases challenging the state tax-credit program. In the 5-to-4 decision Monday that surprised many legal analysts, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, joined the court's liberal wing to provide the decisive fifth vote necessary to uphold a federal appeals court ruling that Arizona's tax-credit setup can be challenged in federal court. The decision is an important victory for those seeking to outlaw tax-credit and school-voucher plans as impermissible government entanglement with religion. At the same time it is a major setback to supporters of public aid to parochial schools.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 8:41pm :: Politics
 
 

Rapping up the National Hip-Hop Political Convention

Activists Hold Hip-Hop Political Convention Sat Jun 19, 2004 07:54 PM ET By Christine Kearney NEWARK, N.J. (Reuters) - Young black Americans -- the "hip-hop generation" -- need to turn their emotional rhetoric into political action, most importantly by voting on Election Day, a gathering of black activists said on Saturday. The activists were among 3,000 people who met in Newark, New Jersey, for the National Hip-Hop Political Convention, which ended on Saturday. Their mission: educate, motivate and unite young black Americans so they can elect more black politicians. Bakari Kitwana, 37, author and co-founder of the convention, defined the "hip-hop generation" as blacks born between 1965 and 1984, but said it extends to anyone who listens to hip-hop music. Through a series of workshops -- including "How to Get Stupid White Men Out of Office," "Why Vote: Voices on the Criminal Justice System," and "Why We Don't Have Any Money: Reparations, Gentrification and Your Bad-A-- Credit" -- the grass-roots meeting also tried to develop a political agenda for the hip-hop generation and identify potential leaders. Organizers did not officially endorse specific candidates. "Eminem's first album sold 1.7 million in the first week. ... We want to take those numbers and consumers and translate them into a concrete, identifiable voting block ... that cuts across race, class, age and sexual orientation," Kitwana said.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 8:29pm :: Politics
 
 

the Juneteenth Film Festival

'Juneteenth' Fest Draws Black Filmmakers By The Associated Press DALLAS - Young black filmmakers are traveling to northern Texas this week as organizers of the Juneteenth Film Festival search for the next Spike Lee. The five-day festival features celebrities including Steve Harvey and Erykah Badu , more than 20 original films and $50,000 in scholarships. "We are focused on trying to attract the quality and depth of films that touch on the subjects of freedom, independence and racial issues," said Kennedy Barnes, a member of the festival's board of directors. "We encouraged the student filmmakers to submit films that were motivational or inspirational in keeping with the message of Juneteenth." Juneteenth, or June 19, is the day in 1865 that Union General Gordon Granger read the Emancipation Proclamation in Galveston. That freed about 250,000 slaves in Texas — 2 1/2 years after President Abraham Lincoln issued the proclamation. This year marks the 25th anniversary of Juneteenth becoming a Texas state holiday, and 25 other states also recognize the day.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 1:15pm :: Race and Identity
 
 

Biting my lines

Cynthia Tucker has an editorial about how the "Free Market" is pricing health care out of the reach of too many folks. She opens with a line about capitalism being the official state religion. This is literally true, IMO, and I've been saying it for years.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 1:06pm :: Economics
 
 

The Financial Times is a shill for liberals, right?

Bush has misled Americans on Iraq Financial Times; Jun 18, 2004 The congressional commission investigating the September 11, 2001 attacks on the US has concluded that there is no evidence to support the Bush administration's thesis that Saddam Hussein helped Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda organisation carry them out. This conclusion, emerging from a strong tradition of congressional oversight, could be taken further. The evidence the administration produced to demonstrate the link was, at best, spurious, at worst, fabricated. This is not a small matter, especially in the context of the Bush team's case for its war of choice against Iraq. The first public justification for the war was that the Iraqi dictator possessed weapons of mass destruction with which he could dominate his neighbours and threaten the west. This was always an exaggeration. There was some reason to believe he had residual chemical and biological weapons, but none whatsoever to suggest he had reconstituted a nuclear arms programme. As we now know, no WMD of any description have been found; not one US assertion to the United Nations Security Council by Colin Powell, secretary of state, in February last year, has been substantiated. The second public justification - which was wheeled on stage to distract the audience from the embarrassing absence of WMD - was that the war was about freeing Iraqis and, indeed, the Middle East from tyranny. After Falluja and Abu Ghraib, however, 92 per cent of Iraqis regard US troops as occupiers, while 2 per cent see them as liberators, according to a Coalition Provisional Authority poll. Yet there was nothing intrinsically absurd about the WMD fears, or ignoble about opposition to Saddam's tyranny - however late Washington developed this. The purported link between Baghdad and al-Qaeda, by contrast, was never believed by anyone who knows Iraq and the region. It was and is nonsense, the sort of "intelligence" true believers in the Bush camp lapped up from clever charlatans they sponsored such as the now disgraced Ahmad Chalabi. Yet, even this week, vice-president Dick Cheney continues to assert Saddam had "long-established ties with al-Qaeda". No wonder that, until recently, polls regularly showed more than half of Americans believed Iraq was behind the attack on New York's twin towers. Whether the Osama and Saddam thesis was more the result of self-delusion or cynical manipulation, it - along with Washington's mismanagement of the whole Iraqi adventure - has been enormously damaging. The Bush administration has misled the American people. It has isolated the US, as American diplomats and commanders pointed out this week. And its bungling in Iraq has given new and terrifying life to the cult of death sponsored by Osama bin Laden. Above all, it inspires little confidence it is capable of defeating the spreading al-Qaeda franchise, which always was the clear and present danger.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 1:03pm :: Politics
 
 

You'll notice I didn't link those other two conservative-ish sites I mentioned

After some of the comments left here, I decided such links amount to encouraging bad reasoning. And right now I'm feeling the need to drop on eof those reminders Dr. King left laying around:
The white establishment is skilled in flattering and cultivating emerging leaders. It presses its own image on them and finally, from imitation of manners, dress and style of living, a deeper strain of corruption develops. This kind of Negro leader acquires the white man’s contempt for the ordinary Negro. He is often more at home with the middle-class white than he is among his own people. His language changes, his location changes, his income changes, and ultimately he changes from the representative of the Negro to the white man into the white man’s representative to the Negro. The tragedy is that too often he does not recognize what has happened to him. I learned a lesson many years ago from a report of two men who flew to Atlanta to confer with a Negro civil rights leader at the airport. Before they could begin to talk, the porter sweeping the floor drew the local leader aside to talk about a matter that troubled him. After fifteen minutes had passed, one of the visitors said bitterly to his companion, “I am just too busy for this kind of nonsense. I haven’t come a thousand miles to sit and wait while he talks to a porter.” The other replied, “When the day comes that he stops having time to talk to a porter, on that day,I will not have the time to come one mile to see him.”
To put as fine a point on it as possible, if what you're doing is bringing a message to Black folks that says we need to conform to folks who have demonstrated their disdain for us, or if you're just spewing rhetoric or if you really haven't thought your conservative thing through, you probably don't want to have a conversation with me on race or politics at all.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 9:58am :: Race and Identity
 
 

A little more context

Juneteenth Holiday Spreading Across U.S. By Associated Press 12:09 PM PDT, June 18, 2004 OKLAHOMA CITY — Although the Juneteenth holiday first came about across the Red River, Oklahoma is one 13 states to celebrate the June 19 holiday that commemorates the end of slavery in Texas. …Today, Oklahoma and 12 other states have joined Texas in making Juneteenth an official state holiday. Some have talked about making the Juneteenth a national holiday. The first Juneteenth celebration occurred in 1865, in Galveston, Texas, when Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger landed with news that the Civil War had ended and, along with it, slavery. President Lincoln had issued the emancipation proclamation two and a half years earlier, but the union had no power to enforce it in Texas until Granger arrived. Three decades later, black towns in Oklahoma were popping up and an effort to make Oklahoma an all-black state went as far as Congress. Land prospectors advertised cheap land and freedom. "It was an opportunity for them to escape from the racism in the South, an opportunity to prove themselves to whites," said Hannibal B. Johnson, historian and author of "Acres of Aspiration: The All Black Towns in Oklahoma." About 50 black town sites remain, while only about a dozen are still thriving communities.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 9:43am :: Race and Identity
 
 

You can please some of the people some of the time

Juneteenth Not a Celebration for All By PAM EASTON Associated Press Writer June 19, 2004, 7:03 AM EDT HOUSTON -- Twenty-five years ago, Texas made June 19 -- an important date in Civil War history -- a state holiday. Today, some still remain unconvinced the day known as Juneteenth should be officially marked. Juneteenth marks the day Gen. Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston in 1865 to share news of the Emancipation Proclamation, which freed slaves two years earlier on Jan. 1, 1863. "It is not a real reason to celebrate in my opinion," said former U.S. Rep. Craig Washington, who was a state representative when Juneteenth became an official holiday in 1979. "It is a celebration (marking) that we were kept ignorant for that time," said Washington, who pushed for Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday to be observed as a state holiday the year Juneteenth was approved. "King's holiday was the big debate in 1979," said state Sen. Rodney Ellis, who said "somehow" Juneteenth emerged from the debate. "You had some members, even some of the civil rights advocates, who were offended at the notion of people who didn't want to recognize King's birthday all of the sudden deciding that they would support a Juneteenth celebration." State Rep. Al Edwards was behind the push to designate Juneteenth as a holiday. His bill was passed on June 9, 1979. "That was one piece of legislation that was tough to get passed," said Edwards, who encountered opposition from fellow black lawmakers. "When we passed the bill, it gave it sophistication. It became something that was done by blacks, whites and browns. It wasn't just a resolution, an observance, but an outright holiday."
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 9:37am :: Race and Identity
 
 

Juneteenth

If you're going to do something in recognition of the holiday, start with a clear understanding of its history.
What is Juneteenth? ©Juneteenth.com Juneteenth is the oldest known celebration commemorating the ending of slavery in the United States. Dating back to 1865, it was on June 19th that the Union soldiers, led by Major General Gordon Granger, landed at Galveston, Texas with news that the war had ended and that the enslaved were now free. Note that this was two and a half years after President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation - which had become official January 1, 1863. The Emancipation Proclamation had little impact on the Texans due to the minimal number of Union troops to enforce the new Executive order. However, with the surrender of General Lee in April of 1865, and the arrival of General Granger’s regiment, the forces were finally strong enough to influence and overcome the resistance. Later attempts to explain this two and a half year delay in the receipt of this important news have yielded several versions that have been handed down through the years. Often told is the story of a messenger who was murdered on his way to Texas with the news of freedom. Another, is that the news was deliberately withheld by the enslavers to maintain the labor force on the plantations. And still another, is that federal troops actually waited for the slave owners to reap the benefits of one last cotton harvest before going to Texas to enforce the Emancipation Proclamation. All or none of them could be true. For whatever the reason, conditions in Texas remained status quo well beyond what was statutory.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 19, 2004 - 9:36am :: Race and Identity
 
 

Not to put too fine a point on it

Minority Report:
Ralph Reed Deserves a Beatdown Today's New York Times reports that the Bush campaign is urging the Southern Baptists to do all they can to mobilize their constituency to support Dubya, short of breaking laws prohibiting tax-exempt organizations from getting involved in political campaigns. They interview Ralph Reed, the Republican strategist who led the Christian Coalition as saying:
Mr. Reed, for his part, appeared to relish any criticism of the campaign for cultivating churches, since it served to reinforce the campaign's connection to the faith. In his speech at the reception, he brought up recent criticism of the campaign over an e-mail message from Pennsylvania suggesting that supporters distribute campaign information inside the places of worship of "friendly congregations," something specialists in election law say might jeopardize their tax status. "I, for one, believe people of faith have the same rights to participate in the political process as any other citizens," he said. "Christians should not be treated as second-class citizens."
Ralph Reed doesn't know the first goddamn thing about what second-class citizenship is about.
Read the rest, see how correct that last sentence is.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 8:00pm :: Seen online
 
 

Spin No. 1

Quote of note:
The chairman and vice chairman of the Sept. 11 commission differed with Rice's characterization of their panel's findings in separate interviews with Reuters. "We don't think there was any relationship whatsoever having to do with 9/11. Whether al Qaeda and Saddam were cooperating on other things against the United States, we don't know," Commission Chairman Thomas Kean said.

9/11 Report Cited No Iraqi 'Control' of Qaeda - Rice Fri Jun 18, 2004 05:33 PM ET By David Morgan WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In publishing a report that cited no evidence of a collaborative relationship between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda, the Sept. 11 commission actually meant to say that Iraq had no control over the network, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said on Friday. As the White House strove to curb potential damage to President Bush's credibility on Iraq, his closest aide on international security denied any inconsistency between the bipartisan panel's findings and Bush's insistence that a Saddam-Qaeda relationship existed. "What I believe the 9-11 commission was opining on was operational control, an operational relationship between al Qaeda and Iraq which we never alleged," Rice said in an interview with National Public Radio. "The president simply outlined what we knew about what al Qaeda and Iraq had done together. Operational control to me would mean that he (Saddam) was, perhaps, directing what al Qaeda would do." Intelligence reports of links between Saddam and the group blamed for the 2001 attacks formed a cornerstone of Bush's rationale for the invasion and occupation of the turbulent Arab country, where 833 U.S. soldiers have died after 14 months of violence.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 7:45pm :: War
 
 

Neoconservation: As the planet's temperature rises, we'll use less heating oil

Global Warming Raises Stink in Britain Fri Jun 18, 2004 11:36 AM ET LONDON (Reuters) - The discovery of breeding colonies of stinkbugs in London is clear proof that global warming is a fact of life, a scientist said on Friday. The small insect -- Nezara viridula or southern green stinkbug -- is native to far warmer climes in North America, South America and Africa and has never before been known to breed in chilly Britain, said Max Barclay, curator of beetles at London's Natural History Museum. "A book on British bugs written in 1959 noted that the climate was too cold for stinkbugs to survive," Barclay said. "But we have now found three breeding colonies of them here which is clear proof that the climate has changed in the last 50 years, and particularly in the last three or four," he added.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 7:10pm :: News
 
 

For the record, I call bullshit

Otherwise this would have come up in the 9/11 Commission hearings.
Putin Says Russia Gave Bush Information on Terrorism By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Filed at 7:26 a.m. ET ASTANA, Kazakhstan (AP) -- Russia gave the Bush administration intelligence that suggested Saddam Hussein's regime was preparing attacks against the United States and its interests abroad before the Iraq war, President Vladimir Putin said Friday. Putin said he couldn't comment on how critical the Russians' information was in U.S. decision to invade Iraq. However, he said the intelligence didn't cause Russia to waver from its firm opposition to the war. ``Indeed, after Sept. 11, 2001, and before the start of the military operation in Iraq, the Russian special services ... received information that officials from Saddam's regime were preparing terrorist attacks in the United States and outside it against the U.S. military and other interests,'' Putin said. ``Despite that information about terrorist attacks being prepared by Saddam's regime, Russia's position on Iraq remains unchanged,'' Putin said. Putin said Russia didn't have any information that Saddam's regime had actually been behind any terrorist acts.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 7:08pm :: War
 
 

If you believe it, you can ach…never mind…

Quote of note:
WHY THIS MATTERS: The Financial Times writes, "The evidence the administration produced to demonstrate the link was, at best, spurious, at worst, fabricated. This is not a small matter, especially in the context of the Bush team's case for its war of choice against Iraq." And the ramifications are huge. The Baltimore Sun writes, "The war in Iraq is proving to be a colossal blunder. Al-Qaida had no meaningful connection to Iraq before the war, but Washington has played right into Osama bin Laden's hands by blindly sending troops into the seething desert nation."
And they can't say they weren't warned it would turn out this way.

White House Caught in Web of Deceptions

Confronted with the 9/11 Commission's report this week, which stated there was no collaborative relationship between al Qaeda and Saddam, the White House refuses to admit  to misleading the public. President Bush said, "This administration never said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and al Qaeda. We did say there were numerous contacts between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda." But he is playing semantic games which distort undisputable facts. Top officials in the Bush administration – including the president and the vice president – have repeatedly cited a collaborative relationship - not just contacts - between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda as a justification for invading Iraq. Now, after months of careful study, the bi-partisan commission investigating 9/11 says there is no credible evidence to support that claim. But instead of taking responsibility for their actions, the administration has continued to weave a web of deception. (See for yourself: Check out the American Progress Claim vs. Fact database for more statements the White House has made to push the misleading al Qaeda/Saddam theory.)

BUSH AND CHENEY TIED IRAQ TO 9/11: Time and time again, the administration did link Iraq and the terrorist attacks of 9/11. Vice President Cheney was still spinning the myth yesterday; asked if Iraq was involved in the Sept. 11 attack, he replied, "We don't know. You know, what the commission said is they can't find any evidence of that." On Meet the Press, Cheney said Iraq was the "geographic base of the terrorists who had us under assault now for many years, but most especially on 9/11." Announcing major combat was over in Iraq in May 2003, President Bush said, "the battle of Iraq is one victory in a war on terror that began on September the 11th, 2001." Even going into the invasion of Iraq, "Bush and Cheney…sought to tie Iraq specifically to the 9/11 attacks. In a letter to Congress on March 19, 2003 -- the day the war in Iraq began -- Bush said that the war was permitted under legislation authorizing force against those who 'planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001.'"

Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 6:23pm :: War
 
 

You know why these decisions are coming about?

Because the USofA has always restricted citizens' rights in an unconstitutional manner when it feels it's at war. Afterwards we've shown the same remorse and resolve not to repeat the error that a young man inspired by a hangover shows over getting drunk.
Make sure you have rights left

We like to think all citizens of the United States of America are guaranteed certain civil and human rights. Unfortunately, that guarantee is subject to the vagaries of human judgment. At times of national crisis this nation has always reduced the protections we are "guaranteed" by law. In fact Justice Scalia has said in wartime, "the protections will be ratcheted right down to the constitutional minimum. I won't let it go beyond the constitutional minimum."

It is expected. There is historical precedent for it. Unfortunately, in every case the historic precedent has been that the impositions were deemed unnecessary and, in most cases, unconstitutional after the fact.
The first such case was the Alien and Sedition Acts which passed in 1798. The threat was a French-backed navy of privateers operating in the area around the West Indies which was threatening the expanding U.S. merchant shipping force. The Act allowed the President to order

…all natives, citizens, denizens, or subjects of the hostile nation or government, being males of the age of fourteen years and upwards, who shall be within the United States, and not actually naturalized, shall be liable to be apprehended, restrained, secured and removed, as alien enemies.


One month later an addendum was added to the law. Section two is worth quoting in its entirety:

SEC. 2. And be it farther enacted, That if any person shall write, print, utter or publish, or shall cause or procure to be written, printed, uttered or published, or shall knowingly and willingly assist or aid in writing, printing, uttering or publishing any false, scandalous and malicious writing or writings against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress of the United States, or the President of the United States, with intent to defame the said government, or either house of the said Congress, or the said President, or to bring them, or either of them, into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them, or either or any of them, the hatred of the good people of the United States, or to stir up sedition within the United States, or to excite any unlawful combinations therein, for opposing or resisting any law of the United States, or any act of the President of the United States, done in pursuance of any such law, or of the powers in him vested by the constitution of the United States, or to resist, oppose, or defeat any such law or act, or to aid, encourage or abet any hostile designs of any foreign nation against United States, their people or government, then such person, being thereof convicted before any court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, shall be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand dollars, and by imprisonment not exceeding two years.


Under the Act the reigning Federalists party arranged for at least 25 arrests, 15 indictments, and 10 convictions—all against the minority Republicans. Among the defendants were the four leading Republican newspapers and three Republican officeholders. And when the Republicans took power in the 1800 elections, Jefferson pardoned most of them and Congress paid their fines.

It is fortunate the Act had a sunset provision, specifically expiring March 3, 1801 or there would be no need for the P.A.T.R.I.O.T. Act…and before you dismiss that remark as partisan hyperbole, remember that John Ashcroft's Justice Department charged Greenpeace a full fifteen months after one of their standard protest under an 1872 law:

The group is charged with violating an obscure 1872 law intended for proprietors of boarding houses who preyed on sailors returning to port. It forbids the unauthorized boarding of "any vessel about to arrive at the place of her destination."

The last court decision concerning the law, from 1890, said it was meant to prevent "sailor-mongers" from luring crews to boarding houses "by the help of intoxicants and the use of other means, often savoring of violence."


The next such instance was President Lincoln's suspension of habeas corpus during the Civil War…an event I've seen Conservative commentators use to support the idea of a Presidential perogative to cut into civil rights at times of war. Unfortunately, this one actually made it to the Supreme Court…also unfortunately, after the Civil War ended. And Mr. Ashcroft should heed the last paragraph of the decision:

It follows, from what has been said on this subject, that there are occasions when martial rule can be properly applied. If, in foreign invasion or civil war, the courts are actually closed, and it is impossible to administer criminal justice according to law, then, on the theatre of active military operations, where war really prevails, there is a necessity to furnish a substitute for the civil authority, thus overthrown, to preserve the safety of the army and society; and as no power is left but the military, it is allowed to govern by martial rule until the laws can have their free course. As necessity creates the rule, so it limits its duration; for, if this government is continued after the courts are reinstated, it is a gross usurpation of power. Martial rule can never exist where the courts are open, and in the proper and unobstructed exercise of their jurisdiction. It is also confined to the locality of actual war.(emphasis added)


The next major breech of civil rights took place during World War I. According to a speech given by Justice William J. Brennan, Jr.[pdf],

…during World War I the Senate considered a bill that would have made the entire United States a military zone within which anyone who published any material that might endanger the success of U.S. military operations could be tried as a spy by a military tribunal and put to death.11 Unwilling to go this far, President Wilson instead convinced Congress to enact the Espionage Act of 1917, which made it a crime, during a time of war, to make false statements with the intent to interfere with the success of U.S. military forces or military recruiting. This Act provided the predicate for confiscating antiwar films and raiding the offices of antiwar organizations. In 1918 the Act was amended to make it a crime also to "willfully utter, print, write, or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about" the U.S. form of government, Constitution, flag, or its military forces or uniform "or any language intended to bring the [same] into contempt, scorn, contumely, or disrepute

All in all, over two thousand individuals were prosecuted under the Espionage Act. Very few individuals were convicted for actually urging men not to enlist or submit to the draft—purportedly the main object of the Act. Rather, the vast majority of the convictions were for stating opinions about the war that the courts treated as false statements of fact because they conflicted with speeches by President Wilson or with the resolution of Congress declaring war. Among the supposed "threats to national security" that were prosecuted under the Act were statements of religious objections to the war, advocacy of heavier taxation instead of the issuance of war bonds, suggestions that the draft was unconstitutional, and criticisms of the Red Cross or the Y.M.C.A.13 Moreover, such "subversive" statements were criminalized even if they were never directly communicated to soldiers or to men about to enlist or be drafted—it was thought enough that the statements might conceivably reach such men and undermine the war effort.


And of course there was the infamous interning of Japanese Americans during World War II, a case so egregious that reparations, symbolic though they may have been, were paid to survivors.

Now we find ourselves "at war" with a concept. Once again we're told we're in a situation where the "suspension" of our rights is "necessary" for national security, for the duration…of a "war" with an undefined and undefinable end. Will we as a nation allow our rights to be suspended when the odds of being struck by lightning are greater than that of being involved in a terrorist attack?
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 6:10pm :: War
 
 

Keep them judgments coming

Judge Scolds U.S. Officials Over Barring Jet Travelers A federal district court judge upbraided the government for using "frivolous claims" to avoid disclosing its list of people who are banned from boarding aircraft because of terrorism concerns. The June 15, 2004 ruling came in a lawsuit in which the ACLU and others are attempting to determine the criteria the Bush Administration has used to place hundreds of people on "no fly" lists. The plaintiffs are also seeking the names of those persons, and the government defendants – the Justice Department, the FBI and the Transportation Security Administration - have claimed the information is exempt from the Freedom of Information Act because it involves national security information or is otherwise exempt from disclosure. In his ruling, Judge Charles Breyer of San Francisco said that he had privately reviewed the materials at issue and concluded that the government had not proved the information should be kept confidential in many instances. He said the withheld information included much "innocuous information," including much that was available in the public record, and ordered the government to review the material it had withheld and reconsider whether it could be properly exempted from disclosure. The ACLU has estimated that more than 500 people in San Francisco alone have been barred from boarding places because their names were on no-fly lists; in some cases, their presence on those lists was a result of government error.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 5:57pm :: News
 
 

Hence, "narcoterrorism"

Prosecutors Using Post-9/11 Laws To Prosecute Non-Terrorism Crimes Federal and state prosecutors are applying anti-terrorism laws adopted after the 9/11 attacks to run-of-the-mill probes of political corruption, financial crimes and immigration fraud, according to a report by the Scripps Howard News Service. According to the report, the Treasury Department has routinely used money-laundering provisions in the USA Patriot Act to scrutinize transactions in the private real estate market, casinos, storefront check-cashing stores and auto dealers. State prosecutors used a Virginia anti-terrorism statute making it a capital offense to be involved in more than one murder in a three-year period to sentence Washington-area snipers John Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo. In addition, the FBI has deployed Patriot Act provisions in a political corruption probe involving a Las Vegas strip bar and the Justice Department reported to Congress last year that it used the new law in probes of credit-card fraud, theft from a bank account and a kidnapping. In the first action of its kind, the Treasury Department this year also used the Patriot Act to put Syria's largest commercial bank and two commercial banks in Myanmar on blacklists, which effectively forbids any U.S. financial institutions from doing business with them. Peter Swire, a law school professor at Ohio State University, said criminal statutes are often broadened as prosecutors stretch to find new ways to convict people accused of wrongdoing, as was the case with racketeering laws passed in 1970. Swire noted that many Patriot Act provisions were proposals that either the White House or Congress had previously rejected as overly intrusive, and many of them are slated to expire next year unless Congress makes the changes permanent. The Department of Justice has been vigorously campaigning to keep the controversial provisions. The ACLU and other civil rights groups are urging Congress to terminate many of these provisions, arguing that the government already has sufficient investigative tools and the controversial Patriot Act measures unnecessarily expand government power.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 5:56pm :: News
 
 

Though nuking the guilty bastards could be the better course

U.S. Court Rules Rape is Grounds for Asylum A federal appeals court has issued a groundbreaking decision holding that a Guatemalan woman can pursue asylum in the U.S. Ms. Ms. Garcia-Martinez was gang-raped by soldiers who believed that she and her family supported guerrilla rebels. In a June 14, 2004 ruling, a unanimous three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals wrote that Reina Izabel Garcia-Martinez had "survived atrocities that most of us only experience in our nightmares," overruling an immigration judge's 2001 decision to deny her asylum claim. The Bureau of Immigration Appeals had rejected her case. The panel say the immigration judge's ruling that Ms. Garcia–Martinez had failed to demonstrate past persecution had overlooked evidence that was "stamped on every page" of her asylum request. In her application, Ms. Garcia-Martinez said that leftist guerrillas had come to her village and forcibly conscripted young men, including her brother, who was kidnapped in 1983. She testified that a few years later, the Guatemalan military began coming to her village and, rather than protecting villagers, began beating and raping women based on their mistaken belief that villagers were aiding the guerrillas. When she was nineteen, soldiers forced their way into her house and beat her parents while three soldiers took turns beating and raping her. When Ms. Garcia-Martinez recovered from her injuries, fearing soldiers would return for her, she made her way through Mexico to San Francisco. In 2001, an immigration judge found while she was credible, Ms. Garcia Marques had "failed to show . . . that her attack had anything to do with . . . her political opinion, her race, religion, her political affiliation or membership in a particular social group." Those are the grounds on which a claim of asylum may be based. The Ninth Circuit's decision sharply disputed that holding, saying the immigration judge's "determination that Garcia's rape was a random criminal act, unconnected to the government, is not supported by substantial evidence."
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 5:54pm :: War
 
 

Changing rhetoric into vocabulary

Time Magazine has an article titled The New Druglords, about the Colombian cocaine trade, which leads with
The war on narcoterrorism faces a new evil as Colombia's paramilitaries turn into a cocaine cartel
"The war on narcoterrorism"? We're merging the "war on drugs" with the equally successful "war on terror"?
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 10:48am :: Random rant
 
 

Can we fix this now, please?

THOUSANDS WHO HAVE HAD THEIR VOTING RIGHTS RESTORED MAY REMAIN ON FLORIDA PURGE LISTS Massive Discrepancies Revealed In Two Gov’t Clemency Lists New York, NY -- Documents obtained from the State of Florida reveal that the state’s “felon match” list for purging voters may include many of 25,585 people whose voting rights have been restored through clemency grants or pardons. Unless corrective action is taken, those wrongly placed on the purge list will be unable to vote in this year’s presidential election. The Florida Division of Elections (DOE) attempts to identify registered voters who should be taken off the rolls because of previous felony convictions, using criminal history data supplied by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. To avoid the disfranchisement of eligible voters, people with felony convictions who have been granted clemency and had their voting rights restored must be removed from that group; otherwise, their names may be wrongly purged from the voter rolls. According to research by the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, the Florida Division of Elections database identifies 145,823 individuals who have been granted clemency since 1964. Documents obtained from the Florida Office of Executive Clemency show a different – and larger – number of records of processed clemency cases and pardons over the same period, tallying 171,408 individuals. (To obtain the State of Florida documents and source data click here.) “What explains DOE’s apparent undercount of people whose voting rights have been restored?” asks Jessie Allen, associate counsel at the Brennan Center. “If officials at the Division of Elections know of the larger tally of people who have regained their voting rights, they should explain why they are allowing these citizens to end up on the purge lists. On the other hand, if the Clemency Office’s tally comes as news to them, they need to deal with this problem in a hurry.”
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 10:29am :: Politics
 
 

Okay, we deploy first, THEN test?

… No more ass-backward than anything else this administration has done. 'Realistic' Missile Tests Ordered Senate Also Votes to Increase Army Troop Levels Permanently By Helen Dewar Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, June 18, 2004; Page A13 The Senate ordered "realistic" tests of the Bush administration's proposed missile defense system yesterday but balked at Democratic proposals to delay deployment until the tests are conducted and to require an evaluation by an independent testing office. The Senate also voted, 93 to 4, to increase permanently the authorized size of the Army by 20,000 troops, to 502,400. The administration has temporarily expanded Army troop levels to more than 495,000 but opposes a permanent increase. The House voted earlier to expand the Army by 30,000 and the Marines by 9,000 over three years. The missile defense votes amounted to a go-ahead for initial deployment of the first nine ground-based missile interceptors in Alaska and California later this year and signaled likely congressional support for about $10 million for the program in next year's defense budget. Democrats, arguing that the planned national shield may not be effective in shooting down incoming missiles, wanted to require tests of the system's operation under realistic conditions, with the results to be evaluated by the Pentagon's chief of testing, Thomas Christie, whom they regard as independent from political pressures.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 7:29am :: Politics
 
 

Only the best comedians have better timing than Ashcroft

But what Ashcroft is pulling ain't no joke.
Patriot Act Provision Invoked, Memo Says FBI Request Came Weeks After Ashcroft Denied Using Controversial Part of Law By Amy Goldstein Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, June 18, 2004; Page A11 The FBI asked the Justice Department last fall to seek permission from a secret federal court to use the most controversial provision of the USA Patriot Act, four weeks after Attorney General John D. Ashcroft said that part of the law had never been used, according to government documents disclosed this week. A one-paragraph memo -- saying the FBI wanted to use the part of the law that allows investigators in terrorism and espionage cases easier access to people's business and library records -- was in a stack of documents the government has released under court order, as debate persists over whether use of the anti-terrorism law violates civil liberties.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 7:26am :: Politics
 
 

Pretty much what I expected

3rd Graders in Poor Areas Bear the Brunt of Promotion Rules By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN and ELISSA GOOTMAN Results of the citywide third-grade exams show that in the city's lowest-performing school districts, as many as a third of the eligible students failed to meet the cutoff for promotion to the fourth grade. In District 5 in Harlem and in District 16 in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, one in three children subject to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's new third-grade promotion rules now face the prospect of repeating third grade and have been urged to attend summer school. More than one in four children subject to the promotion policy similarly failed in Districts 7, 9 and 12 in the Bronx and in Districts 13, 17 and 19 in Brooklyn, according to the results. The data, released yesterday, suggested that children in impoverished, predominantly black neighborhoods were likely to be most affected by the mayor's plan. The promotion policy calls for any third grader scoring at Level 1, the lowest of four rankings, on either the annual reading or math tests to be referred to summer school. Any student who does not score at Level 2 or higher after retaking the test in August or who does not win an appeal will have to repeat the third grade. In all, slightly more than 17 percent of the 63,072 third graders citywide who are subject to the policy scored at Level 1 on one or both tests. More than 6,300 special education students and more than 2,300 students who do not speak English were exempt from the mayor's policy; promotion decisions for them will be based on other criteria.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 7:15am :: Education
 
 

They say faith is the evidence of things unseen

But that really ought to be restricted from use in the political scene, you know? When dealing with the strictly terrestrial one reaches a point where the evidence confirms or denies one's beliefs.
Bush and Cheney Talk Strongly of Qaeda Links With Hussein By DAVID E. SANGER and ROBIN TONER Published: June 18, 2004 President Bush and Vice President Cheney said yesterday that they remain convinced that Saddam Hussein's government had a long history of ties to Al Qaeda, a day after the commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks reported that its review of classified intelligence found no evidence of a "collaborative relationship" that linked Iraq to the terrorist organization.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 7:06am :: War
 
 

The operative term is "collaborative"

And l'il Georgie knows it. That's why he said "there is a relationship." There was "a relationship" between pre-invasion Iraq and the USofA. But it wasn't collaborative either. Shall we shock and awe ourselves? Quote of note:
With its historic access to government secrets, the panel was able to shed new light on old accountings, demonstrating, for example, that Mr. Bush himself, in the weeks before the attack, had received more detailed warnings about Al Qaeda's intentions than the White House had acknowledged.
…and another:
In the studies, Mr. Bush in particular has come off as less certain and decisive than he has portrayed himself.

Questioning Nearly Every Aspect of the Responses to Sept. 11 By DOUGLAS JEHL WASHINGTON, June 17 - For most of 2002, President Bush argued that a commission created to look into the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks would only distract from the post-Sept. 11 war on terrorism. Now, in 17 preliminary staff reports, that panel has called into question nearly every aspect of the administration's response to terror, including the idea that Iraq and Al Qaeda were somehow the same foe. Far from a bolt from the blue, the commission has demonstrated over the last 19 months that the Sept. 11 attacks were foreseen, at least in general terms, and might well have been prevented, had it not been for misjudgments, mistakes and glitches, some within the White House. In the face of those findings, Mr. Bush stood firm, disputing the particular finding in a staff report that there was no "collaborative relationship" between Saddam Hussein and the terrorist organization. "There was a relationship between Iraq and Al Qaeda," Mr. Bush declared.
So now there's no doubt about the reason the White House resisted the very creation of the 9/11 Commission and then fought mightily to restrict its operation. No doubt of the reason for harping on the lack of absolute specificity. And the Bushista response?
At a briefing, a senior White House official sought again to turn away attention from the past. "The real issue is how do we move forward," the official said. "We've made a lot of changes since Sept. 11, because this country was simply not on war footing at the time of the attacks."
Moving forward, we have to eliminate the errors we've made. That is something the current administration has yet to do. Between this, the exposure of a CIA operative for political reasons, the number of flat out lies and denials that have come to light, the actual war crime admitted to by Rumsfeld and the ideological domination of the administration by an ideologically bankrupt philosophy, the only reason for holding back on impeachment proceedings is that voting the Bushistas out will be faster.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 6:43am :: War
 
 

Fixing to get de-blogrolled

First of all, there's http://www.blacksforbush.org/, which is a useful progressive site, and there's http://blacksforbush.blogspot.com, which is a conservative site whose proprietor Scott has recently commented here. The blogroll will be redone entirely soon, but the miscategorization of the Blogspot site was significant enough that I made this adjustment immediately. Scott's been moved to the Conservatives box, and Blacks for Bush.org, the intended recipient of the "cognitive dissonance link, is both linked and named. The rest of this post exists solely to provide an immediately available response to Scott's post that was inspired by "On Tactics."
Prometheus 6 has agreed with the premise of this blog in his latest post,"we're taking bids for our votes after that from all comers". But of course as usual, the timing is not right, to quote "the Neocon thing currently in place that has to go". As always Black America showing its power needs to wait for a better time.
I don't think the premise of Scott's blog is to "[take] bids for our votes from all comers." The time is exactly right to establish the Black constituency's power. The question is, what is the most constructive way to exercise it. The right to bear arms implies the ability to shoot oneself in the foot, and even to hold the gun backward while aiming. The correct exercise of power is not a reflexive flailing. I've laid out my reasons to vote against Bush. None have been addressed, much less refuted. As to the specific statements made in this post, those that are even possible to consider valid interpretations of Democratic positions have been refuted numerous times elsewhere. The others:
We have a democratic presidential candidate suggesting that we lower taxes on corporations so they can pay even less than the less than their fair share they are currently paying. We have democratic protectionist telling our trading partners to raise prices on their goods so poor black consumers can purchase fewer things with their dollars.
are hallucinatory. We have to be concerned about the soundness of the structures we live in as well as our personal physical health. And right now the USofA is such that the basement floods during a storm (race) and the roof is on fire (warmongers). My position is, if you don't put out the fire you can't clean up after the flood or even waterproof your foundations.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 18, 2004 - 2:11am :: Politics
 
 

Republican senators join the coverup

Quote of note:
At last week's hearing, Ashcroft said it was not the Justice Department's policy to define torture. But he said international rules governing treatment of detainees apply to countries, not groups like al Qaeda.
Let's assume this bit of evasion is a valid interpretation of the international rules. The Iraq invasion is an action against a country (if you try to go with "it wasn't against the country, it was against a regime," I will vomit into your mouth).
Senate Panel Refuses to Subpoena Torture Memos Thu Jun 17, 2004 04:54 PM ET By Thomas Ferraro WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A divided U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday refused to subpoena Justice Department memos on U.S. torture policy toward enemy combatants. On a party-line vote of 10-9, the committee rejected a Democratic proposal that would have given U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft until June 24 to turn over the materials or make an acceptable claim of privilege not to do so. Failure to have reached a negotiated agreement with the committee's top Republican and Democrat would have required Ashcroft to have turned over all the documents before July 1. "It's a dumb-ass thing to do," Chairman Orrin Hatch, a Utah Republican, said in rejecting such a confrontational move, urging all sides to try instead to reach a voluntary accord. Ashcroft refused to last week to release the memos, telling a Judiciary Committee hearing they were part of his private advice to President Bush in the war on terror.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 17, 2004 - 6:37pm :: War
 
 

Ashcroft's timing continues to be beyond reproach

In a Justice Department that happens to declassify memos just in time to support a smear campaign, one can't help but occasionally wonder…
CIA Contractor Charged in Afghan Prisoner Beating Thu Jun 17, 2004 04:52 PM ET By James Vicini WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A CIA contractor was arrested on Thursday for brutally beating a detainee who died at a U.S. military base in Afghanistan, the first charges against a civilian in the current scandal over U.S. overseas prisoner abuse, officials said. David Passaro, 38, a former Army Ranger who worked as a contractor for the CIA, was charged in a four-count indictment in the first case by the Justice Department since questions arose over mistreatment of prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan. Passaro was accused of using his hands, feet and a large flashlight to beat an Afghan detainee during interrogations in 2003 at the base near the town of Asadabad close to the Pakistan border. The indictment, returned by a federal grand jury in North Carolina, charged Passaro with two counts of assault with a dangerous weapon with intent to do bodily harm and two counts of assault resulting in serious bodily injury.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 17, 2004 - 6:30pm :: War
 
 

More possible messes to deal with

Quote of note:
Pearlstein said multiple sources reported U.S. detention centers in, among other places, Kohat in Pakistan near the border with Afghanistan, on the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia and at Al Jafr prison in Jordan, where the group said the CIA had an interrogation facility. Prisoners are also being held at the Naval Consolidated Brig in Charleston, South Carolina, and others were suspected of being held on U.S. warships

Report Says U.S. Has 'Secret' Detention Centers Thu Jun 17, 2004 03:43 PM ET By Sue Pleming WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is holding terrorism suspects in more than two dozen detention centers worldwide and about half of these operate in total secrecy, said a human rights report released on Thursday. Human Rights First, formerly known as the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, said in a report that secrecy surrounding these facilities made "inappropriate detention and abuse not only likely but inevitable." "The abuses at Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib cannot be addressed in isolation," said Deborah Pearlstein, director of the group's U.S. Law and Security program, referring to the U.S. Naval base prison in Cuba and Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq where abuses are being investigated. "This is all about secrecy, accountability and the law," Pearlstein told a news conference.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 17, 2004 - 6:07pm :: War
 
 

On Constituencies

Let me be clear about something. I've said one doesn't have to, and in fact shouldn't, overlook their other constituencies in order to acknowledge any specific one. In keeping with that, I have to say the Bushista Neocon agenda is so damaging to the overall collective that if the Republican Party adopted a pure-progressive stance on race and held to their every other policy, I would still have to vote against them. All their promises would amount to being given a nice comfortable chair in a house they're burning down.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 17, 2004 - 5:05pm :: Politics
 
 

On tactics

Gonna get Cosby-direct for a minute. Scott at Blacks for Bush (whose blog motto is "Earning Respect by Becoming Swing Voters!"), left his mission statement in the comments of the post immediately downpage:
Since the Democrats have failed in their mission to respect and protect their strongest supporters and ignored the black vote I have decided to vote for Bush in the following Election. For me the decision is very easy I live in NYC and NY always goes democrat so my vote is effectively useless in a presidential election. Unfortunately the sick feeling I get when I consider voting republican means that I am not a swing voter and thus elected officials ignore my needs. Over the next few months I will be investigating and sharing why Blacks should vote for Bush in 2004."
Okay, I understand this is a possible response. Obviously I've come to a different one and I'm going to explain why, or re-explain. Maybe assemble the explanation is best. In the USofA, one has power to the degree one has a constituency. The constituency is a group of people with common interests - in sociological terms, an in-group (WARNING: there's a pop-under on the other side of that link). As such, we all belong to multiple constituencies, and I'm not suggesting how anyone should prioritize them. I am saying that everyone generally recognized as being Black has common interests. "Black people" is a natural constituency. Again, that assertion is not intended to devalue any other constituencies one has. It is intended to insure the Black constituency is not devalued, because its unique issues will not be championed by any other constituency unless it expects to benefit as well, or all its own issues are resolved. And I feel the need to make this point up front because Black folks believe in the American "rugged individual" myth as much as any other American does. That's one reason the "Black people are not a monolith" meme that circulated about a decade ago was so successful at eroding a number of organizations. And historically, Black people often find themselves in a position where their personal well-being could be immediately secured by helping suppress the activism of other Black folks. Honestly, the term "sell-out" has as storied a history as the term "sambo." This is a symptom of the function Black people perform for the social machine. We're like a capacitor. We gain when there's more juice in the circuit than strictly necessary to operate, and are the first to lose charge when the voltage drops (also known as last hired, first fired). We dampen the oscillations. We are ballast. This is the nature of the relationship between the collective "Black People" to the whole collective "USofA" of which it is a part. Social ostracism, denial of rights every citizen is entitled to, active suppression, all that came about in order to establish that relationship. Changing that relationship should be the overall goal and our actions as a constituency should move us ever further in that direction. And effecting a change requires the constituency to exercise power in its own behalf. We need to be clear what power is because in my opinion "Black People" don't have but so much of it. The amount of income, wealth we have, the amount we spend and our registered voters are often called power but they are more properly called force…power is directed force. Force disrupts things, power shapes them. This makes power more effective when done right and more dangerous and damaging when done wrong. A week ago I posted a link to a copy of Black Power Defined by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
When a people are mired in oppression, they realize deliverance only when they have accumulated the power to enforce change. the powerful never lose opportunities – they remain available to them. The powerless, on the other hand, never experience opportunity – it is always arriving at a later time. The nettlesome task of Negroes today is to discover how to organize our strength into compelling power so that the government cannot elude our demands. We must develop, from strength, a situation in which the government finds it wise and prudent to collaborate with us. It would be the height of naivety to wait passively until the administration had somehow been infused with such blessings of good will that it implored us for our programs. We must frankly acknowledge that in past years our creativity and imagination were not employed in learning how to develop power. We found a method in nonviolent protest that worked, and we employed it enthusiastically. We did not have leisure to probe for a deeper understanding of its laws and lines of development. Although our actions were bold and crowned with successes, they were substantially improvised and spontaneous. They attained the goals set for them but carried the blemishes of inexperience. This is where the civil rights movement stands today. Now we must take the next major step of examining the levers of power which Negroes must grasp to influence the course of events.
It's mandatory reading for Black partisans and should be for "Black People" too because our efforts are still largely limited to this unexamined set of found techniques. Dr. King says:
In our society power sources can always finally be traced to ideological, economic and political forces.
I note that the Black constituency has little by way of an ideology beyond "We're all equal." Once, years ago, I asked on a Black issues-oriented, and basically Black populated, mailing list if they would be upset by an advance alien race bringing rigorous proof that Black people were superior to white people. As I expected, they tried to flay me. We've focused on proving we are "as good as" that being "as good as" has become the actual goal for those who still think about it. Our focus on political technique (in which I include judicial approaches) came about because we pretty much had no national economic power. Our local economic power existed because we were an integral part of the communities we lived in. Boycotts work when the target figures they lose more by holding their ground than by yielding somewhat, and the change in the status quo is minimal. That means boycotts (and the less effective protest marches which target morals rather than money) are not likely to force a change in our relationship to the mainstream. We still have no national economic power…we still don't compel consideration of our economic issues, largely because we haven't defined them. The issues we've actively pursued have been social and legal. The groundwork has been laid to change the nature of the relationship between "Black People" and the greater society. All that is prologue to considering Scott's mission statement. Because the problem is that relationship. The problem is "Black People" have not really exercised power as a constituency. And no one believes we can—thay feel we're all carrot and no stick. In fact, considerable effort is put into convincing us we have no Black constituency, that we should each melt into the other in-groups we are members of. This would probably help issues, to be honest, but would ultimately leave our unique issues unresolved (and I'm probably not talking about what you think I am). "Black People" must see they are part of a natural constituency that must exercise power for its own benefit as all other constituencies do. We need to develop that ideology as a guide to what truly is beneficial, but a few facts stand out immediately:
  • It would be to our benefit to convince the mainstream the Black constituency is capable of exercising power…of directing our force.
  • Republican rhetoric has militated public opinion against "Black People"
  • It would be foolish to support someone that has acted against the constituency's interests
  • It would be foolish to believe someone would act in a way counter to their track record until they have established a new one. Promises should be watched, but should not motivate.
So I think at this moment, three things can be done:
  1. Massively repudiate the Republican/Neocon ideology. "Black People" can not only tip the balance, we can do it decisively enough to show we can tip it either way.
  2. Make it clear it's the Neocon thing currently in place that has to go, and we're taking bids for our votes after that from all comers.
  3. Start working on that ideology
That first step means I have to reject Scott's approach.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 16, 2004 - 8:35pm :: Politics
 
 

Do the math

On the other hand, Juan Williams makes a seriously valid point: that Black folks could be the key to the White House if we turn out in sufficient numbers. And given that national political deadlock, those numbers don't even have to be that large (though I REALLY hope they are). One of my favorite books, A Mathematician Reads the Newspaper by John Allen Paulos explains there are situations in which folks who think they have voting power actually don't:
…consider a corporation with four stockholders holding, respectively, 27 percent, 26 percent, 25 percent and 22 percent of the stock. Again, a simple majority is needed to pass any measure. In this case, any two of the first three stockholders can pass a measure whereas the last stockholder’s vote is never crucial to any outcome. (When the last stockholder’s 22 percent is added to any one of the first three stockholders’ percentages, the sum is less than 51 percent and any larger coalition of stockholders doesn’t require the last stockholder’s 22 percent.)
but the same sort of consideration can show there are situations where folks who think they have no voting power actually do. And in my opinion, the upcoming presidential election is one of them. The country is not only polarized, but evenly divided—we all know that. Last numbers I saw said something like 45% progressive, 45% regressive Republican. These are hard-core positions. Now, what would happen to that balance if large numbers of Black folks voted against those they feel are actively hostile to their interest? Think about it. WE CAN TIP THE BALANCE.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 16, 2004 - 8:46am :: Politics
 
 

On a certain level, I'm convinced Juan Williams has lost his mind

Bush Shouldn't Write Off the Black Vote By JUAN WILLIAMS WASHINGTON — With the presidential election only a few months away, it is time for President Bush to unleash his secret weapon — his relationship with black and Hispanic voters. [P6: He HAS no relationship with Black voters to speak of.] The president is already winning a third of the popular vote among Hispanics, according to a Zogby International poll taken this spring. With advertisements and outreach focused on reforms to allow easier immigration for workers, the president has a good chance to add to his numbers among Hispanics. But in a close race, the key to re-election rests on the president's ability to increase his percentage of the black vote. Here, he has the chance to make tremendous gains — if only because he now has practically no support among black voters. A May Washington Post/ABC News poll showed the likely Democratic nominee, Senator John Kerry, with a 79 percent to 6 percent lead over Mr. Bush among black voters. If the president gets only 6 percent of the black vote this year he will have achieved the near impossible task of getting a lower percentage of black votes than he did in 2000, when he won 8 percent.[P6: Oh, yes, please unleashed that relationship. I'm begging you.] But the president has the opportunity to flip the script. With a direct appeal, President Bush could win at least 20 percent of the black vote — and the White House. First, the field is open. Compared with previous Democratic campaigns, Mr. Kerry's has done a poor job of reaching out to black voters. As Donna Brazile, Al Gore's campaign manager in 2000, said recently, "Don't expect me to go out and say John Kerry is a great man and a visionary if you're not running ads on African-American or Hispanic cable networks. Fair is fair. So send my dad a postcard, send my sisters a bumper sticker." The Kerry campaign has also been notable for its lack of blacks and Hispanics among the candidate's top advisers. And Mr. Kerry has rarely been identified with issues that compel black voters — notably affirmative action. [P6: Bush, on the other hand is VERY strongly identified with issues that compel Black voters — notably affirmative action.
G.W. Bush: Affirmative Action Baby by Manning Marable Several days before last month's national holiday celebrating Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday, the Bush administration came out forcefully against affirmative action policies initiated at the University of Michigan, which soon, will be under Supreme Court review. …The controversies over both affirmative action and Pickering's renomination led many columnists to question the administration's commitment to civil rights. One of the most thoughtful commentaries to appear was by author Roland S. Martin, which appeared in USA Today on the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday. Posing the question, how would King have viewed Bush's rejection of affirmative action, Martin observed: "President Bush opposes the University of Michigan's admissions program because he views it as a quota system." "Yet he is proud to call himself a Yale graduate, even though he benefited from a quota system because of his family's history at the Ivy League school. That's right. Our own president is an affirmative action baby."
] Third, Mr. Bush has a network to make a pitch to black voters — the black church. Despite some bumps along the way, black churches remain generally enthusiastic about the president's faith-based initiative. The president has used his appearances before faith-based groups as a way to communicate with black Americans. It was no surprise that Mr. Bush used a speech to ministers to condemn Senator Trent Lott for expressing kind words about Strom Thurmond's segregationist past.[P6: And I, at least, haven't forgotten that events have shown that to be an empty statement.] And then there is the president's top selling point with black voters — his track record of appointing minorities to top positions. There are three black cabinet secretaries in the Bush administration: Alphonso Jackson, secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development; Rod Paige, secretary of education; and Colin Powell, the secretary of state. What's more, the administration official most closely identified with the president is a black woman, Condoleezza Rice, the national security adviser. By giving Ms. Rice and Mr. Powell so much clout, President Bush is miles ahead of any other president, Democrat or Republican, in his treatment of [P6: specific] black people. [P6: These people are NOT a selling point. They are, in general, considered a sell-out point.]
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 16, 2004 - 8:19am :: Politics
 
 

Well, they ARE quite knowledgeable

Quote of note:
By 3 p.m. one recent Tuesday, immigration officials had run out of the 1,800 travel documents they issue each day. The number of applicants is likely to soar during the next few weeks when new graduates rush to leave. "I guess that 50% of them will never return to Iraq," says Emad, a passport official who asks to be identified by only his first name. "Even I would leave if I could."

Iraq's Future? These Kids Want No Part of It For Baghdad University's class of '04, the main ambition is finding a way out By VIVIENNE WALT Monday, Jun. 21, 2004 At 21, Louis Yako has an impressive resume. He speaks five languages, cites passages from Arthur Miller and Ernest Hemingway, has a fine singing voice and will graduate from Baghdad University this month with high marks in English literature. In brief, he is the kind of go-getter Iraq could sorely use in the months to come, as the U.S. occupation winds down and the newly named government tries to prove that Iraq is ready to run itself. Like almost all his classmates, however, Yako has something else in mind: leaving Iraq. The U.S. hailed the naming of an interim government two weeks ago as a step toward an eventual withdrawal of American forces from Iraq. But the graduating seniors at Baghdad University are already plotting exit strategies of their own. Outside the school's College of Languages, two friends discussed which British graduate programs might accept them. Another student thought he might have found a job in the United Arab Emirates. Even students without concrete plans have decided to get out. "I haven't a clue where I'm going, but it will be outside Iraq," says Omar Abdul Wahab al-Samarrai, 24, an English major who grew up in Europe and Africa. For years he had his heart set on a job in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but that idea slipped away as the country descended into violent chaos. "I want a chance in life," he says. "I don't see it here."
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 16, 2004 - 8:03am :: War
 
 

What, Me Worry?

greenspan_testifies.jpg
Greenspan testifies before Congress on interest rates
Inflation Doesn't Worry Greenspan Fed Chairman Says Threat Is in Check -- for Now -- and Interest Rates Can Be Raised Gradually By Nell Henderson Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, June 16, 2004; Page E01 Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan yesterday played down inflation concerns after a government report showed consumer prices rose in May at the fastest monthly rate in more than three years.


Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 16, 2004 - 7:15am :: Economics
 
 

A totally avoidable tragedy

Quote of note:
Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-CT) agreed. "Nobody saw this coming," Lieberman said. "With 20/20 hindsight, of course, we know that if [House Speaker Dennis] Hastert hadn't let Public Law 107-306 come to the floor in November of 2002, we could have saved many of our colleagues from their sad fates."
Report: 9/11 Commission Could Have Been Prevented WASHINGTON, DC—According to key members of the Bush Administration, the tragic proceedings of the 9/11 commission, which devastated the political lives of numerous government officials, could have been averted with preventive action in 2002 and 2003. "A few adept legislative maneuvers could have saved the reputations of hundreds," President Bush's counterterrorism chief Fran Townsend told reporters Monday. "Had we foreseen the dangers of the commission's deceptively simple requests, we could have spared dozens of victims from the shocking, public mangling of their careers." "It's tragic," Townsend added. "All those political futures snuffed out as millions of Americans watched on television. And to think there was a remote chance that they could've gotten our president." Although there were only 10 commission members, they worked with shocking efficiency, and served to carry out the decisions made with the help of a much larger network of government employees. "The frighteningly resolute faces of commission chair Thomas H. Kean and vice-chair Lee H. Hamilton are familiar after several weeks of frenzied media coverage, but the commission's roots run deeper," Townsend said. "The thing that keeps me awake at night is the number of advisors who are still out there today, secretly evaluating our policies. We have no way of knowing who might be called forth by a panel in the future."
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 16, 2004 - 7:09am :: Seen online
 
 

Cheney probably wasn't told in advance about the details of the contracts

Back when there was some doubt that the orders to torture Iraqi prisoners came from on high, I held forth on the topic elsewhere thus:
Still, I need to remind you: "When you control a man's thinking you do not have to worry about his actions. You do not have to tell him not to stand here or go yonder. He will find his "proper place" and will stay in it. You do not need to send him to the back door. He will go without being told. In fact, if there is no back door, he will cut one for his special benefit. His education makes it necessary." - Dr. Carter G. Woodson Whose thinking is better controlled than those in the military? Controlling their thinking is the central purpose of Basic Training. If the commanding officer makes clear certain results are desired, the acceptible techniques for acquisition, limits (or lack of) to execution and that rewards are forthcoming to those who help bring about the desired results…then says "go get them results," what do you think will happen? The soldiers will do everything right up to the limit of what they understand is allowable. Picture the conversation: Commander: I want them results! Military Intelligence Liason: I hear then sand niggers really hate to be nekkid in front of each other. Breaks them down. Commander: Really. I don't care about them, I want them results! Military Intelligence Liason: Last joint I was at, Gitmo, we really fucked them over to get what we wanted. Commander: Really. I don't care about them, I want them results! Assembled troops: HOOO-RAAAAUGH! And nobody tells anybody specifically what to do.
So I have no doubt at all that Cheney wasn't intimately involved in getting Halliburton those contracts. He didn't need to be. Anyway… Panel to Widen Iraq Hearing Committee to Air Former Halliburton Employees' Charges By Ellen McCarthy and Mike Allen Washington Post Staff Writers Wednesday, June 16, 2004; Page E03 A congressional committee said yesterday it will hear testimony in July from former Halliburton Co. employees who claim the company mismanaged lucrative contracts in Iraq and will invite Halliburton executives to answer lawmakers' questions about the way it charged for goods and services. The former employees, who were not permitted to testify at yesterday's hearings of the House Committee on Government Reform, have alleged that Halliburton mismanaged contracts for work in Iraq. Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.) disclosed their accusations on Monday and protested their exclusion. Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.), the committee's chairman, said he would hold follow-up hearings next month to get testimony from the former employees. The committee also requested documents from the Defense Department and the General Accounting Office related to the involvement of a political appointee, Michael Mobbs, in the decision to award Halliburton a contract to plan the restoration of Iraq's oil fields. Mobbs, an adviser to Douglas Feith, an undersecretary of defense, told Davis and Waxman last week that he briefed top officials -- including I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff -- before he selected Halliburton. Cheney is Halliburton's former chief executive. However, White House officials said yesterday that Cheney was not told of the decision in advance.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 16, 2004 - 6:53am :: War
 
 

Welcome to America

I had to add some emphasis and links to this one. Quote of note:
That bill would cause a problem for the business community, Randel Johnson, vice president of labor, immigration and employee benefits at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said yesterday. "We would oppose the bill because it sets a precedent for paid leave which will be expensive," he said, adding that the bill would also create confusion and could spur a new onslaught of lawsuits.
And it would create confusion exactly how? Employees can count to seven. So can employers. Anyway… Studies Show U.S. Trails On Sick Leave Proposed Law at Odds With Employers' Goal By Amy Joyce Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, June 16, 2004; Page E02 The United States lags behind the rest of the world in giving workers paid leave to stay home sick or to take care of ill family members, and almost half of all private-sector employees have no paid sick days, according to two new studies. A report on state laws (PDF), conducted by the nonprofit National Partnership for Women & Families, was released in conjunction with legislation two Democrats proposed yesterday to provide all full-time employees with seven days of paid sick leave per year. The other study, which covers global leave laws and was funded by the Ford Foundation, will be released today. The push for requiring paid leave comes at a time some major business groups are asking the Bush administration to head in the opposite direction by making it harder for workers to take the up to 12 weeks of unpaid family leave allowed under federal law. "This [proposed bill] is in contrast to pious concern for the future of manufacturing when the answer is to drape more chains across the backs of employers," said Neil Trautwein, assistant vice president for human resource policy at the National Association of Manufacturers.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 16, 2004 - 6:38am :: Economics
 
 

Da game - part three

No. Comment.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 10:05pm :: Random rant
 
 

Da game, part two

L.A.'s looking better. Both teams feel it's Showtime, though. It's going to come down to fouls again. And offensive rebounds, apparently. The Lakers are so tight, Missing layups and free throws. (Did I ever mention I'm kinda tired of the Lakers? Jordan's Bulls used to annoy me too)
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 9:34pm :: Random rant
 
 

Da game-part one

Four minutes, four fouls. Not good, even with a seven point lead. Especially since two of the fouls are on Shaq. Kobe and Shaq are pros…they can hang. But Shaq is sitting. And the lead is gone with 4:16 left in the quarter. It's not looking good for the Lakers.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 9:20pm :: Random rant
 
 

Mixed drinks, anyone?

I swear, I didn't customize the results at all other than eliminating the duplicate form. I suspect there's no bad output, but I admit I like the particular output I got.
How to make a Prometheus 6
Ingredients:
1 part pride
1 part self-sufficiency
1 part
Method:
Combine in a tall glass half filled with crushed ice. Serve with a slice of lustfulness and a pinch of salt. Yum!
How to make a Earl Dunovant
Ingredients:
1 part friendliness
5 parts humour
3 parts leadership
Method:
Layer ingredientes in a shot glass. Add emotion to taste! Do not overindulge!

Username:

Personality cocktail
From Go-Quiz.com
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 6:01pm :: Seen online
 
 

You can't miss what you can't measure

You can't violate what you ain't got none of.
Republican Leader Accused of Ethics Violations Tue Jun 15, 2004 05:02 PM ET By Thomas Ferraro WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A freshman Democrat filed an ethics complaint on Tuesday against House of Representatives Majority Leader Tom Delay, a Texas Republican, ending an informal seven-year ethics cease-fire between the two parties. Rep. Chris Bell of Texas accused DeLay of soliciting campaign donations in return for legislative favors and using a political action committee to launder illegal contributions. In what DeLay dismissed as a rehash of unsubstantiated and old newspaper clippings, Bell also charged that he had improperly used a federal agency to track down Texas Democratic legislators in a partisan battle last year. "It is my opinion that Mr. DeLay is the most corrupt politician in America today," Bell told a news conference. Fired back DeLay: "None of these things have any validity. .... There is no substance to any of them."
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 5:46pm :: Politics
 
 

Forced acknowledgement

So Cobb introduced me to a couple of interesting writers. So what. Stereo Describes My Scenario: Strikes me more like blogging on culture than politics. And Mr. Tooley hasn't gone classist, it seems. There's two more new-to-me blogs on Cobb's list that are interesting. I'll link one tomorrow and one Friday. The others you either know or I don't appreciate.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 4:38pm :: Politics
 
 

I changed my mind

So I think Howard Stern's radio show sucks. I'm right (left?) pleased by significant parts of his web site.
Shock-jock Stern starts anti-Bush crusade DEMOCRATS WELCOME RADIO HOST'S IMPACT By Steven Thomma WASHINGTON - Forget Al Franken. Democrats have a new champion on talk radio that they hope will counter the likes of conservative icons Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. It's shock jock Howard Stern. Known more for crude talk of sex and lewd acts than politics or public policy, Stern has launched an on-air crusade he calls a "jihad" to defeat President Bush. He blames Bush for a government crackdown on his use of obscenity on the air. And he's having an impact, apparently boosting the prospects of Sen. John Kerry, D- Mass., according to a new Democratic poll released yesterday. That was welcome news to Democrats who've long ached for a liberal voice on talk radio and have watched in frustration as former comic Franken has struggled with a new program that has limited air play. Stern is going after Bush with near-obsessive zeal, a notable development in a medium in which 20 of the top 27 talk-show hosts are conservatives, including the top-rated Limbaugh and Hannity.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 4:17pm :: Politics
 
 

This may be a more important issue than the Presidency

Election holds key to court's direction By Deb Price / The Detroit News During his 1986 Senate confirmation hearings, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia scoffed at the idea of a “living Constitution,” echoing his earlier stingy assessment of what the sacred document offers Americans struggling to gain rights: “To some degree, a constitutional guarantee is like a commercial loan; you can only get it if, at the time, you don’t really need it.” Contrast this with the view of another Reagan appointee, Justice Anthony Kennedy. In the court’s ruling last year that gay Americans have constitutionally protected privacy rights, Kennedy declared that the lofty but vague language of the Constitution’s liberty clauses highlights their drafters’ humble wisdom: “They knew times can blind us to certain truths and later generations can see that laws once thought necessary and proper in fact serve only to oppress. As the Constitution endures, persons in every generation can invoke its principles in their own search for greater freedom.” The most lasting impact of the 2004 election may well be on the court’s vision. Will justices appointed by the next president read the Constitution like the tight-fisted Scalia or the open-hearted Kennedy?
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 3:55pm :: Politics
 
 

We like Molly Ivins. Always have.

Ivins: Forget Nixon, Bush's 'imperial presidency' is the real thing Molly Ivins FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM AUSTIN, Texas -- When, in future, you find yourself wondering, "Whatever happened to the Constitution?" you will want to go back and look at June 8, 2004. That was the day the attorney general of the United States -- a.k.a. "the nation's top law enforcement officer" -- refused to provide the Senate Judiciary Committee with his department's memos concerning torture. In order to justify torture, these memos declare that the president is bound by neither U.S. law nor international treaties. We have put ourselves on the same moral level as Saddam Hussein, the only difference being quantity. Quite literally, the president may as well wear a crown -- forget that "no man is above the law" jazz. We used to talk about "the imperial presidency" under Nixon, but this is the real thing. …And I think it is time for citizens to take some responsibility, as well. Is this what we have come to? Is this what we want our government to do for us? Oh and by way, to my fellow political reporters who keep repeating that Bush is having a wonderful week: Why don't you think about what you stand for?
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 3:48pm :: Politics
 
 

I don't know if I want to hang with you while you're wearing one of these

'Black box' cam for total recall By Jo Twist BBC News Online science and technology staff A wearable camera full of sensors could help people with memory problems, according to Microsoft researchers. The prototype SenseCam takes an instant snap every time it spots changes in movement, temperature or light. Currently capable of storing 2,000 images on a 128MB memory card, the cam could help people record their days. The technology has been developed by the Microsoft Research laboratories [P6: why am I not surprised?] in Cambridge, UK, and is to undergo tests at Addenbrookes Hospital this summer. "SenseCam has been designed to act like a black box for the human body," lead researcher Lyndsay Williams told BBC News Online. "It was something I originally created as a method for helping my family find their keys at home. "It's so frustrating trying to re-trace one's steps so I build a device which would help find a solution to this problem." It also seems to be potentially the ultimate way to keep a visual blog, or diary, of your life. [P6: GHOD, don't be giving people any ideas!]
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 3:40pm :: Tech
 
 

Now it all makes sense

Remember October 2003?
House Nixes Anti-Profiteering Penalties in Iraq Spending Bill 10/31/2003 3:44:00 PM To: National Desk Contact: David Carle of the Office of Sen. Patrick Leahy, 202-224-3693 WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 /U.S. Newswire/ -- The final version of the $87 billion spending bill for Iraq and Afghanistan is missing provisions the Senate had passed to penalize war profiteers who defraud American taxpayers. House negotiators on the package refused to accept the Senate provisions.
Well, check this. GOP refusing to allow testimony on Halliburton spending By Seth Borenstein Knight Ridder Newspapers WASHINGTON - Halliburton Inc. paid high-priced bills for common items, such as soda, laundry and hotels, in Iraq and Kuwait and then passed the inflated costs along to taxpayers, according to several former Halliburton employees and a Pentagon internal audit. Democrats in the House of Representatives, who are feuding with House Republicans over whether the spending should be publicly aired at a hearing on Tuesday, released signed statements Monday by five ex-Halliburton employees recounting the lavish spending. Those former employees contend that the politically connected firm:
  • Lodged 100 workers at a five-star hotel in Kuwait for a total of $10,000 a day while the Pentagon wanted them to stay in tents, like soldiers, at $139 a night.
  • Abandoned $85,000 trucks because of flat tires and minor problems.
  • Paid $100 to have a 15-pound bag of laundry cleaned as part of a million-dollar laundry contract in peaceful Kuwait. The price for cleaning the same amount of laundry in war-torn Iraq was $28.
  • Spent $1.50 a can to buy 37,200 cans of soda in Kuwait, about 24 times higher than the contract price.
  • Knowingly paid subcontractors twice for the same bill.
Halliburton is already under fire for allegations of overcharging the Pentagon for fuel and soldiers' meals. The latest accusations center on whether Halliburton properly keeps track of its bills from smaller subcontractors, Pentagon auditors said in a month-old report released Monday by Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 3:22pm :: War
 
 

It seems Bush IS Reagan's inheritor

After Reagan declare ketchup fulfilled the school lunch requirement for vegetables, Bush follows up with this:
HEALTH –ADMINISTRATION CALLS FRENCH FRIES 'FRESH VEGGIES': While the White House urged Americans to eat more fresh vegetables as part of a more healthy diet, it seems his administration has a strange definition of what a healthy diet might include. According to the Florida Sun-Sentinel, the Department of Agriculture now classifies "frozen French fries as 'fresh vegetables.'" The administration "quietly changed the regulations last year at the behest of the French fry industry."
I'm not sure; this may be an attempt to appeal to Theresa Heinz Kerry or an attempt to rebuild bridges with France. More likely it's a straight kickback. Totally as a side issue, this comes from A brief history of ketchup.
So, what's in a name? Variations such as catsup, catchup, katsup, and others abounded alongside 'ketchup'. However, when the Reagan administration briefly decided to count ketchup as a vegetable in 1981, Del Monte Catsup found itself out of the loop due to their spelling-they permanently changed to 'ketchup', but by then public outcry had forced a reversal of administration policy. Ever since, though, you'll be hard-pressed to find a bottle from any manufacturer labeled anything other than 'ketchup'. Although it frequently graces such foods as fries and greasy burgers, ketchup itself has a moderate health benefit, as it contains lycopene, an antioxidant associated with decreased cancer risk. (Unlikely that it's enough to cancel out the negative effects of the fries, though.) [P6: emphasis added.]
I'd have just linked, but the damn site has a pop-under and I won't subject anyone to that sort of thing. Anyway, it indicates a long-standing tradition of Republican absurdity.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 12:37pm :: Politics
 
 

Somewhat less hypocritical than Kerryopoly

The Center for American Progress gives you… Contractopoly
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 12:35pm :: Seen online
 
 

Grrrrr

My connectivity is kind of screwed today. I'm pretty sure it's my cable provider, and that outgoing FTP is particularly hosed is a concern. LATER: Well, FTP is back. I don't know if the ISP cleared up some issue or another or my releasing and resetting the lease I got thru DHCP did it. And yeah, I care which it was.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 11:43am :: Random rant
 
 

Bet you can't pick just one

Usually when I link to Don Asmussen's "The San Francisco Comic Strip" I pick one of his three faux (or is that Fox) headlines to display and wrap the link around that. This time I'd need to set up a script that cycles through them.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 8:29am :: Cartoons
 
 

Cock-eyed optimist

ceo.gif
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 8:22am :: Cartoons
 
 

Pop quiz, with answers

How many Presidents have we had? 42 (Sorry, Dubya don't count) How many have served for two terms? 15
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 8:16am :: Politics
 
 

Your ability to breathe is impinging on my constitutional right to make obscene profits

State seeks 30% cut in tailpipe emissions Automakers say they may sue if 10-year plan OKd - Jane Kay, Chronicle Environment Writer Tuesday, June 15, 2004 California proposed precedent-setting regulations Monday designed to combat global warming by requiring automakers to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases in new cars, SUVs and pickups by nearly 30 percent over the next decade. The rules, mandated by a 2002 state law, are the first in the country to curb carbon dioxide from tailpipes. Other states, primarily in the Northeast, are watching the regulations closely with the expectation that they will propose something similar. Environmental groups praised the rules, although some said the emission reductions didn't go far enough. Meanwhile, the big automakers challenged the state's authority to regulate the gases, and said they might go to court to block the rules. About one-third of California's global warming pollutants come from cars and light duty trucks, according to state scientists.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 8:14am :: News
 
 

IMO, if you need a gig of email storage you're being a bit ridiculous

Yahoo bolsters free e-mail to counter Google's Gmail - MICHAEL LIEDTKE, AP Business Writer Monday, June 14, 2004 (06-14) 21:08 PDT SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Internet giant Yahoo! Inc. is fortifying its free e-mail service with 25 times more storage and freeing up millions of previously claimed e-mail addresses in an effort to thwart a looming threat from its increasingly disruptive rival Google Inc. Beginning Tuesday, all of Yahoo's free e-mail accounts will be upgraded to 100 megabytes, a move spurred by Google's plans to offer 1,000 megabytes of free storage through its Gmail service, which has remained in a test phase since early April. Yahoo has been offering 4 megabytes of free e-mail storage, although some people with accounts opened several years ago have 6 megabytes of free storage. Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Yahoo disclosed that it would be increasing its free storage to 100 megabytes during an analyst meeting held last month, but hadn't provided a specific time for the upgrade until now. The company hopes to appeal to e-mailers in other ways, too. Angling for new users, Yahoo has decided to let people begin signing up for addresses that have been inactive for years. The offer is designed to lure Web surfers who may have been previously interested in signing up for a free Yahoo e-mail account only to learn one of their preferred handles had already been claimed. "Some of these addresses could be very juicy and might attract a lot of interest," said David Ferris, an e-mail analyst in San Francisco.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 8:03am :: Seen online
 
 

Consider the likelihood of YOUR facing a Bush judge

Tout Torture, Get Promoted Defending cruelty can be a career booster in Bush's administration. By Robert Scheer June 15, 2004 What a revelation to learn that the Justice Department lawyer who wrote the infamous memo in effect defending torture is now a U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals judge. It tells you all you need to know about the sort of conservative to whom George W. Bush is turning in his attempt to pack the federal courts.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 7:55am :: Politics
 
 

Almost broke a promise

I said I don't have to write about Reagan anymore, but I almost blogged this. Gotta watch myself.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 7:53am
 
 

An abomination

A Cover-Up at the World's End U.S. officials have much to answer for in a Peace Corps killing in Tonga. By Philip Weiss June 15, 2004 The Kingdom of Tonga is a tiny Polynesian archipelago of 100,000 people about 1,200 miles northeast of New Zealand. In 1976, 80 Peace Corps volunteers were posted to the kingdom, most of them working as high school teachers in the Tongan capital, Nuku'alofa. They led a simple life. They rode black Chinese one-speed bicycles to school, spent part of their $2-a-day stipend on beer at the Tonga Club on Friday nights, and now and then had dances with taped rock music on faraway beaches. Deb Gardner lived by herself in a hut near the bush at the east edge of town. She was a 23-year-old biology teacher from Tacoma, Wash. — dark-haired, outdoorsy and something of a free spirit. One of her many suitors among the volunteers was Dennis Priven, 24, a muscular blond who was considered the best poker player on the island. He was a brilliant, bespectacled introvert from Brooklyn who taught math and chemistry at the leading high school and went everywhere with a dive knife on the waist of his cutoffs. Gardner was polite to Priven but rebuffed his advances, and he grew obsessed with her. On the night of Oct. 14, 1976, Priven rode to Gardner's hut carrying a metal pipe and his knife, prosecutors said later. He stabbed her 22 times, then rode away on his bike. Neighbors carried her in a pickup truck to the hospital, where she died. Two days later, by the time Gardner's body had left the island en route to Washington state, a concerted American effort to obstruct the process of justice had already begun. In an apparent effort to protect the image of the Peace Corps, the U.S. government would do its utmost that week and in the months and years afterward to make sure that justice was not done, in a travesty that still rankles the few people who knew about it, one that still begs for resolution.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 15, 2004 - 7:45am
 
 

The Beastie Blogs

The winners of MaxSpeak's contest are such that I don't even want to read the nominations. They are entities whose names and blogs have never appeared on P6 and never will.
THE VICIOUS INSTAPUNDIT BLOGROLL CONTEST: WE HAVE A WINNER Voting for the Vicious Instapundit Blogroll Contest closed a week ago Sunday. …The winning entries reflect two different strains of demagogy in Blogovia (the right-hemisphere of the blogosphere). Demagogy may be giving too much credit, since in the case of [redacted], it is hard to see any persuasive power in his rants. Evidently, venting makes him and his readers feel better. Thank God for small pleasures. That aside, [redacted] is consistent with other voices that reflect a perpetual hysteria. It's not simply that the world has gone wrong for these people, since many would share that view, albeit for diverse reasons. What's different is the uncontrollable urge to demonize individuals, often in violent terms. This "literature" (sic) ought to provide case material for courses in abnormal psychology. For all of that, I can't help but doubt that the [redacted] is serious in what he writes. It's just too cartoonish. We also observe in these quarters the sophomoric desire to shock liberals. The quoted bloggers express a desire to win the vote. They think their viciousness is a badge of machismo, like suburban white boys who affect ghetto gangsta postures. We had the Beastie Boys, and now we have the beastie bloggers. They try to act dangerous, but all they really want to do is become commodities, and they don't even know it. There is no reason to fear nameless little people with keyboards. Rather, the approach is clinical, like the study of bugs. The [redacted] (2nd place) fantasy about murdering high officials of the U.S. Government is the quieter, equally demented side of this same dementia. His post seems to attain about 90 percent of the threshold for a visit from the Secret Service. [redacted] is a horse of a different color. His style is passive-aggressive, the way of the weasel. The attack is not direct and forthright, but delivered by innuendo, often through third parties. Criticism is more in sorrow than in anger. Plausible deniability shrouds his posts. If harm should befall the objects of his disapproval, it's really too bad but really their fault. They should have known better or somehow rejected bad leaders. The quote submitted in the contest typifies this logic: genocide is a misfortune, not a crime. A crime has perpetrators, but for the enemies of America to be victims of genocide, the criminals would be the West, or the U.S. But that cannot be. By definition, the U.S. is good and cannot commit crimes. All references to crimes committed by the U.S. Government bespeak hatred of America and alignment with the Enemy. This is a recipe for the production of cannon fodder. Watch the ticker.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 11:29pm :: Seen online
 
 

Almost enough reason to read Newsmax

Jay Leno jokes found by following a link from Brad DeLong's joint: June 10th According to the "New York Times”, last year white house lawyers concluded that President Bush could legally order interrogators to torture and even kill people in the interest of national security - so if that's legal, what the hell are we charging Saddam Hussein with? June 8th Today the Washington Post revealed that in 2002, the Justice Department sent a memo to the White House justifying the use of torture. Torture - that's our Department of "Justice" - they say "it's OK to torture people." What's the Department of Education doing, burning books?
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 11:24pm :: Seen online
 
 

Be careful; you don't want to set a precedent for Iraq

HELL no, you get no link.
To: Southerners everywhere The League of the South is considering petitioning Congress to conduct a thorough, non-partisan study examining the long neglected injustices arising from the war crimes committed across the South from 1861-1865 in violation of the U. S. Constitution, the Law of Nations, and U. S. Executive Order Number 100, whereby the private property of non-combatants was ravaged, burned, stolen, and destroyed as a deliberate policy of an unconstitutional war of invasion, conquest, and occupation. Tens of thousands of individuals in the South are now signing petitions asking The League of the South to represent them as a class by exercising the people’s right of petition or by a suit at law for damages. We anticipate that a thorough and impartial Congressional investigation will reveal the necessity for a long overdue compensatory program of justice for people of all races in the South who were subjected to treatment during and after the War Between the States that resulted in little less than the barbaric dispossession and destruction of the Southern people and their way of life. No reparations, no indemnification, and no “Marshall Plan” has ever been conceived or enacted by the United States Government. The United States Government now claims to be the moral monitor for the entire world; however, it cannot justify this position without first cleansing its own shield of the shame of war crimes and acts of vengeance against Southern Americans in action perhaps best described by General William Tecumseh Sherman, who said: “ . . . about 20% of our effort [in Georgia and South Carolina] was against military objectives. The rest [80%] was sheer waste and destruction.” Sadly, such unconscionable depredations were all too common across the South during both the war and Reconstruction. The League of the South plans to seek reparations from the United States Government for all Southerners and their families who suffered atrocities during the war and the years of military occupation that followed. If you agree with us or would like to participate in these actions, please sign our petition. Sincerely, The Undersigned
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 11:06pm :: Race and Identity
 
 

Navel gazing

Typical bloggish post on a classic subject what gets beat to death coming up. I was asked by email about traffic building suggestions. It's something I do something specific about about even less than I think about it, but I have thought about it (which means I've done specific things about it, of course). I've been referred to once or twice as a "heavy hitter"—my jaw is still bruised from the impact with the floor—but I'm not a A-list blogger. My traffic has steadily increased, though. On a good day I break 500 visits, on an average day I break 400. These qualifications will let you judge the number of salt grains to apply. First the obvious repetitive stuff: I post a lot. A WHOLE lot. People looking for news like new news. I link a lot. A WHOLE lot. It's a blogging tradition that I note is slacking off somewhat, and that slacking will not benefit a blogger's traffic figures. More on that in the unobvious section. I add SOMEthing to each news article I blog. At times it's a headline that gives some focus or makes my opinion obvious enough that I need say nothing else. Generally, though, what I add is conciseness. You will get the gist of the article from what I post. DO NOT BLOG ANY UNIMPORTANT NEWS ARTICLES. Personal stuff can be flip, trivial, whatever. And you're the only judge of importance, but make that judgment. The unobvious stuff: Trackback links are a major source of traffic because the best blogging is a conversation. It may be between you and your readers in the comments or adding value to a post you've seen elsewhere or (if you don't get carried away with yourself) a dispute over an issue between you and the owner of another blog. That's why not crediting your sources is not a good idea. You may well look like you're finding all this stuff yourself and that's cool I guess, but you don't get the trackback link. Before trackbacks, the word was to comment intelligently on the A-List blogs. But commenting on, say, Eschaton, will only be noticed if you're one of the first 40-50 folks. I guarantee you I am not reading all 572 comments on Political Animal unless the post is of particular interest to me. But I may look at all 15-20 trackbacks and follow three or four back to their source. Pick your news sources well. People are more likely to read your stuff if they don't expect to see it elsewhere or expect to see it in your place first. I will rarely fail to add commentary or at least add a "Quote of Note" to a NY Times article I abstract because you'll see it all over hell and back, if you haven't read it first yourself. But I may not add anything to a Reuters abstract. Major newspapers use Reuters, but I can post it first. THAT is sufficient value-add for most folks. And the internal links are important to me. Someone correct me if I'm wrong but I believe most A-List editorial bloggers owe their traffic to Trent Lott. I wasn't around at the time. So I've got some of my best stuff (and I've seriously slacked about keeping my best stuff indexed) in the permanent archives. And I have reference material that folks find useful. Now, stuff specific to P6. My first major bump in traffic came from Alas, A Blog linking to my Racism series. Another came with the Reparations series. Believe it or not, the next jump came from being publicly dissed by someone a lot of folks were angry with at the time. And traffic cruised at that level until the Black Blogger discussion, which I collated from personal interest and it blew up…TOTALLY unexpected. I was noticed by a couple folks. I'd name them but I'd miss some. But my biggest traffic boosts came from retreads—being nominated for The Bloggies and two Koufax Awards brought in a HUGE amount of traffic and a big chunk of the folks decided to keep reading. Obviously, a link from the A-List will get you a big bump in traffic. What will sustain you is general quality. Crap like Blogopoly will bring folks in but if that's all you got your traffic will return to pre-gimmick levels like immediately. But if you're a writer (which I consider myself to be), crap like Blogopoly could give you a decent permanent increment.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 10:02pm :: Seen online
 
 

Why wait?

Quote of note:
The two narratives are also significant because, unlike many other such accounts, there is a wealth of genealogical information about the former slaves' lives that corroborates much of what they wrote.
Journals of 2 Ex-Slaves Draw Vivid Portraits By RANDY KENNEDY The scene sounds like one conjured up by a screenwriter for a Civil War epic. As the Union Army converges on Richmond in 1862 and white residents frantically pack their silver, a group of slaves gathers in a hotel tavern after closing time. The slave in charge of the tavern, John Washington, pours the others drinks, and they all cheerfully toast to "the Yankees' health." The scene is not from a movie. It is from an account that Mr. Washington wrote in 1873 and whose existence few people even knew of until the last few months. But through a series of coincidences, his handwritten autobiography and another powerful unpublished narrative much like it, by a former Alabama slave named Wallace Turnage, have surfaced and come to the attention of a Yale historian, David W. Blight, who calls them "altogether remarkable." The narratives are likely to generate great interest in the academic world, in part because they speak to a lively debate in recent slavery studies: to what degree did Lincoln emancipate the slaves, and to what degree were they already emancipating themselves as the war ravaged the South? Mr. Washington and Mr. Turnage liberated themselves during the war, stealing away from their masters by rowboat, at great risk. But both were taken in by the Union Army, without whose help they might have been recaptured. "What these narratives demonstrate in authentic and rich detail is that slaves became free by both means," Dr. Blight said.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 8:30pm :: Race and Identity
 
 

Codifying hypocrisy

Congress Toys With Forgiveness It seems axiomatic in Congress that whenever a bill comes along that both parties agree must be passed, it becomes a magnet for every piece of pork, every political cause, every lobbyist giveaway. The latest example is an urgently needed measure to end a $5 billion annual subsidy for American exporters that has put the nation in violation of international trade practices. Over the last few months, even as Europe began imposing billions in retaliatory tariffs on American industries, lawmakers have contrived to turn this relatively simple vehicle into a $100 billion gravy train. More than 100 amendments throw everyone from Nascar entrepreneurs to dog-track owners and tobacco growers a piece of the action, even though they have nothing to do with the trade issue at hand. And now, just as House action is approaching, Republican leaders have added an outrageous sop for political-minded church leaders. Under the proposal, churches that venture too zealously into politics would be allowed three "unintentional violations" of the law governing nonprofit organizations without risking immediate loss of their tax-exempt status. Wouldn't we all love such tax-code mercies? This transparent bridge across the church-state divide comes as hustings-tempted clergy are already being openly enlisted by White House campaigners as "friendly congregations" for the November elections. The House proposal mocks honest clergy as much as the tax code.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 8:19pm :: Politics
 
 

I have to acknowledge his passing

I knew of Ralph Wiley, but wasn't really familiar with his writing.
Professor Kim:
Ralph Wiley, 1952-2004 Ralph Wiley, the ESPN sportswriter who coined the phrase "Billy Ball" is dead of a heart attack at 52. He was in the midst of covering the NBA playoffs when he died. In addition to his prominence as a sports columnist,Wiley was a respected author who dispensed racial wisdom with tough love
.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 8:14pm :: Seen online
 
 

A public service message for folks with diabetes

If you shift to an Atkins-style diet you'll need less insulin. But you may still have high blood sugar reading occasionally, after a particularly rich meal, say, or because you really miss orange juice and decide to have some. And so you'll need to do some insulin adjustments. Thing is, you have to adjust your adjustments too. If, pre-dietary adjustment, you needed x units of insulin to compensate for y extra carbohydrates, post-dietary adjustment you need < x units of insulin…and you have to figure out what that adjustment factor is. This is from personal experience, not clinical trials.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 6:29pm :: Random rant
 
 

A difficult position to be in

Glen Loury has sort of emblemized the best of Black conservatism. I say sort of because he's been rejected by the Conservative mainstream because he's maintained his concern for Black people; he remained a Black partisan. Being an economist, though, his approach also alienated the civil rights establishment. As Paul Krugman said:
But at some point Loury made the discovery that eventually confronts every honest intellectual who gets drawn into the political arena: The enemies of your enemies are not necessarily your friends. The Glenn Loury who wrote that 1976 thesis was not a conservative. He criticized the simplistic anti-racism of the liberal establishment because he wanted society to tackle the real problems, not because he wanted it to stand aside. His seeming allies on the right, however, turned out to be interested only in the critique, not in the next step. (According to Loury, "When I told one gathering of conservatives that their seeming hostility to every social program smacks of indifference to the poor, I was told that a surgeon cannot properly be said to have no concern for a terminally ill patient simply because he had moved on to the next case.") Loury found out that the apparent regard for his ideas by conservative intellectuals was entirely conditional. Any questioning of conservative orthodoxy was viewed as an act of betrayal, giving aid and comfort to the liberal enemy. It was the loyalty test all over again.
A very good example of thew sort of thing that got him in trouble with Conservatives is Passing Strict Scrutiny: Using Social Science to Define Affirmativ Action Programs by Clark D. Cunningham, Glenn C. Loury and John David Skrentny(Word .doc file).
Passing Strict Scrutiny: Using Social Science To Design Affirmative Action Programs CLARK D. CUNNINGHAM, GLENN C. LOURY, AND JOHN DAVID SKRENTNY
A PARABLE Imagine a mad bomber with a stockpile of biological and radiation weapons. The bomber takes a state map that indicates the boundaries of every county. He picks out a dozen counties and colors some of those counties red, some green, and the rest blue. Taking that map aloft, he drops biological weapons on the red counties, radiation weapons on the green counties, and all that he has left of both kinds on the blue counties. He then kills himself in a suicide crash. Although many residents of the targeted counties become ill almost immediately, the terrible extent of the harm he caused becomes apparent only as the years go by and public health officials begin to notice patterns of cancer and birth defects. The situation is complicated not only by the puzzling variety of problems within and among the counties, but also by the passage of time as people move out of the targeted counties, carrying illness with them, and others move into the counties where the still potent effects of the bombing linger. The government becomes increasingly frustrated by the complexity of the problem, its persistence, and the limited, and occasionally counterproductive, results of efforts to restore public health. Then the bomber's map is discovered in the rubble of his crashed plane. ... INTRODUCTION In the parable, should the government use the bomber's map in its efforts to restore public health? The answer would seem to be an obvious yes. No one would say that the government was perpetuating the bomber's vicious "discrimination" against the colored counties by using his map to guide its public health programs. Nor can one imagine that residents of un-colored counties would claim that they were being discriminated against because people with links to the colored counties were given free health care or preferential admission to cancer treatment facilities. For many social scientists, it seems equally obvious that the "map" used in the United States to categorize people into racial and ethnic categories remains a necessary tool for public policy. Because the "map" projects the complex patterns of past and continuing discrimination onto the current geography of our nation, a well-designed affirmative action plan uses that map to guide the uncertain but essential task of restoring social and economic health for the victims of discrimination. However, there are few, if any, affirmative action plans that can be described as carefully designed; in particular, relevant information and methods developed by the social sciences are not used. To return to the parable, one analogy to some affirmative action programs might be if the map users were literally color-blind, and thus, treated all targeted counties alike even though the bombing pattern varied among counties. Another analogous mistake would be if the public health officials in the parable failed to take into account population changes after the bombing event, putting all their public health efforts only into the targeted counties, providing identical health care to long-time residents and people who had moved in after the bombing, and ignoring people and their descendants who had moved out after the bombing. If there was a judicial role in the parable, it would be to make sure that government had, in fact, the right map, and was using it appropriately to remedy the harm the bomber caused.
This is not the sort of argument that keeps one on the sunny side of the Conservative disposition. Yet it's a big part of the reasoning needed to address the effects of government enforced discrimination…yes, sadly the mad bomber is the our government. On the other hand, this:
Ian Ayres, who is both an economist and a legal scholar, has reported the results of empirical research on retail car negotiations showing that black male testers received final offer mark-ups that were much higher than those given white male testers. Although the behavior of the car retailers may indeed have been caused by present practices of deliberate discrimination, consider the following model that could also explain these results:
Suppose automobile dealers think black buyers have higher reservation prices than whites - prices above which they will simply walk away rather than haggle further. On this belief, dealers will be tougher when bargaining with blacks, more reluctant to offer low prices, more eager to foist on them expensive accessories, etc. Now, given that such race-based dealer behavior is common, blacks would come to expect tough dealer bargaining as the norm when one shops for cars. As such, a black buyer who contemplates walking away would have to anticipate less favorable alternative opportunities and higher search costs than would a white buyer who entertains that option. And so, the typical black buyer might find it rational to accept a price rather than continue searching elsewhere, even though the typical white might reject that same price. Yet, this racial difference in typical buyer behavior is precisely what justified the view among dealers that a customer's race would predict bargaining behavior. Thus, even if there are no intrinsic differences in bargaining ability between the two populations, an equilibrium can emerge where the dealers' rule of thumb, "be tougher with blacks," is all too clearly justified by the facts.
…will not make the left very happy with you either. You see, both the left and the right have a common concern when it comes to racial issues: establishing blame. It seems neither can act unless the other has its hands tied by historical responsibility. Loury's position was that racial inequities don't need racism to be maintained. All they need is momentum. If one accepts this one can't exclude conservative approaches—power relations being what they are, it is unacceptable to most to accept ANY position held by a perceived opponent, so his ideas will be unacceptable to liberals. And one can't exclude progressive approaches for the same reason. This, and the very idea of acknowledging racial disparities may not be the fault of those on the short end of the stick, makes his position unacceptable to Conservatives. And as a result, the intellectual output of a talented and honorable man is simply cast aside.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 3:25pm :: Race and Identity
 
 

Suicide by media

Hannity and Podesta Square Off In an interview on June 3, American Progress CEO John Podesta said, "I think when you get so distant from the facts, as -- as guys like Limbaugh and Sean Hannity do, yeah, I think that tends to -- it kind of -- it tends to corrupt the dialogue." Apparently he struck a nerve with Fox News' Sean Hannity. Hannity challenged Podesta to "defend and explain one example where I -- where I said something that was so false." Tomorrow, Podesta will appear on Hannity and Colmes, which airs at 9PM on Fox News. If there is a specific Hannity falsehood you think he should mention, send it to [email protected].
Hannity's challenge raises a the possibility that he actually believes all his rhetoric.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 12:21pm :: Seen online
 
 

Ingrates

neocon.gif
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 11:42am :: Cartoons
 
 

The reason it's called "Iraqi Sovereignty" instead of just "Sovereignty"

Contractor Immunity a Divisive Issue Interim Government Resists U.S. Proposal to Exempt Foreigners From Iraqi Law By Edward Cody Washington Post Foreign Service Monday, June 14, 2004; Page A01 BAGHDAD, June 13 -- In an early test of its imminent sovereignty, Iraq's new government has been resisting a U.S. demand that thousands of foreign contractors here be granted immunity from Iraqi law, in the same way as U.S. military forces are now immune, according to Iraqi sources. The U.S. proposal, although not widely known, has touched a nerve with some nationalist-minded Iraqis already chafing under the 14-month-old U.S.-led occupation. If accepted by Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, it would put the highly visible U.S. foreign contractors into a special legal category, not subject to military justice and beyond the reach of Iraq's justice system.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 11:40am :: War
 
 

It's Flag Day?

Quote of note:
Justice Antonin Scalia, who voted to strike down the statutory ban on flag burning some years ago, has described in speeches how doing so irritated him. He would have loved to put the defendant -- a "bearded, scruffy, sandal-wearing guy burning the American flag" -- in jail, he said. It made him "furious" not to be able to. But "I was handcuffed -- I couldn't help it, that's my understanding of the First Amendment. I can't do the nasty things I'd like to do."

Flag (Burning) Day Monday, June 14, 2004 TODAY IS FLAG DAY, and this is an election year. It is no coincidence that the Senate Judiciary Committee plans this week to report out a constitutional amendment giving Congress the power to prohibit the "physical desecration" of the American flag. The flag-burning amendment is one of those regular rituals of legislative troublemaking that would be beneath comment save for the chance that it might actually muster the votes necessary to get sent to the states for ratification.…Foes should have the votes to kill it again this year, but one never knows. In the long run, the threat that it will become a real blight on America's founding charter -- rather than merely on the honor of its legislators -- is a real one. The problem the amendment purports to address doesn't exist: Flag burning is rare. The surest consequence of passing the amendment, in fact, would be to make it more common. Flag burning could become a particularly exciting form of protest were it an affront not merely to social norms and decency but to the constitutional order itself. But even if flag burning were rampant already, writing censorship of expression into the Constitution would still be offensive.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 10:23am :: News
 
 

What can you say?

uf-blog.gif
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 10:17am :: Seen online
 
 

Here's a big surprise

Fla. Voting Machines Have Recount Flaw Sat Jun 12, 7:09 PM ET TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Touchscreen voting machines in 11 counties have a software flaw that could make manual recounts impossible in November's presidential election, state officials said. A spokeswoman for the secretary of state called the problems "minor technical hiccups" that can be resolved, but critics allege voting officials wrongly certified a voting system they knew had a bug. The electronic voting machines are a response to Florida's 2000 presidential election fiasco, where thousands of punchcard ballots were improperly marked. But the new machines have brought concerns that errors could go unchecked without paper records of the electronic voting. The machines, made by Election Systems & Software of Omaha, Neb., fail to provide a consistent electronic "event log" of voting activity when asked to reproduce what happened during the election, state officials said. Officials with the company and the state Division of Elections said they believe they can fix the problem by linking the voting equipment with laptop computers. Florida's two largest counties — Miami-Dade and Broward — are among those affected by the flaws.
And how are you going to audit the laptop computers? They really think we're stupid.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 10:14am :: Politics
 
 

And how would you deal with someone that refuses to give up the swab?

Seriously an issue I can see both sides of. But you know, I might be willing to support this if all the cases where prisoners want to challenge their conviction using DNA evidence are reviewed, and if the information is destroyed In mid sentence I realized, no way that happens. Quote of note:
The initiative, which does not yet have a ballot number, would immediately require DNA samples from everyone convicted of any felony, as well as those arrested for murder or rape. The ballot measure requires that beginning in 2009, DNA samples would be collected from anyone arrested for a felony. "Today, with a state DNA database of more than 220,000 samples, we have increased the number of 'hits' from one a year to an average of more than one a day,'' said state Attorney General Bill Lockyer, a co-chair of the initiative campaign. "By including DNA samples from all felons, we should have a database of more than 1 million DNA profiles that will help California law enforcement use this proven, high-tech tool to quickly solve even more criminal cases and prevent more crimes from being committed.''

Proposition to take DNA at arrest stirs privacy fears Mandatory sampling on November ballot - John Wildermuth, Chronicle Political Writer Saturday, June 12, 2004 A man who lost his brother to an unknown serial killer has bankrolled a November ballot measure that would force everyone arrested for a felony in California to provide a DNA sample. Although backers of the measure say such a greatly expanded DNA database could clear up thousands of unsolved crimes, civil rights activists argue it would give the government access to too much information about too many people. "DNA is not like a fingerprint, since getting it is more invasive and it holds information beyond mere identification,'' said Tania Simoncelli, a science and technology fellow for the American Civil Liberties Union. "Storing it permanently for future criminal investigations doesn't comply with the Constitution.'' That's not the way Bruce Harrington, a Newport Beach attorney and developer, sees it. Harrington spent more than $1.3 million to qualify the initiative for the ballot and is confident he'll win the support of California voters in November. "It's really a shame that California is so far behind when it comes to collecting DNA, when there's compelling information from other states about how effective it can be,'' Harrington said. He said that under the ballot measure, "At the same time someone has a mug shot and fingerprints taken after an arrest, he'll have a mouth swab (for DNA) and that's it.''
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 10:04am :: News
 
 

Interesting indeed

Quote of note:
The Post deleted several lines from the memo that are not germane to the legal arguments being made in it and that are the subject of further reporting by The Post.
…which means I'll have to watch the Post more closely. They've obviously got something deep, something they have high enough confidence in to mention the fact they're working on it, up their sleeve. Justice Dept. Memo Says Torture 'May Be Justified' By Dana Priest Washington Post Staff Writer Sunday, June 13, 2004; 6:30 PM Today washingtonpost.com is posting a copy of the Aug. 1, 2002, memorandum "Re: Standards of Conduct for Interrogation under 18 U.S.C. 2340-2340A," from the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel for Alberto R. Gonzales, counsel to President Bush. The memo was written at the request of the CIA. The CIA wanted authority to conduct more aggressive interrogations than were permitted prior to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. The interrogations were of suspected al Qaeda members whom the CIA had apprehended outside the United States. The CIA asked the White House for legal guidance. The White House asked the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel for its legal opinion on the standards of conduct under the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhumane and Degrading Treatment or Punishment. The Office of Legal Counsel is the federal government's ultimate legal adviser. The most significant and sensitive topics that the federal government considers are often given to the OLC for review. In this case, the memorandum was signed by Jay S. Bybee, the head of the office at the time. Bybee's signature gives the document additional authority, making it akin to a binding legal opinion on government policy on interrogations. Bybee has since become a judge on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 9:52am :: War
 
 

Religious blowback

Quote of note:
None of that has been lost on the Kerry campaign. "It's one thing for a bishop to tell Catholic politicians to refrain from taking Communion but quite a different thing when the church hierarchy begins to bring that pressure to all Catholics," says Kerry spokeswoman Stephanie Cutter. President Bush's campaign also sees the issue as producing a potential upside for Kerry. A top Bush strategist is concerned that it unsettles the moderate slice of the Catholic electorate that both parties are courting, puts Kerry in the sympathetic position of being a victim and—worst of all, as far as the Bush campaign is concerned—makes people aware that he is a Catholic. Indeed, one of the more striking findings of the TIME poll is that fully a third of Americans know Kerry's religion, which is slightly higher than the percentage who named some version of Protestantism when asked the religion of Bush.
One of the reasons the quote is notable is one of the CNN weekend anchorsmade half a reference to that last sentence. They said "only about 30%" of people knew Kerry's religion but made no mention that even fewer named Bush as a Protestant. Anyway… Battling the Bishops Is Kerry Catholic enough? There's evidence the question is backfiring on his critics By KAREN TUMULTY / WASHINGTON Posted Sunday, June 13, 2004 It made only the faintest blip on John Kerry's campaign radar screen— or anyone else's—when an Archbishop from St. Louis, Mo., told a local television station four months ago that the Massachusetts Senator with a staunchly pro-choice voting record should "not present himself for Communion" in that archdiocese. In the frenzied days when Kerry strategists were gearing up for their first nationwide round of primaries, they were far more preoccupied with introducing Kerry to voters as a decorated Vietnam veteran, untangling him from the contradictions of his Senate voting record and figuring out how to dodge the inevitable "Massachusetts liberal" label. In all their internal discussions of the candidate's personal strengths and liabilities, a top adviser recalls, nobody ever even raised what was perhaps the most personal one of all: Kerry's Catholicism and the fact that he could become the first person of his faith since John F. Kennedy to run as the nominee of a major political party. If that didn't seem like such a big deal then, it does now. A handful of other church leaders have since echoed Archbishop Raymond Burke's declaration that Catholic politicians who vote against church teachings are unfit for the sacrament that more than any other symbolizes a Catholic's ongoing connection to the faith. At least one of those leaders—Colorado Springs, Colo., Bishop Michael Sheridan—has even suggested that unrepentant Catholics who so much as vote for a pro-choice politician should stay away from the Communion rail. …It is proving painful as well for the American Catholic hierarchy, which is still trying to re-establish its credibility after the sexual-abuse scandal that shook it in 2002. A deep divide has opened between a vast majority of Catholics and the newly vocal minority of bishops and priests who are publicly advocating a hard line with Catholic politicians—and even voters—who stray from church teachings. In a TIME poll conducted two weeks ago, three-quarters of Catholics said they disagree with the bishops who would deny the Eucharist to politicians who disagree with the church on abortion, and nearly 70% said the Catholic Church should not be trying to influence either the positions that Catholic politicians take on the issues or the way that Catholics vote. That held true even among majorities of Catholics who consider themselves very religious and who attend Mass at least once a week.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 14, 2004 - 9:42am :: Politics
 
 

More on Da Finals

Did you know www.nba.com has a Playoff Finals Blogs? Wild.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 11:07pm :: Random rant
 
 

Da playoff

You know what the Lakers' problem is? Karl Malone. It ain't like I can even approach his game, but he DOES freeze when things get tight. And since the whole game is tight he ain't even shooting. It's like five on four out there. That the Lakers have kept in it is all about Shaq, and Kobe's bizarre talent for making impossible shots more regularly than regular shots. I'll say this, though…Karl's daughter is FOINE!
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 10:54pm :: Random rant
 
 

No surprise at this point

After seeing stories like this one, it's obvious.
Racism rife in British police forces: Report Sunday, June 13, 2004 (London): Blacks and Asians were a target of racist behaviour, which was found to be rife in police forces in England and Wales, an investigation by the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) has revealed. "We have examined more than half of the forces and the police authorities. It is a complete shambles, and racism is rife," The Sunday Telegraph reported quoting a CRE official. Chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality Trevor Phillips has threatened chief constables with legal action for flouting race laws, the report said. Catalogue of abuses Phillips has notified Home Secretary David Blunkett that he is ready to take action after a formal CRE investigation uncovered a catalogue of abuses in police forces in England and Wales. According to the inquiry, only one of 15 police forces had complied with the race equality scheme under the terms of the Act.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 9:27pm :: Race and Identity
 
 

A little respect

Time Magazine has an article on blogs that totally neutralizes that NY Times post about obsessive bloggers that a number of people were insulted by (sorry, can't find the NY Times link).
Meet Joe Blog Why are more and more people getting their news from amateur websites called blogs? Because they're fast, funny and totally biased
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 4:34pm :: Seen online
 
 

You know, I could get accustomed to reading Wonkette

I'm not a regular reader of pure snark. If I was, I'd have kept reading Marduk's Babylonian Musings, at least until it went on what looks like a terminal pause. But Wonkette is on the good guys' side it seem. And is a little evil, which I definitely appreciate.
Gipperporn: Four Days In, Reagan Still Deceased So glad that the nets are going wall-to-wall with the Reagan stuff for the fourth consecutive day. Otherwise we might forget that he's dead. At this point, however, the strain of keeping the story alive is starting to show. Fox, for instance, has run out of famous Reagan fanatics; this morning they interviewed one of the soldiers guarding the president's casket.
Fox: Did you ever meet Reagan? Marine (who appears to be approximately 18 years old): Uh, no, sir. Fox: How much of an honor is it to be doing this duty? Marine: It's a great honor.
Clearly, things are getting desperate; at some point, they may have to interview someone who didn't like the guy. And in case you were wondering: Still dead.
I wonder if Wonkette caught the CNN interview with the guy who was sleeping in his car wearing a three-piece suit. Anyway, the Gipperporn tag is used on a couple of posts. What you have to do is check out The Antidote (which would seem to belong to The Stranger and would have gotten you TOTALLY FUCKED UP ALL THIS WEEK), then scroll down to the related links.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 4:11pm :: Seen online
 
 

Why don't I believe Mr. DeLong

He says:
Jonathan Chait writes:
Last night I happened to be reading an old Michael Kinsley TRB column from 1985. (I tend to do that when I need inspiration to write.) The column deals with book by Peter Ueberroth and Lee Iacocca. He writes, “Both books are examples of a genre best described as autohagiography.”
I, myself, too, tend often to just happen to be reading old newsmagazine columns from decades ago...
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 4:09pm
 
 

Side effect of being nosy on technical issues

On the Blogger development list, someone asked why it's hosted by Yahoo instead of Google producing something similar. The answer: http://groups-beta.google.com/
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 3:46pm :: Seen online
 
 

XXX

Hiding a bad guy named triple X How the military treated some inmates at Abu Ghraib like 'ghosts' By Edward T. Pound The top U.S. commander in Iraq, Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, issued a classified order last November directing military guards to hide a prisoner, later dubbed "Triple X" by soldiers, from Red Cross inspectors and keep his name off official rosters. The disclosure, by military sources, is the first indication that Sanchez was directly involved in efforts to hide prisoners from the Red Cross, a practice that was sharply criticized by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba in a report describing abuses of detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 10:45am :: War
 
 

This was just unthinking, not evil

Though if they were really concerned, they would have thought things through. After all, they fully addressed all the concerns of Big Pharma.
U.S. to Drop Benefit Cuts Linked to Drug Discounts By ROBERT PEAR WASHINGTON, June 12 - The Bush administration said Saturday that it would rescind a federal policy that threatened to cut food stamp benefits for several million low-income elderly and disabled people who save money on their medicines by using the new Medicare drug discount cards. The administration's reversal came two days before President Bush was scheduled to visit Missouri to promote use of the cards, which have received a tepid reaction from many Medicare beneficiaries. In interviews this week, state officials across the country said low-income people who used the cards could find their food stamp benefits reduced as a result. The cuts, they said, were a direct result of federal regulations and a policy statement issued by the Agriculture Department on March 10. The purpose of the discount cards is to reduce out-of-pocket drug costs. But when a person's drug expenses go down, state officials said, the food stamp program assumes that the person has more money available to spend on other needs, including food. So the person may receive a smaller food stamp allotment, they said. Judy K. Toelle, the food stamp director in South Dakota, confirmed that such cuts would occur under the federal rules. For example, she said, a woman with monthly income of $1,060, shelter expenses of $555 and drug costs of $325 now receives $51 a month in food stamps. But, she said, if the card reduced her out-of-pocket drug costs by $100, the woman would get $41 less in food stamps, so the net saving would be $59. Food stamp officials in California, Colorado, Missouri , New Mexico and Washington State said they were simply following federal rules in reducing food stamp benefits to take account of the fact that people with discount cards spent less on prescription drugs. Those regulations have not been changed. But after inquiries from The New York Times, Eric M. Bost, an under secretary of agriculture, said, "We will immediately be clarifying policy guidance to ensure that food stamp applicants or recipients who use the new Medicare discount card will experience no impact on their eligibility or benefits." The abrupt shift highlights the confusion between federal and state officials, and between the two federal agencies that administer Medicare and food stamps.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 10:26am :: Economics
 
 

Selfish bastards

Diversity Plan Shaped in Texas Is Under Attack By JONATHAN D. GLATER AUSTIN, Tex., June 8 — Texas lawmakers thought they had found the ideal alternative to race-based affirmative action. Seven years ago, after a federal court outlawed the use of race in the admissions policies of the state's public universities, the Legislature came up with an answer: It passed a law guaranteeing admission to the top 10 percent of the graduating class from any public or private high school. After a few years of hard work, diversity was restored and other states, including California and Florida, adopted similar approaches. The law looked like a success. But the 10 percent rule, which seemed to skirt the tricky issue of race so deftly, is coming under increasing attack these days as many wealthy parents complain that their children are not getting a fair shake. A consensus seems to be building that some change is necessary. Parents whose children have been denied admission to the University of Texas at Austin, the crown jewel of Texas higher education, argue that some high schools are better than others, and that managing to stay in the top 25 percent at a demanding school should mean more than landing in the top 10 percent at a less rigorous one. The dispute shows how hard it is to come up with a system for doling out precious but scarce spots in elite universities without angering someone.
So. Affirmative action based on economic class is being rejected. Race based programs are already rejected. I have no idea why people thought wealthy folks would accept any diversion of the privileges of wealth. And the way our system works, they'll likely get their way.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 10:16am :: News
 
 

Oops, my bad

Errors Are Seen in Early Attacks on Iraqi Leaders By DOUGLAS JEHL and ERIC SCHMITT WASHINGTON, June 12 — The United States launched many more failed airstrikes on a far broader array of senior Iraqi leaders during the early days of the war last year than has previously been acknowledged, and some caused significant civilian casualties, according to senior military and intelligence officials. Only a few of the 50 airstrikes have been described in public. All were unsuccessful, and many, including the two well-known raids on Saddam Hussein and his sons, appear to have been undercut by poor intelligence, current and former government officials said. The strikes, carried out against so-called high-value targets during a one-month period that began on March 19, 2003, used precision-guided munitions against at least 13 Iraqi leaders, including Gen. Izzat Ibrahim, Iraq's No. 2 official, the officials said. General Ibrahim is still at large, along with at least one other top official who was a target of the failed raids. That official, Maj. Gen. Rafi Abd al-Latif Tilfah, the former head of the Directorate of General Security, and General Ibrahim are playing a leadership role in the anti-American insurgency, according to a briefing document prepared last month by the Defense Intelligence Agency. The broad scope of the campaign and its failures, along with the civilian casualties, have not been acknowledged by the Bush administration.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 10:09am :: War
 
 

Who knew Nader was so stupid?

Nader Had Campaign Office at Charity Situation Raises Ethical Questions By James V. Grimaldi Washington Post Staff Writer Sunday, June 13, 2004; Page A01 Since October, Ralph Nader has run his campaign for president out of the same downtown Washington offices that through April housed a public charity he created -- an overlap that campaign finance specialists said could run afoul of federal laws. Tax law explicitly forbids public charities from aiding political campaigns. Violations can result in a charity losing its tax-exempt status. In addition, campaign law requires candidates to account for all contributions -- including shared office space and resources, down to the use of copying machines, receptionists and telephones. Records show many links between Nader's campaign and the charity Citizen Works. For example, the charity's listed president, Theresa Amato, is also Nader's campaign manager. The campaign said in an e-mail to The Washington Post that Amato resigned from the charity in 2003. But in the charity's most recent corporate filing with the District, in January, Amato listed herself as the charity's president and registered agent.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 9:27am :: News
 
 

Ghazi Al-Yawar Paraphrased

My first action will be to congratulate my fellow Iraqis and roll up our sleeves to get to work. Our economic decision making should be pure Iraqi. On saying No to the US: It's not that we will say no, we have to weigh our options and choose the most viable. We want the US to be The Country That Freed Iraq. They're not going to tear down that prison, and are supposed to take over the whole prison system.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 9:15am :: News
 
 

Powell Paraphrased

Powell: There are not large numbers of NATO troops waiting to go to Iraq. ICRC isnt an investigatory body, so Bush's statement that the International Red Cross should investigate Abu Ghairab will not materialize.
George: what was going on, because it looks like there was a section of the Govt. that was trying its best to justify torture. Powell: we were trying to figure out how to deal with a new type of attack and enemy Colin: (on the report that terrorism had fallen to its lowest point since 1969) cut-off date was incorrect, analysis was inconsistent with previous methods, errors crept in and we will find out how by tomorrow.
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 9:03am :: News
 
 

This week on ABC

Get ready to get dizzy. Colin and the new Iraqi Prez is up. And for even more spinning, Mary Maitlan and Donna Brazile (and I just woke up, so if I misspelled anyone's name tough titty).
Posted by Prometheus 6 on June 13, 2004 - 8:59am :: War